Reality shivered down Meredith’s spine. Frightful awareness blanketed her shoulders with a chill. Hunter had murdered this man, and he’d done it quickly. Efficiently. With blood on his hands. Like he knew precisely how to end a life. She rubbed her arms to ward off the bleak tendrils winding into her soul. Hunter Christian was a killer.
Rummaging through the brush, he retrieved the dead man’s knife that he’d tossed aside at the start of the scuffle. It joined the rest of the gear on the litter alongside Teague’s legs. Hunter tossed the dead man’s shirt and boots to her. “Here. Put ’em on.”
She turned aside and let them drop to the ground, not wanting to touch anything that belonged to the dead. “No thanks.”
“Do it,” he ordered, pointing to the bundle at her feet. “He doesn’t need them. You do.”
“But he’s d-d-dead.”
“So?”
But you killed him, and the shirt smells bad, and I... I don’t want to. She faced him, almost afraid to look into his eyes. How could he be so heartless?
Hunter’s brows narrowed. His upper lip twitched, and she got the point. He thought she was defying him, which she was. Kind of. Mean Girl seemed to have taken a time-out just when Meredith could’ve really used the burst of confidence. She’d never known she had a stronger, meaner side to her until Eddy had taught her the ropes of living with a total jerk. Too bad Mean Girl didn’t always show up when Meredith needed her.
She looked down at her dirty, bloodied feet. What a mess. Her French pedicure had been reduced to grime, stubbed toes, and cracked nails. Walking barefoot through the jungle wasn’t easy. There were thorns aplenty, and she’d found every last one of them. Her feet hurt. There wasn’t a part of her body that wasn’t scraped, scratched, or bitten. But could she reduce herself to stealing from a dead man?
“Put ’em on,” Hunter ordered again, his tone a soft whip of contempt. He’d already put on another guy’s shirt, which looked worse with the blood pouring out of his knife wound. “I’ll not ask you again.”
Or what? You’ll kill me, too? She didn’t understand. If he’d just let her help, this despicable thing he wanted her to do might not seem so abhorrent. She ached to help him, to doctor him. Why wouldn’t he let her near?
Ugh. She complied, sliding her feet into the dead guy’s over-sized boots. They were too large and better than nothing, but the shirt? No way. Just the thought of a dead man’s shirt against her skin pitched acid up her throat. Wearing his boots was bad enough.
“Are you ever going to do what you’re told?”
Meredith looked up to that same angry scowl. Out of the blue, Mean Girl was back from her break. “Are you always going to treat me like I’m stupid?”
Without asking, she picked up the shirt and ripped a piece of the hem from it. Folding it into a makeshift bandage, she marched up to her angry, very stubborn companion. Before Hunter could open his big mouth to pitch another fit, she latched onto his massive forearm and stuffed the rag down his shirt, pressing it firmly to the hole in his chest.
He rolled his head back and hissed.
“You can growl all you want, but you need help. Now shut up and let me.” She knew how to order people around, too, darn it.
It was hard to miss the way her fingers didn’t quite circle his arm. The way her heart pounded at her audacious nerve. The way the merciless glare of a war-hardened soldier stole the breath from her lungs. She nearly wilted, but this man needed help. He’d just saved her life twice, and yeah, he’d killed someone, but he’d done that to save her. He wasn’t just a cold-blooded killer. He was Hunter Christian, and he used to be her friend, and someone needed to save him for a change.
He kept glaring. She kept the pressure on his chest whether he liked it or not. Man, he was one stubborn jackass. She had to be hurting him, but other than that initial hiss, he didn’t react, didn’t even flinch a muscle or blink one evil eye. And for sure he’d never say thank you.
But that wasn’t what she wanted, was it?
Meredith bit her lip at the hard man beneath her touch. What had happened to the tender, fun-loving person she’d once known? This Hunter was gentle one moment, but off the charts angry the next. He hadn’t always been like this. He’d been one of the nicer guys she’d known while growing up, prone to excel in English Lit and poetry, never gymnastics, and certainly not ROTC. She never would’ve figured him for USMC material, not in a million years. An artist maybe or an author, possibly a teacher, yet there he was, an ex-Marine, hard as stone, and ready to die for everyone else. Worse, ready to kill.
He glowered an intensely sexy frown that sparked her female libido, as close as they were to each other. The boy she’d once loved was gone and only the all-male version remained. How could she not notice the fire in his dark eyes, the way his brows arched as if he expected her to cower, to be afraid of him? She wasn’t, not really. When he glanced down at her hand inside his shirt, his long, thick lashes fluttered over his rugged cheekbones that seemed more stone than flesh. Heck, even the black stubble on his chin radiated pure testosterone, but she was sure the boy she knew was still in there.
A tsunami of desire for that Hunter swamped her common sense. Out the door went logic, and in came one ragged, scruffy feline on the prowl. She leaned toward him. He didn’t budge, just let her approach like he was approachable, like she couldn’t get through the wall he’d built no matter what she tried.
But try she did. “What happened, Hunter? You used to be so different. Why the change? What—?”
“I got smart.” The cleft in his chin was more pronounced in the dim light. “What the hell do you care?”
His vehemence took her breath. “I’m just surprised. You used to be so—”
“Trusting?” He brushed her hand aside and ripped the bloodstained cloth out of her hand. “Forget it.” Tearing off a smaller strip of the cloth, he wadded it into a golf-ball-sized plug and shoved it into the hole in his chest with his thumb, staring at her the entire time. Not once did he blink from the pain, and it had to hurt. He just kept plugging that hole, stabbing the wad in deeper until he’d staunched the blood flow. Just stared her down until she could take no more.
Her resolve crumbled. There was a time in her life when she’d had to learn to stand up for herself, but this was different. Eddy had hurt her for sport. He’d thought it was a game. Hunter was something else. He seemed to be carrying a deeper pain than that knife wound.
“Hunter. Please. Talk to me. There’s just you and me. We’ve got a long road ahead of us. We need to be able to at least talk. Tell me what happened. What changed you?”
The darkest eyes flitted to her fingers where they still clutched his forearm. He couldn’t have hurt her more if he’d slapped her.
She let go.
CHAPTER EIGHT
“We’re going to end this one way or the other. Move it. We need to get to the river.”
Did she not get the point? Hunter was tired of running from whoever was hunting them. It was time to hit back at the enemy, and hit back hard. If the guys chasing them thought those bamboo booby traps he’d left behind were brutal, they had no idea what brutality was about. The best defense was a gawddamned hard offense, and he intended to be as offensive and brutal as he needed to be. Never piss off a Marine!
As far as choosing his knife over his gun with that last guy? Hunter rolled the cramp out of his right shoulder. Sometimes a guy needed the hard and dirty way of settling up with a dirtbag.
“But why would anyone do this to us? To me?” she asked, a definite whimper in her voice as they prepared to trudge through the jungle.
God, he needed a cigarette! She hadn’t moved an inch. Her hand wasn’t even near the container’s handle like she intended to snap to. He rolled the clawing pinch out of his neck, then flexed his shoulder because the grip of aggravation was still there. Every word out of her whiny mouth worked his last nerve.
Why no longer mattered in this fight to the death. Couldn’t she figure that o
ut? Jesus, it wasn’t hard. Only who mattered, and Hunter had an appointment in the near future with that asshole. As soon as Meredith and Teague were stashed somewhere safe again, he meant to backtrack and hunt every last one of those bastards down.
“I said move out,” he growled, tired of explaining what would’ve been obvious to anyone with a brain.
“No,” she said stubbornly, and he understood. Really, he did. Meredith was a born drama queen and probably tired of walking in the dark. No, wait. Maybe she’d broken a nail helping him neutralize that last bastard. No, wait again. That wasn’t right. All she’d done was stand and watch and snivel while he’d fought hand-to-hand for both their lives. She hadn’t even picked up a branch or a rock to knock the guy over the head like another soldier would’ve done. Obviously, she wasn’t dressed for this kind of an outing. She wouldn’t even put on the shirt he’d given her. Or maybe it was the boots, just not her style, and she needed to—shop!
He lifted poor Teague’s litter, nothing but disgust on his mind. Yeah, he could’ve ended that fight with one shot. He had a gun, but sometimes revenge required a man to get his hands dirty. Hunter started walking. With or without Meredith at his side, he had a mission to finish. If she thought he was going to get weepy-eyed because he’d gotten into a little knife play, guess again. As long as nothing major had been severed and the bleeding eventually stopped, Hunter did what any jarhead would do in his circumstance. He kept moving.
“I thought we were going to the river?” she called after him.
“We are.”
“Well, the river was near your camp, the last I remember. We’re miles from there.”
“There are no waterfalls there.”
“So what? Why do we need waterfalls? And what is your darn problem?” She was the one doing the barking now, and she still hadn’t moved one step.
Hunter rolled his shoulders before he turned to face her. Fine. If she wanted to fight, he was ready to accommodate. God knew he’d had plenty of time to think about this moment. The litter went back to the ground, and Teague with it. Hunter stalked back to Meredith, ignoring the pain in his chest but not the hemorrhoid in his butt named Meredith! “You really want to have this discussion now? Here? When we’re running for our lives?”
Her chin lifted. “Why not?” Her hands came to rest on her hips, which, oh, by the way, were mostly naked. Damn her. She should’ve put that shirt on like she was told. Meredith never had learned to listen, and now she sure as hell wasn’t playing fair.
“What’s wrong with you, Hunter Christian? You used to be nice, but you’ve had a chip on your shoulder from the first minute you saw me,” she informed him like he didn’t already know, her hands on the curve of her shapely hips. “Heck, you should’ve seen the look on your face when you found out it was me under that helmet.”
“Visor. Remember?” He tapped his temple to make his point crystal clear. “I didn’t know it was you, or did you get scared and forget that, too?”
Her eyes nearly bugged out at his perfectly aimed hit below the belt. Yeah, she knew he meant the gun she’d lost. Who was that stupid they forgot where they put their weapon in the middle of a fight? Apparently, Meredith!
“Give it a rest, Christian. You had to have seen the roster before you came on this operation. You knew I’d be here. How many Meredith Flynns do you think there are in the world?”
“What damned roster? Why’d you have to come on this little vacation?”
“Because it’s my job.” She had a cute way of sticking her chin out when she emphasized certain words like job. “Teague asked for a four-man opposing team, and Alex Stewart sent men. Teague and I didn’t care who they were.”
“You married him!” Hunter roared, the truth finally out in the open where it belonged.
“Him? Teague? No I... we’re not... Oh... him.” Meredith took a half-step back, her fingers to her open mouth. She blinked as if he’d just shared a piece of news she’d never heard before. Like hell. She knew what she’d done the day she’d stepped all over Hunter’s heart on her way to good times with Welch, the richest freshman in college.
“You left me without saying a word. You ran! Not once did you think to call or explain why that good-for-nothing was suddenly your man of the hour. Not you. Not queen-of-the-ball, everybody-loves-me Meredith Flynn. Oh, no. I thought we were moving in together. After all we’d said, I thought we meant something to each other. I thought we were solid!”
“But I... I...”
“But. You. Lied! All the shit you said about loving me was nothing but lies. You never meant any of it.” He wiped his lip with the back of his clenched fist, angry that he was out of control, and that he needed to hit something. She had yet to offer one solid line of defense.
Overhearing Big Guy and Fat Bastard’s bullshit earlier had only stirred everything up again. Hunter had loved Meredith with all he had. They were an item, at least, he’d thought they were. But she’d had money back then, and he should’ve seen it coming. Birds of a feather and all that crap. She and Welch ran in the same circles, and so did their parents.
Hunter was born a nobody and would die a nobody.
Swallowing hard, he forced himself to calm. A little. “I don’t care how you live your life, but I’m not a fucking doormat for you to traipse over on your way to fame and fortune. You’ve got your rich boy. Go back to him. Leave me alone.”
“You left me,” she whispered so softly he almost didn’t hear her. “You joined the Marines after Christmas, and I talked to your mother, and, Hunter, you never said a word to me—not even goodbye. You just… left.”
“I left you?” He was back to growling. Everything about her made him so damned angry, he couldn’t think. “You were wearing his ring, remember? How could I stay? And why? So you could rub it in my face every time I saw you? So I could watch you walk down the aisle with the jerk who’d kept track of every cheerleader, co-ed, and wannabe that he banged? Did you think you were something special to Welch? Did you think he cared for you more than I did? Is that why you slept with him?”
So there. Yes, Hunter knew what had happened after the homecoming game, after the big drunken orgy at Welch’s apartment, the apartment Welch’s parents had paid for so he could live the high life while other kids worked two jobs to get through college. Hunter knew about Meredith’s pregnancy. Hell, the whole school did. If she’d just have told him and not let him find out through the San Diego Southern University grapevine. If she had half a spine.
His anger ratcheted higher. If Welch had been there in the jungle with him, Hunter would’ve taken him apart.
Meredith pursed her lips, framing the smallest O. A bleak shadow deepened the blue of her irises to gray, but Hunter kept letting her have it, every last fermented drop of the bitterness he’d stored in the wine cellar of his heart for far too long. “Why shouldn’t I have left? I needed to get the hell away from you.” He snapped his fingers. “The Corps made it happen, and you know what? It felt gawddamned good.”
Meredith blinked with that doe-eyed look of hers. She lifted her chin, her lower lip trembling. “But Hunter—”
“Don’t but me!” He couldn’t tolerate any more lies. “It’s too late. You’re married. Stop waving your ass around like you’re not. I saw you with Eric. Shit. You’re the last thing he needs in his life. And stop coming on to Seth and Ky. They don’t need the likes of you screwing them like you did me!” Now he’d stooped to mean and nasty, not his forte. Eric, Seth, and Ky might have been dead for all he knew. He had no right drawing them into this fight. He shut his mouth before he dishonored his friends further.
“But Hunter—”
He jerked a palm up to her face. “Stop, Meredith. Stop trying to explain. I gave up on you long ago. Don’t think you can wave your tits at me and I’ll give in. I’ve been there once. I gotta give it to you...” He paused long enough to suck in a long, deep breath that didn’t come close to easing the angst in his gut, or the guilt he felt for unleashing on he
r like he had. Yeah, not one of his finer moments. “I learned a lot the day you walked out on me.”
“Like what?” she asked, her voice suddenly as calm as a summer morning, something glimmering at the corner of her eyes. She wasn’t angry. She hadn’t come back at him, not once. Was she... could she in any way be as filled with regret as he was?
He stopped in his tracks, cocked his head, and glared at her, needing to understand what had just happened. The tiniest inkling of suspicion whispered at the back of his hard head that maybe he’d missed something. That maybe she’d trapped him all over again. Hell, no. Not this time.
“That all women lie,” he spat. “They play a guy like the trusting fool he is, they get what they want, and, shit. I don’t have time for this.” He stalked back to Teague. “Move out.”
“No.”
He froze, clenched his fingers into fists, and counted to ten before he returned Teague to the ground and whirled on her with deadly deliberation in his heart. It was time she knew who she was dealing with. Nose to nose, he ordered her one last time, “I. Said. Move.”
She lifted her chin, daring him like she had a choice. “And I said—”
“No! Fuckin’! More!” Hunter bellowed. He meant to do nothing more than get in her face and intimidate the shit out of her. Like a Marine Corps drill sergeant. Like the demon he truly was. She should be scared of him, damn it!
It almost worked. He’d backed her straight into the nearest tree and cornered her, his hands on the trunk near her shoulders. She was caged with nowhere to run, and he’d catch her if she dared try.
Finally! The perfect level of shock and awe blossomed in those dusky, baby blues. He sneered his dominance and took hold of her chin, the pad of his thumb forcing her face up so he could rain holy shit down on her.
She knew it, too. She’d stepped too far over the line this time. Meredith Flynn was in for an overdue and damned good butt-chewing, and he was just the man for the job.
Until everything went to hell.
Hunter (In the Company of Snipers Book 14) Page 7