Chapter 12 Lessons
Lessons
Nathan's makeshift gym occupied the second bedroom of his apartment, a space transformed into something between a dojo and a tactical training ground.
Mats covered the floor, a heavy bag hung in one corner, and various equipment lined the walls—pull-up bars, resistance bands, things that spoke of discipline I was still learning to separate from obedience.
"Your stance is too rigid," he said, circling me like I was prey. "You're thinking too much about form, not enough about adapting."
"Gabriel valued precision." The name still tasted bitter, but I was practicing saying it without flinching. Progress, Nathan called it. I called it exposure therapy.
"Gabriel's not here." Nathan feinted left, then swept my legs when I failed to adjust. I hit the mat hard, breath punching out of my lungs. "Real fights are chaos. You have to flow with them."
I rolled to my feet, ignoring the ache in my hip. "Easy for you to say. You weren't programmed to freeze without explicit instructions."
"Then let's deprogram you." He beckoned me forward. "Again."
We'd been at this for two hours. My muscles screamed, sweat soaked through my tank top, and frustration built like pressure in a cracked pipe. Every time I thought I had the technique down, he'd change tactics, forcing me to think instead of just react according to training.
"Stop." I held up a hand. "This isn't working."
"Because you're still waiting for permission to act." He stepped closer, just inside my guard. "You're strong, fast, trained. But you second-guess every instinct."
"Instincts got beaten out of me." I wiped sweat from my eyes. "All I have left are protocols."
"Bullshit." The profanity made me blink. Nathan rarely swore during training, maintaining professional distance that I both appreciated and resented. "You have instincts. I've seen them when you're not thinking. When you saved those women. When you're in bed with—"
"That's different."
"Is it?" He moved closer still, close enough that I could smell his soap beneath the sweat. "Show me what you do when you're not thinking. When it's just about want."
"Nathan..."
"Show me," he repeated, voice dropping to that register that made heat pool in my belly.
Fine. He wanted instinct? I'd give him instinct.
I moved without telegraph, using his proximity against him. Hip throw combined with a leg sweep I'd learned from watching not training. He hit the mat, but I followed him down, knees planted on either side of his hips, hands pinning his wrists.
"Like that?" I asked, breathless for reasons that had nothing to do with exertion.
His eyes darkened. "Exactly like that."
The position was tactical, dominant, but my body had other ideas. Two hours of close-contact training, his hands on me to correct form, his body against mine to demonstrate holds—I was wound tight as piano wire. And from the growing hardness beneath me, he wasn't unaffected either.
"This is how you beat me," I said, rocking slightly against him. "Get me out of my head. Make me want something more than I fear consequences."
"Is it working?" His voice came out rough.
"You tell me." I released his wrists to pull off my tank top, sports bra following. Cool air hit overheated skin, making my nipples tighten. "Still thinking too much?"
"Bunny—" He started to sit up.
I pushed him back down. "No. My turn to teach.
" I leaned forward, hands braced on either side of his head.
"Lesson one: reading micro-expressions. Right now your pupils are dilated, pulse visible at your throat.
Your hands are clenched because you want to touch but think you shouldn't.
Classic arousal markers fighting with perceived propriety. "
"We're supposed to be training."
"We are." I rolled my hips, drawing a hiss from him. "You're teaching me to trust my instincts. I'm teaching you to read the person beneath the training." I straightened, hands going to the waistband of my shorts. "Want to know a secret?"
He nodded, eyes tracking my movements.
"Didn't wear anything underneath." I lifted just enough to shimmy the shorts down, proving my point. "Instinct told me training might become something else. Old me would have ignored it, added layers for protection. New me decided to see what happened."
"Fuck." His hands found my hips, not pulling me down but not pushing away either. "You're going to be the death of me."
"Small death," I echoed our previous conversation. "You'll recover."
I reached between us, finding him hard and ready through his sweatpants. A few tugs freed him, and I positioned myself carefully, letting the head brush where I was already wet and aching.
"This okay?" I asked, needing to hear it.
"More than okay." His thumbs stroked my hipbones. "But only if you're sure. Only if this is what you want, not what you think—"
I sank down, cutting off his words with action. We both groaned at the stretch, the fullness, the perfect friction of coming together. I stayed still for a moment, adjusting to the invasion that felt nothing like violation.
"You're not broken," Nathan said, voice wrecked. "You're feral. Difference is, broken means damaged. Feral means wild. Untamed." His hands tightened on my hips. "I like feral."
Something cracked open in my chest at the words. I started moving, slow at first, then finding rhythm. His hands guided but didn't control, letting me set pace and depth. The power of it went to my head like whiskey.
"Lesson two," I managed between gasps. "Body language. You bite your lip when you're close. Right fist clenches tighter than left. Your breathing goes shallow then deep just before—"
He surged up, capturing my mouth in a kiss that derailed all thought. I'd never initiated kissing during sex before, too vulnerable, too intimate. But now I chased his tongue with mine, nipped at his lower lip, claimed his mouth like I was claiming his body.
When we broke apart, I didn't stop moving. If anything, I rode him harder, chasing something more than physical release. His hands mapped my body like territory to memorize—the curve of breast, the dip of waist, the flex of thighs working to take him deeper.
"So fucking beautiful," he said against my throat. "So strong. Look at you, taking what you want. Using me for your pleasure."
"Not using." I had to correct that, make him understand. "Sharing. Want—need you to feel good too."
"I am. Christ, Bunny, never felt anything like you."
I believed him. Could read the truth in how his body tensed beneath mine, how his fingers dug into my hips hard enough to bruise, how he fought not to thrust up and take control. He was letting me lead, letting me learn what I liked when choice was mine alone.
"Nathan," I gasped as pressure built to breaking. His name on my lips during sex felt like crossing a bridge I couldn't uncross. "Nathan, please—"
"I've got you." One hand slipped between us, finding that bundle of nerves that made me see stars. "Let go. Want to feel you come on me. Around me. For me."
The combination of friction and his voice shattered my control. I came with a cry that might have been his name, might have been prayer, might have been something altogether new. He followed seconds later, spilling inside me with a groan that I felt in my bones.
I collapsed against his chest, both of us panting like we'd run marathons. His arms came around me, holding loose enough I could move if needed, tight enough I felt anchored.
"That wasn't in the training manual," I said eventually.
His laugh rumbled through me. "Best lessons never are."
I pushed up enough to see his face, suddenly needing to mark him the way he'd marked me. I pressed kisses along his jaw, down his throat, then sucked at the junction of neck and shoulder until he hissed. When I pulled back, a purple bruise was already forming.
"Mine," I said, then froze. Possessiveness was dangerous. Led to obsession, control, all the things I was supposed to be escaping.
"Yours," Nathan agreed easily. "Just like you're mine. Equal possession. Mutual belonging." He traced my cheekbone. "That scare you?"
"Terrifies me," I admitted.
"Good. Real things should." He shifted, still inside me but softening. "Want to try something?"
"What?"
"Lesson three. Trust falls, but horizontal." He guided me to lie fully on his chest, our bodies still connected. "Stay here. Just breathe with me. No agenda, no next move. Just be."
"I don't know how to just be."
"Then learn. That's what we're doing, right? Teaching each other?"
I settled against him, ear over his heart. The steady rhythm should have made me anxious—too vulnerable, too exposed. Instead, it calmed something primal in my brain. Safety, it whispered. Home.
We stayed like that long enough for sweat to cool, for breathing to sync, for the outside world to fade until only this moment existed. When he finally softened enough to slip out, the loss made me whimper.
"Shh," he soothed, reaching for tissues from the gym bag nearby. "I'm not going anywhere."
He cleaned us both with gentle efficiency, then maneuvered us until I was tucked against his side on the mat. Not the most comfortable position, but neither of us seemed inclined to move.
"You're a good teacher," he said eventually.
"You too." I traced patterns on his chest, marveling at the freedom to touch without asking. "Though your methods are unconventional."
"Pot, meet kettle."
"Fair." I pressed a kiss over his heart, then forced myself to sit up. "We should actually train though. Moscow won't care that I'm having personal growth."
"Pragmatic even in afterglow. I lo—" He caught himself, but I heard what he almost said.
"Nathan."
"Sorry. Too soon. I know you're not—"
"I might love you." The words fell out unplanned, terrifying in their honesty. "I don't know what love looks like without ownership. But the way I feel about you, it's... different. Bigger. Scarier."
He sat up slowly, giving me time to retreat if needed. When I didn't, he cupped my face in both hands. "That's enough. More than enough."
"I need you to know," I continued, words tumbling over themselves, "that this might be all I can give for a while. Might being the operative word. Everything's tangled up with… and I can't—"
"Bunny." He kissed me quiet, soft and sure. "I'm not asking for declarations. I'm not Gabriel, needing contracts and certainties. You saying 'might' is bigger than any definite from someone else."
"Why?"
"Because 'might' means you're choosing it. Not programmed, not conditioned, not required. Choosing." He rested his forehead against mine. "That's everything."
We stayed there for a moment, breathing the same air, existing in the space between might and will. Then, because life didn't stop for emotional revelations, we got dressed and returned to actual training.
The rest of the session was different though. I moved with more confidence, trusting my body to know what to do. Nathan adjusted his teaching, less instruction and more guided discovery. We flowed between defense and offense, teacher and student, predator and prey.
"Better," he said after I successfully countered a grab that would have frozen me that morning. "You're not thinking, just responding."
"Turns out my instincts aren't as dead as I thought."
"No, just buried." He reset for another round. "We'll keep digging them out."
"Nathan?" I dropped into ready stance. "Thank you."
"For what?"
"For seeing feral where everyone else saw broken."
His smile was answer enough.
We trained until our muscles screamed and exhaustion made our techniques sloppy. When we finally called it, I was drenched in fresh sweat but felt cleaner than I had in years. Not fixed—I doubted I'd ever be fully fixed—but healing. Learning. Becoming.
In the shower afterward (his bathroom, water hot enough to steam mirrors), I catalogued new bruises alongside old scars. Battle marks and love marks existing on the same canvas. The poetry of it might have made me laugh if I wasn't so tired.
Nathan joined me, washing my hair with careful hands while I leaned against his chest. Domestic in ways that should have felt suffocating but instead felt like release. Another protocol broken, another chain cut.
"Moscow next week?" he asked as we dried off.
"Have to arrange the contacts first. Make sure they'll see me." I toweled my hair, considering logistics. "Some might refuse. I wasn't exactly popular among subjects."
"Why?"
"Teacher's pet," I said without bitterness. "Gabriel's favorite. His proof that the program worked. They hated me for thriving where they suffered."
"Did you thrive though?"
I paused, really considering. "I survived by convincing myself I was thriving. There's a difference."
"And now?"
"Now?" I looked at him, this man who'd seen me at my worst and still offered love without conditions. "Now I'm learning what actual thriving looks like."
"What does it look like?"
"Like choice. Like trust. Like being feral instead of broken." I moved into his space, bold in ways that surprised us both. "Like teaching and being taught. Like maybe becoming someone who can love without losing herself."
"I'll take those lessons," he said softly.
"Good." I kissed him, quick but thorough. "Because I'm just getting started."
Later, lying in his bed with city lights painting us silver, I thought about lessons learned and yet to come.
In Moscow, I'd face people who knew me before—Batch 47, Gabriel's success story, the rabbit who loved her cage.
They'd expect to find the same hollow girl who confused conditioning for care.
They were in for a surprise.
Nathan's breathing evened out beside me, one arm thrown possessively across my waist. I could have moved it, maintained distance, kept walls between us. Instead, I pressed closer, letting his warmth seep into places that had been cold so long I'd forgotten they could thaw.
"I might love you," I whispered into darkness, practicing the words until they felt less like betrayal and more like beginning.
Tomorrow would bring fresh challenges. Contact with other survivors. Plans within plans. The hunt for Gabriel and whoever bankrolled his obsession.
But tonight, I had this. A man who saw wildness where others saw wreckage. A bed that felt like a sanctuary instead of a trap. A body learning it could feel pleasure without permission.
Lessons in being human. In being free. In being feral.
I was an excellent student when properly motivated.
And Nathan? He was one hell of a teacher.
I smiled against his shoulder, already planning tomorrow's training. He'd taught me to trust my instincts in combat. Time to see what other instincts we could unearth.
The rabbit was learning to bare teeth.
Gabriel should have killed me when he had the chance.