Tia Tames The Animal

Tia Tames The Animal

Disclaimer: All characters owned by World Wrestling Entertainment are the property of WWE and are used here without permission, but with the utmost respect for the persons who portray those characters. Tia Marie Daniels is a character of my own creation, that I respectfully ask not be used by anyone else. All other characters are my own, as well, but may be used by others.

Chapter 1—A Day in the Gym

"Come on, one more," Tia said, pushing her client to one more rep on the lat pulldown machine. She held the connection point of the wide bar to the cable and helped her client slowly lower the weight after the final set. "Very good! How do you feel?"

"Tired," Jim replied, "but I'm definitely seeing results from the workouts. My wife is thrilled that I have the energy to keep up with her and the kids now when we go biking in the park."

"Good, then I've done my job right," she said. "I'm gonna let you go hit the cardio equipment. Pick whatever you want today and just make sure you stay in your target heart rate zone for 30 minutes. Let me know when you're done and I'll stretch you out then."

As Jim moved on to his cardio, Tia walked around the gym to see if there was anyone who needed her help. She re-racked some weights that were left lying on the floor, not noticing that she was being watched from across the room.

"Did you see her?" John asked his friend Dave as they were resting between sets at the squat rack. "She just picked up a 50 pound dumbbell like it was nothing to rack it."

"Yeah, she's a lot stronger then she looks, huh," Dave replied. "Why do you think I've been in awe of her since she started work here last month? I saw her working out the other day and couldn't believe the weights she was using. She had 300 pounds on the bar for squats, then did like 6 sets with it. Most girls would run from that kind of weight and she did it like it was nothing."

"So, when you gonna ask her out?" John asked, putting another plate on the bar before doing his own squats.

"I'm not," Dave said. "Not after finding out some about her. She's in school for her doctorate, man. She'd be bored out of her mind on a date with me, cause I could never keep up my end of the conversation with someone that smart."

"Whatever, man," John smiled as Tia walked by. "I'm gonna ask her out then and I'm not going to worry about conversations because if I have my way, we won't be talkin'!" He walked over to the counter where Tia was looking over her schedule for the day. "Hi, I'm John. You're Tia, right?"

"Yes, I'm Tia," she replied. "Is there something I can help you with?"

"Yes, there is," he grinned, leaning in closer to her. "You can help me have an enjoyable evening in the company of a beautiful woman. Will you have dinner with me tonight?"

"No," she said, backing away from him slightly and grinning from ear to ear. "My daughter would kill me if I went on a date with you. She's your biggest fan and would accuse me of stealing her man if I went out with you."

"Daughter, huh?" John looked shocked.

"Yep, a 17 year old daughter who wants YOU as her graduation present next year," Tia laughed.

"No way you have a 17 year old daughter," John shouted. "You can't be more then 27 yourself."

"Aren't you the charmer!" Tia replied. "But yes, I do have a 17 year old daughter and a 19 year old son, and I'm at least old enough to be your, uh, Mom's younger sister." They both laughed. "So even if my daughter wouldn't be hurt by it, I couldn't go out with you because you're just too young for me."

"So, tell me about your daughter," John said. "Does she look like you? When can I meet her?"

"Some people say she looks just like me and I'm not sure I'm ready for her to meet you. I am a Mom, after all, and much like a Momma Tiger, I protect my babies." Tia gave him as evil a stare as she was capable of. "You'll have to prove you're worthy of my daughter before I'd be willing to introduce you."

"Oh, I'm worthy," John said, flexing his biceps. "I'm big and strong and can protect her for you. Not to mention I'm rich and can give her the moon if she wants it!"

"Oh, I doubt she wants the moon," Tia said, "but you never know. Her plan is to go to Harvard Law and make enough money to buy whatever she wants, so I don't think she's interested in your money. As for the bulging biceps, remember she is only 17 so too young for you right now. I'll tell you what though, you be a good boy for the next few months and prove to me that you won't break her heart and maybe, just maybe, I'll be nice and give you her phone number on her 18th birthday."

"Deal," John said, holding out his hand to shake on it. "And to start proving what a good boy I am, I want to introduce you to my friend Dave. Hopefully, he's not too old for you, cause he's getting up there in years. So senile that he wouldn't come say Hi with me. But he's a really nice guy, who thinks you're the most amazingly strong women he's ever seen, so I think the two of you might want to enjoy that dinner tonight instead of you and me."

"So the two of you have been discussing me, have you?" she asked. "And you think that will make you seem like a good boy and make me want to go out with him?"

"Well, yeah, and yeah," John said. "We've both been really impressed with your weights when you're working out and how dedicated you seem to be to your clients."

"And you haven't been admiring my, um, assets?" she asked, looking at him with a distasteful look on her face.

"Well," he said with a grin.

"That's what I thought," she said, slamming her planner. "Sorry, I learned my lesson long ago. I won't fall for the gimmick because I spent my formative years in a wrestling locker room. I won't be treated like a ring rat, and I won't date anyone who brags to the boys all about it." She walked away before he could say anything else, going over to help her client stretch after his workout.

"Dave's going to kill me," John said, speaking randomly to the empty space she left at the counter.

"What did you do?" Dave asked from behind him, causing him to jump from the deep baritone voice.

"Dave," John said, his voice getting an octive higher as he turned around. "How long have you been standing there?"

"Just long enough to hear that I'm going to kill you. I just want to know why before I do it," he said as he glared at John.

"Well, I may have made her think we're a couple of pervs who are just after her body?" John said as he sprinted around behind the counter and out of Dave's reach.

"You did what?" Dave shouted.

"I didn't mean to," John said, "but she apparently has some experience with wrestlers and when I said that you and I had been talking about her, she immediately thought we were talking about her like we would an old ring rat instead of the cool conversation we were having about her and she walked off before I could correct her. You gotta talk to her, man, and let her know that we were impressed by her, not being total pervs."

"You're right," Dave said. "I am going to kill you. I see the woman of my dreams and you make her think I'm some kind of perverted jerk." Dave started stalking around the counter toward John. "You'd better fix this, or be prepared to lose some vital body parts."

"I'll fix it!" John yelled as he ran off to the locker room away from a fuming Dave.