“In order to...do that, he had to...do something. That something involved him having sex with...someone I don’t really...get along with.”
“He used sex to visit you?”
Anna sighed. “It’s hard to explain without going into a lot more details, but in a roundabout way, yes. He did it to manipulate me into breaking up with someone I really didn’t want to break up with.” She took a sip of water and stared back at the table in front of her.
“Ah.” Hugo rubbed his head. “That seems...not nice.”
Anna smiled at his diplomacy. “Then I found out that he got someone pregnant when he was there, and threw in my face that his dad got me pregnant.”
“His...dad...?”
Anna exhaled sharply. She realized how that sounded. To someone outside the Brotherhood, that would sound really bad. Her shoulders slumped and she closed her eyes. “In the world that I live in, he has a right to do that...,” she said lamely.
“You’ve slept with your husband’s...dad and brother...?”
Her face burned. She shouldn’t have gone to Hugo. She should have gone to Aaron instead. He at least understood the strangeness that was the Brotherhood. “I haven’t slept with Kurt in a while....”
“But you were engaged.”
“He wouldn’t sleep with me.”
“Oh.”
The room was quiet and Anna felt awkward. “I’m sorry, Hugo. I shouldn’t have come to you about this....” She stood, but he grabbed her hand.
“Why did you come to me?” he asked in a hoarse whisper.
Anna turned to look at him, her heart aching. She never had a chance with him. Their relationship was doomed from the beginning. “We never had a chance...,” she whispered, eyes full of grief. “I’m so sorry, Hugo. If I’d known—”
“I don’t regret a moment of time I spent with you, Kittycat.”
Tears burned her eyes at his use of his pet name for her. “If Alex hadn’t come....”
They gazed into each other’s eyes. Damn Alex! Damn him for coming back. Why couldn’t he have stayed where he was? Why did he have to come back and ruin things? She’d had a life. She’d been happy. And he had to come back and ruin it all.
Anna slowly sat back down. “I miss you,” she whispered.
Hugo reached out and caressed her cheek. “I miss you, too.”
She leaned forward, brushing her lips against his. He jumped slightly at her touch, but didn’t back away. “I didn’t want to break up with you,” she whispered, running her hand over his shoulder and around his neck. “I didn’t want to leave you.”
Suddenly, Hugo’s arms wrapped around her and held her tightly against him. He cupped the back of her head and crushed his lips against hers. She opened her mouth, letting him thrust his tongue in and out slowly, sensually. She moaned softly and clung tighter to his shoulders.
He pulled her onto his lap, her legs straddling his, and she pressed her hips against him. His cock was straining against his sweatpants and he groaned when she pressed against him. She smiled against his lips.
His hands slid under her t-shirt as he kissed her and she shuddered as he caressed her back. She slid her hands down his torso and brushed his cock, making him jump.
“Katrina...,” he murmured.
She sat up and pulled her shirt off. His eyes widened as he gazed at her bra-covered breasts. She took his hand and placed it on her right breast and he inhaled slowly. He squeezed gently and she closed her eyes and sighed. “Yes...,” she sighed as desire coursed through her body.
Hugo leaned forward, pulling her bra down, and took her nipple into his mouth. Anna moaned softly and held his head to her. His tongue swirled around and around her nipple and her arms moved to his shoulders and pulled at his shirt.
Thoughts of Alex came unbidden to her mind and she pushed them aside. She didn’t care that he wouldn’t like what she was doing. He could kiss her a—
A shooting pain shot through her head and she grabbed hold of it and screamed.
“Katrina!” Hugo exclaimed. “Katrina, what’s wrong?”
Chapter Fifty
Alex paced on the rooftop terrace. He went back and forth between anger and hurt at Anna’s departure. How dare she get upset about something he did when he never thought he’d see her again! He hadn’t done it against Anna. He did it to Vlad.
And how many men had she fucked while he was gone? How many men had she fallen in love with? How could she get upset for him keeping her from being with Hugo? Alex was returning. He couldn’t let her be with someone who wouldn’t be able to protect her. She was his wife, dammit! His wife! His slave! She belonged to him.
“Alex?”
Alex spun around to see Greg standing near the door, holding his phone out. “You need to take this.”
“Was?” he snapped into the phone.
“Alex? It’s Hugo.”
Alex barely contained a growl. This was not a person who should be calling him right now. Hugo was at the top of his shit list. “What do you want?”
There was a slight hesitation. “It’s Anna. She’s—”
“Anna’s with you?” Alex growled.
“I...yes. She’s in pain. She holding her head and crying.”
Her head? “What was she doing when it started hurting?” Hugo didn’t answer right away and Alex’s stomach began to twist into knots. “What the hell were you doing with my wife?”
“We...shit, Alex. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for anything to happen.”
Alex felt his temper snap. “Tell her to stop fucking rebelling and get her ass home as soon as she can fucking walk. And you better stay the fuck away from her from now on or I will have you fired.” He ended the call and threw his phone down in the middle of the terrace.
“Argh!” he yelled at the sky. What the hell had she been doing? No, he knew what she’d been doing. She was being intentionally rebellious, which is why her head was hurting. Fucking stupid woman. Why was she acting this way?
He stalked downstairs to the library for a drink. What the hell was he going to do now?
*****
An hour later, Anna walked through the door of the condo looking very pale and weak. Alex stood in the doorway of the library and glared at her. “Go take a fucking shower and rinse that motherfucker off of you.”
“Yes, Alex,” she said meekly, and hurried to their bedroom.
He walked into the bedroom a few minutes later and was pleased to hear the water running in the bathroom. She wasn’t rebelling anymore. Good.
When she came out of the bathroom in her pink cotton robe a while later, he was sitting on the foot of the bed, waiting for her. She froze in the doorway when she saw him, fear evident in her eyes. He flinched, seeing the fear. He didn’t want her afraid of him...did he? But he didn’t want to feel the hurt right now. He wanted to be angry, not hurt.
They stared at each other for a moment before Anna slowly approached him and knelt at his feet, head down. “I’m sorry...,” she said softly, trailing off as if she didn’t know what to call him.
The angry part of him liked the idea of her calling him Master, but that would wound her. His rational side didn’t want to wound her. His irrational side wanted to wound her as she’d wounded him.
She’d gone to her ex-boyfriend and started having sex. The only reason she stopped was because of the pain of rebellion.
“How could you do that to me, Anna?” he asked in a soft voice.
She looked up at him, hurt and anger in her eyes. “I didn’t ask you to come back.”
Alex felt as if she’d slapped him across the face. He stared at her, hardly believing what he’d heard. “Do you wish I hadn’t?”
She sighed and looked down at her hands. “It doesn’t matter what I wish,” she said in a broken voice. “You are here. I belong to you.”
Alex lifted his chin and clenched his jaw. “Yes, you do.” He reached down and tipped her face up to his. “You never had a problem with it before.”
Her eyes narrowed. “You weren’t around long enough for me to have a problem with it.”
Alex barely kept himself from wincing.
“Perhaps you should perform the final ritual. Then I would be like the other Elder-Mistresses. Cold and beautiful.”
“I like your warmth,” he said before he could stop himself.
Anna didn’t respond, but looked back at the floor.
He felt his anger rising to the surface again. “I will allow you to continue dancing with Hugo for this season, but once Devin is dealt with, we will be returning to San Francisco. I expect you to keep your interactions with him strictly professional.”
“Yes, Alex.”
He wasn’t commanding her, he rationalized to himself. He was just laying out his expectations.
“When I am out of town, I expect you to go to class and then return here. No going out to clubs or spending time with other men. I obviously can’t trust you.” He wondered briefly if she would be glad if he disappeared again.
“Yes, Alex.” Her voice was getting softer with each response.
“If you need to go somewhere, I expect you to ask me first. If you disobey me, I will put a tracker on you.”
“I won’t disobey you,” she whispered.
He continued to look down at her and she looked up after a moment. “Do you want me to sleep in a different room?” Her eyes were remorseful.
“Why would I want that?”
“That’s what...I mean, in case you want to bring another woman home.”
Was she going to say that’s what Devin would have her do? He closed his eyes. He was angry, yes, but he wouldn’t do that to her. “No woman could satisfy me like you do.” It was true.
She made no response to that.
*****
The next two days were filled with tension. Alex hardly spoke to Anna and she didn’t dare approach him. She went to class and rehearsals each day and kept to herself for the most part. If she wasn’t dancing, she was at home. Alex and his men spent most of the time in the study, planning their trip to Boston, and their interactions were kept minimal.
Anna didn’t say much to him and she understood why he was angry. He had a right to be. She’d hurt Alex terribly by what she’d done with Hugo. Alex didn’t come to rehearsals anymore. They had sex every night, but he kept it impersonal. He wouldn’t even kiss her.
Tuesday night was her first regular performance. She went home after rehearsal that afternoon to rest. As she was getting ready to leave, she knocked on the study door.
“Herein.”
She opened the door and saw the men standing around a large table with maps and computers covering it. Alex didn’t look up as she stood there.
“A-are you coming tonight?” she asked softly. Before their fight, he said he would attend as many performances as he could, tonight being one of them.
He looked up and stared at her with hard eyes. “I told you I would be there,” he snapped.
Her mouth moved to speak, but no sound came out. He cocked his eyebrow at her, impatiently waiting for her to speak. “Okay,” she finally squeaked out and left the room quickly, blinking away the burning tears. Would he ever forgive her?
*****
She arrived at the theater and went straight to her dressing room. Slowly, she began to get ready and jumped when there was a knock at the door a while later. She stood and opened the door, half-afraid it was Alex.
It was Hugo. “Are you okay, Katrina?”
She smiled. “Of course. Why?”
“You don’t seem okay.” He frowned. “Is Alex hurting you?”
She shook her head. He wasn’t being abusive. Just...ignoring her.
“You don’t need to lie for him.”
“I’m fine, Hugo. Please....” She looked down the hallway. “I can’t be seen talking to you.”
Hugo frowned. “He’s no better than Kurt.”
“I hurt him, Hugo. What else is he supposed to do?”
“He made us break up. Him and his stupid family.” His gaze softened. “Otherwise I wouldn’t have let you go.”
She gave him a longing look. The more Alex ignored her, the more her heart ached for Hugo. “It doesn’t do any good to wish things were different,” she said bitterly.
*****
The ballet Anna was dancing in was the first one of the evening and she went straight home after she was done. She took a shower and curled up in bed to read until she fell asleep or Alex came home, whichever came first.
She finished her book around ten-thirty and Alex still wasn’t home, so she wandered into the library to find another one to read. Ignoring the pain in her heart was getting easier. Sometimes.
Nothing looked good in the library and she went back to the bedroom to look around for her Kindle. There was always something interesting to download.
The door opened and she heard male voices as she was settling back into bed. And then she heard female voices and her heart dropped into her stomach. Multiple female voices.
Should she go out there? Should she hide so whomever Alex brought home wouldn’t know she was here? Did he want her to know that he’d brought someone home?
She bit her lip and then decided to go out, using the premise that she wanted some water. Her cup was by the bed and she grabbed it before walking out into the hallway and to the living room. Her stomach churned as the voices got louder.
When she walked around the corner, she saw three nicely dressed women, along with the four men sitting in the room. Alex was sitting on one end of the couch with Greg and another woman. The woman reached for Alex, but he shook his head and brushed her hand away.
Alex looked up at that moment and their eyes met. Emotions flittered across his face as he looked at her. Anna held her cup up with an apologetic look and hurried to the kitchen.
One of the women giggled as Tony kissed her neck. The one sitting between Alex and Greg saw her and raised her eyebrows. “Who’s that?”
Everyone turned around to look at her. She felt awkward, standing in her pajama pants and chemise, obviously ready for bed, while the women were dressed elegantly and hanging on the men.
“That’s Anna,” Alex said, staring at her. “She...lives here.”
The third woman laughed. “Live in maid?”
“Something like that,” Alex said in an even tone.
Anna bit her lip to keep from crying out and walked into the kitchen, quickly filling her cup and almost running back to the hallway and out of sight. It was obvious that Alex didn’t want the women to know he was married to her. Should she sleep elsewhere tonight? Probably.
She made a fast decision and went upstairs to the conservatory. There was a couch up there and, if the door was closed, it was fairly quiet. She wrapped the blanket around herself on the couch and cried herself to sleep.
*****
Alex awoke to an empty bed. He’d gone out with the other men after the performance and they’d found some women at the bar they went to. Alex didn’t flirt; he had no desire to, but the idea of making Anna jealous appealed to him.
He had no intention of sleeping with any of them. They were there for the other guys. But he couldn’t resist the jab about Anna’s purpose in the household. He saw the pain in her eyes and felt satisfied that she was hurting as much as he was.
But when he came to bed and Anna wasn’t there, he realized he might have gone too far. He found her upstairs in the conservatory, her face still wet from her tears. She’d slept up there to give him the opportunity to be with someone else.
His whole body tingled with guilt. How many times had Devin done that to her? The very fact that she offered to sleep somewhere else after they first began fighting made him realize she’d probably experienced that with Devin more than a few times. Was he no better than Devin?
Alex just wanted her to feel his jealousy. For her to know how much she’d hurt him by running to Hugo after they’d fought. He was angry and hurt and wanted to punish her so she’d never do it aga
in. But had he gone too far? Had his anger done irreparable harm?
She’d been incredibly submissive these last few days, coming home immediately after rehearsals and reading quietly in the library, or napping in their bed. When she was asleep, he would stand in the doorway and watch her. Even though he was angry, he still woke up early and watched her sleep until her alarm went off.
Maybe he should just get her free of Devin and then let her be with Hugo. She wouldn’t be in danger any more. She could have her new life; the new life she’d begun here.
He was still contemplating his thoughts when there was a soft knock at the door.
“Come.”
The door opened a tiny bit and he saw Anna’s eyes, red from crying. “I need to get ready for class,” she whispered. “May I come in?”
Alex nodded and she opened the door further. Her eyes widened when she looked at the bed. She glanced at him and then back at the empty spot next to him, biting her lip and then glanced at the bathroom door. “Is she in there?” she asked softly.
“Is who in there?” Alex asked.
“The...woman you slept with last night.”
“I didn’t sleep with anyone last night.”
Her mouth formed an “O” and she blinked rapidly as she turned and hurried into the bathroom. She emerged a while later and approached him slowly. “W-would you like me to give you a blowjob?”
Alex studied her for a long moment. She fidgeted with the hem of her shirt. Would rejecting her make her feel worse? Would accepting make her feel used? If he accepted, at least she wouldn’t think that he was off with another woman.
“Do you have enough time?” he asked.
She glanced at the clock beside him and nodded.
He nodded stiffly and she nervously walked around the other side of the bed. She gave him a mournful look before pulling at the blanket.
*****
The rest of the week passed much as the start of the week had. Anna knew Alex was still upset with her, and she tried to keep him as happy as she could. He still spent much of his time in the study and Anna felt very lonely.
The Life of Anna, Part 5: Emerged Page 39
