I.N.E.T 1

by Brenda Cothern

  “Glad I already have you trained when it comes to who’s smarter, then.” Slade winked.

  “Fuck you,” Knight laughed and stood when Slade did.

  “You’ve got an early morning and a busy day tomorrow,” Slade commented as they walked out the door.

  “Yeah. I’m being poked in the ass before they poke around in my head,” Knight grumbled and walked next to Slade across the courtyard toward the dorm.

  “What, you’ve never been poked in the ass before?” Slade shoulder bumped Knight. “You might like it.” He pulled open the door to Knight’s dorm.

  Knight stepped through the door and looked over his shoulder to reply. “You trying to tell me something, Slade?”

  Slade grinned. “I don’t know. Do I need to tell you something?”

  Knight stopped just inside the door and turned to face Slade. Slade stepped in front of him and Knight reached out and hooked his fingers into the belt loops of the man’s jeans. He didn’t pull his partner closer, but just kept his fingers in the loops while he stared in Slade’s darker blue eyes.

  “Being poked in the ass tomorrow won’t be the first time I’ve had a finger there,” Knight’s voice dropped low so he wouldn’t be overheard.

  Slade knew Knight wasn’t referring to a physical prostate exam. The thought of having his finger, or better yet, his cock up Knight’s ass had him subconsciously licking his lips.

  Knight smirked at Slade’s reaction to his words and caressed his thumbs across Slade’s jeans along the sides of the man’s erection without releasing his fingers from the belt loops. He finally let go of Slade’s belt loops because he didn’t need to get them any more riled up then they already were since there wasn’t anything they could do about their arousal. And they were both aroused; aroused as fuck and in the worst possible place to do something.

  Slade let Knight unhook his fingers from his belt loops and drop them to his sides, even though Slade wanted to drag the man’s hand to his now aching cock. He cleared his throat and chuckled when Knight raised a questioning brow.

  “I think it’s safer for us both if I just say goodnight here.” Slade stuffed his hands into the front pockets of his jeans to stop himself from reaching out to touch Knight. Touch him, kiss him, fuck him…all of the damned above.

  “Do you always play it safe?”

  “No,” Slade replied, then turned on his heel and walked away before he did something stupid.

  “Shit,” Knight muttered as he climbed the steps that would take him to his room.

  The next day was just as boring as orientation had been. Knight had never been poked and prodded so much in his life as he had been in the damn physical. He wasn’t just poked and prodded either.

  The INET docs did an EEG to check his brain, an EKG to check his heart, and a stress test on a damn treadmill to check his lungs and heart. After all that, they made him do as many sit-ups, push-ups, and pull-ups as he could in five minute blocks for each. It was like being in the fucking military, or at least what Knight thought the military would be like. Thankfully, Knight was fit, so fit that he was still going when the doc called time.

  After the physical abuse was over, they sent him to endure the mental abuse from the head-shrinker. Knight had suffered through so many psych evaluations in his past that he easily faked his way through to pass. The hardest part of dealing with the shrink was keeping his temper in check.

  Agent Butler was a decent enough doctor up until he started tossing out stupid fucking questions about animals to test his logic. Knight had experienced the safari riddles and the stupid laying an egg shit before, but the riddles still pissed him off..

  Really? Roosters and eggs… pfft.

  Knight grunted out the answers like a good little agent wannabe. Still, he was sure Butler didn’t appreciate his parting comment about how if it was up to him, he’d just shoot all the animals then the questions wouldn’t matter.

  He was still in a growly mood when he walked across the courtyard to the cafeteria to get dinner. Knight grabbed his food and sat at a table with his back against the wall without engaging anyone. Being social was so not on his ‘to do list’ right now, or even at all, while he was in fucking training.

  Movement from the corner of his eye while he was cutting into his chicken breast like the damned thing wasn’t already dead, made him turn. There stood shy little Stacy next to his table holding her dinner tray. Her hesitant smile fell and Knight knew it was because of the glare he was giving her.

  Just what I don’t fucking need, some stupid kid with a crush, Knight thought uncharitably.

  “Um…hi,” Stacy looked nervous, but Knight was impressed when she didn’t look away from him like she had last night.

  “What do you want, Stacy?” Knight knew he growled out his question, knew that his voice sounded deadly because he made no attempt to hide his annoyance.

  Stacy looked speechless and blinked at him. Her lack of reply only pissed him off even more because his little sister use to do the same damned blinking shit when she didn’t know what to say. She used to get the deer in the headlights look, too.

  “Look, I am not here to make friends. In fact, I don’t want to know anyone’s name and talk to them or ‘get to know’ them at all. So, I’m not interested. At. All. Go away.”

  Knight was being harsh, he knew, but he really didn’t give a shit if he hurt her feelings as long as she got the message. Her eyes filling with tears told Knight she got his message loud and clear. He resumed eating his dinner and ignored her as she turned and fled. Knight noticed Slade approach his table from the other side and ignored his new partner, too.

  Slade heard Knight lay into Stacy when he approached the table. Knight’s voice was low when he ran Stacy off, but Slade had excellent hearing. He took the seat across from Knight and didn’t say anything while his partner attacked his dinner. It wasn’t until Knight’s eyes shifted to look at him that Slade finally spoke.

  “That was kinda mean, don’t you think?”

  “No.” Knight shoveled another bite of mashed potatoes into his mouth.

  Slade waited for Knight to say more and when he didn’t, Slade frowned.

  “You’re giving me that look again,” Knight grumbled after a few minutes and added Slade’s frown to the list of things that pissed him off.

  On Friday, Slade had found Knight’s anger sexy to the point that it turned him on. Right now? Not so much. His partner’s anger was still sexy, but Slade’s concern that Knight really did have anger management issues replaced any arousal he might have felt.

  “This is my ‘why are you so pissed’ look,” Slade circled his finger to indicate his face when he replied. He had a feeling he would be giving this look to Knight frequently, and getting fucking wrinkles way too soon for his age because of it.

  Knight only grunted in reply and finished his dinner. He stood and took his tray to the drop station. Slade’s presence was constant behind him as he slammed through the cafeteria doors. Knight just ignored the man and kept walking.

  Twelve

  Slade followed Knight halfway across the courtyard before he spoke to his partner again. “So, you’re not going to tell me what set you off this time? What the fuck is wrong with you?”

  Knight stopped and spun around to face Slade so quickly that had Slade’s reflexes not been so honed, he would have walked straight into Knight. He didn’t expect Knight to turn on him, but he didn’t step back when the man did.

  “You want to know what set me off? How about this bullshit training for starters? I’ve learned everything in that fucking manual and I don’t need to be trained on how to use my fucking gun either!” Knight got right up in Slade’s face and continued his rant.

  “I’m not some college recruit who doesn’t know their ass from a hole in the ground. Add in the physical that was a joke and the bullshit about stuffing elephants into God damned refrigerators, like I’ll ever need to do that in the field, and fucking roosters who don’t lay fucking eggs,
and I think I have the right to be a tad bit ticked off about how my time is being wasted by this fucking training!”

  Knight was chest to chest with him, but Slade didn’t back down from his partner who definitely had anger management issues. Serious anger management issues.

  “How the hell did you pass the psych eval with your anger issues?” Slade asked curiously, and waited for Knight to explode again. He didn’t have to wait long. Three seconds, maybe?

  “You go through enough of them and the stupid fuckers don’t even realize you have the God damned answer key!” Knight growled out through clenched teeth.

  Enough of them? Slade thought, but knew now was not the time to ask how many or what the evals were for.

  Somewhere in the back of his mind, Knight knew he shouldn’t be this furious over his training so far. He also knew he shouldn’t be lashing out at Slade because the man had nothing to do with his irrational anger. Slade was just a convenient target. Knight felt the need to hit something. Or maybe shoot someone. Yeah, shooting someone sounded real good right about now. Too bad he would have to settle for hitting someone instead.

  When Slade said nothing, Knight spat out, “So, you going to play it safe and go tattle to the powers that be, now?” Knight just couldn’t reign in his anger. “Be a good little agent and all that shit? Go on then,” Knight challenged Slade even though he had no grounds to assume Slade was even the type of man to run to his boss with partner problems. He poked the man’s chest to emphasize his point and glared.

  Slade was willing to let Knight fume at him; willing to let Knight bitch about his training so far, even if it was only the man’s second day. However, what he wasn’t willing to do was be poked in the fucking chest. Again.

  Apparently, Knight’s anger erased the man’s memory of what happened the last time he shoved his finger into Slade’s sternum. Thoughts of Friday when Knight poked him in the chest and the outcome came to Slade’s mind. He knew taking Knight down, as he had before, while they were in the middle of the courtyard was not an option, but he wasn’t about to be poked without retaliating.

  Slade grabbed Knight’s wrist and resisted pushing the pressure point, again, that would make his partner’s arm and hand useless.

  “Don’t. Fucking. Poke. Me,” Slade snarled, and let his own anger rise to the surface. “You want to take your bullshit out on me? Fine,” Slade growled into Knight’s furious gaze. “But not here. Let’s go.”

  Slade roughly pushed Knight’s wrist down and released it before he turned and stormed toward the gymnasium. He didn’t need to look over his shoulder to know that Knight was hot on his heels. Slade could feel Knight’s fury as if a hand was pushing between his shoulder blades. Slade ignored the feeling and flung open the door to the gym.

  Knight knew, just fucking knew, that he was about to get his ass handed to him. He didn’t care. The need to hit something was so strong that the thought of the consequences for going head to head with Slade never crossed his mind.

  Slade led him down two different hallways until he pushed through a set of swinging doors. His partner hit the lights and Knight saw they had entered an almost bare room. The only indication the room was used to work out, or for any type of training, was the padded mats that covered most of the floor.

  Slade crossed to the center of the room and didn’t spare Knight a glance before he bent and unlaced his boots. He toed them off and removed his weapon from the small of his back.

  “You want to fight me?” Slade finally looked at his partner. “Take those fuckers off,” Slade indicated Knight’s boots. “And disarm.”

  Slade bent and picked up his boots and gun. He set both on the side of the mats. When he turned to face Knight, his partner was bending to remove his boots off the mat and place his gun next to them. Slade didn’t wait for Knight to turn and face him before he struck.

  Knight’s hand had barely left his weapon when Slade slammed into him. He never heard his partner cross the plastic covered mat. In fact, he didn’t even know Slade was close until the man’s arms snaked around his waist; he was lifted off his feet, and thrown down onto the mats. Being caught off guard infuriated him even more.

  Slade knew attacking Knight before the man was ready to spar was fighting dirty. But, fights were never clean and they sure as hell weren’t as pretty as the shit Hollywood put on the screen.

  Knight grunted when he hit the mat and Slade grinned sadistically. His anger at being poked had cooled as they walked through the training complex. However, that didn’t mean Slade wasn’t going to enjoy the hell out of beating the shit out of his new partner. Again. And he would beat Knight, beat the damned anger right out of the man, if he had to go to such an extreme.

  Air whistled out of Knight and he instinctively rolled when he made contact with the mat. He was on his feet and facing Slade without any thought. He may have been caught off guard, but he was ready now.

  “You fucking asshole. That how you want to play it?” Knight glared at Slade and didn’t even realize he echoed Slade’s words from the ring last Friday. Slade shrugged and Knight saw red at his partner’s nonchalance.

  Slade knew his blasé response to Knight’s question would prompt the man to lash out. Lash out he did, too. Knight rushed him and almost, almost, got close enough to grab him. Slade spun away from him and in the process, his hand connected between Knight’s shoulder blades and he shoved. The move practically sent Knight to the mat again.

  Slade couldn’t resist smirking after he deflected Knight’s bull rush. His smirk was still in place when Knight regained his balance, turned, and glared at him.

  “That all you got, rookie?” Slade taunted.

  As long as Knight was furious, Slade could toy with the man all he liked. He knew Knight could hold his own in the ring from when they sparred on Friday. However on Friday, Knight was still focused even though he was pissed then, too. The man in front of him right now was so far from focused that it wasn’t even funny. Lesson number one that he taught the new recruits when they started hand-to-hand combat lessons was to make their opponent lose focus. Once they did, the fight was already won.

  Knight rushed Slade again. The man pulled the same move and when he turned to face his partner, he roared. “Fucker!”

  It’s wasn’t only Slade’s avoidance tactics to engage him that infuriated Knight. No, it was the God damn superior smile that spread across the man’s lips.

  “I’ve never fucked a her,” Slade chuckled at his own joke before he grew serious again. “I can do this all night. You’re letting your anger distract you, Knight. Where’s the man I faced in the ring at Sparta on Friday?”

  Slade’s words fueled Knight’s rage, but they sank in just the same. Blindly attacking Slade wasn’t going to take the man down. Knight knew this and fought his urge to rush the man again. He fought and lost.

  Knight launched himself at Slade once more, but this time Slade didn’t side step him. They collided and grappled for only a moment before Knight found himself flat on his back. Air whooshed out of him again and he looked up at Slade.

  “Motherfucker,” Knight growled once he caught his breath, but didn’t move to get up.

  “I do not fuck my mother. That shit’s just sick,” Slade looked down into Knight’s pale blue eyes. “You done being stupid? I don’t want to hurt you before your real hand-to-hand training starts in a few weeks.”

  Knight schooled his features and forced his body to relax into the perfect imitation of defeat. “Yeah, I’m done.” Knight was sure his words were believable. He had enough practice undercover to project any tone or emotion that he wanted in order to deceive someone.

  “Good.” Slade wasn’t sure if he believed Knight, but he still offered his hand to help his partner up.

  Knight accepted Slade’s hand, but when the man pulled him to his feet, Knight let the momentum carry him further. At the same time Slade went to steady their balance, Knight threw an elbow into Slade’s jaw. The force behind his blow was powerful e
nough to send Slade staggering back away from him.

  “That focused enough for you.” Knight glared at Slade and braced himself for his partner’s counter attack.

  “Son of a bitch,” Slade cursed more at himself than Knight.

  Slade could already feel his jaw throbbing from the solid hit from Knight’s elbow so he opened and closed his jaw to make sure it wasn’t broken. It was his own stupid fault that he was sure to be sporting a beauty of a bruise tomorrow. He had underestimated his partner, trusted him, and let his guard down like he never would have done in a fight had he been in the field.

  There was no excuse for his lapse of anticipation of an attack, even if he thought his opponent conceded defeat. Just because Knight was his new partner, didn’t mean he knew the man. Nor should he have automatically trusted him.

  Knight’s attack had caught Slade off guard and he was ready for Slade to retaliate. There was no doubt Slade would and he welcomed it. At least Knight thought he did until he saw the gleam in Slade’s eyes. That gleam let him know that pay back was going to be a bitch. And it was. He could barely defend against the rapid blows Slade rained down on him when the man finally made his move. In fact, he was only blocking one in three hits and he was sure he was going to feel every one of them come morning, if not before.

  Unlike Knight, Slade didn’t let his anger at himself or Knight dictate his actions when he punched, kneed, and kicked Knight. No, instead, calmness overcame him as he delivered his blows; blows that would force Knight into submission.

  Slade was sure this was the fight Knight wanted, fuck, needed to release all the pent up anger the man felt inside. However, Slade refused to beat Knight senseless or until they were both too exhausted to continue.

  Time to end this shit, Slade grumbled mentally.

  Slade stepped into Knight’s space and grabbed Knight’s bicep at the same time he forced a leg behind Knight’s. Slight pressure on the back of Knight’s knee put Knight’s center of gravity off balance just like Slade knew it would. When Knight stumbled, Slade yanked on his bicep which caused Knight to spin mid-fall. Again, Slade expected the outcome of action and was prepared to absorb the impact when he landed on Knight’s back.