The first paintball hits the side of the tank, echoing like a gunshot.
Kayla jolts upright. “What the fuck?!” she yells.
The second one comes through the open hatch above us, exploding red across the wall six inches from my head.
“CLAY!” Kayla screams, detaching herself from us as quickly as possible given our compromising position, then scrambles sideways.
More shots are fired, hitting all three of us. Vero loses his mind laughing, already pulling his clothes toward him across the floor. “I told you he was a sore loser.”
Another shot hits Vero’s thigh, and his laughter gets louder and more unhinged. He looks genuinely delighted.
“GET. DRESSED.” Clay’s voice comes from above us, flat and unamused. “We have a problem.”
Vero’s laughter cuts off, and we look at each other. Kayla is already pulling her shirt over her head when she hisses through her teeth, then her hand drops to her ribs on her left side. She pulls her shirt back up, and we see a small spot of red that’s not paint.
“It’s fine,” she says.
Vero crouches in front of her. “Let me see.”
She lets him examine her, and he prods around it gently, but she hisses again. The paintball split the skin, not deeply, but enough to bleed. Vero glares up at me, and I scowl toward the hatch where Ares has appeared, right as he drops inside.
He crosses to Kayla and crouches in front of her, moving Vero’s hand aside. He looks at it himself, his jaw tight.
“It needs to be cleaned,” he says.
“I said it’s fine.”
“I said it needs to be cleaned.” He doesn’t raise his voice, simply stands up and patiently holds his hand out to her.
Kayla looks at his hand, then up at his face, and I see something pass between them. She takes his hand, and he pulls her up, steering her toward the hatch without looking back.
Vero appears at my shoulder, still pulling his shirt on. “What?”
“Nothing.”
“When you say nothing, it means it’s something.”
Ares helps Kayla through the hatch, one hand steady on her back. He is focused on her in the same way he focuses on a problem he is trying to solve. It’s not his normal act. I almost tell Vero, knowing he would pester Ares into sharing with him what’s going on, but I want to see how this plays out. So instead, I file it away for later and pull on my shirt.
“Let’s go find out what Clay’s problem is now.”
Kayla
I wake up feeling like I’m trapped in a furnace, a warm body pressed against mine. I open my eyes and know I am in Ares’s room again. This is the second time I have woken up in here, but at least this time I was conscious when I arrived. Last night, he let me shower off the paint, and when I came out, he was sitting on the bed with a first aid kit open beside him. He cleaned the wound on my ribs as I yawned, then after he was done, he pulled back the covers and told me to get some sleep. He said that once I woke up, he would take me home. Though I don’t know when he got in beside me.
I lie still and stare at the arm across my waist, studying his features as he sleeps, the softness of his face while he doesn’t know he is being watched. It’s like seeing a whole different side to him. One he doesn’t show people. For whatever reason, this man is guarded and puts on a show for those around him.
Shifting slightly, I turn onto my back, and his arm moves to my stomach. I look over and see he is closer than I expected. His face is relaxed, the sharp edges have melted, and his dirty-blonde hair is pushed back from his face, making him look younger. I run my eyes from the line of his jaw to his broadshoulders and down to the sheet that sits low across his stomach, then back up to his face, and that’s when I notice a faint scar along his jaw. It’s barely visible and runs from his ear, down his jawline, and stops before his chin. I can’t help wondering how he got it, and I unconsciously reach out and touch it. The tips of my fingers run along his skin, and Ares’s eyes fly open.
I pause, neither of us moving a muscle for a long moment.
Awareness buzzes through every part of my body that’s touching him, coalescing where his hand is now on my stomach beneath my shirt. I don’t know who breaks the spell first, but before I can blink, his mouth is on mine, and I’m wrapping my hand around the back of his neck. I pull him closer, and his body shifts over mine.
Ares kisses me like it’s the first time he has ever kissed a woman. One of his hands slides up my ribs and stops just below the dressing.
“It doesn’t hurt,” I whisper against his lips, and he slides his hand over it.
He pulls my shirt over my head and gazes down at me.
