Bertinelli Family

Chapter 40. Haşhaş

Third Person POV

Arriving home, the Bertinelli family walked inside all with various expressions. William walked inside and ignored his family taking his luggage up to his room and immediately going to his home office closing his door to all visitors. 

All of his children went to their rooms. The youngest four of the family all texted one another and made their way to Riley's room. The three sisters walked to find their oldest sister laying on her bed staring at the ceiling like it held the world's most wanted answers. 

"What are we gonna do?" Ruby asked as she sat down on her sister's bed. 

"About what exactly?" Riley asked her sister.

"Notes threatening us, and heads being sent to us. On top of that Dad and Oliver lying to us." Ruby has more to add to her worries but can only put into words the few she mentions. 

"We do nothing," Riley tells her sisters. What she doesn't say is how she plans on talking to her father and oldest brother. She wanted answers just as much as her sisters but she knew she couldn't just barge in and demand answers. 

"What do you mean we do nothing?!" Ruby jumped off the bed and stood in front of her sister who was still avoiding eye contact. 

"I mean you three do nothing." Riley sat up to look at her enraged sister. 

"What?" The three sisters all spoke at once.

"You three will do nothing and I will deal with it."

"Just like you dealt with Bradley," Ruby spoke with venom lacing her voice. 

"Yeah, just like I dealt with Bradley, like how I dealt with the bullies back in middle school, how I dealt with the creeps you ran into at parties, like how I dealt with mom. If you want to keep bringing  up things that I have done let's bring up yours too." Riley started her rant. Her sisters only watched as she unleashed every moment of stress she got while taking care of her sisters. 

"Let's start with sneaking out and hiding a boyfriend from your own sisters. How about you dating a bully that enjoys beating up people in deserted hallways for being different? Huh. What do you not have anything to say?" Riley stood in front of her sister with anger radiating off of her. Ryan stood in shock as Rory had unshed tears. 

"What are you talking about?" Ruby asked her sister. 

"Oh, you must have been too busy shoving your tongues done each other's throats to actually talk to each other." Ruby looked shocked while Riley just looked pissed. 

"Now how bout you get the hell out of my room." Riley walked away into her bathroom and slammed the door and audibly locked it. The three watched their normally cold and guarded sister break down in front of them. 

The three decided to follow through and walk out of the room and downstairs to find their older siblings in the kitchen. 

Upstairs Riley was in her bathroom staring at the mirror as her eyes turned red. Feeling the burn in her eyes she only smiled at her reflection and got angrier. She clenched her fists till her knuckles turned white, and little crescents were embedded in her palm. 

Licking the front of her teeth, she glared at her reflection. She was not upset that she had yelled at her sisters she had done that plenty growing up, but she was mad at herself for telling one of Ashton's secrets. 

Her sisters hardly even knew who Ashton was let alone how they became friends. She still felt like she had betrayed one of her first real friends she had. 

The other three sisters were downstairs they were obviously upset about something but were refusing to tell their older siblings. 

William was still in his office going over security tapes and trying to find who was threatening his family. 

Riley had finished glaring in her mirror and was able to subside her anger long enough to go downstairs. She had managed to walk to her father's office without her siblings seeing her from the kitchen. 

She walked to his door and put her ear against it and heard him shuffling papers. She decided against knocking and walked into the office. She shut the door and made her way to sit in front of her father without saying a word to his questioning glance. 

"Look I'm a little busy Riley. Can we do this later?" He spoke with clear stress in his voice as he looked at his daughter. 

"That's why I'm here." She spoke like she was in a business meeting. 

"Riley." He rubbed his brow. 

"Dad. Listen I think you should have told us about the notes but you didn't. Can't fix it. What you can do is let me help."

"Help with what exactly?"

"Finding whoever this is."

"Riley."

"Listen I'm not going to let someone threaten me and my sisters and sit here and do nothing."

"I can't let my daughter get involved in something like this."

"I'm already involved. Might as well let me help and get this thing done faster."

"Since you're not going to give up, fine." Riley nods to her father. "But, you will listen to everything I tell you."

"Fine."

"Here, go through these." He hands her a stack of papers.

"What are these?" 

"Those are the notes I've been receiving." Riley looks down at the stack in front of her amazed at the number of papers that were they.