Trepidation [Book 1]

Chapter 08: broke down

Awful. It's going awful. I don't know what this guy wants me to do because I'm basically a dummy here, and everything he's asking, processes in my brain correctly but I do the wrong thing.

"Oh my Jesus Christ, Francesca you're honestly so frustrating." He says and I giggle as he walks behind me. He runs his fingers down my arms, and butterflies erupting in waves as he slowly wraps them around my wrist. His breathing is slightly uneven but I'm unsure if that's from laughing. "The bag does not feel anything, okay? And the person you're going to be hitting, you are wanting to hurt because they're either going to be mugging you or attacking you."

"I'm sorry but you were the one that called him Jim." I say, turning my head to look at him and his face is dangerously close to mine.

"Every predator has a name, a family, a life, but you're still going to hit them." He says and I sigh, turning around.

"Is it so bad that I am not the violent type?" I ask, hoping this is over.

"I saw you push Matt into so many different things the other day, you can't convince me of that." He says with a smile and I groan, getting back in place.

I don't know why I can't hit the stupid bag. I just know that for some reason, I can't.

"Your feet are perfect, we've got the whole front toe, back heal thing done. You just need to get the courage to actually hit the thing." He murmurs, holding my wrist and putting me in place before moving. Sad, I kind of liked him behind me. Wow, dirty thoughts go away.

Making my first – very sad – attempt at punching the bag, I finally hit it and do a little victory dance making him burst out laughing.

"You're something else, I swear." He says, shaking his head.

"Can't I kick it? I like kicking things." I ask, looking at the kickable bag. Yeah, I could kick that.

"Move out of the way, and I'll show you how to kick it but remember I'm not a kick boxer." He says and I giggle, taking a seat out of the way.

This is fun. I like seeing guys do the work.

My eyes immediately widen when I see him kick it, the heavy-ass bag literally swings from side to side, not stopping when he walks away from. How powerful is this guy?

"Yeah, I can't do that either." I say, crossing my arms.

"Look, I brought you here today so you could have some fun. I have not once seen a sad face of yours whilst you've been here. So if you come out of this amazing at self-defense, that's great but it's just fun, okay? Today at work you didn't look very happy, and you needed some fun. And since you apparently don't want to have sex with me, this is the next option." He says and I smile, lying down on the mats.

"It's not that I won't have sex with you, it's that I won't have sex with anyone." I say and he frowns, towering over me, his legs either side of my body. Well this is a... position.

"Are you a virgin?" He asks and I burst out laughing, like really laughing. "Okay, that's a no."

"No, I'm not. I've just sworn off boys and sex to protect this thing called a heart." I say, pointing to my chest and he raises his brows at me.

"You can still have sex without getting your heart involved." He says, and I scoff shaking my head.

"No, you've got it wrong. Having sex is easy, we could get naked right now and have sex all day with no string attached but who is to say that it would be worth it. In my history the only person that has been relatively good in bed was my ex-boyfriend. All the other guys just want a quick fuck which means no pleasure on my end, and I'm sorry if I want that." I say, and he looks down at me with pity.