Alex

“To my parents’ house. Family dinner.”

My immediate instinct is to say no and several reasons filter through my head. First, I want Sutton all to myself. I don’t want to share her right now. Second, seems kind of lame to meet her parents for our first date—and this could be our only date for all I know—and finally, did I mention I want Sutton all to myself?

Then I remember that I’m leaving tomorrow for an extended away-game schedule and won’t be back for another five days. Suddenly I realize I’ll take Sutton any way I can get her. “Okay. I’m in.”

“Really?” she asks, looking at me skeptically.

“Yeah, why not?”

“It’s just…seems kind of lame, going to my parents’ house for a first date.”

“Thought the same thing when you suggested it.”

“Painfully honest, right?”

Grinning at her, I nod. “Yup. But I realized I’d just like to spend time with you, and if your parents are half as cool as you, I’m thinking this will be fun.”

“They’re great. You’ll love them. My mom and Jim-Dad have achieved sainthood already in my book.”

“Jim-Dad?” I ask with a laugh.

“He’s my stepdad. He’s raised me since I was about eight.”

“What about your real dad?”

“Jim-Dad is my real dad,” she says, not with any censure but with genuine warmth and amusement. “Now, if you’re talking about the sperm donor who is my birth father—well, he’s floating around Raleigh somewhere. He flits in and out of my life on occasion, depending on whether he’s clean or not.”

My mouth drops open and I stare at her in disbelief over what I think she just implied, and the way she said it with full acceptance and not an ounce of bitterness. “Your dad is a…?”

“Drug addict? Yup. He’s definitely not father of the year, but I try to support him as best I can.”

“And by support you mean…?”

“Not financial. I mean I try to give him encouragement and emotional support, but it’s hard when I’ve watched him yo-yo back and forth.”

I’m quiet for a moment, comparing her revelation to thoughts of my own father, who battles with alcohol. No, that’s not quite right. He doesn’t battle. That would imply he’s tried to quit at some point, but he never has to my knowledge. He has succumbed, nothing more.

“Is that why you do what you do?” I ask her.

“Drug counseling? Pretty obvious, right?”

“Pretty f**king impressive, I’d say.”

Sutton’s face flushes red and she averts her gaze with uncharacteristic shyness. She picks up the fork and starts fiddling with it again while she continues. “My life was very bad when my dad was part of it. His drug addiction brought a lot of suffering down on my mom and me. My mom saved me, though. She got me out of that environment—as best she could. Then Jim-Dad saved us both.”

Laying the fork back down, she lifts her eyes to meet mine, and she is smiling in a moment of happy reflection and love for her family.

I want to hear all about her story, but I’m actually afraid to. I’m afraid to hear it because of the comparisons I’ll draw to my own life, and I hate thinking about my childhood. I also don’t want to hear her story because something churns a bit in my gut. It appears we both had crappy childhoods, yet Sutton seems to have adjusted just fine. At least from what I can tell.

Me?

Not so much. I’ve let my past shape me into something that a few weeks ago I was pretty comfortable with.

But now?

Now I’m not sure I like looking in the mirror and seeing the reflection. I’m pretty confident that while Sutton has been a beautiful, bright spot in my life recently, she could also cause me a world of hurt by peeling away my scabs. I like her, want to get to know her, want to spend time with her.

Want to f**k her, no doubt.

But I don’t want to get too close. I think that would cause repercussions that I probably couldn’t bear in the long run.

Chapter 12

Sutton

I can’t believe I’m on a date with Alex Crossman. I can’t believe Alex Crossman just had dinner at my parents’ house. I can’t believe I want him to kiss me more than I’ve ever wanted to be kissed before, and my palms are sweating so badly over the prospect I keep wiping them on my jeans.

The evening has been perfect so far. Alex picked me up at my house. When I invited him in and asked if he wanted a tour, he just gave me a slick grin and said, “Later. When I drop you off.”

And that was when my insanely slutty side came to light. All I could imagine was him coming into my house and pushing me up against the wall…taking all kinds of indecent liberties with me whether I wanted him to or not. The image was burned so hotly into my mind that I kept revisiting it during dinner.

Sometimes I even had a hard time concentrating on what was going on around me, my mind wandering toward my fantasies rather than my reality.

And the reality was, that dinner was fun and wonderful, and the best part was seeing Glenn’s face when I showed up with Alex. I thought he was going to perish on the spot, and he got so tongue-tied that he could barely say hello. Alex had pulled a bag out of the back of his Suburban when we pulled up in front of my parents’ home, and when I asked what was in it, he just shrugged and said, “A few things for your brother.”

A few things turned out to be a signed Crossman jersey, four tickets to the next home game for the entire family, a signed Crossman poster and a stick signed by the Cold Fury’s goalie, Max Fournier. I freakin’ had to turn my head and wipe my eyes on my shoulder when I saw the way Glenn’s face lit up. For a split second, he doubted the entire bounty before him, and looked to Mom for reassurance that it was okay to accept so many wonderful gifts. Then my little brother—my beautiful little baby brother—looked to Alex and said, “It’s too much.”