Page 3 of Seductive Swimmer
2
Alex
Getting up at the arse crack of dawn to get my daily swim in is not exactly my idea of a good time, but I do it anyway. It’s a habit, a throwback to the days when I would spend hours upon hours training, honing my technique and pushing my speed. I was among the elite, the best of the best, and I have the Olympic hardware to prove it.
Growing up just outside of London, the options for training at the top-notch level were endless. Great Britain wanted to build their Olympic team, and I was a prime candidate. But a temporary relocation to the states from London was a necessary move. If I had stayed in England, there’s no way I would have been as successful as I was in my swimming career. My father and I would have come to blows, and I probably would have stopped just to spite him.
Which is what prompted my coach to arrange for a transfer to an American training facility, with a coach who specialized in butterfly — my favorite stroke. A few years later I returned to England to join Team GB in the London Olympics. I should have been on the podium again four years later, but fate had a different idea. Thanks to an icy road and shit tires, my competitive swimming career ended well before I was ready. It’s hard to train at the elite level with the amount of metal I’ve got in my leg. Yet I still drag myself out of bed to hit the pool for an hour every morning. Swimming saves my sanity, even as the memories of what I missed out on haunt me. There could have been a gold medal next to my two silver, but instead all I have is a nasty scar down my leg.
It wasn’t so bad getting up at five am every morning when I lived in a building that had a full-length pool as an amenity. But a recent move gave me a better apartment, with an unfortunately tiny pool. My need to swim daily forced me to start visiting the local community center which conveniently has a full fifty-meter pool. The building is dated, and a far cry from the upscale facilities I used to train in, but that doesn’t matter to me. It’s clean, and the familiar aroma of chlorine assaults my senses every morning. It’s the only thing that truly wakes me up in the morning.
At least it isn’t busy this early in the day. I’m not a people person at the best of times, and I’m certainly not one to share my lane. Aside from the lifeguard, most of the time the only other person here is the woman who swims in the lane next to me. I’ve worked hard not to stare too much at her; no small feat when I consider how fucking sexy she is.
She’s always got her long hair tied up in a braid, which she coils on top of her head for her swim cap to cover. Her body is slim, but she has curves in all the right places. Curves that are perfectly displayed in her racerback swimsuit.
She tends to arrive after I’ve already started my laps, yet somehow I can tell the moment she walks out onto the pool deck. And like a total wanker I always lift my head to watch her slide into the pool. She’s not exactly the most graceful person I’ve seen, as evidenced by the number of times she’s dropped things or fumbled getting her swim cap on. That is, until she hits the water. Then it becomes clear she’s a woman after my own heart, more comfortable in the pool than anywhere else.
I caught her watching me today, and while we’ve caught each other’s gaze a few times, this is the first time I’ve noticed her openly paying me any attention at all.And it’s about bloody time.There was no mistaking the desire in her eyes, even from a distance. But when I winked at her, a move that normally acts as a green light for a woman, she turned and ran.
I’m intrigued. Call it enjoying the chase, call it wanting what I can’t have, I don’t care. But I can see there’s an attraction under her nervous behavior and I intend to see where that leads.
My business partner is already hard at work when I arrive at our downtown offices later that morning. Up on the thirty-sixth floor, we have one corner suite that is perfect for the two of us and our administrators. We’ve made a solid name for ourselves over the last five years, both in the restaurant industry and the business community of Manhattan as a whole. Not too bad for a former Olympic athlete with a business degree.
Brayden Cross and I met in college, in one of our first-year business courses. His father owned a chain of hotels on the West Coast, but Brayden wanted to do his own thing. On a rare night off for me, between competitions, we hatched a plan to start our own company — bringing high-end cuisine that was still accessible to the masses into Manhattan. I was a silent partner at first, thanks to a tidy investment portfolio started by my grandfather and supplemented by endorsement deals over my swimming career. But when my accident forced me into retirement, I took on a more active role at DC Group, eventually ending up as Chief Operating Officer. At least, that’s my title. We tend to be more fluid with our responsibilities between the two of us, working as a team to tackle any pressing concerns. And that approach has worked. We opened our second location just over a year ago, and business has been thriving.
Brayden finds me with a steaming cup of tea in hand as I peruse our latest financials. There’s something that isn’t adding up with one of our restaurants, and it’s going to affect our bottom line, and our ability to open a third location if we don’t figure it out. A friend of Brayden’s, Dexter Truitt, suggested we bring a forensic accountant in to consult and analyse our numbers. He just so happened to have someone he recommended, and I believe Brayden is meeting with them next week. As our Chief Financial Officer, Brayden is more involved in the money side of things than I am. But I always keep myself aware of things, especially when there are issues. Such as right now.
“Alex, did you see the latest inventory report from Fortune?” he asks, speaking about our second location, an Asian fusion tapas bar in Midtown, and the cause of the frown on my face.
“I’m reviewing them now. Something’s not right, the product invoices from the last month don’t make sense with the sales they’re reporting. There’s way too much being paid to the vendors for how low these sales are. And why the fuck are the sales dropping off? Our reviews are still amazing and the staff seem happy; it doesn’t make sense.”
He nods. “I know. The accountant Dexter Truitt recommended is coming in next week. I had hoped she could start sooner, but apparently she’s tying up some loose ends on other jobs first.”
“Alright, need me for the interview?”
“No, it’s really just a formality. If Dex trusts her, we’d be fools not to hire her.”
It’s my turn to nod brusquely. “True. I’ll be heading down to Fable this afternoon; the new bar manager is starting today, and I want to make sure things go smoothly.”
“I’ll meet you there later for a drink? Fuck knows I’ll need one if I have to spend another day staring at numbers that don’t make sense.”
I slap him on the back as we walk to the doorway of my office. “Better you than me, mate.”
We head in opposite directions, me to pick up some paperwork from the city planning department that our front receptionist has, him to his office.
As I sip my tea, looking over the permits and approvals from the city, my mind drifts back to this morning. Mystery girl hasn’t been far from my thoughts for a while now, which is peculiar for me. I’m not the type to dwell on one woman. I don’t have the time or energy for a relationship. But something about her pulls me in.
Or maybe you just need to get laid. That’s a more likely story. And a problem that is easily rectified.
Later that evening at Fable, our flagship location that focuses on farm to table cooking, or as farm to table as one can get in the middle of Manhattan, Brayden slides into the booth across from me. He eyes the papers I have spread across the table in front of me.
“What’s this mess?”
“Caroline wants to bring on a sommelier. It makes sense, and it’s something we’ve considered in the past. Maybe now’s the time,” I muse.
Brayden doesn’t seem as convinced. “Let’s wait until Savannah has a handle on what’s happening at Fortune first. I don’t want to throw money at a new idea until we’re on top of the situation.”
“Savannah?” I lift my head up, curious about the name.
