The Breaking (The Curse of the Regina Book 1)

by A. P. Marie

  While Zander resumes an air of righteous indignation, Caiden takes on the qualities of a scolded dog. Everywhere I go, he is there. He complements everything from my clothes to how I butter my bread. I allow this to go on only because it’s humorous watching how much it annoys Zander.

  I start training but I refuse to allow either Zander or Caiden to mentor me. Instead I ask Jacob if he will do it. Caiden and Zander both find reasons to be in the gym every time we start training for the day, but I ignore them. After training they try to talk to me about that session and I feign deafness. It may not be the most mature way to handle it but I haven’t killed them yet so I’d say that’s a win.

  Zander has arranged for a tutor to come and teach me about Nephilim history. Apparently, her daughter was due to deliver a baby any day though, so she wasn’t flying in until after the baby was born. When she comes, I’m supposed to train in the morning with Jacob, and her after lunch. But for now, I still have my afternoons free.

  After about a week of this I find myself sitting in my bedroom reading a book with Jacob reclined in a chair beside me watching TV. In the last week I may have been purposefully impeding any relationship growth with Zander and Caiden; however, the opposite can be said about Jacob. He no longer guards me from afar. I don’t let him stay outside my door anymore. Now, I ask him to come and sit with me. I was right in thinking that we could be friends.

  I put down my book to rib Jacob about his training skills (which are phenomenal- but I’d never tell him that).

  “I’m just saying, if you weren’t so rough with me, I might be making more progress.” I point out for the hundredth time today.

  He definitely doesn’t take it easy on me in training. I’m just learning basic self-defense and hand to hand fighting techniques, but I have bruises peppering my arms from Jacob slipping through my pitiful defenses.

  “I wouldn’t be helping you any to go easy on you. Your enemies will not go easy on you.” Jacob doesn’t even spare me a glance as he completes his part of what is becoming a well-practiced conversation.

  I bite my lip pondering any new angle I could argue that would earn me fewer sore muscles. As I glance around the room looking for inspiration, I see Zander standing in my doorway. I was so caught up in my conversation with Jacob that I hadn’t even noticed the loosening in my chest.

  “Jacob, did you forget to lock the door? I thought we talked about keeping out the pests?” I ask frowning in Jacob’s direction.

  “Jacob answers to me. I am his boss, as well as his King.” Zander replies stiffly. “Emily, we need to talk.”

  I know it’s past time for me to talk to Zander and Caiden. So I relent. “What could we possibly have to talk about, Zander?” I ask in my most sickly-sweet voice.

  “How long will you continue to punish me?” Anger seeps into his voice. “I have spent my entire life without you and now that I have you in my house, you refuse me access to you. It’s maddening.”

  I purse my lips contemplating this. I hadn’t really thought about it like that. I suppose it does seem a little cruel.

  “Maybe just a little while longer.” I answer thoughtfully, truly not knowing the answer.

  Even from this distance my body craves his. It’s strange, I feel drawn to Caiden also but it’s different. My connection to Zander feels entirely physical. I want his body, his touches, and his presence. With Caiden it’s more of a feeling. Caiden makes me feel at home and comfortable and I crave that.

  “May I come in? Please?” I giggle at the stiffness in his question. I’d guess he hasn’t ever asked permission to come into one of his own rooms.

  “I suppose that would be okay since Jacob’s here.” I scoot over making room on the couch for him to join me. He sends a pointed glance at Jacob as he nears the couch and Jacob stands.

  “I just remembered I have a really important… thing. That I have to do. Umm, five minutes ago?” Lie. He smiles hugely as he backs out the door.

  “Traitor!” I call after him. Some friend.

  I raise my hand to stop Zander before he moves too far into the room.

  “Before you come in here, I need some answers. I’m tired of being in the dark.” I twist my face into the most severe look I can manage so that he knows exactly how serious I am.

  “What do you need to know?”

  Questions that have been floating around in my head for the last week all jockey for the position closes to my mouth. When one finally works its way out, even I am surprised by it.

  “When Caiden first got here you said the Lights had found me. How do you know it was them?”

  Zander watches my face intently. I’m not sure what he’s looking for or if he finds it but after what feels like an eternity, he answers my question.

  “I had men watching you. When the Lights would get close, I would give my men the signal to move you. When you were still in foster care they would normally find some way to get you moved to a new home. Once you got older, they would do something subtle that would make you suspicious and you would move on. Until the Lights actually moved on you, I couldn’t do anything to stop them, but I wouldn’t risk leaving you to them. It was a stalemate.”

  Again, his eyes flicker over my face appraising my reaction. I school my features as best I can and gesture for him to go on. “When my men took you, the Lights were able to find you without us being alerted. They had set up an ambush in your apartment when you were out that morning. I needed to make a decision and quick, so I told my men to bring you in.”

  When he finishes his explanation, he isn’t watching me anymore and is instead studying his lap. Without being able to see his face I’m not sure what emotion is so difficult for him or why he seems incapable of eye contact.

  “They were there? In my apartment?” All of those years that I had prided myself on staying ahead of my enemies and really, I was only following the cues that Zander had left for me. He nods and finally looks back up at me.

  “I wasn’t watching closely enough. They shouldn’t have been able to get that close.” Guilt. That’s the emotion Zander was hiding from me. The fact that those men were able to set up an ambition in my own apartment is too close for comfort.

  “It isn’t your fault, Zander. You were looking out for me? Protecting me, even when I didn’t know it?” Again, Zander nods.

  “I really was trying to give Caiden time to get to know you. My feelings for you are, and always have been, immensely confusing. I desire you and feel a draw to you. No matter how far away you are. I had to ensure your safety. It’s as essential to me as my own safety, even before I met you.” He moves nearer to me and kneels on the carpet at my feet.

  “The prophecy that caused us to be mated also predicted your demise. I cannot live with the knowledge that I played a part in your death. But I also can’t stay away from you. I couldn’t let the Lights take you. Caiden was the best option but every day he spent with you I felt like my heart was being torn out of my chest. Every time he filed a report about you, I had to physically stop myself from going to you. It’s been a mess. I could have stayed away though. I would have done what was best for you despite what it did to me, except the Lights came.”

  The earnestness and sincerity in his words and his tone steal the breath from my lungs. Everything I thought, the things I was sure I knew, they were wrong. All of them.

  “You didn’t kidnap me?” I can’t muster anything louder than a whisper as I continue connecting invisible dots.

  A smirk crosses Zanders face, “No, Darling, I definitely kidnapped you. But I did it for a good reason.” And he’s right. He did kidnap me, but he did it for my own protection. To keep me out of the hands of the Lights. And I’m finding that I don’t blame him. Not like I did.

  Zander sinks into the couch next to me. His presence is already driving me crazy and I think I know all too clearly what he was talking about when he said my lack of presence was maddening. I can feel his body radiating heat near mine. Echoes of the tingles that normall
y accompany his touch, run from my hip to my knee where our legs are almost touching.

  A huge smirk spreads across his face as he sees me eyeing the negative space between us. “I can fix that for you.”

  I play dumb. “Fix what?” Smiling sweetly, I look up into his eyes and instantly my smile falters. He’s perfect. Freaking everything about him. Physically, he really is a god.

  “That need. I know you need my touch. I can feel it. You may have been trying to prove something to me, but you were hurting both of us.” His smooth voice has a sexy persuasiveness that instantly ignites my desire.

  “Zander, I don’t even know what to think about being double mated. I really don’t think we should complicate the situation.” Honesty is always the best policy, right? In the last week I have worried long and hard how to handle this situation without hurting anyone involved, but I can’t seem to come up with any plan that doesn’t hurt someone.

  “It doesn’t have to mean anything else. Your body craves mine and my body craves yours. It’s as simple as that. A starving man wouldn’t refuse an apple to spare the oranges feelings.” As he speaks his mouth gets closer and closer to my ear until I can feel his breath raising the hair on my neck.

  His chest is pushed up against my shoulder and the tingling echoes intensify, as if they recognize we are just one thin piece of cotton away from touching.

  “I can’t hurt Caiden.” It’s becoming harder and harder to remember why this isn’t a good idea. His voice is so persuasive, and he has a valid point. I think.

  “This won’t hurt Caiden. This helps us both. We both need this. We have been suffering from our separation. If you feel the need to tell Caiden you could, but you wouldn’t have to. He wouldn’t have to know.” His voice rumbles in my ear and I feel it resonating in my groin. “You don’t even have to say anything. Just nod your head. Let me know if you want this and I will give you anything you desire.”

  I try hard to resist. Thinking about Caiden is effective until it hits me that I never promised Caiden anything. When we were in Iowa, we were friends. That’s it. We may have hugged occasionally but we have never even kissed each other. I nod my head.

  Zander reaches his arm around my side and lifts me up and over his lap. In the next instant I am straddling his lap with his lips a millimeter from my own. We haven’t made any skin to skin contact yet and I know what will happen when we do. I hover my lips over his for a moment intensifying the anticipation of the electricity that exists between us.

  When our lips finally connect, it’s heaven. The electricity surges through my body with a vengeance. I can almost feel its anger at having been kept away from its addiction for so long. I groan into Zander’s mouth and his hands move around to grasp my butt.

  Using his hands under my butt as bracing to lift me, he stands and moves us to my bed. He lays me down on the bed with his body hovering over mine. All the while, his lips are moving against mine and creating a need deep in my belly.

  “God, I needed this.” He whispers in my ear when our lips part. Truth.

  A rumbling surge of contentment rushes through me, but for the first time I recognize that it isn’t my emotion. Our connection is showing me how much he needs this. He can probably feel my need, too. Being able to feel his arousal increases my desire and before I know it, I am grabbing for the hem of his shirt and ripping it over his head.

  He unbuttons my pants and pulls them off my legs, and when he lays back down over my body, I can feel his bare thighs against mine. I grab my shirt and pull it over my head and his lips instantly travel over my newly exposed midriff. The second his lips make contact with my stomach, we both release heavy sighs.

  Nothing about this is slow. It’s not love and patience and reassurances. This is fire and passion and desire. I need his body in a way that I have never experienced before.

  His fingers trail over my abdomen leaving a trail of fire in their wake. Gently, he brushes his fingers over my hip, down my thigh, but when he reaches my knee, he changes track and starts gliding back up my leg. His fingers brushing over my inner thigh bring me alive. I swear I could live in this sensation. When his fingers reach the apex of my thighs, he trails them lightly over my panties and I can’t help but tilt my hips into his hand.

  My core craves friction and I am powerless against it. Slowly, he moves his fingers to the edge of my panties where my leg and sex meet and I moan against his lips. Pushing my panties aside his finger trails up my most sensitive area.

  “Please, Zander. Oh, god, please.” I groan incoherently into his mouth and am rewarded with a smile.

  “Anything, baby.” He removes his hand long enough to remove my panties.

  As he pulls down his own boxers, I remove my bra and when he lays back down on me there is nothing between our bodies. We don’t even leave enough room between us for air to exist. His lips find mine and I can feel his erection pressing gently against my center.

  Inexperience means nothing to me right now. I should feel shy or unsure, but I don’t. My body instinctively knows what it wants and how to accomplish that. I tilt my hips toward Zander which places his tip right where I want it.

  “This might hurt, just a bit.” Zander is looking at me through heavy eyelids and I know he needs this as bad as I do. I raise my hips, causing him to push heavily against me.

  He nods his head and I know he won’t try to be gentle. We are too far past that. If what he is feeling is half of what I am feeling, then slow and gentle will be an impossibility.

  He thrusts his hips forward and enters me in one quick stroke as a slow hiss escapes his teeth. The feeling is completely foreign and at the same time completely familiar. My body recognizes Zander as an essential piece to my anatomy. The uncomfortable pinch was so minor that I don’t even have room in my brain to contemplate it.

  I roll my head backwards on the bed and a low moan slips between my lips. Zander pulls out and once more enters me. He drops his head to the bedspread beside my neck and picks up his pace.

  This isn’t love-making. This is fucking. Zander fucks me hard and fast. He sets an unrelenting pace and somehow my body keeps up, meeting his thrust for thrust. There is an inherent rightness to our connection. I can’t imagine how I ever survived without the sensations caused by his body moving in mine.

  I feel my muscles clench around him, and an intensity starts to build deep inside of me. As the intensity grows, I can no longer stay quiet and I have no qualms about what comes out of my mouth. One second I am pleading to Zander and god and the next I am mumbling incoherently. When his fingers snake down between us to tap against my clit as he continues to ram into me, I come undone. I feel Zander pause. He starts to twitch inside of me, and I know that he is spilling into my body.

  We lay still for a moment while we both catch our breath. After a moment, Zander rises off me. As he begins to pull out of me, my body objects.

  He kisses his way down my abdomen and when he reaches my recently abused nether regions, he blows softly on them. The cool air is a welcome relief from the friction that our bodies created and causes me to arch my back off the bed spread.

  “Don’t worry, I’ll be back soon.” When he speaks his head is still between my knees and I get the distinct impression that he is talking more to my center than he is to me. And something about that is crazy hot. His assurance that he will return both turns me on and calms me down.

  As Zander crawls back up my body to cuddle beside me, I contemplate what just happened. I should be concerned that I just slept with a man that I barely know. I should also be concerned that I allowed him to have sex with me with no protection. For some reason though, I can’t work up the emotion. I like that there was nothing between us during sex. I don’t want there to be any barriers between us. And while I hate to admit it, I like the idea that he spilled himself into me. It feels possessive, and I like that too.

  I curl up into a ball with my back to Zander’s chest and find myself being more comfortable than I can ever recal
l being. My joints feel slightly looser and my muscles more relaxed. He rests his arm on my side as his hand cups my sex. The placement of his hand feels intentional. Like he’s staking his claim or marking his territory and I swear I like that too.

  Chapter 10

  Just A Few More Questions

  When I wake up the next morning Zander is wrapped around me. There is a blanket covering our bodies that wasn’t there when I fell asleep. Zander must have covered us up during the night. I roll out of bed to go get into the shower, leaving Zander asleep on my bed.

  I realize after my shower that I didn’t bring any clothes to change into in the bathroom with me and I wasn’t wearing anything when I came in, so I have nothing to put on to go back into the room. I wrap the towel tightly around my body and walk into my bedroom. Zander is sitting up on the bed, watching me as I walk to the closet.

  As soon as I get in the closet, I feel him behind me. He wraps his arms around my midriff and pulls me back into his chest.

  “Good morning, Emily.” He whispers in my ear and plants a sweet kiss on my cheek. “I’ll see you at breakfast.” And with that, he is gone.

  I had worried during my shower about the morning after weirdness you hear about. I didn’t know if things would be awkward between us. Thankfully, things don’t necessarily feel awkward. His kiss was sweet but not overbearing. He doesn’t seem to have gone all caveman on me and claimed me as his own or anything equally dramatic.

  Last night, I enjoyed his possession. He owned by body in the dark and I loved every minute of it. This morning though I worried about the same things that turned me on last night. We had sex. He doesn’t own me. Despite what happened between us, I have no intention of completing the final mating ceremony with him. It was just sex. I wasn’t sure if he would be okay with that in the light of day.

  I finish getting dressed and head to the kitchen for breakfast. This will be the real test. Usually Zander, Caiden, and I all eat breakfast together. I don’t want Caiden to find out about last night, yet. I’m planning to tell him, but I want to tell him in my time and in my way. Not because Zander thinks he has some sort of claim over me and Caiden notices.