Alex shook his head. "I grew up and stopped liking cookies, really, mostly. I had a lot of work to do, as a kid, and not a lot of free time to think about cookies." Alex had grown up fast, and had become a lot like his mom, who, despite good intentions, had come to lean on her pre-teen, then teen, son, to pick up a lot of the slack as a worker around the job.

"Nah. You can argue all you like. First thing I learned a a kid was that most women I knew were smarter than me, and stronger than most guys."