Chapter 19
NINETEEN
brAN
Hours later, we end up in the barn because Tallulah is vibrating like a live wire with leftover tension and anger, and I won’t let her discharge it on Nightjar.
“We need to do some self-defense training,” I tell her.
“That’s what you’re here for,” she argues.
“If I’m ever not around, it will come in handy to have some basic skills. Let’s go.”
She crosses her arms over her chest and slits her eyes. “You just want to throw me on the ground,” she says.
“If I wanted you on the ground,” I say, “you’d already be there.”
Heat flares across her face, and she shifts, dropping her arms and clenching her hands. Her nipples stand out, hard little points against her top. Her reaction hits my bloodstream too fast, and my cock thickens in response to her obvious arousal.
“Fine.” She grits the words out and brushes past me, heading toward the barn. I watch her go for a moment, trying to get my body under control.
This might not be the best of ideas.
Kael’s words echo in the back of my skull: Hands to yourself.
Brodie has a mat in the center of the barn, and there’s enough open space for footwork and falls. Dust motes spin in the winter light slanting through the high windows.
Twig toes the edge of the mat. “What’s first? Punching? Kicking? How to murder a man with a hair clip?”
“Escape,” I say. “You’re not taking Henry down. You’re creating space and getting out.”
“How practical,” she mutters.
“How alive,” I correct.
I step onto the mat and hold out a hand.
“Come here,” I say.
She looks at my hand like it has cooties.
“I feel like you’re abusing your power as the big scary mob guy,” she says.
“Tallulah,” I say.
She swallows and steps forward.
Her palm hits mine. Callused from typing, soft in places. Too small. Too warm.
“Rule one,” I say. “You don’t let anyone put hands on you without consent. Ever. Including me. If I touch you, it’s because you said I could. If you say stop, it stops. I don’t care if we’re mid-move.”
Her chin comes up. There’s something like respect in her eyes, under all the sarcasm.
“Clear,” she says.
“Say it,” I insist.
“You can touch me,” she says quietly. Then she adds, with a taunting smile, “For training.”
Kael’s threat pulses behind my ribs.
Hands to yourself.
I ignore the part of me that wants to argue technicalities.
“First scenario,” I say instead. “Wrist grab. You don’t yank away, although that’s going to be your first instinct. You rotate. Toward the thumb, not away.”
I close my fingers around her wrist slowly. Thumb over her pulse. Nerves jump under my hand.
“Look at me,” I say.
She does.
“See my thumb?” I ask. “That’s the weak point. You turn your wrist toward it and step in, not back. Use your weight. Don’t try to fight strength with strength you don’t have.”
I guide her through it, hand on her forearm, then at her elbow. We’re close enough that I can feel her breathing change.
“Try it,” I say, letting go.
I watch as she mentally works the problem, then gives a little nod. “Okay. Ready. Grab me.”
I grab.
She sets her shoulders, then over-rotates, stumbles, ends up closer than she meant to be. My hand slides from her wrist to her forearm to her side, steadying.
Her whole body hits my front in a soft, unplanned collision.
My fingers dig into the curve of her waist on reflex.
Every cell in my body goes on high alert.
Kael’s voice snaps through my head like a gunshot—the minute you touch her like she’s yours, you’re a problem—and I drop my hands as fast as I can make myself.
“Angles,” I say roughly, stepping back. “You misjudged the angle. Let’s do it again.”
We run it. Again. Again.
By the fifth time she’s slipping out of my grip clean, turning herself into a knife and a bolt of lightning.
“You’re good at this,” I tell her.
“You sound surprised.” Her cheeks are flushed with exertion, eyes bright.
“Nah, I’m worried,” I correct. “Good at this means you’ll start picking fights on purpose.”
Her mouth quirks. “You say that like it’s something new.”
“Okay, moving on. Second scenario,” I cut in.
I need distance. Structure. Anything but the feel of that small body slamming into mine.
“Wall pin. I feel like this is the most likely one for Henry. He likes control. He’s not going to drag you into an alley if he can press you against something and watch you squirm. ”
“Fantastic,” she says, but there’s a thread of fear behind it. “Show me.”
I walk her backward until her shoulders hit the barn boards. Her breath fogs faintly in the winter air.
“In this scenario, you want your hands up,” I say. “Palms out. You’re building a frame, not clawing his eyes out. Claws are for later.”
She lifts her hands, palms resting lightly against my chest as I step in.
Too close.
I plant my hands on the boards beside her head. My body cages hers without actually touching.
It doesn’t matter. My nervous system is convinced.
She has to tip her head back to meet my eyes. Her throat is exposed. Her pulse is a frantic flutter.
“Tallulah,” I say quietly. “You with me?”
“Unfortunately,” she whispers.
The confession lands between us, hot and dangerous.
“On my mark,” I say, because I have to get this back on script, “you drop your weight, pivot your hips, and drive your knee into me. Hard as you can. Then you run. You do not stay to see if I’m okay. You do not apologize.”
“Right,” she says. “In theory. In practice, my brain is…misfiling.”
“What kind of misfiling?” I ask, even though I know.
“The part where you’re very close,” she murmurs, “and I’m not scared of you, which is confusing, and also my body thinks this is…interesting.”
Heat punches low in my spine.
“Re-file it,” I say, voice flat. “Just for this. You can be confused later.”
“If there is a later,” she mutters.
We are not talking about later. Later is a place where Kael’s threats and my own rules might not apply.
If we earn it.
“On three,” I say. “One. Two—”
On “two,” she drops and drives her knee up like I told her.
Good girl.
I twist, taking it on the thigh instead of the groin. Pain spikes white-hot up my leg.
“I’m sorry,” she gasps.
“Don’t be,” I grunt. “Do it again.”
We reset. Again. Again.
She gets cleaner. Faster. More confident.
By the fourth run, sweat darkens my T-shirt. Her hair’s half out of its knot, curls sticking to her forehead. She looks wild and alive and nothing like the girl who flinched at a text.
“You good?” I ask.
“No,” she pants. “But I’m…less breakable.”
“Again,” I say.
We move.
This time, when she drops her weight, my boot slips on the edge of the mat. The world tilts.
We go down.
I twist, taking the hit with my back. The mat slams into my spine. Air punches out of my lungs.
Tallulah lands on top of me.
Everything stops.
Her palms are splayed over my chest, her knees bracketing my hips. Her hoodie’s rucked up so there’s bare skin pressed against my stomach, hot and smooth.
Her hair falls around us like a curtain, and her eyes lock on mine.
For a second, all I can think is mine.
Then Kael’s voice snaps like a whip in my skull—the minute you touch her like she’s yours—and I go rigid.
“Don’t kill me,” she whispers, the hint of a breathless laugh in it, “but I think I just won.”
My hands are hovering uselessly in the air, inches from her thighs.
I should move her. I should roll us apart, get distance, remember what my job is.
Instead I let myself look. Just for a second I probably don’t deserve.
At the flush high on her cheekbones. At the rise and fall of her chest against mine. At the tiny white scar near her eyebrow I hadn’t noticed before.
“You did,” I say. My voice comes out lower than I intended. “You won.”
She shifts, trying to get comfortable. Her weight rolls over my hips.
White heat licks up my spine. I bite down hard enough on my tongue to taste blood.
“Bran,” she whispers.
“Yeah.”
“This is…complicated,” she says.
“Understatement,” I manage.
If I put my hands on her now, it won’t be for training. I know that. Kael knows that. Hell, Cotton and Brodie would probably know it from across the pasture.
“You know,” she adds faintly, “if Henry had hidden a camera in here, he’d probably be furious—”
The thought is enough to make my skin crawl.
“Tink,” I warn. “Don’t put him in this.”
“I’m not,” she says quickly. “I’m just—coping. Badly.”
“Cope quieter,” I say.
Silence buzzes between us.
I can see it in her eyes—the temptation. One lean, one tilt of her head, and her mouth would be on mine. It would be too easy. There’s already sweat on her skin and adrenaline in her blood. My body is more than ready to take all of that and turn it into something that’s both uglier and sweeter.
Kael would break my fingers.
Brodie would break my neck.
I’d deserve both.
“Bran,” she says again, very softly. “If you don’t move in three seconds, I’m going to do something we’re probably both going to regret later.”
That’s what snaps me out of it.
I exhale, harsh, and drop my hands to her hips—not possessive, not greedy, just a firm, neutral grip.
Even that feels like too much.
“Up,” I say.
She shivers under my fingers like the word hit somewhere intimate, then scrambles off me, backing up until her spine hits the opposite stall.
I push myself upright slower, giving my dick time to remember there are bigger threats in this barn than my self-control.
She drags a hand through her hair, breathing fast. “Sorry,” she blurts.
“For what?” I ask.
“For gravity,” she says. “And hormones. And…being me. Which seems to be giving you a stroke.”
Despite everything, a short laugh punches out of me.
“Tink,” I say.
“If you say ‘you’re just a job’ right now, I swear to god—”
“I’m not going to say that,” I cut in.
She goes very still. Her eyes search my face, like she’s trying to figure out what I am going to say.
“I’m not allowed to touch you like that,” I say, choosing the hardest version of the truth. “Not while he’s out there. Not while you’re under my protection. Not while I’m the only thing between you and him.”