MARRIED TO MY ENEMY

MORNING CARDIO

**MORNING CARDIO**

**Ximena POV**

I wake up to a beat, an alarm, an annoying base line, Deep and pounding, vibrating right through the mattress, through the floor, straight into my bones.

For a second I don't know where I am. The sheets smell wrong clean hotel laundry, not my lavender spray from home. The pillow is too soft. The light coming through the curtains is too white and too early.

Then Bam! it all crashes back at once. The airpor, the rude guy with the green eyes. The f*****g hotel mix-up.The one bedroom. The invisible line down the middle of the bed that I was sure he would cross.

Right. Bali. I'm on the run.

But, Who the hell is playing music this early?

I sit up too fast and my head spins. I press my hand to my forehead and blink at the other side of the huge bed.

It's empty. The covers are thrown back like he just got up.

Great. He probably left to go be annoying somewhere else.

I didn't sleep well. Who would? I spent the first three hours lying stiff as a board, listening to a total stranger breathe next to me, ready to scream or kick or throw a lamp if he rolled too close to my side.

He, of course, fell asleep the second his head hit the pillow. Typical. Out cold in under a minute, breathing slow and even like he was on vacation. Meanwhile I was doing military surveillance on his shoulder, counting every inhale.

I don't even know what time I finally passed out. Close to four. My eyes feel sandy. My mouth is dry. My hair is a disaster, and I slept in the same cheap sundress I bought in Singapore because I would rather die than ask him for a t-shirt.

I'm sure it's him playing the music. I can feel that petty, sleep-deprived anger bubbling up from my stomach.

My stomach growls then, loud enough to hear over the bass. Right. I haven't eaten anything real since those sad airplane pretzels yesterday. I'm running on adrenaline and spite, and both are wearing off fast.

I grab my phone from the nightstand. 6:03 a.m.

Six in the morning. Who works out at six on vacation? Psychopaths. CEOs with anger issues. Men who cheat on their wives. Wait, that's not my husband. Focus.

"Where is that sound coming from?" I mumble. My cheap sundress is wrinkled. My feet are cold on the wood floor. I don't care. I'm too irritated to be cute. Too hungry to be pretty.

I stomp out of the bedroom, barefoot, following the thump thump thump. It gets louder as I walk through the living room. The whole suite is still dark except for the grey morning light off the ocean. The place looks even bigger in the morning, and emptier. It still smells faintly like him, like clean soap and something expensive.

There's a closed door on the far side I didn't notice last night. Light spills out from underneath it. The private gym the receptionist bragged about.

I push it open without knocking. I don't knock for enemies.

I am not prepared for what I see.

My, my, my.

Diego is in the middle of the room, hanging from a pull-up bar on the wall. He's wearing only black track pants that hang low on his hips. No shirt. No shoes. Just sweat.

His back is to me, and his body… wow. It's covered in a thin layer of sweat that makes his muscles shine under the bright lights. His back is a perfect V, wide at the shoulders and tapering down to his waist. His arms flex with every pull-up, pure muscle moving under skin. That rumpled white shirt he wore yesterday lied to me. It should be arrested for fraud.

He drops down, lands light on his feet, and turns to grab his water bottle. That's when I get the full view.

How many packs does he have? Let me count. One, two, three… four, five, six, seven, eight. An actual eight-pack. I thought those were just photoshopped on i********: models who sell detox tea.

His stomach looks like you could wash clothes on it. His chest is broad. His shoulders are… okay, stop.

I actually drool a little and quickly wipe the corner of my mouth with the back of my hand. Hello? Focus, Ximena. You're on the run from a forced marriage to a cartel playboy, not on a dating show in Bali. Get it together.

Then I see the source of the noise. A small black speaker on the weight bench, blasting aggressive hip-hop with a bass line that rattles my teeth.

I march in like I own the place and, without saying a word to him, reach down and switch it off.

The sudden silence is instant and glorious. I can hear the AC hum and my own heart beating way too fast.

Diego turns around slowly, water bottle halfway to his mouth. He looks at me, his expression completely unreadable. Sweat drips down his temple, down his neck, down his chest, following that line down his stomach. He doesn't say a word. He just stares for a beat, then walks over, sets his bottle down, and switches the music right back on. He even turns it up one notch.

Oh, so that's how we're playing this.

I grit my teeth and jab the button again, turning it off like it insulted my mother.

He immediately turns it on.

"Turn it off," I say, my voice tight.

"Why did you turn it off?" he asks, not even looking at me as he picks up a towel to wipe his face. The towel drags over his chest and I hate that I notice the way the muscles move.

"Because it's too early for noise like this! I'm trying to sleep!"

"Princess, it's morning," he says, finally looking at me. His green eyes are way too awake for six a.m. "And some people have things to do."

"You call this 'things to do'?" I shoot back, gesturing at his sweaty chest like it offended me personally. "I'm trying to have my beauty sleep."

He smirks. That tiny, infuriating smirk that makes me want to commit crimes. "Okay, so go and sleep."

I storm over and turn it off again. "The issue is your music is disturbing me, and it's probably disturbing everyone else in this hotel!"

He actually laughs, a short humorless laugh. "No, it's not. If you weren't so busy being a princess, you'd know these suites are soundproofed. That's why they cost more than your little market dress."

My mouth drops open. Did he just insult my dress? My fifty-thousand-rupiah masterpiece that's keeping me undercover?

"Really?" I ask.

"Yeah," he says, picking up a dumbbell like I'm boring him. "Really."

"But it's not soundproof to me," I point out, crossing my arms. "I'm in the same suite! I can hear it!"

"Look," he says, his patience gone. He sets the weight down with a loud clank that makes me jump. "You're complaining about the noise, but you were snoring like a pig this morning." He mumbles that last part, but in the quiet gym I hear it perfectly.

I freeze.

"What did you just say?" My voice drops low.

He looks me right in the eye, and this time he doesn't mumble. He says it clear and slow. "I said, you snore like a big pig. It's loud for a girl with princess syndrome. And look at your hair," he gestures at my head with his sweaty hand. "It's so messed up. Not so perfect now, are you?"

My entire face goes hot. Burning hot. Humiliation shoots straight up my neck to my ears.

I snore? I do not snore. I've never snored a day in my life. My mother would have told me. My expensive silk pillowcases in Milan would have told me. I'm a Bianchi. We do not snore. We breathe elegantly.

And my hair? Okay fine, it probably looks like a bird's nest that got hit by lightning then run over by a taxi. I slept in it after running through three airports with no brush. But he did not need to point it out. Especially not while he looks like a fitness magazine cover.

"You bastard!" I shout, my voice cracking because I'm so mad and so embarrassed my brain goes completely blank. Im looking for the best comeback but my Italian, Spanish, English all gone. Deleted.

He just raises an eyebrow, completely unbothered, sweat dripping down his temple onto his collarbone. He looks like an ad for protein powder. I look like I got hit by a truck, then dragged behind it.

That makes it worse.

I can't stand there one more second while he looks perfect and I look like a swamp creature who snores. I turn around and rush out of the gym, slamming the door behind me as hard as I can. The bang echoes through the whole suite.

I stomp back into the bedroom and throw myself face-first onto the bed, screaming into the pillow so he won't hear me.

I hate him. I hate him so much. I hate his stupid eight-pack and his stupid green eyes and his stupid morning energy and his stupid speaker.

And I hate that he heard me snore. I will never recover from this. Sophia Santos is now dead too.

I lie there for five minutes, fuming, listening to the muffled bass start up again through the door. He turned the music back on. Of course he did. Because he's evil.

My stomach growls again, even louder, so loud it hurts. I'm starving, tired, humiliated, and stuck sharing a suite with the most infuriating man on the planet.

This is a nightmare with abs. And I'm losing.