And Mother Makes Three
By: Demoness Mark
Chapter 11
Quatre glanced over the figures of his most recent enterprise, another plan set to help those in need. Still, he couldn't get his mind off the fact that he would soon have twelve teenagers working as interns, including his darling 'niece' Mariemaia...or at least he would if he ever managed to read all of the resumes for the other applicants.
He sighed and glanced over his desk, and sighed again when he say the towering piles of paperwork, stacks of resumes, and bushels of figures dealing with installing new housing and schools on the L4 colony. Perhaps this could be the project he got the new interns working on...it could count for both community service hours and their internships after all, plus it would mean that he wouldn't have to deal with the paperwork himself . . . but being Quatre he just couldn't bring himself to finish that idea.
He switched his attention to the thick stack of applications and started to read, when the phone harshly cut into his thoughts. He sighed, and pushed the pile aside to answer the phone.
A husky voice reached out to him from the other end of the line, "Hi, Quatre. You called earlier about the name of a private school for Maia, and the other interns, of course."
Catherine. He smiled, and most of the tension left his body, leaving only that which she had been the cause of.
"Yes, of course. Do you happen to remember the name of that private school you told me about a few months ago?"
As Quatre was settling down to business (which just happened to involve speaking to the beautiful woman he loved), Heero was trying to get Mariemaia into what he deemed to be suitable clothing for the dinner mission.
"But, Dad . . . " Mariemaia started in her very best whiny voice, which usually made her dad give in.
"Don't you 'but, Dad' me, young lady, you will not be wearing that . . . that . . . indecent costume to dinner and that is final. It barely covers what needs to be covered in order to be legal. No daughter of mine is going anywhere looking like that."
"I think that we need to compromise, or we are going to be very late to our rendezvous. I won't wear this, but I won't wear that horrid pink, frilly think that is masquerading as a dress. Deal?"
She looked so hopeful, that Heero sighed and gave in.
"Agreed, as long as the new outfit covers you from armpits to knees, and I get to burn those rags as soon as we get home."
While she change Heero worried, or perhaps fretted is a better description. He kept wondering if he was doing the right thing, maybe he should have just sent her to Quatre's without telling her anything. Hell, she would have been safer if he had let her leave, as there would have been no reason for VECTOR to go after her if she hated him. He definitely shouldn't have told her anything, it was too dangerous. He was an idiot for even getting involved with this mission in the first place. He could have had everything he had ever wanted. Relena probably would be his wife right now, and Maia would have had the mother she always wanted, they might have even had a child of their own. That thought hurt too much to linger on and so he was glad that he was interrupted by the sound of his child running down the stairs to meet him.
This time he was pleased to see that she was dressed suitably in a khaki colored skirt that just brushed her knees, a black shirt with spaghetti straps which was emblazoned with the slogan daddy's princess in rhinestones (which had been a gift from Duo. When he had presented it to Mariemaia, he had explained that he couldn't find one which said the girl who had pussy-whipped the great Heero Yuy, so he had gotten the next closest thing), with a black leather jacket over it.
"Do I pass inspection?"
He nodded curtly, and offered his arm to her.
"Good, then let's go kick some terrorist butts."
He had to smile and laugh at that one, despite the worry he had for his only child. He was glad that Maia knew him well enough to understand why he was being so quiet, and accept him despite it.
The drive to the casual restaurant that Grace had suggested for this first assignation (and last if Heero had anything to say about it), was unsurprisingly silent.
He already knew what the restaurant was like, as he had cased the place a couple of days ago, and drilled the pertinent details into Maia's head, including the placement of all three exits, in case something went wrong. She would be safe, he'd make certain of it. He remembered Maia's reaction when hearing that Grace had chosen the restaurant for their meeting, she had wanted him to call Grace back and tell her that Maia wanted to go elsewhere. His precious daughter had said that if they had done that it would clue Grace into the fact that Maia wasn't going to accept Grace as her mother. Heero had vetoed it, fearing that it would tip their hand too much, and that it would make Grace angry enough to put Maia on the list of targets, not that he had told Maia the second reason.
He turned to his daughter, "Showtime."
