Max hoped it was Lana this time, just so he could hear her voice, and was disappointed when he didn’t see her name on the screen. He was even more disappointed when he heard Detective Coletti’s distinctive voice on the other end of the line.
“I don’t know what Wallace told you, but I haven’t been anywhere near that house,” Max stated firmly before the other cop had a chance to say anything.
“Yeah right.” Coletti snorted. “Like I frigging believe that. But it doesn’t matter. That’s not why I called. I figure you’d want to know the Department of Family and Protective Services gave me a call. According to the DFPS, Mrs. Wallace finally decided she’s had enough. She took the kids and left her husband a few hours ago. They’re at the Safe Campus in Bluffview.”
Max couldn’t believe how amazing those few simple words made him feel. It wasn’t until that moment that he realized he’d been holding his breath, expecting Coletti to tell him that Wallace had killed his family.
“You think I could stop in and check in on them, see if they need anything?” Max asked, not really sure why he was even asking Coletti.
“The department wanted you to stay away from Wallace and his residence,” Coletti said. “I don’t see any reason you can’t go see those kids now that they’re out of the house.”
Max didn’t say anything for long time, fighting some emotions he wasn’t sure what to do with. “Thanks, Coletti. I didn’t think it was going to work out, but I guess it did.”
“Sometimes it does,” the detective said. “Those are the ones we hope for.”
Max hung up to see Brooks regarding him with a smile on his face.
Max grinned. “I think Mrs. Wallace and her kids are going to be okay.”
“So I heard,” Brooks said. “Better not mention to Cooper how cool Coletti is being. It might ruin his opinion of the man.”
Chapter 8
“I don’t have a skull…or bones,” Max said, sprouting yet another one of his favorite movie lines, and making the Wallace kids laugh like crazy. Lana couldn’t blame them. He was making her laugh, too.
Lana, Max, Terence, Nina, and Natasha were sitting at a picnic table outside one of the dorm-style buildings of the Safe Campus emergency shelter, talking about animated movies while they worked their way through a ridiculous pile of cheeseburgers, fish sandwiches, onion rings, and fries. It hurt seeing Terence eating his burger with one hand heavily wrapped in gauze, especially after knowing how the injury had happened. Even so, she couldn’t help smiling at the way the boy’s face lit up when Max talked to him. The connection between the two of them was obvious. It was like Terence had found an older brother to idolize.
Even the two girls were looking at Max like he was the best thing since sliced bread. The fact that Max had brought them both french fries and onion rings because he’d been worried they might not like one or the other probably had something to do with it. Or maybe it was because Max knew all the best lines from the movie Frozen, as well as the words to the songs, too. That probably didn’t hurt, either. Lana was definitely going to grill him on that surprising bit of knowledge later. Right now, she was having too much fun being around this family that was, maybe for the first time in years, happy.
Lana had been thrilled when Max called and told her that Mrs. Wallace and her children had gotten away from her abusive husband and moved into a safe place. She’d been even more overjoyed when Max asked her to go with him to visit them.
They’d had to sign in to get past security at the gate of the Safe Campus shelter on Preston Park. The guard there had gone so far as to check the bags of food they’d brought with them, even after Max had flashed his badge. But that was a good thing. No one wanted the wrong people sneaking onto the shelter’s property.
She and Max had talked to Mrs. Wallace briefly, while she’d been filling out paperwork to get assistance with longer-term housing arrangements. Lana had cried a little when the woman had tearfully hugged Max and said it was his words that had given her the strength to leave her husband.
“I always believed he would wake up one day and see what he was doing to us.” The woman told them. “But he got drunk last night and woke up this morning in a rage. When he came at Natasha with a kitchen knife because she’d woken him up with her laughter, I knew he was never going to change. It was like you said, that this would keep happening until one of my children ended up dead. Unless I stood up to him. So that’s what I did. I put my children first and walked out of there.”
Max’s eyes had gotten a little misty at that as well. He wasn’t the only one. Half the staff in the building had tears in their eyes. It was one hell of a moment.
Lana kept Nina and Natasha entertained, spelling words with all the french fries they had on the wax paper from the sandwiches, while Max and Terence went over to the nearby swings to talk for a while. The girls seemed to understand that their brother needed some time alone with Max, and didn’t complain about his absence.
“Are you two going to get married?” Natasha asked suddenly, a ketchup-covered onion ring halfway to her mouth.
To say the question caught Lana off guard was an understatement. The two blond-haired sisters regarded her expectantly, their expressions adorable.
“Um…” she finally said. “Well, we only met a few days ago, so we’re just dating now.”
Natasha considered that as she took a bite of her onion ring. “Don’t you like him?”
Lana glanced at Max, glad he couldn’t hear any of this all the way over by the swings. “Sure I like him. He’s great.”
“Then you should marry him,” Natasha said seriously before eating the rest of her onion ring. “If I had a boyfriend who brought me both french fries and onion rings, I’d marry him. Not that I’m old enough to get married yet. I can’t do that for another year or two.”
Lana nodded at that well thought-out opinion. There was a certain logic to basing your marriage decision on a willingness to buy alternative side dishes. She’d certainly seen women get married for lesser reasons.
As she and the girls discussed the various menu options for her wedding to Max—just in case—Lana caught snatches of Max’s conversation with Terence on the breeze. What she heard made her want to cry.
