Page 36 of Monster Mate

The bedroom contained nothing but a ratty Queen-sized mattress…and pictures of Roxie.

Neil had wallpapered the entire 10’ x 12’ space with surveillance photos of his mate. There were photos of her at the Monster Match, at the supermarket with Winston, taking Waldo for a walk, and being released from the hospital.

There was even an entire wall of photos that seemed to have been taken close to his property, maybe with a telephoto lens, because there he was, kissing Roxie in the solarium, the garden, and backyard.

The truly bone-chilling ones, though, were of Roxie with him in their bedroom. In those shots, there were slashes across her throat, as if Neil had angrily scratched them with a blade of some kind before pinning them to the wall.

He’d been intruding on Roxie’s every private moment since she arrived in Sanity Falls, and he was angry in a big, dangerous way.

No matter how much Roxie wanted to reclaim her independence and take care of this problem herself, it was just too dangerous. Neil was too dangerous. He needed to be dealt with sooner rather than later.

Riordan turned on his heel, ready to get out of this physical manifestation of psychosis, and caught sight of something in the closet that captured his full attention.

Bags of fertilizer.

He could only think of one thing a person like Neil (who clearly didn’t do any yard maintenance) would do with bags of fertilizer.

Making bombs.

Neil could potentially kill half the town with a well-placed bomb.

God help them all.

He needed to find Roxie and get her to safety now.

CHAPTER 23

“I don’t see what the big deal is.”

Roxie put her car in park in front of Riordan’s house and pinched the bridge of her nose in exasperation. “The big deal, Winston, is that there aren’t a ton of facilities who offer water physical therapy in Sanity Falls. We can’t afford for you to alienate anyone—anyone else, that is—at that YMCA.”

Winston sniffed indignantly and crossed his arms over his chest. “It’s not my fault they can’t handle the truth.”

“You don’t need to always tell the truth,” she intoned dryly. “Especially when no one asked you.”

“Look, if that therapist can’t handle a few simple questions, then he’s not fit to work with the public.”

“Commenting on someone’s appearance is never OK. And it’s especially not OK to ask him if his parents lost a bet with God.”

Winston scowled at her. “Hey, when I’m out there, he’s the only thing standing between me and drowning. If he’s some cosmic joke, I need to know.”

She rolled her eyes. “You’re in the shallow end the whole time, Winston. It’s not like you’re a Navy SEAL.”

“Whatever. Fuck him if he can’t take a joke.”

“He probably can take a joke, but you weren’t joking. You were an asshole to him, Winston.”

The asshole in question had the nerve to lean over and boop her nose with the tip of his index finger. “You love me anyway.”

God help her, she really did. And while she never would’ve said anything herself, the physical therapist at the pool that morning did have the brow of a caveman and a hooked nose that reminded Roxie of a Toucan. So, while Winston’s question was entirely awful and inappropriate, it wasn’t like Roxie hadn’t been thinking the same thing. Especially after the guy had leered at her boobs and told her that if she was ever injured and needed PT, she should come to him immediately…in a bikini. Then he'd given her a wink that made her skin crawl and one of those stupid little finger gun movements.

So…why was she chastising Winston again?

Oh, yeah. Because she didn’t want to have to drive three towns over for his next water physical therapy session.

“Just try to be a little nicer next time, OK?”

When Winston didn’t answer, she glanced over, then followed his horrified gaze to Riordan’s front door.

---