Page 197 of The ARC Unit: Breach

I shook my head again.

His other hand shifted up before I understood what he was doing. His thumb and forefinger closed over my nose, cutting off my only other option to breathe entirely.

My eyebrows shot up.

Oh, you fucking asshole.

Wolf stared down at me while realization fully caught up, completely unmoved by the look I gave him.

“Breathe through that smart mouth or don’t breathe at all.”

I held out purely because I refused to give him the satisfaction.

My eyes stayed locked on his, narrowed with enough anger that any normal person might have reconsidered what they were doing.

Wolf didn’t. He didn’t shift his weight or loosen his grip, and there wasn’t even a flicker of impatience in his eyes. He just stood there and waited, completely fucking unbothered, like he had already decided I would give in and had nowhere else to be until I did.

The urge to breathe came gradually at first, then all at once. Pressure tightened through my chest, and I swallowed against the instinct to open my mouth.

My glare sharpened but his expression didn’t change.

Asshole.

I tried to hold on a little longer out of spite, but my body eventually won the argument. My lips parted open wide and the breath rushed out of me, followed immediately by a desperate inhale.

Wolf didn’t give me enough time to use the breath for words. His fingers stayed clamped around my nose as he tipped my head back, forcing my face up toward his.

With his other hand, he released my throat and hooked two fingers beneath the lower edge of the mask, dragging it up just far enough to uncover his mouth. I caught a flash of dark stubble and the shape of his lips before he leaned over me.

Then he spat directly onto my tongue.

The mask dropped back into place almost immediately, hiding him again before I could get more than that brief glimpse. Heat rushed through me so fast it was almost embarrassing.

There was mint underneath the faint taste of cigarettes, familiar enough by now that I knew exactly where it came from, and the sheer filthiness of what he had just done sent another pulse of warmth low through my stomach.

I swallowed without thinking.

His eyes stayed on my mouth. “Good girl.”

Fuck.

He released my nose as I dragged in a deeper breath, staring up at him. Then he took half a step back, the black webbing still hanging loose from his fist.

“Turn around.”

I stayed where I was for one heartbeat too long. He leaned closer until the fabric of his mask brushed my temple.

“You want me rough, Mercer? Stop making me ask nicely.”

Every bit of air left my lungs as I turned.

The office window reflected us back. My field clothes were still rumpled and dusty from the warehouse, my hair half-fallen from its tie, while Wolf stood a full head and shoulders above me in black from throat to boots. The mask swallowed almost all of his face, leaving only his eyes visible over my shoulder, dark and fixed on mine.

“Hands behind you.”

I brought them back.

“Higher.”