Breaker (Unmasked #3)

17. Chapter 11

Chapter 11

Cora

S unlight leaks through the large windows in the kitchen overlooking the brilliant blue ocean. My chest pangs with hurt, thinking of Viper’s blue eyes and the dark troubled sea that churred beyond the mansion.

Last night, sleep didn’t come easy. The familiar tendrils of dread slithered back into my core the moment they left me last night. That oily, suffocating sensation that once gripped me now coils tighter. Even though I knew Clyde was in the room across the hall, I was still scared to fall asleep. Scared that Rune would come in to question me further or worse. I wouldn’t put it past him to hold me down and fuck me in my childhood bed.

In the past, I had resigned myself to being Rune’s plaything without hope of escape. I was trapped. Used. Abused.

His.

But now I know a soft touch and hungry need that doesn’t scald me with resentment. How it feels to be touched with care and tenderness. What it feels like to be treated well. My needs taken care of and not as foreplay right before the random man I picked out for the evening rammed his dick in me and got off way too fast. I know what it feels like to be kissed, like I’m truly desired. Soft and sweet and full of promise.

Promises they better keep.

Reaper’s going to get me.

He promised.

Every time I repeat the words in my mind, a deep emptiness carves a hole in my chest, echoing the way lies tend to.

I scrub my hands over my face, the lingering anger toward Clyde gnawing at my insides. Anger toward Rune. Life. On top of it, my head hurts. My arm hurts. Actually, everything hurts this morning, my heart the worst.

“Any word?” Rune strides into the kitchen, the scent of his musky cologne mingling with the aroma of brewing coffee. His fingers fumble with the buttons of his suit jacket as he leans over to place a kiss on the top of my head like he didn’t hold me down and have my doctor examine me without my consent.

It’s so typical of him. Pretending as if last night didn’t happen. Just like he always did after he fucked me. It’s heavy, holding the vile deeds of others. It suffocates all the good things left inside a person until they’re drowning in the sickness.

“No,” Clyde tells him, pulling a coffee mug from the cabinet and setting it on the counter for Rune.

I told Clyde I wasn’t hungry, but guilt must have turned him into a chef, because he’s currently making me eggs I don’t want. His arms flex as he scoops eggs from the pan onto a plate. A simple t-shirt under his blazer replaces his usual attire of tailored suits today, the material clinging to his toned back. Faded jeans hug his strong legs. I rarely see Clyde so casually dressed, which means he doesn’t plan on joining Rune at the office today.

Lucky me . I get to spend my day with Clyde.

“Have you heard from Snyder at all?” Rune asks him, petting my head before he walks to the coffeepot. I resist swiping at my hair.

Screaming.

Crying.

Instead, I say, “I thought we settled the Snyder deal?”

I can pretend too. I’ve gotten good at it. Sweeping bad things under the carpet and pretending they don’t exist.

But I remember.

I just file it away for later.

Clyde glances over his shoulder. “Rune presented another deal and they’re sitting on it.”

“Deal?” I ask, forgetting I was mad. Delly and I worked so hard to cover up whatever Rune was actually buying, that every detail has etched itself in my mind. “We bought their entire chain of hotels. What else do they have?”

Rune glances at Clyde but says nothing.

I give wide eyes to Rune as he pours himself a cup of coffee, then turns to place the carafe back.

“Well?” I ask. It’s obvious this isn’t something they want to discuss, but I push on, “Anyone? If I’m going to be spending my days covering up illegal shit, then at least I should know what crimes I’m committing.”

Rune whips around so fast, his coffee sloshes out of his mug on to his hand. He exhales a sharp hiss and slaps it down on the on the counter, reaching for a napkin. Blue eyes laser in on me. “You’ve become quite bold for a girl who was held hostage for three weeks.”

I hold his gaze, daring him to be cruel in front of Clyde. They may be lifelong friends, but Clyde does not know what Rune is really like.

“Cora,” Clyde warns, glaring at me.

Rune brushes past, saying over his shoulder to Clyde, “Get me the RSVP list for the event. I want to make sure one of their guys is attending.”

“Event?” I ask.

“Zane’s annual fundraiser,” Clyde says. “And yes, you’re expected to attend.”

“I’m not fucking going,” I say, crossing my arms like a defiant child. The thought of spending an evening at Zane’s stupid fundraiser makes me want to slam my face into the table until I’m unconscious.

Every year, Zane holds a fundraiser for some random cause and invites all his friends and associates. Delly and I sign the checks for Rune, and most times, we attend the function long enough to shake a few hands and pose for the cameras before we slip out. I hate his fundraisers as much as I can’t stand him.

Clyde steps over, placing a plate of scrambled eggs in front of me. He points to his runny eggs. “Shut up and eat.”

My teeth grind together as I lock eyes with him. His intense, penetrating gaze warns me to tread carefully. When he gets like this, I know better than to push.

Deflating, I uncross my arms and angrily snatch up my napkin. “Your eggs suck,” I mumble. “Where’s Claudia?”

Clyde picks up the fork and hands it to me after the front door slams shut, telling me Rune’s gone. He lifts his chin toward the front of the house. “He fired all his staff except for Conner.”

“His driver?” I ask, shocked. “Why did he let everyone go?”

Clyde raises one brow, silently asking me, Why do you think? “He’d have fired me if he could.”

“He can’t fire you. You’re his closest friend.”

“Precisely,” Clyde says, “but his paranoia is through the roof.”

I lean back in my seat, looking back out the large windows. That explains why Rune was getting his own coffee this morning. He’s let his entire staff go. That also explains why I didn’t see any security detail. Rune must be so worried about everyone he’s surrounded himself with that he isn’t sure who to trust. The men he obviously has a history with walked into his club and fucked us. After one of the club’s security guards let us all into a VIP lounge. These men know people and it’s obvious they planned this.

Our last night with them flashes through my mind. I rake my hands through my hair, trying to stop the flood of memories. I’ve never in my life felt so possessed. So owned.

So safe.

Looking back on that night we spent with them in the club, I can’t help but think about how Reaper was with Delly. Possessive in almost a cruel, slightly unhinged way. How Viper and Breaker were with us both, so hungry, so possessive.

How Viper kissed and consumed us like he was eating a meal he’d paid a fortune for, one he’s wanted, planned for, craved for years. How Striker barely contained his need as he watched me get fucked. The way he cherished Delly.

How Breaker touched me like he already knew me. Like we’d been lovers for years.

Hindsight is 20-20 and all, but I don’t think they realized just how much they were revealing in those hours we spent with them. Now that I’m sitting alone, away from them, waiting, I wonder how long they watched us.

Delly and I never discussed it, and I think we both avoided the topic because of what it meant, but these men knew us. In ways that men know lovers. How a person obsessed has a deep understanding of every detail about the object of their desire.

And right now, staring at my eggs through a haze of angry tears, I want nothing more than to be possessed by them again.

Maybe we were away too long, and we got caught up in some twisted romantic notion that the men took us because they craved us. It’s possible we got messed up in the head because we were being held prisoner by the men we fucked. And who wouldn’t? They are consuming in every way, taking over every sense. They are sex and sensuality in a dominant male form. Caring and protective. Mysterious and so erotically potent, my cheeks heat just thinking about them.

If we’d not met them that night, Delly and I never would have come together. We’d have not fucked at all if we’d not been taken. Surely we’d not have kissed if it weren’t for that night in the club. We never would have done any of the things we’ve done if it weren’t for those four men who have seriously fucked with my head to the point I don’t know what’s up from down or what’s real.

No. That’s not true. I know what’s real.

Being in my childhood kitchen with Clyde, knowing I am expected to resume my role as Rune’s secret keeper, money launderer, and secret whore, is very real.

And I have a new role.

Wife.

That’s got to be the reason I’d be returned to Rune instead of Delly. And that’s the only reason my implant would be removed. Last night, Rune said having it removed was part of the deal, which can only mean I’m expected to conceive.

The last several years flash through my mind, like a movie. All the dinners, all the parties, every time Rune would redirect Zane away from Delly. The irritated glances at Zane. They weren’t because he feared Zane’s intentions. He knew Delly was safe from him.

He knew because he’d already planned to sell me to the devil.

I didn’t think it was possible, but my heart cracks open a little more.

Reaper, all of them, sent me back because I was promised to someone else.

Part of me fears that’s why they took me. If this was all part of the plan. To make me fall, make promises they never intended to keep. That way, when the time came, they had a bargaining chip, and I wouldn’t put up much of a fight because I truly believed them.

I was theirs, and they’d always come for me.

But here I am, being brought to slaughter like I mean nothing, presented as a whore to be used, as a womb to carry a child, a trophy to place on a shelf. Like I am nothing because they wanted Delly. I was nothing more than a bargaining chip.

I was expendable.

Because I would have to be returned, and Rune knew it. That’s why he never came for us. Everyone knew it. You can’t make this kind of deal between families, then just break it. And that silver-haired man… He knew it too.

That’s why I’m here.

Rune had no choice but to let them keep Delly in exchange for me. I don’t know what’s more fucked up. That he let his blood go, his heir to the kingdom he built, or that he was too scared to lose it all. His money. His power. His control.

He chose his empire over his daughter.

The clattering sound of ceramic hitting the table jolts me from my thoughts. I glance over and see a steaming stack of fluffy pancakes.

My eyes slip up to Clyde’s face. “You made pancakes?”

His brows knit, making the wrinkles around his eyes deepen. “Why do you look like these pancakes are about to make you cry?”

I swipe a tear from my cheek. Because the meanest man I’ve ever met made me pancakes after he promised me I was his, then sent me away.

My chin wobbles and I remind myself I’m not expendable, but that lie is starting to feel hollow. “I don’t know if I like pancakes anymore.”

“But you love pancakes.” Clyde stabs the top two with a fork and places them on my plate next to my untouched eggs. He slathers butter over the top and hands me the syrup. “You love blueberry pancakes, and chocolate chip pancakes. Plain pancakes.” He grabs my fork and hands it to me again. I take it weakly, swiping again at my cheek. “You like all pancakes.”

I nod as I cry, because I do. I love pancakes. My father used to make them for me. It is the only good thing I remember about him.

Good. Nothing is good. I’ve never even had an ounce of goodness outside of the flimsy, trivial things that money can buy. The only good, substantial, permanent thing I’ve had is Delly and I don’t have her.

My hand swipes across the table before I know what I’m doing and the plate crashes to the floor. Shards hit the wall, and scatter noisily across the white tile floor.

“Which one?” I ask, my chair nearly topping over as I stand upright. “Which man am I supposed to marry?”

The way Clyde’s chest expands on an inhale, and how his eyes drop, tells me I was right.

“Which family?” I ask, smacking my hand on the table to release some of this rage. I’m so sick of being controlled. “Or is it Rune I’m supposed to marry?”

Clyde recoils, his expression turning to disgust. “Why would you marry Rune?”

My laugh is so bitter is burns my throat.

“Cora,” Clyde barks, grabbing my arm. “Why, in god’s name, would Rune want to marry you?”

“Why do you think ?“ My voice cracks, pain spilling out. Clyde loves me. I know he does. But he’s also a blind fool. Shoving him away, I clear the angry hurt in my throat. “I’m rich, and I own part of his company.”

His shoulders ease. “No, not Rune.”

“Zane?” I hiss, disbelief like a sour truth on my tongue. I sink back to my chair. “Fuck.”

Clyde doesn’t answer. He doesn’t have to. Instead, he crouches and cleans up my mess, gathering the broken plate and stacking it on the table next to his perfect pancakes without a word.

“Let me guess,” I say. “Rune promised Zane he could have my money if he handed over the shares of Rune’s company I inherited from my parents.”

Still nothing.

“Clyde,” I snap. His dark eyes meet mine, so full of sorrow, my anger weakens even more. “I deserve to know what Zane expects as payment for marrying the disgraced Julian girl.”

“You deserve more than all of this, Cora,” Clyde says.