Page 84 of Ravaged Devotion

That was most likely the real reason.

Feelings.

The twins had witnessed their father murder their mother at a young age. They’d both shut down for a time after that, and when Rue had finally seen them again months later, they’d been different.

Ryker had new anger management issues and a penchant to lash out, whereas Ryder had retreated further into himself. He and Uriel had spent most of their time playing video games together, but there was a detachment even between them, as though Ryder could no longer form connections with people.

His twin was his only confidant, and it was obvious now that even between them, Ryder had kept his real secrets close to the chest.

But his aversion to love and all things romantic was well known.

Was that why he’d done it?

He’d seen how things were progressing between Ryker and Rue, and had feared for his brother, or both of them? Love had gotten his mother killed, and even though they’d hardly been children at eighteen, that mindset had stuck with Ryder as he’d grown. That love was more than weakness, it was a dangerous attachment, one that could only lead to pain and loss.

Really, it was more surprising that neither Rue or Ryker had seen it coming, but hindsight was twenty-twenty. Rue might have also blamed him more before, but now, after having just lost his own mother to a brutal and unfair death…

He shoved papers back into a folder and closed the desk drawer he’d been riffling through, moving onto another. “Ryker’s belonged to me for as long as I can remember. Nothing can change that.”

Lenore stared at him a moment and then made an awkward sound he couldn’t quite place the meaning of. “You’re right. You are a Black Hart. You even sound like them.”

“Does that make you uncomfortable?”

“We’ve been friends since middle school,” she reminded. “I know who you are, Rue.”

There wasn’t really anything here. He sighed and gave up. “What I am is a bad detective. Let’s go join the others.”

“What were you even hoping to find?”

“I don’t know.” He blew out a breath. “But we’ve got to operate under the assumption that there really is someone behind all of this.”

“Behind bad weather and monsters in the woods?”

“When you put it that way, it sounds farfetched.”

“Yeah, because it is.” Lenore shook her head. “They’re just being paranoid. I mean, I get they have enemies, especially Ryker’s dad, but they believe someone…what? Got a ton of fog machines big enough to shroud the entire resort and filled it with creatures from a horror movie? And they got those where, exactly?”

“I don’t know,” he repeated. “But explain how a bear could sound exactly like my mom? And not just. It wasn’t screams like it’d been with Darae. That thing spoke full sentences. You heard it too.”

Lenore shifted on her feet. “Okay, but are we guessing someone trained them to do that? To mimic the voices of the dead, and—”

“Not just the dead. One pretended to be Uriel when Ryker and I were on watch duty the other night.”

“You were on watch with him?” Lenore crossed her arms and seemed to be taking him more seriously, but then she blew out a breath and shook her head a second time. “I just don’t believe it. It’s too much of a leap.”

While she had a point, Rue wasn’t convinced. Ryker wouldn’t have jumped to that conclusion if there wasn’t some merit there.

“You said it was Uriel’s voice?” She glanced over her shoulder as if worried one of the others would overhear, even though they were all meant to be on the third floor. “What if…What if you’re partially right?”

“What do you mean?”

“He was trapped in a game for three years,” she reminded.

“This isn’t a game.”

“But it’s like one, isn’t it?” She moved closer to the desk, lowering her voice. “Uriel has always been strange. What if being in that virtual reality messed with him and he’s the one doing all of this?”

“He woke up a week ago.” Rue might have considered her logic if not for that last fact. A week was definitely not enough time to pull a hoax of this magnitude off.