Page 80 of Dark Endures

His eyes go wide. “She gets to play with the snakes.”

“Only the non-spicy ones,” I clarify.

“She’s trained to handle them,” Maddox adds.

“But she’s not a brother.”

“Everett, chill.”

I freeze for the boy.

Everett nods at Maddox. “Fine. Whatever.” He turns back to me. “Are you sure you two aren’t dating? You look perfect for each other.”

Looks can be deceiving.

“Why did you come to my office?” Maddox asks.

A switch flips in the kid’s head. “I need to talk to you about Levi.”

I can almost feel Maddox sigh and roll his eyes, but he holds on to his patience. “Levi is fine. I’m getting daily updates from the rehab center.”

Rehab? Who’s Levi and why is he in rehab?

“Levi might be doing fine, but Jordan is worried about his brother.”

Aww. That sounds hard. Ottilie worried the entire time her brother was there, too.

Those words transform Maddox’s face. He goes from irritated to concerned. “They don’t allow visitors for the first few weeks. I can get the therapist to see Jordan.”

“He doesn’t trust them. Jordan needs to talk to his brother to see with his own eyes that it’s helping.”

Does anyone? Winnie went to them all through school and hated it.

“I’ll contact the rehab center and arrange a call. Then, as soon as they allow visitors, I’ll arrange for the jet to take Jordan to see his brother.”

Maddox really cares about his family. He’d make a great father one day. Or are Everett, Levi, and Jordan his kids? That’s possible. Maddox would have had to have started pretty young. But Everett certainly acts like his kid, ignoring Maddox and doing whatever he wants.

Wouldn’t he want to see his child just as much?

“Can I go too? Just to support Jordan. All of this is really hard on him.”

Maddox stares at Everett for a long minute before asking, “Do you want to go to fly on the jet?”

Everett shakes his head. “Nah. I’ve been on a few of them, and don’t really like flying.”

“You can go.”

“Thanks.” Everett jumps up. “I’ll go tell Jordan. It was nice meeting you, Mindy. You should think about dating Maddox. He’s a really good guy.” The kid runs off just like he came in.

That was weird. I feel like I learned so much about Maddox, but have so many questions. The thing about asking questions is that it invites people to ask you questions, so I stay silent.

***

“The apple pie has caramel and chocolate in it.” It tastes so much like a warm caramel apple.

“Try it with the salted caramel ice cream.” Maddox opens a thermos I hadn’t noticed and scoops some ice cream onto my plate.

“Mmmmmm.” I let the flavors play in my mouth, creating the most delicious orchestra on my tongue. “You can feed me like this anytime.”

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