“No,” Emerson said immediately. And then, to Luca’s surprise, he fell forward, an almost comic collapse, his forehead digging into Luca’s shoulder. “Please don’t leave.”
On instinct, Luca’s arms wrapped around him. His hands rubbed up and down Emerson’s back.
“You really wouldn’t mind?” Emerson asked into Luca’s t-shirt. “Hanging out with her for a while?”
“Of course not.”
“Okay.” With a heaving sigh, Emerson pushed himself off Luca’s chest. He reached up, brushed a hand across Luca’s cheek. “Thank you.”
And then he walked back into his daughter’s room, as if what had just transpired in the hallway was totally normal.
But as Luca followed him back into the room, he couldn’t stop thinking about how it kind ofhadfelt normal.
Even though the last few days, ever since Emerson had returned from Portland with Daisy in tow on Saturday, had been…not bad, but—well. Every single day that Luca couldn’t touch Emerson made him realize how much he’d gotten used to touching Emerson. But he’d tried not to be too whiny about it. These were the terms he had helped set up and agreed to. Fuck, if anything, it wasgood. He was already entirely too fucked up about this whole thing. Space was good. Space wasgreat.
But then, at the first sign of Emerson needing help?—
Luca had literally sprinted across the farm.
And then welcomed him into his arms.
Luca had apparently missed Emerson explaining the plan to Daisy in the midst of his thoughts. She must have been down with it, though, because suddenly, her body was wrapped around his knees, her shout of “Loo-kah!” startling him out of his head.
A knock sounded on the front door.
“Okay, I gotta go.” Emerson rested a hand on both Luca and Daisy’s shoulders. And then he reached down and extracted Daisy’s glasses from her face and her hair, wiping the lenses on his t-shirt before settling the contraption back on her head. Both careful and quick, like he’d done it a million times before. “But come get me if you need anything, okay?”
Luca nodded, but Emerson was already gone.
“All right, m’lady,” Luca said, trying to get himself together. He held out his hand. “Should we go see our favorite cow?”
It shouldn’t have been surprising to him, really. How quick he was to jump past boundaries. He’d been doing it since the moment he’d met Emerson at the bar. He’d been doing it every time they slept together. God, he’d made it through exactly one (1) night in Emerson’s bedroom without asking about the photos on the wall. There he was the next night, prying into Emerson’s entire life history. Eating up every morsel Emerson gave him.
Daisy was silent, other than her sniffles, as they walked across the road toward the barn.
“Oh, shit,” Luca said. Daisy glared up at him. “I mean,shoot. Sorry. Daisy, you know you can’t bring Moomoo into the barn.”
She pulled her hand away. Stopped walking. Hugged Moomoo to her chest and looked at Luca with a pout so dramatic Luca had to pretend to cough into his hand to hide his laugh.
Once he’d recovered, he dropped to his haunches in front of her.
“Those are the rules, Daisy.” He reached up, tucked a lock of wispy bleach-blonde hair behind her ear. “We can go back inside and hang out there with Moomoo, or we can put him away and then go see Sally. Which do you want?”
Daisy dropped her eyes from his to look at her stuffed animal. The red had mostly faded from her face, leaving only slightly rosy cheeks.
“I hurt him,” she whispered, fingering the tear in Moomoo’s neck. “Didn’t mean to.”
“I know.” Luca kept his voice steady, pretended there weren’t things happening inside his chest. “We all have big feelings sometimes. Moomoo knows you didn’t mean to hurt him.”
Daisy pet Moomoo for a moment more before she looked at Luca, brown eyes big and sad.
“He can stay inside,” she said, as if no one had ever made such a sacrifice. “We see Sally.”
“Good choice.” Luca stood, wincing a little at his sore quads, and gently ruffled Daisy’s hair. “I bet you he could use a little nap anyway.”
“Yeah,” Daisy agreed, voice perking up. “He’s so tired.” And she was running, her little legs sprinting across the road with surprising speed, and Luca hustled to keep up with her.
Inside, they carefully laid Moomoo down on top of Daisy’s comforter and underneath a small, soft blue blanket sized perfectly for Moomoo. She gave him a kiss on theforehead before turning and taking Luca’s hand again. Luca pretended his chest wasn’t doing even more weird shit.
