Page 124 of Santa Daddy
Pride and terror warred in my chest.
But she was right. If this was our last stand, she deserved the tools to make someone bleed first.
We started with the gun.
She fumbled at first—grip a little off, stance too rigid. I stepped behind her, close enough to feel the warmth of her back against my chest, and wrapped my hands around hers, adjusting finger placement, fixing her sight line.
“Breathe out on the trigger pull,” I murmured into her ear. “Don’t fight the recoil. Let it surprise you.”
The first shot went wide, kicking snow off a low branch.
The second hit paper just outside the center ring of the crude target I’d nailed to a pine. By the fifth, she was grouping inside center-mass tight enough to make any instructor nod.
“She’s a natural,” I thought. God help anyone who thought she was just decoration.
“Self-defense,” I said, holstering the pistol and stepping in front of her. “If someone grabs you from behind?—”
I demonstrated, arm sliding around her throat in a loose choke.
Her elbow drove back into my ribs with enough force to bruise. She twisted, stomped down at my foot, and brought her knee up toward my groin with lethal intent.
I blocked it because I saw it coming.
If I hadn’t, I’d have been on the floor.
“Fast learner, indeed,” I said, a laugh catching in my throat.
Our practice blurred.
One second, I was correcting the angle of her elbow. The next, I was pinned against the wall, her breath hot on my mouth, cheeks flushed from exertion, eyes dark and bright all at once.
“Is this part of the lesson?” she asked, voice low and rough.
“No,” I said honestly. “This is me losing my mind.”
I kissed her.
Everything that had been twisting inside me—fear, rage, need—poured into the contact. She answered with all of her own, hands fisting in my shirt, pulling me closer even though the movement tugged at my shoulder.
When we broke apart, night had settled fully outside. The fire in the small hearth crackled and spat, painting the cramped room in gold that almost made it feel like a home someone had loved once.
Almost.
We ended up on the sagging couch, weapons still within arm’s reach. She curled against my uninjured side, head tucked under my chin, watching the flames dance.
For a few stolen minutes, it was easy to pretend we were just a couple in a shitty cabin with a broken heater, not two marks waiting for execution.
“Konstantin,” she said quietly.
“Mmm?” I traced my fingers along her forearm, over small nicks and bruises that made my blood simmer.
“I love you,” she said.
The words hit harder than any bullet ever had.
Not because I hadn’t seen it building in her eyes. I had. But hearing it… made it real in a way nothing else could.
She loves me.
