Page 2 of Danger Close (Mourningkill #3)

Attack

Teri

I ducked, barely dodging Harrison’s punch. I pulled back, out of his reach.

“Get in there, Teri!” Ambrose, the combatives instructor, bellowed from the other side of the ropes.

He stared at me with his ebony skin, the gold flecks in his eyes sparkling with his agitation.

Harrison jabbed again. I dodged, pulling back.

“Quit dancing around him and throw a punch!” Ambrose shook his head, and I felt the embarrassment in my bones. “Attack! Attack!”

Harrison tried again, sending a hook-cross combo. I blocked the first, and the other glanced off my shoulder. I lunged in, landing an uppercut to his ribs, and he gave a light grunt with the impact.

“That’s it!” Harrison gave me a wink from behind his gloves, his lips pulled back to smile through his mouth guard. “You’re doing great.”

Tension left my shoulders. I smiled to myself, even as sweat stung my eyes. I had landed a hit! Even if Harrison was holding back, I’d at least attacked.

“You should have closed in!” Ambrose scowled, his critique sobering me like an ice bath. “Harrison, quit going easier on her!”

“I’m not!” the young man protested.

Ambrose grumbled something, and pulled away from the ropes to watch another sparring duo.

“I’m not going easy on you,” Harrison reassured me. A sure sign that he was, in fact, going easy on me.

Maybe he was doing me a disservice, not letting me reach my full potential as a fighter… but that was fine. I would never step into the octagon. I would never compete in the amateur leagues. I came here, three days a week, for one reason, and one reason only–so no one could ever hurt me again.

If that was not in the cards, then at least I would go down with a fight.

I would not be the defenseless thing I had once been.

Not again.

Blood-soaked hands, the drop of sweat on the hardwood mixed with my tears. A rug. Groceries spilled across the kitchen floor…

“Look out!” Harrison’s fist slammed into the side of my head.

I groaned and fell back, my fingers covering my eye.

The bell rang, indicating that the bout was over. Class was done.

“Shit!” Harrison pulled his gloves off and threw them to the ground so he could touch my face with his bare fingers. “Christ, I’m sorry Teri.”

Harrison was in his thirties, gentle, with surfer-boy blond hair. He lightly grazed his fingers over the tender flesh in front of my temple, pulling back when I winced.

“I’m sorry. You’re gonna end up with a shiner.” He swore under his breath. “Go sit down. I’ll get your things and give you a bag of ice to put on it.”

He sauntered off, young and energetic, between the ropes.

Ambrose, the owner of this fighting gym, rested his elbows on ropes again and glared at me. “Instead of stumbling back, you should have leaned in.”

Class after class, I had still not learned how to go on the offensive.

“Maybe the black eye will knock some sense into you.” Ambrose pointed to his left eye, indicating where I was sure to bruise.

“You say such charming things.” I walked towards the end of the ring on shaky legs. We had sparred for an hour, in five minute bouts. My body was absolutely destroyed in the best way possible.

“I’m a charming guy,” Ambrose said, dryly.

As I climbed down to the ground, I knew he would not let this go. He crossed his massive arms over his chest, where the emblem of “Mad Dog MMA”, with an angry bull dog, winked at me. He, himself, resembled the bulldog.

“Lean the fuck in, go on the attack. Otherwise, that’s gonna happen again, or maybe worse,” he pointed to my eye. “Give as good as you get.”

I pulled off my glove, holding it between my bicep and ribs. I unraveled the rough textured wraps around my fists.

Ambrose was my age, around his early fifties, if not a little older, and in peak physical shape.

His terse, stiff demeanor might have turned off another woman, but me?

I found his standoffishness comforting. He was all business, even if he knew that I was far too old to be one of the athletes he trained for the UFC, or the Underground Circuit.

“Lay off her, old man.” Harrison jogged back, slapping Ambrose on the back, a bag of ice in his hand.

“I will not!” Ambrose never took his eyes off me.

“I don’t know why you insist on coming here, week after week, training with people half your age to fight in the octagon you have no plans to enter.

I don’t know what lights a fire under your ass to keep working as hard as you do.

But until you learn to get on the attack, you’ll plateau where you are, and you’re never going to get to the skill you’re looking for. ”

With that, Ambrose walked away, as I took a seat on a nearby wooden bench, Harrison’s proffered ice pack against my eye.

Ambrose was right. But something in me still loathed to attack someone. Had I won a few sparring matches? Yes. But that was because I’d used their attack against them and just happened to get the drop on them. It was more self-defense than offensive.

“Don’t mind him,” Harrison said with a big smile. “You’re doing great.”

He sat beside me and lifted his water bottle, squirting it into his open mouth.

“I’m doing mediocre.” I laughed a little, looking away from my young sparring partner.

“You’re doing great ,” he said with emphasis.

Harrison had fought for years in the Underground Circuit. His skill, and his good looks, were always a big draw for the crowds. If only I were twenty years younger…

“The guys and I are going out to the Fight Ring.” That was a small bar that the young ones like him frequented. They had some kind of agreement with the elusive organizers of the Underground Circuit, and could televise the fights.

The young could go and beat their chests and cheer on their fellow fighters, surrounded by adoring fans–mostly women–who were like moths to their alluring flame.

I had no place there.

“It’d be cool, if you wanted to come,” he said bashfully, when I did not answer his implied question.

Oh, mon pouvre petit … my poor little one.

“That sounds delightful, but I think I’m too old for such raucous company." I tried to keep the smile from my lips. “At my age, after a class like this? I need an epsom salt bath, an ibuprofen, and sleep.”

“Hey, Harry!” Ambrose called Harrison. “Stick around and help me clean.”

“What?” he said, confused.

“Rudy disappeared,” Ambrose sighed. “He went home on vacation, and who the hell knows what happened.”

Rudy was an Italian man who paid for his training, room and board with custodial work. He cleaned the mats, organized the equipment, and maintained the gym. He’d taken me to the hospital when I hurt my shoulder and couldn’t drive myself. He’d always helped me.

But people who helped me always got hurt…

“Has anyone heard from him?” Fear crept up my throat.

“No, I’m getting in touch with his family,” Ambrose said. “In the meantime, Harrison, quit flirting and start cleaning.”

Harrison sighed, then looked at me. “You know, if you wanted to get a drink sometime…”

I felt bad having to quash his little heart.

“Harrison.” I tried to keep my expression neutral, but understanding. “I’m old enough to be your mother. I have a daughter that’s your age. Find someone a little closer to your generation.”

His jaw set in a stubborn line. He smoldered his wickedly lethal blue eyes at me as he said, “I don’t like women my own age. I never have.”

My God, this boy was dangerous in and out of the octagon.

“You just haven’t met the right one,” I whispered, gently coming to my feet and handing him back the bag of ice. “If my daughter comes to visit, I should introduce you. I think you two would get along.”

“Oh yeah?” he said skeptically, already dismissing the idea of my offspring because of her age.

“Yeah.” I tried to look encouraging, even as a dull pain squeezed my heart.

Trinity would never visit, and I could not blame her.