Picking up Terror from my parents' house was a lot like picking up a regular child from their grandparents' house, at least I guess it was, I didn't actually have any experience to go on. Billy and I shared a look before we walked up the path, a silent promise to NOT burst out laughing on sight if Mom was locked and loaded with horror stories about our little angel's sexual deviancies.
"We act completely surprised," I muttered, as Billy smirked beside me. "If she mentions the humping, you maintain a stance of complete and utter bafflement, do you hear me, Butcher?"
"Absolutely, Veronica," he mumbled. "Terror's never once gotten randy with anything, stuffed or not."
The door opened as soon as we were within touching distance and my dad was looking fit to burst. Either laughter or screaming I couldn't tell, but he gestured for us to come inside and I shot Billy a side eye that warned him once again to keep his shit together and we crossed the threshold. Once inside, my eyes went wide and I nearly cracked a fucking rib. Mom had turned the family room into Terror's own private orgy of debauchery, stuffy-wise anyway. He had a veritable zoo, farm, and fucking science-fiction fantasy gangbang of stuffed animals to choose from along with enough treats, a bed that had his name embroidered on it, his own porcelain water and food bowl, and a new leash and collar set that put what Billy and I had brought him with to shame. Dear fucking -
"Mother -" I breathed, as she came into sight with a huge smile on her face.
"Doesn't he look so happy?" She was beaming and I wondered if maybe hearing that I was, for all intents and purposes barren, and the fact that Billy wasn't really interested in becoming a father, had somehow broken her? "Since he hasn't been," she leaned closer to Billy and I and lowered her voice to just a hint above a breath, as though Terror might hear and understand the word, "neutered. I thought I'd make sure he had ample 'fun toys'." Jesus fucking Christ. "I called a vet and they said that this was perfectly normal and fine, as long as he doesn't get any chaffing." Please for the love of all that is good and holy, don't let my mother have actually checked to see if Terror has any chaffing on his little doggy boy parts. "If he does, he'll start excessively licking himself. The vet sent over some salve and a cone, I have them in the pantry. I didn't want to scare him with them before they're necessary." Fuck me running with a fucking pitchfork.
"Thank you, Margaret," Billy sounded so sincere that I wasn't sure I could look at him on the off chance I'd bust from the complete fucking absurdity of this entire fucking situation. "You've taken amazing care of my boy. OUR boy," he corrected. "We'll drop him by tomorrow at the same time." Then he called for Terror and we were in the car again.
"Did that just happen?" I asked, once we were about halfway to our house and my brain reengaged. "Did my mother actually turn the family room of the house I was raised in into a fucking dog den of masturbation?"
Billy let go, the laughter he must have held in from the moment he saw the fucking UNICORN she bought for Terror to mount released and with that I started to giggle too. The insanity of it, my mom, a country club matron, had called a veterinarian to make sure her grandpet was normal for humping the stuffies and then went overboard with it. Jesus.
"The salve, the cone," he was shaking his head as he pulled up our driveway, "that bit nearly did me in, Ronnie." You, I thought? It nearly fucking undid me to the point of mad cackling.
"I thought she was going to tell me she checked," I chuckled, watching him get Terror out and walk him around the yard, Terror jumping at the fireflies while I moved toward the house. "What do we feel like for dinner?" I called back.
"Something easy," was my answer, and I was in full agreement as I walked into the house, thinking that we'd be discussing more than just Terror's day at grandma's over Netflix and food.
We were on the hanging bed, sipping drinks and laughing at Terror's snoring - clearly worn out from his exercise at Mom's, when we finally got around to discussing everything that we worked through during our workday.
"Stormfront had to have chipped him," I said, shaking my head even as I snuggled deeper into his arms. "I swear that - I have to get at least two of the chips turned off, Billy, jammed or something." He hummed his agreement. "I'll discuss it with Frenchie and one of the techie geeks I have on staff, I won't tell the geek the specifics."
"Speakin' of Frenchie," Billy took my glass from me and put it on the table beside the bed. "We looked over the plans and we think a couple of those mini drones that are all the rage now, that kids use?" I nodded my understanding and he went on, "We think we can use those to do a little intel gathering. See who else moves around the neighborhood. See what these tutors look like, and when they come and go. If we can get the right drone, might even be able to see what they're teaching Ryan."
"Do you think they're trying to teach him a curriculum more like what his Daddy had than what a regular little boy gets taught?" It had crossed my mind, but I didn't want to give it substance, not yet.
"Got to think that there's a reason this shit doesn't meet the sniff test, Ronnie." I sighed. "I want to run the recon before we go in on Sunday."
That meant he'd be out of the office at least during part of the week, we really were back to work. "Back to the swing of things, are we Mr. Butcher?" I smiled into the darkness and he chuckled.
"Getting there, Doc." He kissed my temple. "Hearing you sound like the head of the office, throwing your weight around, got my pants feeling a bit tighter than usual, Ronnie." I bit my lip, and he went on. "You sounded like you were about to rip someone's head off, love."
"You liked that, did you?" Tilting my head, I was rewarded with his nose sliding down my cheek so his lips could find my neck. "I think my patience is waning. You might end up hearing that a LOT more." He growled and turned me to face him.
"That's not a bad thing, Ronnie." And he showed me just how little of a bad thing he found it.
Billy and I dropped Terror off at Grandma's, as she insisted on being called, the next morning and I was considering having her checked out by a fellow therapist. All the trauma from my near death experiences must have rattled some shit loose in my mom's makeup, because she was baby talking the wrinkly dog as we left and I could SWEAR she was promising him a trip to the toy store to add to his menagerie. For fuck's sake, I was going to get a call from FAO Schwarz because my mother let Terror try out his new sex toys before buying, wasn't I?
Onto the office, where Billy met up with Frenchie and Kimiko, grinning like a little boy on Christmas morning with the drones they'd gotten their hands on with what I had to imagine was Joseph's paper pushing magic. They had copies of the plans I'd printed of Ryan's neighborhood and were discussing the best places for them to start from while I sat down and fired up the next round of my own research.
"I'm going to check in with MM and Mallory," I informed my partner, and got an agreeable grunt. "I want to see where we are on the search for other satellite locations for Vought off the books experiments, and I want to speak to Grace about Ryan's situation."
"I'll check in once we have a better idea of what's going on during the day," Billy offered, closer than I'd expected. I looked up to find him beside me, close enough to touch. "I want to see just what they've got going on over there, too." He breathed deeply, but not getting the calmness he was searching for he reached for me and I gladly stood up and wrapped myself up in his arms. His face buried in my hair and I knew we both needed this, the strength we got from one another to face what we had to look into during our work day. "I love you," his voice was almost reverent and I rubbed my face against his jacket and shirt covered chest, loving how his scent was distinctly him.
"And I love you, Billy Butcher," I reminded him, as he pulled away to look down into my eyes. "We'll figure this out, just like we figure out every other fucking thing they throw at us."
He nodded, kissing me senseless for luck, and then off he went with his part of the team while I sat down in our far to quiet office and got started on my piece of the puzzle. How the hell keeping Ryan Butcher had gotten so far off track?