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QBS ArchAngel – Beyond the Moon
Nathan and Ecaterina were packing up a bag for little Christina. It was their first evening to spend some time alone after Aunt Bethany Anne had offered to watch the little one.
Nathan wasn’t sure that even Bethany Anne’s offer to watch their first child for an evening would be accepted by his wife. But, when Ecaterina looked over to Nathan to see what he thought of the offer she could tell he was doing his best to remain neutral. Well, as neutral as possible to not make her feel bad if she decided to not accept.
Ecaterina knew her husband well enough realize he wanted some time with her without interruptions if at all possible, so she had agreed that it would be nice to have a few hours with her husband alone.
Now, Nathan looked around their suite on the ArchAngel. They had two rooms at the moment, and both were filled with baby stuff. In two days, Bobcat promised him a storage container would arrive from the moon, and he was provided ten linear feet of storage to move little Christina’s unneeded gifts out of here.
If Ecaterina had her way, at least a quarter of it was going to Bethany Anne’s suite tonight. “Sweetheart,” he spoke, catching Ecaterina holding two different toys, “I don’t think we need to provide everything in one pass.”
Ecaterina looked over to him and lifted her left hand that had a squishy duck which Christina liked to hear at times, “But, if she doesn’t have the right toy, she might cry too long.”
Nathan stepped over to his wife, and wrapped his arms around her, “Don’t you think that Bethany Anne might be able to figure out a way to come get the toys if she feels something is needed? We are going to be gone, there isn’t a reason she can’t come into the room and fetch another set of toys, or hell, she will probably tell someone to come get some.”
Ecaterina placed her forehead against Nathan’s chest, “I’m freaking out, aren’t I.”
Nathan gently swept his hand down her back, saying nothing.
She sighed loudly and poked him in the chest and looked up into his eyes, “You are being too quiet. How bad is it?”
Nathan wasn’t getting out of this one. He pursed his lips and considered his response, “On a scale of one to ten, with ten being an ultimate freak-out, you are a six.”
Ecaterina weighed what he had just told her. Trying to figure out how he was squirming his way out of telling her the total, horrible truth. She pressed her lips together, she couldn’t figure it out. Either she was only freaking out a little, or he had just figured out a way to hide the truth from her due to English not being her first language.
She smiled, either way, she needed to relax. She put her ear back on his chest and wrapped her arms around him, “She’s beautiful, Nathan. Sometimes, when it’s just Christina and me, I tell her how I met you in a bar and how her Uncle robbed you blind.”
Nathan scoffed, “What? Ivan didn’t rob me blind.”
“Ivan most certainly did rob you blind!” she snickered, “for a trip into the mountains, it was very expensive,” she snuggled a little closer.
“Oh, but you misunderstood what I was buying.” He replied.
“What?” She asked. He could feel her move her head so she could look up at him. He could picture the question in her eyes.
“You misunderstood what I was buying. You see, I was buying the chance to have you alone on the mountain. That way, there would be no other competition for your attention. So, from my vantage point, it was a bargain.” He grinned, happy that he had gained the upper hand.
Nathan could almost hear her brain work the words around, deciding how she would translate that back into her language. He sure hoped there weren’t translation issues. Once or twice, when he forgot her language, he would screw up, and it was hell to pay for a little while as he tried to get her to understand the English-Romanian language issues.
She finally spoke, “So, you are saying you paid for my time, and it was worth much money?”
Nathan just held her close and mumbled, “Mmmhhhmm.”
“So, I was like a, what do you call it in America, a call girl?”
Oh…Shit! Nathan’s eyes opened and darted around, trying to come up with some idea, ANY idea to stop her line of questioning. “Sweetheart, that is not what I was thinking, and you are well aware of it.” Nathan had no defense but to push back.
“Then what is the meaning of an ultimate freakout?” She asked him.
Befuddled on the sudden change in questioning, Nathan answered, “An ultimate freakout is the absolute worst example of something that you can think of. Like, take one of the bad examples for those monster bride reality tv shows you watch and then triple that reaction.”
“So, it is like a logarithmic scale, not a linear scale?” She asked him, still with a slight edge in her voice.
“Huh?” Nathan was confused for a moment, wondering who was teaching Ecaterina about logarithmic and linear scale and answered, “Yes, logarithmic, why?”
She took a step back and then punched him in the stomach. Nathan barely had time to clench his muscles before her fist slammed home, “Because that means a six is not so good!” She told him, triumph in her voice for figuring out how he was dodging her earlier question.
“Oh,” he said, bending over slightly and speaking hoarsely from her punch, “That is where you were going with the questions.”
Nathan tried not to smirk as he stayed bent over. All things considered, he had dodged that question rather neatly until this last moment. Now, if he could just keep the smile off of his face when he stood back up!
From Michael >> Ok, so now you see my nefarious plan to introduce the second of the two things that GRABS people and won’t let go…
Children.
MWUHAHAHAHAHAHA…Snort…little bit…chuckle. Well, hell. A fan was asking what it would be like if Bethany Anne had to watch little Christina and I had to agree, it could be funny as hell… So, guess what is coming in a near-future snippet? No? No guesses? Wow, tough crowd (smile). Since I already have a dog (the other (animal) item that grabs attention)… The only thing I found out is THOU SHALL NOT KILL ANIMALS…Unless they are old…
Seeing how I kinda killed Michael off… But didn’t….but he is gone… So what could I do w/ Ashur? I have plans…so many, many plans… Actually, I’m doing something my wife suggested a while back. We shall see if it makes it all the way through the book. We both know (if you have been reading my Author Notes) that sometimes the characters write themselves. So, I cannot guarantee anything!