Chapter 32: I’ll Bite You

Two piercing, strike-you-dead purple eyes flared open in the dark—awfully lethal for a guy who had clearly just been pulled from a deep, uninterrupted slumber. He had messy brown hair, a broad, impressive build, and wore a crumpled shirt that screamed he had been napping in the shadows for hours.

"You..." he growled, his voice a low, gravelly vibration against my back.

A rough, involuntary shiver rolled down my spine. Every assassin instinct I possessed screamed the exact same warning: Dangerous.

I couldn’t beat him. Not in this body. Not in this state. First the emerald-eyed instructor in the hallway, then the red-eyed Damian, then golden-eyed Edgar... and now this purple-eyed monster hiding in a dusty basement. There were way too many high-tier threats in this world, and I was far too weak.

While he was still half-asleep, it was my only window to flee.

I scrambled to throw myself off him, utilizing my swiftest movement techniques—but his Alpha reflexes were terrifyingly instantaneous.

Before I could even push up off his body, his thick arm clamped firmly around my waist, pinning me flat against his chest.

"What is this?" he demanded, his voice dropping into a dark, gravelly rumble. His grip was very solid, holding me so effortlessly that I couldn’t move an inch. "You throw yourself at me and ruin my nap... how are you going to pay for this?"

His purple eyes glinted dangerously in the dim light. He was mad—furious that his peaceful slumber had been violently disrupted.

I forced a tight, polite, totally fake smile onto my face, turning my head slightly to look at him. "If I tell you it’s a complete misunderstanding and I just tripped... would you believe me?"

"And how would you have found your way down here in the first place to create this misunderstanding?" he growled, lifting his head slightly, his grip tightening like a lock.

Panic flared beneath my calm exterior. Should I just knock him out? No. One wrong move against an Alpha of this tier, and I’d be snapped in half. For now, I had to play nice and sugarcoat the situation.

"Did my uncle send you?" he asked suddenly, catching me completely off guard.

His uncle?

I subtly sniffed his wolf scent again, trying to trace the scent, but I wasn’t sure if I had ever encountered a wolf with a similar signature. Unless... Edgar?

I had no idea who his uncle was, but fuck it. If agreeing meant he’d let me off easy, I’d claim whoever he wanted.

"That’s right," I said smoothly, letting out a soft sigh of faux relief. "Your uncle sent me."

I thought that would be my golden ticket out. Instead, the Alpha gritted a sharp, vicious curse under his breath—one I didn’t quite catch—his jaw clenching in sheer annoyance.

"Right, well... if there’s nothing else, I’ll be on my way," I said, pressing my hands down against his massive forearm to slide out of his reach.

He didn’t budge at all.

"Who said you’re leaving?" he muttered flatly.

Before I could reply, he shifted his weight, pulling me tighter against his broad frame, and buried his face straight into the crook of my neck.

He went completely still, his heavy breathing warming my skin. He couldn’t scent a wolf on me—because I didn’t have one—but he didn’t say a single word about it.

I sat there, frozen against a sleeping Alpha in a high-pressure basement, silently recalculating every single choice that had led me to this room.

"You... what are you doing?" I demanded, my voice tight.

He grumbled, his warm breath fanning across my collarbone. "What does it look like I’m doing? Sleep, or I’ll bite you."

I blinked, absolute confusion cutting through my initial alarm. He wanted me to sleep? Me? What did his damn nap have to do with me?

"Hey, um, it seems you’ve got the wrong idea, but I—"

Before I could finish, he snapped his head up. Those dangerous purple eyes locked onto mine, burning with a lethal glint that promised violence.

"Your inner wolf is silent, but your mouth is far too noisy," he growled, his jaw clenching. "Shut it, or I’ll do it for you."

Excuse me?

A massive irk mark practically formed on my forehead. Did this arrogant bastard just tell me—Anarix, the deadly Shadow Wolf—to shut up?

My blood instantly boiled, hot and lethal.

"Who do you think you are?!" I snapped, completely abandoning any attempt at playing modest. "You say shut up and expect me to just shut up? I don’t know what kind of misunderstanding you’ve come to, but I am not—"

Mph.

His lips suddenly slammed against mine.

My eyes widened to the size of saucers. This... what the hell is he doing?!

The kiss was sudden, rough, and entirely overwhelming. Seeing me completely stunned into silence, he pulled back just an inch, his gaze resting on my parted lips.

"If my uncle sent you down here, then you should know the rule about staying quiet," he murmured, his voice a deep, raspy vibration. "If not for the fact that your wolf is silent and isn’t whimpering all the time like the rest of them, I would have ripped you to pieces. So stay quiet. I do not appreciate noisemakers."

My mind reeled. What did any of this have to do with my wolf? I didn’t have a wolf yet so of course it was silent. And more than that—he called me a noisemaker? He had just blatantly assaulted my lips, and now he was treating me like an inconvenient alarm clock?!

Rage, pure and unadulterated, flooded my veins.

"I don’t know what makes you think you have the right to—"

Mph!

He stole my breath again, locking his mouth over mine before I could get another word out.

I slammed my hands against his chest and pushed with every ounce of force this body possessed, but it was like trying to shove a mountain. He was as solid as an immovable rock. His lips were hot, possessive, and completely unyielding—and this time, he didn’t stop at just pressing them against mine.

He deepened it, his grip around my waist tightening until there wasn’t a single ounce of air between us.

"So noisy," he growled low against my lips, deepening the kiss until my head began to spin from the sheer lack of oxygen.

My rage boiled over into an inferno. How dare he. How dare this arrogant, sleeping freak look down on me and use me like a quiet pillow just because he was currently stronger than me?!

I bit down hard on his bottom lip.

The sharp metallic taste of blood burst across my tongue.𝘧𝓇ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝘣𝓃ℴ