Young and Foolish

Chapter 33: Danny's Girl

Ryder's POV:

 Dinner with Sarah on Tuesdays was a norm now. We had built  a pattern of me coming over to her house after school to study. And unlike the first time, she didn't stay locked away in her room painting away, and I wasn't stuck with Nicky. 

Nicky honestly wasn't all that bad. Even though she could be hard to understand sometimes, I kind of liked it when she'd run into my arms to give me a hug as soon as I walked in. If I wanted to be in a serious relationship with Sarah, I'd need her family to like me, too. Mrs. Viv liked me a lot, and Nicky adored me. Richard seemed to like me, too. The only one left that I had to win over was her twin brother, but I wasn't going to worry about his approval if he was out of the picture. 

And by out of the picture, I meant that he was apparently not well-liked by the rest of the family. There was some hostility between him and Richard, which I learned through how uptight Richard got whenever the name Theodore was brought into conversation. I didn't know exactly what had happened before he went to that boarding school, but whatever it was wasn't good. 

Sarah didn't talk about him much either, but it was clear the thought of him had her rather upset, too. She was never too loose with her emotions, but she immediately diverted the conversation to another topic the second he was mentioned. 

Nicky seemed to be the only one that didn't feel too strongly against him, but then again, I figured she was probably too young to understand whatever it was that he did wrong. I had only learned of all this because Nicky was the only one with enough guts to talk about him. But she mostly just asked simple things, like if the two of them could go to the park together when he got back. 

I wanted to know if he was the reason they had to leave their old pack, but I also didn't want to pry. 

Thankfully, my curiosity wasn't overwhelming. I don't really care to know what he did, because knowing Sarah's family, it probably wasn't even that bad. They were like the nicest people I knew, so there was no way he was much different. 

And up until the first week of November, I had thought that Theodore was the only mystery I had to wonder about. 

This particular Tuesday, I could immediately tell that something was up. Richard and Mrs. Viv kept sending each other mysterious glances throughout the afternoon, and it was clear that they were keeping a secret from Sarah. But by those mischievous grins they could hardly keep off their faces, I was sure it was some sort of surprise. And somehow, Sarah didn't notice a thing. 

It was actually pretty amusing watching everyone giggling to themselves and metaphorically tiptoeing around, with her being absolutely clueless in the middle of it all. And even though I didn't know what the surprise was, I couldn't help but chuckle to myself too every time I noticed either of her parents throw a glance at each other. 

She finally noticed something off during dinner. 

"Why do you keep looking at each other like that?" she asked, squinting at them.

"Like what?" Mrs. Viv cocked her head to the side, playing innocent. Unfortunately, she was a bad actor.  Her reaction only made Sarah more suspicious. 

But before she got the chance to pry further, the doorbell rang. 

"Why don't you go answer that, Sarah?" Richard asked, sounding a lot more nonchalant than Mrs. Viv was trying to be. 

Sarah raised an eyebrow at them, but didn't disobey. But as soon as she left the table, everyone else got up to go see whoever it was that came, lingering near the edge of the kitchen entrance. I followed along as well, because Mrs. Viv and Richard's excitement was making me curious. 

I peered around the corner to see Sarah open the door, but she hardly opened it a smidge before squealing shrilly. I flinched ever so slightly, noticing Richard and Nicky do the same. Curse werewolf super-hearing. 

She threw the door open and leapt right into the arms of an attractive blonde, who had dropped a duffel bag to catch her and hold her tightly in his arms. 

My heart fell watching their embrace, which I could only describe as loving. 

"I missed you, Lily," he murmured. The grin on his face was blinding. Lily? No, that's not the most important question. What I really wanted to know was who he was. Her brother? A boyfriend? 

"I missed you too, Danny," she replied. 

Oh. Danny.