Page 13 of Hunted

Ethan was objectively gorgeous, even pulling faces like that. He was all limbs—muscular thighs so thick they could squeeze a watermelon in half, and arms that could hoist a woman over his shoulder fireman-style to carry her to safety. I mean, if a person thought of him like that.

“Hurry up and shut the door, Eth. I’m freezing!” I hissed, spurring the lumbering giant into action.

He winced, finally noticing that I was standing in the middle of the room half naked with arms folded over my bare breasts, then crossed the threshold and shut the door sheepishly behind him.

“Sorry, Ads.” Ethan recovered quickly with a roguishly handsome grin. “Do you need any help getting out of the rest of your clothes?”

I’d already tossed my ruined shirt in the bin and hand-washed the blood out of my favourite sports crop, hanging it up to dry over the thin wall of the shower stall, but no way was I taking him up on that particular offer.

“Gross,” Fleur scoffed. “Get a room, you two.”

Then I scoffed, knowing Ethan had already slept with every female in our cohort, and some of the men, too—including the lanky, blonde Frenchwoman currently rifling through the medical kit—except for me. I was that last notch in his belt. A notch that had approximately zero inclination to sleep with anyone at the Academy, let alone someone I considered a friend.

My mind flickered briefly to two gargantuan instructors, betraying me in the lie. But as hot as they both were, my vagina would remain closed for business. I was not about to give the Academy any further incentive to throw me to the wolves—nothing more than my gender already gave them. The only thing I wanted from this place was that one lonesome sniper assignment up for grabs. I’d been working towards it for months, dedicating every spare second I could scrounge up to target practice, after I’d shown a sliver of adeptness with a Barrett M82.

Fleur had no such reservations, knowing she wouldn’t be given an assignment at all after Graduation. Her parents already had her whole future planned out: billionaire business heiress, set to marry a wealthy international politician's son, and have a trio of her own shiny, perfect babies.

Too bad Fleur had ideas of her own that her parents knew nothing about. She was going to run away, follow me on my first assignment, wherever in the world that happened to take me, and then we’d take our sweet-ass time heading to the next location.

We’d travel the world together—at least until her parents tracked her down and dragged her back into that perfect little existence they’d carved out for her.

“Ethan, darling, you know I love you”—he perked up at my saccharine tone—“but I’d rather turn up to formation naked than have sex with you.”

His face dropped into a scowl, then morphed into an expression of pure mischief. “Careful, Ads. I might just make that my next bet.” He winked.

“Ugh! Enough foreplay,” Fleur cut in. “Hands,” she demanded.

I held out both mangled hands, palm up, waiting for her to finish rummaging around in the med kit.

“Aha!” she exclaimed, holding a sad-looking little tube of medical-grade wound glue. “I’ll do this one. You get the other, Taylor,” she ordered, with Eth as powerless to resist as I was. She squeezed a thin line across each cut, ditched the tube, then pulled both sides of my hand back together until the glue set.

Ethan mimicked the action.

“Nice work, nurse Taylor,” I drawled, shooting him a wink.

“Now help me stitch this shoulder up, Taylor,” Fleur ordered before he could say or do anything in response to the jab.

Ethan’s deep-brown, half-moon eyes widened in real horror. “Uhh, Fleur… You know how terrible I am with a needle, right?”

She rolled her eyes before answering. “Yes, Ethan. I remember how shoddy your stitchwork is every time I look in a mirror and see this mess.” She lifted the hem of her shirt, revealing perhaps the only physical marring she possessed: a star-shaped, three-dimensional scar that ought to have been a simple, shiny patch of skin, but now looked like her lower abdomen got into a fight with a hot poker and lost—courtesy of Eth’s abysmal ‘stitches’ out in the field during an overnight assessment.

“Which is why I am the one with the needle and gloves,” she continued. “You just need to hold Adelaide still.”

“Hey, I can hold myself still,” I whined.

“Right, and the sun will rise in the west tomorrow,” Fleur shot back with sarcasm so thick I could taste it.

I scowled, knowing she was right but stubborn enough to deny needing help.

“C’mere, gorgeous,” Eth crooned from where he sat on the floor with his back braced against the porcelain bathtub, arms outstretched in invitation.

I grunted but plopped down in front of him, and he immediately draped one long arm around my torso—chivalrously ignoring my bare breasts—effectively pinning both arms to my sides. His free hand wrapped around my forehead, forcibly smooshing my face into the crook of his neck.

“What the fuck are you doing that for?”

My shoulder was throbbing by this point, all adrenaline completely drained from my system.

“I know you, Adelaide Sinclair,” Ethan murmured. “Once our mutual friend over there starts stitching, you’re going to start flailing.”