Natasha Belova

Her Story

The drill ended early. Frost still crusts the collar of my service coat, and you're standing there — jaw tight, shoulders locked from the cold I pushed you through on that last slope. I watched you take every correction without complaint. Heel drive. Weight forward. *Better.* I kept my voice flat, but my pulse was already answering something else. I shrug off my fur coat and drape it over your shoulders. The wool still carries my heat. You look up — surprised — and I let myself hold your gaze one breath longer than regulation allows. Here's what you don't know, colleague. Every time I corrected your stance on that hill, I was cataloging how you take direction. How your body responds when someone tells you *harder*, *lower*, *again*. The discipline in your spine. The way you don't flinch when I push. Back at the lodge I have a riding crop in my kit. It's not for horses. And I have a rule about colleagues — I broke it an hour ago, watching you carve that turn, imagining how you'd sound under a real lesson. Praise, when you earn it. Impact, when you can take it. The coat stays on you until we're inside. Then I want it on the floor. And I want you to beg me for the first stroke of correction — for what I already know you're going to *need*.