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He shook his head. “No way. I’m helping.”

“It’s not a big deal. I don’t want to keep you too long. I’m sure you have things to do,” Tori continued.

Was she trying to get rid of him? He shook his head at that thought, trying to push it away. She couldn’t be.

“I don’t have anywhere else I’d rather be,” Chance told her.

She didn’t say it, but her mouth formed an O. He smiled, happy she wasn’t trying to push him away.

He helped her put dinner away and load the dishwasher. She tried to stop him, but he scrubbed out the roasting pan and put it away.

Tori watched him more than she helped and he didn’t mind. She seemed caught off guard more by his help than him showing up early and playing with Emmett.

Isaac was an ass. He already knew it, but clearly no one in her life had set expectations that men actually helped their partners. Little things like helping with the dishes didn’t deserve the millions of thanks that she’d given him.

“Thank you again,” Tori told him as they left the kitchen.

He stopped and turned to her. “You don’t have to thank me. I ate, cleaning is the least I could do. My mother would kill me if I didn’t.”

“She raised you right,” Tori said.

“Mom,” Emmett called.

They jumped apart even though they hadn’t been touching.

“What?” Tori called, her eyes staying on Chance.

“Can I play video games?” Emmett asked.

Tori sighed and looked at her watch. “He’s got an hour before bedtime,” she told Chance.

“Let’s play, then.” Chance headed for the living room.

The next hour was extended by another half an hour as he and Emmett battled it out in a video game. They went back and forth and joked and teased each other.

Tori reclined on the sofa beside him, their thighs touching as Emmett went from the sofa to the recliner to the floor. The kid was a bundle of energy.

She sent him off to bed and followed him up to get him settled. Chance cleared away the video game and the controllers, putting them back in their spots he’d seen Emmett take them from and turned on a TV show while he waited.

“He will be talking about running drills with you for the rest of his life,” Tori told him when she returned. “Thank you for doing that with him.”

“I didn’t do it to get thanks from you. I had a good time with him.” Chance took her hand and pulled her onto the sofa next to him. “I won’t stay too long, but I wanted to spend some time with you before I left.”

“I don’t know what to do with you,” she confessed to him.

“You don’t have to do anything. Just be you and I’ll be me,” he told her. “I wanted to tell you something,” Chance told her. “I made an appointment to talk to a therapist today about working through my frustrations on the field.”

“That’s great,” she smiled.

He needed her to know that he was working on being a good example for Emmett. He really wanted this to work.

“Can I kiss you?” he whispered, mindful of the child upstairs.

“Please,” she breathed out.

“Thank God,” he said as he closed the short distance between them.

Nine

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