“Not the same thing, Parker!” she said, imitating his tone and making him smile. “Oh!” she said suddenly. “I can do a free throw now, just like you taught me! You need to come see it!”
His chest ached at the beseeching tone in her voice. She missed him. Yeah, she had Mom and Dad, but they’d continued to hold the reins just a little too tight. Their hearts were in the right place and they operated from fear for her, that she’d get hurt or worse, with absolutely zero intentions of abuse or neglect, but Amory was starting to chafe under their constant supervision.
Or at least Parker would be chafing. Hell, he’d be going insane by now. “I’ll come by soon as I can,” he promised.
“Today?”
“No,” he said, wincing when she let out a sound of distress.
“Tomorrow?” she asked.
“Soon as I wrap up this thing at work I’ve got going on, okay?”
“But that could be a very long time,” she said. “Right?”
“Right,” he said. “But hopefully not.”
“But maybe!”
He sighed. Amory didn’t have a good sense of time; she never had. Last year he’d bought her an iPhone and had taught her how to schedule in all her work shifts and anything else important so that she wouldn’t miss anything.
She’d put in her entire life on that calendar, and his. She was forever texting him asking about his upcoming appointments so that she could program them into her calendar. “Maybe,” he conceded. “I’ll tell you when ahead of time and you can put it on your phone then. You’ll be the first person I come see, okay?”
“Promise?” she asked.
“Promise.”
“Pinkie-swear and hope to die?” she pressed.
“Never hope to die, Amory.”
“It’s a saying! And it means you have to keep your promise!”
“Fine.” He caved with her. He always did. “Pinkie-swear and hope to die,” he said dutifully, wincing again at the happy squeal that nearly pierced his eardrums. “Gotta go, Am.”
“Love you, Parker.”
“Love you back.”
“See you next week!” she yelled.
“Am—”
But she was already gone. Parker slid his phone away, the movement causing the kittens to get a second wind, mewling and climbing on top of each other to try to get up his body. He set them back on the floor, where they immediately once again began to try to crawl up his legs.
With their claws.
He nabbed one in each hand before calling Oreo back in.
Oreo came sliding into the bathroom, panting in happiness at being needed. At the sight of the kittens still there, he suddenly stopped short, skidding on the linoleum, eyes wide in terror even though they were smaller than his paws.
“They’re just silly little babies,” he told Oreo.
He whined unhappily and tucked his tail between his legs.
“They’re not going to hurt you,” Parker said, and set the kittens down in front of him to sniff. “See? Harmless.”
The tabby stalked underneath a mistrustful Oreo and stopped between the dog’s legs, eyeing the long tail with a curious eye. Then the kitten crouched low, wriggled his butt, and . . . pounced.
And missed Oreo’s tail by a mile.
Still, Oreo cried.
“It’s okay,” Parker said. “I promise they’re not going to hurt you—”
Too late. Because Oreo lifted his leg and . . . peed on them.
Fourteen
A half hour later, Parker had bathed the kittens and calmed Oreo down with a big bowl of food and some hugs, and the four of them were trying the meet-and-greet thing again.
Oreo lay on the floor, still wide-eyed but allowing the kittens to crawl all over him. The gray one climbed up the big dog like Oreo was Mt. Everest, ending up on top of his head.
Oreo’s eyes rolled up and they eyeballed each other, scaredy-cat dog and mountain-conquering, fearless kitten.
Parker’s cell rang. “You forget dinner?” Wyatt asked.
Shit. “Yeah,” he said, “sorry.”
“No problem. Hightail your ass to the bar and grill; we’ll meet you there.”
“Which bar and grill?”