The Rules of Engagement (Mercer #2)

RoE Chapter One

Chapter one:

“Attack me.”

My eyebrows shot up into my hairline.  “Excuse me?”

Ashton’s smile was all encouragement as he beckoned me towards him.  “Go ahead.  It’s fine.  Just attack me like you would attack someone who’s accosting you in a dark alley.”

I shook my head at him, already concerned for his well being, and I hadn’t even made a move against him yet.  “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“Why not?”

“Because if you were attacking me in an alley, I’d be fighting for my survival.  I don’t really want to hurt you if it’s not necessary.”

His expression became one of amusement.  “It’s okay, think of this as necessary.  And don’t worry about hurting me.  You won’t.”

So say you, I thought uneasily, but he was proving stubborn and wouldn’t let up.  The rest of the class joined in, egging me on and encouraging me to attack him.  Evidently tired of waiting, Ashton tried to goad me into it by lunging at me.

Big.  Mistake.

I reacted on instinct more than anything else, a spike of fear hitting me hard in the chest.  Clumsily dodging his attack, I stepped into him and grabbed a fistful of his hair.  Yanking painfully, I snapped his head back and punched him in the throat.  To finish up, I stomped on his foot, drove my elbow into his gut, and kneed him in the groin.  The whole thing was over before it began.

Ashton didn’t know what hit him.  He was so unprepared for me actually striking him back that he let his guard down completely.  And boy, did it cost him.  He ended up in a gasping, moaning heap at my feet, cupping himself between his legs while he tried to regain the ability to breathe.  His originally neatly styled dark brown hair hung in his eyes, and his pristine white t-shirt wasted no time in collecting stray bits of dust from the hardwood floors.

The class gaped at me in stunned silence.  I opened my mouth to apologise, but caught myself.  After all, he had told me to attack him.  Was it really my fault he was on the ground playing the victim rather than the victor?

“Jesus,” he croaked, finally managing to gain a sitting position.  Grimacing, he looked up at me from where he was on the ground, a hand rubbing at his throat.  “Remind me never to provoke you again.”

I shrugged.  “I don’t like to be touched.”

Truth.

I’d been viciously manhandled too many times not to freak out a little bit whenever someone reached for me without my explicit permission.  Ashton was just lucky he’d tried it while I had an inkling of his intentions. 

“Duly noted,” Ashton said, regaining his feet.  He dusted his hands off on his pants and gave me a sincere smile, his hazel eyes gentle.  “And if that’s how you fight when you’re cornered, I don’t think you have much to learn from me.”

Neither did I.  But then, I hadn’t come to a self defense class voluntarily.  I knew how to incapacitate someone if the situation called for it.  And I’d learned the hard way what happened when you hesitated.

“Alright,” Ashton called, reclaiming everyone’s attention while I moved to lean against the far wall.  He paced in front of the fourteen people standing before him.  “You’re all here tonight because of an unfortunate incident that happened a little over a month ago.  As I understand it, a teacher at Frederickson High School was attacked by a student and hospitalised as a result.”