I mentally cursed at myself. The automatic feeders were still in their boxes. “Um, I think there are a couple of food bowls in the dishwasher.”
“Okay, Papa!” he dutifully went to look as I poured the eggs into the pan and began scrambling them. “There’s only two, Papa.”
Screw it. I opened a nearby cupboard and handed him one of our regular food bowls. “Use this for right now.”
Neal took it from me and the critters all raced after him as he placed the bowls next to the water fountain we’d set up last night and filled them with dry food.
“I did it!” he shouted, lugging back the boxes of food.
“Thank you, sweetheart.”
He giggled. “Daddy’s your sweetheart!”
“You’re also my sweetheart.”
“That’s silly.”
“There’s nothing silly about how much Papa loves you.” I quickly put the toast into the toaster before plating up the eggs.
“I loves you too, Papa. And I loves Daddy and I loves Molly and I loves the kitties. Are they all my sweethearts?”
I laughed. “I suppose they could be.”
“I has lots of sweethearts,” he decided.
I beamed. Having so many to love and be loved back by was never a bad thing. I was glad he could feel all of it around him. Neal was going to be just fine.
CHAPTER27
JOLAR
“I can’t believehow much room I have now,” Klora said as he got onto the elevator. “I’ve got to choose more furniture to fill up the space.” He beamed. “We get to go to work together now as I’m only two decks below you and this is the closest one.”
I smiled back at him. “How are your cats settling in?”
“Great! And they have more furniture than I do!” he laughed.Then, sobering, he said, “I didn’t get a report from Dr. Quincy, did you?”
“No, nor from Xeranos or the local field agent., which is most puzzling indeed.”
“Hmm. Most odd.”
The elevator came to a stop, opening up to reveal the corridor we needed to follow to reach the brig. To our surprise, Sachuu was leaning against the wall, as if waiting for us.
“Excellent. You’re right on time. We have had a rather interesting turn of events,” he informed us, uncrossing his arms.
“Is it someone blocking Dr. Quincy from sharing the samples and results?” Klora asked, falling into step alongside the L.T.C. as he led us away from the brig, turning down a side corridor.
Sachuu didn’t reply immediately, instead showing us to a small conference room. My eyebrows rose, spotting our Fleet commander, Gundar, seated at the table, along with Peterson and a man I did not recognize.
“Hi,” the man said, standing up and offering his hand to me to shake, then Klora. “I’m Carl Reynolds. Agent Jeffries was reassigned.”
I glanced over at Peterson who gave me a smug smile. Ah, it was like that, was it? Not that I was sad about it. Jeffries was a very unpleasant person.
“Very nice to meet you,” I said belatedly, as Klora shook his hand.
“Same,” Klora added, pumping his hand enthusiastically.
“I’m really excited to be here,” Reynolds said, as he extricated his hand. “I’ve been following the human-Mylos interactions ever since your Ambassador Tellan first arrived. Gotta say, I’ve been sorely tempted to go in and see if I’m a mate match.”
