Mia Regina (#1)

Chapter 12: Teach Me

"Okay. It hurts," I whimpered and tapped his arm to let go. His strong, tight headlock was breathtaking in a bad sense.

          "C'mon, love. That was nothing. You need to harden up. I can't have you chickening out every day now," he huffed as he let go and crossed his arms across his chest. "That's why I'm teaching you how to fight. If I go easy on you then you'll never be strong enough. I need you to be strong and smart enough to take me down."

"Take you down?" My brows rose as I panted for air that his moves knocked out of my lungs.

"I'm very strong if you haven't noticed," he motioned to himself rather smugly which made me scoff in return. "And I need you to be strong enough to take down a man like me when they come after you again. You never know what you'll encounter, so you have to be prepared for anything. Understood?"

I nodded in acknowledgement and let out a puff of air. "Fine! Teach me. Harden me up. Do whatever it takes to do so. I'm putty in your hands. Mold me anyway you like."

"That's like a good girl." A mischievous grin formed on his prefect, smooth lips. He lightly grabbed me by my wrist and dragged me out of the sweaty, steamy room and into a huge shooting range studio that was accessed through the double doors in the corner.

From what I comprehended, this place was a massive playground for people to fight and shoot to perfect themselves in those fields. But I never encountered anyone here except for Leo and Mike in the past three days of my training. Leo supposedly told all of his men that he was handling some 'business'. I guess he was embarrassed to tell them that he was teaching a girl how to fight.

"Let's see if your hand can still get prefect shots," he said as we stood in a large booth.

          On my first day, I got perfect hits on the realistic looking dummies. Perfect damn headshots. I was extremely surprised at my supposed skill and so was Leo. I guess I can thank my papa for that maybe. When I was little, papa used to take me out to shoot soda cans in the backyard and I always hit them while Ashton struggled. He even cried out of failure once which made laugh every time I thought of it. Now they were all just precious memories. So, I guess that helped with these perfect headshots. To be honest, throwing paper balls in the trash cans in high school also helped to an extent.

Leo snaked his hands along my forearm to my hands that held the gun aiming at the dummy's head. His body was compressed against mine. I could feel the perfect ridges of his abs on my back through his black v-neck shirt. This sudden distraction wasn't good, but it felt good.

"How about we try the heart this time?" He whispered softly behind my ear forcing chills to run down my spine. Suddenly, my breath hitched in my throat unable to release itself from the constricting hold.

"O-Okay," I stuttered out.

"Does shooting the heart make you that nervous or is it because I'm too close?" I could sense the smug expression on his face that I've seen quite a few times in the previous training days.

"Shut up," I nudged him and aimed for the heart. Once I knew I had the right spot, I pulled the trigger.

"Perfect!" Leo declared as he pulled away from me with an expression of success on his chiseled features. "That's a perfect shot too. I didn't even have to teach you how to aim for the right spot. Guess you'll do good under pressure."

"Well, you did teach me how to hold a gun and how my body language should be. So, I have to give you a little credit."

"It's all you, love. All you. You do better than some of my lousy men. Are you sure you haven't had any training?" He smirked at me, staring into my eyes and then cleared his throat as he looked away from me pulling out his phone from his brown shorts.