The Ace

Chapter 13 - Pure Gold

Ever since my first day of training, I had been in the gym nonstop.

Ace gave me days to rest, but even then I found myself in the gym since I had nothing else to do. He made sure to walk me through the gym and into the private area in case any men were feeling brave enough to approach (or harass) me and he continued to do so after all of them eventually realized that even a glance in my direction is a risk.

On my sore days, I would do yoga for a while to stretch my muscles and help with my flexibility; other days I would try to build my endurance by doing some cardio training. On the days I would train with Lorenzo - who is practically my personal trainer at this point - I was doing heavy weight lifting to improve my strength.

I became stronger, faster, and for the first time in my life, I didn't have to take a break after walking up one flight of stairs. I enjoyed feeling the progress, but I couldn't stop myself from being eaten by anxiety every time I realized this isn't just for self-improvement and building a healthy lifestyle.

This was all for me to be able to protect myself if necessary. By the looks of it, whatever Ace found out the day I heard the shouts and bangs, it was serious. Every time I asked him about it he would immediately shut down the subject and it drove me crazy.

The days I would train with Ace were getting easier, but just barely. I had shown progress with the knife-throwing, but it wasn't something that came naturally to me, and Ace noticed. For the first time, I was taken to the gun range and whether it was beginner's luck or a gift, I seemed to be pretty good at handling a gun. Most times I would fire, the bullets would go through the outline of the paper body; by no means was I getting clean headshots, but I at least kept hitting the target.

I've seen John Wick maybe a thousand times, but maybe if I watched it a few more...

Yeah, right. My ass it'd be that easy.

Looking outside my bedroom window, the afternoon sky was bright blue against the fresh snow that had fallen last night. I heard a small knock on my door and I turned to see Nick with a mischievous smile on his face.

"Oh, God," I said, "What did you do now?"

"Ew," he said jokingly, scrunching up his nose, "Your lack of enthusiasm is nauseating. Anyway, considering it's December 21st, we're decorating for Christmas and I wanted to see if you'd like to join."

I raised my eyebrows in amusement. "You guys decorate for Christmas around here?"

"Yeah?" He looked at me like I had two heads before adding, "We're in a mafia, Alex, not a fucking satanic cult. Although I wouldn't blame you for thinking that, Ace is kinda..."

"I heard that, asswipe!" Ace shouted from down the hall.

"Just kidding!" Nick shouted back. "I wasn't kidding," he whispered, shaking his head quickly when he turned back to me, "now get your ass up, I wasn't actually giving you the option of not joining, I just wanted to make you feel like you did. Women usually respond better when they don't feel like they're being told what to do."

I laughed and waved him off, "Alright, alright. Just give me a few minutes."

I went out into the spacious family room, seeing that they had already rearranged some of the furniture to make room for the tallest Christmas tree I've ever seen in my life. Fortunately, it was already standing in place, and all we had to do now was decorate.

Ace was sitting on the couch, staring at Nick - who was now wearing a Santa hat - who managed to tangle himself in the Christmas lights while trying to untangle them. Lorenzo was off to the side, opening the boxes filled with ornaments and there were a few others I hadn't met before who were sorting through and setting up the stockings.