Chapter 17

• Annabelle glanced at the clock as she finished helping Ricky with his spelling words and shooed him off to play with the others. She had thirty more minutes on shift and then she'd be off for a whole glorious two days. She actually had the elusive, rare weekend off, and despite letting Haddie talk her into being her date for a launch party for the newest rum product her company was promoting, she was excited to have time to herself.
• It had been quite a day, to say the least. Earlier in the day, the school had called for her to pick up Aiden because he'd been in yet another fight. She received a lecture from the principal that if this keeps up, other measures might need to be taken for his education. She questioned him about whether the other boys, the ones who kept bullying Aiden, were getting the same reprimand, the same threat of being kicked out of school. He gave her a non-committal answer in the form of a grunt.
• She was happy that she was able to work one on one with Zander while the rest of the boys were in school. Their counseling staff thought it was best to homeschool him until he started communicating verbally. Trying to teach someone who, for the most part, was unresponsive was a frustrating endeavor. All she wanted was some kind of breakthrough with him. Something told her he knew how much she cared for him, how she wished he still had his mother to soothe him, to hug him, to tell him she loved him.