Madison's Quest by Jory Strong

Author:Jory Strong [Strong, Jory]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Jory Strong
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eight

“Here goes,” Madison said, opening the door and stepping into Sunrise Journey Rehab and Recovery Services.

Like Oakhurst Preparatory, this place obviously catered to the rich. The view of Fisherman’s Wharf through a reception area window said expensive real estate. While pictures of a tranquil ranch in the Napa Valley promised success for those footing the bill.

The auburn-haired woman who stepped from an office was model tall and attractive, perfectly tailored and tastefully adorned with the right jewelry.

“May I help you?”

“This may sound odd. But my name is Madison York. I’m wondering if something was left here for me. A package, or possibly an envelope.”

“Just a moment,” the woman said, crossing to another office and knocking softly on the door, the lack of surprise causing Madison’s nerves to jangle.

From inside the office, a man’s voice said, “Come in.”

The woman slipped in, closing the door behind her.

Madison’s palms dampened and her pulse sped. Shane draped an arm over her shoulders while Tyler’s hand tugged hers away from her jeans and enfolded it.

The door opened.

The woman emerged with a metal box similar to the one at Boeddeker Park.

Madison deflated, realized that she’d been hoping for—what? That Bio-dad would step from the office? No, not that, but that at least someone who knew him and was meant to tell her something about him would come out, maybe even meet her and carry an impression of her to him.

Shane muttered, “This is getting old.”

Madison took the box.

They returned to the Jeep.

She set the box on the mustard-yellow hood.

Inside there was another brochure for an out-of-state rehab place. There was an empty pill bottle, a couple of hundred dollar bills rolled tight, as if used to snort drugs, another large envelope.

She pulled the envelope from the box and opened it, removing the first item she touched.

It was a check for seventy-five thousand dollars.

“Doesn’t change my mind,” Shane said. “This shit is still getting old.”

It was, but it was impossible not to feel a measure of gratitude. She hadn’t read past the bank’s intention to foreclose, but surely there was now enough to keep her parents from losing the house.

She tugged a photograph out next. It was the same girl who’d been holding the baby, only fast forward a couple of years and this time there was no doubt that she was looking at an image of her younger self.

“This picture had to have been taken pretty close to the time I was adopted.”

In it she was smiling. Bio-mom was smiling. Their cheeks were rosy, their blonde hair windswept.

Behind them were…tall hills? Low mountains?

“Do you recognize the scenery?” she asked.

Tyler said, “Somewhere in the San Joaquin. Let’s look at the clue.”

It was the last item in the envelope.

Madison unfolded it and placed it on the Jeep’s hood.

Discoveries made as the past unfolds into the future. A turning point fully embraced so unwanted destiny becomes welcome yoke, the first true steps toward it taken among cantaloupe fields that stretch for twenty-one miles.

The picture, the wording, it was hard not to think that this clue would lead her to Bio-mom.

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