“Well, congratulations,” Adam said. “You just earned yourself the title of boxing coach. I want Davis trained ASAP. Set up a schedule and add it to his curriculum. Get Becca to help until your shoulder’s healed, and tell Cody to get him on the mat. Start with grappling basics, but include weapons retention. No point in him having a gun if he can’t hang onto it in a fight.”
“Do we transition him to his left on the pistol as well?” Grant asked. “If he’s a southpaw, he might be naturally left-eye dominant.”
Adam shook his head. “Run him through the range until he can hit center target at a hundred yards with both hands. I want him doing left and right dry-fire drills, weapon transitions, speed reloading, and malfunction clearing until he can do it in his sleep. And get him on a rifle. When he’s comfortable, I’ll come in and train him on the scope.”
“Jesus.” Grant swung his gaze from Davis to Adam. “Looking to create a little ambidextrous mini-you?”
“Fuck no. To survive what’s coming, he’ll need to be better than all of us combined.”
The raw reality of what the future potentially held, and what it meant for Davis and like-minded young adults around the country, sucker punched Jay in the stomach. There were only two sides to the upcoming fight, and both were going to be on the losing end of a bloody battle.
“I have some calls to make.” Adam glanced at his watch, then over at Grant, his expression matching his sharp gaze. “Next JTT briefing is in two hours. Make sure you’re there and ready to contribute.”
“I have a physical therapy session scheduled with Eve at four. Do you want me to cancel, or do you want to do it, because either way, one of us won’t make it on time.”
Fully aware of the pain his fiancée could inflict, Adam grinned. “Fine, join us when you’re done, but try to skip out, and you’ll be in a body cast by dinner time. We clear?”
“That depends,” Grant said, shoving his hands in his pockets and stepping in beside Adam to walk him down the hall.
“On?”
“What’s on the menu?”
Adam’s rapid head shake indicated his thoughts on the direction the conversation had taken. “You’re an idiot, Kincaid.” In a hurry, he took off, and Grant had to put some effort into keeping up.
“Yeah, but you love me anyway, right?”
“Not with that face.”
“Hurtful,” he complained, and Jay’s mouth tipped up at the corner. Grant would be fine. Chase would come around. And Madelyn would heal and rejoin her team.
For now, it was all he could ask for—well, that—and twenty minutes alone with Rebecca so he could grovel his way out of the hole he’d dug for himself.
Holy shit, Becca was about to spontaneously combust. For a couple of reasons. Sweat still sliding down the valley between her boobs, she did her best to wipe it away with the fabric of Jay’s sweatshirt without being too obvious about it.
Her body overheating, she had mixed feelings about covering up. On the one hand, it kept Maya’s tattoos out of Jay’s line of sight. On the other, she might land face down on the mats from the significant spike in her core body temperature.
Also, watching him work with Davis on his boxing skills had cranked up the heat in her CPU. Yeah, her pussy had caught fire. All because Jay had stepped in and taken over training the eager teenager.
At first, Davis had started off hesitant, his punches sloppy and off-balance, his weight shifting in a weird way with every shot. Leave it to Jay to figure out the problem in about three seconds flat. A few adjustments to accommodate a southpaw stance, a quick demo using her as a model to show him how to tighten his guard, and he’d already moved past lesson one.
It’d only been fifteen minutes, and already Davis’s confidence and ability had improved significantly. His gloves now landing on the heavy bag with a meaty smack, he no longer pushed at it with weak wrists, but snapped each punch with proper form.
“Again,” Jay said, standing off to the side as he observed. “One-two. Jab, cross. Keep it sharp.”
Davis reset his feet, rolling his shoulders loose before firing off the combination. The jab flicked out first, tight and precise, tagging the bag just enough to set up the cross. The left hand followed—clean, straight down the pipe, his hips and back foot turning with the motion.
“Better.” Jay nodded. “But stay on your toes. You’re going flat-footed between punches. It’s killing your speed.”
Davis dipped his chin, bounced on the balls of his feet, and threw the combo again.
“Good. Now exhale with each shot. You’re still holding your breath.”
A quick learner, he adjusted his stance to accommodate for the swing of the bag, and let out a hard exhale—tss, tss—with each punch. His strikes sounded heavier, his movements became crisper, and Becca couldn’t have been prouder of the progress he’d made.
“Now we’re getting somewhere,” she said, and Jay smirked.
“Hot damn,” Cody added, catching the bag and slowing its momentum. “You got some strength in those arms, D.” He held out his fist, and Davis’s grin was infectious as he tapped glove to knuckles.
