Breed Me Cursed Alpha (Lyra and Ronan) novel Chapter 6

Chapter 6

Heat wakes me before I open my eyes.

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It’s everywhere. Under my skin. Behind my ribs. Low in my stomach. My whole body feels too tight, too hot, like I’ve been dropped into an oven and told to breathe normally.

I try to roll over. The sheets are a mistake. They cling, soft and heavy, catching on bare skin. My nipples drag against the fabric and my breath punches out in a rough sound I don’t recognize as mine.

Oh.

Right.

The room. The door. The cursed alpha.

My heat.

I force my eyes open. The chamber is dim, lanterns turned low, fire banked to embers in the hearth. Even like this, it’s warm. Too warm. My hair sticks to my neck. Sweat beads on my chest.

I kick the blankets off. It helps for about three seconds.

Then the next wave hits.

It rolls through me, slower this time, but deeper. My hips shift on instinct, chasing pressure. I clamp my thighs together and bite the inside of my cheek hard enough to taste blood.

“No,” I whisper. To my body. To the heat. To the universe.

The universe doesn’t care.

The scent of the room crowds in next. Smoke. Clean linen. A faint wild edge that has nothing to do with the mountain and everything to do with the man who carried it in on his skin.

Ronan.

My pulse stutters just thinking his name. Which is stupid. I barely know him. He’s dangerous, cursed, probably older than my entire family line, and the last person I should be focusing on.

My body does not get that memo.

It remembers his hands on my wrists. His mouth near my throat. The way his voice dropped when he said I’d beg.

I throw an arm over my eyes and groan.

“This is ridiculous.”

I try to think of something else. Anything else. Marcus’s face when he handed me the papers. Kyle’s grip digging into my arm. The Trade Sport hunter’s bored tone when he thanked my father for selling me.

Rage flashes hot.

It gets swallowed instantly by the next spike of heat, stronger than the last, wiping my thoughts clean. My body doesn’t want revenge right now. It wants something much more basic.

I swing my legs over the side of the bed and stand. The room tilts for a second, then steadies. Walking might help. Moving might distract me.

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Chapter 6

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My bare feet sink into the rug. I cross to the stones and press my palms flat against the wall, hoping the cold will bleed into

1. me.

It doesn’t. The stone is warm too, heated from the inside out, like the whole fortress shares a heartbeat.

“Of course it is,” I mutter.

My skin feels too sensitive, like it doesn’t fit. My own breathing sounds obscene in the quiet.

I pace. Bed to hearth. Hearth to door. Back again.

A bead of sweat slides between my shoulder blades. I imagine cool water. Ice. Snow. None of it sticks. Every thought loops back to the same place: a big, scarred alpha with eyes like midnight and a mouth made for trouble.

I stop in the middle of the room and squeeze my eyes

shut.

Don’t think about him. Don’t. Don’t-

“Ronan,” I whisper.

It slips out. A broken little sound that makes me hate myself and my hormones in equal measure.

For a second, there’s nothing.

Then:

“I’m here.”

His voice comes through the door, muffled but clear. My head snaps up so fast it almost hurts.

“How long have you been out there?” My throat is dry. The words rasp.

“Since you started waking up.” There’s a pause. “You make more noise than you think.”

Heat slams through me for a completely different reason. I try not to imagine what I sounded like.

“Enjoy the show?” I ask, because if I don’t push, I might start begging. I hear the strain in my own voice and want to sink into the floor.

“Not even a little,” he says. And he sounds like he means it. “This is torture.”

Good. At least we’re both suffering.

Another wave builds, slow and heavy. I grip my knees and ride it out, breathing through my teeth. When it breaks, I find myself leaning on the wall beside the door.

“How bad is it?” he asks.

I let out a laugh that comes out wrong. “On a scale of one to ten? I’d say I’m somewhere between ‘annoying ache‘ and ‘rip the door off its hinges.””

Silence. Then a low exhale.

“Don’t try the door,” he says. “You won’t like what happens if it opens.”

He doesn’t say I won’t like what happens if it opens, but we both hear it.

Sweat slides down my spine. I press my forehead lightly against the wood. It’s cooler than my skin. Not by much.

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Another pulse claws through me. My hand fists against the door. I breathe, slow and deep, like I used to when I had to stand. still while higher ranks ignored the fact that I wanted to fidget.

“Tell me something.” I say. “Anything. Just… talk.”

There’s a rustle on the other side. I picture him leaning against the door like I am, big frame braced, holding himself back with nothing but will.

“What do you want to know?” he asks.

“Why you stayed,” I say, before I can talk myself out of it. “You could have gone to the far side of the fortress and pretended you didn’t hear a thing.”

“I tried,” he says.

I blink. “Oh.”

“Didn’t get far.” He’s quiet for a moment. “Couldn’t ignore it.”

“The noise?” I ask, embarrassed.

“You,” he says.

The word hits low, where the heat lives. I close my eyes and breathe very carefully for a few seconds.

“That’s not helping,” I mutter.

“You told me to talk,” he reminds me. “This is on you.”

“I regret every decision I’ve ever made.”

Another small pause. Then, “You’re handling it better than most.”

“That’s pathetic and you know it.”

“It’s still true.”

I don’t know if he’s trying to comfort me or distract me. Either way, it kind of works.

The next wave doesn’t crash as hard. It still hurts, but I’m ready this time. I brace my hands on the door and focus on the sound of his voice.

“Tell me about the curse,” I say. “The real version. Not the ghost–story one.”

“Now?” he asks, sounding almost incredulous.

“Yes, now. If my body’s going to make me miserable, I at least want my brain occupied.”

He hesitates long enough that I know he doesn’t talk about this often. Then:

“My mark binds,” he says. “Too tightly. To me. To the land. To the magic here. It burns out anything that isn’t built to carry

it.”

The words are simple. The meaning isn’t.

“Anyone you sleep with dies,” I say quietly, repeating what he told me before.

“Yes.”

Chapter 6

“And you haven’t… tried to break it?”

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“Do you

think I enjoy living like this?” His voice sharpens for the first time. “I’ve clawed at every loophole I could find. The curse doesn’t bend. It doesn’t care if I want to keep someone.”

Keep. Not take.

I wrap my arms around myself, trying to hold in the sudden ache in my chest.

“So you lock yourself up,” I say. “And now I’m locked up too. Great pair we make.”

“I’m not proud of any of this,” he answers. “But the door stays closed, Lyra. No matter what you feel. No matter what you think you want. Understand?”

I know what he’s really saying: Don’t ask me to come in. I might say yes.

Another wave slams into me with perfect timing, cruel and intense. It arches my back and rips a sound out of me I don’t recognize. I choke it off with my hand over my mouth.

The door rattles.

“Lyra?” His voice is harsh. “Say something.”

“I’m fine,” I lie into my palm. “Just great. Ten out of ten experience. Would recommend.”

He doesn’t laugh. “Don’t make me break the door,” he says. “Because if I do, there’s no curse, no ward, no promise that will stop what happens next.”

The blunt honesty of it goes straight through me. My body thrills at the idea. My brain the last small sane part of it – clamps down hard.

“You won’t,” I say, more to myself than to him.

“Don’t test that,” he mutters.

We fall into a rhythm after that. Heat, breath, his voice. My world shrinks to the span of the room and the thickness of the door.

When it’s bad, I talk. When I can’t talk, he does.

He tells me about patrol routes along the Blackfang border. About the way the forest shifts when trespassers cross. About a ghost who still throws stones at anyone who swears in front of her grave.

I tell him stupid things. How I used to steal extra bread for the younger omegas. How I faked stomach cramps once to get out of serving at a pack banquet. How I wanted to see the world beyond our valley and the only way I got out was by being sold.

Somewhere in there, the sharpest edges of the heat blur. It’s still there, humming steady under my skin, making every movement feel loaded. But I can breathe around it. Think past it.

I slide down the door until I’m sitting with my back against it, knees drawn up. I can feel him on the other side somehow, like the wood remembers his weight.

“You still there?” I ask.

“Yes.”

“You’re very talkative for a cursed recluse.”

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Chapter 6

“You’re very mouthy for someone locked in my basement.”

A tired smile tugs at my lips. “You started it.”

There’s a small thud, like he let his own head rest back against the door.

“Get some sleep if you can,” he says. “You’ll need it.”

“I don’t think sleep is happening,” I admit.

“It will. Your body can’t stay at the top of the wave forever. It’ll crash. You’ll have an hour or two. Maybe three.”

“And then?”

“Then it climbs again.”

I sigh. “Can’t wait.”

His voice softens, just a little. “You’re not alone in there, Lyra. I’m right here.”

I shouldn’t let that comfort me. It does anyway.

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My eyes grow heavy despite everything burning under my skin. The steady sound of his breathing through the door lulls me more than any lullaby ever did.

As I start to drift, one thought flickers through the haze:

When this is over, when my heat has run its course and I can think without my body screaming, I’m going to remember every second of this.

Not the ache. Not the frustration.

The fact that when I was trapped and helpless, the most dangerous man I’ve ever met sat on the other side of a locked door and refused to use me.

I fall asleep leaning against the barrier between us, wanting it gone and grateful it’s there at the same time.

On the other side, he doesn’t move.