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But it’s not Mullen, and Rosa and I are not striking… and she has the upper hand right now.
“That’s it, Rosa! You got it!” Seb calls out.
No she fucking doesn’t.
I lean backwards against her hold around my neck, forcing her to fall forward with me so her balance is challenged. Once I’m on my back and her grip falls away from my neck, she places a knee over my hip as she attempts to pivot into side control. But while her knee keeps my hips from moving with her, my legs are free to block her. I wrap them around her lower leg so she can’t rotate on that knee, and pull her back over me. And there’s another strike opportunity as her ribs and face are left unprotected.
But because she’s smaller than I am, she simply just fucking pulls her leg out from between mine and rolls off of me.
“Get on her!”
I roll as well, immediately pushing onto my knees and catching her before she can get off her back, putting us in open guard. She gets her feet on my hips to keep me at a distance, but I have another plan. I bring my hands to her sides so she doesn’t get her arms in, and move to get a grip on one of them so I can sweep and move into back control. But the second I get a grip on her, her knee comes to my chest, and I have to rethink my plan.
“Time!” Max calls out.
I fall back on my butt on the mats and sigh.
Rosa sits up with a smile. “Close one.”
I laugh. “Not close enough. I’d say you took that one.”
Max nods. “Correct.”
Seb and Elijah clap and holler from the side of the mat. “Yeah, Rosa! Fucking beast!”
I shoot them a look, but I’m not able to hide my smile. Because it’s true. She had me scrambling.
“So,” Max looks at me, and I stand, “good defense. I want you to take this into the cage next week with Luca for light sparring. Think about wearing down the body with strikes so you can easily sweep.”
“And what if I wear his body down?” Luca leans over the ropes of the boxing ring, his sweaty curls sticking out everywhere as he smiles widely with his pink mouthguard. “I’m pretty damn good at that.”
“Does it have to be him?” I ask Max, and he laughs.
“You could ask Rosa,” he says with a smirk, and Rosa whirls around to face me.
She smiles. “Bring it, tough guy.”
“Hey,” Luca points a glove at Rosa, “back off. The only body he’ll be wearing down is mine.”
Rosa laughs and puts her hands up in surrender as I roll my eyes. And as Del finally manages to wrangle Luca back into work, I turn to the mat and run through mine and Rosa’s spar in my head again. I would have liked to keep going… when we were in open guard, I could have moved to my feet to avoid her knee to my chest. And then if she brought her hand to the back of my head, I could have–
“Hey.”
I turn to face Rosa as she places a hand on my arm and smiles up at me.
“What do you say we run through a few drills, or roll some more?” she asks. “Maybe from open guard? I could use some more work there.”
As I look down at her, I take in her eager smile and kind eyes. I know she’s saying this because she knows where my head is… but I also know it’s because she cares.
And I really appreciate it.
I smile back at her and nod. “Sounds good.”
Luca sets a box down on the living room floor with a huff, then stands up and puts his hands on his hips. He looks around at the one suitcase and three boxes we just carried up from my car.
“Wow, you really don’t have a lot of stuff.” He looks at me with a furrowed brow. “This is really it?”
“Yeah.” I nod. “I didn’t take much with me from home and the place came furnished. And I’ve pretty much been living here for a few months now, so all my clothes are here.”
