4. Addie #3
She offered me one of the bottles of liquor, tipping some into my open mouth. I smiled when I realised it was whisky—a good one, too.
“Where did you—”
“Don’t ask.” She grinned. “Bottom’s up.”
She poured more of the delicious amber into my mouth—since Ethan apparently had no inclination to release my arms—then downed a mouthful herself, before finally pouring the remaining splash over my shoulder wound.
It stung like a motherfucker and my hiss told her exactly what I thought about it.
“Aw, what about me?” he whined.
“You get stabbed, you get alcohol,” I grumbled back.
“No thanks,” he sang, entirely too gleeful. “Looks painful.”
I hissed through my teeth as Fleur threaded the needle through my torn flesh. “You could say that.”
“Sorry.” She winced. “Tried to do it while you were distracted.”
Through gritted teeth, I asked her a question. “Tell me, did that tactic work when the campus doctor sewed up your ass cheek a year ago?”
Her trilling laugh answered me before any words did. “I have no idea. I was so high on painkillers, I don’t remember.” She giggled again. “Painkillers you would have access to if you’d gone to the medlab instead.” Her brows rose pointedly.
“And be so drug-addled I don’t notice when Sebastos inevitably sneaks in to finish the job?”
Ethan jolted. “What are you talking about?”
“Beckett and I heard him threaten to kill me in the hallway—”
“Beckett?!” Fleur’s head jerked back round as she stared at me in confusion. “When were you with Beckett?”
“And why does Seb want to kill you?” Ethan tacked on.
“A multitude of reasons, but the main one is probably because I threw his own dagger back at him and stuck him in the thigh.”
“Ah.”
My gaze swivelled back to meet Fleur’s hard, assessing stare. “I ran into Beckett in the hallway on my way up here.”
Her face softened. “Oooh, ran into him, did you? Merde, you work quickly.” She laughed. “First Pearce, now Beckett?”
“Jesus, Addie, you do work quick,” Eth teased.
I groaned. “No, I mean I literally ran into him. Face first into the brick wall that is his pectoral muscles.”
Ethan snorted in derision and Fleur cackled.
“Okay, all done, ma chérie,” she announced.
“Already?”
“You’re easily distracted”—she winked—“by talk of muscular instructors.”
I grumbled a string of barely intelligible French curse words, eliciting a gasp from our resident French model. She pressed a hand to her sternum, clutching those invisible pearls, perfect blonde brows flying high on her forehead.
“My, my!” She managed to tut before cracking a grin. “Language.”
“It was French, actually,” I quipped with a smirk.
Fleur and Ethan both groaned mirthfully.
“Oh, Addie,” he grumbled even as his face flitted back over into that mischievous territory. “So, you’ll torture yourself by thinking about our, admittedly very good-looking, but very off-limits instructors, but you won’t go for me?”
“Yep.” I patted his shoulder while he finally ogled my boobs—to be fair, they were perfectly at his eye level as I clambered to my feet. “I’m going to wash this blood off, eat, go to class, then work out where I’ll be sleeping tonight.”
“You can take my bed,” Fleur offered. “We’ll trade tonight. He wouldn’t dare touch a hair on Nadine Deveaux’s daughter’s head.”
“That was a mouthful.” I grinned.
“Just like my cock,” Eth interjected, turning his charm on me—to no avail.
“Ew.”
“But unfortunately true,” Fleur agreed.
“Well, maybe you could use those talented fingers on that mouthful of mine tonight, blondie.” Eth winked at Fleur, who just snorted and tossed the balled-up pair of bloody gloves at his head.
He spluttered, catching sight of his red-speckled reflection in the bathroom mirror, grumbling something under his breath about merciless fiends. Then he reached behind to grasp a handful of damp black fabric, stripping his shirt off over his head to scrub at his face.
Fleur and I paused what we were doing to admire the smooth lines of Ethan’s torso, rippling in all the right places as he washed all traces of my blood away.
Her gaze met mine in the mirror, and she winked, waggling her eyebrows, before sashaying up to him and running an elegant finger down the middle of his chest.
I shook my head, chuckling quietly, then stepped into the steamy shower stall knowing the bathroom was about to get a whole lot steamier.
My teeth clenched when the water hit my wounds, and I watched as crimson swirled down the drain. I lost all track of time, waiting till it turned pink, then finally clear.
Moans and huffed breaths made their way past the rush of the water, leaving no doubt as to how my friends were occupying themselves waiting for me to finish.
I grimaced, realising that it was now I who had to wait for them to finish—and not at all relishing the fact that I had to hear it occur in real time.
Ten minutes later—go Eth—they both exploded in loud shouts that echoed across the tiles. I sent up a silent prayer of thanks that I could finally almost exit the shower stall.
Fleur’s happy giggle filtered through, and I couldn’t help but smile. I had no idea if there was ever going to be anything more between them than whatever this on-again-off-again thing currently was, but I was happy they had each other for the time being.
“We’ll meet you in the dining hall for lunch, Ads!” Ethan called.
“Don’t take too long, and don’t you dare tear those stitches!” Fleur scolded.
Then the door slammed shut behind them. Turning the water off, I swore when I realised I was sans one towel.
Hoping they’d left me a spare on the bench, I padded out of the stall and traipsed across the steam-filled room.
I rubbed the heel of my hand in a neat circle over the mirror, just big enough to glance at my general appearance as I reached for the one remaining towel.
It only had a smidgen of my blood smeared over it.
It’ll do.
Just as my fingers curled around the soft, fluffy edge, the bathroom door slammed open once more. Except, instead of the familiar faces of my friends, I now stood dripping wet, completely naked, and rooted to the spot—before Instructor Lockwood.
My tech instructor’s teal-coloured eyes were locked onto said dripping wet, completely naked body, until I remembered to wrap the towel around myself. He cleared his throat and looked away until I was fully covered—ever the gentleman—with cheeks as red as mine felt.
“You know this bathroom is strictly for instructors only, right?” he asked, inflection rising all the way to the end.
I bit my lip. No, I hadn’t known that. But it explained why we were never interrupted by other recruits, and why it was always in pristine condition—dammit, everything made way too much sense in hindsight.
“No, uhh… I wasn’t aware. I’m so sorry, Sir. I’ll just throw my clothes on and get out of your way,” I blurted at approximately a million miles an hour.
“You know, if it was anyone else who’d caught you, they wouldn’t wait for you to get dressed before booting you out of here.”
My eyes just about bugged out of my head. “You wouldn’t.”
Lockwood laughed sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck. “I ought to, but no. Feel free to clothe yourself before making that hasty getaway you’re so determined to effectuate.”
“Thank you, Sir. I appreciate it.”
I quickly threw on my oversized hoodie, completely disregarding a bra or shirt. He was right—I was incredibly determined to make a run for it. As I was wiggling into my underwear, though, the towel slipped from around my waist and my poor instructor copped another full frontal view of my vagina.
I squeaked in horror, barely registering Lockwood’s pained groan, and rushed to cover my dignity and my nether regions simultaneously.
I couldn’t look up, couldn’t bear to see my future slipping away from one bathroom fuck-up in my instructor’s ocean eyes.
He’d have to report this—would have to inform Beckett, who would in turn have to notify Commander Varco—and there would go any chance I ever had of becoming an Eagle.
Hell, I’d be lucky to even receive a Swallow designation if they thought I’d been propositioning my instructors.
While I was busy grieving my future, my foot got stuck in the leg of my trousers, and I stumbled, knowing full well I was about to eat shit and embarrass myself further in front of my superior officer.
But I barely faltered, because two strong hands had snaked around my waist to prop me up.
Catching our reflection in the mirror, I had a front-row seat in watching my own cheeks redden to tomato status. Lockwood met my gaze in the reflection. His eyes held mine for a beat, then dropped to my parted lips before I couldn’t take it anymore.
I jerked, dragging my pants all the way up, and stepped out of his grip. Unfortunately, my traitorous body refused to forget the way his hands felt wrapped around it, the heat of his palms lingering even as I grabbed the rest of my shit and beelined for the door.
“I’ll, uh, see you in class, Sinclair.”
My hand froze on the painted white wood, and I glanced back over my shoulder.
Lockwood smirked, and I almost tripped through the door when I realised why.
After lunch, there was only one class left to endure for the day.
Cyber Espionage, taught by the very man now grinning smugly at me, who’d seen my entire naked body no more than two minutes ago.
Fuck.