Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 68509 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 343(@200wpm)___ 274(@250wpm)___ 228(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68509 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 343(@200wpm)___ 274(@250wpm)___ 228(@300wpm)
“Leave me here alone? With a bug army? I think not,” I said, following him out of the hammock, almost sticking my feet in my shoes before I thought better of it. “Can you check my shoes?”
Wick’s lips were curved up as he bent forward to grab them and knock them together upside down.
“You know, I gotta admit. There’s something charming about a badass recovery agent who can keep a cool head during a shootout… but is this afraid of bugs.”
“Guns can just shoot me. Not walk all over me with their thousands of legs,” I said, accepting my shoes as a shiver racked my system. “God, what I wouldn’t do for a coffee right now,” I said when Wick handed me water before he started to pull down the hammock and roll it back into his bag. “Aren’t you dying for coffee?”
“I don’t really drink coffee.”
“What do you mean you don’t drink coffee? How do you manage not to be on the six o’clock news for beating someone who flipped you off in traffic during rush hour without coffee?”
“Used to practically live off the stuff,” he told me, pulling a pair of shorts up, then slipping into his own shoes. Without a bug inspection. Like a complete psychopath. “But then I started doing a lot of traveling. And there were so many places where getting a caffeine fix wasn’t possible. I got sick of the withdrawal headaches when that happened, so I just stopped drinking it. For the most part.”
“I’m a much more pleasant person with coffee,” I told him.
“Eh, you’re pretty good without it,” he said, reaching into his bag for, I imagined, a shirt.
And it was right then we both heard them.
Voices.
Male voices.
We each threw our backpacks on, turned, and ran.
There were many things to worry about then: men at our heels, bullet wounds with no medical attention nearby.
Killer bugs.
But all I could seem to focus on as we ran was the fact that I hadn’t gotten a chance to get dressed. Meaning my boobs were… boobing.
And let’s just say, I was not anatomically built to run without a bra on.
I wanted to keep my arms long and loose, knowing it would help keep my lungs open. But it wasn’t long before I had to cross my arms over my chest, pushing my boobs down as we tore through the jungle.
“What’s—” Wick started to ask a while later as I fell further and further behind, watching my steps more carefully since my arms were likely too busy to brace against a fall. “Oh,” he said, letting out a bark of a laugh as he looked at me.
“Some of us need support to run for our lives,” I informed him, gasping for breath.
“I think we covered a good amount of distance,” he said. Lifting an arm, he gestured to a particularly large tree. “Go get yourself together,” he suggested. “Unless you want some help.”
The way my sex tightened said that yes, I absolutely did want help. But when assassins were literally just behind you, you couldn’t stop to get felt up behind a tree. Hell, it was probably reckless to stop to put on a bra. And pee. But some things couldn’t be helped.
When I came back, Wick wasn’t where I’d left him either.
He appeared a moment later through some thick greenery, this time with his shirt on, and carrying two protein bars.
“We’ve gotta fuel up if we are going to be able to keep going,” he explained, passing me a bar. “But let’s walk and eat.”
That was what we did. And even if the bra I chose chafed and the underwire felt like it was about to poke out of the material, it was definitely better than all that bouncing around I’d been doing.
“Do you think it was the same guys?” I asked, wondering if we’d just missed a hope of rescue.
“They were speaking English,” he said. “Well, two of them were. The other was giving out directions in Spanish. Probably a guide. They’d be stupid to come in here, even on a contract kill, without one.”
“You think they got a local to agree to go on a kill job with them?” I asked.
“Just like anywhere else in the world, money talks. I’m sure if the offer was good enough, someone would put their morals aside for the paycheck.”
“True. Am I wrong, or did we, uh, run deeper into the rainforest by accident?”
Wick winced at that, giving me all the answer I needed.
“The only other option was to get closer to the guys. I think if, once we’re done eating, we keep a jogging pace for an hour or so this way,” he said, waving ahead of us, “we should be far enough ahead of them to cut back and head toward the road again.”
Jogging.
Oh, joy.
But I couldn’t exactly complain if it was literally to save our lives. After this was over, I earned the right to skip out on cardio days for a month. At least.