Page 6 of Claimed By the Hitman: Codename Cupid

“Oh? This?” I’d almost forgotten. “Flesh wound. Nothing a drink can’t fix.”

Hera’s out of that sultry dress, cozy in a baggy sweater and shorts. The look suits her. Any look would suit her.

“Did you seriously climb twelve stories with a bottle of vodka and a gunshot wound?”

“What? Don’t be ridiculous,” I laugh and collapse onto the curving blood-red sofa. “I took the stairs to the eleventh floor, picked the lock on an empty room, and climbed up to your balcony. And it’s a knife wound.” I glance around before smiling up at her. “Lovely room. Verylet them eat cake.”

“Well, that makes it so much better. Give me that.”

She tries to snatch the vodka away, but I’m too fast. “You’d take my painkillers?”

“It’ll thin your damn blood. I need to stitch you up and get you out of here.” Hera finally sets the gun down and rubs her temples. “God, I should have never told you where I was.”

“Do you have a headache? Grab a glass.”

“Youare my headache.” She hurries off on her bare feet, rummaging around in the bedroom. “Take off your shirt… and don’t get any ideas!”

I smile, take off my jacket, and start unbuttoning my white shirt. “I’m a tool, Hera. We don’t get ideas.”

She comes back with a little knitting kit. It’s innocent enough, but there’s everything she needs to stitch up a wound. Cautiously, she sits next to me on the sofa and lays out her tools.

As I get my shirt off, I notice her eyes wander. They trace the scars that mark my weaponized body.

She arches an eyebrow. “Not your first rodeo.”

“You look surprised.”

“I’m more shocked by the lack of stupid tattoos.”

“Ink makes you easy to identify. Everyone has scars…”

Hera takes the bottle from my hand, pours a bit on a cotton pad, and presses it to the wound. I suck in a deep breath and exhale the pain.

“That hurt?” she asks, smirking at me.

“Not at all.”

“Liar.”

I shrug. “I’d be a poor assassin if I didn’t know how to lie.”

Hera shakes her head; she takes a look at the bottle before snatching it up again and pulling a swig.

“Oh, God. That is awful.”

“Liquor should feel like a punch to the throat.”

I drop back against the sofa and let her get to work. Hera works the needle in and out through the severed walls of flesh. Her black hair is pulled back in a tight ponytail like a military girl. She has a hard face, unyielding. There’s a hidden softness in her eyes though as she patches me up.

She’s everything I knew she’d be…

“Hera is the goddess of marriage. Did you know that?” I ask conversationally. “She watches over women during childbirth. Maybe that’s why it’s your codename: you’re so motherly and tender.”

She finishes the job by breaking the thread with a yank that makes me curse in Russian.

“Was that tender enough for you?”

“Tough love, I suppose,” I say, examining her work. “Hera is known as a vengeful goddess.”

---