Eternal [HS]

Chapter Twelve

His hands are wrapped firmly around both of her wrists and pinning them to the mat above her head. The cold sensation of his rings digging into her skin is enough to send chills down the length of her body, but she's too preoccupied with the insurmountable task of escaping his hold to linger on it for too long.

She wiggles beneath him with all of her strength, limited in comparison to him, but still impressive considering her lack of skill and exercising, to no avail.

"I can't," she huffs.

He digs into her harder now, laying the pressure on thick this time, and she can feel her chest expanding against his with every inhale with no space to go.

"Y'can, you just need to know the right technique to throw off someone bigger than you," he says, all while fighting off her pathetic kicks and aimless flails with ease, "If y'move your waist and spine, the rest of your body moves too. It won't take much strength to push me off if you do it the right way."

Their bodies press too tightly together for her to do anything productive without specific instructions, and she grunts with the effort it takes to even move him an inch off of her. Her waist twists in his direction to throw him off to her right side, but it isn't working correctly, and he has to stop to correct her.

One of his hands abandons where it was pinning down her wrist while the other compensates for it, wrapping around both of her wrists to keep her trapped with ease. The free hand slips down between their flush bodies until it reaches her left hip and settles there with a confident grasp as if he's done it a million times.

"Like this," he says, using his hand to demonstrate the proper technique.

His fingers dig into the skin at the southernmost point of her back, so low he's almost grabbing her ass, and twists her hips into him with a swift, sharp movement. She can feel it working in how he jolts back a little every time he demonstrates for her. He was right, it doesn't take much force. Granted, he's helping her out right now and this is only practice, but it's working exactly how he said it would.

"Try to throw me off of you."

She relaxes against the mat, takes a deep breath, and tries to remember the exact movement he guided her through.

It's hard for her to concentrate when he's so close to her. She'd like to pretend it isn't true, but he makes her mind feel muddled and hazy when he's near. Similar to how it felt when he was pressed up against her in the bathroom at the dinner party, the feeling of him on top of her makes everything else seem inconsequential, which isn't what you want while trying to learn self-defense.

"What do I get if I succeed?" she asks, angling her head to the side in curiosity, though it must look weird from his perspective.

Both he and the mat are as cold as ice on either side of her, but she isn't cold anymore, not with the indecent thoughts now coursing through her mind against her wishes. It's somewhat infuriating. Despite her efforts to hate his initial attitude that she didn't understand was a clue to what she would later discover about him, she doesn't, and that is what makes her resent him.

"You'll get the satisfaction of not dying the next time someone tries to kill you."

It isn't anything about him, it's the feeling she gets whenever he's with her that angers her so much. He hasn't done anything wrong, even when he tried to prevent her from seeing Adeline at the party last week, and she can't figure out why she feels so annoyed with him if he hasn't done her wrong.

Her eyes are set with determination.

"How about this," she says, "I know I'll be able to flip you over, but if I can pin you, you have to answer a question I've been wanting to ask since the dinner party."