I Dare You

She was the one who packed their lunches, put them to bed, comforted them when they had nightmares, protected them from Daniel, helped them with homework, balanced everyone's activities, went to their games and matches, read them to sleep at night.

For as long as Selene Collins can remember she has been living with her abusive foster "father", Daniel. Over the years other foster kids were brought into the household. She has always been the eldest, always the one doing the protecting, but who was there to protect her?

Then Daniel acquires one last foster child, Jarrod Riors. He's a bad boy all the way through, and does the whole shabang. He sleeps around, drinks, no drugs but he smokes, has tattoos, breaks all the rules. He arrives and see's a whole household filled with scared children, with one that takes continual abuse for the rest. She see's him and reads the warning signs written all over him. They don't like each other, but can they get along, can they get past the secrets and forgotten pasts that have left them both traumatized? Can they survive Daniel's continual abuse, can she have a friend to rely on to shoulder some of the burden, or will her secret keep her so tightly bound that she can't let go? Will he face the past he has constantly tried to run from, or be crushed by it when it catches up?