Hannah

6

Hannah felt terribly. She always felt bad after checking in on her father. She hadn't heard a single sound from him this phone call, in fact most of her phone calls the past few months were silent on his end. Every time she went away for more than a week, it seemed like there was even less of him there when she returned. Even though her dad hadn't been able to give her any fatherly advice in years. She never heard him say he was proud of her, or loved her. She knew he was. He had been a wonderful father for so many years. Even when he had been a drinker trying to cope after the loss of the woman he loved, Hannah hadn't ever been able to hate him.

Hannah didn't blame her dad for his accident. More than enough people already blamed him. Hannah's mother had been the heart of not only her family, but the wider community Hannah had grown up in. Other people didn't know how hard the loss of his wife to breast cancer hit Colton. Only Hannah knew how much Colton had lost when his real, honest soul mate died. Colton had tried to keep going. To keep up appearances. He really had tried his best to live with the pain.

Hannah hadn't blamed him when he ran his truck off a bridge. She knew he was only drinking to try and forget the loss he had suffered. The same pain Hannah felt every day without someone keeping everyone in line. No one being the mother hen. Leaving Hannah feeling like she had been washed overboard at sea. And no one was coming to save her.

Hannah had truly had no idea how expensive her sport of choice had been to her family. She knew things weren't easy, had no idea of the depth until after her father's accident. How much had been sacrificed behind the scenes until her mother had died. Since getting to look behind the financial curtains, Hannah had an eye for finances above any other possible concern. Money made the world go around.

It was her turn to take care of her family. Which meant keeping up with paying for the quality nursing home for her father. He had broken his back in the accident, leaving him paralyzed, only his left arm had any function but he was able to breathe on his own. The traumatic brain injury had taken everything else that had made her father, himself. Her father's warm caring nature paired with the dark sense of humour. The practical, rational man he had been. All gone, locked behind eyes that didn't seem to know who Hannah was anymore. A look in his eyes, like she was someone he used to know and couldn't place anymore.

Needing to get her head back in the game. Hannah washed her makeup off. Scrubbing one last tear from her eye, she made her way to the fitness centre. Ready to get her body warmed up ahead of her show.

As Hannah walked down the hall she was struck by a sharp feeling that she was missing something. Double checking that she had her room key, her air pods, water bottle. Everything else she travelled with, she knew was self contained in her suitcase. She was baffled as to what her brain was trying to her she had forgotten, what she could be missing. What she might be overlooking.

She tried to just put the nagging feeling out of her mind. She smiled as she looked through the window to the pool. Several families with nearly a dozen children had turned the pool into a rolling crashing storm of joyful waves. She could hear the kids laughing through the walls and glass of the windows.

Using her keycard to open the fitness centre, Hannah was at first disappointed to hear that someone else was already working out in the small gym. Until she turned the corner in the long hallway that gave the gym users some privacy and saw Mr. Last on Board doing bicep curls with weights that were almost equal to her own body weight. Easily being lifted by his arms.

Her lower belly clenched thinking of him picking her up, ravishing her body against the wall. She saw his eyebrow twitch as his nostrils flared. Eyes slowly moving from her toes up over her body while he continued to effortlessly lift impossibly heavy weights like they were inconsequential to him.

Hannah shook her head. Her hair was in one braid, pinned to her head like a ballerina. She went to the treadmill to get some cardio time in, then she would try and work her muscle groups one at a time. Trying to shake off the cramped muscle feeling after being stuck in the air all day on her feet.

It was hard to focus on her own workout, to be respectful with such a tall, dark and handsome man stealing her attention. He had been here before she arrived, and as she finished up her circuit on the equipment he was still lifting different weights, different forms. Looking like he was also trying to work all his muscles. Sweat beading on his skin, rolling down the sharp contours of his muscles.

Hannah wasn't sure what had come over her. She had a proper fuck last night. She shouldn't feel this horny for another stranger. Hannah wiped down the last equipment she had been using. Nibbling her lower lip as she gathered up her things. The man seemed to also finally be done with his set and was racking up all the weights he had used.

Hannah went to the gym door, about to leave, to head to her room to shower and get ready by herself. When she got to the door, she watched her hands like they weren't her own as they turned the physical deadbolt. Locking the gym and turning a closed for cleaning sign over in the window.

She turned around, the man was right behind her. Had somehow prowled up unnoticed. He had seen everything she had done. "What are you doing baby girl?" His voice was like caramel in her ears.