Hot CEO: An Enemies to Lovers Romance

by Charlize Starr

  “I’m not a cartoon villain, Samantha. I’m not plotting against you,” Lucas says, sounding annoyed.

  “Really? Because it seems pretty villainous to me,” I say. Maybe I shouldn’t take it so personally, but it feels a lot like a personal attack. It feels a lot like a plot against me. My fitness center is my life. My whole world. It’s everything I’ve ever built and worked for.

  “What does?” Lucas asks. His voice is harder now, even more annoyed than before.

  “Destroying a neighborhood so you can make millions of more dollars!” I huff.

  Lucas scowls. “Hate to break it to you, but this development was going to happen with or without my gym,” Lucas says. “If it wasn’t me, it would be something else.”

  “At least if it was something else, it could be something useful. Something that we actually need around here!” I say, even though he’s right. I’ve had the same thought myself more than once.

  Lucas bristles. “You own a fitness center, and you’re telling me the neighborhood doesn’t need a gym? To exercise?” he asks.

  “Not the way you do it!” I say.

  I’ve never been inside one of his gyms, of course, but I don’t need to know that they’re the worst kind of fitness culture. The kind that goes against everything I try to do.

  Lucas himself goes against everything I’m trying to do with my business and my life. He’s a huge jerk. He’s a money-hungry jerk who spies on his competition and doesn’t see the issue with it. And I’m not letting someone like him ruin my community if I have anything to say about it.

  Chapter Eleven - Lucas

  I’d been in such a good mood following my meeting, and now my day has taken an annoyingly dramatic downhill turn. I’d assumed Samantha would figure out who I was eventually, but her confronting me like this? Acting like her failing business is my fault? It’s ridiculous, and spending time in this conversation is the last thing I want to be doing right now.

  I wasn’t looking for a fight. But Samantha clearly is, and she’s going after everything about my business and what we do.

  “Your way is the only way, is that it?” I ask, annoyed. Maybe more than annoyed. I can’t help but think she’s being really unfair and unreasonable here.

  “It’s certainly better than your way! I help people feel good about themselves!” Samantha says.

  “So do I!” I say.

  Samantha glares at me. “No. You help people feel ‘hot.’ You yell at people and surround them with intimidating machines and people with perfect bodies. You make people feel like shit unless they fit your mold of what exercise should be,” Samantha says scathingly.

  “You let people move their arms around for an hour and pretend that’s exercise!” I snap. “You let people delude themselves into thinking they’re getting in shape when all they’re doing is ‘feeling positive.’”

  “So, it doesn’t fit your mold of what exercise should be?” Samantha asks, throwing her own words back at me like she thinks I’m proving her point.

  I’m frustrated and more than a little irritated. I’ve just spent the morning hearing all about how exercise my way literally saves lives. Hearing Samantha talks about it like this puts me on the defensive.

  “You can be self-righteous with me all you want about how I’m destroying a neighborhood with my shit brand of exercise. It won’t help you with your problems!” I say.

  Samantha visibly bristles. “My problems? What problems are those?” she asks, her voice low and sharp. I don't really know her, but I can tell she’s really angry.

  “Come on. You wouldn’t be this mad about my business being a success if yours wasn’t failing!” I say. I’m probably crossing a line. I’m being a jerk, and I know I am, but I think I have a right to be angry. I might be being an ass, but I’m being provoked.

  “My business,” Samantha says with her hands on her hips, “is doing great, for your information.”

  “Good to know,” I say, “although we probably have different definitions of great.”

  “I’m sure we do. Mine involves helping the community and giving back, and yours involves providing hot tubs after workouts and charging people double for the luxury,” Samantha says.

  “We don’t have hot tubs, but sauna use is actually included in all memberships. Interested in joining up?” I ask sarcastically. The last thing I want to hear today is a guilt trip from a woman who’d crossed a street to yell at me.

  “Do I get a good neighbor discount?” Samantha says back, just as sarcastic.

  “Do you need one? I thought your business was doing well,” I say. Samantha flushes. I’m being an absolute jackass, but I’ve never been good at backing down. My temper has always risen quickly. People tell me I’m too stubborn for my own good. Maybe I am, but I’m really not sure I’m the one who is out of line here.

  “It’s doing better than you’d like it to be,” Samantha says. “We’ve been here for years, and we’ll be here years after you open. Maybe years after people get tired of you and you shut down.”

  “We’ll see about that, won’t we?” I ask.

  “We will,” Samantha says, stiffening. “I’m sure you’ll see it firsthand with all the spying on me you do.”

  “Don’t be sanctimonious. You were obviously spying on me too,” I say, scoffing. “You seem to know an awful lot about me – or think you do, anyway.”

  “I don’t have to spy. I can see right through your giant windows!” Samantha says. I laugh darkly. I try to picture Samantha standing outside the complex, glaring in at me through the windows. It’s so outlandish that it’s almost funny.

  “My windows are an internet search engine? They showed you pictures of my other gyms?” I say.

  “I was just getting information on the competition,” Samantha says, throwing my own words back at me.

  “Competition,” I repeat, making it as dry and derisive as possible. Samantha’s face gets even redder.

  “Probable more competition than you can handle,” she says with a bravado that would be impressive if it weren’t so irritating. “Now, If you’ll excuse me, I have a business to run.”

  “As do I,” I say.

  Samantha glares at me again and then turns on her heel and walks away, ending the conversation.

  I’m still annoyed as hell as I walk back to my car. Samantha has no idea what my business is actually like. I’m sure she’s never set foot in one of my gyms. She’s making assumptions about me and my business based on nothing and then throwing them in my face.

  I’d been feeling almost guilty about the idea of shutting Samantha and her center down. But right now, I’m so angry that I don’t feel guilty at all. I make a snap decision and call my real estate agent. I tell him to put in a call to the owner of the fitness center’s building. I wonder what amount of money it would take to get him to part with it. I wonder if I couldn’t just end this for good.

  Chapter Twelve - Samantha

  No matter how many times I add up my budget, I can’t make the numbers line up right with a rent increase. Even trying to make it work with a single hundred-dollar-a-month increase leaves me a little short. I had known I was cutting it close – but not that close. I don’t know what I’m going to do. I keep looking for a corner I can cut without raising prices, lowering pay, or cutting staff. I don’t see one.

  Everything is already so tight that we don’t have extra spending to cut. I keep looking, thinking that there is surely a switch we can make, and coming up empty. Any switch I can think of has been something a quick internet search tells me we’re already doing in the most cost-effective way. It shouldn’t surprise me. I always research everything before I do it. I’ve spent a lot of time making decisions for the center that I thought would benefit it for a long time to come.

  Still, right now, I’m hoping I’ve made a mistake somewhere along the line and my budget has wiggle room because I’m going to discover we’re actually overpaying for electricity or cleaning supplies or something, anything.


  I can’t find a single thing.

  I suppose we could have a fundraiser, but that’s still asking my clients for more money, and it wouldn’t be a long-term solution. Plus, I’d have to find extra money to throw a fundraiser in the first place. When I first started the center, I got several grants and a couple of loans to get things up and running. The grants were mostly designed for young women with new business ventures – things to help you get your footing. I can’t find any tailored to women who’ve been running a business for a decade and who are hitting a rough spot. I suppose it makes sense. Those would just be prolonging the failure.

  I’m frustrated and disheartened. To make matters worse, I can’t stop thinking about my fight with Lucas. I can’t believe what an ass he was. Actually, I can believe it – that’s exactly the sort of person I thought he was. That doesn’t make me any less angry about it, though. The thought that someone as self-important and full of himself as Lucas had called me self-righteous makes me see red every time I think about it.

  I don’t know why I’m letting it get to me so much. I shouldn’t be letting someone like that under my skin. It’s a distraction, which is the last thing I need right now. But I can’t let it go. I keep replaying the fight in my head, thinking of things I wish I’d said or done differently.

  I know I shouldn’t have gone over to him in the first place. I shouldn’t have sought out a fight with him. It’s not like me to seek a fight, but I’ve been under so much stress lately that it had almost felt good to yell at him. The way he responded and the things he said make me think that maybe it was for the best. If a guy like that who thinks like that is going to be in the neighborhood, trying to drive me out of business, then we were going to have a confrontation about it sooner or later anyway.

  I just wish I could get him out of mind now that it’s over. I wish I could clear my head of all my thoughts of him. Even when I’m working out, totally in the moment and getting my adrenaline going, he keeps showing up in my thoughts. It’s not helping my overall bad mood at all. It’s certainly not making these numbers add together any better.

  I take a long sip of tea, trying to breathe. I’m scanning the lines for what feels like the hundredth time when something catches my eye. Not a way to save money, but maybe a way to make it.

  A few years ago, a client had requested to use the space for a birthday party. We’d worked out a one-time deal and the day had been a great success. Looking at the itemized listing on the spreadsheet now, I’m wondering if we couldn’t offer more services. I open a blank document on my computer and start to type out ideas.

  We could offer rentals for parties or maybe private lessons with my teachers. I think if I could come up with a list of extra things to offer, I could send out an email and a flyer to my clients asking if they’d be interested in the services. I could even put flyers around the neighborhood.

  I don’t know if there will be any interest, but it’s worth a try.

  I text all my staff to let them know we need to make time for a meeting this afternoon. I want to get their ideas and feedback on this too. Maybe they’ll have thoughts on additional things we could offer as well.

  “A meeting about what?” Julia asks, sticking her head in my office door a few seconds after I send the text. She looks worried, like maybe she thinks I’m announcing we’re going to be shutting down before the fight even begins.

  “Brainstorming,” I say, “I’m thinking of having us offer more services.”

  “Oh! To bring in more money?” Julia asks.

  I nod. “Exactly. Remember when we hosted a birthday party a few years ago? I was thinking we could do more of that,” I say.

  Julia grins. “That seems smart,” she says. I know she’s been worried about the development across the street. We all have.

  “I hope so,” I say. “Will you let everyone know so they can start thinking of ideas?”

  “You got it,” Julia says.

  After talking to Julia, I feel a little bit better. It’s not a solution. It may not result in anything at all. It’s an idea, though, and that makes me feel more hopeful than anything else has lately. An idea is at least a start. An idea is a feeling that this isn’t hopeless after all. With an idea, I’ll have the motivation to actually try to fix this and save the business. With an idea, it feels a lot more like a real possibility.

  Chapter Thirteen - Lucas

  My fight with Samantha keeps playing in my mind on a loop. I’m sure she was having a bad day. I probably was at least partially responsible for her bad day. I know that.

  But I don’t think someone who goes around yelling self-righteous shit at complete strangers is really someone I should be worrying about. I should let it go and follow up on the information my real estate agent left me. I’ve got a number of a man named George I can call and some general information about the building’s worth. I have to say I’m considering it.

  Going through with it would likely make me exactly who she accused me of being. I could end the illusion that this is really a competition right now. I could make an offer on her building and put an end to this.

  I’m not sure I want things to go down that way. At least not yet.

  I still think she’s all wrong about me and about my business, but I don’t like leaving things the way we did. For some reason I can’t figure out, Samantha feels important. I can’t stand the idea that she’s probably thinking all sorts of horrible things about me now. It shouldn’t matter – I hardly know her, and she was the one who confronted me – but still. I don’t want that fight to be her impression of me from now on. I want her to think better of me than that. We are going to be neighbors in more than one way. I’ll see her all the time and I know I won’t just be able to ignore her. I don’t want to just ignore her. Something about her is stuck in my head, and I can’t shake it out, no matter how much I work up a sweat.

  I scan her center’s website. I’m looking for her personal contact email, thinking it might be easier to smooth the waters in writing. I don’t find it, only an extension of her office. I don’t really want to call – I’m concerned we’d just start yelling at each other again if I did.

  The website has several pictures of Samantha on it, making me want to work this out with her even more. I scroll through the offering of classes and get an idea. I pull up this afternoon’s classes and select a yoga class. I pay for it through their interface, shaking my head at myself. I never thought I’d be attending a yoga class, but exercising her way, just this once, seems like a way to extend a peace offering to me.

  I have a little free time in my schedule this afternoon, anyway. I don’t think it can hurt things, not after how badly our last encounter had gone. I don’t think it will make either of us change our minds about the other, but it might make the next few months slightly more tolerable.

  “Hey,” Paul says, stepping into my office. “Are you going to be around for a while?”

  “I’m actually headed out,” I tell him, standing up from my desk and starting to gather a few things. “Why?”

  “Just wondering if you wanted to order lunch,” Paul says, shrugging. “Where are you off to?”

  “Have you ever done yoga?” I ask, answering his question with one of my own.

  “Yoga?” Paul asks, skeptical. “Is this about that Samantha woman? With the rundown fitness center?”

  “I’m making a peace offering,” I say. Paul raises his eyebrows at me. “We had a fight. I want to smooth it over.”

  “But you said she was terrible – and I cannot picture you doing yoga,” Paul says, laughing.

  “She’s insufferable, but I said a few things I shouldn’t have, and we’re going to be neighbors. I feel like I need to make sure we can at least be civil to each other,” I say.

  Paul still looks unconvinced. “You know,” Paul says, “you’ve never mentioned whether she was pretty, young, single, or all three.”

  “Doesn’t seem important. It’s just business,” I say, grabbing my ja
cket from the back of my chair. I admit that Samantha being attractive might be part of the motivation, or least part of my hesitation to just shut her down before I even open. It’s not the entire reason, though, and I don’t really have time to explain all of it to Paul.

  “So she’s not?” Paul asks. He’s looking at me like he thinks I’m full of shit.

  “She is,” I admit. “Pretty, anyway, and about our age. But I have no idea if she’s single.”

  “Looking to find out?” Paul asks, winking.

  I shake my head. “It’s just business,” I say. It’s also that I can’t get Samantha out of my head, but I don’t tell Paul that.

  “If you say so,” Paul says, eyebrows still raised. He watches me as I get ready to head out the door, and then adds, “You know, I took that whole semester of dance in college just to impress Molly,” as if he thinks it’s relevant to what’s going on here.

  “It’s just business,” I repeat sharply, grabbing my keys and heading out the door to end the conversation. I know what Paul is getting at and how much he thinks it would be good to have someone special in my life. I just really don’t want to have that conversation right now.

  “Have fun at yoga,” Paul calls as I leave, a teasing tone in his voice.

  ***

  I get to the center a few minutes early and head for the yoga class. The girl at the front desk glares at me, but I ignore her and keep walking, finding the right studio for the class and taking a deep breath to steel myself before I enter. A dozen or so people of all ages are already there, stretching and chatting. The class fills up over the next several minutes to about twenty-five people.

  The instructor is a young guy who looks straight out of college. I hadn’t expected it to be Samantha – as the owner, I’m sure she doesn’t have much time to teach classes herself – but I have to admit I’m a little disappointed.

  When the class starts, I’m immediately struck by how difficult it is. We start with a supposedly easy warm-up sequence that involves ways my body does not want to bend at all, and then we transition into a series of moves that make my calves feel like they’re rebelling against me. Around me in the room, school-aged children and grandmotherly women are doing the move at a far more advanced level than I am, looking casual about it all. It’s as if they are relaxing on a sofa watching television.