Sins of the Innocent - Jamie McGuire Page 0,40

would be like to see you again.” His jaw worked under his skin, and then he looked up at me.

“Stop being a baby, and hit her!” Claire yelled.

“This brings back memories,” Mom said quietly to Dad.

“Just try,” I said.

“Eden …”

“We don’t have all day!” Claire yelled.

“Okay then,” I said. “We’ll try this a different way.”

I went in for the attack, throwing a punch. Levi bent back, preventing my knuckles from connecting with his face by mere centimeters. He threw a punch, and I stepped to the side. He moved past me, and I spun and kicked his back, forcing him several steps forward.

He turned around, and I frowned.

“You’re not trying,” I said.

I lunged at him again, landing a punch to his mouth, and when he spun, I grabbed him, wrapping my arms around his middle. My back bent, and I let the both of us fall backward. Levi’s head crashed into the cement below. Then I grabbed his ankles before tossing him across the courtyard, and he fell back against Bex.

Bex pushed him back, and Levi stood up, wiping blood from his lip.

He nodded. “Pretty good.”

Claire grabbed him, holding him against the outer wall of our house. “You saw what happened to her last night. Do you want that to happen again? What if you’re distracted? What if you can’t get to her? Do you want her to know what to do to protect herself? Or do you want her to die while she’s waiting on you to save her?”

Levi looked back at me and then nodded to my aunt.

He walked back to the center of the courtyard and took a deep breath. “I’m sorry.”

“You haven’t hit me yet,” I said.

In a blur—faster than Bex, faster than Claire, even faster than my father—Levi attacked. His elbow met my shoulder, nearly sending me to the ground, and then he spun, ramming his foot into the back of my knee. Before I could right myself, he kicked my back, sending me to the soil.

He gave me a moment to stand, and then I shifted my weight, all of my focus being drawn in without effort. My adrenaline replaced thoughts with instinct, and I lunged for him again. I met each of his blows with my own, sometimes taking the full force of his elbow or knee, sometimes knocking him to the ground.

Five minutes went by, and the pace didn’t let up. After ten minutes, the intensity only amplified. Neither of us would let up. We were punching, kicking, spinning, using anything handy to throw or stab or smash.

I stumbled back, holding myself up with my hands on my thighs, heaving.

“Good,” Levi said, spitting a glob of blood on the ground. “That was good. Could be better, but we’ll try again tomorrow.”

“Who taught you how to fight?” Claire asked.

Levi stood up, stretching his back, squinting one eye with the pain. “You pick up a few things when you live among the most evil beings in existence. She’s tougher though,” he said, nodding to me.

“I haven’t seen the”—she held up her finger and moved her arm in a circle—“thing before.”

Levi smiled at me, still breathing hard. “She handled it.”

“What do I”—I took in a couple of breaths—“need to work on?”

“Speed and anticipation mostly,” Levi said. “You’ve been sparring with the same people for too long. You’re surprised too easily, and you’re not sure how to recoup.”

I nodded, putting my hands on my hips. Levi limped over to me, letting me put my arm around his neck. We hobbled together to the house where Mom had set up a makeshift triage in the kitchen.

Mom was more than just unhappy.

But Grandmother was livid. “You couldn’t have spared the sixteenth-century garden bench? Did you have to splinter it across his back?”

“Yes,” I said, grunting as I climbed onto a portable table covered with a plastic sheet.

Levi was on the floor across the room with Dad and Bex.

Claire poured antiseptic over a wound on my ribs, and I sucked in a sharp breath.

“This will be healed by morning,” Claire said, pulling out the gauze and Ace bandages. “Let me see your arm.”

I held it out, revealing a laceration that spanned my forearm from elbow to wrist.

“Oh!” Mom said, looking away and holding her wrist to her nose, keeping her gloved hand sterile. “I saw bone.”

“That might take a little longer,” Claire said.

I leaned over, getting a better look. “It’s not that bad,” I said, watching as the blood poured from the wound onto the plastic on the floor.

“He