CHAPTER 60

YOU'RE HOLDING BACK

"And I am officially jobless now." Angie announced as she found Bryan in the crowd, sitting outside for lunch break.

"Why? What did you do?" Bryan asked, super casually.

"Why would you assume I must have done something?" Angie raised an eyebrow. It was like Bryan automatically knew she had screwed up and gotten fired because of that.

He mirrored her raised brow and she backed off. "Yeah, I get your point." She chuckled while sitting by his side.

"Right, so the guy I work for, at the Ballistics division, he told me they just switched to magnetic cards instead of paper coupons. And, obviously, the cards have a name and a photo on them. So, moral of the story is – dude can't keep on giving me his food tickets anymore. God, I hate technology!" She allowed herself to whine since food was a big deal.

"Oh…" A frown appeared on Bryan's face.

"Before you say it – I don't want your help. Thanks." She said, a bit snappy.

Her words made him roll his eyes. She was way too proud to be helped.

"Well, you have fifty coupons, you should be good until you find a new job." He suggested.

"I had fifty, more than a week ago. I don't know if you've noticed, but I eat. Like, twice a day, if I'm lucky. So…yeah…" Her head leaned back, allowing the sun to hit her face. She'd milk those last rays of sunshine before the Autumn would hit Quantico hard.

Bryan chose not to reply. Wise choice.


"I feel like we're in an alternate universe all of a sudden…" Angie commented during their next training session.

It was combat and she had been excited to start it, but something was holding her back.

"Come on, Trainee. You're slacking." The guy – a huge guy with lots of muscle mass, yelled at her when she spaced out.

Her hands swung in the air, but then ultimately she was sick and done with it, so she let him sprawl her on the floor.

"Dude, you gave up so fast!" Bryan was surprised, and not in a good way.

"Guess I'm just not a fighter." Angie shrugged, sitting on a bench, on the side of the training range.

"You kind of have to be one, if you want to stay." He informed her of the obvious.

"Whatever…" Something about this class was rubbing her the wrong way.

Bryan decided that this, along with tactical driving, was Angie's weak point, so he didn't want to tease her any further.

Training went on and Angie kept to the side, not volunteering for a single thing, just quietly observing.

The guy who trained them noticed that, now that there were fewer people left in the Academy. Dan was right – they had double the attention on them now.

"Hey!" The guy called out after Angie when the class was done.

At first, she did not even know he was calling her, out of everyone, so she paid no attention to him.

It was only after he called her 'bow-chick' that she realized he had been trying to get her attention.

And yet, she gave him none.

"Yo-…" He started to speak as soon as he walked up to her, making a colossal mistake.

She felt his hand on her shoulder and something struck a nerve. Without even thinking about her actions, she grabbed his hand and two seconds later he was on the floor.

"Angela? More like Devila!" Bryan scoffed, watching her own that instructor.

"Shoot…" She muttered to herself, realizing she had crossed the line between Angela and Insanity one more time.

"Right…" The instructor said, picking himself up.

He was a huge man, yes. But he never thought she might react this way to his simple attempt to go talk to her after class, so he wasn't in the mental state to defend himself. And that was where she got him good.

"If only you had done that in class." He added, not sure how he felt about the youngest Trainee owning him in front of everyone.

"I'm sorry, I guess…" Angie shrugged, offering her hand, to help him stand up.

He did not even touch that hand.

"Class dismissed." He called out.

"A word?" He then turned to face her again.

Oh, he seemed pissed.

Angie made a sign to Bryan, to wait for her outside.

"You're holding back." He called her out immediately, as soon as everyone else left.

"All due respect, Sir, but we are here to learn. We are not supposed to already know everything." She smiled, only to fool him.

"No, no." Shaking his head, he was not fooled by her. "You are holding back on what you have. I just have to figure out why and then build you up from there."

"Why not just build me up from scratch?" She suggested.

"Because you are way above that scratch by now." Something about the arrogance in his voice, the way he was owning her now, with words, made her extremely irritated.

"Sir, I don't know what you're talking about. I'm just here to try and learn how to fight, if I ever need to use that skill."

"This might be it. You prefer using a gun, don't you?" He kept trying to figure out why she was acting dumb.

"Well, if I was on the field, surrounded by huge men like you and an option between fighting them with my bare hands or blowing their brains out with a shotgun, I'd surely choose the latter." She stated, her hand nervously fidgeting by her side, playing with the hem of her workout top.

"You surely didn't have a problem taking me down and, like you said, I am a big guy." She hated him, she hated the way he was testing her and she hated that he was trying to read her like an open book.

"That's only because you took-…" She started off, but he finished that thought for her.

"Took you off guard?" He smirked.

She nodded, being more than busted. This man was smart.

"Why do you put on that show?" He continued with his questions and, God, she just wanted to punch him.

"I like acting." A smile appeared on her face.

Usually it helped fool people. This time, it did not.

He swung at her so hard and so fast that, if she were the airhead that she pretended to be, she'd be on her way to the ER immediately.

Her hand blocked his punch with the speed of a lightning, counter-attacking him and with two swift motions he landed on the floor once more.

"Impressive." He smirked, this time happy to be laying on his back. First time had been a surprise. Second time had been a reassurance for him. "Krav Maga?"

She shrugged, unable to give him an answer.

"Who taught you how to fight?" He raised an eyebrow, analyzing the technique that she had used to overpower him. This was something he had scheduled to teach in the Academy, a few weeks later.

"Life." She continued her little show and by now he knew that he wasn't getting words out of her.

It was okay. All he wanted to get out of her was anger, emotion, the kind of feelings and technique that would make her an even better fighter.

"You better watch out, Trainee." He smirked, getting up on his own, one more time. "I'm coming after you." He added.

"Oh, I can't wait." She smirked as well, her innocent smile now gone and all that she showed before leaving the training field was confidence. If he had figured her out, then she might as well own up to it and make a cool exit.


"I can't believe we have two more classes by the end of the day. Is it still Monday?" Angie groaned in annoyance once she joined Bryan on their way to the next class.

None of them had taken a shower since the morning and this was pissing them off.

"I'm not sure." He laughed.

That day was longer than expected, now that their schedule had a million things on it.

"What's next?" She opened her schedule and finally had some good news. "Oh, cool! Seger's class!"

"That hot one who teaches us about dead bodies?" Bryan suddenly felt a little better about his day, as well.

"Can you, please, stop drooling over every female teacher?" She sighed and walked over to the Auditorium. "Well, on the bright side, we finally get to sit on our butts for the next few hours. No sweating involved. I'm down with that."

On their way there, they stopped by the bathrooms for a third outfit change of the day. Angie sprayed herself with deodorant, wanting nothing more than to be able to take a quick 5-minute shower. She always liked being fresh, it made her feel good. And at that moment, she felt sweaty and disgusting.

"Hello class." SSA Clara Seger walked in, waving at everyone.

She looked even more beautiful now, compared to their first class. Angie kept checking out her make-up, wondering if it were even realistic to think that, once an Agent, one could maintain a look so on-point. And that lipgloss that she had asked about... Angie did not stop staring at it, as creepy as that might have looked.

Agent Seger carried out a very informative lecture, one filled with details and techniques. She only had little time to explain everything, so she came prepared this time.

"Now, remember how I told you when we first met, that I had spaced out and forgotten to prepare your reading list?" She said at the end of the class.

"Well, this is it now." Her finger pointed to the last slide of her presentation, where two books were illustrated.

"It's only two books, but they are quite big, so I'm sure most of you will hate me anyway." She said in a sweet, innocent tone, making it hard for anyone to believe that they were about to hate her. Which, they were about to. Those books were hard to read and even harder to understand. And the exam she had prepared for them was impossible to pass, unless one would have given 150% of themselves during class.

Clara called a few people to come join her for a discussion after class and Angie was not mad about not being one of them. She needed a shower and nothing was going to stand between her and the running hot water now, before their last class would start.

As Agent Seger waited for her chosen Trainees to gather their stuff and to join her at her teacher's desk in the Auditorium, she briefly walked by Angie's desk.

"You are welcome." She smirked, her left hand allowing an object to slide down Angie's desk, before ending up right in front of the girl.

"Holy shit!" Angie squealed, grabbing the thing like a kid on Christmas morning.

Clara then walked off, as if nothing had happened.

"Can't you do that on our way to the dorm?" Bryan hurried her, when he saw her taking her sweet time at her desk.

"Yo, you can't hurry beauty!" Angie announced while allowing the soft lipgloss brush slide across her lips. It tasted like cherry and it had a faint red color to it, but other than that, it was shiny and moisturizing and it was everything her lips had ever dreamed of.

She shot a glance at Agent Seger, now sporting her new lipgloss, one that she would not stop using for the next few weeks, mouthing a silent 'thank you' to the woman before she ran after Bryan, who was in no mood to sit and wait for Angie to get her glow on.