Hissy Fit (The Southern Gentleman #1)(57)

“Yes,” the coach, who also happened to be the school resource officer, said. “Honestly, I’d like you to give the handstand push-ups at least a try. I don’t expect you to do them all. Heck, I don’t expect you to do any. But how will you know if you can even do one if you don’t at least try?”

That was true.

I wouldn’t know if I didn’t try.

But…I had a feeling that I wouldn’t be able to do it. I could barely bend over and shave my legs without getting out of breath. How did he expect me to do a handstand push-up?

“You’re adorable,” Flint laughed. “I swear, I can see every emotion cross over your face. I like you, girl.”

The coach was the biggest man I’d ever seen. He was a tanned-skinned hottie that had a buzzed head, a bright white smile, and eyes the color of warm chocolate. I swear he and Ezra had a love affair going when I wasn’t around.

Ezra talked about him constantly, and vice versa. Flint had been to a few practices, helping the kids with strength training, and we’d even gone out to eat with Flint and his flavor of the month.

Apparently, this gym was a family to them, and that family included hanging out with them outside of gym hours.

How Ezra was supposed to find time was beyond me. He had two-a-day practices coming up, baseball and football camps, and let’s not forget about the fact that he still had to eat at some point in there.

That was truly why I’d decided to go with him.

He didn’t like leaving me for his only free two hours a day that we didn’t spend either eating, taking a shower, or doing other things that didn’t include sleeping when we were in bed.

There really wasn’t enough time in the day for all that Ezra had on his plate.

I could see why he didn’t want to teach his sex-ed class last year—and wouldn’t be doing it this year, either.

Speaking of the sex-ed class, the harassment charge that had been filed against me had gone away just as fast as it’d come. After speaking with some of the students, they’d all cleared my name and said that there was never anything that went on in that class that was inappropriate.

Meaning if I wanted, I could take my sex-ed class back over next year.

I knew that I could.

It all boiled down to whether Ezra would allow me to.

He was so protective of me, and always cognizant of my fears.

Those fears had slowly been put to rest over the summer as I spent more and more time with some big boys on the football team and during the camps. I wouldn’t say that I’d be completely comfortable being in a room with his football players, but I’d definitely be open to the idea of one day doing it—which, a long time ago, wouldn’t have even crossed my mind.

Ezra poked me on the ass, and I blinked and looked up. “What?”

“You ready?”

Was I ready? Ready for what?

“Sure,” I shrugged. “Just don’t kill me, okay?”

He didn’t have to kill me. I nearly killed myself.

Turns out, I was right about the handstand push-ups. I found out when Ezra helped me do the handstand, and then let me go.

I started to go down into the push-up when my legs started to travel sideways.

My finally out of the cast arm started to give out on me, and I fell.

My face smashed into the mat, my arm went awkwardly to one side. My legs went in a different direction.

Oh, and let’s not forget that the wall I was leaning against had a rack of wall balls—one of which had hit me in the face yesterday—against it.

My feet hit the bottom of the rack, and after all that embarrassing stuff with having my face meet the mat, the wall balls added the final insult and finished me off.

Oh, and they got it all on video.

***

“I’ll come to your CrossFit class if you take me out to get donuts afterward,” I bargained.

“We don’t have time to get donuts,” he countered. “How about you get the donuts before the class. You can eat them in the corner like the little piggy you are.”

My mouth fell open in affront, and I gasped. “You did not just call me a piggy!”

It was actually kind of funny, not that I’d be telling him that.

“If it walks like a donut, and talks like a donut…”

I launched myself at him, and he made an oomph sound as my body hit his. He might’ve had a chance to catch me had he not been laughing so hard at the look on my face.

“I cannot believe you just said that!” I cried, punching him in the arm repeatedly.

He caught me before I could connect a third time, rolling me so that I was smooshed into the couch cushions and his body was pinning me in place.

I wiggled, trying to break free, and he pushed himself down harder.

“It’s okay,” he muttered, his mouth only inches from mine. “I like the way you smell when you eat the donuts. And licking the glaze off your lips is about as exciting as it gets for me when I’ve given up all carbs.”

Did I forget to mention, on top of him working his ass off all day long, he’d also given up one of God’s greatest creations—carbs?

“I bet each flake of glaze is like two whole carbs,” I joked. “You better stay away from me until I can go change my shirt.” I pushed my hands up underneath of us and cupped the girls—which had gotten bigger over the last couple of months as I took up his carb intake. It seemed the fitter he got, the fatter I seemed to get.