Covet (Andre/Anika, Lucious/Cookie/Malcolm)

Chapter Three: Don't Leave Me This Way

Notes:

- "...[s]he'd promised not to put her hands on him again." From Déjà Vu, which can be found here.

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It was pitch black in the bridal suite when Anika woke up. "Andre." Anika gently nudged Andre in the ribs. "Andre. How long have we been asleep?"

Slowly and grudgingly, Andre joined Anika back in a world where she was his father's wife. Marrying Anika to Lucious had been the most painful thing he'd ever had to do, man of the cloth or not. Andre grabbed his phone and flipped it on. "Wow, it's a quarter to nine."

"It is?" Anika sat up and stretched, trying to clear her head, but Andre pulled her back into his arms. He wasn't ready to give Anika back to Lucious just yet. "Anika, I meant everything I said," he promised. "It's over between me and Rhonda. You keep that in mind while you and Lucious are out on your romantic honeymoon."

"Knowing Lucious, he'll take me straight to a river to dump my body in," Anika said sourly.

"Don't say that, Anika." Andre squeezed Anika's hands gently, though he was at a loss for words. Lucious had straight up threatened to kill his son's mother. There was no way in hell Lucious thought that Hakeem was really the child of Anika's baby. Did he think he was doing Andre a favor by getting rid of Anika after Leo was born? "Lucious is not going to hurt you, no matter what he says. I'm not going to let him hurt you. I promise. Even if you have to move in with me."

"You mean you and Rhonda?" Anika asked dryly.

"If that's what it takes, yes."

"Then everybody will know about us."

"Then they'll know."

The cycle ends when it's supposed to end, Anika thought as the two of them laid there, trying to stretch this sweet moment out a little while longer. "To breaking the cycle," Anika pledged with a smile.

Andre took Anika's hands in his own and kissed them. "To our family," Andre agreed. "To me and you, and to Leo."

"To Leo," Anika repeated. She kissed Andre's hand, then giggled when Andre's hands began to slide upward. "Andre, stop it! That tickles."

"Let me see 'em." Andre gently squeezed one of Anika's breasts. "What?" he said playfully when Anika swatted his hand away. "It's not like I haven't seen them before."

That was true, but that was also before Anika's bust line ramped up to a D-cup. "Right now, little Leo is pressing up against my bladder. So unless you want to swim out of this bed, get out of my way."

It was time for her to return to her life as Mrs. Lucious Lyon. Be care what you wish for. For years, Anika had wanted nothing more than to be Lucious's wife. Now she was, and she could've cried because of it. Anika turned on the light, then bolted upright. "Andre," she managed to say, her voice barely above a whisper. "Andre..."

Andre rolled over, then sat up sharply. "Dad?" he said to the silent, unmoving figure now bathed in the room's light. "What the hell are you doing in here!?"

"I was trying to find my lovely wife. I figured that she would be wherever one of my sons was at, and I was right." Lucious shot Anika a disappointed look, as if she hadn't made the honor roll or missed the game-winning goal. "You didn't waste no time, did you?"

"Nothing happened," Anika said, not that it mattered. Andre was her child's father, plus he was married to her best friend. What they'd done or hadn't done over the last couple of hours was the least of her problems. But while Anika had done a number of things that she wasn't proud of, even she wouldn't stoop as low as to have sex with her stepson on her wedding day, even if she was married to Lucious Lyon.