“You have my word.” Robbie’s lips twisted into an empty smile, as if pretending he wasn’t a snake.
Ryder followed him to a booth nearby, all the while thanking the powers that be that Lexi was working late and not here to witness this. When the old man’s face melded with the cruel face that had laughed when five-year-old Ryder had been lying on the floor, clutching his throbbing cheek, Ryder’s heartrate went crazy. He clenched his fists against the urge to strangle the final breaths out of Robbie right here and now. Ryder tossed a look back at Wes, whose eyes had gone black as a raven’s, and Kane was staring after him with an unreadable gaze behind those sunglasses.
And for a moment, Ryder felt like a child again, sent off by his mom to spend a few days with Robbie. The fear was still there. But as Ryder sat back on the booth seat, he studied the monster who had been lurking in the shadows of his life all this time, and he came to realize something. Robbie Anderson was just a man, not a monster. He only had the power Ryder gave him, and that shit ended now.
Ryder wasn’t some scared kid anymore. He wasn’t small and helpless. He had fifty pounds of muscle on his biological father, more fighting experience under his belt than humans could guess at, and his owl wasn’t the terrified, gray, little owlet anymore. Inside, his animal raged to be set free to bleed this man.
Robbie made a disgusted ticking sound and said, “Nice eyes.” Fuckin’ little freak.
Ryder wanted to pummel his face with his bare hands. “Two minutes. What do you want?”
“I came to see how much you’re like me now. I want to go knowing I left my mark on the world.”
Ryder huffed a breath and shook his head. “Zero percent like you. I was raised by a good man.”
“Raised by one don’t mean you’re his, boy.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“Why not?”
“Because my real dad calls me that. He earned nicknames. You earned nothing.”
“I’m your real dad. My blood runs through your veins, Ryder. I named you. I watched you come screaming into this world, and no dad was prouder.”
“Bullshit.” Ryder shook his head, disgusted. He looked around the bar, anywhere but at Robbie’s dead eyes.
“You feel the emptiness yet?”
Bile clawed up the back of Ryder’s throat as he crossed his arms.
“You feel the hole? The one you can’t fill up with anything. That’s from me. That’s from your granddad and great granddad, down through the generations. And oh, I was just like you, thinkin’ I would break the curse. It’s why I tried so hard with your mom.”
“You didn’t try. I remember everything. I remember how unhappy you made her. How you didn’t want to touch her. I saw you standing on the other side of her bedroom door when she was sobbing one night, and you were smiling. You were a shit husband.”
“I did the best I could with her, and you’ll do the same to the woman you play house with. Why do you think you’re thirty and still haven’t settled down? I used to hate the curse. Hated being the way I was, until I didn’t anymore. One day I just realized some men are made for families, and some men are made for procreation. We Anderson’s are made for the latter.”
Ryder hated him. Hated him for what he was doing. Consciously, Ryder knew this was horseshit. His dad was just a lowlife abusive sonofabitch. He was a master manipulator who could turn words and phrases and make people question everything. He was that good at lying. But right now, his words made so much damn sense. Maybe Beaston and Weston never saw him with a mate because he had that poisonous Anderson blood flowing through his veins. Maybe he’d been broken from birth.
Robbie leaned forward. “The best thing you can do is leave your baby mommas to raise your mistakes, because I see the monster in you, Ryder. It’s the same monster that lives in me.”
“I remember what you did,” Ryder gritted out. “I remember everything. Every bruise, every scratch, every fractured bone, every drop of blood. I remember every hateful word you spewed at me, and I remember how you would look my mom in her eyes and tell her you took good care of me when she wasn’t around, you piece of shit. Damn straight you got a monster in you, Robbie. But I’m nothing like you. Two minutes is up. Do the world a favor and die quickly.”
Ryder stood, but Robbie followed him toward the bar. “I wanted a different life for you. Your mom and that boar ruined you. I only made girls after you, and my only son who coulda carried on my family name was brainwashed with all that hippy-dippy shifter shit.”
“Yeah, well that shifter shit is my life since I’m a fuckin’ shifter and all.”
“You weren’t supposed to be!”
Rage blasted through Ryder’s body, and the edges of his vision collapsed inward. In an instant, he had Robbie against the back wall, his hand crushing his throat. “What do you mean by that?”
“I tried to save you.”
“Save me from what?”
“From that fucking animal your momma put inside of you.”
The feel of Robbie’s sagging, clammy skin made Ryder sick. He released him and stared at the old man in horror. “What did you do?”
“I signed you up for a program that would’ve given you a normal life, and your mom said no. I fought hard for you, but that asshole boar pushed me out of your life.”
“What program?” Ryder asked low. It better not be what he fucking thought it was.