The Fighter and His Tiger (Unexpected Love #1)

5. Thursday Evening Week Two

5. Thursday Evening Week Two

I spoke to Mrs Graceford, aka. Old Crone who's not that old, on Tuesday and told her I wanted to try the tutoring thing. She was really happy, like weirdly happy, I guess it's cause no-one ever says they'll do it. So I had got the evening off from work and was now I was on my way over to some kid called Riley's house to try to somehow teach a 14-year-old boy Shakespeare.

Yay me!

I was driving my convertible white Golf Mark One which had been left to me by my dad. He collected old cars and left a Porsche 944 S2 for Tyler when he got older, it was amazing but Nan refused to let me drive it, said I was too irresponsible, I would've argued with her but she was right.

I turned down the music on my stereo and started paying attention to my surroundings when I realised I had reached the rich part of town. It wasn't like our town had a line straight through the middle separating rich and poor, there were just certain neighbourhoods where only the rich lived and this was definitely one of them. 

Who was this Riley kid?

Google maps told me I had reached my destination when I pulled up to a huge gate with a tannoy outside it. I wonder how rich you had to be to have a tannoy.

I pressed the button and spoke into it, so weird, "Hello, my name's Reillyn Cole, I'm here to help Riley out with his English work." There was nothing but static for a minute and I started to think I was at the wrong house, awkward.

But then, "Hello dear, yes, of course, come on in," what sounded like an elderly woman's voice sounded through the tannoy scaring the shit out me.

The gates in front me started to open and I assumed she had pressed some button to allow me in. How rich do you have to be for that?

I followed the driveway down, there was dense forest on either side of the road until it opened up into a roundabout which was actually a fountain. Okay, I'm done. They have a water fountain! I pulled up outside the closed garage doors which are to the left of the front door and get out my car with my mouth hanging open.

Oh my shit, they have pillars!

There was a kind-looking elderly woman standing in the door who appeared to be waiting for me. I grabbed my bag with all my books from the car and made my way over to her, still trying to take everything in around me. I would kill to able to draw half the things here.

When I reached her I smiled and stuck my hand out, "Hi ma'am, my name's Reillyn or Rei for short."

She smiled back at me and shook my hand, "Come in, come in." She pulled me into the house and shut the door behind me. "My name is Rosemary, I am the housekeeper for the Ryker's. It's a pleasure, Rei." Aw, she was so sweet, I liked her already. And then I paused.

Wait a second.

"I'm sorry, I must have misheard you. Did you just say, Ryker? As in Elias Ryker?"

At that exact moment as if summoned by speaking his name aloud (cough, devil alert, cough), Elias Ryker came sauntering down the stairs without a shirt on. As in, no top. Shirtless.

What. A. Joke.

 Firstly his right nipple was pierced. Secondly, my guess from the night of the fight was right, he did have tattoos. Both his arms had them littered all across them and there was one on his left shoulder which curled around onto his chest and up to his neck. There was a bird on his left ribcage and a dead tree on his lower right hip which curled around his body, along with a few more little ones. His hair was wet as if he just had a shower and hung in loose strands on his forehead. He was wearing black joggers which hung low enough on his hips for me to see his v-line and he had a silver chain dangling from his neck with some sort of pendant on it. The artist inside me was going crazy, she wanted to admire his tattoo work up close but the normal inside me realised how weird that would be and so I stayed firmly rooted where I was.