Chapter 32
CALLIE
The taillights of Ryder’s truck disappeared down the drive, and I was already moving.
My sandals slapped against the hardwood as I cut through the living room, through the dining room, toward the warm light spilling from the kitchen. The conversation with Ryder was still ricocheting around my head and I needed answers.
I rounded the corner and stopped short.
Maddox stood at the island, surrounded by meticulously organized chaos: a million ingredients, mixing bowls, and baking dishes spread across the granite.
“What the hell is this?” I demanded.
“Overnight crème br?lée French toast.” He wiped his hands on a dish towel. “The bread has to soak in the custard overnight, and then you bake it with this caramelized brown sugar layer that—”
“Enough,” I cut in. “When you pretend you’re going to therapy, where are you actually going?”
The shift in his body was immediate. He was trying to hide it, but I knew what it meant when his shoulders drew back slightly like that. He didn’t want to have this conversation.
“I am going to therapy,” he said cautiously.
“Bullshit.” I moved closer, putting the island between us like a barrier. “What are you up to, Maddox? What’s the angle?”
“There’s no angle. I’m seeing a therapist. Her name is Dr. DeMille, her office is on Baxter Street, and I go twice a week.”
I burst out laughing at that. “Oh my gods! Please, I know I don’t need to give advice to you on lying, but don’t overreach. Once a week is enough of a stretch. You honestly think I’m stupid enough to believe you go twice?”
Maddox’s eyes were pained, but he didn’t look away from me. “I’m not lying.”
“Of course you are! Lies are the only thing I’ve ever gotten from you!” The words roared out with a force that surprised me. “Tell me the truth. Now. And do not give me the same bullshit again.”
Maddox looked trapped for a moment, until he suddenly pulled out his phone.
“Here, I can show you on the portal for my health insurance.” He stabbed at the phone screen as he hastily typed in his passcode and handed the phone over to me. “My insurance has all the records. Look, here… Dr. DeMille, every Monday and Thursday at noon.”
I snatched the phone from his hands, scrolled, and sure enough, there it was, plain as day.
Months of twice-weekly therapy sessions.
The phone felt heavy in my hands. I had been so certain it was a lie. I could not have been more certain! How could I have been wrong?
“This doesn’t…” I shook my head. “You could have faked this. You could have actually gone and just sat there, not engaged, and made a joke of it.”
“I’m not making a joke of it. Every session I show up and I try to work as hard as I can.”
“Work hard at getting Ms. DeMille off, maybe? I know your dick isn’t working, but your tongue is.”
“No, I promise you. It’s not anything like that.”
“Then why haven’t I heard about it until now?” I demanded, tossing his phone back onto the counter. “If this were legit, you would use it to score points with me.”
“That’s exactly why I didn’t tell you. I knew I had to do it for real. If I were doing it just so you would see me doing it… I don’t want to manipulate people like that anymore.”
His eyes were so soulful as he said it. Those stupid fucking soulful eyes. Exactly what lured me in with him in the first place.
“Why should I believe that? Why should I believe anything you say?”
“You shouldn’t.”
That stopped me.
“You’re right,” he continued, and his voice was so fucking calm, so measured, that I wanted to throw something at him. “You have no reason to trust me. I destroyed that. I know it’s way too late to matter to you, but I am trying to fix what’s broken in me.”
He seemed so sincere.
But he had always seemed sincere, hadn’t he?
“Twice a week.” I made it sound like an accusation. “What, once wasn’t enough? Needed extra credit?”
He hesitated briefly before forging ahead. “I asked for three times, actually.”
I blinked.
“Dr. DeMille said no. She said three times a week creates its own problems. Too much therapeutic dependence, not enough time to process between sessions. But she said two could be helpful, especially when the problems are acute. I wanted to be as aggressive as I could about treating my issues.”
I felt like my brain was going to explode. None of this computed with the Maddox I knew. Not even servant Maddox of recent months.
I paced, agitation overwhelming me. Nothing here made sense.
And then, it suddenly hit me. I saw what was really going on. Cackling manic laughter erupted from me, and I hated how crazed it sounded. “I just got it! I see the plan now!”
Maddox stared at me, his eyes a convincing imitation of vulnerability and yearning.
“I can’t believe it took me this long. This was pretty clever, actually.
Do all this stuff—the therapy, the charity—but don’t tell me directly.
Plant it with people like Ryder and Duke, so it gets back to me.
And because I discovered it ‘accidentally,’ that’ll make it believable.
” I was waving my hands around like a crazy person as the pieces of his scheme fell into place.
“That’s how you fool me. That’s how you get me to believe this is real! ”
“Callie—”
“The charity work.” I spun to face him. “How disgusting was that, huh? Having to be around homeless people and pretend to give a shit about them? Did you do a full-body rubdown with sanitizer after?”
“Please!” The word riped out of him as the devastation he’d been trying to hide cracked across his face, naked and raw. “I’m sorry, Callie, I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t you dare apologize to me!”
A wine glass on the open shelving across the kitchen exploded.
“You think there’s any apology in the world that could fix what you’ve done to me?” Another glass blew up.
“I know there isn’t.”
“Look at how crazy you’ve made me! I don’t know what to believe anymore!
” I was screaming at the top of my lungs.
An entire row of wine glasses detonated in sequence like dominoes.
Maddox was standing far enough away, but the glass showered his elaborate meal prep.
So much for overnight crème br?lée French toast.
“I wish there was something I could do to fix what I’ve done.” His eyes were watering, which made me even more enraged.
“Oh, fuck off. There’s no fixing this! How am I going to trust anyone after what you’ve done to me? Years of lies! Years! Years of you fucking every woman that crossed your path, and then coming home and telling me you loved me. And I had no idea!”
The mixing bowl shattered, sending custard pouring onto the floor.
“Do you know how many of those guys this summer could have been something? How many of them wanted more? But as soon as they did, I pulled the plug.” Rage built in my voice. “I can’t put myself back in the position you put me in! I can’t give someone that power over me again.”
The kitchen had gone quiet. I shook my head.
“This was my greatest fear, the solitary witch life. I knew I didn’t want that for myself.
I knew I wanted a husband, and not only a coven.
” I wrapped my arms around myself. “But now I get it. I thought I knew better, but those witches knew how to live. Men just for flings, and nothing more. It’s not sad. It’s smart. It’s protection.”
Maddox’s knees hit the floor.
It happened so fast I almost didn’t process it. One moment he was standing, the next he was kneeling at my feet, looking up at me with a beseeching expression.
“Please,” he said. “Please don’t do that.”
“Don’t do what? Protect myself?”
“Don’t give up on love.”
I stared at him. “What?”
“Not with me. I know it can’t be with me.” He was talking fast now. “But someone. Please, give someone a chance.”
This felt like a hallucination. “Are you seriously kneeling in glass right now begging me to get with another man?”
“The most important thing to me—” His voice broke. He swallowed hard and tried again. “The only important thing to me now is that you find love again. Real love, with someone who deserves you. Please, don’t let what I did turn you into someone you’re not.”
“I don’t want to be the doormat you married,” I snarled.
“You wanted love. Real partnership. You deserve it, and you can give it, because you gave it to me. Don’t give up on that because I was too broken to return it to you.
” He looked up at me with those wet hazel eyes.
“Other men aren’t like me. Don’t turn on all of them because of how rotten I am. Please.”
The kitchen was silent except for my own ragged breathing and the occasional soft tink of settling glass.
“And what, you figured all this out in therapy?” The words came out sharp and mocking. “Had some big breakthrough about love and trust?”
“Yes.” He said it simply. “That’s exactly where I figured it out.”
“How am I supposed to believe you?” I glared at him. “How am I supposed to believe any of this?”
“Do you want to use the memory magic again? Would that help?”
Everything in me went quiet. I hadn’t expected that.
He locked his eyes on mine. “Total access. Not just therapy. Anything you need to see, anywhere in my mind.”
I should have said no. The memory magic was too intense, too overwhelming. And I desired separation from Maddox now, not going deeper.
I should have told him I didn’t need to see inside his head, that I didn’t care what he did in therapy, that nothing he could show me would change anything.
But I was so turned around. So lost in the labyrinth of what was real and what was performance. And the awful truth was… I did need this. I was feeling so shaken, so unsure of what I could trust. I needed to see the real inner truth, even if it made me pathetic to need the proof this badly.
“I hate that I need this,” I murmured.
“I know.” His voice was gentle.
My hand was trembling as I reached out.
The moment my fingers touched his face, the connection roared to life. That familiar magical tether snapped taut between us, his mind opening to mine like a door swinging wide.
And then I was falling. Into Maddox, and into the truth.