Chapter 9
Spencer
Iall but fall out of the elevator and trudge my way to the apartment door. Hell, what a damn day. Between avoiding Mrs. Princeton, taking the monthly property inspection on horseback, and the budget meeting from the depths of Satan’s lair, I’m fucked.
My phone buzzes as I unlock the front door and walk inside.
Brady.
Hey bud, carpool this Friday?
With less than thirty minutes separating us, Brady and I have been traveling the circuit together for almost as long as I’ve been on it. I tap out an affirmative response and drop onto the sofa.
I sit for a beat before I realize that my apartment is too quiet.
A sliver of panic sets in as I remember Ivy . . .
And Riley.
Bolting from the sofa, I sprint for Riley’s bedroom. I swing around her open door only to find the room they both currently share empty.
Fuck.
I double-check the time on my phone.
6:14
Campus classes never run past five. And it’s only a fifteen-minute drive from there to here.
“Riley?” I call out as I duck my head into the room that was meant to be hers and then my own. Checking the spare bathroom and then my en suite, just in case, I make a beeline back to the kitchen. The apartment is empty.
They’re not here.
My chest tightens, taking me by surprise.
I check my phone for messages. I left my number on the counter this morning. Surely she put it in her phone?
But I have no unread messages.
I tap Stacey’s name and video call her.
She accepts a few rings later, her sweaty, red face filling the screen as it bobs. “Stace, you gotta stop answering on the run,” I grind out.
“Deal with it, Spencer. What do you want? I’m three minutes away from the sixth mile.”
I roll my eyes at my overachieving sister and remember the very important reason I was calling. “Is Riley with you?”
Stacey jerks to a halt, huffing deep breaths as her eyes widen. “What do you mean? What the hell did you do?”
“Jesus, can you drop the Spencer blame game for one fucking minute? I came home and the two of them are nowhere to be found.”
“Well, I highly doubt she made off with your kid, brother. Did you call her?” The disgust in her voice riles me up. I know I shouldn’t let it, but it damn well does.
“No, I thought I’d piss you off first, for funsies. Christ sake, Stace, I would call her if I had her number.”
“What? You don’t have her number? And you left her with your kid? Seriously, Spencer.”
The temptation to hang the fuck up is almost too much, but I need to know if Riley and Ivy are okay, so I press on. “Did you see Riley on campus today?”
Her face slackens before she clears her throat. “She took the baby to class, Spencer. I didn’t even know you could do that.”
Her gaze is set somewhere far off in the park she’s running in.
“She took Ivy to class?”
“Yes, Spencer, keep up.”
Now she rolls her eyes at me.
Fuck.
Guilt sluices its way through my veins. “Thanks for nothing, sis.”
I hang up.
I hang my head, palm dragging down my face before I lose a breathy, “Fucking Christ.”
So I can trace the route from here to the campus, see if she broke down or something? Drive around until I find her beat-up little car.
Or . . . I can stop being dramatic and wait for them to come home. My gut told me two things about Riley when we met, both the first time we met and the moment I laid eyes on her with my baby.
First, she is independent as fuck.
Second, she’s protective. Maybe more so than I can understand.
Nobody has ever been protective over Stacey and me.
Even as kids, it was fend for yourself in almost every department.
Emotionally, deal with it yourself. Life, sort out your own problems unless Daddy hands you his version of a solution because you took too long to decide.
Family, the few people you shared a childhood house with, if only to keep up the pretense of the happy family facade that will help the family business.
I don’t remember the last time anyone aside from Brades had my back.
Deciding to trust the woman I’ve met three times, I sink onto the sofa and stare at my phone, like my heated gaze will entice it to ring.
The silence grows louder.
Until I am hallucinating the happy sounds of laughter.
Like some sick joke my mind plays on me to rub salt into the wound of what I missed in my childhood of being unloved.
Being pitted against your sister, each blamed for the things the other did, is not love. I know that now. It took a decade of therapy to unravel that little gem.
Still, I’m left with a shell of a soul and little to no understanding how to love. What it even means keeps me up some nights.
I huff a sardonic laugh at my inner thoughts. Poor little rich cowboy, Mommy and Daddy didn’t love you. Your only sibling is disgusted with you on a regular basis.
The wealth I live in is a stark contrast to the love debt I’ve racked up, deep as the pits of hell.
Whoever left their flesh and blood on my doorstep should have known that before leaving Ivy here. How can I raise a kid when my own upbringing was pure toxicity in disastrous proportions?
The mocking laughter turns to a soft echo.
Winding its way under the front door.
I let my head fall back, closing my eyes.
“I am so fucked up,” I mutter.
A knock on the door startles me, and I jump to my feet.
Who the hell?
I cross the foyer and pull the door open.
To an annoyed Riley, Ivy in her arms, her school bags hanging from one shoulder, a grocery bag hanging from the other.
“’Bout time, you eejit.” Her brows are permanently crushed downward as she pushes past me.
“Where the hell have you been?”
She ignores me, unloading her shoulders as she talks softly to Ivy.
“Riley? I came home to an empty apartment. My kid nowhere to be found.”
She rubs her palm over Ivy’s head before tossing a blanket on the floor and laying her down with a soft whisper I can’t make out.
When she rises, she stalks for me.
And hell, the fire in her dark eyes has me setting my shoulders back.
Her pointer finger stabs my polo shirt, over my heart, in sync with her steps as she advances on me.
I stumble back toward the front door.
“You . . . You absolute, fecking eejit. Of all the self-absorbed, stupid shite.” She glances at the baby on the floor.
My back hits the door.
She reaches around me and opens it. “Outside.”
I hold up my hands like I’m in a literal stickup.
The door shuts behind her, and she closes her eyes, pinching the bridge of her nose as she sucks in a breath.
I fold my arms over my chest. “Where—”
Her hand shoots up between us.
What on earth is she doing?
Her head tilts slightly to the side as her eyes open. She rights herself and looks up at me.
Her dark hair is pulled back in a long messy ponytail with a navy velvet scrunchie. Now the fire in her eyes has my body responding in a way it absolutely shouldn’t be.
“Spencer, when you decided to keep Ivy, how exactly did you see this thing going?”
Fuck. How I loathe introspective, open-ended damn questions.
I tense up, jaw set. “What’d you mean?”
“I came home at four, with Ivy, and was locked out. I don’t have a key.”
I release my arms to my sides. “I gave you my number.”
Her face twitches.
Gotcha, little firecracker. The tension coiled in my body releases as hers ratchets up with every second that passes.
“So, where’d you two go?”
Her gaze flickers down the hallway to the only other door on this floor.
“Ah, been out visiting. Mrs. Henderson would love the company. See, Riles, all’s well that ends well.”
“No, Lockwood. I need a key, and you need to communicate, or this deal is off.”
“If the deal is off, O’Malley, I’ll have my money back.”
“God, you are a world class ass, you know tha—”
A small cry interrupts our fight.
Our first fight.
“Mommy and Daddy shouldn’t be fighting, Riley. It’s bad for the baby.”
Her eyes narrow. “You are insufferable.”
“You’re welcome.” I gesture with a hand toward the door.
She turns on her heel for it. The scent of her perfume and shampoo hit me like a concrete block to the face.
Oh . . . fuck.
“No.” A small sound leaves her lips, as she tugs on the door handle. She spins back. “Spencer, it’s locked.”
“Yeah, it locks from the inside . . . oh shit.”
I huff a shaky laugh.
“How is this funny? Ivy is inside.”
Her chest plummets, her knuckles turning white around the handle.
She’s freaking out.
“Riley, breathe. We’ll get in.”
“How? Your keys are inside and I. Don’t. Have. One!”
Her breaths shorten.
Holy fuck.
I run a hand through my hair before logic kicks in. “Henry has the masters. I’ll call down.”
I slide my hand into my back pocket to meet . . . soft denim. No phone.
“Shite. You eejit.”
“Me? You shoved me through the damn door, O’Malley.”
I need to use her last name right now, to keep some distance. If I am any more familiar with her, the vulnerability she’s offering up, I’m likely to press her to said locked door just to see what she tastes like.
I am well aware her panic should not do it for me.
I put it down to never being on the receiving end of controlled and affectionate interactions my entire life.
I like the real, raw parts of people. It’s one of the reasons I love the Pbr circuit.
And the one thing that had this woman turning over in my mind on repeat after the day I walked in on her half dressed.
My need, my desperate want, for real emotion is like an addiction.
Riley O’Malley is a huge catalog of raw emotion, strong opinions, and the clapbacks that only come from being loved unconditionally. That kind of persona is one I’ve strived for since I started therapy.
Not that I will ever admit that to another living soul. Not even Brades.
Add that to this slip of a woman with a body that is stuck in my mind at the worst, most inappropriate times, and the fact that she would rather die than cross that line with me.
And I can’t resist her pull.
She’s tugging on my shirt.
We’re moving for Mrs. Henderson’s door.
“Wait, I’ll go down to Henry,” I say. “What will she think? It looks bad, Riley. I don’t want her to think I’m a shit parent.”
The way her expression darkens, I can tell she wants to throw that one right back in my face. She turns back, standing in front of Mrs. Henderson’s door, arms crossed, brows pinched, heated gaze homed in on my face. “This is faster. Ivy’s already upset.”
The faint cry of the baby is muffled by my own front door.
Hell, I really had to listen for it.
I guide Riley back around to face me, clamping my hands on her shoulders as her eyes widen. “She’ll be okay. I’ll take the elevator and be back in five.”
Her head tilts, her expression turning dangerous as she unfolds her arms and curls her hand into a fist. Letting her arm drop, she slams that fist into the door behind her three times.
Fuck.
I haul in a breath as the door opens.
“Hello, you two. What’s going on?” Mrs. Henderson is in her rollers already, her face twisted with confusion.
Riley spins to face her. “This eejit locked us out. Can I use your phone please, Florence?”
“Of course, love. At the end of the counter.”
Riley makes a beeline for the phone and is back ten seconds later.
“Spencer is everything okay, honey?”
Heat crawls up my neck. My throat closes over.
I manage a nod.
“Oh good. Your lovely little nanny here kept me company for a few hours this afternoon. I loved having her here, but perhaps she needs a key?”
I huff a strangled sound.
“Yes ma’am.”