Hidden Secrets

"No, this is fine just the way it is. I can use it an hour or so every evening before I leave for the night."

"By the way how was the movie?"

"Kind of boring actually, now I know why it's been a long time since I went to the movies. At one point I was actually nodding off. Thank you again for doing this for me. Make sure you have a bill for me when you come for coffee on Monday," she said changing the subject quickly. If you don't mind, I still have a lot of paperwork to do tonight."

"Sure, no problem. I'll see you Monday morning. Here's the set of keys for the new door, put one on your key ring with your car key. Be careful, that lock stays in the locked position even when you twist the doorknob, so always check that you have your keys with you before you close it behind you. We wouldn't want you to get locked out without your keys."

"I'll make sure I have my keys whenever I leave here for any reason."

"One more thing, make sure you lock the door when you are in here. It's much better to have the bad guys on the outside trying to get in, than to have them just come through an unlocked door."

Having said all he could think of saying, Rick turned the locking button to the locked position, opened the door, walked out, and pulled the door closed behind him, testing the knob one last time to be sure it was locked.

Sasha, leaned against the door and smiled, thinking that it was so sweet that he cared so much about her safety. With a sigh, she retreated to her office, removed the seat cushion from the leather couch behind her desk, unfolded her bed, and removed her quilted blanket from the bottom drawer of her lateral file cabinet.

She spent the next twenty minutes, making sure the studio was clean and ready for her morning classes. Her nightly ritual was almost complete. Sasha walked back to her office, striped out of her clothes, and shut the office light. When her eyes became adjusted to the darkness, she walked out into the large room, and did a half hour of stretching and advanced yoga exercises. She had always found that this last half hour of exercise, put both her body and mind at peace and ready to sleep. Naked, she stood and walked quietly back to her office and climbed into bed.

________________

Bright and early Monday morning Rick arrived bringing breakfast. The table was set, she already had the coffee made. Sasha kissed him on the cheek and said good morning. It was a good morning, the temperature was in the low seventies, it was one of those rare mornings when the evening temperature prevailed, at least for a few hours, in its daily battle against the Arizona sun.

"Rick, did you bring me a bill, I'd like to pay you today."

"I was thinking Sasha, why don't you pay me in kind?"

At first, she was almost insulted by what she thought he was inferring.

"What do you mean by 'in kind'?"

"Well, I've been thinking about starting an exercise program. I'd like to tone up my body. I haven't been getting a lot of exercise lately and when I look in the mirror, I don't really like what I see. I was in much better shape when I was still in college."

Sasha visibly relaxed when she realized that she had misunderstood what he was asking. He didn't seem like that kind of guy, unlike her last boyfriend.

"Sure Rick, I think that's very commendable of you. Although from what I see you don't look too out of shape to me; but I have to ask the students in my beginner's classes about having a male join our group. You would be the first male to ever join us."

"If it is going to cause a problem, then I'll just have to think of something else."

"No, let me talk to them first. I'm sure we can work something out."

Two days later she flagged him down as he was driving through the parking lot.

"Rick, I'm sorry, I wasn't expecting the responses I received from my students. Basically, they didn't want to feel that they were being leered at. When I told them that you were not that type of guy, they basically insisted that all guys were the same."

"Don't worry, I'll try something else."

"Wait, what would you think about individual lessons. They can be pretty expensive, usually I charge fifty-five dollars per lesson, but for you I'll cut that in half."

"No, that's fine with me, besides, I have already paid for three of those lessons with the work I've done. When can I start?"

"Is Tuesday night at 7:00 good for you?"

"That works out very well for me. How should I dress?"

"Normally all my students wear leggings and a short sleaved tee shirt over a sports bra. You can skip the sports bra and the leggings. Just a tee shirt and a pair of gym shorts, but not too short. You will be doing a lot of bending over and stretching, we wouldn't want you to be overexposed now would we? Also, white gym socks will be fine."

"Sounds good, I'll see you Tuesday evening."

____________

Although he didn't want to appear to be overanxious to see her again, Rick walked through the front door at a quarter to seven. The door to the main room was closed. There was a sign on the door.

'If this door is closed, the class is still in progress, please take a seat, the class will be done by ten minutes to the hour.'

Like clockwork, the door to the waiting room opened at ten minutes to seven and the first of the students came out, towels draped over their shoulders, an exercise mat rolled up under their arm. Rick counted about eight women as they rather nosily left the main room and filed out into the evening air. He was almost ready to get up out of his seat, when the final two women came out; he heard a voice that sounded familiar.

"Great class Sasha, see you next week."

The last woman came into view, stuck her hand out to keep the door from closing on her and turned towards him. He knew her, quite well as a matter of fact. It was Debbie, his administrative assistant. Quickly he held a finger up to his lips and when he saw that she understood, he mouthed, 'I'll talk to you tomorrow.'

Debbie just nodded and smiled a conspiratorial smile. As if to say, 'Oh you bet you will, boss of mine.'

Debbie was in her early fifties but looked at least ten years younger. Now Rick knew the reason why. She had been his father's assistant from the day she graduated high school and had come to work for the company. When his father had died and Rick took over the reins of the company, there was no hesitation in asking her to stay on board. She knew everything there was to know about the company and the people that now worked for him. She also knew where all the skeletons were buried. She had proved invaluable during his short tenure as president.

"Hi Rick, come on in, take your sneakers off, I'll be with you in a few minutes."

Rick did what she asked and had just put his sneakers against the side wall out of the way, when Sasha returned with a rolled-up mat.

"I usually have my students sign a contract for the different programs they sign up for. It makes it clearer for both me and my students as to what our responsibilities and liabilities are. Between you and me, we'll just settle for a handshake for now. This is your mat, please bring it with you to each class. I don't keep many in stock and the floor can get really hard after a while without one. Roll your mat out just like mine and stand facing me. We are going to start with the basic movements. At first you are going to have to watch me closely, I will call out the name of the movement and demonstrate it once, then you will do the movement while I supervise and correct you position. Don't be embarrassed if you have to do each exercise several times before you do it correctly. All of us have gone through this in the beginning. In time, the movements will become second nature to you.

First, with your feet slightly separated I want you to reach up with both hands and try to touch the ceiling. Now bring your hands down in an arc until they are straight out in front of you, Now bend at the waist, keeping your back as straight as possible and holding your belly button against your backbone; don't forget to breathe. Good, straighten back up keeping your hands out straight until they are parallel with the floor. That's one. Now continue and give me four more."

This went on for fifty minutes. With each new exercise Sasha explained precisely how she wanted the exercise done and reminded him to hold his stomach in and breathe. By the time fifty minutes was over, the material around his neck was wet with sweat. He could already feel the burning in his abdomen and his legs felt like wet noodles.

"Great job, Rick. I'll see you tomorrow."

The next morning, Rick was barely able to get out of bed. His arms and legs were sore, but it was nothing compared to his stomach muscles and his butt and hamstrings. They were on fire.

"How does she do this every day, all day long."

Instead of the pool, he chose the hot tub. After twenty minutes he almost felt normal again. That is until he got out of the tub and walked back into the house to get dressed. The sun was just peeking between the mountain peaks when he left the house. By the time he switched vehicles, the pain was back. At each garbage receptacle, he stopped the truck and slowly collected and replaced the bag. When he got to the can by Sasha's studio, he found her leaning against the wall, with a container of hot coffee and a bottle of Advil.

"I figured you could use these. You men never learn. Don't try to be a hero. For the first couple of classes your muscles are going to hurt like hell. Take the pain relievers. Soon it will be all over, and you won't feel like this the next morning."

"Thank you. How do you do it every day?"

"I've exercised all my life, if it wasn't gymnastics, it was yoga, or Pilates, I even dabbled in martial arts for a while, but I didn't like getting hit and I could not separate my anger from my responses. Soon, no one would get in the ring with me. Not even the guys. I'll see you on Monday morning. By the way, get two egg sandwiches from now on for yourself."

When Rick finally dragged his ass into the office, Debbie took one look at him, laughed, and got him a cup of coffee and a couple of Advil tablets.

"How did you know?"

"From the pain on your face and the way you were walking."

"Come in and shut the door."

After she was sitting in front of him, he smiled at her and began to speak.

"I want to thank you for not saying anything. If you had, Sasha would have questioned how we knew each other, and for right now at least, I don't want her to know who I am."

"So you're the one. When I first started taking classes with her, she was angry almost all the time. I think it was an old boyfriend that treated her badly. After a while she wasn't mad anymore, but she wasn't happy either. In the last year or so, I've seen a big change in her. She's always smiling now. She still pushes us hard, but now it's about making us better.

Last night, after I went to bed, I kept thinking about seeing you and her personality change. You're the guy she was talking about when she said she had a new man in her life who she really liked. She's a little frustrated at his apparently lack of response to her flirting. I should have known it was you. Your father told me to keep an eye on you. He felt that between the two of us, we could make sure you didn't make a mistake in your love life. Now all the pieces are falling into place. Her personality change, you're not wanting her to know who you are. Her lease renewal."

She saw the look of shock on his face.

"You didn't think you could slip that one past me now did you? No increase in her base rent for the next five years and only a small increase in her escalator clause. I know you are not dumb, the only thing it could be was that you were in love with her. I'm right, aren't I? It's serious between you two. Only she doesn't know who you really are. You are playing a dangerous game."

"It's not a game, you know me better than that. I'm not a player. I just wanted to be sure that she loves me for the man she thinks I am and not for what I have. You understand, don't you?"

"Yes, I understand, but will she?"

"I want you to be my eyes and ears when you're with her. I just need a little more time; I want to be in tip-top shape when we finally get together. I don't want her to be disappointed in me."

"Rick, don't be silly, you are already a very desirable man, if I were only twenty years younger, you'd already be mine. And I don't mean because of the money you have. There are going to be at least five broken hearts scattered around this company when you finally come out of the closet."

"Trust me, I know what I'm doing."

______________________

On Monday morning as usual he brought breakfast, only this time he brought two egg sandwiches for himself and her protein omelet. Before he had a chance to open the first one, Sasha took them both, opened them, took the tops off of each roll, turned one over onto the other and took that top piece of bread as well.

"There, that's better. From now on, you are on a high protein, low carb diet. You are going to be doing a lot more exercising than you are used to and your muscles are going to need that extra protein. I want you to come here every night at seven from now on. My treat. You wanted to get in better shape, now you have no choice. I'll be able to tell if you are slacking off on your diet."

Chapter Five

For the next six weeks, Sasha whipped his ass into shape. She watched as his face slimmed down, his stomach flattened, and his posture improved.

One evening after his third week on the reformer she caught him looking at his sculpted abs and his solid butt.

"You think you're getting pretty hot, don't you. Well you're not there yet, not by a long shot buddy boy. When you can do this; then you'll have completed the first phase of your transformation."

Sasha got off her reformer and walked over to her mat. She slipped off her shirt and her leggings. She was only dressed in a sports bra, and a pair of thong panties.

Sitting on her mat, she placed her hands by her sides, and slowly began to curl her body, first up off of the mat, and then, slowly, she began to pull her legs back between her arms. She continued the move until her body was through her arms and she doing a handstand. Now she arched her back and brought her toes down until they were touching the top of her head.

"This movement is called the Scorpion Handstand, fitting for Arizona, don't you think?"

But she wasn't done yet, now she bent her arms and moved her body forward over her hands, Rick could tell this move required a great deal of upper body strength. But she wasn't finished yet. Seeming like she was split in two parts, she dropped closer to the floor as if she were going to do a push up and then twisted her lower body until she was able to bring one leg in front of her right arm and the other leg over the same arm and lock her legs together at her ankles by bringing the lower leg over the upper leg.

All this time her head was held high, she smiled looking him straight in the eye as she maintained the pushup position.

"This is called the Eight-Angle Pose. It's not for the weak of heart or body.

To Rick, she looked like she had tied herself into a knot. But he watched as she untangled herself, the only parts of her body touching the ground were her hands.

Her final trick was to do a perfect handstand and then do ten pushups as well. When she was done, she brought her feet forward, arching her back until her feet touched the mat on either side of her head and stood up. By this time, Rick was so overwhelmed by her strength and conditioning that his erection was practically ripping through his shorts. He turned his back to her in a futile attempt to hide his obvious arousal.

He was not even aware that she had walked up behind him until she reached around him, grabbed his erection in her hand and began to nibble on his ear.

"This is why I don't have coed classes. Half of my students would take one look at you and turn their head in disgust; while the other half would all but forget about what I'm teaching them and focus their attention only on this."

Sasha gave it a playful squeeze. She could feel the small tremble as it traveled up his body.

"Enough of this playing hard-to-get, I'm not waiting a second longer; you are mine."

She turned him around until he was facing her, placed her hands on either side of his head, and kissed him; her tongue invading his mouth seeking out his. Rick's arms slowly encircled her body, firmly pulling her even closer against his own. One hand slid down her backbone, coming to rest on her uncovered butt cheek, and held it tightly. He felt her glute tense, spreading his grip, making it tougher to hold and impossible to squeeze.

Sasha ended their kiss, looked him in the eyes, and smiled. She had him now, he was completely under her spell, and there was no turning back. Her hands slide down his chest, down along his sides, until she found the bottom of his shirt. With a quick upward movement, she pulled the tee-shirt upward until he was forced to release his grip, his arms became entrapped by his own shirt.

Suddenly he sensed that she was no longer standing in front of him, and then he felt her hands grip the waistband of his gym shorts and pull them down his legs, over his knees until they dropped to the floor. Seconds later, he felt the grip of her hand around the base of his manhood and the unmistakable sensation of being engulfed by her sensuous mouth.

Rick, after several more seconds of struggling, finally removed his shirt, freeing his arms. Looking downward, his gaze captured her deep blue unblinking eyes, returning his gaze, seemingly smiling up at him in triumph, as her mouth and tongue brought him ever closer to the point of no return. His hands moved to the sides her head, not to hold her fast against her will, but rather to keep himself from falling backward.

The feeling was like nothing he had ever felt before. Sure, he had had oral before with his previous girlfriends; but this was different, the others had been doing it almost as a chore, something they felt they had to do. With Sasha, he felt as if she was making love to it as if it were a being separate and apart from his body. A low moan escaped his mouth as he began to lose control. "I'm going to cum," he uttered, almost in a whisper, "I'm gonna cum."

Her hands got a firm grasp of his butt, just as his hands made a feeble attempt to pull her head off of him. She took him deeper into her mouth as she felt the first of a series of contractions and her mouth was filled with his essence. She held him long after the contractions had ceased, her eyes still watching his rapture slowly turn to a sense of calm and contentment.

When his eyes finally opened, he looked down at her, their eyes met, and no words needed to be spoken. Sasha reluctantly allowed him to remove himself from her mouth, her lips clinging around him as if acting on their own. She stood, this time it was Rick who kissed her deeply and held her in a tight embrace.

When they ended their embrace, Sasha bent over quickly rolled up his mat, took his still evident arousal in her hand, and led him across the room until they were standing next to her mat. Then, she unrolled his mat over hers, and lowered her body gently pulling him down over her.

"Now it's my turn," Rick whispered as he moved backward until he was kneeling between her legs.

Sasha quickly curled her body off the mat, grabbed hold of her sports bra in a crosshanded movement, and pulled it up and off of her body. Rick watched as her stomach turned from a smooth flat plane of sensuous white skin, with a cute inward belly button, to a symmetrical series of eight rectangles of hard, well-developed muscles, four on each side of a line that connected her lower body to a spot just below the middle of her breasts.