Page 112 of Always Be an Us

"That thing isn’t staying here."

"Duh. I’m taking Remy home with me. Officer Jensen called and told me they caught the person who broke into my house, so I guess I should be leaving soon."

"No," I tell her. "I'm not sure they got the right guy."

"Well," she shrugs. "Either way, I can’t stay here forever. And when I go, I'm taking Remy home."

"You're not leaving," I repeat, frustrated.

She raises a challenging eyebrow. "You can't make me stay."

"Watch me."

We stare at each other for a few seconds, and a muffled giggle interrupts our standoff. Rachel has her mouth hidden behind her hand, but her eyes are laughing when she turns to Amelia.

"Are they always like that?" she asks.

"Frequently," my daughter responds with a long-suffering sigh.

Emma blushes and ducks her head, heading to the door.

"Where do you think you're going?" I ask her.

"To get some stuff from my house. And to start cleaning up. Don't worry, I'll go with Cross."

"No," I say. She pauses. Cross freezes too in the process of getting up.

"You'll go with me," I conclude.

Emma purses her lips like she wants to argue but ultimately gives a resigned sigh. She picks up the dog leash from the couch. "Fine."

"Have fun," Rachel calls out in a laughing tone as I close the door behind us.

"You don't have to clean up the mess from the break-in yourself," I say. "I can hire someone to do it for you."

"Nah. I don't want strangers in my house. Plus, I need to at least pick up the important stuff. There's a lot of pictures and important memorabilia that got smashed up."

I nod. That makes sense.

Throughout the car ride, the dog sits in Emma's lap, eyeing me as she pets his head.

"He's car trained," Emma says, clearly noticing the many times I looked at the dog.

"You're serious about keeping that thing," I say.

"His name is Remy and yeah, I'm pretty serious." She grins a little. "Why don't you like dogs?"

"They poop and pee everywhere, and they're clingy as hell. I don't have a reason to like them," I respond.

Remy reacts peculiarly to my speech, hanging his head to one side so his tongue lolls out of his mouth and one ear covers his eye.

"Aww, look how cute he is," Emma coos.

I cynically consider how many times the dog practiced that look to win humans over. "No amount of cute can make me want to keep him."

"So you admit he's cute."

I roll my eyes and change the subject. "What do you know about Nate Huntley?"

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