AllFreeNovel
Share Us
It’s a good thing I’m not trying to grift her because she doesn’t seem willing to buy whatever I’m selling. Time to apply more pressure. I narrow my eyes at her. “Did he also tell you about thehunting?”
“What hunting?”
I sit back with a smile. “So he hasn’t told you.”
“I’m his head of security. He only needs me to know what’s relevant to keeping him safe. Anything else would be more information than I care to know.”
“You don’t care to know about your boss’s new hobby of hunting people for sport?” I ask with false surprise.
“It sounds like something he would do,” Nadine says without batting an (exquisitely long) eyelash. “If you didn’t want to do it, maybe you shouldn’t have signed that contract.”
“You never heard of coercion, Nay-Nay?”
Nadine shrugs. “You slipped up and you paid the price.”
Wow. She’s really been working for rich people too long.
Still, there’s always something admirable about a woman who doesn’t feel as if she owes the world her pity and sympathy. Since I’m not going to shake any fruit loose from the tree of her heart, I might as well try to get something else out of her.
“Any hot tips?”
She flicks me a glance. “What do you mean?”
“For the hunts. I got through the first one by cheating.”
“He actually hunted you?”
“He tried. I smashed his locks and his internet and then I bolted and hid in the woods.” When she gives me an incredulouslook, I add, “I panicked, okay? He didn’t give me any time to prepare, and my leg is fucked. I had to dosomething.”
“What happens if he catches you?”
“Presumably, something dark and fucked up. You know your boss better than I do. What happens if he catches me?”
She shrugs.
“Something dark and fucked up.”
Maybe Nay-Nay put somethingin my coffee, or maybe the fever and the injury and the exhaustion hit me harder than I thought. I pass out cold on the couch ten minutes later, right after Nadine tells me to stop talking and let her pay attention to the documentary she’s trying to watch.
I wake up some indeterminate time later, back in the bed of my guest room in Fort Fletch. I have no idea what time it is or how long I’ve been asleep or where Nadine is. All I know is pain.
“Fuck,” I mutter.
My voice comes out a croak. Everything hurts, from the soles of my feet all the way to my pounding skull. All I can think of is the time that’s being wasted and the shit I have to do. I climb out of bed. My leg almost buckles under me. I realise, almost lazily, that I’ve not yet seen what the wound looks like.
I realise, almost with surprise, that I’m probably going to be scarred for life.
My scars are just like my tattoos—they’remine. My skin, my marks.
But this one isn’t. This one is Luca’s.Luca’smark, onmyskin.
Mustering all my strength, I haul myself onto my feet. I feel absolutely disgusting, and not just because of the thought ofLuca marking me. I’ve been wearing the same underwear for the past few days, there’s mud on my arms and legs, and my hair and skin are greasy with sweat.
I hobble into the bathroom and run both taps as far as they will go. The bathtub is big and square and almost aggressively white. Everything is horribly bright. If I wasn’t afraid I’d slip and break my good leg, I would turn off the lights just to spare my throbbing skull.
Eyelids squeezed shut against the light and the pain, I slide down to my ass on the floor next to the bathtub. I just need to wait for the water to fill the tub. I probably shouldn’t get in the bath with the bandage on, but I also feel like I shouldn’t soak the wound in hot water. What if I get the water all gross and bloody?
I sigh and let myself slump down onto my side on the floor, face pressed to the bath mat.
