They (the shifters, obviously) could all hear Brenton and Sheriff.
“Someone drove up with a couple of guys in a pickup. They threw a few Molotov cocktails in, but everyone was able to run out through the back. The guys had been rowdy and screaming before they threw ‘em so people realized it was bad news.”
She kept her face hidden in Zachary’s chest, digging her nails into his back. Sheriff was saying this was an attack on the diner. Meaning it was an attack on Wild Junction and the shifters who owned the place. Her and Andrew. Their pride.
“Did you get a description of the truck?” Brenton hissed. “Anything?”
“You know who this was, Brenton. You don’t need me to tell you.” Sheriff growled. “The hunters are mad you all hid, and now they’ve burned down the diner to get your attention. We both know it.”
Andrew left her to go talk to his employees and patrons, telling them that they would continue to get paid while the diner was repaired. He needed to keep them calm. Riley was proud of his composure, something she was lacking at this moment.
“We need to find where they are hiding,” Brenton hissed. Zachary brought Riley over to them, letting her in on the conversation, but she didn’t speak. There was nothing to say.
“Where are your other two?” Sheriff looked between them, noting the absence of Troy and Gabe.
“Left them in charge of the house,” Zachary’s rough voice washed over Riley and she leaned hard into him. He rubbed her back slowly and she let it comfort her. “Needed to keep someone there, and there was no reason to all come out here and leave the house open for attack.”
“How secure is the mansion?” Sheriff crossed his arms over his chest.
“Bullet-proof glass windows. Multiple layers of security with motion sensors and lockdown features in case the security is activated. It would unlock gun safes in the bedrooms for people to arm themselves if we’re attacked while asleep. It’s really high-tech stuff that Zachary and Gabe put together.” Brenton ran a hand through his hair and Riley smelled his stress levels increase steadily. He wasn’t okay with this. This had escalated too quickly.
They watched the building slowly burn. The firefighters had to stop once the grease in the kitchen lit up. Andrew had tears in his eyes, they all did. This was their place.
Ruth even drove into town when she heard the news. Andrew held her as she cried. Riley could barely listen.
“I’m going to build it exactly as it was,” he whispered to the elderly woman. “A bunch of fucking punks aren’t going to run us out of town, you hear me?”
“Good boy.” Ruth patted his cheek, shaking. “Make it better.”
It took an hour for the fire to die out, but Brenton didn’t rush any of them to get home. Riley finally decided to get in the SUV and wait, listening to people talk. The crowd was gone, off to home. Ruth left, one of the deputies driving off with her.
Sheriff leaned into her window as the guys climbed in.
“You take care, kitten. Be safe. We’ll get these fuckers.” He pointed at her and then looked to Brenton in the driver’s seat next to her. “And you all… don’t fucking hurt her. I’ll ignore this, pretend I’m comfortable with it, but I swear to God, if she gets hurt, you are all done for.”
“Of course, Sheriff,” Brenton took her hand and she smiled sadly at him. Sheriff hit the top of the SUV, letting them know they could go.
It was a quiet drive, all of them thinking about what had just happened.
“Do you think it’s a Chapter?” she asked quietly.
“It had to be, and they aren’t afraid to get dangerous. We need to be on guard,” Brenton told her, his face tight with rage. “I would give my fortune away in a bet that they will attack the house next. They don’t just want us dead, they want our existence wiped from the face of the earth.”
“This is bad,” Zachary said from the back. “They couldn’t get Riley, so they burn down a fucking building?”
“They want us to know that they’re still watching.” Andrew tossed his phone onto the seat. “They want us to know that this is a war for them.”
“This isn’t normal for the SHS,” Brenton mumbled. “They don’t play like this. They normally capture low ranking and insignificant shifters and hunt them, play with them. This seems like a fucking vendetta.”
“We’ve never had any problems with hunters, though.” Zachary leaned back and let his head fall over the back of the seat. Riley could see him in the side mirror.
“I know.” Brenton had a bite to his voice, a sharpness that Riley knew was his self-control beginning to fray. “We’re missing something here. Something important.”
Riley searched her memory, something pricking the back of her mind.
“I’m just trying to look out for you. A lot of people in town don’t like that they came back. I don’t want you to be on the side with them. I want you on my side.”
“Haley…” she bit her bottom lip. “Haley told me that a lot of people were unhappy you were back. How she wanted me to be on ‘her side’ and not yours. It was the last conversation we ever had. She was upset when I told her that y’all were like my family.”
“Why didn’t you say anything earlier?” Brenton gave her a sharp look before looking back to the road.
“My apartment was broken into that night, and I never thought about it again. Haley quit the diner and left our lives. I haven’t even seen her around town, now that I think about it.”
“You don’t think she was mentioning a local SHS Chapter, do you?” Andrew was looking over to Riley, who shrugged back at him.
“I didn’t know what she meant and no one in town seemed hostile to y’all.” Riley wrung her hands more, they were starting to hurt. “And I fit with you, so I wrote her off as bitter about something.”
“What?” Zachary this time.
“She said Brenton broke her older sister’s heart when he left. She didn’t outright hate y'all when she told me that, but over that month, when you first got here, she grew more and more angry that I was around you guys. Then she wouldn’t tell me why since it was the ‘town’s concern’ and not mine since I wasn’t raised here.” Riley sighed. “She wouldn’t give me the information to listen to her, so I wouldn’t end my friendship with y’all. So, she and I stopped being friends.”
“Jesus, do you think…” Andrew looked from Riley to Zachary, behind her.
“I have no idea,” Zachary murmured.
“I think I might,” Brenton hissed. “Riley. Normal girl, living on her own, no family. Five shifters take her in, and now she’s suddenly one of them. They probably think we stole her from her human life. We bought their favorite place and then fired a girl and had her arrested. To them, we might seem like invaders where we were once just outsiders, living on the fringes.”
“You think?” Zachary was thoughtful. “Fuck, if it is that, then they are mad. We grew up here!”
“We didn’t go to school with them,” Andrew pointed out. “We didn’t really see them other than to party. And yeah, Riley, some of us used to treat women around here like shit.”
“Not you,” Brenton growled. “You had one girlfriend, once, while we weren’t living here. But yeah… Me, Zachary, Troy, and Gabe really cut a swath of broken hearts through every town and city within three hours of here. Including Denver.”
“Yeah, I heard about that before.” Riley shook her head. “You were teenagers though, and what did happen before you came back… well, I haven’t asked because you haven’t given me a reason to know.”
“That’s a pragmatic way of looking at it,” Brenton stopped them in the garage. Riley climbed out, shrugging.
“It’s a good way of looking at it. Why hold the past against someone when you weren’t a part of it? You are obviously different now.” Riley looked between them. “Did anyone ever get hurt by what y’all did physically?”
They paled and looked at each other. She didn’t know why, but the smell of fear filled the room. It was accen
ted by guilt and sadness.
“Tell Troy and Gabe to meet us in the den,” Brenton growled, storming off.
“Wait, what?” Riley tried to catch Andrew, but he kept moving towards the security room. Zachary grabbed her and dragged her to the den where Brenton was already pouring a scotch. Brenton didn’t drink often. He tended to lose a bit of control and didn’t like it.
She realized this was bad from the looks on Troy and Gabe’s faces as they walked in behind Andrew, who was still pale. Brenton spoke the moment the door was closed and locked.
“We need to talk about Caroline Sharpton.”
TROY
Oh fuck. Troy knew the moment Andrew pulled them from the security room. He fucking knew it.
Caroline Sharpton. He looked at Gabe, whose haunted eyes were staring at his hands.
“As in Jeff and Haley Sharpton?” Riley gasped and Troy began to shake.
“She was Jeff’s older sister,” he mumbled. “And we killed her.”
The look Riley had on her face broke him to pieces.
“Tell us the entire story. It’s been a long time,” Brenton snarled. “Because these fucking hunters are getting personal. This a fucking war to them and I think I now know why.”
Riley sat on the far end of her couch, and Troy noted how much distance was between them. Every inch of that physical space weighed on him.
“I should start from the beginning, then.” Troy rubbed his face. He needed a drink for this, but he knew Brenton would tear his heart out if he tried to pour one. He could only imagine what Gabe was feeling and thinking, lost in his own nightmares.
“Please do,” Riley’s voice shook. No one was sitting with her. Brenton paced around the room while Zachary and Andrew sat on the couch across from Troy and Gabe. Troy wanted so badly to hold her, but he wouldn’t blame her for wanting nothing to do with them at the end of this.
“Gabe and I had a really fucked childhood. We mentioned our parents to you,” he took a shaky breath. “They were all mean to each other. My mom was married to our dad. Gabe’s mom was his mistress. Both women got pregnant at the same time, hoping their child would be the first born and get all the money. So, when we were born, not even a full month apart, they used us against the other side of the family. He divided the fortune evenly and our mothers were furious. You know all this.”
“Yup,” Riley snapped.
“Yeah… Well, Gabe and I realized all we had was each other…” Troy looked to his brother, who was still stuck staring at his hands. “And we got really close. Really close. Freaked people out, really, but we were more like twins than half-brothers.”
“We did everything together, and when we moved to this place and met Brenton, he took us in as we were,” Gabe was hoarse. Troy winced at the sound of despair in his voice.
“He educated us and tried to protect us from more assholes, our legal guardians.” Troy mumbled. “And we didn’t make it easy. We developed a serious rebellious streak. Finally, when we were teens, we met Caroline Sharpton at a party. We were planning on leaving in like, six months, but it didn’t matter to us.”
“She was a doll,” Gabe mumbled. “Sweet, innocent, kind. She made us feel clean and good in a way no one else ever had. She didn’t care about our money or anything.”
“So, we got together with her. She was the first girl we ever shared. We treated her like a china doll, something precious, and we grew into our own with her. At least as much as teens can grow.” Troy was now holding Riley’s amber eyes in his own. Her lips were a little parted.
“You were in love with her,” Riley whispered, an odd emotion passing over her face. Troy didn’t know it, had never seen it on her before. Other, stronger scents in the room made it impossible for him to really analyze hers.
“Yeah, and when we left, we asked her to visit us,” Troy shook his head slowly. “She had never left Wild Junction, and we wanted her to see the world.”
“We were also rich party animals who could afford the good shit,” Gabe snarled viciously. Riley jumped a little at the outburst and Troy elbowed his brother. “We were always fucked up, since Brenton was a teenager himself. While he legally was in charge of us, we didn’t fucking want to listen to him most of the time.”
Riley looked to Brenton, who had no emotion on his face. Troy knew Brenton was remembering those days. It was a fucking mess, it was mayhem and bedlam. Zachary was having major anger issues in the early years, Andrew was trying to go to school, and Troy and Gabe got into trouble.
“Yeah,” Brenton snarled. “They made my life pretty hard.”
“I grew to like drinking… a lot.” Troy covered his face, putting his elbows on his knees.
“And I fucking loved coke,” Gabe growled. Troy winced at how angry Gabe sounded. “And any other illicit substance I could get my hands on. Too smart, too much money and too much time on my hands. I was even trying out acid at one point, just to give it a try.” He sounded mean, Troy noticed.
“So, you wanted Caroline to visit?” Riley’s voice was taut.
“Yup and we flew her out, bought her all sorts of nice shit. Took her to a party the night before she was supposed to go home.”
“One I had told both of them they needed to stay away from,” Brenton growled.
“Nothing happened at the party, but we needed to get home, so Caroline could get to the airport on time,” Troy wanted this to be over. “We didn’t want to call Brenton or the others because we didn’t want them to know. We had snuck out while they were busy. We were really fucked up.”
“I decided to drive because I thought I was better than Troy,” Gabe’s voice broke over that sentence. “And I wasn’t any better. Hell, Caroline was drunk too. She had let loose to enjoy her last night with us. She wanted to drive but we sure as hell weren’t going to let her behind the wheel.”
“The accident left us both pretty messed up but Caroline…” Troy felt the tears fall again. They always came down when he thought about that night. “It wasn’t even our fault! We were hit by a trucker who fell asleep at the wheel but… maybe if we were sober, maybe if we never fucking went like Brenton told us to…”
“I stepped in and got her body home to her family. Tragic accident for a bunch of teenagers,” Brenton snarled viciously. “And these two spiraled out of control. Sent both of them to rehab only three years ago. Their vices became addictions since they-”
“Fuck you, Brenton,” Gabe roared. “We’ve been over this a thousand times. You don’t need to fucking scold us anymore for it. We were eighteen and fucked up, not just by the drugs and alcohol. We’ve been sober for three fucking years!”
They all stayed quiet after Gabe’s outburst and Riley stood up slowly. Her eyes were wide and filled with unshed tears. She reached out to Gabe, who flinched but she only pulled him to her and gave him a tight hug, holding his head to her shoulder. Troy wanted to die a slow painful death. Gabe was crying into her as the wounds were reopened in front of the woman they now cared for.
When she let go of Gabe, she walked to Troy and he couldn’t stand. She just stood in between his legs and wrapped her arms around his head. He leaned into her stomach and cried like a fucking baby.
“You two had such a hard life and I’m sorry,” Riley was crying now as well. “Why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you tell me how you had to overcome this awful tragedy?”
“We thought you would leave us,” Troy’s voice broke and he wrapped his arms around her hips, his nails biting into her, holding her as tight as he felt he could. “We thought you would hate us. And you keep getting hurt and it's our fucking fault.”
“We’re fuck ups, we’ve always known that.”
“Oh boys,” she rubbed Troy’s back. “I can’t hate you. You were kids.”
“You got kidnapped because I figured out who your mother is,” Gabe growled. “Hunters are attacking us probably because of Caroline now. You should hate us.”
“Don’t say that,” Riley snapped. “My mother decided
who she wanted to be. Trevor made the decision with that militia pride to kidnap me. Cameron made the decision to try and kill me. None of that was your fault.”
“Everyone sit back down.” Brenton sounded tired and Troy couldn’t blame him. “Here’s what we need to do.”
Riley sat between the brothers now. Troy couldn’t take his eyes off her. Gabe was curled away from her, scratching his arm. It wasn’t looking good for Gabe. He always took it the hardest since he was behind the wheel, even though it was Troy’s idea that they should risk it and just drive home that night.
The accident wasn’t their fault, but they should have never been on the road. If they were sober then… maybe anything else could have happened that night. Maybe an innocent girl wouldn’t be dead.
“I think the hunters in a local Chapter knew Troy and Gabe were with Caroline. Then her body comes back.” Brenton laid out on the middle couch, rubbing his face with one hand, holding his drink with the other. “They must have convinced Jeff and Haley it wasn’t safe for us to come back and to keep everyone away from us. Haley walks out of Riley’s life when Riley stays with us. Then the incident with Winter. Now they want us to go down.”
“That doesn’t explain all the information they had on us,” Zachary spoke up. He and Andrew had remained emotionless and quiet through it all. Troy knew it was because they had never known what to say about the accident. They didn’t understand the addictions and everything else. Troy couldn’t blame them for that.
“Exactly, so we need to capture one of them. I don’t care how or where. We need to find out if this is just a wild theory or if it’s the truth. We don’t know if something bigger is going on, or if other major prides have hunters after them. Everyone had been fairly quiet over the last month or so.”
“We need more information,” Gabe nodded. “Yeah, I’ll work on it.”
“Thank you. Zachary, you coordinate with Sheriff about finding and grabbing one of them. We stay on lock down outside of those tasks. We need to get a lot done with the diner now, so Andrew and I will be dealing with that. Riley, I just want you to keep practicing your self-defense and shooting skills. Be prepared.”
Wild Fire (The Kingson Pride Book 2) Page 9
