Harry thanks the receptionist and wishes her a cheery 'Merry Christmas'. She checks the time as she walks down the steps to her car. Two hours until she sees Dempsey, just enough to make use of his staff perk, a police parking permit, to get one last present for him.
Harrods it is, though she doubts the wisdom of being here on Christmas Eve with the hoards. Fortunately, she steals a shortcut with the aid of a security guard who is still grateful for her and Dempsey catching a notorious thief many years ago. They are unforgettable around these parts. The department on the first floor doesn't let her down when she gets there, grabbing the most suitable, generic but clearly labeled item so her message is one hundred-percent clear.
At Eton Place, she checks on her father who appears to be gifted with the foundation of youth, as he hands back her son, who is sticky and gummy in the way that only a twelve-month old can be. Jane and Rachel coo over him and explain he was a good boy for his aunts. They make the last of the arrangements for tomorrow. She's in charge of Christmas pudding and brandy butter and has made far too much.
At home, she quickly changes her son, and they are standing at window when Dempsey arrives, Thomas already waving furiously in a haphazard fashion. His father beams a smile as he carries the groceries in the house. She'd marry him all over again for just doing the food shopping.
'What is wrong with you? You were distracted all morning, and then you disappeared after lunch." He says after dinner; Thomas is sitting in his lap playing with a toy bear dressed as a policeman. She may have spilled the sauce on his t-shirt deliberately.
"Nothing!" She grins. It's proving too hard to keep the smile from her face, so she decides not to.
"You're behaving strange." He says and she tells him that it takes one weirdo to know another. She lives with him after all.
He gives up but still eyes her with baffled amusement, "You want me to make coffee?"
"I'll do it." She says, putting on the kettle. "You change the little man."
Fiddling with the coffee jar, she stands in the doorway of Tom's nursery, watching her husband move their little boy from one arm to another as if he weighs nothing, tackling the nappy with ease. Between them, they create an orchestra of affectionate noises. Suddenly all goes quiet and still.
She can see Dempsey's head tilt from side to side. He holds up his son in his clean nappies and studies the vest, close and then at arm's length, so he can read the writing on it. Thomas looks up at his mother and waves his fists in the air to celebrate her arrival.
"Harry?" He asks, and then because it's obvious she is there with him, eager to see his reaction, he blows a raspberry back at his son. "Did you learn to drive and get to the stores, Thomas Dempsey?"
Tommy strokes his father's cheek with wet fingers and babbles out, 'Dadda'.
"You didn't? So I'm gonna chance this with my special detective training and said your mother knows something I didn't, and you are gonna be a big brother."
Thomas wiggles and grab a handful of Dempsey's t-shirt, held gently and adoringly. Her husband finally turns around with a smile that matches his son's, both with shocks of dark hair.
"How long did you keep this a secret?" He asks, running a finger over Tom's chest in case she wasn't clear what he's read.
"Since three this afternoon when the doctor confirmed what I thought." She wraps an arm around his other side and grimaces when Tom grabs her hair. It's long these days and he's obsessed by it. "I didn't want to say until I was completely sure."
She welcomes the long kiss; "How long before thoughts get to blood test results?"
"Four weeks." She takes a hairband from her wrist and gathers her hair into a ponytail. "I'm sorry if…."
Disregarding the coffee and the baby in his arms, he hugs his family close and stops her words with another kiss. She realises he's not at all concerned that she kept it quiet but that his inner caveman has surfaced as he tries to work out when their newest arrival was conceived.
"It was after that Thanksgiving dinner out?" He grins proudly. "I gotta thank Rach for babysitting..."
She despairs of him, "Or the morning after when you tested out the kitchen table."
"We." Dempsey corrects her, beaming and then worries his son's nose, much to his delight. "You were conceived in New York. I got a little baseball team going on here."
"Jeez, you're so you." She rolls her eyes but can't help laugh as he holds Thomas in the air to reread the words.
"And so are you, especially when you curse like a Yank. Don't pretend you didn't like it." He bestows a kiss to her nose and his son's.
"How about you make the coffee decaffeinated for me, and I'll feed this one. When he's asleep, we can test the table again?" She suggests, her hand adventuring down his back.
It's gone eleven on Christmas Eve; she's grateful that Thomas isn't aware of Santa yet because they've forgotten sherry, mince pies, and a carrot.
Dempsey looks up with a filthy grin from the chair that he's balanced on, up her body, "I knew I'd like brandy butter eventually."