Tom Clark slapped his belly as he looked at himself in the mirror. Rather than the flab he gotten used to over the years, his flat hand met real muscle, and like they said on those old cereal commercials, he no longer pinched more than inch on his waist.
It was true that at the age of 47, Tom was in the best shape of his life, and it was all thanks to his daughter, Brin. After a scare with his heart - which had turned out to be nothing more than anxiety and extra pepperoni with one or two beers over the limit - she'd insisted that he start working out and running with her. Brin had been a helluva high school basketball player, and she worked part-time at her university's wellness center as a personal trainer. Those first few weeks had been pure hell, but now Tom easily loped along beside Brin three miles each morning without gasping for breath or with a stitch in his side.
With a healthy body, Tom had also rediscovered a healthy sex drive. He seemed to be as randy now as he'd been 25 years ago, when he'd been surrounded by bodies as tight and alluring as that of Brin. And while one of those bodies was now a little curvier and had made a few concessions to gravity over those 25 years, it was still the body Tom most craved. Lexi. Brin's mom and Tom's wife.
Unfortunately for Tom, Lexi's new promotion meant a lot of travel, and last night she'd left for 10 days on the West Coast.
"Dad, you almost ready?"
"Yeah, baby, be right there," Tom answered, reaching for a t-shirt. His bedroom door opened slightly as Brin peeked around it. He caught a glimpse of her auburn hair in the mirror as he pulled the shirt over his head.
Brin was impressed - and amazed - with the abs she saw just a hint of as Tom turned toward the door and pulled the shirt down. Just a few months ago, those muscles had been buried under a beer belly, but now her dad was as tight as any of the gym rats from the U. She took no small amount of pride in knowing that she'd been the one to whip Dad into shape.
"Get a move on, old man, the sun's nearly up and I don't want to be responsible for some senior citizen dropping dead of heat stroke during my run," she teased.
"Thank you, m'am, may I have another," Tom grinned, pushing past his daughter, bending to grasp his ankles.
Brin laughed, but felt herself flush strangely as she noticed Tom's calves and the backs of his thighs flexing as he stretched. She'd always enjoyed this kind of easy relationship with her dad, but lately she felt something inexplicable when they were together. Butterflies in her stomach. A quickening in her pulse. With any other guy, she'd have called it...a crush.
That, of course, was patently ridiculous. This was her dad, of all people. Still, she had to admit, he now looked, well, sexy in his running shorts.
"Yo, Earth to Brin, come in Brin - I thought you were in a hurry," Tom said, shaking Brin out of her revery.
They went out the door into the driveway, stopping to stretch and warm up by running in place for a few minutes. Suddenly Brin gave her dad a little shove in the chest.
"Catch me if you can, old man," she whooped and bounded down the street.
Tom recovered quickly and fell in behind her. Just a few neighbors were stirring as they followed their usual route. When Tom drew alongside Brin, he suddenly sprinted ahead, leaving her about ten yards behind. He looked back over his shoulder, but Brin wasn't going to take the bait this time. She just wagged a finger at Tom and kept to her own steady pace.
Brin found her eyes again drawn to the back of her dad's legs and, well, his butt. She had to admit it to herself - her dad looked damn good, and she liked looking at him. More than once, her mom had jokingly thanked Brin for her dad's new body.
"And especially his stamina," her mom had said with a wink one evening as she slipped into their bedroom.
For a moment, the comment didn't register with Brin, but when it did, she stood there a little stunned and highly amused. But a little tickle somewhere in the back of her brain also hinted at arousal. That night, she'd had some very vivid erotic dreams that she could barely remember when she woke up the next morning. But given the fact that she woke up with her hand in her pajama pants told her all she needed to know about how nice those dreams had been.
Distracted by these thoughts, Brin didn't see the neighbor's golden retriever bound into the road in front of her until the last minute. She took an awkward leap to avoid him, but still caught her foot on his back and came down hard on her left knee. The dog gave a little "Whoop," and went on his merry way while Brin looked down to find some serious road rash and a little blood trickling down her leg.
"Holy shit," she screamed. "Stupid damned dog!"
Tom pulled up when he heard Brin yell and turned back to see her sitting on the side of the road, her knee drawn up under chin and a nasty looking cut there.
"Whoa, Brin, you okay?" Tom asked as he knelt beside his daughter. Without a thought, he pulled his t-shirt over his head and used it to gently start brushing away the dirt and asphalt pebbles on Brin's knee. Not the most sanitary thing in the world, he thought, but it's better than nothing.
Despite the pain in her leg, Brin again couldn't help admiring her dad's new body, and she felt that tingling in her belly again.
"I'm good Dad, just help me up, please." Brin said, looping an arm around her dad's neck. But instead of helping Brin to her feet, Tom scooped his daughter into his arms and turned toward the house.
"Dad, what are you..." Brin began.
Tom kissed her cheek softly and said, "Shh, it's the least I can do for my best girl."
The truth was, Tom liked having his daughter in his arms like this again, her own arms around his neck and her head against his chest. Brin had always been a "daddy's girl" and she'd grown up way too fast it seemed.
Memories flooded back to Brin as well. Of laughing uncontrollably as her dad tickled her; of him being there in the middle of the night to hold her when she woke up with a bad dream; the way he held her when she'd had her first heartbreak at 12 or so. She snuggled closer to her Dad, but feeling the bare skin of his chest against her cheek again gave Brin that spark she couldn't quite explain to herself.
Tom carried Brin back down the street and up the driveway.