Surveillance

Chapter 25

"Again."

You laid flat on your back on the mat in the gym, groaning at the pain in your back as you rolled over on your side to sit up. Catalina and Marissa were watching on the side, both worried and excited as they watched you train with Natasha.

"Come on, get up," Natasha motioned to you. You groaned as you got to your feet. As you stood, you looked at her with tired eyes and mumbled, "This was your idea, you know."

She shrugged, "Yeah, but you agreed, so up."

You huffed and stood to your feet, falling back into stance as you got ready to get into another round with the trained assassin. When she came at you, you blocked her first punch and just focused on blocking. At some point, she made you go to hit her, but as you went to strike her, she dodged your attack and struck you instead.

You were thankful she was going easy on you in that moment because the hit had already hurt enough. You formed a T with your hands as you gasped, "Timeout, timeout."

She rolled her eyes and laughed, crossing her arms over her chest as you sat down on the mat, your legs splayed out before you and your hands propping yourself up behind you. She pat her leg and Scout, from the side of the two girls watching, came over as Natasha bent down to pet her.

"Your girl is a wimp, Scout," Natasha said to the dog, who barked in response with her tongue hanging out of her mouth.

"Hey! That's mean. Don't be mean," you told her, fanning yourself with your hands.

"See what I mean?" she commented, jabbing her thumb in your direction while Scout made a noise of agreement.

"Let me get this straight," Catalina said as she drew Natasha's attention to them. "You're going to teach us to fight?"

Natasha shrugged as she moved to go sit with the girls, you eventually following after as you took the other side of them. "I'm going to teach you to defend yourself," Natasha corrected. "You two have no reason to fight, but every woman should know how to defend herself."

"So..." Marissa muttered, "No throwing punches?"

Natasha sighed and let a smile slip onto her lips, "Maybe if I run out of blocks to teach you." She nudged Marissa's arm, and the girl smiled at her.

You drank some of your water and then motioned to the mat, "If either one of you want to take over, be my guest. I need a break." You mumbled that last one to yourself and everyone laughed in response before Catalina eagerly stood, her gloves wrapped around her hands securely. "I want to go first."

You nudged Marissa, "You okay with that?"

She nodded, "Yeah, I want to watch a little more before I try it."

"Fine with me. Come on, Cat," Natasha said as the two advanced to the mat. They started going as Natasha began to teach the girl some moves. You quickly got lost in the way she moved, her swift but fluid and graceful movements almost incomprehensible by how quickly she moved.

She was covered in a light blanket of sweat, she had been training with you for about an hour now. Some of her red hair stuck to her forehead, the rest pulled back in a long braid that kept her hair out of her face.

Despite the time and effort she had been spending training you and the girls, her breath was relatively even and balanced out as she fought and in spaces where she allowed Catalina to catch her breath.

She chanced a look over at you and caught you taking her in, sending a smirk and a wink your way as you quickly turned away, blushing deeply. She silently chuckled before going back to Catalina.