“Train?” she asked, as if he hadn’t attempted twenty times this last week. Yes, it was smarter to learn how to defend herself, but considering the others’ strength and skill, she doubted she stood a chance against them. Why kill herself trying?
“You will learn to protect yourself, as you should’ve been taught from birth.” In the time they’d been stuck together, he’d avoided answering questions about her mother. Despite her probing, he’d maintained the stance that he hadn’t known of Nadia’s existence.
“You’d think you’d have given up by now,” she muttered. Heaving a heavy sigh, she nodded. “Fine. What else does it entail? Kickboxing?”
She’d done a bit in her life, but wasn’t proficient at it. Like running, workouts were low on her want-to-do list.
A half-smile curled his mouth. “You must learn to walk before you can dance, girl.”
“Nadia. My name is Nadia, Dad. And according to all the big, bad archangels trying to kill me, I’m already a badass. So what do I need to know?”
“Movement. Your footing is that of a newborn colt. I shall teach you proper balance. Then we will expand from there.”
She couldn’t argue. In the past, whenever she and Katie had gone clubbing, Nadia had blamed her lack of coordination on booze. The truth was much sadder. She was a klutz.
Suppressing the urge to tell him “good luck,” she nodded. “What’s first?”
“You will stand on the balcony rail.”
“You can fuck all the way off. Not happening.” No way would she tell him she had a major fear of heights. Revealing her anxieties would give him the advantage and prove her a weakling.
“I won’t let you fall, Nadia.” His softly spoken words were kinder than expected and so similar to something Luc would’ve said, it tugged at her heartstrings.
Tossing her throw pillow aside, she rose and shook off her melancholy. “Have you heard anything about Luc? Surely you belong to some kind of cosmic hotline, right? Don’t you share one consciousness or something?”
Her father’s mouth tightened. “No. You are not to worry about him.”
“Don’t tell me what to do,” Nadia snapped, disliking his bossiness. “He’s the only person who cared enough to keep me alive in all of this.”
“I didn’t know of your existence,” Gabriel retorted, anger deepening his voice. “But he isn’t a man to fall in love with. He will use you to his ends as he uses everyone.”
Because she had no good argument and feared he might be correct, she turned away. “I’m not doing the railing thing. Not right away. We can try something else first. Do we move the furniture back or what?”
Weirdly, for as big as he was, she never heard him move, and when his hand touched her shoulder, she flinched. Yet he didn’t withdraw, instead shifting so they faced each other.
“I’m sorry, Nadia. I know you care for him, but you shouldn’t.”
“I hardly know him,” she replied truthfully. “And I’m not convinced I didn’t get a bad hit from one of Katie’s party drugs and am right now tripping balls. Or maybe there was a hallucinogen on the parchment I touched. All this talk of triscelenes and archangels is disturbing as fuck.”
Amusement lit his violet-blue eyes. “You have your mother’s humor.”
“When will you tell me about her?”
“When I can speak about her without rage and grief.”
Nadia covered his hand with hers. “I’m sorry.”
“You have no need to be. The important thing is to teach you what you should’ve learned.” In a wickedly fast move, he twisted her wrist, swept her legs from beneath her, and knocked her flat.
She squeaked.
When she could catch her breath, she said, “Brutal, dude.”
“Necessary, dudette.” He stepped back, not offering to help her up, and she was reminded of her first encounter with Luc. These were men not given to courtesy. They treated women as equals and expected them to hold their own. “You can never be caught off guard again, Nadia. Before a celestial strikes, however quick or small, the atmosphere around you will shift. You’ll feel the crackling energy if you concentrate.”
Had she? He’d moved with astonishing speed.
“Get up,” he ordered. “We will keep trying until you have memorized the sensation.”
