Bonded

Chapter 12

I ducked as Jacob swung his fist at me, full force. Staying on the balls of my feet, I took three quick steps under his arm before turning to face him again. He looked at me, focused, careful, his fists up. We danced a bit, him taking steps forward, me taking steps back. He swung again with his left hand; I blocked with my left. He jabbed with his right; I dodged my head before it could connect. I tried to remember the defensive techniques I had been learning. Little hairs matted themselves to my forehead, I was sweating hard. He spun around, swinging his leg. The blow connected to the side of my bare abdomen.

"Ugh," I groaned, keeling over for a second. I only had a second to react before he was charging me. I stepped to the side, out of his way before spinning myself around to face him. I aimed for his shoulders, his chest, and his abdomen, him blocking every shot. My eyes shot down at my blocked jab before grabbing his wrists.

"Keep your eyes up, Leah," Paul instructed.

With Jacob's wrists in my hands, I swept my leg to knock him down. He jumped up, turned himself around breaking himself free of my grip. He wrapped his arms around my body, locking my arms to my side. I jabbed him in the stomach with my elbow, feeling him lose air. I whirled around to face him.

"Expand, Leah, now!" Paul shouted.

I held up my fists, jumping lightly on my feet. Jacob locked eyes with me, predatory and playful. I swung my fist with a grunt, aiming for the side of his head. He ducked, charging for my midsection. I jumped to the side, pushing him away. Jacob pulled a roundhouse kick, growling loudly. I, quickly, grabbed his ankle, twisting it the opposite direction. He then used the momentum from the roundhouse to kick his other leg forward, knocking in my shoulder. I spun around before he could grab me, holding my hands up as we circled each other.

"Black, find her access point. I'm looking right at it," Paul said, evenly.

Jacob swung again. Block. Block. Duck. He chuckled, parrying my punches before grabbing my right wrist with his left hand. He spun me around, holding my arm behind my back and charging me toward a tree. As soon as we were close enough, I hopped one foot then the other, running up the length of it and pushing myself until I was flipping up and over him, landing on my feet behind him. I heard a whoop from behind me. Breaking free of Jacob's grip, I didn't have enough time to react before his hand was wrapped around my throat and he was throwing me toward the ground. Before I could make a full impact, Jacob placed a hand on my lower back, gently lowering me into the grass. "Shit!" I cursed. "You cheated!" I swatted at the hand around my neck and scowled.

"I didn't cheat. I'm just better than you, Clearwater." He winked at me before offering me a hand to lift me up. I grabbed it and grunted as he pulled me up. Jacob placed a small kiss on my lips as I heard the other wolves clapping and cheering for us.

We had been training for the past couple of months, in wolf form and human form. It was the best way to understand our bodies, our reflexes, and what we could possibly do in case of any kind of emergency. Jacob and I asked Paul if he could help us train because, before he was a wolf, he took up boxing and MMA to work on his anger issues. He was a really good teacher. Paul had the patience to practice with us and watch and critique our sparring matches.

Since the date, Jacob, Sam, and I started to get serious about making the pack a united front. The boys had started helping out with the renovations on the old Alpha house. Jacob felt that it would be best served as a working space where we could have pack meetings and also give us all a place to chill and relax. So, I guess, it really was turning out to be a playhouse/clubhouse type deal. Jared and Embry helped to repair the floors, I had the imprints come and help repaint. I even made it so one of the rooms was good for the high school pups to do homework. We got authorization to put down some trees so we could make a backyard behind Kaya's house and to make an easier path from the reservation to the house.