Page 41 of Stella's Christmas Rescue
“I’m glad to hear you say that.”
“It’s sort of like fighting, but to a beat. I get you close to me...” He takes me in his arms and my heart pounds in my chest. Hequietly says, “With dancing, I get to touch you. So, whatever it takes to get you here in my arms. If that’s dancing, so be it.”
I smile up at him, because he’s being sweet. But I can’t stop thinking about everything that’s happened. Blood and glass spring to mind. Then, Kowalski’s face. “Maybe we should get back to the judo.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because I don’t feel safe yet.”
He brushes the hair from my face and pins it behind my ear. “I’ll keep you safe.”
“Jordan,” I am firm when I say his name and that gets his attention, “Do you think I’m ready to face down an attacker?”
He sighs. “Not unless you are very, very lucky.”
“Then, we practice.” I look down at his bulge. “So, put that way.”
He adjusts himself for a second. “Got it. I was thinking about it earlier, you should know how to use a knife.”
“Why a knife?”
“Guns are great, but they work better as a threat than as an actual weapon a lot of the time. They have a very limited range of efficacy.”
I frown. “How do you mean?”
“The only part that works is wherever the bullet lands, and that’s only if it lands successfully.”
I slowly nod and say my thought out loud, “Which is why they work better as a threat.”
“Exactly. And when the first assailant charged in here, if you had a gun, it could have been useful, but only if you got yours out first. Then, when he had you pinned at the sink, a gun wouldn’t have done you any good. A knife, on the other hand, would have been very useful. Plus, it’s easier to keep a knife in your pocket at all times, instead of a gun.”
“I don’t know about that, the broken plate worked pretty good.” I think about it, then nod. “Okay, I get it. But if there was something I could forget about my life so far in Floyd, it’d be how it felt to cut that man.”
He shrugs, “Better that feeling, than the other way around.”
“Good point. How do we practice for that?”
“Wooden spoons and nudity.”
“What?” I laugh.
“Oh, and some ketchup for fake blood.”
He lays out some towels onto the blankets we had used for padding for the hand—to—hand. We paint wooden spoons with ketchup on one side of it, then strip down. “This is one of the strangest ways a man has gotten me naked.”
He laughs. “Well, I didn’t think you’d want ketchup all over your clothes, and I know I don’t want mine messed up like that. So, when you have a knife, you might feel like you have the advantage. But you don’t.”
“Then why learn how to use one?”
Jordan asks, “Simplyhavinga knife does not give you the advantage. You have to know how to use it. Pretend the wooden spoon is a single-sided knife. The ketchup is the sharp side, the clean side is the dull side. Hold the spoon end in your hand, that’s the handle. Then put the clean side against your forearm, like this, so the ketchup side is out and facing me. Your strongest attack…” we practice for a long time before we’re both covered in ketchup. “God help anyone who attacks you when you have a knife.”
I laugh. “You think?”
“Yeah, you’re a natural.” He smiles and takes me in his arms. The ketchup scent is heavy in the air and our naked bodies are slick and sticky with it. My skin prickles with his heat. He asks, “Think maybe we could shower all this off?”
I ask, “Together?”
“Mm, hmm.”
