Chapter 27 Riley #2
Because you’re scared of what he might say, a voice whispered. You’re scared he’ll confirm everything Vix told you.
Shut up. I was about to push the door open when I heard the voices. One of them was Caelan. The other was Vix.
I froze, my hand on the door handle.
“When are you going to tell her?” Vix was saying.
“I won’t.” Caelan’s voice was flat, final.
“So you’ll keep lying to her, forever? I don’t want to be your dirty little secret.”
My blood turned to ice.
“You’re not my secret.” Caelan sounded almost irritated. “Everyone knows about us. Riley won’t change our relationship, Vix.”
Everyone knows about us. The words echoed in my head as my mind spiraled out of control.
Did that mean the entire court knew Caelan and Vix were together?
Was I a joke to everyone here? Every bow, every welcome, every polite smile hiding pity or amusement at the human who didn’t realize her mate belonged to another woman?
Congratulations, Riley. You’ve officially become the punchline.
Riley won’t change our relationship. So he was just going to keep seeing Vix behind my back? Keep playing house with me during the day and sneaking off to her at night? Was that what “working late” meant? Was that what it always meant?
All those nights in the human world when he was away dealing with “pack business.” All those times he disappeared for hours without explanation. Had he been with her then too?
Had our entire relationship been a lie?
Tears were streaming down my face before I even realized I was crying. My stomach heaved. I was going to be sick, I was going to collapse, I was going to...
“She’s going to be mad, you know?” Vix’s voice again, tinged with amusement. “When she discovers the truth.”
She laughed. Vix was actually laughing, and I wanted to die.
I slammed the door open.
It banged against the wall with enough force to shake the room. Both heads snapped toward me. Caelan at his desk, papers spread in front of him, and Vix kneeling beside his chair with her hand resting high on his thigh, intimately close to places that should belong only to me.
My vision went white with rage.
“You fucking asshole,” I spat, my voice shaking. “Now I know why you like to stay late to work.”
Caelan’s expression shifted. Confusion, then alarm, then horror as he took in my tear-streaked face.
“Riley...”
“I never should’ve trusted you.” The tears wouldn’t stop. They pour down my cheeks, humiliating me, but I couldn’t control them. “Was any of it real? Was ANYTHING you said to me real?”
“What are you...”
I couldn’t bear to hear his answer right now. Wasn’t ready to stand here and listen to him try to explain, to justify, to lie some more. If he said one more word I would shatter completely.
“Sorry for interrupting.” I was already turning, already running, unable to look at them for another second. “By all means, continue.”
I didn’t wait for a response.
I ran.
The corridors blurred around me. I didn’t know where I was going, didn’t care. Just needed to be anywhere else, anywhere but here, anywhere but near him. My mind was spiraling, thoughts crashing into each other with no order or logic.
Was everything a lie?
The mate bond, the claiming, the declarations of love, all of it. Was it all a manipulation? A game? Did he have Vix waiting in the wings the entire time, laughing at the stupid human who thought she was special? Should I have trusted him more and let him explain?
I was spiraling. I knew I was spiraling. Couldn’t stop.
I should have known better. I should have sworn off men after Damien, after years of manipulation and abuse and learning the hard way that people who claimed to love you could destroy you.
Damien took my money, my confidence, my sense of self-worth. He made me believe I was worthless without him. That I couldn’t survive alone. That I needed him even when he was hurting me.
And I had escaped that. I had clawed my way out of that relationship. I had started to rebuild myself, piece by painful piece.
Then Caelan came along.
Caelan with his pretty words and his protective growls and his “you’re mine, you belong to me, I’ll never let you go.” Caelan who looked at me with reverence, with devotion, with a hunger that made me feel precious. Caelan who said I was his mate, his fate, his everything.
And I believed him. I trusted him. I let myself fall in love with him.
And now this.
Behind me, I heard cursing and running footsteps. He was chasing me.
“RILEY! STOP!”
I ran faster.
The world was spinning. My vision kept going in and out. I touched the wall to stay upright, stumbling, tripping over my own feet. The headache was blinding now, the nausea overwhelming.
I couldn’t keep going. My legs gave out and I fell, the stone floor rushing up to meet me.
I hit hard, pain shooting through my knees, my palms, my shoulder where I crumpled against the wall.
The impact jarred through my bones, but I barely felt it.
The physical pain was nothing compared to the agony in my chest.
“RILEY!”
Hands were grabbing me. I fought them, punching and scratching, desperate to get away from him, from his lies, from everything.
“STOP PUNCHING ME!”
The familiar, high-pitched voice cut through the haze, and it wasn’t Caelan. It was Thessa. When I blinked, trying to focus, her face swam into view, worried and confused, her hands raised defensively.
“What the fuck happened?” Thessa demanded. “You came running around the corner and just collapsed. Are you okay?”
“No.” My voice broke. “Cae... he...”
I couldn’t get his name out, couldn’t form the words. Everything was spinning.
“What did my stupid brother do?”
“He... Vix... I heard...” I wasn’t making sense. I knew I wasn’t making sense. “They were... she was...”
“Slow down. Breathe.”
I tried. Couldn’t.
The nausea surged, and I barely had time to turn my head before I was throwing up on the stone floor. Thessa held my hair back, muttering curses in a language I didn’t understand.
“Okay. Okay, that’s not good. We need a healer.”
I wanted to argue, wanted to say I was fine. But I couldn’t speak, could barely see, could barely do anything but shake and cry and try not to vomit again.
I felt him before I saw him. Caelan was close, and I could sense it through the bond, feel his presence pressing against my chest. He was saying my name, trying to approach...
“STAY AWAY!” Thessa yelled, putting herself between me and whatever was behind her. “I don’t know what you did, but she’s clearly not okay, and you need to back off.”
I loved her so much.
***
The next hour was a blur.
Thessa called for guards, for a healer, for people to help carry me because I couldn’t walk, could barely stay conscious, my body giving out in ways I didn’t understand.
They took me to the infirmary.
It was a large room with multiple beds, stone walls, and a fire crackling in the hearth. A healer, an older woman with kind eyes and efficient hands, directed the guards to lay me down on one of the beds.
I was vaguely aware of Caelan somewhere in the background, trying to get close, being blocked by Thessa’s shouted commands. Good. I didn’t want to see him. I didn’t want to hear his voice. I didn’t want anything from him except answers, and I was terrified of what those answers would be.
“What happened?” the healer asked Thessa.
“I don’t know. I found her collapsed in the corridor. She was crying, then she vomited, then she almost passed out.”
“Has she been ill? Any symptoms before this?”
“I don’t... Riley?” Thessa squeezed my hand. “Have you been feeling sick?”
I tried to focus. My vision was clearer now, the world slowly stabilizing, but I still felt awful, weak, hollowed out. Every ounce of energy had been drained from my body, leaving me empty and exhausted.
“A little,” I managed. “Nausea. Dizziness. Since I arrived.”
The healer frowned. “How long ago was that?”
“Several days. Maybe a week.”
“And before that? In the human realm?”
I thought back. The nausea, the fatigue that wouldn’t go away no matter how much I slept, the way food tasted wrong and certain smells made me gag.
“A few weeks, maybe. I thought it was stress.”
The healer exchanged a look with Thessa. One I couldn’t interpret.
“I’m going to run some tests,” the healer said. “Just need a bit of blood.”
She produced a small needle and vial. I winced as she drew blood from my arm, trying not to look. I’d never been great with needles, blood, or medical procedures in general. Add it to the list of things I was handling poorly today.
“We’ve adopted some of the humans’ technology,” Thessa said, clearly trying to distract me. “Lytopia was so outdated before the portals opened. Needles, certain medical practices, even some of the plumbing. It’s been a good change, actually. Made things more efficient.”
I nodded weakly, grateful for the distraction even if I could barely process the words.
The healer bustled away with the vial, muttering about confirming results. Thessa squeezed my hand again, her expression a mix of confusion and concern.
“I’m sure it’s nothing serious,” she said, but she didn’t sound sure.
I lay there, staring at the ceiling, my mind a hurricane of images I couldn’t escape.
Caelan and Vix in his office. The overheard conversation.
Her hand on his thigh, positioned with a familiarity that spoke of practice, of habit, of a relationship that went far deeper than he’d ever admitted. Everyone knows about us.
My brain was really committed to torturing me today.
I started crying again, and I couldn’t stop it. The tears just came, pouring down my temples and into my hair, silent and uncontrollable.
I had trusted him. I had opened myself up to him. I had let him claim me, mark me, make me his in ways that could never be undone. And all along, he’d been keeping secrets still, lying to me, making me look foolish in front of an entire court.
“Hey.” Thessa’s voice was gentle. “Whatever happened, whatever my idiot brother did, we’ll figure it out, okay? I’m on your side.”
“He’s with Vix,” I whispered.
“What?”
“I heard them. In his office. She said... and he said...” I couldn’t repeat it, couldn’t say the words out loud. “She was kneeling next to him. Her hand was on his...”
“That can’t be real, I refuse. But I’m going to kill him anyway.”
“I thought it was real. I thought the bond was real.”
“It IS real. Mate bonds can’t be faked.” Thessa sounded angry now.
Not at me, but at the situation. At her brother.
“There has to be an explanation. Caelan would never... he’s obsessed with you, Riley.
He’s been obsessed with you since the moment he met you.
He refused to consider anyone else for years because his wolf wouldn’t accept them. ”
“I know what I heard.”
Before Thessa could respond, the healer returned.
She was smiling.
It was the kind of smile that made my stomach drop, because smiles that big usually preceded news that changed everything. News that flipped your entire world on its axis and left you scrambling to find your footing.
“Well,” the healer said, clasping her hands together. “I have your results.”
“And?”
“Congratulations!” The healer beamed, her whole face lighting up with joy. “You’re about ten weeks pregnant.”
I stared at the healer. Then at Thessa, who had gone completely white. Then at the ceiling, the walls, the fire crackling in the hearth, because my brain had apparently decided to short-circuit and I couldn’t process a single coherent thought.
Pregnant. Ten weeks.
Well. That explained a lot.
That was from before I came here, from the human world, from the claiming, from before Caelan left for the war.
“What?” I croaked.
“Pregnant, dear. With child. You’re going to be a mother.”
My hand moved to my stomach instinctively. There was no bump, no sign, but suddenly everything made sense. The nausea, the fatigue, the dizziness, the way my body had been betraying me for weeks. It wasn’t stress or the realm change or leftover effects from the heat.
I was carrying Caelan’s baby. And I had just run away from him believing he was cheating on me with Vix.
“Oh god,” I whispered.
“I’ll give you a moment,” the healer said, still beaming, clearly oblivious to the chaos she’d just created. “This is wonderful news! A royal heir! The king and queen will be thrilled!”
She bustled away again, radiating joy that felt deeply inappropriate given the circumstances.
Thessa and I stared at each other.
“Holy shit,” Thessa breathed.
“Holy shit,” I agreed.
And then I started crying again. For entirely different reasons this time.