And now that I think about it … even at my house, he never left a dish sitting out or a pair of worn pants laying around. No shoes tossed aside. Not even a towel on the floor or Hatley’s chip bags on the coffee table.
I follow the sound of the sink running and prop up on the counter next to him. “You okay?”
He washes the plate. Dries it. Put it back in the cupboard. Then repeats it all with the second one.
It’s not until he stops in the middle of the floor, the towel twisting in his grip that he answers me with a weak voice.
“I’m tired.”
I push off in his direction and hold my hand out for the towel, intent on at least putting it up since I didn’t realize he was picking up everything else but then he surprises the fuck out of me.
He gives me his hand instead.
Swear, I could melt right here into the recently mopped tile when his warm fingers slide against mine, thin and trembling.
“Is that … not what I was supposed to do?”
My jaw makes a snap with how fast I shut it. “That is absolutely an okay thing to do.” With a smile and a burning in the backs of my eyes, I swipe the towel and toss it away. “It’s nap time, bubs. Let’s go.”
“What about her?”
I curl my fingers around his, interlacing the digits with my heart in my throat.
“Bobbie said she’d be here in an hour to check on her. She’s good for now.”
The slow nod he gives seems reluctant, even as he starts tugging me to the back of the house to a small bedroom. There’s barely enough room for a bed and a dresser, the door hitting the foot of the mattress.
It reminds me of the trailer I grew up in.
I gulp hard and force a blankness to my face.
“I promise, the sheets are clean.”
My gaze snaps to Emmett as he steps between the dresser and the mattress and turns to me, his cheeks flushed, hands twisting.
I grab them gently.
Doesn’t he realize that it doesn’t matter to me? That the only thing that matters to me is that his mom let him live like that? That she didn’t seem to care about him and his well-being?
That she made him clean it all up?
Instead, I bend slowly to meet his dropped gaze.
“You’re here, baby. That’s all I care about.”
He tries to hide the way his bottom lip wobbles by biting it. Then he nods, uncertain once again, and squeezes my fingers.
“You want inside or outside?”
I eye the twin sized bed and the wall it’s pushed up against and purse my lips.
In most cases, I’d take closest to the door. Just in case there’s a break in or a fire. If someone needed triage, I’d be there with just a roll from bed.
But this is Emmett.
Would he be okay being trapped in?
“Just get in,” I murmur low and use our joined hands to tug him closer. “I’ll weasel in around you.”
