A half smile curled Graham’s lip. “Again,” he said, with another nod. “Louder. Project. Imagine someone’s behind that wall and they’re going to come running. You can do it.”
I filled my lungs again, my ribs twinging, before I screamed. I wasn’t even sure what I was saying, but I let something loose inside myself in a way I hadn’t in years. When I was finished, I felt ridiculous, but…braver.
Graham was smiling now, the full weight of it making the embarrassed blush in my cheeks hotter.
We worked on yelling a little while longer, until my throat felt on the verge of bleeding and Graham made me stop.
“You’re doing great,” he said. “We’ll work on a couple more things today.”
He stepped closer again, the heat of him sinking into my skin.
“We’ll do a wrist release next. We’ll start slow. I’m going to hold your wrist lightly—no pressure. You rotate toward the thumb and pull back. Think slip, not yank.”
I swallowed. Memories of other hands, other grips, flared at the edges of my vision. My chest tightened, but his tone kept me from spiraling. He placed his hand around my wrist like it was the most natural thing in the world—gentle, but businesslike.
“Rotate toward my thumb.” He guided my wrist with his free hand. “Not away. Toward the thumb. Shrug your shoulder down. Pull your elbow toward your hip.”
I twisted. The movement felt small and mechanical, but when I slid my hand through the space between his fingers, the tiny rush of triumph was disproportionate and utterly intoxicating. I took a small step back.
“Again,” he instructed. “Faster.”
Each repetition was a little less foreign. His hand tightened a fraction on mine with each try, and my body remembered to do the thing before my mind had time to freeze. After a few reps, the motion became automatic enough.
He watched me with a careful, almost reverent attention. It made my skin feel very, very thin.
“Good,” he murmured. “Now let’s try a stomp. If someone’s on your back, you use your legs. Drop your weight, bend your knees a bit, and bring your heel straight down behind you onto my shoe—hard.”
“Your shoe?” I repeated, incredulous. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
“You won’t hurt me.”
I narrowed my eyes.
“Trust me,” he said.
Still, I hesitated before I did as asked. The heel of my foot hit the rubber with a thud that rattled up my calf and into my sternum—not pleasant, but not too much. It felt almost…powerful.
“Good. Again—stomp, then swing an elbow to the face if you need to before dropping low and twisting out of the hold if you can. Get away. Don’t stay. Run.”
We rehearsed the sequence slowly: stomp, pull, turn, step away. He never forced the motion. He corrected the angle of my foot, adjusted my movements, and reminded me to keep breathing through it all.
By the end of the hour, my ribs ached in a dull, but manageable way. Graham noticed when I was moving slower, and demanded we finish for the day.
I hated to admit it, but this whole thing wasn’t the worst. There were parts of it that I actually enjoyed. I was tired, but I’d never felt so alive, too. Like I could do anything.
Graham leaned back against the wall and gave me that faint, guarded smile of his. “You did really well. A natural.”
I rolled my eyes, but a bud of pride bloomed in my chest. “I don’t know about that.”
“I wouldn’t lie to you.”
When he said it, it shocked me that I believed him.
He cleared his throat as he straightened, suddenly looking uncomfortable. “So, I have something for you.”
I frowned. “Something for me?”
“For all your hard work this morning.” He nodded. “I got you a present. If you want it.”
