I glared at Keesha. She glared back at me before she left. At least the hate was mutual. After I hit my first foster father, the system had labeled me emotionally unstable and I’d lost the right to see my brothers. Since I’d had no outbursts with any of my other foster families and showed “improvement,” I’d recently regained once-a-month supervised visitation.

Jacob mumbled into my shoulder, “I missed you, Noah.”

I pulled away and looked at my eight-year-old brother. He had Dad’s blond hair, blue eyes and nose. “I missed you, too. Where’s Tyler?”

Jacob diverted his gaze to the floor. “He’s coming. Mom … I mean …” he stuttered. “Carrie is talking to him in the hallway. He’s a little nervous.” His eyes met mine again, full of worry.

I faked a smile and messed up his hair. “No worries, bro. He’ll come when he’s ready. You want to open your present?”

He flashed a smile that reminded me of Mom and nodded. I handed him his gift and watched him open the box that contained twenty new packs of Pokémon cards. He sat on the floor and lost interest in me as he tore open each pack, occasionally telling me random facts about a particular card he liked.

I glanced at the clock and then at the door. I only had so much time with my brothers and some bitch had Tyler. Even though I’d told Jacob it was okay, it wasn’t. Tyler was only two when our parents died. I needed every minute I could get to help him remember them. Hell, who was I kidding? I needed every minute to help him remember me.

“How are things with Carrie and Joe?” I tried to sound nonchalant, but this question made me nervous. I had firsthand experience with shitty foster parents and I’d kill anybody who tried to treat my brothers like those people had treated me.

Jacob organized the cards into different categories. “Fine. They told us on Christmas that we could start calling them Mom and Dad if we wanted to.”

Son of a bitch. My fist clenched and I bit the inside of my mouth, drawing blood.

Jacob looked away from his cards for the first time. “Where you going, Noah?”

“To get Tyler.” I only had forty-five minutes left. If they wanted to play dirty, so could I.

The minute I entered the hallway, Keesha stepped out of the observation room connected to mine, shutting the door behind her. “Get back in there and visit with your brother. You already complain that you don’t see them enough.”

I pointed my finger at her. “I earned at least two hours a month with my brothers. At least—not limited to. If they don’t get Tyler in that room in thirty seconds, I’m going to call a lawyer and tell him you’re knowingly keeping me from my brothers.”

Keesha stared at me for a second then started to laugh. “You’re a smart boy, Noah. Learnin’ the system and usin’ it to your advantage. Get back in there. He’s on his way.” I turned, but Keesha called out, “And Noah, if you ever point your finger at me again, I’ll break it off and hand it to you.”

Jacob gave me Mom’s smile again when I reentered. I focused on shoving the anger out of my system. Jacob was easy. Jacob remembered. Tyler—Tyler was a whole other animal.

Carrie, the perfect adult with perfect brunette hair, entered the room with Tyler wrapped around her like a baby monkey to his mother. I held out my hands. “Give him to me.”

I towered over her. Easy to do since she only came to my shoulder. Instead of handing him over, she slipped another arm around him. “He’s scared.”

Correction. She was scared. “I’m his brother and you’re not related to him. He’ll be fine.”

When she made no move to release him, I continued, “I have the right to this visit.”

She licked her lips. “Tyler, baby, it’s time to see Noah and play with Jacob. It looks like Noah got you a present.”

At those words, Tyler lifted his head and stared at me. The face of my youngest brother almost brought me to my knees. It wasn’t because he looked like me and Mom, but because the entire right side of his face was bruised. My heart beat faster when I saw the patch of shaved brown hair and at least five staples in his skull.

My head snapped to the transparent mirror, a clear indication that if Keesha didn’t get her social worker ass in here, I was going to kill this woman.

I sucked in a calming breath. Tyler was only four and my anger would frighten him. I reached out and took him from her. She held her arms out as if I’d stolen her puppy. “It was an accident,” she whispered.

“Hey, lil’ bro. Would you like to open your present?” I asked Tyler.

Tyler nodded. I placed him next to Jacob and handed him his gift. Keesha walked in as Carrie scurried out. Keesha held her hands up. “It was an accident. I should have told you before Tyler came in, but it slipped my mind.”

My eyes narrowed as I looked straight at her. “We’ll discuss this later.” I returned to my brothers and prayed that Tyler would speak at least one word to me before the session ended.

ONCE AGAIN, I SAT ON THE folding chair, but I wasn’t nervous this time. I was fucking pissed.

Keesha took the seat opposite me. “Carrie and Joe got Tyler a bike for Christmas and they let him ride it a couple of days ago without a helmet. When he fell, they took him immediately to the hospital and notified me. They feel horrible.”

“They should,” I barked. “How do you know they didn’t hit him?”

Keesha picked up the blue ribbon from Tyler’s package. “They’re good people. I don’t believe they would intentionally hurt your brothers.”

Yeah. Genuine saints. “If they’re so great, then they should stop stonewalling me and let me see my brothers.”

“They took on the boys after the incident with your first foster family, Noah. They’d heard that you were emotionally unstable. That alone proves how much they care for those boys. Carrie and Joe don’t want to see them get hurt.”

My fist closed and I kept my hand under the table to prevent myself from pounding the wall like I wanted. Keesha would love more leverage to prove my instability. “I would never hurt them.”

“I know that,” said Keesha with a hint of defeat. “Why do you think I suggested that Mrs. Collins take you on?”

I should have known. “So she’s your fault.”

She leaned forward, placing her arms on the table. “You’re a great kid, Noah. You’ve got a lot of potential in front of you if you’d just lose the attitude.”

I shook my head. “I thought I proved myself already. Christ, you’ve placed me in a home with another teenager.”

“I told you. This can be a slow process. Just come to the visitations, behave and work with Mrs. Collins. By the time you graduate, I’m sure we can move on to unsupervised visitation.”

Unsupervised visitation? A muscle in my jaw jumped. Bullshit. “I’ll be eighteen by the time I graduate. I’ll have custody by then.”

Keesha’s face twitched with amusement, but then became solemn. “You think you could raise your brothers while workin’ at a fast-food joint? You think a judge would choose you over Carrie and Joe?”

Choose me over Carrie and Joe? The realization that the judge might have this choice created a disturbing nausea in my gut. Jacob had said they wanted him to call them Mom and Dad. “Carrie and Joe are filing for adoption, aren’t they?”

The moment she looked away I knew the answer. There was no way in hell anyone but me would raise my brothers. “You’re right, Keesha. I’ve learned a lot in the past two and a half years. I’ve learned that this state takes blood into consideration and that the excuse of me being emotionally unstable must not be sticking if I’ve been placed in a home with another foster kid. I may not be able to take care of my brothers now, but in four months I will.”

Ready to leave, I pushed away from the table and stood. Keesha’s eyes crunched together in anger. “Don’t mess those boys’ lives up over an accident.”

I spun around and pulled up my sleeve, pointing at the round scar on my bicep. “Gerald called that an accident. The best way to describe Don is as an accident. What type of accident would you call Faith and Charles Meeks? I’ve got words for them, but you forbade that type of language. My brothers will never be accidents of this system.”

With that, I stalked out, slamming the door behind me.

Echo

Watching beer pong typically bored me, but not when Lila continued to kick everyone’s butt. The girl was on fire. Plus anytime the opposing team hit her cup, she asked some random guy to drink it. Guys always lined up to do her bidding.

“Are you going to play?” Luke asked.

Caught up in my own thoughts, I’d missed his approach. “Nope. This is all Lila.” Plus I didn’t do anything that drew attention to me.

“Tonight should be all about you. It is your birthday.” He paused. “Happy birthday, Echo.”

“Thanks.”

“So you gonna watch her all night?” Luke appraised the game with his thumbs hitched in his pockets. If I didn’t know better, I’d say he was up to something.

“Buddy system. I’ve got Lila and Lila’s got me. Natalie and Grace are around here somewhere.” I surveyed the kitchen, half expecting them to spontaneously appear.

“Smart, yet annoying.” Luke placed his palm on the wall next to my head, but kept his body a safe distance from mine. When he used to do that, he would crowd me with his body, causing butterflies to pole-vault in my stomach. Then he would lean in closer and kiss me. Those days were long gone—the crowding, the butterflies, the pole-vaulting and especially the kissing. “I was going to ask you to dance.”

I made a show of looking around. “Who you trying to make jealous, Luke?”

He withdrew his hand and laughed—really laughed. Not the fake one he used in the cafeteria with his girl of the week. “Come find me when Lila’s done playing games.”

Lila threw her hands in the air and yelled as she demolished, once again, another team. At this point, I was sure they were letting her win just so she’d continue to play. Luke disappeared.

She grabbed one of the remaining cups of beer and walked away from the table, to the dismay of the guys who hung on her every movement. She drank half then handed the rest to me. “Here. Nat’s still DD, right?”

“Yep.” I took the cup from her and finished it off. I didn’t particularly care for the taste, but when at a kegger …

I enjoyed the warm fuzzy feeling the beer eventually brought on. The edges of my life didn’t seem so bad then. Week number two of the second term had brought on my first one-on-one therapy session with Mrs. Collins, no job, and the fear that Noah Hutchins would change his mind and tell everyone about my scars. The two of us had gone back to ignoring each other. “Mrs. Collins asked me this week if I drank. I’m really tired of lying to her.”

Michael Blair, host of the party, walked by with a tray full of beers for another round of beer pong. Lila stole two and passed one to me. “Adults want us to lie. They expect us to lie. They want to live in their perfect little worlds and pretend we do nothing more than eat cookie dough and watch reality TV.”