Having learned her lesson, Riley got the fuck out of the way, abandoning the bathroom as fast as her legs would take her.
With fingers crossed that Clark kept his brush in his sock drawer or something, she walked back to the bedroom, only noticing that she was leaving a wet trail of footprints when she slid a little on the laminate. Oh, come on. Who knew there were so many ways to leave evidence?
Riley might be hot and capable, but she was starting to think she would make the worst criminal ever.
Hopping on one foot, then the other, she took off her boots and set them beside the door.
She’d have to find a way to mop up before she left, but that was fine. Doable. Clark definitely had cleaning products around here somewhere. The air held faint traces of lemon Lysol.
A quick glance at her watch confirmed that she needed to get a move on. It had already been close to fifteen minutes since Clark left. The longer she trespassed, the higher the risk of him coming back and catching her.
Riley canvassed the bedroom as stealthily as possible.
There weren’t a ton of places in the compact area for him to keep a brush. He didn’t have anything on top of his dresser. With as much detachment as possible, she folded back his sheets and turned over his pillows, scoping for loose hairs, but unsurprisingly, his linens were pristine.
Starting to panic a little now, she yanked open the top drawers of his dresser. The contents were neatly organized by type—undershirts and athletic shorts—though not color coordinated, which she’d half expected.
He did fold his socks. Nerd.
When she knelt to open the bottom drawer and caught a glimpse of boxer briefs, Riley couldn’t fight the sudden assault of a Calvin Klein ad montage featuring Clark as all the models—pouting, flexing, bending over . . .
By the time she snapped out of that haze, she’d managed to bleed through her makeshift bandage—right onto his underwear. Oh my god. Red alert! Red alert!!!!
She tore out the marked pair, shoving them into her back pocket—she would have to dispose of the evidence later—and slammed the drawer closed, jumping to her feet.
Her heart thrashed in double time. B&E was one thing, damaging the man’s delicates another.
What a disaster. She would have to find a way to slip him a twenty—or two? How much did it cost for a new pair of Calvin Kleins?
Get it together, she told herself, shaking her head to try to clear it. This was no time to go to pieces. She needed a plan B here.
She paced back and forth, sliding a little in her socks, and then it came to her—hats.
Hats had hair in them sometimes—thanks again, Matthew Gray Gubler, for being hot enough to get her through even the more upsetting episodes of Criminal Minds.
Riley spun, trying to figure out where Clark might keep knitwear. Surely a man who insisted on carting around not one, but two pairs of caving helmets took care to protect his delicate ears from chilly temps?
Except this room had no hooks. Maybe he kept bins under the bed like her mom? Flattening herself to the floor, Riley army crawled under there. And—aha! Bins! She was a genius. A genius who could barely raise her head under here, but still.
Despite the cramped quarters, she managed to lift the lid on the first plastic container, coughing when the movement released a cloud of dust in her face. Apparently, Clark didn’t clean everywhere.
Once she recovered, Riley rooted her good hand around in the bin, going by feel, since she couldn’t see much under here. When her hand brushed something that crinkled, she jumped at the noise, slamming her head up against the bed frame.
Ow. Fuck.
Okay, this wasn’t gonna work. She could be unknowingly running her hand over crystallized grasshopper guts.
No. No way. She needed to slide the bin out so she could actually look at what was inside.
Scooting backward, Riley managed to get the thing out and, blinking in the sunlight, pulled the lid off.
Oh. Huh. The crinkly thing she’d touched turned out to be a newspaper clipping. Riley was about to move it aside when the black-and-white picture at the bottom caught her eye. That was unmistakably a younger Clark—same brooding expression minus twenty years—standing with a man who, judging by his jaw shape and dark brows, could be his father. Upon closer inspection, he was even wearing the same kind of signature felt hat with a quail feather as the main character in the film from the plane. As she pulled the clipping closer, Riley saw that the image was folded. Carefully, she brought forward the other section, revealing another guy in the picture. Hmm. Maybe a volunteer? Riley scanned for a caption.
Archaeologist Alfie Edgeware, on-site in Leeds, with his sons, Clark （15） and Patrick （19）
Her brain skipped a beat like an old record.
Sons?
Patrick.
“Oh my god.”
The camper door swung open, Clark ducking inside. His eyes followed the trail of her boot prints, snagged momentarily on the cat chomping chicken in his shower, and ended on her kneeling next to his bed, storage box open, newspaper in hand.
“What the fuck are you doing in here?” Clark’s stance pulled tight with mounting rage. “Are those my pants in your pocket?”
Riley couldn’t say, This isn’t what it looks like. It was. He’d caught her red-handed, snooping with intent to steal. Shit didn’t seem like a strong enough response to her rotten luck at this point.
She sighed. “Sonofabitch.”
“I shouldn’t be surprised, and yet somehow I am.” Clark thrust both hands on his hips. “God, I knew you were . . .”
Somehow, his brows sank impossibly closer together.
“。 . . bleeding.”
Huh? Oh, right. She looked down at the grisly mess of her arm.
“You should be proud. Your guard cat is very effective.”
He folded his lips together, breathing deeply once and then again through his nose before pointing at his desk chair.
“Sit,” he said dangerously.
Apparently, Riley had less of an iron will than the cat, because she obeyed.
Was he going to interrogate her? Here? Now?
When instead he moved to take out a first aid kit from under the sink, she slumped forward onto the wooden table.
“Don’t think this means you’re off the hook.” He placed the box in front of her and began removing supplies.
Normally Riley would argue that she didn’t need fussing over, especially from him, but if Clark wanted to patch her up instead of immediately turning her over to the local authorities, she certainly wasn’t in a position to complain.
Besides, now that she’d stopped moving, the scratches stung to all get-out.
“She doesn’t usually bite the hand that feeds her.” Clark eyed the empty chicken container left on the counter before unwrapping the toilet paper from her arm.
“I tried to take back her banana,” Riley felt obligated to explain. “Those aren’t, like, lethal to cats, right? Bananas?”
Clark gave her a wry look as he poured liquid onto a cotton ball. “Right.”
Phew. At least no one could add cat murder to her list of recent crimes.
Riley eyed the doused cotton ball with anxiety. “Is that gonna sting?”
“Unfortunately”—he swiped the cold compress against her scratches and watched her wince, unmoved—“no.”
Yikes. If she had to guess, she’d put his anger at a spicy eight out of ten right now.