Hate to Love It

Chapter 10: Intruder in the System

Chapter Ten

The wedding hymn was playing and he was nervous as hell. He pried his fingers off the hard grip he had on his gold and white suit and looked at his best man, Jace, behind him at the altar. The blond gave him a small, forced smile. He tried to inhale, feeling his heart beat like it's trying to get out of his tightening chest. 

 
This is it. 

 
He's getting married. 

 
Izzy situated herself on the other side dressed in a silk muted gold gown which hugged her figure nicely. He tried to catch her eyes but she just ducked her head like she was about to break down and cry. Why?

 
Izzy knew him better than Jace and his parents. She knew who he was even before he accepted what he was. So he couldn't understand this attitude in the most important day of his life and it started to make him more nervous. 

 
Maryse and Robert were on the front pews, eyes shining. They're...proud? He thought strangely. Since when did they approve of his...preference?

 
A gasp ran through the crowd and he momentarily pulled his eyes from parents and to the person towards him at the altar. 

 
His soon-to-be significant other was walking towards him on the aisle, with a large, flowing veil that covered the whole upper body. He could only see the shiny, brown Italian leather dress shoes and suede black pants and he cocked his head, mystified.

 
The ceremony went on without him even knowing it, answering automatically, not hearing the actual words until his partner faced him and oh, it's already the part where they're supposed to kiss. 
 

"You may now kiss the bride," the priest said joyfully and he felt his stomach drop. 
 

Bride. 

 
With shaking fingers, he lifted the veil and instead of a honey-skinned Omega, he was facing a pale woman, blue eyes crazed and blood red lips pulled back in a snarl. 

 
"You're mine. You're mine, Alec!"

 
Alec woke up, sweat rolling down his forehead. Breathe. It's only a dream , he gasped, trying to will his racing heart to beat normally.
 

The Alpha rubbed his sleep-laden eyes and startled a little when his phone rang insistently, the vestiges of the nightmare still vivid in his mind's eye. 
 

Alec clicked the answer button, wishing so much that it be the off button instead. "How many times has it been, Underhill?" He croaked, throat dry and still feeling drained. He already had an inkling as to why his head of security is calling him at 5 in the morning. 
 

"We apologize, Sir. This is already the third time the hacker managed to get into the system. Our team has been up all night trying to get him out but he manages to evade all the additional firewalls built up on top of the existing ones," Underhill's tired voice floated the phone. 
 

"He? How'd you know it's a man?"

 
"The pattern that our team caught on his last trace before disappearing again is it seems like he only targets the profiles of Omega males who are bisexual, Sir. He made himself a profile under the name Jonathan and through that managed to enter the system and is perusing through the profiles of males with names starting with the letter--" 
 

Alec tuned Underhill out, wracking his brain on his last conversation he had with Raphael, Magnus' bodyguard and bestfriend. 
 

"The last time we heard, he managed to bail himself out. Be careful, Lightwood. All the footage our legal team managed to compile that showed Sebastian and Magnus vanished without a trace in all of our devices and personal computers. Including the court's copies," the Beta said.