by Hanna Hart
Jaxon nodded, but his eyes found their way to the floorboards of his front porch. “I don’t think I can see you for a while,” he said, his voice sounding suddenly foreign to her.
Madelyn’s heart stopped. She felt a cold chill shoot through her body, and she straightened her posture. “What?” she asked in disbelief. “One thing, and just like that, you stop liking me?”
“No,” he said evenly. “I care about you, Madelyn. I love you, actually. But I have to love Sutton more, and my gut is telling me I don’t want you around him.”
She felt tears fall as she closed her eyes, unable to look at him but equally as unwilling to walk off of his porch. “You love me?”
“I do,” he said.
She nodded as she heard the words repeated. She’d never felt so good and so awful at the same time.
“But it’s over?” she asked.
He reached over to squeeze her hand. “It’s not over. I just need some time.”
“Jax, I would never let anything happen to Sutton. You know that,” she pleaded, looking deep into his eyes.
He offered a soft smile and said, “I know.”
“But you’re not going to let me see him?”
He seemed to consider it but stood firm in his decision. “Protecting my child comes first. It has to. No matter how much it hurts. Until I know I can trust you.”
“Then I’ll quit,” she said quickly, tears spilling down her cheeks.
“You’ll quit your job?”
She nodded. “Yes.”
“Just like that?”
“Yes,” she repeated. “Because that’s how much you both mean to me. Please, Jax,” she said, bursting into full heavy sobs. She cried hard into her hands, and she could sense the pain in Jaxon. She knew he hated to see her upset. He rubbed his hand along her back and then pulled her into his arms.
“All I’m asking for is time, okay?” he said, and she knew right then that things weren’t going to end well.
What could she say to him now?
If he forgave her, how could she tell him that she was keeping an even bigger secret from him?
How could she live without Sutton in her life? She didn’t want to lose him again. Then again, maybe she was a terrible mother. Maybe she was crazy for thinking she could be a private investigator and keep her son safe. Maybe Jaxon had every right to keep her from him. Maybe she wasn’t fit to parent her own son.
17
Jaxon
Jaxon sat in his living room with Hunter and Rachel. The two had been together for years and years—and had been friends for longer than that, and always provided Jaxon with good advice.
The two of them were the first people he told about Madelyn and what had been going on the last week.
Jaxon had been in a daze without Madelyn. He missed her to the point of feeling excruciated by the lack of her, but every time he thought about knocking on her front door, something stopped him dead in his tracks.
“She’s a private investigator?” Hunter repeated as he lay back, his feet crossed over the arm of the couch.
“That’s weird,” Rachel said with a frown.
“It’s weird,” Hunter agreed quickly. The two of them had a snappy banter, like they were in the same mind at all times.
This was part of the reason Jaxon liked getting advice from Rachel and Hunter. They may have had a strange start to their relationship, but they were the happiest couple he knew. Their love was so strong, it was almost palpable. They were willing to give up everything just to be together—Hunter had even given up his ranch’s place under the Brookside Ranch umbrella.
They knew what it was like to take big risks for the one you loved, and Jaxon wanted to know if he should take one for Madelyn.
“So, what does she want?” Hunter asked.
Jaxon narrowed his brows. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, you’re pretty mad at her, so what did she want from you?” his brother specified. “Was she spying on you, or was it just the crazy guy who showed up on her doorstep that ruined it?”
“Which wasn’t a shining a moment, by the way,” Rachel added with a laugh.
Jaxon turned around to watch Sutton as he walked through the living room. The boy had seemed so lost since Madelyn had been gone. Today especially. He’d been walking around in a dream and had completely lost his appetite.
“She didn’t want anything from me,” Jaxon said, returning to his conversation. “But she lied.”
His argument elicited bored looks from his company. Rachel nodded, but Hunter raised a brow and gave an unsympathetic shrug.
“Dude,” Jaxon insisted, “she follows people around for a living!”
“Yeah, but most girls are stalkers anyway,” Hunter snorted.
Jaxon shook his head. “I’m not talking about looking up an ex on Facebook or even catfishing here. I’m talking about following people around in the city, taking pictures of them, and reporting back to spouses, agencies, workplaces. Stuff like that. It’s creepy. And even if I could overlook the fact that it’s creepy and weird, what am I supposed to do about Sutton??
“Having someone follow her home is a huge problem,” Rachel agreed.
“It’s all a problem,” Jaxon said with a sigh, turning his attention back to his son.
“Wow. You’ve grown up so much,” Hunter said with a proud smile.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, you’re putting Sutton first, and that’s exactly what you should be doing. It’s just crazy. Usually, you’re so...throw caution to the wind.”
“Yeah, well, I can’t throw caution to the wind now,” he said with wide eyes. “I have a business and a kid, and life doesn’t work that way anymore.”
Hunter looked at Rachel, and they shared a significant smile.
“What?” Jaxon laughed.
Hunter nodded toward him and said, “Sucks being a grown-up, doesn’t it?”
“I don’t know what to do. I love her, but this is unhealthy, right? I can’t have people showing up here looking for her. She said she’d quit, but I can’t ask her to do that, can I?”
“Sounds like you don’t have to ask her,” Rachel offered. “She said she’d quit, and after what happened to her, I’m sure she means it. Nobody wants to be treated like that!”
“No,” Jaxon said slowly. “But if that’s her job, if it’s what she’s passionate about, then who am I to tell her she can’t? I don’t own her.”
Hunter put a finger to his temple and chuckled. “Whoa, just give it a rest. You’ve been going around and around in the same circle for an hour now!”
“Try days,” Jaxon said, exasperated.
“Have you talked to her since you said you needed time?” Rachel asked, and Jaxon shook his head.
“No. Doesn’t that defeat the purpose of asking for time? I mean, I’ve seen her out on the porch, and we just wave or give each other the nod. You know, it’s civil.”
“Do you miss her?” his sister-in-law asked.
“That would be an understatement,” he admitted. He had never gotten so close to someone so fast. In a way, he felt like they were already a little family. They’d spent the summer creating Sunday morning rituals and couldn’t get enough of ranch life. Everything with her had been so perfect before it all came crashing down.
“It sounds to me like it’s over,” Hunter said with a shrug.
“What? How can you say that? He just said he misses her!” Rachel laughed.
“Yeah, but he’s giving her the cold-shoulder. Sorry, let me correct myself. The civil shoulder. That means he’s working on making her unimportant, which means he’s learning how to get back to life without her.”
Rachel shook her head. “You Brooks have some really strange logic.” She looked at Jaxon and said, “Do you want to be with this girl or not?
“I don’t know. I know I don’t want to be without her. I know Sutton loves her, and so do I,” he turned to look at Sutton and noticed the boy seemed a little dizzy.
“Hey, buddy, come here. You okay?”
He took Sutton by the shoulders and knew immediately that something was wrong. The boy was on the verge of fainting, and his skin was ice cold.
“My tummy hurts,” Sutton said in a voice so sickly it sent a wave of nausea through Jaxon’s core.
“He looks pale, Jax,” Rachel said with concern.
Sutton struggled to inhale and made a pained groan. Jaxon checked his throat for any sign of something lodged in there, he checked for fever and tried to ask Sutton what was wrong, but nothing was helping. He could feel a panic in him rise as Sutton fell unconscious, and before he knew it, he could hear ambulance sirens in the distance.
The ride to the hospital was a blur. He sat in the back of the ambulance while Hunter and Rachel followed behind in their car. He looked down at Sutton laying on the gurney with two attendants watching his breath and checking his blood pressure.
He explained to them what had happened. “He’s had an infection,” he said frantically, trying to get his words straight. “We thought it was just a cold or the flu or something, but he finished his antibiotics a few weeks ago and he’s been anemic the last two days. Today he got dizzy, and he seems to be having pains.”
“Is he allergic to anything?”
“No,” he said.
“Is there any history of high blood pressure, blood or heart disease, or diabetes in the family?”
“No. I-I don’t know,” he stammered, not knowing exactly where Sutton came from or who he was at his core.
There were more of the same questions when they reached the hospital. Jaxon found himself repeating the story twice more to a doctor and the triage nurse. He sat with Sutton for what felt like an eternity, listening to the doctors talking to him and feeling an overwhelming sense of urgency and panic. He wanted to grab the hospital staff and shake them and beg them to do something.
“Okay, we’re going to stabilize him first and get him rehydrated, and then we’ll do some scans to see if he has anything going on in there,” the doctor said. “You can sit in the waiting room, and we’ll come out when we’re done.”
“Can I stay with him?” Jaxon asked, cringing inwardly as he heard Sutton cry out in pain.
The doctor turned back to look at the book, then shook his head apologetically to Jaxon. “We’ll call you as soon as we’ve finished the tests. It won’t be long.”
Jaxon grit his teeth. He talked to Sutton and told him everything was going to be alright before he headed into the waiting room with Hunter and Rachel.
“Maybe he’s just dehydrated,” Rachel said after some time, rubbing her hand along Jaxon’s back.
“No,” he said under his breath. “He’s been acting weird for a few days now. I thought he was just getting over this bug, but…” he shook his head. “I should have known better.”
“He’ll be okay, man,” Hunter hushed.
He paced the emergency waiting room in a panic. He had never experienced this kind of fear before, but he knew Sutton would be okay. He would be alright because he had to be.
Jaxon craned his neck back and listened to it crack, trying to find any way to relieve the stress he felt. He heard a voice he recognized talking to a nurse and looked over. It was Madelyn.
“What are you doing here?” he asked as he walked up to her, pulling her into an embrace.
He didn’t care what happened before. He was just so, so happy to see her; to hold her and have her here.
Madelyn’s face contorted with worry, and in a panic, she asked, “I saw the ambulance leave the neighborhood and I got so worried. I’m so sorry. I know you don’t want to see me, but I just needed to know if everything is okay.”
“It’s Sutton,” he said, ending their embrace.
“What?” her eyes went wide; face pale. “What happened to him?”
“He’s not good,” he trembled, willing himself to keep it together. “He was really weak, and I didn’t know what else to do.”
“Is he alright?”
“They can’t figure out what’s wrong with him. Whatever he has, he’s had it for over a month now, and he can’t seem to shake it. He’s so weak, and he was having trouble with blurry vision,” he shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“What are the symptoms?” she asked, suddenly eerily calm. “What else did the doctor say?”
“Uh, chest pain, cold feet, dizzy,” he counted off on his fingers.
Madelyn closed her eyes and leaned her head back, pulling in a long, resigned breath. She covered her face with her hands and then said, “Can I talk to the doctor?”
“What?” he stiffened. “Why?”
“I need to talk to him, just for a second,” she pleaded.
“First, tell me why,” he said.
“I know you’re his dad and you know best, and I know that you aren’t crazy about me right now and that you think I’m dangerous, but I would really just like to see Sutton and talk to his doctor for just a second.”
“Okay,” he said slowly. Jaxon had chills run up both of his arms as he looked down at the girl he loved. He didn’t know what was happening, but he didn’t like it one bit.
Rachel and Hunter gave him a puzzled look, and he gave a confused shrug before leading Madelyn into Sutton’s room. The doctor hadn’t said Jaxon could come back yet, but Madelyn seemed determined to lay eyes on the boy.
“Can I help you?” the doctor asked as they stepped into the room.
“Hi, yes,” Madelyn said calmly. “Are you the one tending to Sutton Brooks?”
The doctor nodded. “Yes, I am. Can I help you?”
“I was just wondering,” she began nervously, “if you have tested him for sickle cell disease.”
Jaxon set his jaw nervously and watched as the doctor consulted his chart. He seemed to consider something before turning back to Madelyn. “Why?” the doctor asked. “Does the child have a history of SCD in his family?”
“No,” Jaxon said firmly, just as Madelyn said, “Yes.”
“No, he doesn’t,” he insisted.
The doctor did not look charmed by the pair. “Well, does he or doesn’t he? This is something we need to know.”
“Yes,” she said and met Jaxon’s eyes.
She looked so ashamed that it caused a deep pit of despair to well up in Jaxon’s stomach.
“I’m his mother,” she said without a second thought, “and I have SCD.”
18
Madelyn
When Sutton was stabilized, the doctor invited both Jaxon and Madelyn to come in and see him. At first, Madelyn wondered if Jaxon would allow her to come in with him, considering he hadn’t said a word to her since the doctor had confirmed that Sutton did have SCD.
Jaxon had given her such a cold, confused stare.
Inside of the recovery room, Jaxon ran his hand through Sutton’s hair. Madelyn wanted to reach down and touch her son, but she didn’t want to upset Jaxon any more than she already had.
Telling Jaxon that Sutton was her son didn’t come out even remotely the way Madelyn had imagined. She had always pictured herself telling him over coffee or in a more intimate setting—not here, not at a hospital after her son just had an attack.
She couldn’t fathom what Jaxon was thinking. She knew he must have been hurt and angry, but Madelyn felt a hundred times lighter. The weight of the secrecy had lifted from her, and she felt like she was just Madelyn again.
She and Jaxon sat on either side of Sutton’s bed, and after what felt like hours of monitoring him, Jaxon finally said, “We need to talk.”
Madelyn agreed, and the two of them walked through the expansive hospital together, following green lines on the floors to lead them to the outside world. They walked out the side exit to a closed-in courtyard. There were picnic tables and benches, all surrounded by tall trees and flower gardens.
“This is a lot,” he said, shaking his head.
Madelyn nodded. “I know,” she said. “Is there anything you want to ask me?”
&nb
sp; “Yeah. What’s his life going to look like?”
Madelyn’s brows shot up in surprise. She had been expecting him to yell at her or ask her how she found him, but of course, his primary concern was Sutton’s health. She smiled inwardly at his fatherly concern. “It’s a treatable disease.”
“How?”
“Medication, pain relief management, sometimes they can do a bone marrow transplant, but not usual.”
He frowned. “Not usual, as in...he’ll have this forever?”
Madelyn bit her lip. “Yes. Risk of problems increases when you’re dehydrated, so it’s important that he’s drinking all the time.” She studied Jaxon’s features as they crumbled. It was clear he was in distress. “He’ll live a normal life, Jax,” she said softly.
“You almost died!” he shouted, then pinched the bridge of his nose. His tone went quieter as he repeated, “You almost died, Maddie. You said so yourself. The doctor gave you weeks.”
“Yes, because I was pregnant, and it was a high-risk pregnancy. I wasn’t healthy. I wasn’t taking care of myself the way I should have been.”
Jaxon nodded, trying to calm himself down. He paced the garden, and she followed behind him like a helpless puppy.
He turned to her as if something were just dawning on him and repeated, “You were...pregnant,” he breathed. “With Sutton.”
Her heart sank as he said the words. She was worried about how their conversation was going to go from here. The last thing she wanted to do was hurt him but hurt him she had.
“Yes,” she said.
“And that’s why you came to Kerhonkson. To find him?”
She bit her lip. “Yes.”
“How did you find him?”
“I hired someone I knew from another agency,” she said, the words slipping out of her mouth like rushing water. “Just so you know, the investigator didn’t know who you were or where Sutton ended up. He just knew the general neighborhood. Meeting you was a fluke, I swear.”
Technically, she wasn’t lying.
Her intention was always to find Sutton and reunite with him but meeting Jaxon and falling for him had been its own separate thing. She didn’t want him to confuse those two instances or think that she used him to get to Sutton.
