1
GWEN
Girls are just as strong as boys.
That’s what we’d all heard growing up.
And it was a load of bullshit.
Most men didn’t have half my emotional or mental endurance. But physically? I’d have to do three times the lifting to get half the strength a male opponent had.
Maybe if someone would’ve told me that, I wouldn’t have wound up in this position. One I knew well.
Sweaty back suctioned to the mat beneath me, he pinned my wrists up at my sides. The fluorescent lights hanging from the drop ceiling pulsed around his face, adding a sickly shadow to his strong jaw and creamy cheeks. His expression was blank, minus the periodic eye rolls each time I attempted, and failed, to free my arms from his grasp.
He kneeled between my legs. Mine? Spread open around his chest, feet flailing against his unmoving hips. No matter how hard I tried to yank free, that was all I could manage. Flailing my feet around. Only for him to body block my kicks and wedge me further beneath him.
But, as a woman, I was far from Axel’s type. It’s not like my hands were trembling and my heart was pounding. I was just gritting my teeth at the reminder that, yet again, I stood next to no chance in hand-to-hand combat with a man.
“Fight smarter, not harder, Gwen,” Axel said.
Obviously, because if I fought any harder, I was gonna blow some blood vessels.
Exasperated, I released all my tense limbs and grunted my annoyance. “I thought I was supposed to use my legs.”
“You are. To kick me in the face once I’m vulnerable.” His tone came out just as pointed as my own. “So get me vulnerable.”
“If I could remember how, I would, asshole.”
He narrowed his eyes.
I narrowed mine.
“Work in reverse,” Axel said. “Do the opposite of what you think you should do.”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“Maybe if you paid attention, you’d know.”
I paid plenty of attention. The steps were clear. Once his weight was off me, I had to create distance however possible. Kicking, slapping, punching—it didn’t matter. Create distance and hit hard to disable him long enough to get away.
But I couldn’t remember how to create that distance.
It happened every time I was in this position. That was why, even after taking this course half a dozen times, I hadn’t managed to pass it.
“Maybe if I had a gun,” I said, “I would be just fine right now.”
“Too bad you don’t.”
I grunted and went back to kicking my feet like an angry toddler.
Axel rolled his eyes. “Just tap out.”
I didn’t want to tap out. I wanted to get this over with.
“What’s going on over there?” Rhiannon’s voice came from somewhere behind me. “You giving her grief again, Axel?”
I was still kicking, but I couldn’t manage to get my feet to the front of his torso. Each time I tried, he swayed his hips one way or the other.
