Page 136 of Star Bringer
That doesn’t sound like much fun. I’ve already mastered the groin kick, after all, so I was hoping for something more advanced. “Can I have a laser pistol?”
“Hell no.” He actually blanches.
I hadn’t actually expected him to say yes. “How about a knife?” I tease. After what happened on Glacea, I suspect the idea of me with any sort of weapon makes Ian extremely nervous.
“Maybe later.” He winces. “A lot later.”
“I’ll give you a weapon, Kali,” Max calls to me.
I shoot him a wide grin, which he responds to with a wink and a smile of his own.
“Spoilsport,” I tease Ian. “So how do I defend myself without a weapon?”
“You need to strategically pick where you hit.” I have a flashback to Ian sticking his thumbs in that man’s eyes on Askkandia. The horrible wet noise they made as they popped. Ugh. I’ll never forget it, but I’m not sure I could ever do that. Even if my life depended on it. Surely there are other places to try.
“Okay, so show me where you’re vulnerable,” I tell him.
He smirks. “No such place. But in general, throat, solar plexus, and eyes, in addition to your favorite, the crotch. A hard hit in any of those areas might give you the chance to run away.”
“I don’t want to run away. I want to be able to stop them.”
“You mean kill them?” He studies me for a moment, head cocked to one side. “I’m not sure you have it in you to be a killer, Princess.”
I hear a snort from the edge of the room. Beckett. I ignore her.
“Not necessarily kill,” I say, because I’m not sure I’ve got that in me, either. “But incapacitate, so they can’t chase after me or anyone who’s with me.”
“Let’s concentrate on keeping you alive first,” Ian answers. “Then we’ll worry about you ‘stopping’ people. So, if I come at you from the front—”
He moves toward me and grabs my shoulders. I twist away, and he lets me go, just like that.
“Good—” he starts, but I cut him off with a frown.
“Why do I get the feeling that you’re not giving this all you’ve got?” I ask. “Come on, Ian. How can I learn if you don’t take it seriously?”
“If I give it all I’ve got, then you’re dead, Princess.”
He makes a fair point. “Okay, then. How about we start by you taking off the kid gloves? I’m not so fragile that you have to worry about breaking me.”
“Says the woman who just got shot,” he mutters to himself. But he must take my words to heart, because the next time he comes for me, he moves superfast.
He grabs my arm, pulling me toward him with a quick spin that ends with his arm around my throat. Panic crawls through me as his grip tightens and my air supply becomes a lot more restricted.
Part of me knows very well that he won’t hurt me—but it’s not the same part that has a vise around her throat. That part is freaking out, my hand coming up to claw at his arm in an effort to give myself just a little more space.
“Come on, Princess,” he taunts. “You’ve got maybe thirty seconds before you pass out. What are you going to do?”
I try to pull away, but he’s not budging. I stamp on his foot, and he laughs close to my ear.
“Ten seconds,” he murmurs. My vision is going dark.
I try to stab him in the solar plexus with my elbow, but it hardly even connects.
Finally, he releases me and steps back. “That’s the problem. You’ll never be a match for someone bigger and stronger who wants to hurt you.”
The smug look on his face makes me want to wipe it off.
“That’s not necessarily true,” Max tells him. “I’ve seen Milla take on guys nearly twice her size and beat the shit out of them.”
