Page 106 of Without a Trace
Didn’t know that after my dad died, my mom shoved me into a dingy martial arts gym with cracked mirrors and too-loud fluorescent lights. Said it would teach me control. Discipline. Balance.
It didn’t.
It just taught me how to strike first.
Rhett stepped in.
He didn’t hold back.
Neither did I.
We danced in heat and tension. I caught a hit to the ribs that knocked my breath sideways, but I landed a clean right hook that made his head snap like a whip.
“Fuck,” he muttered, stumbling back with a grin.
Kane whistled low.
Zeke stayed silent. Watching everything. Calculating.
My chest burned, lungs scraping against the inside of my ribs, but I held my ground. Felt the sweat drip down the curve of my spine.
“Switch,” Zeke called.
Kane rolled his shoulders and stepped in. Taller than Rhett, broader too. Less finesse. More power.
He went for my left side—I dropped, pivoted, used his momentum against him. Came up swinging.
He blocked, laughing. “You’ve been holding out on us?”
I backed off just enough to breathe. “You didn’t ask.”
He feinted. I dodged. He almost took me down with a sweep, but I caught myself at the last second—shoes digging into the thick sand.
“Not bad,” he said, panting a little now.
“Don’t patronize me,” I snapped, chest heaving.
His grin sharpened. “Wouldn’t dream of it.”
The sun beat down harder. Salt air stuck to my skin.
Kane stepped out of the circle, breath ragged. I spit sand and pushed sweaty hair off my face.
Then I heard them—boots on packed earth, slow and deliberate.
Trace and Alden appeared through the trees, shirtless and sun-drenched, the kind of reckless beauty that shouldn’t be allowed this close to danger. Muscles taut. Eyes unreadable. Shadows where their secrets lived.
They didn’t announce themselves.
Didn’t need to.
I kept my body loose, my fists up—but my pulse kicked hard.
Not because I was intimidated.
Because even sweat-soaked and bruised, I wanted them to see it.
See me.
