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Dixon fell back laughing, just as he’d rolled off the bed the night before.
“Stop it. You told me to forget everything about fighting. What do you expect?”
This time, when he stood up, she brought her foot up to kick at his groin. His eyes widened as the strike approached, and he turned his hips to the side.
His body off balance, she swept his legs again.
“How do you like me now?” She tapped her chest with a little thunk thunk.
Dixon got back to his feet and lifted his arm. Too late to realize he’d intended to clap her on the shoulder, she grabbed his arm, turned into him, and used his momentum to carry him over her body in the same throw she’d relearned with Connell and Nico.
He struck the mat with another grunt.
“I’m done for the day,” she said, uncomfortable with the stirrings inside her. She wanted to go back upstairs, take a long shower, and have a pot of tea.
She tugged on her hand wraps, but Dixon shook his head. “Uh-uh,” he said, getting to his feet.
The rare use of his voice stopped her.
Dixon tapped his chest. For the next half-hour, her mind and body sloshed back and forth like a wave, sometimes bursting forth in anger the moment he signaled for her to attack, other times reining themselves in as a proper heir should.
After one last sloppy attack, Dixon finally called for a timeout. He led her to one of the heavy bags chained to the ceiling, then set his wristwatch with a feeble little beep. Holding the bag, he jutted his chin toward it.
Tristan, he mouthed, pointing at a face-sized X made from tape on the mat.
Lila punched until her annoyance wasn’t enough to carry her through, her strength flagging in less than a minute. Her arms became lead weights, each muscle sore and hot, like some invisible force had latched on to her elbows, pulling them down. By the time Dixon finally called time, she’d been hitting the bag with the force of a toddler.
Three minutes. She’d barely lasted three minutes.
Lila rested her hands on her hips, panting and staring longingly at the door. “Can we be done now?”
Dixon shook his head and gestured for her to start again.
“You’ve got to be kidding me.” She could barely lift her arms into position.
All at once, Dixon grabbed the bag, humping it while he moaned and groaned.
Lila raised her arms with effort, punching out with dead, sloppy arms, biting her cheeks as she hit the heavy bag.
After another three minutes, Dixon ended her torture.
“Thank the gods,” Lila grumbled, taking off her wraps at last. “No more today. I’m exhausted, and I have a lot of data to go through. Hopefully, I’ll still be able to type.”
While Dixon gathered up his things, she slipped on a borrowed hoodie, pulling it over her face as they trudged upstairs, each step creaking as her tired legs climbed. She kept her eyes on the ground, all t
o avoid curious eyes, but they met no one on the stairs. She checked her palm as Dixon led her down the fifth floor corridor.
She had no messages.
The fact did not surprise her. That morning, she and Dixon had driven to Bullstow. According to the militia at the gatehouse, her father was still in a meeting. Had he and the committee talked all night? Had they taken a break for breakfast? Couldn’t he have taken a few seconds to send her a message?
Dixon pointed again to a sentence he’d scrawled that morning. They probably took his palm away.
He opened the apartment door, both of them breathing a sigh of relief at the empty room. Tristan and Katia had vanished when they returned from Bullstow, and had not yet returned.
They hadn’t returned after Lila’s shower, either, nor when Dixon hopped in after, leaving her to roam freely around the apartment. When the water turned on in the bathroom, she slid into Tristan’s empty room, only one thing on her mind.
She opened the top drawer of Tristan’s bedside table with a little rattle, ignoring the half-torn sheet of condoms. Snatching Tristan’s brush, she carefully pulled out every strand of his hair and put them into the vial Helen had given her. She replaced the brush quickly and darted from his room, closing the door behind her.
