Page 23 of Family Bonds- Emma & Warren

There was an employee walking by with a folder and some papers in her hand. He stopped her. “Do you have a piece of paper and a pen I can use?”

The employee’s jaw dropped when he’d asked that, then turned to look at Hunter who nodded.

She ripped a piece of paper off of something and handed him a pen. He wrote his number and his initials and gave it to Hunter.

The employee left.

“You want me to give this to her?” Hunter asked.

“Someone to give it to her,” he said. “I can’t expect you to run errands for me, but I trust that no one else will know whose number that is.”

“I’ll deal with it,” Hunter said.

There was humor on the man’s face he couldn’t quite place and didn’t know why it seemed so funny.

“I appreciate it,” he said. “You probably think I’m nuts.”

“No,” Hunter said. “I might have been in your place a time or two if my mind is going where I think it could be.”

He snorted. He doubted that.

“Yeah, well,” he said. “Sometimes you just got to take a chance. We’ll see what Emma thinks of it.”

Hunter laughed. True humor, like there was some private joke he was being left out of.

“You might not be prepared for her thoughts,” Hunter said.

7

BE A DISTRACTION

“I’m busy, Lucky,” Emma said, shoving away the six-month-old kitten that jumped on her lap and tried to walk on her keyboard.

“Meow,” her kitten said, sticking its gray head under her arm as she typed.

“When I want to cuddle, you’re nowhere to be found or don’t want to be touched. When you want some affection, you think you can interrupt me. Nope, you’ll learn who is boss.”

Her fingers were moving faster on the keys to get the thoughts out of her head.

They flowed faster than she could type at times.

“No,” she screeched at Lucky when he jumped on the keyboard and mashed everything together. There were letters all mixed up and words that weren’t actually words on her screen.

She picked the ball of fur off her laptop, causing more keys to jam together and put him on the floor. “You’ve got food and water. I know you do because it’s automatic. I’ll finish soon. I promise.”

Having never owned a pet in her life, she did not know felines could be this needy.

Or this temperamental depending on his mood.

Lucky crawled up on her lap again, but she picked her laptop up and climbed off of the lounge chair she was sitting on in her sunroom.

She should have sat on the deck in the shade, but it was too hot for her and she never liked to have sweat on her keyboard from her hands.

If keypunches could be logged like steps, she’d have zero percent body fat!

She moved to the bar in the corner, sat on a stool with her laptop on the counter, and tried to finish her train of thought.

Lucky’s tail was tickling the soles of her feet as she rested them on the rungs.