Enemy Zone: Enemies-to-Lovers Standalone Healing-Love Military Romance (Trident Rescue)

by Alex Lidell

  He shrugs a shoulder, scrutinizing my hand on his arm as if it’s the most fascinating spectacle he’s ever witnessed.

  “Why not?” I hear my tone shifting, something inside me switching from prey mode into my professional skin. Investigative journalism isn’t all that different from medicine in some regard, working through layers of information to get to the truth.

  “Can’t.”

  “When’s the last time you ate?” I demand, getting another shrug in return. “Today?”

  “Can we go back to the version of the evening where you’re scared of me and on your way out?” He is only half kidding.

  I huff. Releasing Cullen’s arm, I raid the mini fridge that’s kept in the dispatch office, which is full of juice boxes and applesauce cups for patients. Kicking one of the wheeled chairs over to Cullen, I hand him both the items. “Drink. Eat.”

  “Those are for patients,” he argues, but does take the offered chair. “I’m fine.”

  “You look like hammered dog shit, Cullen. Eat the food.”

  With an exasperated sigh, he pops open the apple sauce. Within two seconds, he’s inhaled the small jar and accepts another two from me without protest, color returning to him with the intake of sugar. It’s unexpectedly satisfying.

  Grabbing the other wheeled chair, I settle myself beside him. There’s a low hum of energy between us, but it’s not the usual antagonism. More like camaraderie between two people who both have their demons.

  “See? I’m not totally worthless, especially for a blonde,” I say.

  “Never said you were. And you’re not a blonde.”

  I blink at him. “Of course I’m a blonde.”

  “But it’s a different sort of blonde. There’s like”—he makes a swirling motion with his hand over my head—“red in there too.”

  I huff a small chuckle, fingering my hair. Of all things for Cullen to have noticed, this isn’t one I’d expected. “It’s called strawberry, genius.” My smile falters as I point my chin at his hands. “What did you hit, Cullen?” I really hope it’s a what and not a who.

  He moves his fingers around. “A few trees. A door. A wall.”

  “What kind of wall?”

  His eyes meet mine, the green in them laced with fire and challenge. And a hint of vulnerability that’s gone as soon as I see it. “Brick,” he snaps.

  I frown at the shift in Cullen’s tone, which feels like a manufactured kind of angry. As if the man is trying to shove me away on purpose. Like an injured bear. No, a wolf. Lithe and deadly and hurting.

  “Why?” I ask.

  A muscle flexes in his jaw. “It was the closest one around.”

  “You know what I—”

  “Go home, Reynolds,” he says in a tone that demands—expects—obedience. The kind that I’ve a feeling most everyone in this Trident-god-hero-worshiping town would heed without question. I think that’s how Cullen likes it, what makes it so easy for him to keep the world at arm’s length. Denton Valley sees exactly what Cullen Hunt shows it: a successful CEO, a philanthropist, a rescuer. A man in constant charge of his business and himself. Now that I look closer though, I see glimmers of pain behind that curtain of perfection.

  Reaching out toward him, I pull Cullen’s hand into my lap, then run my thumb lightly over the injured knuckles. “I take it the brick won.”

  With a quick squeeze to Cullen’s wrist, I get up long enough to retrieve a first aid kit and settle right back beside him, his split-knuckle hand heavy on my lap. Pulling out triple antibiotic, I debate how to spread it over the ripped-up flesh without hurting him.

  Cullen chuckles without humor. “I’m not going to take your head off if the meds sting.”

  I nod, focusing the next few minutes of my attention entirely on his hands, the abused knuckles swollen and clearly painful. “Are you going to take my head off for any other reason?” I ask without looking up.

  “Not so long as I know it’s you I’m seeing.” His voice is so quiet, I’m not sure he meant to say the words aloud.

  He’d said something similar about Charlie. Ileene had too. Who else would you be seeing, Cullen? Why?

  I don’t press, though. Don’t even acknowledge having heard the confession as I clean and spread an antibiotic ointment on the open sores while gently probing the bones beneath. Cullen was bad enough off to be hitting brick walls. What set him off, though? The bar fight? The fight between us? I shove the thought away, but I can’t help noticing how the tension within his coiled muscles eases with my touch.

  I bite my lip. “There may be a fracture.”

  “There isn’t.” So certain. So damn cocky.

  I lift my face to call his bullshit.

  “I had it X-rayed,” he says, meeting my gaze. His eyes are more open than I’m used to seeing them. The pain is still there, but it’s a bit softer than before. He’s also sitting up straighter. Strange how I no longer consider that a threat. Still, him maintaining such intense eye contact is making me squirm. I pretend not to feel the sudden flash of heat between my legs.

  “What? Why are you staring at me?” I ask, my voice higher pitched than normal.

  “Why are you here so late at night, Sky?”

  The question takes me by surprise, so I answer with more candor than I probably should. “It’s nice here, and I needed the Wi-Fi.”

  A crease appears between his brows. “Your place doesn’t have Wi-Fi? Is it out in the sticks?”

  “No. It’s…” It’s a shithole. “I just didn’t realize what time it’d gotten to be.”

  He nods as if in acceptance, but the intensity of his gaze never diminishes.

  I finish tending the last of the cuts and release his hand, missing the skin contact already. “So, do you attack innocent walls often?” I mean it half in jest, only now realizing I was stretching the tentative trust between us one step too far.

  Cullen’s face closes off, the camaraderie we shared vanishing like a mirage. “I need to go.” He stands, giving me a short nod. “Thank you for your assistance.”

  My chest tightens. “Cullen…”

  “You may use the space as you like, but please keep the lights on the next time you’re here late.” His tone is polite, his gaze no longer open to me. In fact, everything about his features has gone blank. Inscrutable.

  Without another word, he turns on his heel and walks silently toward the door, whooshing through before letting it fall closed with an audible clank.

  11

  Cullen

  Cullen stretched his arms over his head, his wrists brushing the thick rails and crossbars of his wrought iron headboard. He opened his eyes and realized a couple of things at once. It was Saturday morning. He’d managed to actually sleep, and not just sleep, but sleep deeply and late, as the sun already shining down on Pikes Peak suggested. Sure enough, the alarm clock confirmed the time. Eight thirty in the morning. Three hours later than Cullen’s usual wake-up call.

  Christ.

  It was the first good night’s sleep he’d had in days. The longest in months. Ironically, the person who’d made it possible for him to finally rest was also the one who’d set off his recent episode. No, that was unfair. Skylar Reynolds might have lit the match, but she didn’t build the pyre. Cullen’s fucked-up mind did that all by itself. He’d never been fit for human company, and PTSD didn’t help.

  Cullen yawned and sat up, the king-size mattress shifting comfortably to adjust to the change. After sleeping on bare ground for years, the bed’s softness was still a small daily jolt.

  For a second, he allowed himself to imagine there was a certain strawberry-blonde woman in his bed. Which was a mistake, given the sudden—and rather painful—way his cock hardened. Yes, his body was still ahead of itself. But her pouty lips, the long column of her delicate throat, and her startling blue eyes had that effect on him. Not to mention her breasts. She never exactly flaunted the goddamn things, but they called to him nonetheless. Which reminded him of how twisted up and sideways this woman
had him.

  Then he recalled Reynolds’s desperate attempt to flee from his car, and his body cooled as if dunked into ice water. Cullen frightened her. Viscerally. Like he frightened his own family. The image of an Afghani woman flashed before him again, the one who yanked her daughter from his arms rather than let him keep the child breathing. He could still hear the fear in her voice. And the worst of it was that the woman wasn’t altogether wrong. That attack had been his fault.

  He shook his head. The smart thing to do was to keep his distance from Skylar Reynolds. More to the point, Cullen needed to pull his head out of his ass and get back in the game.

  He swung himself out of bed, the movement just enough to make the shrapnel in his shoulder twinge, and took his prazosin. At least he’d kept up with his meds. Normally, Cullen went to sleep and rose at the same times. Then, an hour in his home gym, a shower, a protein shake, and work. The military had drilled a respect for routine into him, and keeping to a rigid schedule made him function better overall. Being thrown off it over these past several days made him feel as if he was crawling out of his goddamn skin.

  But it was now eight thirty in the morning, and Cullen would just have to deal with it.

  Pulling out his phone, he pulled up Eli’s number. Since it was Saturday, the guys were likely going to make their way to Liam’s club, North Vault.

  Vault 7 p.m.? Cullen texted Eli. The result was predictable as hell. His cell rang within seconds.

  “So you’re amongst the living again?” his friend spat out, obviously pissed.

  “Yeah.”

  “You’re a fucking arsehole, you know that?” Eli half yelled into the phone, and Cullen closed his eyes. He did know that. He knew it better than anyone. But he didn’t say anything in response. The silence ticked on for several tense heartbeats before his buddy broke it. “I take it you’re in one piece more or less?”

  “Yeah.”

  Eli huffed out an exasperated sigh. “See you at seven.”

  “Roger,” Cullen replied, but his buddy had already disconnected from the line.

  After walking over to his office, Cullen pulled open his laptop. Catherine had made sure the most critical calls had gotten through to him over the past few days but now he needed to catch up. Scanning through his email, he frowned at what he saw. Or, more accurately, what he didn’t see.

  “Adrianna,” Cullen barked into the phone as soon as the line connected. “Where is my mortgage bill?”

  The woman on the other end of the line huffed. “It’s my mortgage payment, Cullen. And I’ll make it tomorrow. You don’t need to keep paying my bills for me, you know.”

  “I’m not paying your bills. I’m paying Bar’s.” Cullen pinched the bridge of his nose. Addie was Bar’s wife and as good a woman as Cullen had ever met. Kind, responsible, strong. But she had trouble accepting help—and when dealing with Bar’s family, she needed the help. Frank Peterson, Bar Peterson’s brother, had launched a full-out assault on collecting all of Bar’s assets before the man’s body even returned from the Middle East. With the prenup Bar’s family had forced him and Addie to sign and Frank Peterson’s unscrupulous tactics, she was left with nothing except the house, but even that only so long as she made the payments. If the place went into foreclosure, Frank would get the proceeds of the sale.

  A physical therapist, Addie had a good job—but it wasn’t enough to manage everything on her own with Frank filing lawsuits left and right.

  “Has Frank made any moves lately?” Cullen asked.

  Addie sighed. “Filed an ordinance violation that my grass is overgrown. I swear the man must have measured it with a damn ruler. And no, I don’t need help cutting it. I took care of it yesterday.”

  Yesterday. That would be Friday. Addie had either paid out of pocket or taken the day off work.

  “Addie, I’ll give you a choice,” Cullen said, turning his voice hard. “You either give me the details from your bank and I’ll set up automatic payments, or I’ll have Liam trace it for me and you can spend the next ten years working out which Cayman Island account your mortgage payments are coming from. I promise I’ll make the latter so much of a pain in your ass, you’ll wish you were dealing with Frank.”

  Hanging up before Addie had a chance to protest, Cullen tapped his fingers on the table. There had to be an easier way of getting Addie to take the money, one that wouldn’t insult her pride as well. He’d ask Liam when he saw the guys tonight. With the security company Liam ran, he had connections. And if he couldn’t figure it out, Eli could.

  Speaking of connections… Cullen punched Liam’s number.

  “Rowen,” Liam answered on the first ring.

  “Can you run a background on my—our—new dispatcher?” Cullen winced at his wording.

  A pause. “Did she do something?”

  “No. But I want to know why she might find working at the Rescue in the middle of the night more comfortable than in her own house. And she works for Frank, so—”

  “So the asshole is likely doing what he can to screw with her. Got it,” Liam said. “You coming today? Mason told me—”

  “Mason gossips like an old woman. I’ll be there. Get Keasley out too. Drag him if you need to.”

  “Received and understood,” Liam said from the other end of the line. “And Hunt? Good to have you back.”

  “Fuck you.” After hanging up the phone, Cullen got his protein shake and settled down to deal with the rest of the piling mess in his email.

  Cullen strode into the Vault and zeroed in on the three men sitting in a secluded alcove at the back of the club. Eli, Liam, and Kyan, the latter in his signature low-pulled baseball cap, were already there and lounging in their usual spot. Raising a hand to them in greeting, Cullen skirted the dance floor, where a sizable crowd moved in tune to the thrumming beats of the house music—Prince’s “Kiss”—and stopped at the bar.

  If Trident Rescue was Cullen’s pet project, North Vault was Liam’s. With its indirect mood lighting and blue-on-blue color scheme, the North Vault managed to be classy and seductive at the same time. Liam had designed every part of the Vault to create the sense of a world within a world, an escape for people wanting to take the edge off. The drinks were quality, the sound system the best in Denton Valley, the dance floor large, and the booths private. Drinking, dancing, general socializing, or—on specially designated days—recreation of a more specifically sexual sort were all welcome.

  The aromas of freshly sliced lemon and various flavors of rum and vodka wafted over Cullen as he placed his forearm on the polished bar top, getting the bartender’s attention. “Glenfiddich thirty-year, neat.”

  “Coming right up.” The sinfully alluring brunette acknowledged the order and went to work. She wore a black blouse cut deeply at the neckline, a black miniskirt with stockings, and black stiletto heels. Sexy. Yet Cullen’s mind was filled with a different set of measurements, along with a long curtain of strawberry-blonde hair that smelled like flowers.

  In fact, the wall behind the bar just so happened to be the exact same blue as Reynolds’s eyes. Goddammit. Even here, his brain seemed fixated on Sky.

  Taking the drink off the bar, Cullen took a fortifying sip of scotch and made his way to where the others were sitting. In some ways, the three looked like a mismatched lot. Eli, who must have been coming directly from work, had his suit on, the tie now loosened but still screaming business. Liam looked relaxed in black jeans and a tight, equally black V-neck shirt, all showing off his honed body. With his dark brown hair curling at his nape, hazel eyes, and a dimple that came out whenever he smiled, the owner of the North Vault drew women to him like moths to a flame—and he played with them the same way: intensely and without attachment. He made as much clear going in, but that didn’t slow the number of takers any more than did Eli’s similar approach.

  Sitting opposite Liam, Kyan Keasley never displayed much of himself nowadays, the long sleeves of his turtleneck concealing mortar round burns. They were all di
fferent, yet the same. And all of them Cullen’s men.

  “Ah, he deigns to make an appearance,” Liam said, making an affected rolling motion with one hand as if acknowledging royalty.

  “Fuck off.” Sliding into a seat opposite Kyan, Cullen took another swig of scotch, savoring the smoky smooth flavor as the liquid whisked along his tongue. The drink went down his gullet like silk without even the slightest bite.

  “Welcome back, arsehole,” Eli said by way of greeting before frowning at Cullen’s hand. “What in hell’s name is that?”

  Cullen examined his knuckles and Sky’s Band-Aid covering the middle one. Truth be told, Cullen himself didn’t know why he hadn’t pulled the thing off. It wasn’t actually doing any good there, but…well, he just hadn’t. So there. For a moment, Cullen considered lying. He really did. He could say Catherine had done it or even Rachel. But they weren’t in high school anymore. Besides, he supposed there was nothing wrong with the truth. “Reynolds wanted to play medic.”

  There was no need to explain what caused the injuries to begin with. The guys knew well enough.

  “Takes two to play,” said Liam, with such casual mildness that Cullen just rolled his eyes. Liam’s games were of a distinctly kinky taste, and some of the toys he kept both in his closet and in the North Vault’s private hold made Cullen cringe no matter how much Liam insisted he was missing out.

  “Here you are, sir.” A waitress appeared at the table, placing a Don Julio Añejo tequila before Kyan and club soda on a napkin before Liam.

  “Speaking of games.” Cullen toasted Liam’s drink as the other men smirked at one another. If Liam was on club soda, he had a woman or few in his sights. “Evening plans, then?”

  Liam waggled his eyebrows, his grin hitching up every line of his face. “Damn straight.”

  “Would you like another scotch?” the waitress asked Cullen.