Chapter Thirty-One - Ryder
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Ryder
Present
Nothingness.
No images, no memories, no time, no anything.
Why do I have to be conscious again?
There’s nothing worse than being conscious in this state when my mind won’t process anything about where I am or what’s going on.
All I know is that I don’t know what’s happening, how I got here, or how to get free.
My mind can work enough to process present thoughts but not enough to come up with anything useful.
It’s like nothing truly exists.
My skin—at least what I think is my skin—buzzes with the need to move or do anything at all.
But I have no control over my body.
The faint click of a doorknob is the only sound able to break through the nothingness, and I cling to it. I use the measured footsteps to ground myself to reality and force my way through the haze.
I’m struck with a sense of déjà vu.
I’ve done this before—multiple times. I’ve heard the click, focused on it with all my might, and tried to fight through the cloud encasing my mind.
It has never worked, but that doesn’t stop me from trying.
I’m desperate for any sign of where I am. If only I could find my eyes…
“Open,” a muffled voice orders.
Thanks to the lack of control over my body, I don’t react—or at least, I don’t think I do.
There’s an irritated huff before pressure squeezes my chin, tugging it down. Liquid flows down my throat, and my natural reaction to swallowing takes control, greedily accepting the offering.
If I could sort my thoughts, I might’ve realized how dehydrated I am.
Water continues pouring down my throat, and that same déjà vu strikes again when the liquid turns warm and thick. Maybe soup? I can’t say for sure, and even if I could, it wouldn’t make a difference.
There’s a sound like metal clinking before the pressure around my wrists and ankles releases. “Come on. Don’t make this more difficult than it needs to be,” the voice says, and something cool—likely a knife—presses against my skin.
Maybe at my throat?
As if I wasn’t already disoriented, the world spins when hands pull me to stand. I follow, unable to even consider resisting.
I’m a puppet, moving how and when this puppet master orders, unable to so much as think for myself.
Somewhere in the back of my mind, I seem to know where we’re going, like the steps we take are familiar to me. A door squeaks open, and the echo reverberates around us.
A bathroom.
That familiar part of me knows to sit as the hands guide me down.
There’s another, softer squeak, and this one is followed by the beating of water against linoleum.
Still, as my thoughts process, there’s nothing outside of what’s physically happening. It’s like I’m trapped inside a bubble, and there’s so much I need to know just outside of it, but it’s too far out of my reach to obtain.
Then, there’s that voice.
Like a halo shining in the otherwise blackness, there she is.
I just wish her words didn’t hurt so damn bad.
I left because a life without you was better than a life where I would never come first.
‘I did put you first!’ I want to scream at her—my angel of torment.
As I’m pulled like a marionette to my feet, stripped of clothing, and pushed into the water, I relish the loss of consciousness when memories of that day steal me from this nothingness.
38 Weeks Along
I burst into Moreno’s office with the force of a hurricane. The door slams against the wall, sticking there when the doorknob breaks through it, but I don’t care.
In a flash, I have Mason by the collar, shoved against the bookshelf. Books rain down around us, one falling on my head, but I don’t even blink.
“Ryder!” Moreno barks. “What the hell are you doing?”
My voice is a feral growl. “I gave you one rule, Consoli. Stay the hell away from Rachel, and what did you do?”
He doesn’t answer, and I slam him into the shelf again, more books falling as I do.
“Ryder!” Moreno calls, but I ignore him.
Mason lifts his hands as much as he can in his position. “I was just in the garden, and she happened to be there. I don’t see how that’s my fault.”
“You motherf—”
A firm hand wrenches me back, and I let it. Mason gasps for a full breath, looking at Moreno with wide eyes. “The hospitality here is horrendous.”
Moreno—whose hand still holds my shoulder—gives him a warning glare. “You were ordered to stay away from the girl.”
“Her name is Rachel,” I snap. My eyes shoot back to Mason, who sports an unbothered expression that fuels my murderous rage. “And if I see you near her again, I will personally deliver a different part of your dismembered body to every member of your family. You got that?”
A wild, unrestrained spark of sadism flashes in his eyes. It’s brief, but I catch it. Mason might have others fooled by his designer suit and Cheshire Cat grin, but I see the demented psychopath beneath the mask.
“I have no intention of looking in your girl’s direction. It was an unfortunate coincidence to run into her. I’ll be more vigilant.”
“You better be,” I spit, chest heaving with each draw of breath.
“Mason, give us a moment,” Moreno orders.
“Of course, sir.”
The door clicks behind him, and Moreno looks at me like I just asked him if we should abandon the mafia life to settle into a career of social media influencing.
“What the actual hell is your problem?” he asks, and I’m just sane enough to appreciate the lack of belittling in his tone.
I point to the door. “I never wanted that bastard here in the first place! I voted against it every single time it came up, but I was outnumbered. Then the one and only condition I have for him is broken within the first day of him being here.”
“Watch your tone,” Moreno says, with a stare that’s cold enough to bring some of my sanity back. “I understand you were against this, but no harm was done. The girl—”
“Rachel.”
“Rachel,” he amends, not particularly chivalrously, “is perfectly fine, correct?”
I give one tight nod.
“Then it seems the real issue is that she was somewhere she shouldn’t have been, correct?”
I narrow my eyes to thin slits, scowling at him in a way I never would if anyone else was present. When his only reaction is a lifted brow, I take the elephant statue from the bookshelf beside me and throw it into the wall. Not even the crumbling drywall helps my simmering anger.
Moreno looks at me with a blank expression. “Feel better?”
“No.”
He sighs, taking leisurely steps to pick up the statue—which is somehow still perfectly intact. “I suppose I’ve been meaning to do some redecorating,” he says in an infuriatingly nonchalant tone. He lifts the statue. “This would look nice in the guest room overlooking the garden, no?”
“Go to hell, Joshua,” I say with a barely visible grin.
He smiles like I’m sure he’s been dying to since I slammed Mason against the wall.
“Here to help.”
My anger with Mason settles to a comfortable loathing, but my anger toward Rachel still buzzes beneath my skin.
I ditch my car, hoping the walk to the cabin will cool me off. Instead, it gives me more time to recall all the reasons she shouldn’t have been in the garden today.
First, I told her to stay in because of Mason’s arrival. Second, she’s never supposed to go anywhere without Alec or me. Third, because I told her to stay in.
Yeah, it’s worth restating.
I throw the door open, earning me a startled gasp from the kitchenette. When I burst inside, Rachel jumps, clutching her heaving chest. When she registers it’s me, relief eases every crease of her face despite the clear fury on mine.
I have no idea if she doesn’t see my anger, or simply ignores it, but regardless, she gestures to the stove with a shy smile. “I made us dinner.”
My lack of reaction is what finally coaxes her into understanding. Her smile fades, and for the briefest moment, I’m sober enough to hate how I made it go away.
But then my conversation with Alec comes back to me.
“Sir, I have something to report,” he says, nerves shaking his voice.
“I’m a busy man, Alec. Instead of telling me you have something to report, just report it.”
“Right.” He swallows. “Rachel wasn’t at the cabin when I got there, and—”
I shoot to my feet, my chair screeching back from the force. “Where is she?”
“I have her now!” he assures me, but that only somewhat eases my anxiety. “We’re back at the cabin, but I wanted you to hear it from me. She was in the garden for a walk on her own.”
I slowly lower back into my chair. I’ll be talking to Rachel about this later, but I suppose that isn’t the worst thing that could’ve happened today. “If that’s all—”
“It’s not,” Alec says slowly. “She wasn’t alone when I found her.”
Somehow, I know. I just know what he’s about to say.
“She was talking to Mason Consoli.”
It’s not even about Rachel’s exposure to the family business.
It’s the simple fact that this man has the ability to betray his own flesh and blood.
Though it works out in our favor now, a man capable of that is capable of far worse.
He may be pledging his loyalty to our family now, but he’s done it once before and stabbed that promise in the back.
No man in his right mind would allow that kind of danger to exist near the mother of his unborn child, but seeing as I am outnumbered on votes, my only choice is to protect her the best I can.
But I can’t do that if she insists on rebelling against every order I give.
“What the hell were you thinking?” I ask, voice low enough to hint at the level of fury just beneath my calm facade.
“Excuse me?” She plants a hand on her hip and regards me with an expression like I’m the one at fault here.
“You know that you’re not supposed to go anywhere alone.”
“I was perfectly safe.”
“Perfectly safe?” I laugh. “This place is anything but perfectly safe. The man you met is dangerous.”
“He seemed nice to me. I thought you just wanted me away from whatever project you have going on right now.”
I clench my fists over and over again to stop myself from damaging another wall. “How do you know about that?”
“Because I’m not an idiot. I’ve heard about the M.A.C. Project for weeks now, and I don’t intend to get involved with it, so you can calm down.”
I take slow steps toward her, and she has the good sense to look wary.
“Mason Anthony Consoli,” I bite out. “That’s the M.A.C. Project. He’s a traitor to his own family and a dangerous person. You will not disobey me again.”
She abandons the stove and whatever she’s cooking there. “You think I obey you, Ryder? If I follow your rules, it’s because I’ve deemed them justified, not because you say so. You don’t control me.”
In one long stride, I’m crowding her space. “As long as that child is inside you, I absolutely do control you.”
A look of horror strikes her features, and Rachel blinks rapidly. “Well, judging by the fact that my water just broke, I don’t think that’ll be too long.”