Alex (Cold Fury Hockey #1)(12)

But it's mine.

"Thanks, Mom. I think the house is coming along great." I scoop out some lasagna for her and then put a piece on my plate, sitting down to enjoy our birthday dinner for Glenn.

"Your bathroom sink still working okay?" Jim asks.

"Yup. It's proof positive that if you ever quit your day job, you have a career in plumbing," I tell him with a snicker.

I'm hoping one day I'll be done with all of the "fix-ups" for this place. So far, it's coming along well, and luckily Jim-Dad has been able to help me with the more complex repairs. But I single-handedly-and with great love-sanded down and refinished the old hardwood floors that run throughout the house. That took me nearly three weeks to do on my own, but it was worth saving the cost and it was a major accomplishment that I'm proud of. 

Jim takes a huge bite of lasagna and chews with a grin on his face. With a brief glance, I take in his kind eyes, tanned face and scruffy beard. He's a bear of a man, standing over six feet tall and built almost as wide. Jim is an auto mechanic by trade, working at one of the Ford dealerships for the past eighteen years. While cars are his specialty, he's one of those dads who can just fix anything.

We settle into the Murdock family tradition of cracking jokes while we eat dinner, snorting and laughing in between bites of lasagna and garlic bread. While my last name is Price, because my birth father still owns that part of me, I consider myself Jim's daughter and thus a Murdock.

When we're done, I bring out Glenn's birthday cake. It's tradition in our family that the birthday honoree gets their favorite dinner cooked, and their favorite dessert. It doesn't have to be a cake, but in Glenn's case it was.

Homemade red velvet cake with buttercream frosting.

His eyes go wide when he sees the monstrosity that I've made. It's so tall that it actually tilts to the left a little, slightly resembling the Leaning Tower of Pisa. I light the eleven candles and then we all sing a rousing rendition of "Happy Birthday" while Glenn looks around at each of us with a toothy smile on his face. By the time the last notes of the song die out, we're all wearing matching grins.

Glenn closes his eyes to make his wish, then gives a gusty blow to the candles, moving his head back and forth to give them all equal airtime. He blows them out like a champ, all except the one trick candle I had placed in the middle. We all laugh as he repeatedly puffs at it, watching it spark back to life time and time again.

Finally, he gets the candle permanently extinguished, then I serve the cake. Glenn wolfs his down in about three huge bites, which is not surprising. He hit some sort of weird growth spurt a few months ago and seems to be adding inches and pounds to his frame every week. He's going to be tall like Jim, and built like a Mack truck. He's already a superstar on his rec football league, barreling over players that are two and three years older than him.

When the last crumb of cake has been swallowed, my mom gives a big yawn, stretching her arms out wide. "That was just fabulous, Sutton. I'll help you do the dishes and we'll get out of your hair tonight."

I glance over at Glenn and his jaw is hanging open, his eyes disbelieving what he's heard.

"Good thought, Penny," Jim-Dad says as he looks at her and pushes back from the table. "I have to get up early for work tomorrow and I'm beat. This was a great dinner, Sutton."

Another glance at Glenn and he's staring slack-jawed at his dad. His eyes race over to mine and he's giving me a look like, Are they serious?

I can't leave the kid hanging and my lips quirk upward. "Wait. We forgot about Glenn's present."

"Oh, that's right," my mom says, slapping her palm to her forehead. "How could we have done that?"

Glenn's face relaxes and he purses his lips in amusement, slinging his arms back across the kitchen chair in a posture that says, I really wasn't worried. I knew you guys were kidding the whole time.

Standing from the table, I walk over to my small kitchen pantry and pull out Glenn's present, which Mom brought over earlier in the day to hide. I had wrapped it for her in football-themed paper with a huge gold bow on the top.

My heart seizes-in a good way-when I see the look of surprise on his face from the size of the box. I set it in front of him and say, "This is from me, Mom, and Jim-Dad. We all went in on it together."




       
         
       
        
His eyes look up into mine and he swallows hard. Then they flick over to Mom, and finally to his dad. Placing his hands on the gold bow, he says quietly, "This is the best birthday ever."