As soon as the officer returned to his car, Walker turned to Kota, dropping to his knees before him.
“Hey, you okay?”
Kota shook his head. “I’m sorry. I’m—I’m just not feeling well.”
Walker frowned, pressing the back of his hand to Kota’s clammy forehead. “Are you really car sick?”
Kota shook his head, looking more miserable than he had ten minutes ago. His eyes were red. His lower lip trembled.
Had Walker triggered something from the attack? No. This looked different. This looked personal.
“Then what’s wrong?”
Kota burst into tears.
Walker wasn’t sure which of them was more mortified by this turn of events. He glanced toward the cruiser. Officer Petty was pretending to look at his computer. Pretending. The old bastard was absolutely watching them.
He cut his gaze back to Kota. “Talk to me.”
“We’re almost home,” Kota wailed.
Home.
The word landed strangely. Walker didn’t really have a home. He had a truck. A cat. A handful of safe houses. A house in the middle of nowhere that he stayed at a few weeks out of the year. A freezer full of problems. But Kota had managed to call it home, anyway.
“Okay…?” Walker prompted.
“We’re almost home and you’re just gonna dump me somewhere. I know I told you to do that, but that was before and I don’t want to go,” he sobbed. “I don’t have anywhere else to go. I want to stay with you and Cake. I know I sound crazy, but I don’t want to leave you. I like it here. I like being on the road with you. I don’t even care about the?—”
Walker gently placed a hand over Kota’s mouth. “Shh,” he soothed.
The panic in Kota’s voice was unraveling something inside him. Walker had spent most of his life trying to avoid peoplegetting attached to him. Now, the one person he actually wanted around thought he was being left behind.
“I’m not dumping you anywhere.”
Kota froze.
“You’re not?” he asked, voice muffled against Walker’s hand, fat tears still rolling down his cheeks.
The hope in his eyes was almost painful to look at. Like he’d already prepared himself for the worst and couldn’t quite believe he’d heard correctly.
“No,” Walker said, shaking his head and dropping his hand. “Even if you have the worst possible timing when it comes to confessing.”
“You promise you’re not going to leave me?” Kota asked.
Walker huffed out a laugh. The question shouldn’t have hit him as hard as it did. Nobody had ever asked him to stay before. Most people spent their lives trying to get away from men like him.
“If I manage to keep us both out of prison, I promise I won’t leave you behind.”
Kota launched himself into Walker’s arms, almost knocking him over. The force of it caught him off guard. It was like Kota had been holding himself together with duct tape and blind optimism and finally gave himself permission to let go.
Walker hid his laughter against Kota’s neck as he clung to him.
“I gotta say, this is not how I saw this going,” Walker admitted, pulling back and using his thumbs to wipe the tears from his cheeks. “I thought I might have to actually kidnap you when we got to my place.”
“Really?” Kota asked, with a delight absolutely no other person would have had at that confession.
“Yes. Really. I’m not letting you go either. I’m sorry if I made you so upset you were throwing up over it,” Walker said. “Ifwe’re gonna do this—make this work—you’re going to have to be very straightforward about what you need from me. I am never going to figure it out organically. If you’re mad, tell me. If you’re sad, tell me. I’ll try to fix it. Okay?”
