Page 54 of Fighting Conviction
“You’re stalling.” He slapped the pads together and turned them to her again. “Now get back in here.”
“Come on, Dev, I didn’t sleep well. A survivor came into Sasha Saves last night right before the store and clinic closed. She agreed to do a rape kit at the hospital so I stayed with her half the night.”
Because Ellie hadn’t slept, she’d had to rush out of the dorm when Dev picked her up. And because she had to rush, she hadn’t had a chance to eat anything but one of Virginia’s weight loss energy bars. Even her skin felt tired.
Dev tilted his head. “I thought you weren’t on call last night.”
Ellie blushed, knowing she was about to get caught. “That’s beside the point.”
“No, no, no.” Dev turned the mitt in a way that let him swipe his hand down his face, pausing to massage his eyes before pointing at Ellie. “We all created schedules to make sure this type of thing didn’t happen because you were spreading yourself too thin. You’re not on call when you have early mornings. That’s the deal. How did you even get to the hospital? Your bike got stolen at the park.”
“Ugh, don’t remind me.” Ellie groaned for what felt like the umpteenth time that training session. She hadn’t even thought about her bike after all the chaos of that night. By the time she remembered and Virginia drove her by to look for it, the bike was gone.
Dev gave her a pointed look, obviously still waiting on her answer. She refrained from groaning one more time and looked away, drinking some water before mumbling, “Don’t get mad at her, but Naomi picked me up.”
“Naomi? If she was available, why didn’t she take care of the call?”
Ellie shook her head as she answered. “Not yet. Naomi’s doing a really great job, but she’s still a brand-new volunteer. I couldn’t leave her there by herself. Besides, she doesn’t work the late shifts and had to leave to pick Thea up. It was just me the rest of the time until the survivor was ready to leave and Nora came to drive me back to my dorm.”
“Well…” His shoulders rose and fell on a deep sigh. “Since you’re not listening to anyone else telling you to slow down, I guess I’ll be the asshole and tell you that you brought this exhaustion” —he scanned her body with the mitt— “on yourself. You guys could’ve called Nora from the start, and you know that. You need to think about what’s best foryousometimes, at least for the fact that an attacker won’t care if you’re tired. He’ll use it against you.”
Ellie grumbled. “This morning I would’ve chosen an attacker over you picking me up and making me work out. This is dang torture.”
When she saw Dev’s smirk grow on his face, she realized it was no use. She’d tried every complaint and excuse in her arsenal over the past month and he never gave her an ounce of leeway. It would’ve been a nice change of pace from how everyone else treated her if she wasn’t so exhausted.
She huffed before finally putting her hands up in a blocking stance. “Fine, let’s do this, then.”
When she pulled her whole focus back on Dev, she bounced lightly on her toes to get her mind back in the zone. Sure, she was struggling from lack of food and sleep. Unfortunately, there was also the added complication that Dev was shirtless. With his abs and pecs staring right back at her, Ellie had almost no chance of paying attention.
God he’s so hot.
“Hell yeah he is.”
Sasha’s voice purred in her mind and she giggled until she noticed Dev narrowing his eyes at her. When he smirked, she bit back an embarrassed groan, knowing what was about to come next.
“Whatcha thinking, there, angel?”
Ellie felt her blush flood her all the way down to her toes. “Leave me alone, Dev.” She’d gotten better at keeping her emotions in check, but with how tired she was, and how Dev already seemed to always know what she was thinking, Ellie wasn’t surprised every lust-filled thought was written all over her face.
A low rumble from Dev erupted into a roar of laughter, making Ellie chuckle too. It’d been a long time since she’d seen him laugh like that. If ever, now that she thought about it. His deep bellow echoed across the gym and Ellie’s grew, too.
Until she realized she had an opening.
She dove in with a left hook, skimming the top of Dev’s mitt as he reflexively brought it up to his head.
“Shit!”
“Look alive, Dev.” Ellie did a little shimmy and started to back away as Dev’s eyes darkened. A mischievous smile widened across his face and sent shocks of anticipation right to her clit.
“Oh, so it’s like that, huh?” He tore off his pads and stepped toward her, an odd determination in his eyes. “Okay, we can play that way.”
“Wh-what’re you doing?” Ellie’s voice wavered, unable to hide the thrill of excitement shooting in every nerve.
“We’ve only practiced with protective gear up until now. Let’s graduate you to some actual hand-to-hand combat. Don’t worry, I’ll go easy at first.” Dev’s slow, lazy steps made her stomach flip and she matched him step for step in the opposite direction.
“Combat? Like actual fighting? So, um, I’m not watching myself in the mirror this time?”
“We’ll be doing more than that, baby.” Dev’s low voice made her core throb. But his slow pursuit hadn’t stopped, and instinct told her she didn’t have time to squeeze her thighs together to ease the ache.
