“I would have helped you.” There’s hurt in his voice. He’s offered that a few times, but there’s just no way I can accept his money. We have so little of it. We work so hard for it, and there’s never quite enough to pay all the bills.

“And I appreciate that. It means more than you can know, but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t. That’s your money for you to go to college, and fulfill your own dreams.”

He snorts. “Such as?”

That makes me smile. “I don’t know. There was that time you filled Mr. Lawson’s car with frozen hot dogs. That could be your true calling.”

“Hey, those were cooked from the sun by the time he found out. That’s like free food.”

I laugh softly. “I don’t know what you want to be when you grow up.”

“Hell, Jane. I feel like I’m a hundred years old sometimes.”

“We’ve lived through a lot.”

He falls silent, and I know he’s thinking about the past—same as me. We came from nothing. Less than nothing. We’re the rejects in society, the kids that no one wanted. It leaves a mark on a person that never goes away. I’m grateful that no matter how much Paige is struggling right now, she’ll never have that experience. She has a home here.

Tears prick my eyes, but I force a fake smile in the dimly lit room where he can’t see me. “What about becoming a doctor? You could help people heal from diseases.”

“And pander to the pharmaceutical gods, handing out pills like candy? No, thank you.”

“Then you can be a lawyer. Defend the innocent.”

“They’re all fucking guilty of something.”

I give an exasperated laugh. There’s like a fifty percent chance he’s only saying this to mess with me. “No wonder you feel a hundred years old. You’re so cynical.”

“Hey, just because I’m paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not out to get me.”

“Maybe become a social worker with me. We know how the system works, how kids get left behind. We can make it so that doesn’t happen anymore.”

“I could never do that,” he says quietly.

“Why not?”

“Because the first dad I met who beat his kids, I’d punch him in the gut so many times he’d die. And then I’d end up in jail. I’m too pretty for that, Jane.”

I suck in a breath, because he’s right. There’s true evil in this world. He knows it. I know it. Even if I get a degree and become a social worker, I won’t be able to right every wrong.

That’s a pipe dream, and he’s kind for pretending it might really work.