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.
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.
I shrug one shoulder. I’m not sure how any of that makes it okay to be disrespectful to your friends, but this isn’t the time to discuss it. Especially not with the serious face that Cullen turns toward me.
“Understand me, Reynolds. There is no gray zone in training with me. You do what I tell you, when I tell you, for however long I tell you. Or you tell me you’re done with this endeavor and we go home and never do this again. There is no in-between. You can say stop any time you want, but that’s about the only opinion you get to have. Got it?”
Sounds like being engaged to Jaden. “Got it.”
I follow Cullen out onto the trail, the SEAL setting a brisk pace uphill that has my muscles going from warming up to burning within minutes, though the calm of nature offsets the discomfort as it always does. Gambel oaks, spruces, and cottonwood trees streak by on either side, filling my nose with clean wilderness freshness. A pair of squirrels keep pace with us for a bit before losing interest. By the time we’re two miles into the run however, and still heading away from the studio, I begin to worry.
Another mile and I no longer care for the beauty of the oaks, spruces, or cottonwood trees, my breaths coming in painful, ragged bursts, my lungs aching from the exertion that seems to bypass Cullen completely. When the man comes to a stop atop another hill, I fall unceremoniously down to my knees and gasp for breath.
“On your back, legs six inches from the ground,” Cullen orders harshly. “If you want to roll in the dirt, we might as well use it.”
I grit my teeth but do as I’m told without complaint—a fact that Cullen neither notices nor acknowledges. By the time he’s had me do thirty burpees, bear crawl through a puddle, and sprint up the next two hills, however, my good humor has reached its limit.
“Move, Reynolds,” Cullen shouts as I trip over a root, barely recovering without falling flat on my face. At the edges of my vision, the trail seems to shrink into darkness, my eyes unable to focus on anything not right in front of my nose. Cullen comes up behind me like a wolf herding his prey. “Move.”
“I am moving,” I snap back at him, my silent endurance at its blazing end.
Something dark flashes across Cullen’s face. A warning to keep my mouth shut and…and what? Throw up? Fall down in exhaustion? We’d agreed for me to learn self-defense, not join Cullen’s do-it-yourself boot camp.
My head comes up, my body not backing away an inch even as ragged breaths threaten to rip my lungs to pieces. “Why are you being an asshole?”
Cullen cuts in front of me, blocking my path, his muscular body silhouetted against the glorious sky. “You think that was being an asshole? You know what I think? That you aren’t even trying. Work or quit.” He bares his teeth. “And I think you should quit.”
Fury, a burning inferno of fury, rushes through my blood. My feet hurt. My lungs feel like someone has taken a knife to them. My muscles tremble from the effort of keeping me upright. And after all that, now the asshole wants me to quit?
Or is that what he’d wanted all along? To punish me for arrogantly pursuing my dreams instead of following his orders like some mindless soldier?
My jaw clenches, my eyes flashing as they meet Cullen’s moss-green gaze. He never liked the idea of me training, of me doing what investigative journalism requires, and has finally found a perfect way out. Make me turn back. Run me into the ground until I’ve no choice but to crumple and admit I’m not good enough.
Shows how much he knows. In my mind, I picture Lincoln Drive again. Imagine holding Zack in my arms. Tell myself I must run to keep him alive. And so I do. I put one foot in front of the other and push on, pouring everything I have into keeping ahead of the bastard who has a foot of height and years of training on me.
For a while, it works, my body moving even as I can no longer keep track of where I am. Twigs crack underfoot, my breaths filling my ears. I’m on another muddy uphill slope as I stumble again, landing on my shoulder, searing pain taking what little breath I have.
“Get up,” Cullen hollers. “Get up, get up, get up.”
I don’t know if it’s the extreme fatigue of my joints and muscles, the damage done to my shoulder and arm, or just the fact that Cullen is being so unfathomably cruel, but I lose it. Without warning, tears well in my eyes and stream down my cheeks. Climbing painfully to my feet, I pull back my fist and jab my knuckles into Cullen’s chin.
To my utter surprise, the man takes the shot.
Ironically, the force of the impact sends me backward, my foot slipping on the muddy slope. My precarious balance gives way, and I have half a heartbeat to realize that I’m going down. That the pain I felt moments ago will be nothing compared to a full tumble down the rocky slope. Half a heartbeat, and then I fall.
A large, muscular body wraps around me, Cullen twisting us so he takes the brunt of the impact, his powerful arm securing my injured shoulder like a splint. As we come to the bottom of the mudslide, to the point where I expect Cullen to shove me off him, I feel his arms tightening around me instead.