She looked no more than fifteen years old and was cute with short brown hair and big brown eyes, adorable freckles sprinkled across her nose, and wearing an oversized sweater. She seemed harmless enough, but Fox wanted to know what their relationship was.
“Mister Hannigan.”
“How can I get you to call me Fox?”
“When you start calling me Alistaire, then maybe I’ll think about calling you Crevan.” Vale shrugged.
“Very well.”
They stared at each other, and Fox noticed Vale’s eyes trailing up and down his body.
Look your fill, Vale. Because I will be all yours one day.
“Can I see the baby?”
Fox turned his gaze away from Vale to look at the girl who was beaming at him. “Sure. Scoot over so that I can sit next to you.” Not feeling ashamed that he’d invited himself to their booth. The kid did as he asked, and Fox set the car seat between them, pulling the blankets back some more. Genesis’s eyes were open versus a couple of minutes ago when he’d shown her to Bella.
“What’s her name?” The kid asked.
“Genesis,” Fox smiled. “What’s yours?”
“Oh, I’m Ava.”
“And how do you know Captain Vale?”
“I caught her stealing,” Vale interjected.
“You don’t have to tell everyone that,” Ava pouted.
“Do you expect me to lie?”
Ava huffed, then turned to look at Fox. “I’m not a bad person, promise. I just made a mistake--”
“And got caught,” Fox finished for her.
“Yeah,” she said sheepishly.
“It’s all right. We all make mistakes once or twice in our lifetime. The trick is never to do it again, or get caught,” Fox told her, taking off his coat.
“Don’t encourage her bad behavior,” Vale said.
“Who’s encouraging her? I’m just giving her some sound advice.”
“You’re advising a kid you just met not to get caught when she does something stupid that could put her in danger.”
“You’re reading too much into things. Lighten up some, Vale. What happened to—” Fox stopped when he realized he might say too much and looked away from the captain’s questioning eyes.
“What happened to what?” Vale asked.
Fox looked at him, unable to think of something slick that would draw attention away from the question but nothing came to mind. He was saved from overthinking when Genesis started fussing. He reached down and unbuckled his daughter from the car seat, lifting her in his arms.
“Hey, baby girl.”
Fox kissed her on one of her cheeks, smiling as he looked down at her. He had to admit that through everything he’d experienced so far, Genesis captured his heart, and watching her grow up would be one of his greatest joys.
“Here you go.”
Fox looked up at Bella when she delivered his food. He hummed as hunger overtook him. Fox was about to put Genesis back in her car seat so that he could eat. But the second he was about to set Genesis down, she started crying.
