Page 104 of The ARC Unit: Breach

Leaving would have been simpler. It also would have meant standing in the hallway with my towel while Wolf finished doing whatever he wanted, and I was tired of letting the tension between us claim ordinary pieces of the compound.

I walked toward the last stall instead.

“Fine.”

I could feel his attention follow me in the mirror until the curtain closed between us.

The thin pale fabric had always been terrible at pretending to provide privacy. With the overhead lights behind Wolf, his body remained visible as a broad shadow beside the sinks, softened enough to hide details and clear enough that I could tell exactly when he lifted both hands behind his head.

The mask came off.

My fingers stopped on the shower control.

His uncovered profile existed less than fifteen feet away, reduced by the curtain to the line of a forehead, nose and jaw that I could not turn into an actual face no matter how long I stared. I had spent days catching fragments of him when he smoked and telling myself the rest did not matter. Now there was one piece of fabric between me and the answer, and looking harder would still give me nothing useful.

Wolf set the mask on the bench.

“You going to turn the water on?” he asked.

I twisted the handle so fast the pipes knocked in protest. “I-I was waiting for it to heat.”

“It was off.”

Fuck.

“Thank you, facilities manager.”

Warm water finally came through. I set my towel over the partition and started undressing behind the curtain, suddenly aware that privacy worked both directions. Every movement I made threw a darker outline across the fabric. If I could make out the angle of Wolf’s shoulders from here, he could probably tell when I pulled my shirt over my head.

My hands slowed at my bra.

The bathroom had been embarrassing before because I lived with six men who considered a curtain adequate architecture. After the night before, standing half naked in the same room as Wolf carried a completely different awareness.

I knew the pressure of his palm at my waist. I knew how his hand felt low in my hair and how quickly the combination of anger and proximity could turn my own body against the argument I was trying to have.

I took the bra and rest of my clothes off anyway, stepped beneath the water and forced myself to wash my hair like there was nothing unusual about any of this.

Wolf stayed near the mirror for a while. His silhouette bent as he unlaced his boots, then straightened when he pulled the field shirt over his head. The dark shape of his shoulders widened briefly as both arms lifted, and when the shirt came free, I caught the taper from his upper back to his waist before I remembered I had no business conducting surveillance through a shower curtain.

I faced the tile and worked shampoo through my hair.

A metal buckle touched the bench behind me. The sound was quieter than the click I had spent all morning trying not to hear, though my shoulders still tightened before I could stop them.

“It’s on the bench,” he said.

I looked toward his shadow. “What is?”

“The belt.”

Heat climbed my neck, and I had the sudden, ridiculous suspicion that he had noticed my reaction before I managed to hide it. I pushed the thought aside and forced myself to act like nothing had happened.

“I wasn’t asking.”

“I know.”

I rinsed the shampoo and decided the ceiling was fascinating. But his shadow bent again in my peripheral, forcing me to look back down. Cargo pants dropped into a dark shape around his ankles and disappeared from view when he stepped out of them. A moment later he straightened fully, and the outline between his thighs was unmistakable for one brief second before I snapped my eyes toward the wall.

There were facts adulthood should have prepared me to process without ceremony. Wolf having a penis was one of them. The fact that the silhouette suggested a very specific amount of penis did not need further analysis while I was naked behind translucent plastic.