by Alex Lidell
Frank pursed his lips as he contemplated the broken glass. His housekeeper would come in and take care of it, so that didn’t concern him. The pattern of the shards was giving him an idea, which solidified as he looked again at the bright orange sticky tag he’d ripped off Hunt’s mailbox while storming away that morning. It’d been a small, impulsive movement, and the tag was nothing more than a reminder from Overnight Express on an upcoming shipment to be delivered Wednesday between ten and noon.
But now that Frank was looking at it more closely, he knew his instincts had been spot-on—because the upcoming shipment was from Trident pharmacy, and it had a drug reference number on it to boot. Prazosin, the same shit Bartholomew had been on to keep him from rushing about like a rabid dog and destroying the furniture between deployments.
Pulling out the throwaway phone he used when he needed to re-up his roofies order, Frank ordered some sugar-pill placebos from his bewildered contact, then dug through his address book for the right person.
Timothy Browning, one of the underlings in Liam Rowen’s security firm, picked up on the third ring and grunted into the receiver.
“I need Hunt’s outside security to come down for emergency maintenance Wednesday, ten to noon.”
Browning’s response was clipped. “Cullen Hunt? Jesus Christ, Frank, I’m not comfortable with that. Plus, that’s just down the street from Arnie and Phylicia. ”
“Would you be more comfortable if I went public?” Like any good journalist, Frank had things stored for later reference—one of them being a recording of Browning banging the wife of the chief of police, who also happened to be Browning’s best buddy. The unfortunate couple were the aforementioned Arnie and Phylicia.
“It’s not that I’m refusing, Frank. I’m telling you it’s impossible. All those homes have state-of-the-art systems.”
“You mean the same systems you install? Don’t patronize me, Timothy. You’ll do it, and you’ll do it right.”
Frank heard a huff of exasperated breath. “Fine. But it will be only the outside system. I can’t touch anything inside the house without Liam noticing. So unless you’re planning to spray-paint his front door, I’m not sure what good it’s going to do you at all.”
“Maybe I do want to spray-paint the front door,” said Frank, reaching for the button to end the call. “Not that it’s any of your business.”
Leaning back in his chair, Frank interlaced his fingers behind his head and grinned. Replacing Hunt’s chemical muzzle with sugar pills had a poetic justice to it, like journalism. All Frank was truly doing was stripping away the fraud to let the truth bubble to the surface. And when that happened, when the real animal hiding beneath Cullen Hunt’s expensive suits came to light, Frank and Denton Uncovered would be there to document it all.
Hell, maybe he’d even have Skylar Reynolds do it, and then take her fine ass atop the printed news sheets.
23
Sky
The next morning, we don’t go to Liam’s on account of him getting called away for work. When I express my disappointment to Cullen over breakfast, he looks at me for so long that I shift uncomfortably in my seat.
“What?” I demand.
“The training. It isn’t going to be fun, Reynolds. It will be months before you enjoy it—if you ever do.”
I raise a brow at him over my morning coffee. “How exactly do you know what I will and won’t enjoy? For all you know, I’ve always wanted to be an MMA fighter.”
Cullen snorts. “And yet, you aren’t one.”
Touché. I stick my tongue out at him. Not that I’m not still mad at him over the apartment thing, but it’s hard to resist the moments when Cullen is being almost funny. Plus, the memory of having slept with his arm wrapped around me again makes me moist. We hadn’t talked about it last night, not even one word. Cullen had just left the door to his bedroom wide open, and when I went to pick up my—his—sleeping shirt, he’d moved over to make space. I never left.
“You want to see your new place?” he asks, putting away his coffee cup, and I try not to think about how much like an eviction that sounds. Though it isn’t as if I thought I’d be staying here to begin with.
Putting on the brightest smile I can, I nod quickly. “Absolutely. I’m more than ready to have my own space. Not that I don’t appreciate staying here but…you know.”
“Yeah.” His jaw tightens for a moment, then he turns decidedly and strides out of the kitchen. “I’ll be ready in ten,” he calls over his shoulder.
Not just an eviction; more like an emergency evacuation.
Cullen drives me over to my new place in awkward silence, pulling up to the Pine apartment complex at the same time as another car pulls into an empty visitor spot next to us. Not only is this location leaps and bounds better than my former abode—sadly, Cullen had been right about the mice and roaches—the complex itself looks gorgeous and nothing like the rent-controlled places I’d need in New York. With elongated log-style buildings, the garden apartment’s knotted pine exterior matches the real pines dotting the property. Like Eli’s home, the Pine has that rustic Colorado feel, but without the over-the-top luxury.
The place has a bicycle stand and individually assigned covered parking spaces. Making a mental note to double-check the lease for any hidden provisions, I’m halfway out of Cullen’s truck when Jaz pops out of the other vehicle. There’s an Uber sticker flashing at me before it pulls back out of the space.
“Jaz?” I turn toward Cullen. “Is this your doing?”
“I texted her just before we left and told her to meet us here.”
Told her? As in ordered her? Great. That’s about as helpful as when my mom walked into my kindergarten class and demanded the first three kids she saw invite me to their next birthday party.
“Something wrong?” Cullen asks.
He truly doesn’t even know. “No. Thank you.” Waiting until he can’t see me wince, I work out a mental apology to Jaz—only to find myself enveloped in an enthusiastic hug.
“Look at this place!” The girl spins around, her wide grin genuine enough to evaporate any guilt I might feel. Cullen may have asked her to come, but she plainly doesn’t mind. “This is perfect.”
“You could move here too,” says Cullen, stepping out from behind me and earning himself a glare from Jaz.
“I could,” Jaz says a little too sweetly. “However—”
“There’s a trail in the back that takes you right to several climbing routes,” Cullen continues. “If you were going to—”
“If I were going to be so crude as to tell you where to shove your meddling ideas, I’d do that just now. But given that I’m a sweet little thing, I’ll just politely tell you to fuck off. Tell Kyan that I’m staying right on at his ranch whether he likes it or not. And Cullen—if I were you, I’d not try to get in the middle of that. Hmm?”
Cullen’s glare is enough to chill hot coals, but rolls off Jaz so easily that I can’t help wonder how she does it. The man clears his throat. “All right. Then I shall leave you two ladies too. The movers should have your things in the apartment already and you’ll find the paperwork in the office.”
“Excellent.” Hooking her arm through mine, Jaz steers me past a little kidney-shaped pool to the administrative building, her chin held high enough that she seems part cat.
“What was that?” I ask.
She gives me a sly look. “Cullen likes to fix everybody’s problems, but we disagree on just how much space Kyan needs. Tough love and all. Anyway, look at this place! I may not live here, but girl, I hope there’s a couch, because you’re having visitors.”
Inside the office, a young girl at the desk goes over some pamphlets about apartment rules, mailboxes, and so forth before handing me the keys. “Apartment 222,” she says, grinning with a mouth full of metal. Braces? How old is this girl? “The furniture delivery was last night—please let me know if you find anything damaged.”
Clearly, she hasn’t seen my furniture.
“Sky, come out here,” Jaz calls to me, and for the first time, I step into my bedroom. My friend is there waving to me from a lovely balcony that looks out onto a tree line filled with a mixture of evergreens, mostly, of course, pines. But it’s stunning. And all my belongings—at least the ones that seem to have passed the Trident gods’ inspection—are already here: laptop, clothes, personal things.
“I can’t believe Cullen did this,” I say, still unable to make up my mind on whether to be upset over this or grateful. The place, the furniture, everything is beyond reason. Also beyond asking my opinion.
Jaz laughs. “Listen, that’s Cullen for you. He’s not going to come out and say something nice, and he definitely isn’t a hugger, but seeing a problem and solving it for someone—that’s who he is. Now, let’s go check out your kitchen.”
“He backed off from your wrath,” I point out, following Jaz to admire the fully stocked refrigerator and pantry. Expecting another chuckle, I’m taken aback when the girl turns, her face serious.
“He’s different with you, Sky. It’s… You’re good for him.”
I’m still trying to work out what I think about Jaz’s observation and my new life at the Pine when, Monday evening, I get a text message from Liam. He’s back, the message declares, and he expects me at his studio by 6:30 a.m. the following day. Provided I’m not going to wuss out.
Not wussing out, Tuesday morning I pull up to the address fifteen minutes early—to discover all the Tridents’ cars already there. My gaze lingers on Cullen’s vehicle, my stomach tightening despite myself.
Dressed in my spandex shirt and yoga pants, I’m not sure what I expect to find inside as I approach the door, but my heart is pumping in readiness to kick some ass. I might never have done martial arts before, but my body is still toned from when I used to rock climb regularly. Add to that a morning helping of prophylactic ibuprofen, and I can honestly say I feel good. Strong. Even my shoulder, which I tested out with a pull-up on my doorframe molding this morning, feels stable.
Or maybe I’m just running on adrenaline and nerves.
Slipping through a door that emits a musical ding when I open it, I walk past the still-empty reception desk and locker rooms toward the sounds of male grunting in the back. Here the corridor opens into a kind of gym that probably makes Olympians salivate.
In addition to the usual open space with a hell of a good floor mat, the school-gymnasium-size room has a boxing ring, a free weight corner, several punching bags, three racks with training targets and weapons, and, last but not least, a station with a climbing rope and various pull-up bars that the climber in me can’t wait to try. A back door in the corner of the room has a big sign depicting the running trails in the woods behind the complex, as well as a set of bright yellow reflective vests for joggers.
And then there are the men themselves, all gathered beside the ring, their sweat-soaked clothing betraying how long they’ve all been here already. It’s my first time seeing Kyan in short sleeves, and I can’t help staring at the roughened flesh snaking down his chiseled biceps. I wonder if he knows that his scars somehow make him more beautiful. No, I know that he doesn’t—and wouldn’t believe me if I told him. I hope he finds someone he will believe, though.
Turning my gaze to Liam, I see him standing with his arms crossed over his chest while Cullen and Eli square off against each other. Liam nods to me in quick greeting and jerks his chin toward the empty mat space. Translating his curt gesture to mean something like Good morning, Sky! Please make yourself comfortable and stretch while we finish up, I lower myself to the mat.
Every one of the Tridents is a sight to behold, but it’s Cullen my eyes never lose sight of as he and Eli circle each other like predators. In another sleeveless tee and a loose pair of workout shorts, Cullen’s muscles are again on full display. So are his tattoos, the ink making my fingers long to trace those distinctive patterns, to feel the warmth of his skin beneath them.
“Go,” Liam barks so hard that I flinch at the sudden sound. Then I flinch again when Cullen shoots his fist right into Eli’s head. The headgear the men wear seems very unlikely to offer much protection against the blow.
Lankier than the larger Cullen, Eli dances away from the blow, his bare foot cracking against Cullen’s ribs. Cullen blocks the next kick with his forearm, retaliating with unrestrained brutality that takes my breath away. The merciless exchange continues, each blow filled with power and coiled muscles, each impact sending a feeling of shuddering force through the gym.
“Get your goddamn hands up,” Liam bellows at Eli as Cullen’s fist clips the man’s face and draws blood from the corner of his mouth. When Cullen lands another shot right on Eli’s jaw, Liam explodes with expletives in a booming voice I’ve never heard from the man. And never, ever, want to hear again.
For the first time since waking up this morning, I think I’ve made a mistake coming here, my heart picking up speed.
Meanwhile, in the ring, Eli gets his blows on Cullen’s muscular frame, the men’s glistening muscles coiling and exploding with power that saturates the air with intensity. Thump. Thump. Thump. The blows come with deadly speed, landing with no mercy for the punishment they inflict. It’s no longer beautiful. It’s brutal and cruel and so harrowing that my bile rises up my throat, my moist hands clenching my yoga pants.
Cullen grunts in pain, the sound low and quiet. And potent enough to wrap an iron band around my heart. Moving slowly, I inch my way to the exit, the pristine mat no longer welcoming or comfortable beneath me.
I somehow hear it before I see it, Eli’s gasps of pain as Liam inserts himself into the fight and knocks the man all the way to ground. “You like your goddamn brains splattered?” Liam yells into Eli’s face as the man gathers himself painfully to his knees, his muscular shoulders heaving with panting breaths. “Let me do it for you and save us the fucking trouble. What the goddamn fuck—”
I draw a sharp breath, my hand over my mouth as Liam’s dark face lifts toward me.
“Shit,” says Liam again, but more quietly this time, while Cullen—who now marks my presence—scrubs his hands over his face.
Before I can move, Liam hops over the rope barrier and slowly walks toward me, his palms up while I try to remember how to move. How to run.
“Look at me, Sky,” he says, capturing my gaze with that unyielding command. “I’m not going to hurt you.”
Accepting Cullen’s outstretched hand, Eli pops gracefully to his feet and hops the ropes with the same ease Liam had. “I’m quite all right, soldier,” he says, the nonbloodied side of his mouth coming up in a half grin. “These blokes were just working with me on something.”
“I… I don’t want to do this anymore,” I say, taking a step back.
Liam crouches, balancing easily on the balls of his feet as he makes himself shorter than me. “No one is going to be doing full-contact sparring with you for a long, long time, Sky. You’re not remotely ready for that. You must know that, right?”
I nod slowly.
Liam mirrors my movement. “All right. So what scared you?”
“You,” I blurt out, blood draining from my face as I realize what I said.
Eli laughs.
Shooting Eli a dark glare, Liam turns to Cullen. “I’m going to need you to get her started, Hunt. She doesn’t need to be working with me yet.”
“No,” says Cullen.
&
nbsp; I try and fail not to flinch. “It’s all right. No one needs to train me. I’m fine. I never should have come.”
“That’s not… Jesus Christ.” Hopping the ropes, Cullen strides over to me. Taking hold of my shoulders, he twists me around to face him, his eyes capturing my gaze until the whole rest of the world slips away. Carefully, so carefully, Cullen’s thumb traces the line of my cheekbone, his calloused finger sliding over my skin and sending zings of energy through every nerve in my body. “I didn’t think you’d want to work with me, Sky.”
“I don’t know what I want,” I whisper, my gaze darting toward Liam, who seems genuinely troubled. Disappointment races through me, weighing down my limbs. I was supposed to learn to defend myself today. For the first time in my life, someone was going to teach me to fight back. But… “I can’t… I mean if you—”
“Liam hit Eli because Eli was working on something,” Cullen says, his gaze too perceptive of my thoughts for comfort. “I’ve no intention of hitting you that way. None of us do. But if you do want to learn self-defense, there’s gonna be a good deal of suffering involved.”
In my side vision, Liam nods. “Nothing you can’t handle, Sky. But this isn’t water aerobics.”
“Do you trust me to walk you through it?” Cullen asks, drawing my attention back. “Through the early conditioning? I want you to think carefully before you answer. Eli or Kyan or—”
“You,” I say before I can change my mind. “I’m in. With you.”
24
Sky
Pulling on a pair of sneakers, Cullen motions me toward the back door with that running trail sign. Not what I expected, but going on the trail seems safer than staying anywhere close to the boxing ring, where, I swear to God, the other Tridents are busy trying to choke each other unconscious. Liam is no longer yelling obscenities, though I suspect that will change the moment I step out the door.
“The military has its own language,” Cullen says, following my line of sight.