A/N: I know this took longer than any of us would have preferred, but I'm really trying to finish Ice Princess before I really get into this story. I hope this will keep you going for a while. Thanks for all the amazing support for this story. :)
Disclaimer: I don't own Girl Meets World
Chapter 2: Determination
Sitting at the kitchen table in her apartment, Riley stared at the small white card, trying to analyze everything about it. Which to admit, didn't take much time; it was only two by three inches and the font was generic Times New Roman. Plain and simple. Small and clean. Even a professional specialized in writing styles and techniques, wouldn't be able to tell her anything about the origin of this threat.
Beside her were a pile of unread morning newspapers from around the country headlining her most recent success. Normally, she would enjoy the pleasure of a win, sip from a glass of white wine, maybe even watch a romantic comedy if she was in the mood. But this time it felt different. Not just the heaviness of the sling holding her collarbone in place, or the pain medication the doctor prescribed, not even the pulsing ache of her head as she waited for the piercing to dissipate.
This time it was the hollow feeling that she had in some way been violated.
With her free hand, she pushed back the hair that had fallen into her face and watched Maya run around her kitchen preparing dinner and then back to Josh who had been running in and out of her loft apartment with boxes of groceries.
The hospital had kept Riley under observation for the night to make sure that her concussion was stable and allow for a brief recovery. It had only been a few hours since her doctor gave her the approval to leave on the strict order of bed rest and both Josh and Maya had come to pick her up.
Still, there she was, perched at the dining room table, her eyes fighting to stay open. Neither of her two house guests were aware of the small piece of paper that sat in front of her, haunting her every thought. And that was the way things were going to stay until she knew more.
"Hey Riles," Maya called from the kitchen island where she had her arms allow deep into the sink. The loud sound of Maya's voice felt ten times louder than normal. "Are you feeling up to some soup?" she asked.
Riley slid the paper into her navy blue sweater pocket, and turned to her best friend.
She didn't even have to consider it. "Your soup?" Riley asked. "Always. I hope it's a big pot."
Maya smiled to herself and Riley stood up carefully and slowly, walking across the open concept floor.
"I called your office this morning and explained everything that happened," Maya said stirring the liquid in the pot. Taking a seat at one of the bar stools, Riley rested the arm which wasn't kept in a sling on the counter to hold up her heavy head.
"You didn't have to do that. I was just going to call in and make today a sick day," Riley dismissed.
Maya released an audible sigh, and just as quick Riley knew that they were about to argue, so she felt the need to explain herself.
"The office is crazy busy, even on the weekends. When I miss a day of just emails and phone calls alone, it pushes me back half a week with everything I need to respond to and review. Plus I am nothing without my laptop. The office will still be open for a while, maybe we can go get it," Riley said looking down and squinting at her watch.
Maya tried to collect her patience to deal with the work infused brunette.
"This isn't just a sick say for you, Riley," Maya began, pointing the wooden spoon at Riley. "You were hit by a damn car. An SUV. You have head trauma and a broken collar bone. You are drugged up so high I feel like you are looking right through me. You are not okay and this is not just a sick day."
"I know," Riley said quietly, slightly ashamed by Maya's tone.
"Do you?" Maya asked. "The doctor said bed rest and you're acting it's a normal day for you."
"I know it's not a normal day, but can't I just try and pretend like nothing has changed," Riley asked.
Maya began shaking her head slowly with her lips pursed. "Today is not normal, and pretending that it is would just be foolish."
"Is the soup almost ready?" Riley asked, changing the subject, her eyes wandering around the room.
"Five more minutes," Maya said quietly watching the restless brunette.
Finishing with delivering groceries to his sister, Joshua Matthews drove back to the precinct to grab a few files so that he could work on them and still monitor Riley. He was getting slightly annoyed by all of the questions he was getting about Riley, since the news had gone around that she was involved in an accident.
"Hey Luke!" Josh called to the only detective who hadn't asked about Riley, and walked over to his desk. The young detective was knee high in work since Josh had taken the day off, and Josh almost felt bad the the other man was stuck indoors doing paper work for the day.
Lucas looked up from his computer monitor and turned to his partner.
"I just wanted to let you know that I'm taking the rest of the day off, and possibly tomorrow as well," Josh informed.
"I know," Lucas nodded. "Hunter told me."
Josh looked back at the Sergeant's office and saw saw the man on the phone.
"Oh, okay. Well are you going to be fine on your own today? I can get one of the other detectives to give you a hand with the workload if you want."
Lucas smiled to himself.
"Don't worry about me, just go home to your wife and sister and be with family," Lucas said, remembering the sight of the two beautiful young women from the previous day. Both girls stunning in their own way.
"Thanks Luke," Josh said trying to give his partner a small smile.
Josh began to make his way back to his own desk and filled the rest of his brown cardboard box with the remaining case files. His eyes skimmed across Riley's file and he sighed, remembering the ongoing investigation.
"Lucas?" Josh asked again, hating the sound of his on voice asking for a favour.
Lucas just looked up at him in acknowledgment.
"Do you think you could look into my sister's file again and see if we missed anything," he asked.
"Already on it," Lucas replied, quickly typing on his computer. "I've got some surveillance footage from Riley's office and the entrance of her building at work as well coming in today. I'll call you if there is any advancement."
"Thanks man. I wouldn't usually ask for a favour but this is Riley and-"
"Don't worry about it, Josh. I've got your back," Lucas said, cutting Josh off.
Lucas could tell that Josh was uncomfortable about the situation, and even though they hadn't known each other than long, he still felt bad for his partner. Everything about the situation was grey, instead of the usual black and white. It was messy and Lucas couldn't help but feel bad for Josh's younger sister who had gotten herself into a bad situation.
After a few moments, Lucas watched Josh leave the office towards the elevator, leaving him feeling a little bit less like he was walking on broken glass. He opened up his email, and clicked on the email he had received earlier that day from the security desk at New York Daily News, revealing two attached surveillance videos. He opened the documents and began to to press play.
The first video was from a camera placed in a large office room, which he presumed was the room outside of Riley's office and when he took a closer look he could see the outline of Riley sitting at her desk through the glass windows between her office and the main offices.
The thing about watching surveillance videos was that it was a long and boring process, and it required a lot of patience and a keen eye.
Lucas wasn't really sure what he was looking for, which didn't help the situation at all. And there wasn't any sound to go along with the already uneventful videos.
After about half an hour of watching, Lucas put down his pen. There was only so much he could take of watching surveillance at a time, he needed a coffee break. He leaned backwards in his chair, stretching his arms into the air and releasing a yawn as he looked about his office for a distraction.
A flicker of light caught his attention and he looked back at the computer monitor. Lucas paused the video, Riley appeared to be on the phone with someone, and she was standing up so her white blouse caught the attention of the camera. He rewinded the video a minute and pressed play again, watching Riley reach for the phone as it rang and her reaction to the call.
It was clear that she was upset as she stood up from her seat, her face became angry as she listened to whoever was talking on the other side of the line. Soon her expression changed from angry to sad and fearful. Lucas didn't know what was happening but he knew one thing for certain, someone had upset the young brunette, someone had hurt her deep down and in that moment he wondered if there was more to the story than even Josh was letting on.
The only way he would know was to question the journalist herself.
The call was suspicious, but Lucas still knew that none of the story was adding up.
He knew the facts of the case; Riley was in her office that morning from 8am until 9:30, when she went with two other people who appeared to be technicians. From that time until 11am Riley was with a Farkle Minkus and Isadora Smackle, who had been confirmed to be the technicians filming her latest broadcast which was aired live for the entire country to watch. Riley returned to her office to find a friend, who Lucas now knew to be Maya Matthews where they had a heated discussion until 12pm when they decided to leave for lunch. At exactly 12:20 the ambulance arrived on the scene.
The only way anyone would have been able to know when Riley was leaving the building again to know when to hit her with the car would be if they knew her schedule perfectly. Or even better someone had been watching her as well.
Lucas leaned back in his chair once again, and looked out the window on the opposite wall to see the city outside.
Someone had been watching Riley. But for how long? And how exactly? Through the surveillance? Was there a bug somewhere in the office? Or perhaps a mole somewhere working alongside Riley this entire time. What ever it was, Lucas was going to get to the bottom of all of this.
His mind drifted back to the image of Riley lying on the bed in the hospital, only an hour before seeing her on the news for the first time. She was a beautiful young woman, and yet when she lied on the bed helpless and teary eyed, Lucas couldn't help but feel some sort of desire of protect her. Like an instinct.
Riley was hurting and he going to do everything in his power to make sure that never happened again.
He was going to help her. And he was going to put whoever this creep was who had been stalking Riley behind bars.
Joshua Matthews walked into his sister's apartment finding Maya in the kitchen cleaning up the dishes. The young blonde looked utterly exhausted in her blue overalls and white t-shirt which were covered in small splatters of paint. She had her hair pulled back into a ponytail, a few fly aways carving her face. Josh placed the box full of case files on the counter and smiled sadly at his wife who had yet to acknowledge his presence in the room.
He saw her stop scrubbing, putting her hands against the counter expecting to see her turn around and smile back at him, but she just stood in place, bringing a hand to her face.
Furrowing his brows in confusion, the officer walked around the centre island counter and put a hand on her arm. Maya froze in surprise, then turned instantly to see Josh.
She had a stream of tears running down her face, breaking his heart.
"Hey," he whispered soothingly, wiping away the tears of her face. "What happened sweet girl?"
Maya just wrapped her arms around her husband, letting him hold onto her and comfort her. It surprised Josh to see Maya acting this way, since she used to be so uptight about her emotions, but lately with Maya things had been much looser. With Riley running around awol half the time, neither of them quite knew what was going to happen.
Maya was tough, but sometimes she didn't have to be.
"I'm sorry," Maya whispered, sniffling against his navy blue NYPD shirt. "It's just been a long few days."
"I know," he replied, resting his head on top of hers and rubbing his hand up and down her back. "I wish we were back in Italy going to museums and on wine tours." Josh remembered their honeymoon which they had put off for over a year but had finally gotten to last month.
"Me too," she agreed, pulling her head back, letting Josh kiss her lightly on the forehead. "All that art, I was so inspired. Maybe someday we can go back."
"I would love that," Josh grinned down at Maya who now had a small smile on her face again. He led her over to the living room and pulled her onto his lap sitting on the brown leather chair. "How is she?" he asked looking over his shoulder to Riley's bedroom.
Maya snuggled into the crook of Josh's neck, resting her eyes for a moment. The light from the window shone onto them and the sun warmed their skin. "Avoiding confrontation as usual. She won't even admit that something is wrong. She wanted me to bring her back to work so we could grab her laptop." That didn't surprise him.
"That's Riley for you. Don't worry, I think she's still in shock. Soon it'll settle in and she's really going to need us then."
"Well for now we'll just be baby-sitting the poor girl. I made her some of my soup and she's been sleeping like a baby for a hour now."
"Just what the doctor ordered," Josh said, a small smile on his face. Gosh he was the luckiest man in the world, having such a beautiful, talented and creative wife. Maya truly was the woman of his dreams, and after growing up together, she was definitely his best friend. There wasn't another person in the world he could imagine spending the rest of his life with.
The couple just sat and enjoyed each others presence. Life was far to short not to enjoy the small moments.
Josh wasn't sure who much time had passed when Maya finally spoke up again.
"Josh?" she asked.
"Mmhmm?" he mumbled.
"I want to have a baby," Maya whispered.
If he had been drinking water or eating food, he would have choked. Instead his eyes popped wide open, and then his brows rose in confusion. Neither of them had ever brought up the subject of a family. Not for any particular reason, it just hadn't come up and neither of them really wanted to change anything.
"You what?" he asked.
"I-I want a baby," Maya said, louder this time.
Josh was speechless, he figured it would happen eventually, them having a family. It was everything he ever dreamed of. But sitting here now, all of the words in his vocabulary just seemed to disappear and he sat there looking like a fool.
"Josh?" Maya asked again. "What do you think? Please say something."
Maya's plea brought him out of his limbo trance, and he gave her the warmest of smiles, which suddenly calmed her beating heart.
"I always thought I would be the one having to convince you to have a family," he finally said.
Maya let out a breath she didn't know she had been holding, and cupped her husbands chin in her hands.
"You did?"
"I just know how you are, and I mean, are you sure? You want to have a baby?"
"Yes. And I can't explain why. I just love you so much and I know we're already a family, you and me, but I want a little more."
Josh leaned forward capturing Maya lips against his.
"I want that too," he whispered. "I want that so much. I love you so much." Maya smiled against his lips, losing herself in him.
Riley stared up at the ceiling in her bed, the pain medication just beginning to wear off a she once again began to contemplate life. She wasn't sure how long she had been sleeping, part of her couldn't even force her head to turn just to see her alarm clock.
She was so stiff and tired, even though she'd been sleeping for such a long time already. It must have been at least 7 at night, because when Riley looked down towards the window, she saw the sun just beginning to set over the buildings and the beauty of the red and orange sky.
She knew she had a lot on her mind, and much more important things to be worrying about at the moment, but what was five more minutes or pretending the world was just as typical as it always was?
Riley stood up slowly, walking over to her window and watching the sun set, letting the simplicity overcome her. She stepped back to the small chair she had sitting in her room, meant exactly for these moments of enjoying the cityscape or reading a good book.
She truly missed her simpler life. Her life before she grew up.
Riley sat down in the chair, realizing it was a lot of effort now to stand up for extended periods of time with pain pulsing through her veins.
Looking towards the small shelf she had next to the chair holding all of her favourite books that she had collected over the years, Riley leaned to grab The Great Gatsby which she has read numerous times but curl never quite get enough of. Flipping open the pages, she skimmed the book trying to pick a place to start.
But then she froze, turning her head back to the shelf and finding a single white rose lying against the third shelf.
Almost certain it hadn't been there before she came in her room, she looked back at the door, which was open a crack. She could hear the sound of the television playing in the other room, which meant that Josh and Maya were still there.
She picked up the rose and found another white note waiting beneath it. Hesitant, she leaned to grab for it, and flipped it over in her fingers, immediately wishing she hadn't looked at it at all.
A toast to your innocence. My greatest condolences.
Riley's fingers traced the paper, as he mind pondered in disbelief. Where had this come from. She looked around the room, not entirely sure for what. Her heart beat rapidly, as she looked back at the rose, feeling nauseous just looking at it.
Who was doing this to her? Who was making her feel this way? What did they want?
Riley walked over the her vanity and grabbed her phone, dialling the number of the one person she knew would be able to help her, one of the few people she was certain she could still trust.
"Hello?" the caller answered.
"Farkle?"
Back in the living room, Maya was falling asleep on Josh's shoulder while Josh watched the news when his phone rang in his pocket. Maya stirred in her sleep, while Josh shifted to maneuver the phone from his pocket without disturbing her.
The caller ID showed as his partner.
"Friar?" he asked confused. "It's getting late, why are you calling?"
On the other side of the line, Lucas walked around Riley's office, and stepped out the door for privacy. "I got a warrant for your sister's office. I was looking through some of the surveillance videos from yesterday and I had a hunch that there was something going on there. The guys are in there right now."
Lucas looked back at the office which was being torn apart by the forensics department, looking left, right, and centre for fingerprints, bugs, and fishy activity.
"Normally, I might get pissed, but this is Riley, so have they found anything yet?"
"There was a bug in the office. Of of the squints found it hidden on the underside of her desk. Someone has been listening in her conversations indefinitely." The thought of someone following his sister so closely made Josh sick to his stomach.
"Shit," Josh hissed, rubbing the back of his neck and shaking his head.
"I don't know if we'll find anything else while we're here, but just to be safe, we're going to double check."
Josh sighed, looking back to Riley's room, where she sleep unbeknownst to the world attacking her. He couldn't let her get hurt anymore. Maybe she had gotten herself into this mess, but no one and especially not someone as good as Riley deserved to be haunted like this.
"Do whatever needs to be done," Josh said, looking down to his wife, and pushing back some of the hair that was falling into her face. He wasn't going to let anyone else hurt his family ever again. "Is there anything I can do to help?"
"We've got to question her, man. She might know something and not even realize it."
"You're right. But I just don't know when she'll be up to that."
"Understandable. I just think that she might be in more danger than anyone realizes."
"Me too," Josh agreed, just as someone began knocking on the front door.
"I've got to go. But keep me updated. I know you have the next few days off, so I can take over tomorrow. Have a good break."
"I can come in to help tomorrow if you want." Josh stood up and began walking to the front door of the apartment.
"That's not necessary. You've done enough already. Riley probably won't be up to interrogation for the next few days anyways."
"Sure. Goodnight, Josh.:
"Goodnight," Josh said staring at the door, listening to the tapping continue against the door.
Opening the door, he found two familiar faces smiling guiltily at him.
"Minkus? Smackle?" Josh asked. "What are doing here?"
Farkle pushed himself around the taller man, holding his laptop case in one hand. Isadora stayed on the other side of the door and smiled politely. "Riley asked us here," Farkle explained, knowing exactly where he had to go.
"She's asleep. I'm sure whatever illegal activity you've got prepared can wait until the morning," Josh crossed his arms firmly.
"You being a cop doesn't scare me," Farkle eyed Josh. "And everything we do is inside the law, we just know how to look outside the box."
"Not what I want to hear right now," Josh went to cover his ears.
Josh looked back at Maya who was now frowning at their latest guests, and stood up, walking next to her husband, wrapping a blanket around her.
"Sorry to wake you," he apologized.
"No," Maya shook her head, curiously. "It's fine, I was just resting my eyes anyways. What's going on here."
"They say Riley called them," he explained, wondering why they were lying and why they were actually in Riley's apartment.
"We're not lying, man," Farkle frowned, already setting up his laptop at the kitchen table, typing rapidly.
Smackle waved to Maya and allowed herself into the apartment, taking a seat next to Farkle, the two of them analyzing the information like the geniuses they were.
"You can't just let yourself into the apartment. This is a bad time guys, you need to leave," Josh said, standing up for his sisters integrity.
"They stay," Riley said, stepping into the living room from her bedroom, gaining everyones attention. "And I did call them."
Everyone was uncomfortable, when the young brunette who was usually so put together and always did well hiding her emotions and fears crossed the distance to the table, hugging her body in the large blue sweater. Now, Riley looked utterly scared and no one knew how to react.
Riley slid the two white notes that she had received in the last two days across the table to Farkle and Isadora and waited for their reactions.
A/N: Looks like Lucas is fond of our favourite brunette. What did you think of this chapter? Happy (early) Valentines Day! :)
