Chapter 11
Eleven
Beckett
“If you’re going to drink my beer, Vaughn, the least you can do is hold the bottom of the box so I don’t give myself a hernia.”
Hudson leans against my kitchen counter, looking relaxed for a man who just finished a twelve-hour shift on the psych ward. He cracks a cold beer and takes a slow sip. “I’m a psychiatrist. My hands are for delicate cognitive unraveling, not manual labor.”
I grunt and shove a stack of heavy surgical texts onto a bookshelf. “Get over here and be useful.”
He sighs, pushing off the counter to help me steady a stack of journals, but he’s too late.
“Move over, Doc. Let a professional handle the heavy lifting.” Tom steps into the fray, catching the corner of the box before it tips.
Tom has been a fixture in my life since before I could walk. He was my father’s oldest friend, and since the accident, he’s been the one filling the gaps.
“Thanks, Tom.” I wipe sweat from my forehead. “I didn’t expect you’d be coming by today.”
“Your mother mentioned you still hadn’t unpacked properly,” Tom says, his voice a gravelly rumble as he hefts a box. He looks younger lately, more energized.
We work in silence for a few minutes, punctuating the monotony with small talk.
“Did you see what this idiot did?” Hudson says, nodding toward the TV. I look up.
The news is running a loop of Senator Reece thrusting a middle finger directly into a camera lens, then into the face of a female reporter.
“The flip-off seen around the world.” Hudson chuckles, turning up the volume.
The senator stands at the podium.
“If I had people following me around all day,” Hudson says, “I’d snap too. I can barely handle the admin team.”
“Still doesn’t excuse it.”
“No,” he agrees. “But it explains it.”
He nudges the volume up again with the remote.
“I want to apologize for my actions,” the senator says. “They do not reflect my values—”
I stop listening because she steps into the frame.
Madison.
But she’s not wearing slippers or a robe. She’s not flushed and yelling at me at one in the morning, either.
She’s calm and collected, with the same green eyes that pinned me in my own hallway.
She’s just a different weapon right now.
Hudson squints at the screen. “Why does she look familiar?”
I don’t answer.
“Wait. Isn’t that hot yoga girl from the ER?”
I grunt. “She’s my neighbor.”
Hudson turns his head. “Your neighbor is the hot yoga girl?”
“Yes. Her name is Madison.”
“And now she’s… running a press conference?”
“Looks that way.”
The senator steps aside, allowing Madison her place at the microphone.
“My name is Madison Callahan,” she says. “I represent Senator Reece. The senator acknowledges that his actions were inappropriate. He’s apologized privately and will step back from public appearances.”
A hand shoots up. “Will the senator resign?”
Madison doesn’t miss a beat. “No.”
“Is there an internal investigation?”
“That’s already underway.”
“Do you stand by—”
She lifts a hand. “There will be no further questions. Any statements moving forward will be issued in writing.”
She steps back before they can argue. The senator follows her offstage.
Hudson exhales. “She just shut that down.” He looks at me again, more curious. “You said her name was Madison?”
“Yes.”
He grins. “Madison is hot.”
I give him a look.
“What?” He shrugs. “It’s an observation. She’s hot, and she’s also terrifying.”
“Careful, Hudson,” Tom says, his eyes fixed on the screen. “Women like that don’t just ruin your life. They rearrange it.” He looks back at me, a ghost of a smirk on his face. “She looks like a lot of work, Beck.”
“She yelled at me last night.”
Hudson laughs. “Even better.”
“Apparently, I thud.”
“So she’s fiery?”
Refusing to entertain where the hell this is going, I change the subject. “Did you hear back about funding for your study yet? The divorce thing?”
“The ‘Marital Deconstruction’ study,” he corrects me. “Funding came through this morning. We start the group therapy trials next year. I’m taking couples on the brink of collapse and putting them in a room together to see who survives the fallout. It’s going to be a bloodbath.”
I shove the last book onto the shelf. “You’re a masochist. I’ll stick to broken bones.”
He nods back toward the TV, where they’re replaying Madison’s statement. Her freckled nose crinkles as she navigates a reporter’s question. “Is she always that… intense?”
I think about her in her pink slippers, clutching her back, telling me the weather promised sun but gave her rain. I think about the way she read me like a cheap paperback in the hallway this morning, before I could even find the right name for her.
“From what I’ve seen, yes,” I mutter, cracking my own beer.
“Good luck.” Hudson laughs, clinking his bottle against mine. “Something tells me you’re going to need it.”