Page 45 of A Dangerous Proposal

Lonely.The unexpected word sounded in his brain like a gunshot. “It was delightful, Angel.”

His muscles tensed as he thought about the role he’d been forced into. Never quite accepted by either side of the world. Neither the Light nor the Dark.

“It couldn’t have been easy.” She insisted. “Probably still isn’t.”

Her insight stabbed at him, and he struggled to maintain his expression. Alex forced his lips into a smirk and threw his arms wide. “I’m not exactly suffering here.”

“Do you ever relax?” Her soft tone unsettled him.

“I was pretty relaxed after last night. Now enough about me,” Alex said, desperate to change the subject. “What about you?”

For a moment, Madison was quiet. “What about me?” she asked, allowing the topic change.

“I know you are in a custody battle with your son’s biological father. How did that happen?”

Madison eyed him carefully. “You know I’m not his biological mother.”

“I know he’s technically your nephew, but he was clearly trying to call you Mama when I saw him.” Alex shrugged. “You are the one raising him every day.”

Madison’s eyes filled with tears, and he was immediately alarmed. “What did I say?”

She wiped at her eyes with a watery laugh. “Ignore me. I’m just tired, and I think you may have broken my nervous system last night.” She sucked in a breath and held it for a few seconds before blowing it off in a smooth stream. “Just something Felix said when I dropped off Jax yesterday. About how I’m not his mother, but his new wife Mary is. She’s only known him for a couple of months.” Her face wrinkled in disgust.

“What’s the story? I saw he only sued for custody recently. Where has he been?”

Madison dragged a hand back through her hair. Alex hated the sad look on her face, but he had to get her to share her dilemma. It was the only way he could offer her his solution.

“Are you sure you want to hear this?” He nodded. “Apparently, he was in rehab for a while, and when he got out, he was ‘putting his life back together.’ He met Mary and started a new life in her rich daddy’s mansion.” Madison’s voice dripped with contempt.

“Did he know your sister was pregnant?”

Madison’s body stiffened. He’d found a raw spot.

“Yeah,” she whispered. Her mouth worked back and forth like she was thinking, and then she pushed her food away.

“I hadn’t spoken to my sister in almost a year when I got her call. We weren’t super close anyway, with over ten years age difference between us. Or, at least as she got older, we weren’t.”

Madison stared at something over his shoulder with a sad smile. “I adored her. She was my baby sister, but our parents… They aren’t what you’d call warm. When I left home, Opal was still in elementary school. I got busy with school, and then my graduate program, and then when I became a social worker, the hours were unreal. Somewhere along the way, I left her behind and lost her.”

“What does that mean?”

She exhaled a hard sigh. “I didn’t realize how out of control she’d become. My parents would complain about her acting out, getting in trouble at school, sneaking out, that kind of thing. When I would talk to Opal about it, she made it sound like it was normal, average high school stuff. I believed her, or maybe I wanted to believe her because I didn’t want to be bothered. I don’t know.

“Fast forward a few years, and my sister and her loser, on-again, off-again boyfriend from high school are full-blown addicts. My parents eventually kicked her out, deciding the tough love approach was the way to go.”

She shook her head. “I studied this in school. I should have known what to do, but nothing I tried helped, and eventually I had to cut her off.”

“What did she do?” Alex knew there had to be a reason. From his limited experience with Madison, he knew she was warm and loving. Anyone who spent five minutes with her and Jax could see that.

For a long moment, he didn’t think she’d answer. Madison's hands were white knuckled around the seat of her barstool.

“Madison?”

“I was letting them stay with me for a few weeks. Opal had been arrested for shoplifting again, and Felix claimed he’d used the last of their money bailing her out. One night, while my sister was meeting her legal aid lawyer…”

She swallowed hard, and Alex felt a cold sense of foreboding creep up his spine. His body tensed, sensing the words that came next would change everything.

“Felix was high or drunk, I don’t know… Anyway, he made a pass at me, and when I told my sister she attacked me.” Her throat bobbed when she swallowed and then grimaced. “Only black eye I’ve ever gotten.”

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