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“Ahh…there’s the prick you were telling me about.”
    “Get used to it, Miss Price,” I tell her with a mock bow. “You’ll be seeing quite a bit of him.”
    Turning around, I open her door and walk out of her office, feeling her eyes burn into my back until I turn the corner and head down the depressing gray hallway.

Chapter 4
Sutton
    “You seriously met Alex Crossman? And you’re going to be working with him?”
    “Yes,” I say for the third—maybe fourth—time as I set the lasagna in the middle of the table.
    “Holy shit. That is just so cool,” Glenn says, his eyes filled with excitement and yearning.
    “Watch your mouth,” my mom says sternly but I see my stepdad Jim turn away from the table because he’s about ready to bust out laughing. I catch his eye and shoot him a wink but try to keep my features bland so my little brother doesn’t know we think he’s freakin’ adorable when he cusses.
    Glenn’s eyes cast downward for a second in shame over his curse word but then they pop right back up to me, filled with hope. “Do you think you can get me an autograph, Sutton? It doesn’t have to be much…just on a piece of paper or something.”
    My heart tumbles, seizes and then melts over Glenn’s simple request. He’s an amazing kid, eleven years my junior and he never asks for anything. My mom and stepdad don’t make a lot of money but they have managed to give Glenn and me a damn good life. We may have grown up wearing thrift store clothing and having lean Christmases, but we never lacked for our basic necessities, and we were given so much love and devotion from our parents that we never missed the things we did without.
    At eleven, Glenn is old enough to know the bounds of our parents’ abilities, even as he watches his friends sporting expensive clothing and carrying the very best of iPhones, iPads, gaming devices and toys. He doesn’t ask for these things because he knows our parents can’t afford them, and he never pouts, whines or tries to lay a guilt trip on them about it. But as he sits here staring at me with bright, shining eyes, he knows the cost of an autograph is nothing more than a simple request for me to make to Alex, and I’m not going to deny him that.
    I’m pretty sure Alex would give me an autograph if I asked. He was quite the ass when he stomped out of my office, verifying for me that he must, indeed, be the team’s bad boy. But I feel there’s something else there too.
    I sense there is a reason for the way he is. Call it my counselor intuition, or maybe it’s just plain wishful thinking so I don’t have to deal with an asshole that is an asshole for no other reason than he likes being that way.
    Either way, it’s going to be interesting to see how this plays out.
    “Sure, kiddo,” I say as I tousle his hair. “I’ll get something from him next time I see him.”
    “Yes!” Glenn yells and gives a fist pump in the air. “Everyone at school will die when they see it.”
    “You’ll be the talk of the class,” Mom says, her eyes warm and grateful as she watches the exuberance on Glenn’s face. Then she lifts her gaze to mine and her expression to me says,
Thank you, baby, for making Glenn happy. He deserves it.
    I can feel tears prickle at my eyes so I blink rapidly, and say, “Okay, who is ready for some lasagna?”
    “I’m ready for my birthday cake,” Glenn says with a grin.
    Pushing the spatula into the pan, I lift out a slice and place it on Glenn’s plate. “Lasagna first, then cake,” I tell him.
    “Then presents?” he asks hopefully.
    “We’ll discuss it if you eat all of your dinner,” Mom says.
    Glenn picks up his fork and dives in before I even get the second slice out of the pan. I shake my head with a smile on my face, pulling another piece out.
    “Here you go, Jim-Dad,” I say affectionately as I place the cheesy pile on his plate.
    “Thanks, baby. Looks great,” he says.
    My stepdad is a real-life, bona fide angel. He took