Chapter 112: Apex Fitness

Xavier pulled into the Apex Fitness car park at 7:52AM on Tuesday.

The Panamera sat between a Range Rover and a Mercedes C-Class. The kind of car park that told you something about the establishment before you’d walked through the door. He locked it and headed for the building.

The door opened and Xavier stepped out into a space that immediately made the membership rate feel reasonable. High ceilings. Floor to ceiling windows letting in the kind of morning light that made you want to actually be here. The equipment looked like it had been chosen by someone who knew professionality rather than someone who was furnishing a room. A few people were already working out. Nobody performing, everyone was just present and doing what they came to do.

This works, he thought.

He signed in at the front desk. A staff member showed him around briefly. Cardio section, weights, the functional training area at the far end. Xavier listened and noted and thanked him and found a locker.

He changed into the gym wear he’d ordered the night before. A premium set that had arrived that morning through express delivery. Fitted training top, performance shorts, the kind of trainers that cost enough to make a statement without trying to. He’d ordered it all Monday evening after registering for the membership. Didn’t see the point of joining somewhere like Apex and showing up in anything less than what the environment called for.

He checked himself in the locker room mirror.

Better, he thought. Much better.

Different from the hostel mirror, he thought. Better lighting. More honest.

He went out and started with cardio. Treadmill. Twenty minutes at a pace that was honest about where he was without being embarrassing about it. This body hadn’t been pushed deliberately in four months and he had no interest in discovering its limits dramatically on the first session.

Baseline first, he thought. Build from there.

He moved to the weights after cardio. Found a bench. Started light. Finding the range, understanding what the body could do before asking more of it. His previous life had given him functional strength from delivery work but functional and trained were different things.

He was on his third set when he noticed her. He was already ignoring the people around because he decided that minding his business was a priority.

She was on the cable machine.

Xavier had been vaguely aware of her since he sat down. Not consciously, just the peripheral awareness that happened when something in your environment was worth being aware of without your brain having made a formal decision about it yet.

He looked properly now.

She was gym fit in the way that came from being here regularly and taking it seriously. Dark leggings, fitted top that didn’t apologise for itself, hair pulled back efficiently. Attractive in a specific way. The kind that knew it was attractive and had made peace with that information a long time ago.

She was looking at him.

Not the casual peripheral glance of someone whose eyes had wandered between sets. Actually looking. The particular direct attention of someone who had noticed something and decided to keep noticing it.

She saw me before I saw her, he thought.

He remembered now. Pulling into the car park earlier, stepping out of the Panamera, and catching a brief glimpse of a woman near the entrance. She’d been crouched by her bag getting something out of it. He’d registered her the way you registered someone attractive in passing and kept moving.

Coincidence then, he thought. Same gym. Same morning. She just happened to be here.

He looked at her across the floor still watching him.

But the stares, he thought. That part isn’t coincidence.

He held her gaze for exactly two seconds.

Then looked back at his set.

Money radar, he thought. Fully calibrated. Some people have it and some people don’t. He completed the rep. She has it.

He finished the set. Rest period. He looked at the ceiling.

She’s still looking, he noted without checking. I can feel it.

He started the next set.

He was at the water station after his session. Towel around his neck, phone in hand checking the rebate cycle. when she appeared beside him.

Not subtly. Not with the particular careful approach of someone who wasn’t sure how it would land. Just appeared. Like she’d decided and was acting on the decision with the confidence of someone who had done this before and knew her success rate.

"First time here," she said. Not a question.

"Yes," he replied.

"I thought so," she said. "You have good form for someone finding their baseline."

Good form for someone finding their baseline, Xavier thought. That’s actually an informed observation. She knows what she’s talking about. He looked at her properly for the first time.

Up close she was more striking than the across the floor version. Sharp features with the particular bone structure that made you look twice — she looked Asian, light skinned, brown eyes that were doing considerably more work than her expression was currently admitting to. Her figure in the fitted gym wear was doing nothing to hide itself. Curved in the lower half in a way the leggings made no attempt to downplay, mid sized chest, the overall effect of someone who had been built well and knew it.

Gym fit was an understatement, he thought.

"Thanks," he said.

"I’m Jade," she said.

"Xavier," he replied.

She smiled. The particular smile of someone who had reached the part of the conversation they’d been steering toward and was comfortable being there.

"You drove the midnight blue Panamera," she said.

There it is, he thought.

"Yes," he said.

"Nice car," she said. The smile adjusting slightly. "What do you do."

What do you do, Xavier thought. The question underneath the question. The actual thing she came over here to find out. He looked at her. Investments, he could say. Business acquisitions. I own seven small companies and nearly thirteen million dollars and I’m technically a first year Food and Nutrition student at Riverside University.

"Investments," he said. "Among other things."

She held his gaze. The smile doing something more deliberate now.

"Among other things," she repeated.

"Yes," he said.

She reached into the small pocket of her leggings. The kind designed specifically for a phone and produced hers. Opened it. Turned it to face him with her contact page already open.

"You should have my number," she said. Simply. Directly. The way people said things when they’d decided the indirect route was a waste of everyone’s time.