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"Did you miss the part about me having to work two jobs to pay bills? That I don't have time to date?"
"I think your money woes are going to be over very soon," he says.
"I can't afford to play the lottery," I remind him.
He chuckles, his smile wide, eyes lighting up.
It's a damn shame the situation I'm in because if things were different, I wouldn't hesitate to spend as much time with him as I could manage.
"All of these excuses you have make it sound like dating me would be a bad thing."
I stand from the table, a thank you for lunch on my lips, but he stands too, coming around to my side of the table and standing right in front of me.
"Any man worth his weight, Claire, makes his woman's life easier, not harder. I'm not here to increase your burden. I want to lighten it."
I don't pull my face away when he leans down to kiss me. It isn't a passionate kiss. It's something much scarier. It leaves me wanting more than just a couple of quick romps between the sheets. It shoots possibilities through my head of what a life with him could be like, and I know just how dangerous that can be.
"Walker, I—"
My mouth snaps close when his phone rings, but he pulls it from his pocket without giving me room. Every other man I was even remotely dating would slink away to answer it or they'd say it wasn't important and just let it ring so as to not raise suspicions of why another woman might be calling him.
He connects the call and puts it to his ear. I hate the way it makes me feel when I hear another female on the other end of the line.
"You'd be right," he says, smiling down at me, and it makes my stomach turn.
He runs his hand down my arm when I go to step around him.
"Here she is."
I stare down at the phone when he holds it out to me for a long moment before I shoot a questioning look up at him.
"It's Madison," he says. "She tried calling you first."
There are a million things happening in so few words, but concern for my daughter wins out over wondering what he's been saying to people for her to know that we're together right now.
"Madison?" I say when I lift the phone to my ear.
My heart is racing a million times a minute, and I can tell she's talking, but the pulse in my head is too loud.
A sense of calm washes over me, and it takes a few breaths to understand that Walker is rubbing circles on my back much the same way he did last Sunday when I was making my confessions about my marriage to Hux.
"Claire?"
"I'm here," I tell her when her voice becomes clearer.
"I'm calling to let you know that if you have plans to go anywhere other than home after you pick Larkin up, you'll need to bring her a change of clothes. I was in the kitchen for less than two minutes throwing together a quick snack and one of the boys drew all over her cute pink top with markers. The package said washable, but I can tell you, they most certainly are not. As soon as I get off the phone, I'm going to send a very strongly worded email to the company and I'll place an online order for a new shirt."
"You don't have to do that."
"They need to know that what they're saying isn't true."
"I mean the new clothes. You don't have to do that."
"But you'll bring her a change of clothes? She's in some of the boys' right now, but they just swallow her right up."
"We're going home right after I come to get her," I assure her. "It's no big deal. I'm more surprised she didn't have stains on that shirt already."
"So no plans?"
