Chapter 16
Cormac
The sun is shining by the time I step onto the back grass.
I turn and find Dervla stopping a few feet away, black leggings, trainers, tee, hair tied back. Aidan shuts the back door. Declan stays near it, always on the lookout for danger.
Dervla gives me a look. “Well?”
I jerk my chin at the lawn. “Come here.”
She does without question. She is trusting more now.
“You think being trained means Roisin automatically wins,” I say. “That’s because you’re still thinking about fights like they’re scored. They’re not. Not if you want the other person on the ground fast.”
“I know that.”
“No, you know the idea of that.”
Her eyes narrow. “You’re enjoying this.”
“A bit.” I move closer. “Hit me.”
She smiles. It’s a bit concerning how much she looks like she’s going to enjoy this.
She throws a fast jab at my face, which I duck easily.
I’ve been trained, but I also know how to fight dirty.
It’s how I know dirty will always win. Fancy kicks and punches will only get you so far.
She follows it with her other hand, trying to catch me on the turn.
Better.
I take the second hit on my forearm and step inside her space before she can reset. My hand catches her wrist. My foot hooks behind her ankle. I put her on her arse in the grass.
She lands with an offended grunt and looks up at me like she wants to bite.
“Again,” I say.
She gets up fast, brushing damp grass off her leggings. “That was cheap.”
“Exactly.”
“I hate your teaching style.”
“I know.” I jerk my chin again. “Come on.”
This time, she doesn’t open with a clean shot. She circles half a step, shoulders loose, eyes on my chest instead of my face. Smarter. She aims low, quick kick toward my knee.
I shift back. “Better.”
Then she lunges in with Henrietta’s kind of intent, even without a blade in her hand, and I have to move properly. I catch her forearm, turn her with her own momentum, and she almost gets my throat anyway with her free hand.
I grin despite myself. “That would’ve been useful if you used your nails. Dirty, Dervla. Use whatever you’ve got. Don’t fight to some moral code that you have no idea if your fighting partner is going to use. Brute force, nasty, violent.”
“I don’t have brute force.”
“Likely, neither does Roisin, which means you will be evenly matched.”
She nods, taking that in.
“Strip away all the preconceptions that being trained means she’s better. For starters, you don’t know she’s trained, and secondly, it will make you second-guess yourself.”
“So launch at her all guns blazing?” she asks.
“Now you’re getting it. If she comes at you expecting form, you give her chaos. Don’t trade clean hits. Break the pattern. Go for balance, breath, eyes, throat, knees. Anything soft, anything that bends wrong, anything that makes the body panic.”
Dervla squares up again. “Show me.”
I nod once. “Grab me.”
She lunges for my wrist this time, not my face. Better again. I let her get enough purchase to think she has it, then twist, step across, and send her stumbling past me. Before she can recover, I hook an arm lightly around her throat from behind and stop with my mouth near her ear.
“If this happens,” I say quietly, “you don’t waste time trying to peel fingers one by one. Stamp on a foot. Throw your head back. Drive an elbow into ribs. Then twist toward the thumb and rip out. Fast. Not polite. Not careful. You make space, and you get out.”
I release her.
She spins fast, elbow already driving back where my ribs would be if I were stupid enough to still be there. I’m not. The hit cuts air. She turns with murder in her eyes and a strand of hair stuck to her cheek.
“Again,” she says.
I like that answer.
I move in first this time. Quick enough to force a reaction.
My hand goes for her throat. She bats it away, ducks the second grab, and tries to knee me in the thigh.
I catch her by the forearm, but she doesn’t freeze.
She stamps on my boot hard enough to count, twists toward my thumb exactly where I told her, and nearly tears free before I clamp down.
I let her go and step back. “Good.”
She straightens, breathing harder now. “You sound surprised.”
“I am,” I say. “Most people stop thinking the second something hurts.”
She gives me a filthy look and comes at me again.
Dervla doesn’t bother pretending it is sparring. She drives forward fast, shoulder first, trying to crash into my centre of gravity before I can get set. I absorb the hit and give ground on purpose. Her hand shoots up for my face. I catch the wrist. Her other hand goes straight for my eyes.
I jerk my head back. “That’s it.”
She tries to knee me in the groin.
I turn enough that it glances off my thigh, then catch her around the waist and dump her onto the grass again. She lands harder this time and swears viciously.
Aidan laughs from near the patio doors. “She learns quickly.”
“Fuck off,” Dervla snaps, already pushing herself back up. “I’d stab you if I had a knife,” she mutters.
“You should.” I square up in front of her. “If you have a knife, use it. If you have keys, use them. If you have a glass, a pen, a fucking brick, use that too. Fighting fair is for people who think the world rewards effort.”
Dervla wipes grass from her hands and lifts her chin at me like she wants another round just to prove a point.
I oblige.
I feint high. She flinches, then corrects, which tells me she’s already learning faster than most. I go low for her leg. She hops back, loses balance for half a second, and instead of trying to recover pretty, she launches herself at me with all the grace of a pub brawl.
I catch her around the middle, but she drives her forehead toward my face hard enough that if I were slower, I’d be spitting teeth into the lawn. I shift at the last second, and her head clips my jaw.
Pain snaps bright.
“Fuck,” I grunt.
“You’re a fucking menace,” she says, breathless.
“Exactly.”
She comes again. No hesitation now. Her hand slaps mine away when I reach for her wrist. She kicks at my shin, then stamps on my foot, then goes straight for my throat. I block the last one and shove her back by the shoulder, not hard enough to hurt, just enough to make space.
“See? That. Keep stacking problems. Don’t give her one thing to solve.”
Dervla’s chest rises and falls fast. “I think I’ve got this, Roisin doesn’t stand a chance.”
“Arrogance gets people buried,” I say.
Her expression hardens at once. Good. Better that than smug. Smug makes you slow.
“I’m not being arrogant,” she says.
“You are. You think one lesson in the garden means you’re ready to take on someone who grew up in this shit.”
She opens her mouth, probably to bite my head off, but I step in before she can get the words out and sweep her leg. She hits the grass again with a hiss.
“Fuck’s sake.”
I stand over her. “And now you’re on your back with someone over you. What do you do?”
“Kill them.”
“How?”
She stares up at me for half a second, then lashes out with her foot. I shift, but not far enough. Her trainer clips my knee.
She rolls, comes up on one hip, and snatches at my ankle. If I let her get both hands on me, she’ll drag me off balance out of pure spite if nothing else. I step back, but she uses the movement to get to her feet and drives into me again.
That’s the thing about her. Once she decides to commit, she does it properly. That’s why she will win.
I catch her at the waist. She tries to drive a knee up between my legs, and I turn my hips in time to take most of the force out of it.
“Dirty enough for you?” she pants.
“Getting there.”
I pivot and put her down again, but less cleanly this time because she’s already adapting. She twists as she falls, catches my shirt, and nearly drags me with her. I have to plant my weight hard to stay upright.
Declan lets out a low whistle from the patio. “She’s going to take your eye out.”
“Would serve him right,” Aidan says.
Dervla releases my shirt and rolls away before I can catch her again. Smart. She gets to her feet fast, grass on her leggings, hair half coming loose, cheeks flushed. She looks violent. I like it too much.
I circle once. “Again.”
She comes at me without warning. No set-up. No clean line. Just speed and bad intent. Her hand shoots for my throat. I knock it aside, and she instantly changes target, jamming her fingers toward my eyes. I catch her wrist, but that opens me to the kick she sends into my shin.
Pain flashes. Good hit.
I shove her off and nod once. “Better.”
“You say that like you resent it.”
“I do.”
“You’re a terrible teacher.”
“I’m an honest one.”
She snorts and wipes sweat from her upper lip with the back of her hand. “Same thing, apparently.”
“Not even close.”
I move in again, slower this time, forcing her to read me instead of react to speed. “Listen. Roisin might have training. She might have reach, timing, discipline. Great. None of that matters if you make the fight ugly fast enough that she can’t use any of it.”
Dervla nods once, still breathing hard. She’s taking it in. Not pretending. Not posturing. Learning.
“Most trained fighters expect sequence,” I say. “Guard. Step. Counter. Reset. They expect some level of sense. You take that away. You hit, you keep hitting, and if she gets you down, you bite, gouge, stamp, choke, whatever works. Do not stop because it looks bad.”
“Bit barbaric.”
“Yeah.” I shrug. “Works though.”
She stares at me for a second, then comes in low again. I meet her halfway. She slaps my hand aside, drives forward, and when I go to catch her waist, she drops her weight and rams her shoulder into my stomach instead. It isn’t clean, but it is enough to make me shift.
Then she palms my jaw and shoves my face sideways like she’s trying to put me off-line long enough to knee me.
I catch the knee on my thigh and bark out a laugh despite myself.
She glares and swings for my throat. I block, grab her wrist, and she immediately stamps down on my foot and twists free. Good. Very good.
“Time out,” Declan says.
I nod, agreeing. If I don’t, Dervla will wear herself out.
Declan hands her a bottle of water from the fridge, leaving me to get my own. Nice.
I rip the cap off and guzzle it back. “I think you should go now. Get it over with. Sitting around waiting is wasting time and losing ground.” Dervla twists the cap off her bottle and drinks half of it in one go, throat working, chest still rising too fast. Sweat glistens at her hairline.
There is mud on one knee. A grass stain streaks one hip.
She looks like she should after a lesson worth having.
Dangerous. Annoyed. More confident than she was twenty minutes ago.
Aidan studies her as if he’s evaluating a weapons purchase. “He’s right.”
“Shocking,” Declan mutters.
“To the quad then. I just hope she is on campus and doesn’t make me stand around looking like a cunt,” Dervla says.
“If she’s not, she will hear about it. But something tells me she isn’t hiding. She has no reason to,” Declan says.
I smile. “Until now.”