Chapter 10 Riley
RILEY
Riley screamed.
He screamed at the trees. He screamed at the birds. He screamed at all the stupid mud on the stupid fucking ground.
He’d been doing so well. He’d been cautious, and he’d moved slow. He’d mostly kept his hands to himself. He’d stopped kissing Seth when Seth had asked. Riley had been like a person. Not an animal or a monster but a person.
And then he’d completely, 100 percent, fucked it all up.
“It’s your! Fucking! Fault!” he yelled up at the sky. It had stopped raining, and the clouds were beginning to disperse for once, like they were mocking Riley’s bad mood by letting the sunshine through.
Riley wasn’t talking to God, obviously. He was talking to that stupid fucking voice. The one that wasn’t a voice at all but part of him. The vicious monster part. The bad part.
It didn’t answer him, that stupid voice. It was hiding. Sulking. Ashamed or maybe just biding its time. Riley didn’t know, and he didn’t fucking care.
He’d woken up in the back of Mama Sybil’s car.
He hadn’t known how much time had passed at first. Riley’s healing was always erratic, sometimes much faster and sometimes much slower than that of his moms. So he’d had one horrifying, soul-destroying moment of thinking they were driving him away.
Out of town. Out of Washington. Away from Seth.
They could have been driving for hours and hours already, and he wouldn’t have known it.
Riley had panicked, his limbs flailing as he’d tried to open the door without unlocking it first.
Mama Sybil had turned around, looking at him with one raised brow. “If you kick a hole in my vehicle, we will be having words, Riley.”
And Riley had stopped. Not so much from the threat but from the knowledge that she wouldn’t have been nearly so calm and matter-of-fact if she’d been forcing him to leave his mate.
“Did—did I hurt him?” he’d asked.
Mama Sybil had turned back to face the road, sniffing at the question. “Of course not. We’d never let that happen.”
“And you made him forget?” Riley had asked, more to get it straight in his head than as a real question. Because of course they’d made Seth forget. Of course they’d compelled him—they wouldn’t leave him with the memory of Riley leaping at him like a deranged beast.
But his moms hadn’t answered.
“And you made him forget?” Riley had asked again.
Mama Daphne had cleared her throat from the passenger seat. “No. We thought it best to let things lie.”
Then Riley had gotten out of the car, unlocking the door and rolling out of the moving vehicle without another word.
He’d ignored the scrapes and bruises from the road—they’d heal quickly or they wouldn’t, and what did a few more rips in his jeans matter?
He’d decided it was best to run home, before he stayed and said something horrible to his moms, the women who’d loved him and protected him—and protected Seth from him—and to whom he owed everything.
But letting Seth remember like that?
It was too soon. Riley and Seth were only starting to get to know each other. What chance did Riley have if Seth already knew he was a monster, bloodthirsty and uncontrolled and so very hungry?
The worst part was that Riley didn’t even know what he’d been trying to do back in the bakery.
He’d smelled the rich, decadent scent of orange and copper, had realized Seth was bleeding, and then he’d been…
moving. Fangs already out, that voice in control and Riley relegated to the back of his own mind.
Had the voice been trying to protect Seth?
To lick at that cut until the skin healed and Seth was no longer hurt?
Or to bite in, to create another, worse wound by tearing into his throat and draining him dry?
Riley wasn’t sure, and the voice wasn’t talking.
Well, Riley was done talking too. Or yelling, if he wanted to be specific. Screaming out in the woods by himself like a lunatic wasn’t doing any good, other than sending all the birds flying. He’d go home, go up to the attic, and try to figure out his next move.
It wouldn’t be sulking. It would be planning.
Did flowers and chocolate work in a situation like this? Maybe a card that said, I’m sorry I tried to maul you a second time. Third time’s the charm, I promise.
Maybe Seth wouldn’t open any card Riley sent him, anyway. Maybe Seth hated him. Or maybe he’d convinced himself it wasn’t real—he wouldn’t be the first human to engage in denial when faced with the supernatural.
As Riley came through the trees surrounding the house, he saw there was a car parked by the porch, next to Mama Daphne’s—a car he didn’t recognize. And a man standing there by the front door, waiting for someone.
Riley had one gut-wrenching moment where he thought it might be Seth come to see him, but the details were all wrong.
That wasn’t Seth’s car, that black, nondescript thing.
And the man standing there was taller, with short dark hair and a suit that made him look like he’d come straight from FBI headquarters.
It was all…unusual. Super weird, actually. No one ever came to the house. Even delivery vans stopped at the mail drop much further down the drive.
Riley made his steps deliberately loud as he approached, and the man turned to face him. He was wearing glasses, and they glinted in the ray of sunlight peeking from behind the clouds. “Ah. Hello,” the man said, his voice smooth and mild. “Are you Mr. Beauchamp?”
He pronounced it the French way, just like Riley’s moms did. Riley gave him a nod, halting at the bottom of the porch.
“I heard some yelling,” the man pointed out. “Is everything all right?”
Riley said nothing.
“You encountered…a wild animal, perhaps?”
Riley shook his head. “Scream therapy.”
The man blinked at him. “Oh. Right.” He seemed to shake off Riley’s rudeness in an instant, giving him a bland smile.
“I’m Tim Perkins, a lawyer from the Northwest Institute of Wildlife Research, or NIWR, if you don’t want to say the whole mouthful.
We’re neighbors. Not close neighbors, of course.
” That bland smile sharpened. “Your family has an extensive property here.”
Mr. Perkins paused then, his head cocked expectantly, like Riley was supposed to say something, or maybe invite him in.
But Riley didn’t want this stranger in his house, and he wasn’t the type to be cowed by uncomfortable silences. So he stood there at the bottom of the porch, staring without speaking.
After a few long moments, Mr. Perkins cleared his throat. “Tell me, Mr. Beauchamp, have you encountered any unusual activity in the area?”
Riley tucked his hands into his pockets, rocking onto his heels. “Like UFOs?”
Mr. Perkins narrowed his eyes, apparently not amused. No sense of humor with this one. Seth would have thought it was funny. “Like predators.”
“What kind of predators?” Riley asked. “I thought you all studied marine life.”
He’d heard the rumors in town, sitting for hours in Seth’s bakery like he did. The creepy institute about which no one knew the exact details, but plenty wanted to speculate.
Of course, Riley had also heard his own family was made up of undiscovered serial killers, so he took the rumors with a grain of salt.
The light hit Mr. Perkins’s glasses again, hiding his expression as he drawled, “Oh, we study strange fauna of all kinds.”
The hairs on the back of Riley’s neck stood up.
Careful, the voice warned, speaking up for the first time since they’d woken up in Mama Sybil’s car. It was probably the first bit of useful advice it had ever given Riley. Not that he needed it.
Riley was just debating whether to attempt compulsion to get the man to leave their property when Mama Sybil’s car pulled up. She and Mama Daphne were out in an instant, though they managed to make it look like neither one of them was rushing.
“This is private property,” Mama Sybil announced before Mr. Perkins could even say a word. She sounded haughty as hell, and no matter how angry Riley was with her, he could appreciate the way she could make any man feel like a bug under her shoe.
Mr. Perkins was all genial smiles now. “Hello,” he said. “I’m aware, actually. I’m Tim Perkins from the Northwest Institute of Wildlife Research. I’ve been sent to request permission for access to your land.”
“For what purpose?” Mama Daphne asked.
“As our name suggests, we study wildlife in the area,” Mr. Perkins said, not mentioning anything about strange fauna, Riley noticed. “You own quite a bit of forest property. The larger the field we can cover, the more data we can collect.”
But Mama Sybil was waving a dismissive hand. “I’m afraid that won’t be possible.”
Mr. Perkins coughed gently into his fist. “We’ll stick to the outskirts, of course. You won’t even notice we’re there.”
“You’d be surprised,” Riley muttered.
When he glanced back up, Mama Daphne was subtly shaking her head at him. Before Riley could question the warning, she smiled brightly, holding out her hand to him. “Riley, darling, why don’t you come inside? I think we’re done here.”
Mr. Perkins didn’t make a move to come off the porch. Instead, he held out a card. “In case you change your mind.”
Mama Sybil swept up the stairs and past him, grabbing the card as she went. She shot him a brief smile over her shoulder that didn’t reach her eyes. “We won’t.”
Mr. Perkins maintained his own bland smile as he finally walked off the porch, nodding politely as he passed Riley and Mama Daphne to get to his car. Riley inhaled as he passed—no scent of copper. Not a vampire, then. Just a kinda creepy lawyer.
Back inside the house, Riley watched his moms hang their purses on the hooks in the vestibule. They weren’t indulging in their usual easy chatter, and Riley couldn’t tell if that was because of their most recent visitor or the events of the morning.
If nothing else, Mr. Perkins had served as a distraction from Riley’s self-recrimination.
His moms led him toward the kitchen, and Riley finally broke the silence. “Weird guy.”
Mama Sybil’s brow furrowed as she grabbed three mugs from the cabinet. “If you see him or anyone else from his so-called institute, tell us immediately.”
Riley was already supposed to tell his moms if he encountered any strangers on the property. The fact that she was specifying now was telling. He took a seat at the table. “You think there’s something wrong.”
“I think it’s wise to be alert.” Mama Sybil tossed Mr. Perkins’s card into the garbage. Riley had a feeling she would have preferred to set the thing on fire.
Mama Daphne stopped by his chair to press a kiss to Riley’s cheek, then sashayed over to the stove to start the kettle. “You should be sure to stay presentable, darling. Seth could be here at any moment.”
Riley’s stomach swooped. So much for a distraction. “What do you mean?”
“I gave him our address,” Mama Sybil said lightly, like that was a totally normal thing to do after their son had tried to eat a man.
“So he could run as far from it as possible?”
Mama Daphne grinned brightly as she spooned tea leaves into her favorite teapot. “I think he’ll surprise you.”
Riley dropped his head in his hands, tugging at his hair. He loved these women, but— “Why were you even there?” he gritted out.
“We wanted to meet him,” Mama Daphne said, the absolute picture of innocence.
“You couldn’t wait?”
“Not when he holds your fate in his hands.” Mama Sybil covered Riley’s shoulder with a warm hand. “We told you that everything would be well. We told you we’d make sure of it.”
“I’m surprised you didn’t just attack and form the bond by force, then,” he said bitterly.
His moms exchanged a glance. “We’d like to give you a chance to do it your way first,” Mama Daphne told him.
“And if I don’t succeed?”
Mama Sybil gave his shoulder a tight squeeze. “Then, darling, we’ll do it for you.”
It was as much of a threat as it was a promise.
Sometimes it really sucked having vampires for parents.