Maybe he would once he’d finished with their lesson. He didn’t see why he couldn’t indulge himself, not when she wanted it as badly as he did.
‘Now,’ he said. ‘Punch me.’ Her gaze flickered, a smile curving her mouth, and he grinned. ‘Bloodthirsty, little maid. You don’t need to look quite so pleased at the prospect.’
Her smile deepened and then her fist came out at speed. But he was still ex-Legion and he blocked it easily enough.
She sniffed, obviously dissatisfied with her performance. ‘I want to try again.’
Ares released her fist. ‘I’ve had years of experience at this, Rose. You’ve had all of an hour. You won’t hit me if I don’t want you to.’
She readied herself, elbows bent, her fists tight and drawn back at her sides. ‘What experience? You were a soldier you said.’
‘I was in the French Foreign Legion, spent years fighting in Africa.’
‘Yes, I read about that. It’s—’
‘Not as romantic as it sounds,’ he interrupted, because it hadn’t been. War wasn’t romantic. It was blood and desperation and fear and death, and there was nothing romantic about any of that. Not that it had been romance he’d wanted. He’d wanted escape from grief, pure and simple.
‘Why?’ She’d straightened a little, her curiosity caught. ‘What made you join up?’
This was edging into territory he didn’t want to get into, but it was inevitable the topic would rear its ugly head. And given that the purpose of these two weeks with each other was to get to know one another, it seemed churlish not to tell her. Besides, those years in the Legion where his life had boiled down to eating, sleeping, patrolling and obeying orders without question had been good years. Simple years. He hadn’t had to think. His pain and suffering had only been physical, and he’d embraced it, pushing himself to his physical limits and beyond. He’d wanted to stay there for ever, but a bullet wound and difficulties with his burn injuries had prevented him.
‘I joined because I wanted to test myself.’ He reached for her fist again and adjusted it. ‘My burns had healed but I wanted to get stronger, both physically and mentally, and the Legion seemed like a good fit.’ Not exactly the truth, but not a lie either.
‘What about the regular army?’ Her gaze was on him as he adjusted her thumb. ‘You were born in Greece, weren’t you? So why didn’t you go into the Greek army?’
‘Because I didn’t want to be in Greece. And the Legion takes men from every country.’
There was a crease between her brows. ‘So why did you leave?’
‘I was wounded in action in French Guiana and had some issues with the burn injuries, so that was my military career over.’ The hospital there had been badly equipped and poorly staffed, and he’d suffered a post-surgical infection. They’d given him the last morphine they’d had, but that had been worse than the pain, causing him nightmares of burning buildings and hearing Naya calling for help, and him trying to batter down a door that wouldn’t budge...
Your fault. Your failure.
He shoved the thought away and stepped back. ‘Again.’
Rose’s fist came out, faster this time, but still he blocked it easily.
She made an annoyed sound. ‘So, is that when you started building your company?’
Another difficult subject. Still, he could give her some half-truths. ‘I liked the Legion. Life was simple in it. And after I got out of hospital and realised my military career was over, I decided to recreate my own private military, so to speak.’
Rose was readying herself again, though her gaze was still fixed on him, curiosity burning bright in her beautiful eyes. ‘Is that what Hercules Security is? I couldn’t find much about it online.’
He grinned. ‘You researched me?’
Colour stained her cheeks, which he found he liked very much. ‘You’re my husband and I didn’t know anything about you. So yes, I looked.’
‘You wouldn’t have found much.’
‘Hardly anything,’ she agreed. ‘Apart from Ares, God of War.’
He snorted. ‘A stupid name. But no, there isn’t much because my clients do not like publicity when it comes to military matters.’
‘So...what do you do exactly?’
‘We provide services to governments who cannot use their own military for various reasons, as well as helping out in times of civil unrest or natural disasters. There was an earthquake in China a month ago, for example, and I provided a team to help with digging survivors out of collapsed buildings.’
She frowned. ‘But what does “services to governments” mean? Do you kill people they don’t like or something?’