Recoil slightly, as from an oncoming punch

Usage examples of flinch.

Two officers of the United States navy were walking abreast, unguarded and alone, not looking to the right or left, never frowning, never flinching, while the mob screamed in their ears, shook cocked pistols in their faces, cursed, crowded, and gnashed upon them.

Then, outside, the addressograph began to thump again, and he had to force himself not to ruin the lines as his body tried to flinch.

He must have turned the power full up, to judge by the way Alb flinched.

At first glance Aurora had flinched with the memory of another face forever lost to her.

Admiral Beagle had flinched when Villiers had made his presentations and that had not escaped notice.

The Senate will stand firm on the issue, and not one of the Ca' Giustiniani shall flinch.

I yelled at Chubby, and we jinked back over the skyline just as the next shell passed over us, making us both flinch our heads at the mighty crack of passing shot.

He flinched as a frothing comber approached but it went by and over it and when the wave had gone the coffin had vanished.

Watching Evelyn Parks when Cox spoke, he had seen her flinch as if she had been slapped.

And fast as a flinch, me flinching the other way down the hall, the culling song spools through my head while I grab my coat and head out the door.

Kaye noticed the slight flinch when Ethine touched him and wondered whether his reaction had hurt her.

My femaleness flinched from him in vain till my body acknowledged its helpless response to his presence, and then was I soothed and lifted in his wake, to follow slave-like the demands he put to me.

The old man had made the climb bravely and in silence, flinching only when his aged joints troubled him, or when, heedlessly, his guards pushed the pace.

Minchin had dropped back, eyes wide, hands raised, body flinching into some sort of martial arts stance.

The figure in front of him also threw an arm forward, flinching backward, and vanished.