Page 23 of Break Me Open
Ari is hitting the first wall.
He doesn’t climb it, he attacks it, scaling the boards in three movements, so smoothly that it seems the obstacle was designed for him alone.
I hate him. I absolutely fucking hate him.
My feet finally start moving, my feet punching the cold mud, and the air hurting my teeth. The course is brutal. It’s a mess of rope climbs, iced-over balance beams, crawl trenches, and hurdles.
But all I can focus on is him.
He clears the next obstacles with the same infuriating ease, hits the ground, rolls, and keeps running without a stutter. Someone to my right whistles low. “Fucking hell, Zakirov can move.” Yeah. I’ve noticed. Thanks.
I shouldn’t stare. It’s unprofessional, humiliating, and everything Ari warned me not to do, except the warning wasn’t for this. It was the complicated crush I used to have before Ari exploded into my sights like a land mine made of bad decisions and his beautiful damn fucking face.
I hit the beam harder than intended. I grit my teeth and force balance into my legs. A shout snaps my attention back,and I see Ari is at the rope net, climbing fast, his fingers catching frost-slick rope like it’s nothing. He’s poetry in motion—violent, smug poetry.
“Move, Varrik!” Hall barks behind me.
Right. Moving. Yes.
I take the rope net two rungs at a time. My muscles burning in the cold, but all the burn does is make my brain sharper, and that’s bad, because all it sharpens toward is him.
Ari reaches the top, swings one leg over the beam, then glances down at me. Our eyes lock briefly, and I almost slip on a rung. His mouth twitches. The bastard fucking saw. I grit my teeth harder and push myself faster. My hands are burning, and my arms are starting to shake. This is ridiculous, genuinely ridiculous. The most ridiculous thing that has ever happened to me. I’ve fought grown men twice my size without this much difficulty, and without my balance going to hell because someone looked at me.
But Ari looks at me for a few seconds, and I nearly fall off a net. Truly pathetic.
I haul myself up, refusing to let him have the victory, even a small one, until I’m level with the top beam. When I swing a leg over, he’s already descended on the other side. I want him to slip, just once, just enough to make him mortal. But he hits the ground low and graceful, then sprints off.
Why is he so fast? Why is he so good at this? Why is he making everything harder than it needs to be?
I drop down, hit the ground, and take off again.
The mud crawl is next. It’s a long trench under low wooden slats that scrape your back if you’re not careful. The Russians drop to their bellies and us Brits follow. Ari slides under the slats, and his shirt rides up, just a sliver, showing the tight line of muscle disappearing under the fabric, and I almost choke on air.
I stop paying attention to my surroundings, and my face hits the mud.
I deserved that.
“Eyes forward, Varrik!” someone shouts from behind me. I don’t answer because if I open my mouth, I’ll drown in mud and humiliation. I pull myself through the crawl. The mud is freezing into my clothes, and my chest is burning, but all I can see is the smear of dirt across Ari’s lower back and the way he moves with terrifying efficiency. He doesn’t look back again, but he doesn’t need to, he knows I’m watching.
He always fucking knows.
Finally, it’s the last stretch and on to the fireman carry. Pairs are assigned quickly, Hall pointing between me and the nightmare himself. “Zakirov. Varrik. You two,” he says, and my stomach drops. Ari raises one eyebrow. It’s the slow, taunting kind that suggests he can and will ruin my life for fun.
I want to strangle him, but I also want to push him against a wall.
“Ladies first?” he asks.
“I’ll carry you,” I snap before my brain is fully online enough to stop me.
“Oh? You’re just dying to touch me, aren’t you Varrik?” God. Kill me now.
I square my shoulders, ignoring the heat climbing my neck. “Get on.” He steps into my space before I can brace for it, close enough that the cold air between us feels charged. Then he turns his back, bends slightly, and slings an arm over my shoulder. I get an arm under his knees and nearly forget how to breathe properly.
He’s rock solid and all muscle.
My hands grip the back of his thigh and every muscle in him tightens slightly at the touch. It’s barely perceptible, butit’s enough to send something electric through my body. “Ready?” I grind out.
His breath fans the side of my neck. “Always,” he answers. I lift him and nearly curse at how perfectly he fits against me. Ari’s arm tightens around my shoulders as I start the run. His thigh presses into my hand, and his weight shifts with every stride. The cold air claws at my lungs, but the heat of his body burns straight through my uniform.
