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Kayden shrugged. “What did you expect? Ethan has done what they asked. The rest is on him.”
Something inside me snapped. I gripped his arm and yanked him back. The next minute I was on flat on the floor staring at the ceiling with Kayden’s knee at my throat. Fuck. My sudden confidence I could stop Kayden doinganythingevaporated, but that didn’t stop me wriggling, because fear and temper curled inside me, and I wanted more information or to hit someone.
“Can’t we track him?” I whispered, finding it hard to talk.
Kayden eased the pressure on my neck before backing off and extending a hand to help me up. “That was embarrassingly easy,” he murmured, and brushed himself down.
“We’re not all super spies.” I poked his chest, and he caught my hand, bending my fingers until I cried Uncle. “Fuck you Kayden!”
“Fuck you back!” Kayden muttered his standard reply.
“Why aren’t we tracking him? Why can’t we piggyback on the thing again?”
Kayden snorted a laugh, and even though he found the situation funny, I was a long way past that, and I shoved him. At least I tried to shove him, but he did another fancy flip and I ended up on the floor again. This time at least I didn’t have his knee to my throat.
“Get up,” Kayden ordered, and held out his hand. After a moment’s hesitation, I took his hand and stumbled upright. “Follow me.” Part of me wanted to tell him to fuck off, but maybe he was going to show me something to do with Ethan, so I went after him as he headed for the gym that I’d yet to use. He pulled down some mats from where they rested against a wall and laid them flat.
“Stand there.” He pointed at a white dot in the center of the second mat.
I realized that perhaps this had nothing to do with Ethan, and everything to do with me.
“You want to hit someone, start off by bending your legs and finding your balance.” I did as he said, and he fussed around me, making sure I was standing the way he wanted me to, with gentle touches to my legs and back. “Hands up, head up, don’t watch for the punch that’s coming. You should have already seen that. Anticipate the next one.”
He copied my stance, but I doubt I looked quite as badass as he did. I lifted my hands, curling them into fists. He gave me some directions about my thumbs, bending my knees more, and I wondered how I would ever remember this if I was put in a situation where it was needed. I’d probably spend so long thinking about how to bend my legs and hide my thumbs and keep my head up that I’d fall over.
Kayden held up his hands, palms facing me. “Hit my hand.”
If he knew how much I wanted to hit him, maybe he wouldn’t be saying that, but I didn’t hesitate, using as much force as I could muster and aiming straight for the flat of his hand.
And ending up on the floor. This was getting old, fast.
He went into a crouch next to me. “I had to do that once.” He grinned. “Promise, next time I’ll stand still.”
“Fuck!” I cursed as I tried to breathe. “Are you fucking Lucy’ing me? You make me stand up, bend my legs, keep my head up, only to flatten me each time.”
Kayden frowned. “‘Lucy’ing’?” He helped me to stand up.
“Yeah, the Charlie Brown football thing.”
He stared at me blankly. “I don’t follow football.”
“No, he’s a cartoon character. You know,Peanuts. Didn’t you have a childhood?” I sensed I’d said the wrong thing when his expression went hard.
“No, I grew up in an anti-government commune that was more focused on teaching me how to kill, than watch cartoons.”
“Oh.” Fuck. Now what did I say?
“Bend your knees,” he changed the subject. “Find your balance, keep your head up, remember your thumbs, and hit me.”
I hit him. He didn’t move his hand. He absorbed the blow, worked on my form, and by the time we’d finished, me panting and exhausted, him grinning at me, I’d even hit him again. Somehow he’d defused my fears and my temper, and to top it all, we found somePeanutsvideos on YouTube, and I introduced him to the world of Charlie Brown.
It took me a long time to get to sleep that night—I missed Ethan, and I couldn’t stop imagining what he was going through, or what Danvers might have him doing.
Kayden said I had to trust the process.
I decided it wasn’t the process I was going to trust.
It was Ethan.
