Breaking The Sinner (The Breaking Series Book 4) Read online

  “You know how to fight, but in here we need discipline, too.” Travis sniffed. “You’re gonna get clients who want you to wave a magic wand and fix their body without any work on their part. You need to show them why you can’t do that. You need to show them how they are the only ones holding the key to their own future.”

  Cobra pushed onto his back, a whoosh of breath escaping him. He stared up at the tiled ceiling of the gym. “Got it.”

  Travis appeared over him, his face unnervingly serious. “Training doesn’t work if both people don’t show up. You hear me?”

  Cobra swallowed the snarky response, grinding his jaw. “Yep.”

  Travis offered a hand, and Cobra groaned up to his feet. Sweat already cooled on the tops of his shoulders.

  “I think that’s good for today. When’s your next session with Gen?”

  Cobra reached for a sweat towel, rubbing it over his neck. “After this.”

  “Your workout plan for her looked solid. Stay the course. But don’t let her slack.” Travis clapped him on the back. “You’re doing good. Keep it up.”

  And then Travis hurried out of the gym, leaving Cobra alone with his thoughts and the harsh buzz of the fluorescent lights above. He was doing well. Why was that so hard for him to accept?

  Cobra’s skin prickled. He turned. Gen hung in the doorway.

  “Am I early?”

  Relief washed over him, a warm sensation he tried hard to ignore. It didn’t seem right to acknowledge it.

  “Right on time.” He draped his sweat towel over the bench, fighting the groan at the back of his throat. He didn’t want to look weak even though everything burned.

  “Why are you sweating so much?”

  “Just got done with my workout.” He rolled his neck in a slow circle. He hadn’t seen much of Gen today. Even though their date had been yesterday, it felt like a week had passed. She looked different somehow. Sparkling. Fresher. The standard issue Holt Body crop top brushed the top of where her belly button must be, but her high-waisted black shorts hid that creamy sliver of skin he was eager to glimpse.

  She fingered the top of her auburn ponytail, hip cocked out. When she dragged her jade gaze up to meet his, something inside him cracked. Split wide open, exposing a vulnerability he didn’t like one bit.

  She could have asked him to do anything in that moment, and he would have fallen to his knees, begging to do it.

  “I’m kinda nervous about today,” she admitted.

  “Don’t be.” He steeled himself as he walked toward the rubber exercise mat backed up against a wall of ropes, slings and stretchy bands. “All you have to do is what I tell you.”

  “I bet you like that part, don’t you?”

  He couldn’t fight the smile. He grabbed a medium intensity stretchy band, tugging it taut between his hands. “Yeah. But not as much as I bet you do.”

  Her cheeks were flame red when he looked back at her. He jerked his head toward the mat. “Lie down.”

  She approached slowly, testing the squishy mat material with the toe of her black sneaker. “And then what?”

  He drew a deep breath. His heart rate hadn’t returned to normal, but he wasn’t sure of the cause: the workout or Gen. “We’ll start with a warmup I made for you.”

  Gen nibbled on her bottom lip. “Okay, but can we wait a second?” Indecision creased her face. “You’re like, glistening.”

  A laugh escaped him. “What?”

  She waved her hand as if dismissing him. “You’re all sweaty and perfect right now. I can’t focus.”

  “You’re lucky I’m wearing a shirt,” he said, coming down to his knees. He tugged at Gen’s hands and she followed suit. “Now you ready?”

  “I guess,” she grumbled.

  “We’re gonna start with some rolling.” Cobra explained the maneuver, showing the floppy roll motion he wanted to see. He sat back on his heels as she did it, gritting his teeth against the excellent view. It seemed criminal to enjoy his job this much. Practically voyeurism.

  Cobra ran her through a series of warm-up exercises, from gentle lunges to bear crawls, most of which elicited giggles. By the time he’d eased her into repetitions of squats, she had a fresh sheen of sweat on her face.

  “This is kind of hard,” she admitted.

  “We’re still warming up,” Cobra said. “Tighten your stomach.”

  Cobra led her through progressively harder squats and lunges with enough time to rest and recuperate between sets. Their hour together flew by. Even Cobra couldn’t believe the clock when he checked.

  “Hey, we’re done.” He offered his hand to help her up from the ground. Her palm was slick with sweat. She groaned up to her feet.

  “That was intense.”

  “It was just the beginning.”

  “You guys are all the same around here,” she said breathily. “Beefy fighters who barely break a sweat.”

  “I wasn’t the one working out,” he reminded her. “Besides, I’m not really the same as the other guys. I kinda stick out around here.” Her comment grated on him, but he wasn’t sure why.

  “Stick out? How?” She dabbed the white sweat towel along her collar bone, up the curve of her neck. The neck he’d nibbled personally the evening before.

  “Oh, come on. It’s obvious.” He didn’t want to say the words himself.

  Confusion creased her face. “You look like you’ve been working here your entire life.”

  “You couldn’t be more wrong.” The idea of him fitting in around here was a lot of things: laughable, ridiculous, completely false. “I started a couple months ago.”

  “Didn’t you work at a gym before this?”

  “Nope.” Cobra collected his papers, rustling them loudly as he shoved them back into his folder.

  “Seems like you’ve been doing this for a long time.”

  “Maybe on the outside. But trust me, I’m not like anyone else here.”

  Gen studied the stitching on the towel, her thin fingers caressing the seam before she said, “Yeah. Neither am I.”

  Cobra knocked her gently on the shoulder. “Maybe that’s why I like ya.”

  She sent him a look full of surprise and adoration. His stomach jerked. He shouldn’t have said that.

  He shouldn’t have started messing around with her at all.

  “So we’re done. See you later, Gen.” He needed to get the fuck out of here. Feelings always sucked. He’d rather smoke himself numb and avoid all of the flops and dips of getting close to someone.

  “Are you doing anything later?”

  He stopped in his tracks on his way out of the gym. Without looking her way, he said, “I’m busy.”

  “Oh.”

  He glanced over his shoulder. He should just call the whole thing off. “I’ll let you know when I can hang out.”

  Gen nodded, relief swarming those big green eyes. And with every step he took leading him away from her, he repeated the new goal to himself: the less Red, the better.

  Chapter 13

  “He probably has a good excuse,” Gen said, combing out her hair with her fingers for the tenth time. She was going to make the perfect braids.

  Sophie sent her a flat look. The two of them had been catching up after a few days of opposing schedules. Their girl-and-gab night was officially underway with a local beer Sophie swore was life changing and a heaping stack of sushi from the deli down the street.

  “Three days since your last date, and not a single peep.” Sophie covered the coffee table with a black linen then meticulously arranged the varying trays of sushi. White rice rolls stared up at Gen as she fingered her hair into three equal sections. She’d become a professional French braider if it was the last thing she did.

  “I’ve seen him a couple times at work,” she said, her voice distant as she focused on the movements of her fingers. “I don’t know what he does in his spare time.”

  “Probably other women,” Sophie said.

  Gen frowned. “Ouch.”


  “Girl, I’m looking out for you.” Sophie tutted, shaking her head as she filled two tiny bowls with the dark brown soy sauce. “I hear about this all the time at the bar. Practically every other week, a new guy has ghosted.”

  “Ghosted?” Gen frowned as she felt a strand of hair lump up in her plait. She combed out the braid again.

  “They disappear. Stop texting, stop calling. No reason, no explanation.” Sophie snapped her fingers. “Gone, just like that.”

  “I don’t think Cobra would ghost,” Gen said.

  Sophie hefted with a laugh. “That’s what every woman says about every man. Until it happens to them.”

  “Why would Cobra ghost? It makes no sense.” She smoothed her hair into three sections again. Some strands turned into flyaways with the static electricity.

  “Who knows? Men don’t often make sense.” Sophie sat back, crossing her legs in front of her. “Let’s eat!”

  Gen frowned, working quicker to get at least one braid in. “I’m sure he’ll text me soon. He said he’d let me know when he could hang out.”

  Sophie’s snort didn’t convey much confidence.

  “I mean, why wouldn’t he want to keep seeing me? We have an excellent arrangement.”

  “Most guys don’t want to date,” Sophie said, wielding her chopsticks as if she’d done it her entire life. “If they can get the milk for free, why buy the cow?”

  “We’re not dating,” Gen reminded her, abandoning her braid once another lump appeared. She tugged her thick stresses behind her head into a loose bun. “And I’m not a cow. I don’t even live in a barn. He’s helping me with the list.” Gen reached for the chopsticks, mimicking the way Sophie had them. Even though she held them almost the same, something didn’t look right. “Am I really supposed to eat with these things?”

  “Yes. But hold them more here.” Sophie reached over the coffee table to adjust Gen’s fingers.

  “I don’t see how I can do anything other than stab.”

  “Watch.” Sophie demonstrated a graceful pick-up with her chopsticks, popping the sushi effortlessly into her mouth. She smiled as she chewed. “Now you.”

  Gen hovered the chopsticks close to a sushi piece, fumbling to get them on either side of the rice. The sticks crisscrossed as soon as she attempted to pick it up.

  “This is gonna take some practice,” Gen said.

  “Like everything in life.” Sophie smiled cryptically. “Now try your beer.”

  Gen sighed, abandoning the chopsticks. She took a sip. It bubbled bright on her tongue. “Love this beer.”

  “I’ll make you a beer connoisseur yet.” Sophie maneuvered another sushi piece into her mouth. Gen worked her jaw back and forth.

  “Can you feed me the sushi since you’re so good at it?”

  Sophie laughed, and a piece of rice flew out of her mouth. “Oh, sorry. Spitting isn’t nice.”

  “Not as bad as farting on someone,” Gen said, pushing to standing. She grabbed a fork out of the kitchen before returning to her spot on the floor in front of the coffee table. “In case we all forgot that actually happened.”

  Sophie bit her lip as she laughed.

  “Maybe Cobra is ghosting me because he’s looking for someone who won’t fart on him,” Gen went on.

  “Even though he made out with you despite the farting,” Sophie said.

  “Sure. There was that. But I must have kissed so horribly that he’d rather never speak to me again.”

  Sophie frowned. “I shouldn’t have said anything. I don’t want you to stress about this.”

  “Too late. You taught me about ghosting, now you have to deal with the consequences.” She chewed thoughtfully, a bulky thought crowding her mind. “Did I ghost on my family?”

  Sophie looked up at her with a lighthearted look, but it dissolved quickly. “Sorta, I guess.” She offered a nervous laugh, one that showed the cracks in her badass exterior. “I sure did.”

  Gen forked a few pieces of sushi, staring at but not seeing the food in front of her. “I miss home.”

  Sophie pursed her lips. It was hard to talk about their community with her. Mostly because it was plain that Sophie didn’t call it home anymore. She’d never gone back. Likely never would. “I bet you do. Twenty-four years in that place.”

  “You know, I tried calling home a few days ago. Abigail picked up.” Gen tucked her hands under her thighs, staring down at the shag rug. “She wouldn’t talk to me. Just handed the phone off to Mary.” Mary was the youngest of her family. At age thirteen, she’d been deeply wounded by Gen’s departure but didn’t seem to hold it against her as badly as the rest. All of them had lapped up the victimization story their father loved to spout, that this was Gen punishing them, as though Gen hadn’t been punished her entire life simply for existing.

  “Did Mary talk to you, at least?”

  “Yeah. My parents were out, so that was good. Or maybe bad. I’m not sure anymore.” Gen laughed, but it was humorless. “She begged me to come home for Thanksgiving. I told her I’d see. Overall, sounds like things are the same. Which means I should be glad to be gone. But sometimes, there isn’t anywhere I’d rather be.”

  Sophie frowned a little. “It’s part of the process, Gen. It’ll get easier. I promise.”

  “Why haven’t you gone back?”

  Sophie dragged her gaze up to meet Gen’s. There was pain there, confusion. A world that Gen understood without knowing the details. “It wasn’t the place for me. And you know, you can miss a place, even if you didn’t like living there. You can love a period of your life, even if it wasn’t great.” Sophie sniffed, and it was then that Gen realized there had been emotion clogging her voice. “Same goes for men, too.”

  “Are you talking about Cobra now?”

  Sophie sighed a little, maneuvering another bite of sushi into her mouth. She chewed quietly for a few moments. “You know, if you have an arrangement with him, that’s one thing. But you have to protect your heart. Making the time limit was smart, but he still has free rein to do whatever the hell he wants. And you don’t want his decisions coming back to bite you in the ass. Men will play the field as much as you’ll allow.”

  The idea slithered through Gen’s veins, uncomfortable and icy. She had no say over what he did with his life. But what Sophie suggested seemed plain wrong.

  Gen gripped a piece of sushi between thumb and forefinger. How did Sophie make it look so easy? “I don’t think he’d do that. Isn’t it an obvious thing? One person at a time.”

  Sophie laughed so hard a piece of crab meat shot out of her mouth. “Dammit. I can’t keep this sushi in my mouth.”

  “Don’t hold back,” Gen muttered, picking up a few pieces of rice from the carpet.

  “Gen, this is why we need to talk about this stuff. Some men, from what I’ve heard, from what I’ve experienced myself, will lie to your face about loving you while they’re going behind your back fucking three other girls. Probably telling the same story to all of them. I know you and Cobra have…something else, but you should be clear and wary all the same.”

  Gen nodded, staring at the green and smoked pink chunks inside the next roll. Sophie made sense. Sophie was wiser in this area.

  “I already told him I make the rules,” Gen said, stabbing her fork into the center of a sushi piece.

  “That’s not how you eat it,” Sophie said before deftly chop-sticking another California roll.

  “Yeah, well, it’s how I eat it.” Gen scooped the sushi into her mouth, pieces of rice falling out along the way. “Because like I said, I make the rules.”

  And she did. With Cobra, with sushi, with the whole dang thing. Sophie might be right to caution her, but only Gen could steer this ship. And she knew where to go from here.

  Chapter 14

  Cobra’s eyes burned, even though he had them shut. It was like the weed smoke had weaseled into his skull, scorching the sensitive fibers of his brain. No amount of eye drops helped. He’d been high every second since leaving
work for the weekend.

  Fuck it. He had some things he didn’t want to think about. Like why he wanted Gen to text him so bad. Of course she’d be the one person to listen to him when he told her not to get ahold of him. He’d known that. It was why he’d said it.

  Like an asshole.

  “I’m making some fucking brownies. You want any?” Klay yawned and scratched at his stomach as he stumbled from bedroom to kitchen. Klay’s brownies were the stuff of legend because he made weed butter so potent it could kill a deer.

  “Nah, bro.” Cobra reached for his phone, flipping idly through the screens. Looking for something. Finding nothing. “Maybe later.”

  Klay grunted. The sounds of pans and bowls clanking filled the small apartment. Cobra stared at his welcome screen. He wished he had a picture of her. Something to take the edge off. He’d been keeping his distance since Thursday, and now he wouldn’t even see her for another two days. The plan was backfiring.

  There was an itch to see her, born bone-deep and aggressive. Like, no matter where he scratched, he couldn’t satisfy it. She was the only remedy.

  His phone buzzed.

  GEN: Hi Cobra! Wanna come to the library with me?

  His mouth parted. This was some freaky shit. Like maybe he’d been thinking of her so much that it meant she could feel it. He typed out a response before he could run through the list of doubts and hedging.

  COBRA: Yeah. Where?

  Gen texted him an address and a time. She wanted to meet in a half hour. He pushed off the couch, headed for the bathroom. Fucking finally. Something to do. A place to go. Gen.

  He’d forego a shower so he could make it on time. He pushed his short hair around with wet fingertips and stared at himself long enough to realize he was higher than shit. Gen was pure. He couldn’t see her like this. Not when his eyes were a roadmap to the capital of Blazedville.

  Cobra fished out his phone, staring at their message thread for a few moments. His heart thudded, practically echoing in the quiet bathroom. He should cancel. Through the walls, he could hear Tyler groaning. Panting, like a fucking rhino in heat. Sounded a lot like jacking off.