Rebirth of the Broken Luna A Second Chance at Luna's Heart novel Chapter 222

Chapter 222

OLLIE

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‘Maybe he’ll come back later for the money,” Aunt Lynn suggested gently shrugging her shoulders as well, but she didn’t sound like

she really believed that explanation she was giving to me.

Before anyone could ask more questions about the odd situation, Riley showed up at the kitchen doorway, looking at us.

His face was back to its normal neutral expression that he always kept, and if I hadn’t seen him spit out that ice cream and throw it away without giving a good reason why, I would never have guessed anything was wrong.

“Where’s your ice cream, Riley?” Mama asked, the same question she’d asked me a moment before.

“I ate it already,” Riley said immediately without missing a beat as he added, with a smile on his face. “It was really good. I finished

the whole thing.”

I nearly choked on my own ice cream in shock when I heard those words from his mouth Riley was lying to all of us and he was doing it so smoothly and confidently that I could tell this wasn’t the first time he’d had to create fake stories to cover up his real feelings

or actions.

Part of me wanted to call him out on the lie, to tell Mama what I’d really seen and what truly happened out there. But something

held me back, before I could confess.

I wasn’t sure but maybe it was the memory of how Riley had looked when he was watching that ice cream truck, or maybe it was the

fear that if I called him out in front of our mother, he might go back to pretending that I didn’t exist anymore.

I still remembered what it had been like before we became real friends or became close to each other, back when Riley was still living

with Sophia and he went to the same school as me. He’d been so good at making me feel invisible, at looking right through me like I

wasn’t even there and it hurt a lot. When our teacher Mrs. Henderson would ask questions, Riley would always know the answers before I

did, making me feel stupid and slow in comparison.

The only reason we’d started talking again was because I’d kept insisting on trying to be his friend, even when he clearly didn’t want anything to do with me. And then there had been that accident on the school staircase, where Riley had pushed me but then grabbed me

when we both started falling, taking most of the impact himself when we hit the bottom.

He’d been hurt pretty badly from that fall, and I’d felt terrible about it even though the whole thing had been his fault to begin with. But seeing him hurt like that because he had risked his life to protect me made me realize that Riley wasn’t as heartless and cold as I

portrayed him to be.

Now I was faced with the same kind of choice in this situation. I could expose his lie and end up destroying the building relationship

that we got going on or I could feign ignorance and hope that whatever was bothering him would work itself out on its own.

‘I’m glad you liked it,” Mama said to Riley, her voice warm with affection that ended up making Riley feel both uncomfortable and

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Chapter 222

somewhat relaxed at the same time. Irony.

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“I’m going to go read in my room, I announced, breaking the silence that had settled on us as I needed space to think about

everything that had just happened.

“Okay, sweetheart,” Mama said, kissing the top of my head as I walked past her chair, before letting me go. “Call if you need

anything.”

I nodded my head in response and headed upstairs to our guest bedroom, but reading was the last thing on my mind.

What I really wanted was to talk to Dad about Riley’s weird behavior and try to see if there was any advice he could give me on what

to do.

After all Dad had always been better at understanding Riley than the rest of us, probably because he’d spent so much time with him

even when Riley was still Sophia’s son.

Back then, when Mama was always warning me that Sophia was up to something bad and I should never be caught anywhere alone

with her and also that Riley might be dangerous despite Daddy’s intentions to make us best friends and I had stayed away especially

when I didn’t understand half of what was going on, only that it hurt a lot whenever Riley touched me. But Dad had been the one who

saw past Riley’s defensive walls and hostile attitude towards everyone. He’d somehow managed to connect with my twin brother in ways that I envied, getting Riley to open up and show glimpses of the person he really was underneath all that anger and fear.

Maybe Dad would know why Riley had acted so weird about the ice cream truck or at least he would give me advice on how to help

my brother without him lashing out at me because he felt cornered.

I pulled out my tablet from the drawer and dialed Dad’s number, hoping he wasn’t too busy with his trip to Silver Creek City to talk

to his worried son.

The phone rang once, twice, three times before going to voicemail.

“Hi, you’ve reached Xenois Blackwood. Please leave a message and I’ll get back to you as soon as possible.”

I hung up without leaving a message, feeling more frustrated and worried than before. Dad was probably still running through the

woods in wolf form, trying to get that medicine to Carol’s partner before it was too late, He wouldn’t be able to answer his phone until he

got back to human form, which could be hours from now.

But I needed to talk to someone about what I’d seen.I thought about calling Grandma and Grandpa, but they were still dealing with

their own crisis taking care of our pack since we weren’t in Silver Creek City at the moment..there had to be someone in authority there

to avoid chaos and a coup.

Maybe I was overreacting. Maybe Riley had just been having an off day, or maybe the ice cream really had tasted funny to him for some reason that had nothing to do with anything dangerous or scary.

I flopped down on my bed and stared at the ceiling, wishing Dad would call back and wishing I was brave enough to ask Riley directly

what was wrong.

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Reborn From Regret A Second Chance at Luna’s Heart