Playing Criminal

46 - Derek

The next few days were sufficiently awkward.

I blushed, thinking about all the awkward encounter’s I’d had while being led around the Widow complex by Derek.

Though he should’ve had more important things to do, Derek insisted on re-training me himself. I was a puppy on a leash to him for the weeks following my acceptance into the Widows.

However, being chained to him certainly didn’t make it any less awkward when I bumped into Caden a week or so into training…

I grimaced thinking of the incident….

“Oh,” I gasped as I ran into a half-naked sweaty Caden as Derek led me into the complex’s gym.

As Derek had explained the complex was mainly underground in an older part of the city. Since people still lived in the squalid buildings above and since those people were threatened thoroughly into silence, the Widows were able to remain wholly undetected from the law.

However, the compactness of the Widow community at the main headquarters made awkward encounters like this a given.

It was a normal day with Derek at the punching bag, and I was sweating like a sinner in church. Panting and feeling my entire body throb collectively, Derek let me grab a sip of water.

However, as I turned around, wiping my sweaty eyes with a towel, I walked straight into someone’s chest.

“I’m so-“ I began, but then cut myself off as I gazed up, mouth agape, at Caden.

“Nice to see you.” Caden smiled down at me, while I tried my best not to look at the drops of sweat trailing down his chest.

Biting my lip, I nodded and turned away quickly not even caring what Derek had to say about it.

“Hey,” Derked jerked me back into him by grasping onto my forearm just as I had turned around the corner.

“Caden did you a favor you know, and you can’t avoid him forever- especially in this place.”
Derek eyed me warily as if he expected me to try and escape or defy him in some way.

However, I’d learned my lessons around the Widows and kept my mouth shut. Right now I was being treated so well, I hardly felt like a captive (even though I knew I was here against my will). And, since I was being treated so well, I didn’t want to do anything to screw this up.
If Derek was going to play nice cop, I wasn’t going to do anything to interfere with that.

“Sure,” I mumbled, keeping my eyes on the floor.

“Come on, let’s try another round,” Derek eyed my, mouth taut as he regained his position behind the punching bag.

Mad at myself and mad at Caden, I threw all my weight into my punches until my knuckles were so raw the skin there began peeling away.

After one particularly painful punch, I let out a small gasp and Derek’s concentrated gaze turned even more steely.

“Show me the hand.” He commanded.

Nodding limply, I extended my hand to him.

He pursed his lips, noting the places where drops of blood were beginning to pool.

“You need to be more careful. You need these hands.” He gazed into my eyes with such intensity my breath caught in my throat. I couldn’t say a word even as he brought out tape and proceeded to bandage them up himself.