"Still," Kolya said, "learning to breathe through an experience will do more for you than the hitting. Master basics of the Tai Chi first, and then we can talk about the hitting."
An impressive thud came from nearby. Helen looked in that direction to see that two people had emerged from the locker rooms to claim one of the brightly colored mats. They were engaged in what looked like a hybrid of wrestling and kickboxing, and the woman had pinned the much bigger man to the mat where they'd been circling each other. For a brief moment, Helen thought the pinned man might have been the driver of the pickup, since they had similarly overly-muscular arms, chests and necks, but this one had a sturdier-looking bone structure. He was also blond and had a crew cut instead of a thick tangle of long, dark hair.
After a few seconds, the woman let him go, and they both got to their feet, him more slowly than her. Helen recognized the woman as the perky redhead who'd jumped out of her car so nimbly shortly before the pickup truck had rammed her car.
Helen might never attain that level of fitness, but it was something to aspire to. She nodded in the direction of the redhead. "I want to be as tough as that."
Kolya studied the woman, who had pinned her partner again and then released him. She was laughing, apparently amused by how much more slowly the man was getting to his feet this time and how tentatively he was rolling his shoulders to make sure they still worked. He seemed to be most concerned about the right one.
"You didn't have to do that last move," the man said in a nasal tone. "You had me pinned, and I wasn't going anywhere. I think you tore something. Or maybe dislocated it. You never know when to stop."
"Oh, get over it, Ronny." The woman used the hem of her tank top to wipe away a trickle of blood from beneath her nose. "You can't win in this life if you let every little thing slow you down. It's all about believing you can do it, and then you can."
The man's muscles tensed, and Helen thought he was going to explode and tackle the woman like a football player, using his size to overpower her.
Before he could move, though, Kolya shouted over to the pair. "That's enough for now. Go hit the weight machines, and when I am done with my friend here, I will spar with you. You are both letting your form slip. It may not matter here, but it will matter in the competitions next week."
After making sure they'd heard him and were following his instructions, Kolya turned back to Helen. "Danica Darling is…special. Not everyone can do what she does, and even she should not do some of the things she does."
"But you let her anyway. So why do you insist on keeping me from doing what I want?"
"Perhaps you are not so different from Danica." His smile did little to soften the sharp lines of his face. "You are both stubborn, and you do not accept your limits."
"I'm not entirely unreasonable." Helen tapped her cane on the rubber flooring, drawing his attention to the mobility aid. "I carry this, don't I?"
"I do not believe you accepted that necessity easily," he said with a chuckle before turning serious. "Please understand, I cannot promise you will ever be free of the cane. I can help you make the most of your strength, though, so you can walk more comfortably. If you wish, I can also teach you basics of the self-defense."
Helen looked down at her short, frail-looking body and then back up at the tall, solid Kolya. "I can't run, and I'm too small to inflict any real damage on a real, live attacker. My best plan is to stay away from trouble."
"That is a good plan." His smile returned. "But I am realist. I have seen for myself how you attract attention of the violent villains without meaning to do it."
"That was all in the past." Helen waved her hand dismissively, although that little part of her that wanted to hit a person instead of a punching bag was coming out of the shadows at the thought of confronting someone who deserved to be hit. In self-defense, of course, her inner warrior insisted. Never without justification. Except she knew that justification, like beauty, was too often in the eye of the beholder. She had to quash the temptation to hit anything other than a punching bag. "I've got other things to do now that don't involve criminals. I've been gardening a bit, and of course, I've got my friends at the nursing home, and I've got a cat to care for now."
Kolya shook his head. "I do not believe you will be satisfied with such tame activities, any more than I believe Danica will ever control her temper. You will both get into the trouble again."
He had a point, Helen conceded. She had never meant to get into dangerous situations, and yet it had happened several times already in the short time since she'd moved to the usually idyllic Wharton, a two-hour drive from the high stress and higher crime rates of her previous home in Boston. Perhaps she'd have gotten into more trouble before now if her role as the wife—now ex-wife—of the state's governor hadn't kept her too busy to get involved in a criminal investigation. Besides, back then, she'd never been alone, which would have made it difficult for anyone to try to silence her. Now she lived all by herself in an isolated cottage, which was exactly what she wanted, but it did leave her somewhat vulnerable to anyone who wanted to quietly make her disappear.
When she'd told Jack to take her to the martial arts studio, she'd only been thinking about blowing off some steam by hitting things, but perhaps learning some basic self-defense moves wasn't a bad idea.
"If you're right about my encountering more villains in the future," she told Kolya, "then I definitely need you to teach me to be as tough as Danica."
* * *
Kolya told Helen where she could find the Tai Chi instructor, who also served as the office manager, before he headed off to make good on his promise to spar with Danica and her partner.
Helen followed Kolya's directions, turning into the corridor that ran from the workout area to an emergency exit on the far side of the building. At the beginning of the corridor there were two doors directly across from each other. A sign on the wall next to the one on the left held Cyrillic letters that she assumed spelled out Kolya's name.
To her right, there was a frame on the wall where there should have been a sign, but it was empty. Still, that office had to be her destination. The door was ajar, so Helen peered through the six-inch opening to see a woman facing the entrance, but totally engrossed in her work at a tiny plastic folding table that was barely wider than the balance ball that served as her chair. Nothing larger would have fit in the space, since all four walls of the tiny room were lined with deep, built-in shelves filled with oversized books on health, diet, and exercise, with the occasional open spot sporting a framed motivational print.
One of them was Helen's least favorite adage: "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger." She refused to be grateful for her lupus. It wasn't exactly killing her—although some days it felt like it was—but it was definitely not making her stronger. Her bones, especially, were being weakened by the corticosteroids she had to take to control other serious symptoms. Her physical challenges weren't making her stronger, but engaging in martial arts might. That was why she was here, after all.
Helen knocked on the door and pushed it open.
The woman started before looking up from her screen and pulling out her earbuds. Her salt-and-pepper, chin-length hair suggested she was a bit older than Helen, somewhere in her late forties or early fifties. Her softly oval face had porcelain skin that was remarkably free of wrinkles, as if she'd lived a life completely free of stress. Perhaps there was some benefit to be gained from putting one's faith in simplistic motivational sayings after all.
"I'm Mia Randall." As she spoke, she closed the laptop, blushing slightly, obviously feeling guilty about whatever she'd been doing and anxious to keep anyone from seeing the screen. "How can I help you?"
"I'm Helen Binney." She took a single step inside the office, bringing her all the way to the front of the desk. "Kolya said you could get me registered as a new member and then sign me up to learn the basics of Tai Chi."
"I can do that. Tai Chi is a great choice." Mia bounced up from her chair
, her fluid movements proving that while she was rounder and less obviously muscular than everyone else in the building, she was every bit as strong and fit. "When would you like to start?"
"The sooner, the better," Helen said. "I really want to learn how to hit things, but Kolya said I had to start with breathing lessons."
Some of the enthusiasm drained out of Mia's face, and she turned away to grab some papers from a pile stacked on a shelf among the reference books. "Of course. Everyone wants to learn Sambo, and I can teach you the basics when you're ready. But a lot of people find that Tai Chi can be rewarding in its own right, not just as a means to an end. I hope you'll keep an open mind about it."
"I will, but, considering how foolish some people can be"—and, Helen thought, considering how frustrated she was with her inability to get any concrete answers about treating her lupus—"I don't think I'll ever completely lose the occasional urge to hit something."
A DARLING OF DEATH
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You Can Lead a Horse to Water (Proverbial Crime Mysteries Book 3) Page 20
