“I hope so,” I say, sarcastically.
He grins. God, he’s beautiful.
“I got a few moves to help you get your frustrations out.”
I raise my brows. “Oh?”
He steps closer, and I can feel the heat coming off him, see the suggestion of a smile behind his beard. “Let’s fight.”
I snort. “You want me to fight you?”
He cocks a brow and beckons me forward, still keeping that fraction of distance between us, as if inviting me to close it.
“Come at me,” Ace says. “You might just like it.”
I scoff. “No.”
“You want to punch somethin’, might as well be me. You could use the practice. Bet you’ve never thrown a real punch in your life.”
I press my lips together.
He grins. “Come on, don’t be scared.”
I don’t hesitate any longer, I throw a punch, stiff and self-conscious, but he leans out of the way, catching my wrist in his hand. Fast. Too fast for someone that big. “Try again.”
He lets me go, resets. I jab, he sidesteps. Every time, he’s ahead of me.
“Quit thinkin’ about it,” he says, soft now, “Hit me like you mean it.”
I try to empty myself of everything but that—the burning, guilty, helpless anger that’s been gnawing me up from the inside out. I swing, and this time when he grabs my wrist, he twists, not rough, but hard enough to unbalance me. I lurch forward, and his arm slides around my waist, bracing me against him.
For a second, neither of us move. I’m pressed to his chest, thigh caught between his. He smells like fire, like the thick sweetness of burnt wood, a wild edge beneath it.
“Don’t flinch,” he murmurs. “You lose every fight before it starts, if you’re scared of the hit.”
“Easy for you to say,” I mutter, “this is your job, your career. Mine is to move, not throw punches.”
He steps back. “Let’s try again. Don’t worry about what I’m doing, focus on your move, your thoughts, and don’t hesitate.”
I land a punch this time, right into his shoulder. It stings my knuckles, but my heart flares. He nods, like that’s confirmation of something only he can see. He grabs my hands, holds them up between us. “Want to know why you can be good at this? Because you have more control and precision than most people,you’re balanced and focused. You just need to stop holding back.”
I breathe in, shallow. He hasn’t let go. His thumbs brush over the backs of my hands, slow.
“How’d you learn to fight?”
His gaze goes somewhere far off, like I’ve asked him a question he’s already had to answer too many times. “My uncle. He was a fuckin’ asshole, but he was the only family who didn’t bail when I started getting into trouble. Told me if I was gonna hit, I better learn to take one first.”
I picture him, smaller, beat up, learning the hard way. I hate it, and I hate that this makes it worse.
“Did you like it?” I ask, barely audible.
He shrugs, lets go of my hands, but not of me. “Didn’t matter if I liked it. I was good at it, and it kept them around. Sometimes that’s all people want from you.”
This—this is what I understand. At the edge of every performance, was always the risk they’d notice I wasn’t exceptional anymore. Not the favorite, not even wanted, just another body filling a role.
“It’s kind of like dance,” I say, “except you bleed more.”
He nods. “Do you love dancing?”
