The child has a price at which she can be bought, and it’s apparently a dog, ten stickers, and a chocolate bar. “You my new fwend,” she tells me. “You pwetty. And nice. I wike your dog. We be fwends.”
Bollocks and damnation.
Silas’s kid shouldnotwant to be my friend. “That’s a bad idea.”
Her chin wobbles and her eyes go shiny.
“And I love bad ideas. And zombies,” I hear myself say.
Goldie stifles a laugh with a fist to her mouth.
That mouth.
The fantasies I’ve had about that mouth.
“Thank you, Fletcher.” Her golden-brown eyes are dancing. “That’s very kind of you.”
“Aunt Gow-die, he go ride horses wif us?” Hallie says. “I want fwends for my birfday.”
This is a bad idea.
This is theworstidea.
“He might have to go do work things with your daddy,” Goldie replies.
Yes.
Yes, that.
Hallie’s chin wobbles harder and a tear slips down her cheek.
“Nope. Free for the rest of the day.” Once again, my mouth has not asked my brain’s permission to talk.
Also, it’s not technically true.
I promised my old man I’d video call him later.
Keep pushing that off.
Pushing it off once more won’t hurt. Not like either of us get anything out of the calls. I’m a disappointing obligation. Always have been.
“You don’t need to go eat three chicken breasts, a half-pound of raw spinach, an herbal energy drink, and have a massage, a dunk in a cold bath, and then sleep for ten hours before heading into training again tomorrow?” Goldie says.
She’s getting a desperate note in her voice. She, too, has to know exactly how bad of an idea it would be for me to crash Silas’s kid’s honorary birthday date with Aunt Goldie.
I tap my phone against the credit card reader to pay for all of the books, stickers, and chocolate bars. “Plenty of time.”
Do I want to go home and do exactly what she suggested?
Honestly, yes.
Pretty good recovery for tired, sore muscles.
But Hallie’s sniffling. “I wan’ my fwend and da doggie to wide hooooooowses and come to teeeeaaa wif us.”
How the hell do you say no to that?
She’s crying.
