CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO The Syndicate
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
The Syndicate
We hadn’t taken more than a few steps into the grand foyer when a tall, suited man approached. Sharp edges were carved into the bones of his face and his steps faltered slightly before he caught sight of Zagreus, and then he bowed his head in reverence. Or maybe fear.
“Mr. Vitale,” he murmured.
Zagreus gave him nothing more than a slight nod, cold and disinterested as if he was a king acknowledging a peasant. The man retreated, shoulders stiff, almost relieved to be dismissed without words.
It wasn’t just him.
Eyes followed us, some wide with wary recognition, others squinting with thinly veiled contempt. But not one dared approach again. Not one spoke.
Because Zagreus wasn’t just a man here, he was a god. Or the devil dressed in tailored black.
He wrapped his arm around my waist with such suddenness that I gasped breathily, but it reverberated loudly in my chest. His hand slid across the curve of my hip, and he dipped his mouth once more to my ear.
“Be a good girl for me, Dolcezza. This place is full of wild.”
I wanted to ask him if he was referring to himself, because right now, at this very moment, no one seemed to scare me more than him.
“Don’t give me a reason to decorate this floor with blood.”
Heat spread in slow pulses across my skin, and I nodded. My legs trembled at his beautiful, merciless words. He whispered in sin.
I lifted my head, looking at him through my lashes.
The scar caught the light as he turned his head slightly, and for a moment, I saw him.
All of him.
A fallen angel, carved from something unholy, something both cruel and impossibly beautiful. The scar running from his temple to his cheekbone didn’t mar him, it marked him. Like he’d once fought God… and almost won.
He didn’t stop to acknowledge the others. Champagne glasses raised to him. Men bowed. Women tried to smile. Some whispered behind their hands. But Zagreus walked like none of it mattered. Like he ruled the world and everyone in it was merely background noise.
I wasn’t used to being looked at like this. Like I was something scandalous belonging to a man of power.
Some faces twisted when they saw me. Jealous, disapproving, and confused. I didn’t blame them. I felt the same.
I wanted to vanish.
But my… husband’s grip on my waist wouldn’t let me.
He led us down the hallway, away from the dancing and music, away from the crowd.
We crossed deep red carpeting and gold-veined marble columns.
The walls were lined with dim sconces, and this area was a lot more secluded.
There was hardly anyone except for a few guards in black that I saw.
At the end of the corridor stood a pair of heavy, wooden doors.
Two giant men flanked them, dressed in black, built like statues. When they saw him, their heads dropped in unison. No words, no eye contact, they just kept their heads down without lifting their eyes.
As startled and terrified as I was at the realisation that Zagreus was a lot more powerful than I initially thought, it erected several goosebumps all over my flesh.
Zagreus looked down at me, and I averted my face, feeling something in the pit of my belly all of a sudden. I heard him saying something under his breath, and the guards opened the doors.
The scent hit me first, whiskey and aged wood mingled with leather and cinnamon, with something faintly smoky behind it. The air was thicker here. Heavier. Almost suffocating. Or maybe it was just me.
Maybe it was the fact that I was walking into the lion’s den with the lion himself pressing a hand against the small of my back like I belonged to him. Like I was his to guide. His to own.
God, what the hell was I doing here?
Even breathing made the knot in my stomach tighten until it felt like my ribs were crushing in on it. I didn’t even know if it was fear anymore. Or anticipation. Or both, tangled so tightly together I couldn’t tell them apart.
The room was dimly lit, but a chandelier above with warm lights, shadows dancing on old stone walls. A massive fireplace crackled at the far end, its flames licking at the dark air like a beast hungry for more.
I shouldn’t have come with him here.
I should’ve said no. I should’ve run. Or screamed. Or pushed him away when I still had the chance.
But I didn’t.
I let him touch me. I let him look at me like that, like he saw right through me, down to every ugly, trembling part of me I try to keep hidden.
And the worst part?
I wanted him to see.
“Come,” Zagreus said, his voice a low command that curled around my spine like smoke. Not harsh, but not soft either. Like there was no question I’d obey.
My legs moved before I could tell them not to.
What was wrong with me? Why wasn’t I fighting this?
Because deep down, in some dark, twisted place I didn't want to admit even existed, I liked the way he made me feel. Small. Seen. Dangerous. Desired. Protected.
My eyes widened.
Desired? Seen?
For fuck’s sake, Celestine. He killed Adrian. Kidnapped you. Forced you into a marriage you didn’t want.
Something’s wrong with my head. Gods, wasn’t that terrifying?
I stumbled after him, my heels clicked on the floor, but I barely heard them over the pounding in my chest.
A long, dark central table dominated the room, surrounded by men.
Men who didn’t look like politicians or businessmen.
They looked like gods in exile. Ruthless, magnetic, and impossible to ignore.
Their suits were tailored like Zagreus with sharp expressions and calculations in their eyes.
There were women, too. I didn’t know if I should be happy or worried for them.
I swallowed hard, already wanting to run back. Just my luck, it was already locked.
As Zagreus pulled me with him, the dim light flickered across every angle. The curtains were open, revealing a sky littered with stars. It should’ve been beautiful.
But all I felt was dread.
Cards flicked across the table. A burst of curses, and someone said something in Russian before everything stilled. Everything stopped. Chairs shifted and eyes turned. And silence swallowed my pounding heart.
I froze and took a half-step back, hiding behind Zagreus like a child. His body blocked them, but I could still feel the gravity of the stares dissecting me.
I didn’t belong here.
My whole body melted as Zagreus placed his hand behind him, on my thigh, just above the slit of my dress, and gave it a grounding squeeze, burning me, calming me, and claiming me in the same breath.
I looked up at the side of his face.
The scar. The brutal edge of his jaw. The way he stood tall and composed, as if nothing in this room could ever harm him, or me, not while he was breathing.
“So, the prodigal son arrives. Or are you here for the wine, Vitale?”
The voice came from the far end of the table.
I snuck a glance at the man who leaned back in his chair, half-shrouded in the gold-tinted dark.
He wore an ivory suit with the confidence of someone who’d killed in it before.
His lips curved into something too cruel to be a smile.
He held his glass with lazy elegance, as if he were toying with Zagreus.
My personal hell didn’t pause. His hand found mine, and he pulled me forward.
He gave the man a nod and pulled out a chair.
“The wine bores me, Bianchi. But I hear your wife’s still living with her parents? I hope the nights aren’t… lonely.”
The one sitting next to the man called Bianchi chuckled under his breath. Bianchi glared at him but then turned to Zagreus and raised his brows.
Zagreus pulled me with him and moved to the nearest empty chair. He sat down, long legs folding, and he looked up at me. His eyes burned beneath his long lashes.
“Sit.”
Swallowing the knot, I lowered myself onto the velvet chair beside him.
The moment I sat, he reached for the chair arm and dragged it closer to him.
The legs screeched faintly across the floor, and before I could process what was happening, his hand slid beneath the slit of my dress and landed on my thigh.
Heat surged as his fingers flexed on my skin as if I was his anchor… his favourite possession.
My attention wavered when someone snickered from my left.
A man leaned forward from his chair, arms crossed over his broad chest covered in tight black fabric. His buzz cut made his cheekbones look sharper, and there was a bold tattoo curling up his neck.
Three dotted lines.
Strange for a tattoo.
His eyes were dark, hooded, and his mouth twisted in something between distaste and provocation.
“Didn’t know you brought souvenirs now, Vitale. That a new hobby, or just a desperate one?”
Bianchi laughed, and I suddenly wanted to strangle him for some unknown reason. What was there to laugh about? Did he tell some joke?
Zagreus’s thumb stroked my inner thigh, and he didn’t even look at the man. His attention stayed on me, his jaw ticked once before he finally tilted his head lazily toward the speaker.
As if the man’s words had taken a long, unworthy journey to reach his ears.
“I’d be careful if I were you, Victor.”
Victor scoffed, visibly enjoying as he tipped his glass at Bianchi. “Papi’s threatening now, huh?”
Zagreus turned back to me, brushing my hair away from my neck with the back of his hand. “Ignore them. They’re dogs. They bark when they smell something valuable.”
I nodded and looked around the room again.
They were all men of power. You didn’t need to know their names to feel it. Each one sat like they were the protagonists in a movie, only they could direct. Their presence bled through the air. So arrogant, untamed, quietly chaotic, disturbing, and amused.
I scanned them, barely moving my head.
The one sitting straight across from me, with the palest blue blues I’d ever seen and dark hair slicked back. He didn’t blink. Kept his pale eyes on the cards scattered around the table and played unconsciously with one in his fingers.
To be honest, he was the kind of man who would slice you a thousand times and scatter your pieces on different planets for the sport.
Beside him sat Bianchi. With phone in hand, hunched now, bored all of a sudden as he typed something furiously.
Now that the light touched his features, I realised I’d seen him before.
A magazine cover? On TV? I couldn’t remember.
But I knew one thing: men like him didn’t sit in rooms like this unless they were the ones who built it.
The man on my left, who hadn’t said a word, had a woman draped on his lap. No, not draped. Draped would be too delicate a word. She was perched there like a queen, legs folded and one hand resting on his chest. She didn’t look afraid of this room.
She owned it in her own way.
She was stunning. Her long, dark hair parted at one side, cascading like spilled ink down her back.
Her skin was olive gold, like she’d been carved from an ancient sun-kissed marble, glowing under the dim light.
Her eyes, deep-brown and burning, flicked across the room like daggers.
She looked as if she’d set fire to this table with a flick of her wrist if anyone dared to cross her.
And her dress…
Or what looked like a dress.
It was deep red. Draped across her body in a way I hadn’t seen before, flowing silk with little details, threads woven through the borders, wrapping around her waist and shoulder, one end trailing behind her like a secret. She looked like war. All blood and elegance.
And I hated how beautiful she was.
Sinfully, terrifyingly beautiful.
Then my gaze fell upon the man sitting diagonally across, toward the far right end of the table, who looked East Asian.
Maybe Korean, Japanese, or Chinese? I couldn’t be sure.
His jawline was sharp enough to cut diamonds, black hair slicked back in a rough, low ponytail, and his dark eyes focused on the girl beside him, the one I failed to notice.
She was sitting properly in her own chair, but close. Very close. Head bowed.
Auburn hair spilt over her shoulders, framing a pale, doll-like face. She looked like she didn’t belong here, frail, almost porcelain in how delicate she appeared. Petite and quiet.
But the man beside her…
He kept rubbing slow circles on the back of her hand where it rested on his thighs.
The kind of touch I was familiar with was Zagreus.
Something told me she didn’t come here willingly. None of us did. But something was chilling about how tender he was with her, as if his version of love could kill.
Everyone had someone.
Except the ice-eyed man, Bianchi, and Victor.
But looking at them, I knew they were married. At least the former two. Because both of them had rings on their ring fingers. And the pale blue-eyed one had a small tattoo on his wrist, right above his pulse. I couldn’t catch it. But I recognised the initial.
S.
Written in cursive.