Ice Tyrant’s Obsession

Chapter 3

~~LOLA~~

The rain beat hard atop the umbrella over my head as I made it across the road to the restaurant Ryan had asked us to meet in.

Shutting the umbrella, I propped it by the door side while dusting off water debris on my dress before walking in. I had no idea why I was here for a cheat who didn’t think twice before hurting me that way last night.

Wasn't I stupid?

It was exactly six in the evening and I should be with Mom and Sam, driving with them to our new house but I bailed out at the very last minute… Just to hear Ryan out.

Apologies won't fix a damn thing but they would quiet the storm roaring in my chest.

I clasped my palms tightly on my thighs with hope in my chest and expectations thrumming in my pulse that he'd arrive at exactly 6:10 pm as he'd promised.

But thirty minutes skimmed by and Ryan was nowhere in sight.

Outside the rain intensified.

I watched the droplets patter down the restaurant's glass in sheets. I should excuse his lateness but how could I when I was fully aware he owned a car?

“The car must have broken down” I picked the clear glass of water I'd been served earlier, bringing it to my lips. “The storm’s quite heavy after all.”

Another ten minutes had passed.

No calls or texts from Ryan yet.

By now I had peeled my eyes away from the entrance, already bored. I looked at the ten different texts I'd sent to him in the last thirty minutes, still sitting there, delivered and unresponded to.

I felt my eyes sting red with tears and blinked.

Just ten more minutes, I mentally patted my back to calm the rage rising in me.

Ten more minutes and I’d be out of here, storm or no storm.

“Excuse me, miss.”

A soft tap on my shoulder pulled me out from something deep and faraway as my eyes flew open to see pale fingers hovering above my face. I sprang up to my feet that minute, wincing at my neck’s stiffness.

The waitress in front of me flashed me a concerned look.

“We are closing now, miss. You've been sitted here for so long.”

“No…”

I looked to my sides, behind me, and ahead of me— Silence hit me, there was really no one. It was also dark outside, the atmosphere brightened by the golden hue of the street lamps.

“Did anyone come in here? A guy?”

I couldn't even find the strength to describe Ryan and I didn't have to because she shook her head.

“It's almost nine pm, you’ve been sleeping here for some hours now,” she responded. “If your date were here, he wouldn't just leave.”

I ran a palm over my tightening stomach.

In a hurry, I picked up my bag and phone before dashing out. Outside, the chilly wind hit me like a hurricane as I stared at the almost empty road in horror. It still drizzled and when I turned to get my umbrella from where I last left it… It was gone.

“This has to be a sick joke.” I broke down.

The phone in my hand glared red at just a single percent left with over thirty missed calls from mom, fifteen from an unsaved line, and Ryan’s dreadful text that had been sitting there since exactly seven thirty— it was an excuse, one that he didn't bother to send any sooner.

On cue, lightning struck through the sheets of clouds and a massive shower began pouring.

I contemplated running back into the restaurant but it was already locked by the waitress who was now sprinting down towards a car with her bag held over her head.

Impulsively I followed, the rain blinding my vision.

I was drenched to the core.

“Excuse me…” I slapped a palm on the car’s window, “Can I join you…please?” My heart pulsed rapidly in my ears at the possibility of her turning me down.

She was a beautiful brunette, and if my intuition was right, she appeared young enough to understand my predicament, right?

“Are you really stranded?” she asked as the side window slid low.

“Yes, my phone’s dead and there are no cabs around, please? Just to the bus station…please.” I begged.

Fortunately for me, I was let in. She rode me to the bus station and bid me good luck. It might have been her luck that had me catching the last bus just before it left and all through the ride to the new house, I was as white as a ghost and lost out of my mind.

I was the perfect illustration of a beaten and battered person.

The only thing I could be grateful for right now was actually sitting through Mom bickering in the past week about her husband's wealth and the location of our new home.

It was what somewhat led me through the sophisticated estate until I was standing before a large house guarded by a wrought-iron gate.

“Lola Hart.” My teeth gnashed as I spoke to the security man at the gate.

He wasted not another second before opening the gate to me and when he handed me an umbrella, I waved it off.

What was the use really?

“Jesus! Lola!” Mom cried out as soon as I was let into the grand foyer of the house with water dripping from my hair down to the soles of my shoes.

My shoulders slumped, the weight of it dragging me to crouch low on the ground. My face dropped into my open palm as a quiet sob tore from my chest, wringing every ounce of me from inside out.

“Can we get a towel please?” Mom’s voice trembled with fear.

“What the hell happened to you?” Sam's voice was almost a yell.

“Goodness, Lola?” a weathered voice boomed.

“Oh my sweetheart…” Mom crouched down, her fingers ghosting over my temples as she moved the wet hair strands falling across my face to the back of my ears. “Gosh, I almost died there…where the hell have you been?”

“Here.”

Another voice that lit up a twitch in my belly. It sounded unreasonably deep and utterly familiar.

A warm towel engulfed me in seconds, and despite how bad my brain was clocked out, the heady masculine scent on it was stimulating enough to make my eyes swirl. I still gripped the hem regardless, pulling it tight around me.

I couldn't bring myself to look at anyone. So I pulled the towel over my head after a moment and took hold of Sam’s palm. “Please show me to my room.”

With my chest hollowed and my heart a fractured mess, I was too exhausted to entertain any family introduction. I wasn't mentally inclined either to talk about where I had been, or how I got cheated on, stood up, and made a living mess by the rain in a space of twenty-four hours.

I just wanted to forget.

~

The ringing sound of my cuckoo alarm sliced through my sleep moments after I had a warm bath and tucked myself into bed with mom’s help.

I wasn't sure I got even an hour's worth of sleep.

I peeled the sleep mask just slightly above my left eye to stop the cuckoo’s noise as my stretched-out arm hovered over the alarm on seeing thick digits of ten on it, blurry but firm.

It couldn't possibly be morning but it was.

I sat up, sneezing as I did. My head swayed with a dull pound against my skull. I sneezed yet again, and again, and twice more.

I staggered out of bed to go find relief for my cold. My new room was a beautiful mess with lots to unpack but that could wait.

The hallway was quiet when I stepped out, like no one was home. I walked down the stairs like it was some out-of-body experience into a large sitting room with an extravagance that I barely paid mind to. I was set for the kitchen.

The kitchen wasn't any different, large, clean with a wide island in the middle.

With my throat parched, I grabbed a mug to fetch some water from the faucet, and holding the filled mug to my lips seconds later, I let myself get lost in the memories of the horrible stunt Ryan had pulled on me last night.

I maintained a consistent blink, refusing to give my tears any chance to drop.

“Hey.”

That deep familiar voice boomed low behind me.

It was so sudden that I jerked in fright and the chill water sloshed over the mug’s rim onto my shirt as the fabric dampened in brief seconds against my chest.

A shriek left me and I veered around in that same beat like a frightened deer.

My breath caught instantly.

Heat crept up my neck to my face as my lips fell apart, but words refused to leave.

Hockey guy from Bay Three was standing right there in the kitchen.

And he was staring at me with the same grey hooded eyes that had pinned me yesterday and made me feel utterly small.

Now I was shrinking even further.

This was all Ryan’s fault. I was emotionally wrecked and starved and the only thing my brain thought it wise to conjure and fill the gap with was a half-naked image of no one else but my first-ever patient.

“Get out of my head.” I frowned.

“I am not in your head, nutcracker.” He voiced. “You are the one standing in my world now.”