Trained By Daddy by Ava Sinclair
Chapter One
Lila
What was I thinking?This isn’t for me.
I’m staring at a rack of barbells in graduated weights from two pounds up to fifty pounds. I’d had my first misgivings at the gym’s front desk, where I’d redeemed my online coupon for a free fitness assessment and workout. Maybe it had been my imagination, but I’d gotten the impression that the receptionist was already judging me, and I’d felt compelled to apologize for being so out of shape.
“It’s been awhile since I’ve exercised,” I said. “I mean, I bike a little, but…”
“Don’t worry about it.” The receptionist has smiled as she cut me off. “Everybody has to start somewhere.” Then she’d directed me here to wait for an available trainer.
“Excuse me.” A woman brushes past me and picks up two twenty-five-pound dumbbells. Her bare, muscular arms are shiny with sweat. I turn to stare as she walks away. Is there such a thing as ass envy? I would love to look like that, but it doesn’t seem possible. She has buns of steel. I have buns of…foam.
I turn my attention back to the barbell rack just as a man walks into the weight room. Forget about staring at the beautiful woman. He has to be the most gorgeous guy I’ve ever seen. He’s at least 6’2, tanned and sports a close-cropped beard as dark as his thick hair. The t-shirt he’s wearing is emblazoned with the gym logo; the fabric adheres to the well-defined muscles of his broad chest. He looks fierce. Okay. So maybe I will stay.
The woman with the steel buns smiles and calls to him. “Hey, Daddy!”
I glance at her and then at him. She looks to be about twenty-one. He looks to be in his mid-thirties, just a little older than me.
“Hey, Casey,” he says to the woman.
“How’s it going, Daddy?” Another woman walks in and waves.
I’m wondering what’s up with this when the man spots me. He smiles and I feel a little like sinking into the floor. God, I hope I’m not drooling. Between his looks and the way women are calling him daddy…
He’s coming this way. I try to act cool and affect what looks like a casual stance as I suck my stomach in as tight as I can. He offers me his hand.
“Hi, I’m Gabe Hampton.”
I return his handshake, watching as his huge, hard hand engulfs my small, soft one.
“Sorry about the callouses,” he says. His handshake is gentle. “Side effect of lifting. You’ll find out.”
“I will?” I look up at him, puzzled.
“Sure you will. Gradual lifting is a great way to build strength and muscle tone. We do other things here, but this gym is best known for its weight program.”
“Hey, Daddy. How’s it going?” This time the speaker is a young man who claps Gabe on the back as he walks by. He gives the younger man a playful punch in the shoulder, and I must look confused because he chuckles.
“I suppose I should explain,” he says. “No, these aren’t my kids. I’m the owner and lead trainer here. I run a pretty demanding program and a couple of years ago, somebody started calling me Gym Daddy since Excel Fitness is kind of like my baby. It sort of stuck.” He turns around and there it is, printed across a wide back any woman would kill to rake her nails across. When he turns back, I want to fall through the floor. This man has no idea how erotically triggered I am by that nickname. What would he think if he knew the Kindle in my tote bag is full of daddy kink books? What would he think if he knew I wrote them?
“So, how about a walk through before we do your assessment. I want to show you where you’ll be working out.” He claps his hands together like he’s already sold the place to me.
“Um, yeah?” I say.
“First things first, though. What’s your name?”
“Delilah. But my friends call me Lila.”
“Then that’s what I’ll call you.” His blue eyes crinkle at the edges as he smiles. It’s a genuine, friendly smile. “Come on, Lila.”
He turns away and I follow, trying not to look at the words ‘Gym Daddy’ on the back of his shirt. Already my mind is swimming with story plots I have no business entertaining. I have author friends who base stories on real life people. I have a hard and fast rule not to do that, but if there were ever a man who could fit right into a Daddy book, it’s Gabe Hampton.
It’s a nice gym and it’s clear that he enjoys giving tours. There’s pride in his voice as he guides me through a facility that reflects an efficient, Spartan style. I’ve been to some gyms that included juice bars and saunas. One even had a boutique selling cute but over-priced workout clothes. Excel Fitness has multiple rooms, each designated to a discipline. There’s the weight room, with hand weights, barbells, and racks. There’s a room for cardio workouts, which he explains are great balance to lifting days. Here, jump ropes hang from pegs by the door and a row of exercise bikes sit across from a bank of rowing machines. Several people are hard at work on the bikes, which have fans instead of front tires. The breeze they generate is strong enough to ruffle my hair.
The next room is the largest yet, running the length of the building. It contains an obstacle course with tires, beams, rappelling walls, and rope ladders. Gabe explains that obstacle competitions like Warrior and Tough Mudders have become popular and this room is a favorite with members who want to train for those challenging contests. I nod, impressed, as two men navigate the ladders in a race to the finish.
“This is new,” Gabe says pointing to the wall behind us.
I stare up in amazement at the rock-climbing wall. A young woman is scaling it, her legs and arms straining as she forces herself to the top.
“Wow. It looks so…exhausting.”
“It is, but you know what they say. No pain, no gain, right?”
Am I imagining the teasing smile on his face? The man in the Gym Daddy t-shirt just said “pain.” I decide if he works the word “spank” into this conversation, I’m going to have to leave.
“That’s the tour,” he says. “Do you have any questions about the equipment?”
“No.” I shake my head. “It all looks really hard.”
“It is hard. But it’s fun and there will be somebody to help you any time you need it.” He pauses. “Are you ready for the assessment?”
I’d almost forgot about that. I worry my lower lip with my teeth. “What do I have to do?”
“It’s pretty basic. There’s a questionnaire to gauge your fitness level, a treadmill test. First, though, I’ll need to get a measure of your body fat.”
Oh, hell no.I think, but my answer is more polite.
“No, really,” Mr. Hampton. “That’s okay.”
“It’s Gabe. Or Gym Daddy.” He winks and I almost fall through the floor. “If you’re not comfortable with a male trainer doing the assessment, I can get a female trainer to do it.”
“It’s not that,” I say quickly. My face feels hot. “It’s just that I don’t need someone to measure my body fat. I already know I’m a fattie.”
The handsome smile fades. “We don’t allow that here, young lady.”
“What? Fat people?”
“First of all, I don’t consider you fat. Second, I’m not referring to weight. Any size person is welcome here. What’s not allowed is self-disparagement. There’s another reason they call me Gym Daddy. We all have fun, but I run a tight ship and I’m strict about the few rules I have. My top rule is that we keep it positive. Think you can remember that?”
“Uh-huh.” My reply comes out as a kind of squeak. Those words. That tone. Did he really call me young lady? Lord help me.
“Come on, Lila.” He gestures to the hallway and although I really don’t want this assessment, I tell myself it would be rude to leave after he’s taken all this time with me. I follow him to a small room containing a scale that looks like it could be from a doctor’s office.
Scales. I hate them. But at least this one isn’t like the talking scale my parents got me last Christmas.
“It’ll help you lose weight,” my father had said, obviously fine with extending the shame I’d endured growing up. I’d put the scale in the bathroom, telling myself my father was right. Maybe hearing the scale shout my weight would convince me to diet. It didn’t, though. It made me feel worse and feeling worse made me buy ice cream. The last time I stepped on that scale, I was so mad at what it told me that I banished it to the closet. It’s still there, where it can’t hurt anyone. If it could see me now, it would probably laugh.
There’s something scarier than the scale, though. Gabe is holding an instrument that looks like a pair of flat tongs, only it has an arched piece in the middle with graduated marks on it. He explains that it’s a caliper and asks me if I’m comfortable having him take some measurements.
I really don’t want him to do this. I’m self-conscious enough as it is, and besides; there are some things I’d rather not know and the exact amount of flab I’m toting around is one of them.
“I promise it won’t hurt,” he says, and something about the words, delivered in a deep, coaxing tone, mesmerizes me.
“I guess it’ll be okay,” I hear myself say.
How many stories have I written about strong, sexy men dosing out some tantalizing humiliation? This isn’t exactly what I had in mind in my own fantasy life, but despite my embarrassment, I’m already aware of the wetness forming between my thighs.
“Can you give me your arm?” he asks. Gabe holds his hand out as I comply. He pivots me around and I look back to see him open the caliper and then pinch it onto the excess skin of my upper arm. I stare ahead at the wall. Gabe writes something on a chart and then moves to my back. I’m wearing a loose racerback top because I thought I might be working out today. He measures my back fat as I turn my focus to the ceiling.
“Can you pull your shirt up a little? I need to get your abdomen. If you’re not comfortable…”
“No, I’m fine,” I say with a resigned sigh. I’m not sure I am, though. I’m not sure what I feel. I’m embarrassed, but also a little turned on. Besides, I’ve come this far, and with Gabe focused on measuring me, I sneak a glimpse at his face. He has a slightly Roman nose. His close-cropped beard hides a strong jawline.
Gabe suddenly looks up at me and I gasp, only to have him smile at me. He has dimples. God, I love dimples. I flush and look away.
“Okay, let’s see what we have here,” he says. “Can you step on that scale over there?”
No, I want to say. But I do. Gabe glances over at the number and looks down at the chart he’s filled in.
I crane my neck to look over the edge of the clipboard.
“Hey, no peeking.” He fixes me with a mock stern look. My legs feel weak.
“So how fat am I?”
“I already told you. You’re not fat. You do have body fat. Nearly everyone does.” He looks up. “Your percentage is thirty percent. I’m surprised it’s that high. Not everyone distributes it so well.”
Did he just pay me a compliment? I don’t know what to say, so I don’t say anything.
“Optimum weight loss would be about forty pounds, according to the charts,” he continues, “but between you and me, I think you should just maybe shoot for twenty.”
“Why?”
He shrugs and looks me up and down. There’s that smile again. “Personal opinion. Like I said, not everyone wears weight like you do.”
“I bet you say that to all the women who come here for an assessment,” I say, trying to inject humor into the statement.
He isn’t laughing, though. “No, Lila,” he replies in a stern tone. “There are some trainers that use flattery to get clients, but this is my gym. Gym Daddy is honest about what the people who come here need.
Oh, if you really knew…
“But since you’re suspicious, now I feel like my reputation is on the line, so I’m going to make you an offer. I want you to join, but for free.”
“For…free?”
“Yes. A year’s free membership. On me. If you decide you don’t like it, nothing lost. If you do, after a year you can renew. What do you say?”
I wasn’t expecting this. So much for my cynicism.
“You don’t have to do that.”
“I know. I wouldn’t offer if I didn’t want to. I’ll even train you myself.”
I feel my nipples tighten. Between my legs, my pussy is softly throbbing.
“That’s really nice of you,” I say, crossing my arms over my hardening nipples.
“Good. Then I’ll see you tomorrow? I would start today, but I want to personalize a workout plan just for you.”
“Are you sure it won’t be too much trouble?” I try one last time to let him back out. “I mean, I’m not in the best physical condition.”
“I’m used to whipping people into shape,” he says.
Holy fuck.
“I have to go.” I pick up the gym bag I’d laid on a chair. As I turn away, I feel like I’ve fallen into one of my own romance novels.
“So, I’ll see you tomorrow?” he asks.
“Sure. Yeah.” I look back at him. “Thanks…Gabe.”
“Your welcome, Lila. I’m really looking forward to this.”
