Divorced by the Devil Rider

CHAPTER 8 — Predator Eyes

The coffee had gone untouched long enough for the surface to stop moving, but the heat was still there. Adrian felt the steam brush his lip as he exhaled, slow and controlled, his attention already shifting before the phone even entered his line of sight.

He didn't look at the man holding it. Not yet. His voice didn't falter, but his fingers tightened around the ceramic mug before he even registered why. He didn’t react outwardly, but his body had already accepted the interruption. He hadn’t reacted yet, but his body already knew the interruption mattered. The room didn't get colder, but the silence from the man standing to his left felt heavy. Expectant.

Adrian stopped talking. He didn't finish the word "projections." It just hung there, half-formed.

He set the mug down. It made a sharp clack against the glass desk. A bit too loud. He hadn't meant for it to be that loud, but he didn't correct it. He just reached out.

His hand moved before he consciously chose to take it, the motion automatic. He noticed it a second too late, and the loss of control irritated him more than the interruption itself. The man—Marcus, or maybe it was Elias. He didn’t care which one it was.—didn't pull back. He didn't even flinch. He just let the phone go, his breath hitching slightly in the quiet of the office.

Adrian looked at the screen.

The image broke apart under the low resolution, pixels bleeding into each other, but it didn’t matter. The resolution was bad, but it was enough. He could still see her clearly.

His thumb hovered over the glass. He didn't swipe. He just stared.

She was standing on a corner. He knew that corner. The East block. The grey pavement looked damp, reflecting a sickly yellow from a nearby shop sign. She looked… messy. Not her clothes—those were fine, expensive, probably—but her posture. Her shoulders were hiked up toward her ears, like she was trying to pull her head into a shell. Her hand was shoved into her bag, rummaging for something she’d clearly lost.

A phone? Keys? Her dignity?

He felt a dull thrum in his jaw. He was grinding his teeth. He stopped, forcing his mouth to hang slightly open, breathing through his teeth.

"Zoom," Adrian said.

His voice sounded scratchy to his own ears. Like he hadn't used it in hours.

The man leaned in, his fingers dancing across the screen to enlarge the grain. The image fell apart when they zoomed in. Still enough.

Adrian noticed her shoelace.

Her shoelace dragged behind her, dark against the wet pavement, picking up water and dirt with every step. She didn’t notice. She kept walking, shoulders tight, head slightly angled like she could feel something behind her but didn’t know where to look. Adrian felt his jaw tighten as he watched. She wasn’t thinking clearly anymore. She was reacting. She hadn’t even noticed it. She just kept moving, distracted, reacting instead of thinking. That was when people made mistakes they couldn’t undo.

She hadn’t realized it yet, but she was already moving inside someone else’s timeline.

"Where?" Adrian asked. He didn't look up from the screen.

"East block. Twenty minutes ago, sir."

Twenty minutes. She could be anywhere by now. Or nowhere.

Adrian leaned back. The glass wall behind him was cold, the chill seeping through his tailored shirt and hitting his spine. He didn't move away from it. The cold was grounding. It reminded him that he was up here, forty-two floors above the grime, and she was down there, dragging a shoelace through a puddle.

He looked at the space around her in the photo. He wasn't looking at her eyes anymore. He was looking at the reflections in the store window behind her.

Three shadows. No, four.

Static positions. They weren't moving with the crowd. They were anchored.

"Sloppy," he muttered.

He didn't mean to say it out loud. It just spilled out. He felt a sudden, irrational spike of irritation. Not at her. At the people watching her. They were rushed. You could see it in the way they didn't care about the sightlines. They were desperate to keep eyes on her, which meant they were afraid of losing her.

If they were rushing, it meant they knew they were late. And Adrian hated being late more than anything. Adrian handed the phone back, then stopped halfway through the motion. He took it again without asking. He wasn’t finished. He needed to see it one more time with his own eyes.

One more look.

There, in the corner of the frame. A motorcycle. Matte black. Tucked into an alleyway just deep enough to be a smudge, but he knew that silhouette.

Hellhounds.

His pulse jumped. A quick, frantic thump-thump against his ribs that he had to swallow down.

"They're already there," he said.

It wasn't a question. It was a realization that made his skin crawl. He’d assumed he had more time. He hated assuming. Assuming was for people who ended up in grainy photos with untied shoelaces.

He shoved the phone back into the man’s chest. Harder than necessary.

"She doesn't know yet," Adrian said, his voice flattening out. He was forcing the control back in. Putting the mask on, layer by layer, until he couldn't feel the phantom chill of the glass wall anymore.

"No," the man replied. A hesitation. Just a split second where his voice wavered.

Adrian’s eyes snapped to him. He didn't say anything. He just watched the man’s throat move as he swallowed.

Uncertainty. It was a virus. If this man was uncertain, the whole floor was uncertain.

Adrian stood up. He didn't decide to stand; his legs just pushed him up. He needed to move. The desk felt too small. The office felt like a cage. He walked toward the window, his shoes silent on the deep pile carpet.

Behind him, the air seemed to vanish. Nobody talked. Nobody breathed loudly. They just waited. He liked that. He needed that. If they stayed still, he could think.

"Status," Adrian commanded.

"Removed from the residence at 0800. Accounts flagged and frozen by 0930. The press release went live ten minutes ago."

The man’s voice was faster now. Efficient. He was trying to outrun Adrian’s silence.

Adrian looked out at the city. The lights were starting to blink on as the sun dipped behind the skyscrapers. It looked like a circuit board. Logical. Traceable.

She didn’t belong anywhere anymore. Not in her old life, and not yet in anyone else’s.

He walked back to his desk and tapped his tablet. Her wedding photo popped up. It was a high-resolution file. No grain. No wet shoelaces. Just a woman in a white dress with a smile that didn't reach her ears.

He stared at her hand in the photo. The ring.

Then he looked at the surveillance shot again.

The ring was gone.

He could see the pale indentation on her finger. A ghost of a circle. She’d taken it off recently. Maybe in the back of a cab. Maybe in a bathroom stall while she cried.

The thought of her crying didn't move him. It just signaled a state of mind. High emotional volatility. Low rational defense.

"Has she called anyone?"

"No."

"Anyone called her?"

There was a pause. A long one.

Adrian didn't look up. He just waited. The silence stretched until it felt like it was going to snap.

"...Yes. An unknown number. Six seconds."

Adrian’s fingers twitched on the desk. Six seconds. A 'ping.' A check to see if she’d pick up. Someone was testing the fence, looking for the weak spot.

The window wasn't just narrowing; it was slamming shut.

He felt a sudden, sharp need to be there. Not because he wanted to help. Not because of some noble instinct. He just couldn't stand the idea of someone else picking up the pieces before he could decide what they were worth.

She wasn’t safe anymore. And if someone else reached her first, he would lose control of the situation entirely.

Adrian didn’t raise his voice. He didn’t need to.

“Send the team,” he said quietly. “Now. Before anyone else reaches her.”

He didn't recognize his own voice. It was too quiet. Too final.

"Sir?"

"Now."

He didn't explain. He didn't give them the 'why.' He just watched as the room erupted into controlled chaos. People grabbed phones. Tablets were swiped. The machinery of his life began to grind toward a single point in the East block.

Adrian didn't move. He stayed by the desk, his hand resting on the edge of the tablet.

He was thinking about the shoelace.

Why was he thinking about a stupid shoelace?

Because it meant she was already slipping. And Adrian didn’t tolerate things slipping out of his control.

He looked at the photo of her on the corner one last time. She looked so small. So utterly unaware that the world was closing in on her. The Hellhounds were behind her. His team was moving toward her. The city was swallowing her whole.

She didn't have any options left. She just didn't know it yet.

He felt a strange, cold satisfaction settle in his gut. It wasn't happiness. It was just the feeling of a plan clicking into place. The feeling of a variable being accounted for.

He would bring her here. He would put her in a chair. He would make her tie her shoes.

And then he would decide what to do with the rest of her.

He didn't care if she hated him for it. Hate was a reaction. Hate was something he could work with.

"Bring her to me," he whispered to the empty air in front of him.

The words felt heavy. They felt like a cage.

He picked up his coffee. It was cold now. A thin, bitter film had formed on the surface. He drank it anyway. He didn't flinch at the taste. He just swallowed it down and looked back out at the darkening city. He watched the city and waited, knowing the next call wouldn’t ask for permission. It would confirm she was already in his hands.