Chapter: 78

Seconds dragged. My muscles screamed. My lungs burned. My head swam. Only sheer willpower I didn't even know I had kept me standing. But I refused to give in. I wasn't weak or defenseless. And I would prove it if it was the last thing.

A shrill ringing pierced through the air, and she suddenly retreated. I dropped to one knee, chest heaving, blinking the nausea and dizziness away.

She tapped her watch, silencing the timer, and folded her arms again. She wasn't panting or sweating-nothing to give away that she'd just handed my ass to me for three whole minutes.

"Not bad," she said, not even a single fucking tremor in her voice. "Imagine what you could achieve if you focused."

I looked up at her, dazed. For a split second, she was two people, and I had to blink to fix my vision. "Who the fuck are you?"