It took Adria a second—and Elias’s amused look—to realize she’d been volunteered.
Chapter 13
“WORKS FOR ME.” Climbing had always been a huge joy for her—to the point that Martin had once joked she must’ve been a cat in a former life. It was in fact the one thing they’d enjoyed doing together almost to the end. As if in facing the challenge of a mountain or a sheer cliff face, they’d become partners once more rather than adversaries. “I can handle the lesson on my own,” she said, gently closing the lid on memories that had no place in her new life, “but I hear Drew’s a good climber, too.”
“Yes, he is. Which is why he’ll be running things with you.”
Drew saluted her from across the room. She couldn’t help but smile—how could she do anything but love the man who adored the woman who was, in every way that mattered, her sister. “Level?” she asked Elias.
“Beginner to intermediate. We can’t keep letting the cats show us up when it comes to climbing.”
Several “Hell yeahs” sounded from around the room.
Adria shook her head. “Don’t get any ideas about scrambling around in the trees like they do”—their bodies were just built differently—“but I can get you to a competent level if we do the lessons once a week for, say, two months.”
“Done.” Elias glanced around. “You know if you need the course—stick your name down so I can make sure you’re not on shift at the time.”
A lazy voice—Brody—drawled a question from the back. “I’d like to get in some advanced sniper training while things are quiet. Can you rope in Judd or Dorian?”
Nodding, Elias made another note, then the group took care of a couple of other matters before breaking up. Drew walked over to discuss their joint task as the others ambled out. “You got time now to scout a location and talk about how we want to run the first session?”
“Yes.” Walking out beside him, she grabbed an apple from the bowl by the door.
Drew’d already taken a bite of his by the time she polished it on her shirt and bit in. The crunch was satisfying, the sweetness refreshing, the air outside the den a cool caress. As a partner, Drew was flexible and intelligent, and they had no problems mapping out a strategy for the lesson.
That lesson, when it rolled around the next afternoon, went down like a house on fire. Surrounded by her peers, dirty and dusty and sweaty, she felt a sense of absolute rightness. This was home.
Nothing and no one was going to push her out.
SIENNA went to avoid Riordan’s kick, but knew she’d moved a fraction of an instant too late. She winced at the whack she was undoubtedly about to get to the ribs except … nothing happened. Blinking, she realized he’d pulled the kick. Nothing wrong with that—she did it herself all the time in training, because the aim wasn’t to beat your fellow combatants bloody, but to teach and test one another. The only problem was, Riordan should’ve still tapped her hard enough that she’d remember her error.
Something hot and dark and infuriated boiled in her blood. “What was that?” she demanded, halting the session.
“What?” He shoved a hand through his chocolate-dark curls.
“That excuse for a kick.”
“You stopped us to critique me?” He scowled. “You can do that after—let’s get back to it before I go gray.”
Already stressed over the mating ceremony the following day, Sienna was not in the mood for male wolf bullshit. “How about I incinerate your hair so you don’t have to worry about that?” It just slipped out.
She waited for fear to fill eyes that had always looked at her with friendly affection, stomach curdling at her error—she’d playfully threatened Hawke with singed eyebrows, but had been so careful not to remind the rest of the pack of what she was. But instead of fear, all she got was an “aw shucks” grin and a shrug. “I figured you wouldn’t want to be bruised for your big day tomorrow.” Charming eyes, big and brown and guileless.
It almost made sense. Except now that she thought about it, she realized he’d done the same thing during their last training session—only he’d been a bit more cunning about it, grazing her so she knew she’d been “hit.” However, in spite of his boyish charm, Riordan was a dominant. The more she pushed him to admit what he’d been up to, the more intractable he’d get. “Okay,” she said with a smile she hoped didn’t betray her bloodthirsty mood. “Thanks. Ready?”
He dropped back into the correct stance.
Not giving any warning, she went at him full tilt—her foot connected hard with his ribs, her elbow with his jaw, her fist with his stomach. She did keep her blows away from his pretty face, since he had a date for the ceremony. However, when he blocked her moves but made no aggressive ones of his own, she narrowed her eyes and went to kick him upside the head, which, if it connected, would surely create a nice big black-and-blue bruise down one side of his face.
“Fuck!” Slamming up a hand, he gripped her ankle the instant before she would’ve made contact with his skull and flung her away and to the ground, coming down on top of her an instant later, his much heavier body pinning hers facedown on the mat. “You trying to kill me?” It was a growl.
Instead of replying and though he’d knocked all the air out of her, she went to slam her head back into his face. He jerked out of the way with another brutal word, setting her free. Pressing up to take a seated position on the mat, she raised an eyebrow at Riordan when he gave her a distinctly wary look from where he sat on the other side. “Oh, sorry,” she said with sweetness that would’ve done a candy bar proud, “were we only pretending to train?”