That was where it ended. Looks filled with desire. Gentle caresses. Flirtatious remarks and late-night laughs. I couldn’t let it be more, despite how much my body ached to give in. To have one left out the other, and I couldn’t reconcile what it might look like to let myself have both of them.
That could only last so long.
One morning, I woke up early, determined to put in a few hours in the gym’s training room before spending the day with Wes combing through ancient texts. I started with a few laps around the track before moving on to the boxing bags. Just as I was five minutes into my fifteen-minute routine, a loud snort echoed from behind me, and I rolled my eyes, gritting my teeth at the interruption.
Of course.
“You keep lowering your guard hand like that, and we’ll never survive a demon fight,” Atlas said, stalking around to my right side.
“Yeah?” I kept going, suddenly fueled by animosity to hit harder, pretending it was his beautiful, smug face. “Who asked you?”
“Seeing as I’m your bonded-unbonded warrior, I think I have a say in how well you fight.” His ridiculing grin set me off, and I huffed out my annoyance, turning to face him.
“I bet I could still take you down,” I said and raised an eyebrow in challenge.
He laughed. Actually laughed. Right in my face.
“I’m serious.” I didn’t appreciate his input or his presence, so showing him up to knock him down sent a sick pleasure straight to my filthy little witch heart.
“Oh, I’m sure you are.” He shifted his shoulders and stepped toward me, and I ignored how delightfully sweaty he was, wearing nothing but a pair of gray gym shorts. His broad torso was lined with muscle and scars, and I ached to know where he’d gotten them. I wanted to trace the story of his body with my tongue. Frustrated by that asinine thought, I forced my gaze back to his eyes, swallowing the burn in my cheeks when he caught me staring at him. Again.
“What? Are you scared?” I teased, tilting my head to the side in mock pedantry.
“Of you?” He shook his head and came closer. “Not a chance. But what will your ancestors do to me if I put their precious cargo on her back with two moves?”
“You should be more afraid of what I’ll do to you once I get you on your back.”
The sexual innuendo hung between us, and his glittering gaze traveled the length of me before he licked his lips and grinned again.
Ugh, I hated him.
“Okay, little witch,” he said. “Here are the rules. No magic. Nothing lethal. And nothing you can’t heal with a spell or two, got it?”
Ohhh, he’d left open a whole wide world of hurt.
“Fine,” I said. “First to tap out makes dinner tonight.”
“Fine,” he said. “I hope you remember your abuela’s tamale recipe because I’ve been dreaming about that braised pork since she had everybody over last New Year’s.”
I winced at the mention of my grandmother, and I reminded myself not to be upset that I hadn’t ventured to her house. Yet. I still didn’t know if it was safe to venture off the estate, but I’d concluded I couldn’t reach my sisters from here.
But Atlas’s flippant comment added gas to the inferno in my gut, and when he held his hands up to indicate he was ready, I launched at him.
He blocked my first few swings, and I ducked under one of his right hooks, side-stepping out of the way as he tried to swipe my feet out from under me. The sounds of AC/DC’s “If You Want Blood” echoed through the space, adding the perfect symphony to the decade’s worth of tension finally exploding. He jabbed again, and I blocked. I countered with a hit to his ribs, and he almost wilted, jumping back at the last second with a wicked grin and illuminated eyes.
“Thought you said two moves, Colt?” I teased. “What? Is the liminal making you rusty?”
He laughed and kicked at my stomach, but I shoved his foot down, parried, and kneed him in the chest. I jolted when he grabbed my leg and swung me around, pushing me onto my back. I landed with an oomph that I quickly transformed into a roll back to my feet.
Our fight quickly became a dance. He moved; I countered. I moved; he countered. He went for the face, I went for the jugular. Panting and sweating, we took out our frustration on each other. He landed a few good blows to my stomach and one (admittedly light) jab to my cheek, and then he chuckled and tsked through his teeth.
“I told you to keep your guard hand up.”
That only pissed me off. Without thinking about it, I grabbed a knife from my thigh holster and threw it at him. To my immense surprise, he caught it by the handle just as it whizzed by his cheek, leaving a tiny scratch and a faint trail of blood down his jaw.
“Hey!” he snapped. “Nothing permanent.”
“I can fix that,” I snarled.
