Page 2 of Ryder

Stomach churning at my thoughts, I returned my focus to the problem before me, my brother and cousin. “Fuck.” I ran my fingers over my head. Not many people messed with a Silverman. We had way too much money and a lot of connections. So my brother and cousin must have done something bad for this kid to do what he’d done. “God damn it, Oakley, what the fuck did you do?”

He avoided my gaze. “I may have taken a picture of his sister and photo shopped images of what I wanted to do to her and mouthed off,” he rushed out.

Reaching over I whacked him upside the head. “You damn idiot.”

“It was just a bit of fun and his sister is hot,” mumbled Andrew.

I turned and whacked Andrew, too. “Get your arses in there now. And delete that shit off all your devices because what you fuckwits did is illegal.” Grabbing the scruff of both their shirts I dragged them through emergency and over to the nurses’ triage.

Before we even got to wait in line for the nurse, I heard the sexiest voice I’d ever heard yell, “Goddamn it Arron, sit your arse down now. Leave the dickheads alone.”

Spinning, I searched for that voice and saw a woman with jet black hair falling to her arse. And what a nice round shapely arse it was. She had her hands on the chest of a tall teenager, who was currently staring daggers over my way.

“That the kid that did this to you two?” Both my brother and cousin nodded, but I noticed their gazes didn’t leave the woman’s arse. An urge to beat both of them washed over me at the sight of them staring at what only moments ago I had been staring at. Huh, that was weird. Mentally shaking off the feeling, I gave a glare to both Oakley and Andrew. “Stay in line. I’m going to go over and see if I can smooth things over.”

Without waiting for their reply, I made my way over to the couple. The woman was now quietly talking to the teenager who still hadn’t stopped staring my way. The closer I got the stronger my sense that something wasn’t right, that I wanted to beat the shit out of my brother and cousin for treating the woman the way they had. At thirty-two years old, I knew the need to beat my brother and cousin was stupid. However, the feeling that was running through my veins wasn’t one I had ever had. After taking a few deep breaths, I pushed the feeling aside knowing that I would have to examine it after I finished with this situation.

“I promise if you ignore the dipshits, even though you only have a month or so until HSC, I’ll move you to a new school if you want. One without rich little pricks.”

I stopped just out of reach from them. I was close enough now that a vanilla scent surrounded me instead of the hospital disinfectant. I took in a deep breath of the heavenly scent and almost moaned as my whole body hardened.

“What the fuck do you want?” the teenager snarled.

The vanilla-scented woman spun around to face me and I took a step towards her. Damn, she wasn’t just beautiful, she was stunning. Super long black lashes fluttered, revealing dark brown eyes that looked almost black enough to match her hair. Her nose was straight and perfect with a slight point. Her lips weren’t too full, but they weren’t thin. They were perfect, just like the rest of her. She was a tiny thing, I bet barely five feet tall, with light olive skin and a body to die for. Damn. My heart beat faster than I’d ever felt it beat before. I opened my mouth to reply to the kid, but nothing intelligent came out. “Mine. You’re mine.”

“What! What the hell kind of answer is that?” the kid growled.

My mate, my soulmate, who I’d given up hope of ever finding, groaned and her gaze went from her brother to me and back before she mumbled, “Men.” She stepped in front of her brother and narrowed her gaze on me. “Look, I’m sorry my brother kicked your um…brothers?”

I nodded. I knew if I spoke it wouldn’t be anything but caveman talk.

“Arses, but they were being douches. Arron was just protecting me. Can we just forget about it and put it all behind us? No one will press charges.”

Oh, she was using the threat of pressing charges to keep everything quiet. I couldn’t help the smirk that spread over my face. I crossed my arms over my chest and stared down at my one, my soul mate. “Really?”

Her relaxed stance changed. She straightened herself up and eyed me up and down, a smirk of her own spreading across her beautiful face. “Yes. Really. Now,” she nodded her head in the direction of my brother and cousin. “It looks like they found a nurse and you’re going in instead of waiting with us ‘normal people.’” She raised her hands in air quotes.

Huh, what? What did she mean by normal people? I looked over my shoulder and sure enough, a nurse was guiding my brother and cousin through to the rooms. Sighing, because I knew the Silverman name had gotten us priority, I looked back at my mate, whose name I didn’t even know, and debated what I should do. Did I follow my brother and cousin, who were still under age at seventeen, or did I wait and get to know my mate?

The choice was taken from me when a nurse walked over to me. “Mr. Silverman, if you could please come with me as your brother and cousin are both minors and need an adult or guardian with them.”

My mate turned her back on me and I fought the urge to spin her around, throw her over my shoulder and take off with her. Without saying a word though, I followed the nurse. I’d find my soul mate again, and soon.

What an arsehole. A beautiful, tanned, tall, muscular, hot, god like arsehole. He wasn’t what I expected from the little I learned from Arron. I’d met rich guys before, and they usually didn’t look like the man that came over. I’d gone to a private school and the brothers and fathers of friends didn’t look like the olive-skinned muscular guy I’d just stopped Arron from attacking. I wasn’t one to go all weak at the knees over Mr. Hottie. Gorgeous, muscular guys were a norm for me. With my father in the Army and my brother boxing, I’d seen my fair share of built, handsome men, but the guy I’d just seen had my stomach doing weird flips and flutters. His dark hair was military short and I saw the beginnings of tattoos peeking out of the collar of his suit. His cheeks were high and his jaw square. The stubble added to his manliness. Then I’d seen his eyes. They were green, but not just any green, a rich, rainforest green that had me losing myself in them for a moment.

I thought I was a goner until he spoke. “Mine,” and he stared right at me. “You’re mine.” The first had snapped me out of his green gaze and the next one I fought my body’s reaction as tingles spread over me. Arron’s response spurred me into action and I knew I had to calm my brother down and ignore whatever was going on with me.

My mind went over the short encounter for the next couple of hours while we waited to see a doctor. I couldn’t figure out my response to this man. I didn’t understand why I couldn’t stop thinking about him. What was wrong with me? I’d never obsessed over a guy. I’d had boyfriends. I’d only broken up with my last a month before we moved down to Brisbane.

The man had been hot, but not my type. I usually went for men…less domineering, muscular, powerful, and well, just less. Even meeting the Silverman for that short time, I could feel all those things radiating off him. He reminded me a little of my father. I shivered and not the good shiver. My dad was someone you didn’t cross or go against. He was in shape and wasn’t one to take no for an answer. I was sure that was what the guy I’d met was like too.

“Stamon. Arron Stamon.”

Groaning as I heard my brother’s name and realized I was still obsessing over the encounter, I stood with my brother and promised myself once I walked through the doors and into a room, I would stop thinking of the Silverman. Hopefully I’d never see him again.

So it turned out there was somewhere that didn’t care that I was a Silverman. The Army base. They wouldn’t let me onto it without a family member or a friend that lives on it to escort and be responsible for me. I wasn’t on official police business and the men at the gate had rung my precinct when I tried using that. So now I sat across from the base entrance waiting like a creepy stalker for my soulmate to leave.

My brother told me Arron’s last name and I’d run a search to find out all I could on “my one.” Her name was Divinity Stamon. She was twenty-one years old. Five feet and half an inch. Sixty kilograms. A hairdresser and beauty consultant. She had an apprenticeship at Golden Locks and Beauty and had a brother, Arron Stamon, of whom she was the legal guardian while their father was on deployment. That was the information I could find out on her. I’d rung Zeck and asked him to dig deeper.

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