Chapter 5: Tova Spars

"Again," Tova said.

I got up out of the dirt behind the pump station for the fourth time that morning.

She stood waiting with her hands loose and her weight on the balls of her feet.

I had taken off my jacket and told the cuff to stay dark.

She had said that if I couldn't win a fight without a miracle on my arm, I was going to get everyone killed.

So far I had not won one second of it.

"You lead with your shoulder," she said. "Watch."

She stepped inside my guard, hooked my ankle, and put me on my back with my own weight.

Her knee pinned my chest.

She looked down at me with a strand of black hair stuck to her sweaty forehead.

The scar in her eyebrow pulled when she smiled.

"That's five," she said.

"I'm learning."

"You're bleeding."

I touched my lip and found it split.

She leaned over me, and for a second I thought she'd wipe it.

Instead she kissed it.

It was a hard, angry kiss, all teeth, and her hand fisted in my hair to hold my head in the dirt.

I grabbed the back of her neck and kissed her back as hard as she gave it.

She tasted coffee grounds and sweat.

Her thigh slid between mine.

I felt every curve of her pressed against me, the heat of her coming right through two layers of cloth.

I slid a hand up under her shirt.

Her skin was hot and ridged with old muscle, and my thumb found the underside of her breast.

She made a low sound against my mouth.

Then she tore away and rolled off me, breathing hard.

"That was a mistake," she said.

"It felt like a decision."

"Don't." She got to her feet and brushed off her knees. "I don't sleep with anyone I haven't decided I can trust."

"That's fair."

"And I haven't decided."

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