14. Hazel
Hazel
“What do you want to do, run on the treadmill?” Marilee asked. “Do some boxing? Run the obstacle course?”
“Let me do some stretching first,” I said, dropping to the mat and moving into a stretch. “Then I’d love to hit the bag for a while.”
I sat on a mat and moved my legs in front of me, leaning forward to grab my feet, stretching my back and hamstrings while I looked around the space.
The Sapphic Security gym was pretty impressive.
Taking up most of the floor, there was a boxing ring, punching bags, treadmills, rowing machines, weight benches, and an obstacle course.
It smelled like leather and machine oil, which was better than most gyms I’d visited.
After I’d done a few stretches, I headed to the shelves where I could see boxing gloves, tape, and other supplies.
“Do you need…”
Marilee’s words broke off as she realized that I was taping my hands for boxing.
“You know boxing?” she said, looking surprised.
“My parents trained me to protect myself,” I said.
I’d done a piss poor job of it when those guys found us at Pike Place Market, but that was because I’d been caught off guard.
I’d half convinced myself that I’d been wrong about someone following me in Ottawa, and I never imagined if it was real that they’d try to make a move in a crowded public market.
Then again, at the time I thought it was only my parents coming for me, not every mercenary in the country.
People got sloppy when large sums of money were on the line.
Finishing my preparations, I headed over to one of the bags and began punching it, feeling the familiar sensation of my muscles bunching and my hands connecting with the material of the bag.
I struck with a steady precision, imagining that every punch was me pushing my parents out of my life.
Periodically I’d land a kick to mix things up.
Marilee watched me for a few minutes before getting her own gloves and heading to the second bag that was hanging a few feet away. She had a great form, moving with a lethal ease and an inhuman speed that was no doubt a result of her being supernatural.
We did bag work in silence for at least twenty minutes until my muscles were burning and my heart rate was up, then I decided to take a break. I headed to the water fountain, taking several gulps of water before removing my gloves and taking off the tape.
“You wanna try the obstacle course?” Marilee suggested. “We can race. I’ll give you a head start.”
Like I could win against someone with shifter speed. I’d give it my best shot though. The course looked challenging but fun, two things I liked in a workout. Plus I had a competitive side.
“Sure.”
The obstacle course ran the entire length of the gym, set up for two people to race at the same time. Tires. A rope net to crawl underneath. Real logs to balance on. Monkey bars with mats underneath. And a wall to climb over.
“Ready. Set. Go…”
I took off running, my feet tapping in and out of the long row of tires that made up the first obstacle.
Holding my arms out for balance, I skipped across the balance log, then dropped to the ground to crawl under the net.
I was halfway across the monkey bars when Marilee caught up with me, swinging easily from bar to bar.
We hit the ground at the same time and headed for the wall, my bodyguard easily making it up.
She swung one leg over and straddled the top, waiting for me to catch up.
I made it halfway before I lost my grip and dropped back down to the mat. Two seconds later, Marilee landed on the mat right next to me, a carefree smile on her face.
“You didn’t make it.”
“I didn’t make it,” I said, rolling on my side to face her.
She was dressed in gym shorts and a tank top, her hair pulled back in a low ponytail. She hadn’t even broken a sweat yet. Meanwhile I was a panting, sweaty mess. I really needed to level up my workouts, this was embarrassing.
“You gave it a good try though.”
I rolled my eyes.
“Trying is for losers, winners do. Or at least that’s what my father always said.”
She wrinkled her nose. “Your father sounds like a dick.”
I laughed. “Yeah, he really is.”
Our eyes caught, and the laughter died on my lips. I could see Marilee’s eyes shifting again, changing color as she stared back at me. I felt warm again, and it wasn’t from the effort of running the obstacle course.
I wasn’t sure how it happened, it wasn’t like I made a conscious decision to move, but suddenly I was on top of her, my lips crashing down as she rose to meet me.
Just like last night, my entire body electrified the instant we touched.
I licked along the seam of her lips, sucking her tongue into my mouth when she opened for me, my hands moving to frame her face.
“Why do you taste so good?” I whispered as I drew back enough to kiss my way along her jaw and back to her mouth.
Instead of answering, Marilee bent her knees and flipped us over so she was on top of me, her legs between mine.
She rubbed her hips against me as she gave me a rough and claiming kiss that lit up every nerve ending in my body.
I ran my hands along her back, down the curves of her ass, memorizing the feel of her as the kiss went on and on.
When she finally pulled back, my heart was racing and my panties were soaked. I watched her nostrils flare as she inhaled, no doubt catching the scent of my arousal with her sensitive nose. But judging by the way her nipples were jutting through her shirt, I wasn’t the only one affected.
“We should stop,” she said regretfully. “We’re crossing a line we shouldn’t be crossing.”
It took a few seconds for all the reasons this was a bad idea to penetrate through my lust-addled brain.
Oh yeah. She was my bodyguard. She needed to focus on my safety.
Plus there was the fated mate thing. I didn’t want to lead her on and make her think we had a future together. People like me didn’t get futures.
People like me might not be alive in a few weeks, I reminded myself.
I didn’t think my parents would kill me.
I knew they loved me in their own twisted way.
They wouldn’t hesitate to lock me up somewhere though.
I had no doubt about that. Their enemies were another story.
Now that my father had offered a bounty of his own for me, they knew I was important.
Killing me would send a message, the same way killing my little brother had.
Marilee must have sensed my shift in mood.
“Are you okay?” she asked, studying me carefully.
“Yeah. I’m just hungry,” I lied.
She looked like she was about to challenge me but just then my stomach growled loudly, backing up my claim.
“Martha and Allie should be here soon to join us,” she said, leaping to her feet with a grace that I envied. “I think Bella is still here too – you met her the other day in the conference room -- we’ll see if she wants to join us for dinner. I imagine we’re all hungry by now.”
She reached out a hand to help me get back up and I took it, studiously avoiding her gaze while we put back the equipment and wiped down the mats.
An hour later the five of us were at a nearby Chipotle and I was laughing as Bella told me a story about her sister Darla.
“So Darla is doing close protection for this doctor, Kathryn, who turned out to be her fated mate…”
“Wait, it seems like a lot of you find your fated mates on the job, is that right?” I asked.
Bella nodded. “Yeah. I did. Darla. Wanda. Angie. Martha… It’s kind of a trend.”
Her eyes bounced between me and Marilee, making me wonder if she knew that her coworker thought I was her mate.
“But don’t mention it in front of Lois, it enrages her.”
“Because she thinks it’s unprofessional?” I asked.
“No, because it’s distracting. A distracted bodyguard can make mistakes,” Bella explained.
“Plus people in relationships ask for more time off, which annoys her. And because so many of us have found mates, Lois’s peers at the other offices are giving her shit about it, asking her if she’s running a vampire dating service or something. ”
I took a bite of my burrito as Bella continued her story about her sister and her mate.
“Darla spent her whole adult life in the military and she’s basically clueless about modern culture. But then Kathryn brings her to Target, and my weirdo sister is more excited than that little boy that went to the chocolate factory.”
“Charlie,” Martha supplied, her mouth full of food.
“Yeah him. So they’re hungry from their Target trip so Kathryn suggests Chipotle and that’s it, Darla becomes completely obsessed with this place the first time she came here,” Bella explained.
“Every time one of us is going to meet her for lunch or something she’s always like, ‘Can we go to Chipotle?’ It’s literally the only place she ever wants to go.
Poor Kathryn is so sick of Chipotle now she refuses to go anymore. ”
We all laughed.
“You know what? I’ll send her a picture.”
Bella moved sideways, turning her phone to get a shot of the five of us.
“Hold up your cups so she can see the logo,” she instructed.
A few seconds later her phone pinged. “Told you,” she said, turning the phone to show us the response.
I’m so jealous. Why didn’t you invite me?
The text was accompanied by a crying face emoji.
“I’m telling her traitors who quit the agency don’t get to come to Chipotle with us,” Bella laughed.
“Traitor?”
“She quit Sapphic Security to keep her job at the hospital with her mate,” Marilee explained.
“It sounds like you guys are all pretty tight,” I noted.
“Sapphic Security is like a big family,” Marilee said. “We’re all good friends, us and the bears. They’re honorary Sapphic Security team members.”
“That’s nice.”
If they picked up on the wistful tone of my voice they didn’t say anything.
Being on the run all these years, I hadn’t formed any serious attachments. I had casual friends, the kind you might grab a beer with after work or go to lunch with, but no one who really knew me. No one I had inside jokes with like this group did. I hadn’t realized what I was missing until tonight.
Now Darla wasn’t the only one feeling a little jealous.