And yeah, he was discussing both their travel and the time of day. Weather was next. He got it over with. “It’s not too windy, and nothing’s on fire either, so... Hooyah.”
As he glanced at Casey again, he could see amusement shining in her eyes as she smiled back at him. “Uh-oh. That sounds like regret-induced small talk.”
Rio laughed. Damn, she was fearless when it came to just saying whatever she was thinking. “No regret,” he countered. “I promise.”
“Are you sure?” she said. “If you’d gone to San Diego, you’d be home by now. With Dave.”
Not true, in so many, many ways. He shared only one of them. “Dave’s worse then my grandma when it comes to that whole early-to-bed thing. He’s gotta be up and out in just a few hours, so... It was already too late for him before we left Palm Springs.”
He and Dave had exchanged a flurry of texts during the day, in the rare in-between times at the con when Rio hadn’t needed to keep his full attention on Casey or the crowd. Which meant that Rio’s texts had been short and sparse—Don’t be an idiot. And Just text Luc, for chrissake—while Dave’s had been longer and filled with a variety of details. I know you mean well, but if Luc wants to get in touch, he’ll text or call me.
Tomorrow, Dave was scheduled to do some kind of pre-dawn HALO jump exercise with a SEAL officer known as Big Mac. And he’d also managed to explain to Rio that no, he hadn’t had the giant balls necessary to ask the Senior Chief to check to see if Jon had returned to his apartment downtown. Instead, Joe Cat—the team’s CO—had overheard Dave sharing his tale of woe with the other enlisted men, asking if anyone would go with him so he wouldn’t potentially have to face his ex alone. Turned out the CO knew that the Senior was already downtown, so swinging past Jon’s place was no big thing.
Now Casey pulled her long legs up onto the seat so that she was sitting semi-tailor-style, her arms around her knees as she attempted to stretch out her back and neck.
“Was I doing the dread open-mouthed head-nod?” she asked, reaching up to rub her neck.
Rio laughed, knowing exactly what she meant. He’d fallen asleep himself, too many times, sitting up with his mouth wide open, only to jerk awake as his head fell forward. “Nah,” he said, “but you were curled up at a weird angle.”
“I didn’t expect to fall asleep, but I did the thing,” she reported. “Right after we got onto the freeway. You know, eyes to three o’clock...?”
“And it helped?”
“I still didn’t yawn, but I was apparently suddenly unconscious.”
“Could be the in-the-car effect. Trapped in your seat, can’t do much else—sleep tends to win,” Rio said. “I have a niece who’s... let’s just call her active. Sammie, short for Samantha. She falls asleep whenever my sister puts her in her high chair. Boom, just instantly lights out, face down in the carrots.” He laughed. “I swear, I’ve seen at least three videos of her doing that.”
“How old is she?”
“Almost eighteen months,” he said. “She’s the first. Niece. Grandbaby, too, you know? For my brother-in-law’s family, too.”
“Poor kid—that’s a lot of pressure.”
“Nah,” Rio said. “She’s completely up for it. She’s freaking amazing.”
“Hmm,” Casey said. “Sounds like your biological clock has kicked in.”
He shot her a look. “I don’t think that applies to men.”
“Well, the equivalent, then,” she countered. “Come on, you know what I mean. People hit a certain age and... I see it happening with a lot of my friends from high school, regardless of gender. Completely uninterested in settling down until suddenly they’re, like, totally baby-whipped.”
Rio laughed. “Is that a real thing?”
She laughed, too. “I don’t know, it’s all extremely mysterious to me. I look at a baby and I think Please don’t let it barf or poop on me.”
“Yeah, well, you haven’t met Sammie,” he said.
“And I don’t want to, thanks,” she countered. “I don’t want to catch whatever weird disease it is that would somehow make me crave some fragile, tiny, crying, pooping person that I’m responsible for keeping alive. Holy crap, that’s terrifying. I mean, no, thank you, I do not want to hold your baby, because what if I drop it? I can’t even.”
“It is pretty scary,” he said, grinning at her. Damn, she made him laugh. “But I figure if Bella can do it—my sister—it’s a pretty good bet that I could, too.”
“You’re either courageous or completely clueless,” Casey said. “Or both. So have you told Dave that you’re longing for a child of your own?”
“Whoa, now,” Rio sputtered. “Wait, now. I never said—”
“You haven’t met Sammie, she’s freaking amazing,” Casey delivered his own words back to him in a remarkably good imitation of his voice.
“It’s one thing to appreciate my adorable niece,” he cautioned her. “But another completely to want one of my own. But I will concede that since I met Sammie, I’m no longer a baby-phobe, like some people in this car.”
