“But, why do you care?”
“How could I not?” Maddock murmured, squeezing the hand he still held between his. She stared up at him with tender eyes, her vision clouding. She took the money and pocketed it, gulping as she pulled her hand from his. Her palms were sweaty, and she wiped them on her pant legs.
“Maddock, we need you on the registers,” David hollered down the aisle, interrupting them.
Maddock looked up at the lengthening lines of customers and sighed before turning back to look at her, her hair mused and her clothing wrinkled.
“I’ll pay you back, I promise,” the girl said, but Maddock shook his head firmly.
“No, you don’t need to. It’s a gift. I have to go, but I want to help you. Will you come back later?”
She nodded.
“I’m Maddock. What’s your name?” he asked.
“Ma… dison.” Maddy wasn’t sure why she said that, why she was reluctant to give him the nickname she had always gone by. She’d always hated it, anyway; Ricki had given it to her when she was too drunk to say her real name correctly. She didn’t want to be that person anymore, anyway.
Maddock smiled but resisted his urge to touch her again. He jogged towards the front of the store, turning for one last glance before leaving the aisle.
Maddy stared after the boy as he jogged towards his register. She stuck her hand in her pocket and fingered the $20, having a hard time believing what had just happened. Had a store employee really just caught her shoplifting and, instead of turning her in, offered to help her?
Never in her life had anyone given two cents about her welfare, let alone some beautiful stranger. And he wasn’t just beautiful on the outside, Maddy thought, although he definitely had it going on in the looks department. But more importantly, he was beautiful on the inside, too. Maddy could tell after just a few minutes with him.
She sensed it the first time she saw him, a few days ago when he told the other cashier the price of the tuna. His face was kind and his voice gentle as he spoke to him.
His help had come at just the right moment, too. Maddy abhorred the idea of stealing, but in her desperation she saw no other solution. It had been a week since her world collapsed, and she was no closer to rebuilding it. Her money was gone, she’d lost her job, and she was still spending her nights in the library, praying that no one would catch her. She was exhausted from sleeping in a chair with one eye open and traipsing all over town each day putting in applications on barely more than one can of tuna. She was dirty, and probably smelly, and in desperate need of a new outfit.
Her last paycheck would arrive in a few more days, but until then she had no more money and no way to get any. She was desperately searching for another job, but with no mode of transportation her options were limited. Even her phone was useless now. The battery died a few days ago, and she had no way to charge it.
She’d gone by her aunt’s house several times, hoping to sneak in when no one was home and grab a few of her belongings, but every time Steve had been there. He’d probably quit his job, content to mooch off of Aunt Ricki and the money he stole from Maddy. She tried calling Aunt Ricki’s cell phone a few times from a payphone at the library, but she never responded to the unknown number.
The money that Maddock had given her was a lifesaver. That $20 would be enough to eat off of till she got her paycheck. Then, hopefully, that would last her till she could find another job.
She joined the nearest checkout lane, avoiding the one that Maddock was working. It just felt too awkward. He’d told her to come back later, said that he could help her, but she didn’t know exactly what he meant by that. He looked barely older than she was. What could he do for her? She felt uncomfortable taking charity, especially from strangers, but she couldn’t deny how grateful she was to have that $20.
She’d put in an application at the grocery store, but if they’d tried to reach her she wouldn’t know it. With her phone out of commission and no permanent address, there was no way for anyone to get in contact with her. She wanted to stop by the manager’s office and ask about it, but she knew her appearance would do nothing to help her.
She debated whether she should use the money to buy a hairbrush and some clothes from the thrift shop, but her growling stomach enforced its opinion. She paid for her tuna and rushed out of the store to eat it.
Once her raging belly was quieted, she decided she’d never be able to get a job if she didn’t do something about her appearance, so she gave herself a budget of $5.00 and headed for The Salvation Army, hoping she could find what she needed.
With a quarter to spare, Maddy emerged with a tee shirt, some sweatpants (they were cheaper than jeans), a comb, and some underwear. She felt a little grossed out wearing used underwear, but it couldn’t be much worse than the week-old pair she was currently sporting.
She changed her clothes in a single-stall gas station bathroom, using the paper towels to wash her body as much as possible. Working in small sections, she carefully detangled her hair before washing it in the bathroom sink, using the liquid hand soap as shampoo. She would have given anything for one of those tiny bottles of shampoo they put in hotel rooms.
She wanted to wash out her old clothing, too, but there was no place for her to dry it, and she didn’t want to spend even $0.75 on a laundromat dryer. She thought about washing it out at the library that evening and leaving it to dry overnight, but she wasn’t sure if it would dry all the way with no good place to hang it.
Looking a million bucks better after a $5 improvement, Maddy felt like a new person — confident and capable once again. She had planned to return to the grocery store to talk to Maddock, but now it felt unnecessary. She didn’t want to take any more money from him, and with the money she had left she knew she could get by till she got her paycheck.
Chapter 6
It was a good thing Maddock could scan groceries without looking, he realized, because his eyes rarely left the front door of Hinkleman’s Grocery that afternoon. He was waiting for the girl to return — Madison, she said her name was. When no was around, he let the name roll off his tongue, amused by the similarity to his own name.
He was glad he’d been able to help her a little, but what he really wanted to do was tell her about the shelter. He wondered where she was staying at night, and every time he thought about it a shiver of worry raced down his spine and he feared for her safety.
When it was time for him to clock out and she still hadn’t made an appearance, Maddock thought briefly about skipping his shift at the shelter to work a few more hours at the grocery store. His own sense of responsibility nagged him, though, and he decided the shelter needed him more than the girl did. He asked Dorothy to keep an eye out for her, and he gave her a note to pass along with information about the shelter.
He wondered briefly if she was a drug addict who’d taken his money and blown it. Was she off somewhere, getting high, and that’s why she hadn’t returned to the supermarket? Maddock didn’t think so, but you couldn’t always tell by looking.
When he arrived at the shelter, the chef was elbow deep in a pot of spaghetti sauce, tossing in a dozen different spices at random. The room reeked of garlic and oregano, and red splotches dotted the otherwise plain, white, cinderblock walls as the sauce bubbled and spurted. It would turn out delicious, Maddock knew, because Bob had a gift for cooking. He wasn’t a Celestia or anything, it wasn’t that kind of gift, he just had a knack for making things taste great without following a recipe.
“Hey Bob, how’s it going?” Maddock asked as he hung up his jacket and grabbed an apron.
Bob stretched his short legs and bent over his round, sauce-stained belly to pull out a sample for Maddock. “Taste this sauce. Does it have enough seasoning? I’m thinking of adding a smidge more basil. What do you think?”
Maddock savored a spoonful and rolled his eyes as he groaned in pleasure. “Don’t change a thing; it’s amazing.”
Bob wrinkled his forehead and lifted h
is chin, wiping steam from his glasses. “You really think so?”
“Definitely.” Maddock chuckled at the chef’s insecurity. “What can I do?”
“Put the garlic bread in the oven and start dishing out the salad.”
Maddock followed Bob’s directions, and soon it was time for the kitchen to start serving. The Grace & Mercy Soup Kitchen and Shelter offered three hot meals a day to the needy people of Indianapolis. Dinner and breakfast were included in a stay at the shelter, but lunch had to be purchased. The price was minimal, though, barely covering food costs, and it wouldn’t even cover that if it weren’t for Maddock’s frequent donations.
Maddock alerted the other servers that the kitchen was ready then took his own place on the serving line behind the pot of noodles. He enjoyed seeing all the regulars — he knew many of their names and stories, but he couldn’t help wishing that Madison would show up, even though he hadn’t gotten the chance to tell her about it.
The diners bustled into the dining room in wiggly lines, pressing each other towards the servers, overeager to enjoy Bob’s latest creation. Many of them were dirty and tattered, the original cut and color of their clothing unrecognizable. Their hair was gray and frazzled, stringy and matted, and many of them smelled like smoke and alcohol. Most people would be turned off by them, but Maddock wasn’t. He didn’t see them as they were now; he imagined them as they could be or used to be. He saw their value as humans, hidden beneath the layers.
He tried his best to get to know them. Not everyone was friendly, but most of them were thrilled to have someone to talk to, someone who would listen and treat them like a real person.
“Hi Patty, you look extra nice today, did you get your hair cut? How’s your wife, George? What’s happening, Sam? Did you have that job interview? Where’s your daughter, Emily? Did you go to the clinic and get that cut looked at, Marcus?” Maddock fired out greetings and garnered status updates as fast as he could while moving the customers through the line efficiently. When everyone was served, sometimes he would sit in the dining room with them for a few minutes and let them talk to him before returning to the kitchen to help with clean up.
Today he had a more pressing question to ask them — how did they first hear about Grace & Mercy? He was curious to find out if the shelter needed to do a better job of educating the community about the services they offered. Their answers made it clear that word-of-mouth was the predominant way the homeless population gained information. It confirmed Maddock’s suspicion that many people in town might not even know the shelter was available. He was definitely going to talk to the director about improving their marketing.
His shift flew by in a blink, like always, and soon it was time to meet up with his brother. Maddock said his goodbyes to the chef and the other volunteers and took one last look at his home away from home, praying that Madison was in someplace just as safe and warm tonight.
Chapter 7
There were already four cars crammed into the tiny driveway when Cheydan arrived at his best friend Zeph’s house, including a shiny new SUV he didn’t recognize, and Cheydan wondered briefly if Zeph had invited someone new to join them.
The little bungalow was yellow with blue shutters, and a swing hung from the soffit of the broad, white porch. The planters on each side of the stairs were empty now, but as soon as it warmed up enough they would probably sport pink geraniums. Zeph’s wife, Eve, had quickly turned the little house into a home.
She was domestic like that; it came from a dozen years of helping her then-single mother raise Eve’s younger brothers. Now that Eve’s mother had reunited with her first love, Eve’s brothers had another parent to look out for them and Eve could concentrate on her own new home and husband.
Cheydan couldn’t help but envy them a little bit. Zeph was only 20 years old, and already he had an important career, a nice house, and an amazing woman to come home to. His earlier years hadn’t been so easy, but now Zeph was living the life Cheydan had always dreamed of.
The racy sports car parked in front of him told Cheydan that Zeph’s sister, Charisse, and her boyfriend, Jake were there already. Cheydan groaned a little at the idea of them together. He still didn’t think Jake was good enough for his favorite girl. Cheydan didn’t have a sister, but he had played big brother to Risse ever since they were little. Cheydan was having a hard time getting used to the idea of some guy he didn’t really like hanging all over his little “sister.” Risse had already worked a miracle of kindness in bad boy Jake, though, so they were in love, and Jake wasn’t going anywhere. Cheydan would just have to force himself to find a way to like him.
He climbed the steps and was just about to knock when his brother pulled up in the driveway. Maddock jumped out of his car and bounded up the steps, his long legs taking them two at a time.
“Hey bro, what took you so long?” Maddock said as he stepped in front of his brother and rapped on the door. Cheydan just rolled his eyes and ignored him as the door swung open.
“Hey! What’s happening?” Zeph slapped his friends on the back as he ushered them in to the living room. It was a whole lot cleaner and smelled a lot better than Zeph’s bedroom at his parents house used to. What was it about girls that made everything nicer?
The walls were a pale, sky blue, and comfy, matching leather furniture made it look like the Arellas were officially grown-ups. Camel-colored silk drapes hung from the windows, and they even had coasters on their end tables. An X-Box hooked up to the TV was the only evidence that the old Zeph lived here. Cheydan chuckled at the stack of games piled haphazardly next to it as he imagined Eve getting on Zeph’s case about straightening them.
“Eve, this place looks amazing!” Cheydan said, giving the lanky redhead a hug.
“Yeah, totally.” Maddock agreed. He was happy for his friends, but he couldn’t help but think about all the people who would sleep on the streets tonight. He hoped Madison wasn’t one of them.
“Thanks, guys. So glad you could make it.” Her freckled smile was infectious.
“What about me? I live here, too! How’s come she gets all the compliments?” Zeph complained.
“What’d you pick out — the flower arrangements?” Maddock jabbed Zeph with his elbow.
Charisse heard their voices and emerged from the kitchen, Jake following close behind her. “Hey guys! I’ve missed you!” She grabbed the twins in a group hug, standing on her tiptoes to reach them better. Her long, blonde hair hung in a complicated braid, and she was dressed more for a photo shoot than a carnival. She looked like a much prettier version of her brother.
Risse’s boyfriend, Jake, lingered a few steps behind her, quietly sipping a glass of soda. “Jake.” Cheydan said, nodding his head, his face and voice void of emotion.
“Cheydan.” Jake responded with equal enthusiasm. Charisse gave a stern look to the both of them.
“Is this everybody? Whose SUV is that out there?” Maddock asked, peeking out the front window.
“Oh, we’re test-driving that for the evening. If you want to, we can all ride together.” Zeph said with a smile, proud of his adulting.
“I didn’t know you were looking for a new car, Zephy.” Risse straddled the arm of the chair her brother was sitting in.
“Yeah, Eve’s car could use replacing, and she said we needed something roomier.” Zeph’s voice made it obvious that he would happily give Eve whatever she wanted.
“Well, then what are we waiting for? Let’s take it for a ride!” Maddock jumped up and headed for the door, and the rest of the gang followed him. They oohed and aahed as they admired the back-up camera, knurled wood interior, and soft, leather upholstery.
Maddock poked his head between between Zeph and Eve in the front seats. “This is great, Zeph, but why do you need such a big vehicle? You planning a huge family?”
Zeph laughed nervously. “Maybe someday.”
The ride was short; they barely had time to check out all the features before nearing the fairgrounds. The carnival s
prawled across half of the mall parking lot, flashing colored lights and spinning midway rides creating a visual cacophony. They piled from the vehicle and headed towards the ticket booth, arguing about whether they should purchase wristbands or ticket booklets. They couldn’t agree, so all the guys got wristbands, and the girls decided to share a book of tickets.
Once they gained admission, the fair spread out before them, bombarding their senses like a Vegas buffet. The air smelled like popcorn and cotton candy, carnies barked out challenges trying to lure them into playing the midway, and the crowd bustled around them like a hoard of eager lemmings, rushing to the next source of excitement.
“I’m getting in line for some grub, you guys,” Maddock called out when the scent of sausage from a nearby food truck invaded his nostrils.
“Bro, don’t you think you should wait? I don’t want you barfing on me on the Scrambler.”
“Yeah, let’s ride a few rides, then we’ll take a dinner break,” Zeph suggested.
“There’s the Himalaya; that’s always fun.” Cheydan pointed towards the extreme carousel.
“Yes! I love that one!” Everyone turned in surprise at Eve’s loud outburst. “What? I like carnival rides. Is there something wrong with that?”
“Just when I think I can’t possibly love you any more than I already do, you go and surprise me.” Zeph wrapped his arms around her and kissed her. Eve blushed when the others rolled their eyes at Zeph’s PDA.
“Awesome, let’s do it,” Jake said, and headed towards the ride. Maddock looked longingly at the food truck but followed behind them.
The line was long, but the ride held a lot of people, so it only took a few minutes before they were climbing in and the lap bar was descending. The music started, loud and raucous, and soon the cars were rushing around the undulating platform, centrifugal force pulling the riders towards the center. The cars clanked and shuttered as they went faster and faster.
Date with Destiny Collection: Angel Romance Series: Books 1 - 4 Page 29
