Page 49 of Every Sunset

MADDOX

The relief that flooded me when I walked into the school office and found Max sat on the seats in there was so great it took me aback for a second.

I liked Max. Of course I did. He was a good kid – loyal and caring.

He took amazing care of his mom, despite him still being so young.

Anna had brought him up so amazingly, and even though he was still a kid, anyone could see the kind of good man he would be in a few years.

Logan and I had both grown close to him in the weeks that he and Anna had lived with us.

It helped that the kid was pretty mature for his age, and had a great sense of humor.

We hadn’t lied when we told Max and Anna that we cared very much about the both of them.

They’d become important to us in the time they had been with us.

Anna was ours, and that meant Max was ours too.

But I never really thought when I told Anna multiple times how much I loved her, that I was growing so attached to Max too.

But seeing him sat there whole and safe – it showed me for damned sure that I was starting to feel more than just responsibility for the teenager.

It was more than me simply caring about him too.

What I was feeling in that moment had to be something paternal – the love of a parent.

I knew that may be jumping the gun. Anna barely knew me, let alone Max, and it would take time for them both to come to trust me enough to see me, and Logan too, as a father figure to Max.

None of that changed the fact that Max was already feeling very much like he was my kid though.

“Madd? What happened? Is my mom okay?” Max demanded the second he looked up and saw me walking through the door. He was already on his feet and in an instant he was at my side.

“Yeah, bud. Your mom’s alright. She just needs you home right now, okay?” I assured him as I placed my hand on his shoulder and gave it a squeeze of support. It helped calm my fears too, to place my hand on his wide shoulder and assure myself without a doubt that he was there and safe.

“Did she pass out again?” he asked.

“Let’s get to the car and then I can tell you everything.”

Max barely allowed me to get my seatbelt into place before he was demanding answers from me once again.

I abandoned starting the car and looked to him.

I hated seeing the stress on his young face again.

It seemed like that was the only feeling he ever had since he arrived with us.

He was too young to be carrying all that he had on his shoulders.

“The FBI turned up at our place this afternoon,” I started.

“Oh fuck!” he gasped as he dropped his head into his hands.

His breathing started to pick up right away.

“Do they know? Did that fucker report us? Because if he did, we didn’t do anything wrong!

He drugged my mom and he…he hurt her so bad, Madd.

He could have killed her! I just wanted to stop him. I just…I had to save my mom!”

“Take a breath, Max. It’s all gonna be just fine.

Callum didn’t report you. The FBI are investigating a series of murders and the investigation led them to your mom.

They think Callum is the murderer, though they had no idea who he was until they spoke to your mom,” I explained as I held the back of his neck in an attempt to calm him down.

“Murderer?” he gulped.

“Yeah. They already found six bodies – women who looked a lot like your mom, apparently. You probably saved her life that night, Max.”

“Oh God!” Max wrenched the door of my truck open and all but threw himself out of it. I heard him vomiting, but before I could get out of the car he appeared at the passenger side and reached into the car for his back pack.

“Better?” I asked as he tried to catch his breath again.

“Not even nearly, Maddox. That fucker is a murderer! What if…if I hadn’t gotten there when I did? What if I’d stayed at Joey’s for dinner before I went home? I c-could have lost her!” he cried.

“You didn’t though, Max. You got to her in time and you saved her.”

“That’s why he came here, right? It didn’t make any sense that he’d come after her, but it does now. She survived. He doesn’t want her telling the cops, right?”

“You’re too smart for your own damn good,” I sighed.

Silence descended in the cab of my truck as Max pulled a bottle of water from his backpack and swilled out his mouth several times. Finally he closed up his backpack, threw it into the back seat, then climbed back into the passenger seat, slamming the door closed.

“How is she?” he asked.

“She told the FBI what she could, but it took everything she had left in her. She was pretty shaken up when I left. Mainly she was terrified for you,” I replied.

“When isn’t she?” he asked with an eyeroll, but the small smile on his face told me how much he loved his mom and the way she tried to always protect him.

“Let’s get back to her. I’m guessing the FBI will still be there when we get home, so they’re probably gonna want to talk to you.”

I started the car and reversed, desperate to get back home and see Anna myself. I wasn’t comfortable leaving her when there were strangers at our place, even if they were FBI.

“What do I tell them? The truth?” Max asked.

“Up until you first hit him and he went down, you tell the truth. After that, your mom lied and said you freed her, so she was the one to knock him out with the bat. He fell and hit his head, then you both ran out of the apartment. When you went back, he was gone. Don’t mention getting rid of his body or car. Understand?”

“God dammit, Mom! Is she ever gonna stop trying to protect me?” he cursed.

“What do you think? She’s your mom. She loves you.”

“I know. Sometimes I just wish she’d see that I’m growing up now, and I can take care of myself too.”

“She will, to some extent. But I doubt she’ll ever stop trying to stand between you and any threat in your life. I just hope that in the future Logan and I will be stood either side of her too,” I admitted.

“I’d be good with that,” Max agreed easily.

ANNA

The FBI stayed at Logan and Maddox’s house well beyond their welcome. They took the footage Madd had from Neil’s hardware store, then they wanted all of Neil’s details so they could talk to him, despite Maddox telling them he already had all of the footage taken outside the store that day.

After Max had come up to Logan’s room, where Logan had made me lie down to rest, to assure me and show me that he was safe and home where I needed him to be, it had been his turn.

Maddox had stayed by Max’s side the entire time as the FBI took a statement about what Max recalled of the night he saved me – or of what Madd had told him he could recall anyway.

The agents had also tried hard to argue with Maddox, Logan, and even Max that they needed to question me further too, but all three had stopped that from happening, and eventually the FBI had left with what they had – which was a hell of a lot more than they had arrived with.

Of course, I was kept out of all of it, sequestered upstairs safely in Logan’s room.

Maddox or Logan were with me throughout, and Max came and laid with me for a while too when the agents were done with him.

I calmed down a lot when Max was home and safe, but my mind was still a jumble of nightmarish flashbacks, and horror filled thoughts of what could have happened to me if Max hadn’t come home when he did that night.

I’d been lucky back then, and I’d been lucky the week before too when I escaped Callum’s attempt to run me off of the road and kill me.

Then he’d been in town too. The more I thought about it all, the surer and more terrified I was in the knowledge that the FBI agents were right – Callum’s plan had been to eliminate me before I could identify him to any authorities.

And that meant my son too – because Max saw that fucker’s face.

I knew it, and Callum knew it. Neither of us were safe while that monster was alive.

After the FBI cleared out and everything had calmed down, the guys, Max, and I had ended up down in the living room, lounging out on the huge sofa and comfy armchairs with a comedy movie.

We didn’t talk about Callum, The FBI, or any of what was going on, We all just seemed to have come to some silent agreement to just try and forget about it all.

The guys ordered pizzas and a ton of sides, then opened a bottle of wine, and cracked open some beers.

I even agreed Max could have a beer, which was pretty chilled out of me, I thought.

As it got later and we all settled into a comfortable silence in front of the movie I finally felt able to relax completely.

Of course the wine helped with that too, as did the fact I was pressed between Logan and Madd on the sofa.

I was curled up, with my legs underneath me, my head resting on Logan’s chest. Madd was crowded in at my other side, and between them they were keeping me toasty warm.

I loved their calming touches over my clothes, and the way they soothed the fears that seemed to now live inside me, until all of the chaos seemed to be muted in the background.

“Anna?” I was awoken by soft kisses on my forehead, light and teasing.

I opened my eyes, only to find the room around me was almost dark, the only light coming from a small table lamp in the corner.

“Hey sleepy head,” Logan whispered and when I turned my head enough to look up, I realized I was still laid on his chest, and he was watching me with a gentle smile on his face.

“Hey. I must have dropped off,” I told him. I looked to my other side for Madd, but he was gone. The armchair was empty too, where Max had been sitting before.

“Maddox and Max went to bed a while ago. You looked too peaceful for me to wake,” Logan explained.

“But you woke me anyway,” I pointed out.