The Syndicate’s Bride

Chapter 13

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Tia

“Are you sure you don’t want to think this through? I have the information you need to catch your culprit.” I asked, peeling my eyes from my ruined shoes to the gruff looking Alpha who stared at me with a blank expression. He was always so unreadable.

He scowled and threw the gun to the ground. “I don’t need you to tell me who the culprit is,” he said sharply. “I’ll find out myself.”

Keeping my blank expression, I allowed my eyes roam his frame. He really was beautiful in a cold masculine way.

His short black hair was properly styled, giving him a sort of 80s Italian look and his suit framed his body perfectly. I looked down to his hands, noticing the callousness of his bruised knuckles from frequent fights and his strong looking frame, a product of intense training. He was every bit an Alpha, and an attractive one at that, but that was all there was to it.

I didn’t like the man one bit.

I was partly relieved when the Winchesters cancelled the engagement because I had no desire to be engaged to a man I would never love, and partly crushed because I wanted that power that came with the alliance.

My father drilled it into my head so many times how beneficial it would if we merged with the Winchesters, but that alliance quickly crashed before it could sail.

And now, he was engaged to a human, Vanessa Logan.

I didn’t know much about her except from the fact that she was heiress to the Logan estate. And although there was nothing special about her in my opinion, there was a sense of curiosity I had towards her.

Plus, I was curious about how the infamous princess had been able to put up with the cold Alpha after their engagement.

She’d probably make a run for it soon.

Ryan turned away, ending the conversation, and went straight for Vanessa who he hoisted over his shoulder with one hand, and walked towards the exit.

Surprised at the action of the usually grumpy Alpha, my eyes followed in curiosity and amusement as they exited the hall, a new found fact dawning on me.

Well, I guess I was wrong about them. “Interesting,” I smirked,“seems even our cold blooded king has a soft spot.”

Vanessa

Ryan hoisted me over his shoulders and walked out the hallbefore I could even react.

My stomach pressed painfully against his shoulders, making me wince slightly in pain, but my body, on the other hand, reacted in a completely different way.

There was something about the way he lifted me over his shoulders with ease that made my heart beat rapidly and desire pull in my stomach, making the pain bearable.

I wiggled slightly, trying to make my position a little bit more comfortable, but that only made him adjust my body till I was a bit lower causing his hand to move up a bit till it rested comfortably just below my ass.

My cheeks reddened. There was no way I was going to stay in that position till we arrived at the car.

I wiggled again, trying to change Ryan’s hand placement for my sanity, but Ryan didn’t seem to like that given his annoyed sighthat followed.

“Stop moving.”

“I’m uncomfortable.”

He sighed. “Suck it up, Vanessa.”

I pressed my thighs together at the sound of my name on his tongue. What’s wrong with me. “Don’t tell me what to do,” I rebutted.

“I’m not in your mood, Vanessa. If you fight me on this, I’ll happily throw you off my shoulders.”

I gaped at the back of his head. Did he just threaten me?

Oh, he was in for it now.

Hoisting up my body, I held on to Ryan’s neck, using it as a support to successfully climb down his body. But before my feet could reach the ground, Ryan held me against his body, placing one of his hands under my thigh to spread my legs, before hoisting me up so that I locked my hands behind his neck for support and wrapped my legs around his waist.

I panicked a bit. “What are you doi–”

My words dissolved into a gasp as he laid my bare back against the cool steel of the car, panting slightly at the feel of his chest against mine. Honestly, I didn’t remember how we went from leaving the banquet to me straddling Ryan against his car.

But I didn’t think I had it in me to complain.

“Ryan–”

“You do not want to get on my bad side, Vanessa. When I ask you to do something, you better do it.” He said in calm anger.

My eyes narrowed. “Get your head out your ass, Ryan, not everyone has to bend to you.”

His jaw clenched as he glared at me with narrow eyes. We both panted heavily, the atmosphere charged with a tension that seemed way more s****l than tense.

We pulled in closer, our breaths fanning each other’s faces as the tension only got thicker. But Ryan broke the spell first by cursing under his breath and lowering me to the ground, taking his warmth with him and leaving me dizzy with need.

He moved to the passenger’s side, pulled the door open and gestured at me to enter with the tip of his head.

“Let’s go.”

Still slightly dazed, I slowly nodded and obeyed wordlessly.

As Ryan drove, I leaned against the window, enjoying the silence of the ride yet a bit curious about the cause of Ryan’s occasional frustrated exhale. He was pissed, that much I could tell, but at what, I had no idea.

Maybe it was the frustration from the banquet. When he had taken command of the situation, demanding for the perpetrators, I had been too stunned and honestly a bit scared to calm him down. That was the angriest I had seen him, and I knew that if I had tried to reason with him, I’d have only gotten in his way.

Or maybe, it was my little provocative, but I doubted the possibility as soon as it crossed my mind. I had gotten on Ryan’s nerves quite a number of times and I doubted it was that little exchange that made him visibly pissed.

Plus, we almost kissed.

I pressed my head further against the window to hide my reddened cheeks at the thought. So, except he had a petty side to him, I doubted that was his problem.

Suddenly, I felt the speed of the car peek up and I glanced nervously at Ryan. He looked passive, focusing ahead as he drummed his fingers against the car wheel. I frowned. Was it a mistake or was it intentional?

A few seconds later, as though in answer to my question, the car got even faster, zooming past trees and pedestrians as it rode up a rough terrain.

I gulped. Was he trying to kill us?

“Ryan?” I called but he continued to look ahead in unflinching concentration, his jaw clenching and his chest falling up and down in fast breaths.

My stomach dropped. Was he even conscious of his speed? Myheart beat so fast my ears could have probably pick up the sound if I concentrated better, and blood dKavand from my face in dread of the worse possible situation.

The car engine roared loudly in my ears, only adding to my growing anxiety, and the tyres wheeled quickly on the rough path. The car was bound to give up at some point considering the roughness of the road and the fact that the car was nothing remotely close to a race car. And if it eventually did, with the speed at which it zoomed,

We were done for.

“Ryan, you’re going to get us killed!” I screamed, terrified, but it fell on deaf ears. I clenched on to my seatbelt with a tearless cry, waiting for the time Ryan decided to slow down or we inevitably crashed.

Thankfully, about a minute later, the car slowed down to its normal speed, willing a relieved breath from me.

I turned to Ryan with fire in my eyes. “Are you f*****g cr–”

I couldn’t complete my sentence as one of the tyres burst out, making the car ride unsteadily. It wasn’t surprising that the tyre couldn’t withstand the intensity at which the car moved, we were just in luck that we didn’t have to deal with more than one missing tyres.

Still, the car turned violently, directing it towards the dead end of a hill. Tugging on my seatbelt, I screamed, finding a bit of relief when the belt easily came undone.

Just as I was about to throw myself out the moving vehicle, Ryan, almost as if he had expected the accident, calmly reached out, lifted me by my waist and threw us both out the car.

Panting heavily, I watched the car skid on the road before eventually coming to a stop a few feet from the dead end,wondering what could have happened if the both of us were still inside the vehicle and it tipped over.

We would have fought the water for so long until we eventually drowned and died.

An image of our still, blue body flashed in my mind and I felt a threat of vomit rising to the surface.

Peeling myself away from Ryan’s arm, I managed to get to my feet and walk to a tree a few distance from where we landed, and emptied my stomach’s contents as soon as I steadied myself against the tree’s bark.

Just as I finished, Ryan stopped beside me, looming over me,and remembering he was the one who got us into this mess, I felt my thread of control snap.

“What the f**k is wrong you?”

“You’re being dramatic,” he said dryly as he sat on the part of the grass that wasn’t tainted by my puke.

I gaped at him. Where does he find his audacity. “I’m the dramatic one? Not you trying to kill us because you’re angry?!”

He rolled his eyes at me, actually rolled them, as he leaned against the tree. “I guess the little princess is fragile too,” he started and my eyes twitched. “You don’t just hide behind daddy and cry every time something happens, do you?

Daddy. My breath immediately hitched and a shiver ran down my spine at the word as I vividly remembered the last time I heard the word. It was a few years back, the day Mr. Logan whipped me till I was bloody and bruised, one of his many punishments he deemed worthy enough to put me in my place.

He had been so angry that he forgot to apply the scar healingointment and left me in the basement, shivering from pain and cold. Alice was the one who found me and took me to the family doctor where suspicion wouldn’t arise.

I was about thirteen then.

That was the day I realized he was merely the man who I shared blood with and nothing more.

I never called him ‘daddy’ after that day, the word sounding too endearing for a monster like him. I stuck to calling him Mr. Logan, in false respect when we were in private, and father, when I was among people merely as a facade.

Realising I had been suspiciously quiet, I raised my head toRyan with a mocking smile. “is that so? Then stay back or the little princess will smash your head with a wrench,” an air of seriousness replaced my mockery. “Maybe that way I’ll open up your head and finally see all those secrets you try so hard to hide.”

He seemed passive but I heard his faint intake of breath. I was onto something. “Tell me, Ryan, what exactly are you? The speed you used to pull me out of the car was anything but human,” I stared him dead in the eye, wanting him to know how serious I was as I worded out my next sentence.

“You aren’t human, Ryan.”