“I’m all in. You know I love to kick some ass, but I have one favor to ask.”
“Anything,” Maggie said excitedly.
“Hunter and Derek are mine. You can have the rest of them, but I want free rein on those two.”
“Deal.”
Maggie and I shook on it and then we ordered another round of beer, drinking the night away with Florrie and the occasional member of Reed Security that walked up. Maggie dropped hints here and there that she wasn’t feeling as strong as she used to and wished she could get her confidence back. By the end of the night, everyone at the bar was eating out of Maggie’s hand.
✯✯✯✯✯
“Knight, we have a problem we need to talk about,” I said, throwing my gym bag on the floor outside the ring. Knight was wrapping his hands and raised an eyebrow at me.
“You want me to set something up for you and Maggie,” he said bluntly.
“How did you-” I huffed out an irritated breath and crossed my arms over my chest.
“Please. Do you think I was born yesterday? The way the three of you were all huddled together at that table and then Maggie kept saying that she didn’t feel strong enough anymore. Who did you think you were fooling?”
“Apparently not you.”
He smirked and shook his head. “Not even a little. So, what exactly do you want from me?”
“I want you to convince Cap that she needs some self-defense lessons. She wants to set up a scene where the three of us are walking out of a nightclub and we’re attacked by the men of Reed Security.”
“And you think the three of you are going to take on all of us?”
I smiled sweetly. “See, I think that Sebastian would be awfully upset if he got even the slightest hint that the men were being too rough on her.”
“You want me to tell them all to take a fall?”
“No, I want you to convince Sebastian that nobody should be too rough on her. It’s not all a lie. She does want to feel empowered again and she can’t do that as long as Sebastian is doing everything for her. Nobody lets her do anything on her own.”
“And what do you get out of this? You and Maggie aren’t exactly chummy.”
“I get to kick Hunter and Derek’s asses. I’ve been promised that much.”
He shook his head and looked up at the ceiling like he was dealing with a crazy person. “If I do this for you-”
“For Maggie,” I interjected.
“No. See, I already know your game. This is a chance for all of you to get to have your fun. You want to play? We play by my rules.”
“And what would those be?”
“First, you’ll have your own little test that you’ll have to overcome during this playtime.” I nodded, knowing exactly what he was talking about. “Second, once you kick Hunter and Derek’s asses, that’s it. This fight is over between the three of you. You let that shit go so that you can finally move on.”
I looked away and rolled my eyes in irritation. I wasn’t sure which rule I hated more. “Anything else?”
“Yeah. One more thing. You get your ass into counseling so that you can finally put this shit behind you.”
“That’s stupid. You can’t put those stipulations on me. This is for Maggie.”
“Is it really? Because I’m sure Maggie could find a way to do this on her own. I think that deep down, you want a crack at everyone at Reed Security.”
“Why would I want that?”
“Because, none of them had to suffer like you do and now they treat you like you’re damaged goods. You’re pissed and you want a shot at them where there are no consequences.”
Damn, he was perceptive. Even I didn’t realize until this minute how true that was. He was right though. I wanted something close to revenge and this was my shot. I shoved out my hand and shook his.
“Deal.”
“Give me a few days to put it together.”
✯✯✯✯✯
“Come on, Lola. Fight it.” Knight’s voice was breaking through the panic, but only enough so that I didn’t go into a complete meltdown. I still couldn’t focus on actually breaking his hold on me. Knight released me and I stumbled forward, resting my hands on my knees as I took in deep, cleansing breaths.
“What the hell are you doing?” Hunter boomed as he walked in the door. “Was it not enough when I had to sedate her last time? Now you’re fucking doing it again?”
“It’s my business and my decision,” I said fiercely.
“Knight, come on, man. You saw it last time. You know this is a mistake.”
Knight crossed his arms over his chest and glared at Hunter. “I’m doing what she asked. I stop when it goes to far. This is what she wants and you need to deal with that.”
“You’re a sadistic fuck. I can’t believe that you’re letting her go through with this,” Hunter spat at him. I was pissed at Hunter right now, but one thing I didn’t want was for him and Knight to get into it. They were friends and they didn’t need to be going at each other’s throats over this.
“Look, Hunter. We’ve got this under control. Don’t take out your anger on Knight. He’s just doing what I asked.”
“Lola-”
“No,” I shouted. “You don’t get a say in this. This is my life and my sanity I’m fighting for. I get to decide how to deal with this. If it goes sideways, it’s not on you.”
“I wasn’t worried about it being on me,” he said sadly. “I was worried about losing my friend.”
He walked away, letting the door slam behind him as he left. I wiped the sweat from my forehead and turned back to Knight.
“You ready to go again?”
He quirked an eyebrow at me and shook his head. “He’s just looking out for you.”
“He’s just trying to tell me what’s best for me. I don’t need a babysitter. What I need is to get better.”
“Alright. Come here.” I walked over to him and turned my back to him. “You have to find a focal point. When your mind starts going crazy, find something that you can focus on and latch onto it. When you start losing it, take deep breaths to calm yourself.”
I nodded and took a deep breath. When he wrapped his arms around me this time, I didn’t panic right away, but when the knife flashed in front of me, I was right back in that room. Knight was yelling at me to focus, but it was hard with the spots dancing in front of my eyes. I gasped for air, taking several deep breaths. I could feel my heart pounding in my chest, but with each deep breath I took, I felt it slow down just a little. I was gaining my control back. I stared ahead at a poster on the far wall. The more I focused on that picture, the more I was able to think about the fact that I needed to get away. I bit down on Knight’s arm and then pushed the knife away from me. I was too terrified to try and do anything else, but I stumbled away from him and fell to the ground, breathing hard as I fought for control.
“That was good,” Knight said proudly. “You wouldn’t get away, but it was one hell of a start.”
When he held out his hand to me, I could tell by the shaking that I was done for the day. “No more today.”
“Tomorrow. We’ll try again.”
I agreed and stayed on the ground, lying down and looking up at the ceiling until I could feel my body coming back to me.
✯✯✯✯✯
We put off the ‘training’ for another two weeks. I talked to Maggie and convinced her that this was something that all the ladies could benefit from. I met with the ladies after work every day and taught them basic self-defense maneuvers that would help them take down any attacker. All the girls were pretty excited to get to do something like this. Maggie, most of all, but I noticed that Alex and Cara also looked especially excited to be getting involved. Hadn’t these assholes ever thought before that something like this would help them to feel stronger? Men, they were so stupid. All they wanted to do was protect us, when really, we needed the tools to be able to take care of ourselves.
“Alright, ladies. Let’s go over those move
s again. When you’re doing them against the guys, remember that they are bigger and stronger than most of us. It won’t be as easy on them.”
Since I already knew all the self-defense moves, I was teaching the class with Florrie. We had twelve women that were involved. Sebastian’s friends’ wives wanted in on the action too, so they joined our little class as well. All of his friends had agreed to be the ‘attackers’ when the time came, so there would be plenty of men to take down.
“Don’t be afraid to use all your strength, Alex. Remember, you have to treat these guys like they really are your attackers. Don’t take it easy on them. They’ve been in enough fights to know how to take care of themselves.”
“I know, but…I won’t have to fight Cole, will I?”
“Not if you don’t want to.”
“I just don’t want to associate him with anything that might make me flip out.”
“I get it,” I reassured Alex. “We’ll be sure to put someone else on you.”
“Nobody touches Sebastian, but me,” Maggie huffed as she took in some deep breaths.
“Are you sure you want to go against him? I think that will piss him off,” Florrie said.
“He needs to see that I’m strong enough to take care of myself, and the only way he’ll see that is if he feels it himself. Otherwise, he’s going to continue to baby me.”
“Okay, how about everyone makes a list of who they do or don’t want to fight and we’ll match it up from there. I can give a list to Sebastian at our meeting. Speaking of which, Florrie and I have to take off in twenty, so let’s get those lists put together now.”
An hour later, Florrie and I were walking into Reed Security and heading for the conference room where Knight had called us all in for this meeting.
“Now that everyone’s here, let’s get down to business. This Saturday, we’re having a special training session.”
A round of groans filled the room and I smirked behind the hand covering my mouth. Knight held up his hand to silence everyone.
“It’s not what you think. After everything that’s happened, some of the women are feeling powerless to say the least. We’ve organized a self-defense class for them and some of the wives of Sebastian’s friends. Florrie and Lola have been working on basic self-defense maneuvers, but now we’re ready to practice those on men that could actually take them down. Now, remember, some of the these women have been terrorized and we don’t want to do anything to make them feel frightened.”
“That’s right. If anyone so much as pulls out one of Maggie’s hairs, I’ll have your ass running drills with Knight for a month,” Sebastian scowled.
Knight rolled his eyes and continued. “We’ll meet here at nine am and go for about an hour. If this works out, we might plan a few more. The last thing we want is for our women to feel defenseless.”
“I’ve got a list of people that they are willing to work with. Some of the women didn’t want to work with someone in particular because of how it might bring up old feelings.”
A lot of the men nodded in understanding. Shmucks. They were all going to be wishing this was over five minutes into the training session.
“I’ll pair you all up and let you know who you’ll be ‘attacking’ on Saturday morning. Once again, I can’t stress enough how important it is to go easy on these women. We want them to feel empowered, not more frightened.”
✯✯✯✯✯
“Let’s get started,” Knight shouted above everyone on Saturday morning. I was loose and ready to go, as were the other women in the group. We were all excited to get to show these alpha males what the women had learned. Maybe they would stop treating us all like we were damaged goods.
“Lola, would you like to demonstrate a few times for the ladies?” Knight smirked at me.
“Sure.” I stood and walked to the front of the room, motioning for Derek to join me. He walked toward me with an eyebrow raised, but came willingly.
“Ladies, I’m going to demonstrate how you can take out someone that is coming at you from the front. Now, Derek is going to come at me.” I motioned him forward and I saw a glint of fear in his eyes. I raised an eyebrow and motioned him forward. He ran toward me full force and I struck out with the heel of my hand, hitting him directly in the nose and sending him backwards. Then I swung my foot as hard as I could into his nuts. He bent forward with a loud groan and collapsed on the floor in a lovely shade of red, breathing like he was in labor.
One of his eyes peeked open and he nodded slightly to me, as if to say that he was giving in. I smiled sweetly and turned back to the girls.
“The heel of your hand is your best bet. Thrust it up hard into his nose. You’ll break it, leaving him disoriented with blurry vision. Then, you take him down once more where it hurts most. Make that kick count. You don’t want him recovering too fast.”
Claire raised her hand high in the air.
“Yes?”
“How long is too fast?”
“He’ll definitely be down long enough for you to get away.”
“But, I mean, when will his functions recover? You know, his manly bits. Because I had this scenario I wanted to try later tonight and I want to know if I have to change my plans.”
“Change your plans,” Derek grunted. He stood slightly and shuffled off to the wall where he sank down in a tight ball.
“One more example before you all begin. Hunter? Would you care to join me?”
He narrowed his eyes at me and slowly shook his head.
“Hunter, don’t be such a baby,” Lucy shouted. “Come on. This is to help us out.”
Hunter shot a death look at his fiancée, but stepped forward.
“Okay, Hunter is going to come at me from behind and wrap his arms around me in a bear hug.”
“No,” he said firmly.
“What’s wrong, Hunter? Are you scared of a woman?”
“Yes,” he said immediately.
The women snickered and jeered until he finally relented and walked up behind me. When he wrapped his arms tightly around me, I dropped my weight down, planting my feet firmly apart and swung back as hard as I could, chopping at his dick with my open hand. His breath huffed out against my neck and his arms loosened enough for me to break free. I swung an elbow back, slamming it into his solar plexes and then finished him off by slamming his face down onto my knee. He dropped immediately to the ground and I grimaced when I saw that I had knocked him out.
“Oops. Well, maybe I took it too far, but that was a great example of how to take a man down. Are you all ready to try?”
The men all stepped back as the women jumped up eagerly.
“Feel better?” Knight asked as he stepped up next to me as Hunter groaned on the ground. I looked down and took a deep cleansing breath.
“Much. Let’s get this shit started.”
Maggie stepped up first to Sebastian. “You ready, Cap?”
“Maggie, I don’t think this is a good idea. You could injure your hand. Those stitches-”
“I don’t have any stitches and my hand has been healed for a while now. It’ll be fine.”
Cap looked at her warily and then to me.
“Cap, you have to go at her full force if she’s going to try this on you. Don’t hold back,” I said sternly.
Cap ran up behind Maggie, grabbing at her right wrist, jerking her back against him. Maggie went with the motion and swung her left elbow back, clipping him in the jaw, but he saw it coming and moved just in time to avoid the full impact.
“Gotta move faster than that, Freckles. An attacker won’t go easy on you,” Sebastian poked at her. He swept her leg out from under her and she fell to her back, but just as he was bending over to attack her, she thrust her foot into the side of his knee. Sebastian wobbled and Maggie thrust her other foot into his groin. When he collapsed to one knee, she gave one final kick to his face, sending him backwards onto the floor.
Maggie stood over him smirking as he held his nuts and face. “Did you mean
something like that, Cap? Or were you going easy on me?” She walked away confidently and the other women started to join in, getting their hits in where they could. Before long, all the members of Reed Security were on the ground, holding onto some part of their body. Mostly their groins. That seemed to be the favorite strike zone of the day.
Arms wrapped around me tightly and I had sensed them coming. What I didn’t anticipate was the knife that was thrust right in front of my face.
“Let’s begin. Should we introduce Lola to some of our games first?”
My breaths came faster and harder as that night flashed in my mind. I could feel the sharp, cool blade being pressed against my forehead. It was practically burning the scar that was already there. I felt vomit rise in my throat as I fought off the waves of panic.
“This line represents where I’m going to cut you with a knife.”
I shook my head violently. I knew this wasn’t real, but the panic was taking over until I couldn’t think straight. I could vaguely see Hunter standing in front of me, yelling something. There was some kind of fight going on in front of me and I tried to focus on that.
I took a deep breath, trying to figure out what to do. This wasn’t real. It was all in my head. I just had to break this hold. I would be okay. Just keep breathing.
“When we’re done, I’m going to peel back your scalp and then Lexie and I will crack that nut open and see what’s inside.”
I screamed as I felt the first cut digging into my scalp. Oh, God. This was really happening all over again. Why wasn’t anyone helping me? Maggie came into my line of vision and I saw her hand with only three fingers. I focused on that. Survival. That’s what it represented. I needed to find a way to survive. I fought against the darkness that was taking over my vision and tried to focus on where the hands around me were. There was one hand clamped across my chest, holding my arms and body to his. The other hand held the knife against my forehead. Think. Think.
Lola: A Reed Security Romance (Reed Security Series Book 8) Page 5