Charlie Foxtrot

by Lani Lynn Vale

  Not that I blamed Blake.

  She did a great job taking care of Beckham.

  Even worse, she’d started back at her job this week and she was exhausted. Which was why I also overlooked the drool that was leaking out the corner of her mouth.

  Beckham and I went to her room where I changed her, read her a story, and then laid her down in her bed.

  She only ever went to her bed when I was there to put her in it.

  She was Daddy’s little girl for sure.

  Turning on her mobile that projected stars on the bedroom’s ceiling while it turned, I flipped off her light and closed the door quietly.

  Then I went back for my other girl, finding her in the exact same position.

  Smiling, I started stripping off my things, starting with my gun, badge, and Kevlar vest.

  My boots soon followed, followed by my pants and shirts.

  Everything was piled high on the floor, but I left it there to get later.

  My next step was to bend down and gather Blake into my arms.

  She was only slightly heavier than she’d been before she had the baby, but to me, she was still perfect.

  If anything, she was even sexier now with the added cushion on her ass and thighs.

  Her breasts were bigger, too.

  Exceptionally so.

  That was thanks to the breastfeeding. Something that was a serious turn on for me, yet I’d never admit to it.

  “Hey,” Blake said sleepily, turning her face into my chest to kiss it. “I missed you.”

  I smiled as I walked into the bedroom, sighing when I saw the bed was full of unfolded clothes.

  “I missed you, too. I put Beckham to bed,” I told her before she had a chance to ask the question I could see brewing in her eyes.

  Laying her on my side, I walked around to the opposite side and shoved all the clothes into a large pile, then scooped them up into my arms before depositing them on the dresser.

  Those we’d get to later, too.

  “How was work?” She asked softly as I sat on the bed and started removing my prosthesis.

  I looked over at her to see her turned towards me, eyes heavy with sleep.

  “Long. The man who was responsible for the call we ran held the woman hostage with a BB gun. We spent four hours there because there was no way in without putting the woman he was holding hostage in danger. Then to find out the gun that we’d been fearing all night was fake was a major blow. Needless to say, we were not happy. Nico missed his anniversary dinner,” I said, laying everything on the floor before I fell in bed beside her.

  Blake scooted over the moment I got into bed, curling into my body.

  “I’m glad it was a stupid call, if it had to be any at all. It’s the bad ones that make my heart scared,” she whispered, voice heavy with the beginning of sleep.

  “I’m sorry,” I said honestly. “I don’t mean to worry you.”

  She patted my belly lightly twice in answer before she fell asleep on me once more.

  And once again, I was left feeling so full I could hardly stand it. Full of love for my wife. For my child. For everything.

  There was not one single thing I’d change.

  Not one.

  ***

  3 years later

  Blake

  “Mom,” an insistent voice said urgently. “I have to pee!”

  I sighed, closing my eyes as I prayed that my daughter would forget that she ‘had to pee’ and just be still for another three minutes while we waited for Foster to get there.

  Today was Foster’s thirty fourth birthday, and I had an incredible party planned out.

  Right this second, we were waiting for my uncle to bring Foster in from the car.

  My daughter, however, had different ideas.

  “I’m going to pee on daddy’s rug, and you know how he doesn’t like that,” Beckham scolded me.

  Chuckles from the other men and women in the room surrounded me in the darkness, and I had to stifle the urge to laugh myself at the ridiculousness of it all.

  “Fine,” I said, standing up with Beckham’s hand in my own. “If you don’t go to the potty, though, I will spank your little hiney.”

  Snorts sounded out among the room, I’m sure finding it humorous that I would even say that. The irony of it all was staggering.

  Foster was the world’s worst person when it came to punishing, and usually it was me who did all of it…which didn’t happen all that often.

  I just hated when Beckham cried, and she had the softest, most sensitive heart in the world. It was hard for anyone to scold her, let alone spank her.

  “Mommy,” she said softly. “I can’t see.”

  I sighed and started searching for my phone, but Luke, who’d been sitting beside me, flipped his lighter open and turned it on.

  Which was followed by the rest of the men in the room, including my grandpa.

  “Thanks,” I muttered.

  “No problem, my dear,” Grandpa said.

  I smiled inwardly, pulling Beckham in my wake as I made my way to the potty where it was inevitable that we’d miss Foster’s entrance.

  “Alright, sweetheart. Hurry up so we don’t miss daddy,” I said hurriedly.

  She gave me a look that clearly said ‘don’t rush me.’

  The same look her father used quite often.

  “Turn around,” she said.

  Sighing, knowing she’d never go if I didn’t turn around, I did so.

  Finally she went, and was pulling her pants up when she decided that maybe she wasn’t through completely.

  My head hit the door with a soft thunk, and I knew we wouldn’t make it in time to surprise Foster.

  “I’m pooping!” She sang, as she always did.

  My head hit the door again with a soft thunk.

  “Momma, you can’t tell you’re fat from the back.”

  Thunk.

  “And you have something sticking to your butt.”

  Thunk.

  “It’s still there.”

  Thunk.

  “Mom.”

  I reached my hand back and felt around, immediately finding the sticker that I told Beckham not to play with stuck to my ass cheek.

  Ripping it off, I tossed it in the vicinity of the trash, and gave another head thunk on the door for good measure.

  I really shouldn’t be surprised. Beckham had a way of making even the simplest things often difficult, challenging and time consuming.

  She was like her father, after all.

  “I’m done,” Beckham announced loudly.

  Flushing, she washed her hands, dried them on the towel hanging next to the sink, and came to my side. Grasping my hand she said, “We can go back out there now.”

  “You do realize, right, that your daddy is probably already here?” I asked my little mini-me.

  She scrunched up her nose, as if the idea that a party would start without her was a foreign concept that she couldn’t quite grasp.

  Sighing, I opened the door.

  Extremely unsurprised to find Foster standing there.

  His arm was leaning up against the doorway above his head, eyes directed at me.

  I smiled. “Hello.”

  “Daddy! I pooped!” Beckham announced loudly, as only a three year old could do.

  “I hear!” He laughed, sounding jovial.

  Once she was out of the bathroom, he stooped, picking Beckham up into his arms.

  I was flabbergasted, yet again, by their similarities.

  It was inevitable that Beckham would have blonde hair, seeing as both Foster and I did.

  But the curls…she got all of those from her daddy.

  They were tight and perfect, just like his. They didn’t frizz out the moment they stepped into the humid Texas air like yours truly.

  Her eyes were all mine, though.

  “Thank you,” Foster said, bringing my attention away from Beckham’s face to his.

  I smiled, then shrugged. “That’s life.�
��

  He grinned, holding his hand out for me.

  I walked into his arm, burying my face into his muscular chest, inhaling the warm cotton blend and crisp scent of outside on his clothes.

  “You’re not fat from either side,” he started, making me laugh. “And nobody saw the sticker on your ass. I promise.”

  I giggled, allowing my head to fall back so I could look into his eyes. “I love you, Foster, my honey boo boo.”

  He snorted and steered me around until we started back towards the living room where the party was now in full swing.

  Our whole family was there.

  And it was big.

  All of Foster’s extended family was there, as well as all of mine. Then there were the families of the men on Foster’s SWAT team, as well as a few of his buddies from his time in the Navy.

  Our house was filled with people that loved Foster.

  “Daddy, mommy said Louis is six weeks old today,” Beckham told Foster as we rejoined the party.

  Foster’s eyes lit, and he turned to me with a smile. “Did she now? I didn’t realize that he was six weeks old today.”

  I blushed under Foster’s hot gaze.

  Today would be six weeks exactly, since I’d had our son, Louis.

  Louis was Beckham’s polar opposite.

  Where I’d had a C-section with Beckham, I’d had a natural birth with Louis.

  Where Beckham had colic and didn’t want anything to do with me if Foster was around, Louis was momma’s little boy.

  “So momma’s daddy’s birthday present?” Foster whispered into my ear.

  A smile split my face as I looked up at him with all the love and adoration I felt for him in my eyes. “If that’s what you want, I’ll give it to you.”

  Before he could reply, a barking from upstairs had him sighing and handing over Beckham.

  “I’ll get him,” he said.

  I nodded, taking Beckham to her grandparents, Micah and Sloan.

  “Do you mind hanging on to her for a bit while I go get the food?” I asked.

  Micah was the one to reach for his granddaughter. “Of course. Then Beckham can show paw how to work his new phone. Sound good, pumpkin?”

  I rolled my eyes.

  They spoiled my child.

  The reason he’d had to get a new phone was because he’d given his old one to Beckham.

  I’d tried to refuse, but they’d insisted and I, of course, couldn’t take the phone away from Beckham when she so clearly wanted it.

  Whatever.

  She’d lose it within the month anyway.

  On my way to the kitchen, I passed by Luke who was busy feeding Boris a cracker.

  “Watch your fingers,” I said laughingly.

  He snorted. “I learned my lesson the first time, trust me.”

  He did, too.

  Nearly all of them did.

  It never seemed to fail that they’d stick their fingers in the cage to touch Boris, and he’d turn around and bite the shit out of their fingers. Then he’d laugh, the little bastard.

  We’d had to make a new cage that extended up higher so no little fingers could be accidentally stuck through the cage’s bars.

  I liked Boris, but god help him if he hurt one of Foster’s babies.

  “Oh!” I said once I pushed through the kitchen doors. “Thanks guys!”

  Mercy, Reese, Georgia, Memphis, and Viddy were all in the kitchen setting out the food when I arrived. Doing the very thing that I’d come in there to do.

  “We figured you wouldn’t mind the help. The lobsters are done, too. Your aunt fixed those before she headed out to the party,” Memphis said, pointing to the cooked lobsters laid out along the entire length of the counter.

  “Woo!” I said, pumping my hand. “I hate doing that! Yet, Foster asks for them every year on his birthday, and I can’t ever figure out why.”

  “Because I like the way you squeal when you cook them,” Foster said, kissing the back of my neck.

  I turned and smiled at him. “You’re horrible, you know that?”

  He winked.

  “Where’s Louis?” I asked, noticing that he didn’t have the child that Molder refused to leave alone.

  In fact, Louis and Beckham would forever have a protector in Molder.

  He loved the kids, and treated them as if they were his own pups.

  He let us know when they were awake. Let us know when they were sick.

  “Ladies,” Foster said, grabbing me by the hand and pulling me into the office that was built off the kitchen. “If you’ll excuse us for a couple minutes.”

  Startled, I looked behind me, seeing the knowing faces.

  “Foster!” I hissed. “What are you doing?”

  He shut the door and locked it behind him before unbuttoning his pants, all the while corralling me towards the couch that was in the middle of the room.

  He grinned when my legs met the back of the couch, and then laughed when I turned my frantic gaze to his.

  “What’s wrong, honey?” He teased.

  I shook my head. “We’re not doing this here. Not with that many people in our house.”

  He grinned. “Oh yeah?”

  When he kissed the base of my neck, and tickled his beard along the sensitive skin, I lost the ability to use complex words.

  “Yeah,” I gasped when he started to suck at the base of my ear.

  “I don’t see you saying no,” he observed as he started to lift my shirt and bra over my head.

  “Mmmm,” I said, eyes zeroing in on how it felt to feel his hands running over my breasts.

  He laughed quietly. “So you want me? Here? Now?”

  “Mmmm,” I said again when he pulled one nipple into his mouth and started to suck lightly.

  I gasped, hips jerking in response.

  “Fuck me,” I ordered him.

  His response was to turn me around, lift up my skirt, and bend me over the couch.

  With his cock lined up at my entrance, he pushed inside with a low growl.

  “That’s what I thought.”

  Coming Soon

  Kill Shot

  September 3, 2015

  Chapter 1

  Brothers and sisters may fight like they hate each other, but they’ll always have each other’s backs. So watch your face if you say something about one in the other’s hearing.

  -Note to self

  Bennett

  “I can’t fucking believe that that stupid cunt marked my face!” I hissed, staring at my face in the mirror of the exam room.

  “Your face was too pretty anyway. You need to get over it,” my sister said, distractedly, not even bothering to look up from her magazine.

  I turned around and glared at the crazy girl.

  “Why are you even here? How’d you know I was here so fast?” I asked with annoyance.

  I loved my big sister and all, but she really was a shit head. We fought like cats and dogs, even now, with both of us well over the age of eighteen.

  Payton was nearly thirty two, and I’d just turned twenty five. And I still couldn’t count the number of times we got into a hitting match each week.

  Something that annoyed our parents and Max, Payton’s husband, to no end.

  Then again, we found it amusing that they didn’t like it, which was probably why we did it so often.

  “Hey, how about we not do this right now?”

  That was Nico, always the voice of reason.

  Nico was what I’d call my best friend, even though he was a little standoffish at times.

  He was on the SWAT team with me and the reason I’d joined the team myself.

  I’d been on the team now for three years and I enjoyed it, most of the time.

  Today, however, wasn’t one of those days.

  Today was a total cluster fuck that I’d like to forget if at all possible.

  However, now I had scratches that started just under my ear and went all the way down my neck and collarbone.

  “
You’ll probably get rabies, and they’ll have to put you down like the dirty dog that you are,” my sister said helpfully.

  I threw the bloody compress I was using, to stem the flow of blood oozing from the cuts at her, nailing her in the middle of her breasts.

  “Bennett, you dirty, rotten bastard!” She hissed.

  I grinned evilly at her. “What were you saying?”

  She flipped me off, took the rag at the cleanest portion between two fingers, and threw it towards the trashcan.

  She missed, and it landed on the foot of the nurse who’d just walked in through the door.

  “Hmm,” the nurse said, lifting her foot and kicking it off into the trashcan. “Nice try, at least.”

  I snorted, but didn’t say anything.

  The woman was cute. Long wavy brown hair in a ponytail at the top of her head. The blonde and red streaks in her hair, paired with her makeup, as well as her jewelry, practically screamed ‘high maintenance.’

  “Which one of you is Bennett Alvarez?” She asked, scanning the room.

  It could be hard to tell, I was sure. There were five people stuffed into the tiny room, and I was the only one standing. I was fairly sure she would have a hard time figuring out who she was supposed to be taking care of, especially since the scratched part of my face was facing away from her.

  “That would be me,” I said, drawing her attention, and the full force of her gaze.

  It felt like she could see right through me.

  It was almost as if she’d stripped me naked in the ten seconds it took her to take me in.

  Then she offered her hand to me as she walked closer.

  “My name’s Lennox Jane. I’ll be sewing you up today,” she introduced herself.

  I took her tiny hand in mine, and shook it twice, up and down, before dropping it as if she’d burned me.

  Electric shocks had poured into my hand from hers the moment our skin touched, and both of our eyes had widened.

  “Are you a doctor?” I asked.

  She shook her head. “No, I’m a PA, or physician’s assistant. Is that okay?”

  I nodded. “Yeah.”

  Was she even old enough to be that? She looked to be twenty two at most. Didn’t that shit take a lot of time to get accomplished?

  She nodded her own head, and then gestured to the bed with her hand. “Have a seat and let me see what’s going on.”