REBECCA'S POV

I woke up feeling tired and had an annoying headache. There's no doubt it was from all the crying I did last night.

Seeing Kirk parked outside of school brought back the memory of how much control he used to have over me. I never wanted to go through that again. Living here with the Bradley's has made me more comfortable than ever before and I had started to forget some of what I've been through.

I realize that Ryan was looking out for me, as always, by suggesting I learn some self-defense with Landon. I agreed wholeheartedly because I feel weak and beaten down. Ryan babies me and treats me like glass but I need to start looking after myself more and not become so dependent on others. I can finally have a mind of my own which is something terrifyingly new to me but I'm so thankful for it.

I broke down last night because I finally understood what Ryan meant when he said we couldn't be together right now. He is by far the most amazing person I have ever met in my life and now that I had discovered how to be my own mind, I hope he can see I will be able to handle a relationship with him.

Although I was extremely tired, my thoughts throughout the night added with my shower and forced me to have a cheery attitude. There's no denying that Ryan is the one for me and I want to prove that I'm good enough for him.

We went through our morning routine except I added in an extra drawstring bag, courtesy of Alex, for my gym clothes I would need after school. Everyone seemed to be in a good mood which only made my day better.

At lunch, Ryan sat extremely close to me so that Melissa couldn't get her claws between us. She did, however, snag the seat right next to Ryan where Mason usually sat and glared at me.

"Hey better me than you," Ryan whispered under his breath.

I grinned at him and ate my sandwich while he and Landon literally talked above my head. Ryan completely ignored Melissa and I was overjoyed. Never missing the looks Mel was sending my way, I thought about how training with Landon would work.

"Hey Landon," I interrupted and the guys laughed.

"Yeah?"

"How am I going to train with you?" He seemed honestly confused.

"What do you mean?" Blushing profusely, I glanced at Ryan before turning back to Landon.

"I mean you're really in shape and I'm not."

"I'm really in shape huh? Are you calling me cute Hanson?" My blush increased tenfold and I felt like you could cook an egg on my face it was so warm.

"N-no. I mean yes you're g-good looking but..." Ryan cut off my stammering with a smirk but it didn't really help with my embarrassment.

"But she has her eyes on a certain gray-eyed Greek God. Specifically, the one sitting to the left of her. Right?"

I didn't respond. I stuffed some of my chips in my mouth and looked down frantically while the two of them had a good laugh at my expense. Once they finally finished making fun of me, Landon answered my question.

"I'm going to act sort of as a personal trainer. We aren't going to do what I usually do because quite honestly, I think you would die."

Still looking at my lunch, I nod to show I heard him and let him get back into his conversation with Ryan. They were talking about this weekend. I heard football, party, and meeting... What?

~~~

The rest of the day flew by quickly until Ryan met me at our shared locker. He could tell I was worrying about Kirk and reliving what happened yesterday.

"Landon is going to walk you out alright? I checked the parking lot on my way here and Kirk isn't there," he said in reassurance. "I'll pick you up from the gym when I'm done with practice." He was about to bolt but paused to wrap his arms around me for just a few seconds. "See you later Becs." And then he was off.

About two minutes later the halls started clearing out and panic set in no matter how hard I tried to hold it off.

"Ready to go?" Landon suddenly appeared next to me and nudged me to start walking instead of waiting for me to answer. I trudged along silently, sticking very close to his side in fear of Kirk suddenly appearing.

When we got to Landon's bike, he handed me the helmet and swung a leg over to steady it enough that I could get on. I wasn't as rushed as yesterday so I realized that we had to sit awfully close together to both fit on this death machine. My entire front-side was mashed up against his back-side, the insides of my legs were pressed against the outside of his, and he wrapped my arms around him causing my hands to become splayed across his abs, which I could feel were very pronounced.

Trying to keep my mind off my current position made the few minutes' drive seem faster. I leapt off the motorcycle almost before it had stopped moving and Landon shot me a strange look. I was about to walk towards the odd warehouse looking gym but his strong arm reached out and pulled be back.

"Becca, you need to stay close to me when we're in there. Do you understand?" His voice was deep and extremely serious so I nodded my head. "Becca, I need you to say that you understand."

"I understand," I said softly and his black eyes somehow became less menacing.

"I'm not trying to scare you but you need to know how serious this is. I got the okay from my boss to bring you here but you need to stay away from the others that go here alright?"

"Okay. I'll stay by you," I said in a stronger voice so he would get that I understood the importance of what he was saying.

Landon let go of my arm but only after he pulled me impossibly close to him. Our sides were practically touching when we walked to the warehouse doors.

The smell of sweat was what hit me first but it was quickly followed by the image of about a dozen unapproachable looking guys punching each other. Several were bleeding somewhere on their bodies and others had old bruises.

"I won't let anything happen to you Becca." Landon's voice was gentler than I had ever heard him speak before and that reason alone made me trust him one hundred percent.

He walked me to a bathroom and waited outside the stall while I changed my clothes. I stepped out wearing one of my t-shirts, Ryan's smallest pair of shorts with the drawstring pulled tight, and my ratty sneakers that were my only pair of shoes. He must have just changed in the open because he now had on gym shorts in place of the dark jeans that were there before.

Landon looked me up and down but didn't mention anything about my odd clothing, he knew that I didn't have much at the moment.

"Ready?" He stated the word more than asked it and once again didn't wait for an answer. Turning to leave, I quickly followed close behind him until we reached a corner of the warehouse gym that had a boxing bag hanging from the ceiling.

"Make a fist," he ordered so I did. "No. Take your thumb out like this." He held up his own massive fist and I noticed the slight bruises he had on his knuckles.

"Becca. Pay attention." I shook my hands out and made a much, much smaller replication of his fist.

"Good. Now punch me."

"Landon! I'm not going to punch you!" I exclaimed when I saw that he was serious. He rolled his eyes and held out a hand in front of my fist.

"Punch me." I did as he said but didn't try all that hard. "Becca come on. Punch me!" His voice was progressively becoming louder and more menacing.

"I don't want to hurt you!" All the fright I just felt left when he burst out laughing. I'd never heard him do that before.

"You aren't going to hurt me. For Christ sakes Becca just punch my hand." I punch it a little harder than the first time.

"Harder." I did. "Harder." I did. "Becca harder."

That's when I didn't hold back anymore and threw my fist forward with as much strength as I could muster from my tiny arms. Still, his hand remained straight. It didn't even move from the impact of my hand at all! I was about to throw another one but Landon chuckled and grasped my fist gently.

"Okay relax Rambo. You need to draw power from your whole body and not just your arm. Even if I punched with just my arm it wouldn't do much damage. Watch." He turned towards the boxing bag and explained what he was doing.

"This is just my arm," he said before fist hit the bag. It flew forward a lot harder than I could have done so I was impressed, until he spoke again. "This is if I use my whole body." He crouched a little and spread his legs to have a wider stance. The form of the punch was completely different and this time, when his fist collided with the bag, it swung back with an insane amount of force. "Understand?"

I stood there gawking in amazement before quickly nodding my head. It was somewhat intimidating to know how strong Landon really was.

"Alright so come over here and get in this stance." I walked closer to the punching bag and tried to copy what he was doing.

"No," he said before reaching out to pat my inner thighs. "You need to widen your stance here and bend slightly at the knees." I did what he said, not offended when he grabbed my body and moved me to the correct position. His hands found my hips and he turned them slightly away from the bag and said: "You need to have range of movement throughout your hips and waist to enable the strength of your legs to help your punch."

Landon used his body to show me the movement he was talking about and I mimicked him.

"Alright. Now show me what you got."

~~~

An hour later I was sweating like a pig. Landon constantly had me jumping around, throwing punches, doing sit ups, and almost anything else you can think of. He kindly let me borrow his sweat towel since he didn't need it before walking me outside the smelly warehouse.

"You did good Becca," he stated matter-of-factly and shot me a small grin. "There's a lot we have to do yet but we have time."

I saw Ryan's truck pull into the lot so Landon helped me grab all my bags I had dropped on the pavement. I really didn't have the strength to sit and hold them while I was waiting. He also opened the truck door for me.

"Remember to take a cold shower or your muscles will start aching sooner. Save the hot water for tomorrow alright?" I nodded in response and waved goodbye when he slammed the door shut.

"How was it?" Ryan asked immediately.

"Interesting," I said and leaned my head back against the seat.

"Alex and I decided we're going to grab something to eat but you clearly need to shower first," he joked and plugged his nose with his free hand.

"Shut up." I slapped his arm playfully and laughed.

All of us decided on what to eat the rest of the way home and took turns to shower before heading out to the diner for some burgers.