Having a little extra help meant Nolan and I weren’t killing ourselves trying to do it all. It also meant I could potentially take in more animals. I had the space and money to build more habitats; there’d just never been enough of me to go around when I’d been doing it on my own.
We’d also gotten word from Deputy Miller this morning that Sheriff Tulley had been fired and that he was facing obstruction charges. Jimmy and his two buddies had already been arrested for the attack on Gentry.
As I made my way up the small bluff, I slowed when I got to the curve where my mother had missed the turn and we’d gone over the embankment. I couldn’t see down into the ravine where the car had ultimately landed, but I didn’t need to. It would be etched into my brain forever. Despite what I’d told Nolan about not carrying anger around, it was admittedly more difficult to find the forgiveness for my father a second time around. I could only figure that he hadn’t been in his right mind when he’d told Maddox I’d insisted on driving that night and that I’d refused to give him the keys when he’d asked for them. I knew I’d get to the point that I’d be able to let go of the anger, but it would definitely take some time.
It took just a few more minutes to reach the old Victorian mansion overlooking the water. It was incredibly run-down and I suspected once the snow melted, it would reveal that the surrounding land that had once been acres of pristinely landscaped grass and gardens was an overgrown mess. I didn’t see any cars in the wraparound driveway, but that didn’t mean anything since Sawyer had mentioned that he’d never actually seen Maddox drive to and from the center.
There was no answer when I knocked on the door, but when I tested the knob and found it unlocked, I didn’t hesitate to enter.
The house was freezing cold, so it wasn’t a shock to find Maddox sitting in front of a roaring fireplace in what had once been the den. He’d moved the cloth-draped furniture aside and rolled a sleeping bag out on the floor. My brother sat unmoving in the single armchair in front of the fireplace, a bottle of liquor at his feet.
“Took you long enough to figure it out, little brother,” Maddox murmured.
I walked around the chair so I was facing Maddox. He looked tired, but not drunk.
I held out my phone to him to show him the message I’d typed for him even before I’d left my house.
“Don’t thank me,” he said as he leaned back in the chair. “All I did was tell the truth. It was long overdue.”
I typed, What do you want from me, Maddox?
“I want you to have the life you should have had ten years ago. I want to go back to that moment and do what I should have done.”
What should you have done?
“Told you how fucking glad I was that I hadn’t lost you too.”
I hated how lackluster his voice sounded. Maddox had always been the more intense of the two of us, but this was different.
“Did the kid and his brother leave?”
At twenty years old, Isaac wasn’t exactly a kid, but to my thirty-two-year-old brother, I supposed he did seem quite young.
No, he’s working at the center for a little while. Nice trick with his car.
Maddox waved his hand impatiently. “Little fool doesn’t know what’s good for him,” he growled. It was the first bit of life I’d actually seen in him.
What happened to you the night of the meeting, Maddox?
“I would have thought it would be obvious to you.”
I paused before typing.
PTSD?
Maddox downed the rest of the alcohol in his glass.
“Textbook case,” he said as he stared into the fire. “Roadside bomb in Mosul. Overturned Humvee, heavy fire, six of my men killed instantly. Three more didn’t last long enough to be evac’d. One guy got out besides me. I’m fucked up in the head, he’s got no legs. Purple Heart medals for both of us. Textbook,” he muttered.
Is that why you don’t drive?
He looked at me in surprise. His first real reaction besides his comment about Isaac.
“How did you know?”
Just a guess, I said, not wanting to get into the details. What are your plans?
When he didn’t answer, I carefully lowered myself to the floor. My hip hadn’t been hurting as much as it had earlier in the winter. It was another reason that taking it easier around the center and splitting the workload with more people would be a good thing.
I’d like to tell you about my plans. But I want to start by telling you something that someone I love very much and who I once hurt very badly told me not long ago.
Maddox read the message and nodded. I felt his eyes on me as I typed.
We’re not the same people we were back then, Maddox. And I believe that if you could change things, you would. I would, too. I would have told you the truth then and there and I would have made sure you believed me instead of letting you walk away. Because you were the most important person in my life. But I chose to let you believe a lie because inside I was still that little kid who wanted to please his parents. It was a lot easier to live that lie than accept the truth. My hope is that you don’t do what I did and start to believe that you deserved what happened to you. My hope is that you don’t relive that day and wonder if there was something you could have or should have done differently. My hope is that you will accept that I forgive you for the things you said and did back then. My hope is that we can one day be brothers again. My hope is that you forgive yourself because I really want back the person who’s always had my back.
As Maddox began reading my message, he nodded a few times. But then his mouth fell and I saw him swallow hard. At one point, he reached up to wipe at his eyes, but when he handed back the phone, he didn’t say anything. Disappointment flared, but just as I started to get to my feet, he reached out to grab my arm. His voice was heavy when he said, “You said you wanted to tell me about your plans.”
Relief went through me and I settled back on the floor. I smiled to myself as I typed an almost identical message to one I’d typed just six short weeks ago.
A message that had changed my life forever.
In the best way.
Do you need a job?
Epilogue
Nolan
Six months later
Exhilaration swept through me as I cleared the last note and the theater broke out into applause. The audience quickly climbed to their feet as several people called out “Bravo!” and “Encore!”
My heart was racing as I bowed to each section of the audience. I tried to spy Dallas through the crowd, but there were too many moving bodies to manage it. I caught a glimpse of my mother in the balcony, but no Dallas. It wasn’t until a good two minutes later as everyone sat back down that I could finally see that Dallas wasn’t sitting next to my mother. My mother sent me a small wave and even from where I was standing, I could see she was beaming. I blew her a kiss and saw her wipe at her eyes.
I still couldn’t get over the fact that she was here.
Not because I didn’t think she wanted to be, but because she’d made such a fuss about not attending any more of my performances if she couldn’t pay for the trip herself. And since her knitting and part-time work at the library were barely covering her regular bills, I’d accepted that the only performance she’d see of mine this year was the first one I’d given in London six weeks earlier.
She’d cried when I’d asked her if she’d wanted to come to that one. Then, like this last time, she’d fought with me about my insistence that Dallas and I would pay for the trip for her. Dallas had been the one to talk her into letting us treat her by turning up the Dallas Kent charm to full wattage. But she’d been a goner when he’d laid the Dallas Kent smile on her.
I still had no clue how she’d managed this trip with her limited means, but I didn’t care. She’d made it and that was what mattered.
My relationship with her had steadily improved over the last six months. We’d taken it really slow by starting with a couple of phone calls here and t
here. Our first big test had come at Thanksgiving time and we’d both passed with flying colors. My mother had, not surprisingly, been missing my father, but cooking for so many people had been a good distraction. Christmas had been a quieter affair, and Dallas and I had ended up inviting her to come to our house.
Our house.
I wasn’t even sure when I’d officially moved in with Dallas. It had just happened after my father’s funeral. I hadn’t even noticed until my mother had stopped by one day with the boxes she’d been storing at the house. She’d decided to put the house up for sale shortly after Christmas so she could move into a senior living community. When she’d brought me the boxes, I’d stupidly asked her what I was supposed to do with them. She’d patted me on the cheek and said, “You’ve got that great big house, Nolan. I’m sure you can find some room in it somewhere.” When Dallas had appeared a few minutes later, I’d still been standing in the driveway, boxes in hand, staring in the direction my mother had driven off in. When I’d asked Dallas if we were living together, he’d merely chuckled, taken one of the boxes from me, and dropped a kiss on my nose.
And that had been that.
“A big thank you to Mr. Nolan Grainger for that incredible performance of Paganini’s Caprice No. 4 in C minor” the conductor said into a microphone as he walked on stage. The audience began applauding again, so I quickly did another round of bowing and then nodded my thanks to the audience, then the conductor. Just as I was about to walk past the man, he grabbed my arm.
“For those of you who’ve been following Mr. Grainger’s story, you’ll know how fortunate we are that he decided to continue to share his gift with us. I’m extremely pleased that he let the London Symphony Orchestra be a part of his return to our little world. But I’m even more pleased that we have the opportunity to be a small part of his next journey.”
I glanced at the man in confusion, since I had no clue what he was talking about. I looked up in the balcony to see if Dallas had returned, but his seat was still empty. Worry went through me. What if he wasn’t feeling well? He’d completely recovered from the surgery six months earlier, but what if something else was troubling him?
I didn’t even notice the audience had stopped applauding until I heard a few hushed whispers drift up onto the stage. I saw that most everyone was looking to my right, so I glanced that way and completely froze at the sight of Dallas walking across the stage. The conductor moved aside as Dallas reached me. I shook my head as I looked from him to the audience. He looked nervous.
I was completely clueless.
“Dallas, what…what?” was all I managed to get out.
“Hi, baby,” he said. His speech had improved dramatically over the past several months, especially since he’d been working so hard with his speech therapist. But to the average person, it still sounded like a harsh whisper and I knew it still tended to embarrass him.
“Hi,” I croaked as he leaned in to kiss my cheek.
He stepped back, only to reach for the conductor’s microphone, which the man promptly handed over.
What?
“Nolan, I have something I want to ask you.”
As soon as he said the words, I began to cry. I nearly dropped my violin – the violin Dallas had given me – but the conductor thankfully grabbed it and my bow before stepping away again.
“Yes,” I said, and the audience laughed. Dallas did too. I clapped my hand over my mouth. I lifted it long enough to say, “Sorry.”
Dallas took my hand and pulled it to his lips for a kiss. The audience was dead silent as he began speaking. “Nolan, the last few times I got my voice back, I didn’t care if I lost it again because no one was listening anyway. There was no one to hear me. Not until the cute, skinny boy who played a mean violin and that I couldn’t keep my eyes off of returned to me as a beautiful, kind-hearted man who gave more than he was given. Who loved more than he was loved. Who listened more than he spoke. As much as I love being able to speak to you, I don’t fear the day when my voice may once again start to fade. Because I know you’ll hear me, Nolan. I know you’ll hear me no matter what. Just like I will always hear you and I will always love you. Always and forever. I know you said yes already, but I need to hear it again. Will you marry me, Nolan?”
I had no clue how I managed it, but I somehow got the word “yes” out a second time, though it probably sounded like a frog croaking more than anything else. Then I was in his arms, crying like a baby as he whispered in my ear that he loved me.
“Love you,” I said with a nod as he gently pushed me back. He wiped at my tears and then reached into his pocket. At some point the audience had burst into applause, but I hadn’t even heard it because I’d been so focused on Dallas. My hands were shaking like crazy as he slipped a beautiful white gold ring on my finger, then he was pulling me into his arms again. I managed a glance at my mother who was wiping at her face with a handkerchief. And I knew in that moment that Dallas had brought her to this final performance so she could share this moment with us.
That knowledge brought a fresh round of happy tears. He held me tight as he whispered, “Let’s go home, Nolan.”
I nodded because for the first time in the history of ever, I, Nolan Grainger, was actually looking forward to going home.
The End
About the Author
Dear Reader,
I hope you enjoyed the start of what I hope will be an intensely emotional new series. And don’t worry, Dallas and Nolan will be back in Maddox’s story as he tries to resist the enigma that is Isaac.
As an independent author, I am always grateful for feedback so if you have the time and desire, please leave a review, good or bad, so I can continue to find out what my readers like and don’t like. You can also send me feedback via email at [email protected]
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Also by Sloane Kennedy
(Note: Not all titles will be available on all retail sites)
The Escort Series
Gabriel’s Rule (M/F)
Shane’s Fall (M/F)
Logan’s Need (M/M)
Barretti Security Series
Loving Vin (M/F)
Redeeming Rafe (M/M)
Saving Ren (M/M/M)
Freeing Zane (M/M)
Finding Series
Finding Home (M/M/M)
Finding Trust (M/M)
Finding Peace (M/M)
Finding Forgiveness (M/M)
Finding Hope (M/M/M)
The Protectors
Absolution (M/M/M)
Salvation (M/M)
Retribution (M/M)
Forsaken (M/M)
Vengeance (M/M/M)
A Protectors Family Christmas
Atonement (M/M)
Revelation (M/M)
Redemption (M/M)
Defiance (M/M)
Non-Series
Letting Go (M/F)
Locked in Silence_Pelican Bay [Book 1] Page 25
