“Don’t I?”
Whatever Talon found in my glance must have convinced him, because he dropped the pads and lifted his own pair of boxing gloves. “You don’t want me to go easy on you, huh?” he asked, falling into a fighting stance.
The pose came to him so naturally that I almost questioned my decision. Not because I didn’t think I could take him, but because something low in my belly liquified at the sight of his confident power.
No. I wasn’t going to stand here and drool over him like some kind of nitwit. I tugged both boxing gloves onto my hands, one over the damned brace that I often contemplated chucking out the window. “Do your worst.”
He shook his head. “I’m not doing my worst with you. An easy warm-up first, then we can get into light boxing.” I swore I detected a hint of humor in his tone.
I didn’t want to warm up more. I wanted to get rid of all those pesky feelings that continued to multiply in his presence. Didn’t he understand that?
Of course, he didn’t. He barely ever showed so much as a flicker of emotion. In a way that was good. I wasn’t the slightest bit worried that he’d put on a cajoling front and turn on the sweet talk that would bring up horrible memories rather than desire. He wasn’t trying to seduce me. But I still had the urge to provoke him in other ways.
If I pushed hard enough, I could get something from him. He was a man, after all, and even the most stoic ones could be pushed to their breaking points.
I should know.
Rather than starting easy, I swung my left fist with all the intensity I could, and Talon quickly deflected it.
“What kind of cops are you, anyway?” I asked, throwing another punch. I’d either get some information out of him or rile him up. I’d be fine with either outcome. “Living together undercover, breaking all kinds of rules—you’ve got to be some special type. FBI? CIA? Some other string of three letters?”
Talon shook his head. “Just the usual kind.”
“Do you deal with a lot of cases like what happened at my friend’s house? How often do total massacres happen around here anyway?”
He went quiet, and I ducked one of his slower punches, elbowing him hard in the gut when he left a small opening. A burst of air shot out of him, and he clenched his jaw as he jerked back.
“Take it easy,” he said firmly, leaving no room for argument. He clearly didn’t know me as well as he hoped.
I moved in with a swift one-two, ignoring the twinge in my bad hand when he batted it aside—because that gave me a chance to shove my other fist into his stomach.
The glove’s padding muted the impact, but Talon still groaned from the force of the blow. The frustration that blazed in his eyes for just an instant left me a little giddy. One point to me.
“That’s it? You’re just going to ignore my questions?” I said.
Hisblows remained easy, practically mocking, as if he still didn’t believe I could keep up. “There’s nothing to say. You know that we can’t discuss our other cases.”
“Fine, what about this case?” I insisted, bouncing from foot to foot and awaiting another opening. He had his face guarded with ironclad defenses, but his abdomen—the same spot I continued assaulting—couldn’t be defended properly with our height difference. I hit him there again and deflected his returning blow.
Cool. Calm. Collected. I needed to break him out of his careful control.
“No,” he said, and his tone left little room for argument. “It’s classified.”
“Yes, so you all keep saying,” I shot back. “I think you just don’t want to admit how stumped you are. I told you more in that one little trip by the house than the bunch of you had figured out on your own, didn’t I?”
I threw a combination of punches to Talon’s abdomen, looping one around and hitting him in the side. His mouth twitched toward a frown.
“Enough talking,” he demanded, and I knew I was getting somewhere. “This is sparring, not an interrogation.”
“Why can’t it be both?” I taunted, bobbing and weaving around him. “Prove that you’ve figured out anything at all about the people who murdered my friend. Give me some hope that you’re going to find the pricks who did that to her. Do you have any idea what it’s like, seeing someone you care about slaughtered like that? Haven’t you ever given a shit about a single person in your life?”
His eyes flashed again, searing hotter as he glared at me. I’d hit a nerve, a good one, but I wasn’t done. “What, is it because nobody ever loved you? Is that your excuse for being cold as an ice cube—why you can’t be bothered to give me even one ounce of closure? Why the fuck should you care about anyone other than yourself?”
His defenses dropped just a fraction, and I struck. I smacked him hardacross the face, and his head seemed to whip to the side in slow motion.
Then everything sped up to a blur. In a single moment, he shook off his gloves and snatched both my wrists in his hands. He shoved me, and I could do nothing but backstep with him until my back was pressed flush against the cool wall. His body caged me there as he pinned my arms above my head.
The musky scent of his sweat and a feral tang that was all him washed over me. He leaned so close his breath grazed my face. “Give it up,” he snarled, his voice deeper and more threatening. “You’re not getting anything out of me.”