Mockingbird (A Stepbrother Romance #2)(12)
I snatch the bokken from the air. It's a sword-sized bundle of wooden lathes bound together with sinew in the shape of a blade. A moment after I catch the sword another one comes singing at my head, the sound of its passing loud and heavy with the skull-cracking threat of a solid hit on my head. I duck out of the way clumsily, almost tripping, and barely get the 'blade' of my own up in time to deflect the next hit.
From then it's a dance. Dad swings, and I finally remember to use the forms I've been studying ever since he took me in after Mom died. The blades go clack clack clack until my hands are sore from taking the ringing impacts of his hits. I never attack, only defend. It's all I can do to keep his strikes off me, much less find an opening of my own. He's been practicing since before I was born. He claims he learned it in Japan. All I know is he's good.
When I think he's about to give me a break he comes at me even harder and I have to awkwardly turn my sword-stick, point down and my wrist at a funny angle, to guard a blow that would probably crack one of my ribs. My grip isn't sure and the whole thing twists out of my hands and then I'm on my knees with the tip of his blade inches from my nose.
He offers me a hand.
"You let your guard down."
"Yeah," I pant, suddenly aware of how freaking tired I am. I bend to pick up the dropped bokken.
"You groan like an old man."
"Sorry."
"Never relax until it's over. Keep your head in the moment. What have I been trying to teach you?"
"Mindfulness."
"That's right. You must live completely in the present moment. People make mistakes, they do things they don't intend to do, because they let their own thoughts distract them. You were thinking about something else."
It's not a statement. He just knows.
"Yeah."
He leans his weapon on his shoulder. "You met the girl?"
The two are connected, and he knows it.
"Yes. Just a quick feeler, like we usually do."
"First impressions?"
"Smart, bold, good looking and doesn't know it."
From his expression I may as well have just read him the weather report.
He sits on the back steps and finally looks winded. "Remember, this is a job. When it's over we're leaving. Don't let yourself get too attached. I know how you are."
I've been hearing that for almost three years now, ever since Leanne. It's a sore spot between us, and he knows it. It was the first time I ever stood up to him, even if it was only temporarily.
"Forms, for an hour. Then get in here. We need to go over the job."
That means solo practice. Slowly, at first, I step through the formalized motions, like a pre-recorded series of dance moves. Slow is smooth, and smooth is fast. By the time I finish I'm swinging the thing around so fast it blurs, practicing attacks I wonder if I'll ever be good enough to use. Kendo, Japanese fencing, is like a game of chess where both sides are always in check. One mistake and it's over.
Somewhere Dad has a vault where he keeps physical prizes he's kept from some of the jobs he's done, and in that vault is a real life samurai sword, over four hundred years old, and he knows how to use it. There isn't one for me, but he expects me to know how to do this anyway. Later in the day we'll work on Aikdo, a similar art. It was devised by a Japanese master and resembles sword fighting without a sword, if that makes any sense. I can arm myself with a bokken and take a swing at Dad and he'll lay me out, almost without touching me.
I'm not that good. Maybe one day I will be, but I have more of an urge to brawl, to get my hands on an opponent. It would get me in trouble, except I don't get the chance very often. A gentleman thief that ends up in fistfights isn't a very good gentleman thief, now is he?
Soaked with sweat and winded, I trudge up to the house and leave both practice swords leaning up against the back wall. When I get in the shower and let the hot water sluice down my back, all I have to do is close my eyes and Diana's face floats in front of my eyes.
Get a grip, Apollo.
That's exactly what I do. My imagination fills in the details, as in my mind's eye she emerges from the ocean sopping wet and glittering in the dusk, and casually undoes the knot behind her neck that holds up her bikini and lets it fall wet to the sand.
It doesn't take long. I end up panting, leaning against the shower wall, unsatisfied but tired. My legs feel like overstretched rubber bands.
Everything is set up in the attic. By everything I mean a cheap folding desk, a laptop, a work table, and some other equipment in cases. In movies people in our trade always have all these fancy gadgets and magical glass cutting tools. What I wouldn't give for a pair of gloves that let me climb up walls. The truth is, if the only way to physically get at something is to dangle from the roof and grab it, there are probably other, easier ways.
I mean, I could have rappelled from the top floor of the hotel into Vivienne's room and nicked the necklace, then exited via the stairwells, but it would be dangerous and difficult when I could just talk my way into having a lonely, desperate woman let me into the service corridors. I hope Brittany is okay and gets her life turned around. It was Brittany, right? Brenda? Something like that.
Dad's got it all laid out.
"We'd have an easier time getting into the Smithsonian, or the Louvre," he announces as soon as I step up into the attic. "This place is built like a fortress. NORAD doesn't have security like this."