A/N the First: Another Tuesday, another chapter! Now we get Chuck's reaction to some things and the promised Violet (she won't be in every chapter, by the way; I mean, do you really want the five-year-old around all the time, getting in the way of other activities? I thought not). Thank you to everybody that reviewed the first chapter and favorited and left comments. You guys are the best. Thanks also to my wonderful beta reader, mxpw!

Tailgaiting

"And the doctors thought it was a lost cause, that she'd never keep the leg. But they've never met Dr. Charles Carmichael before now, have they?" Chuck made heart-monitor beeping noises as he leaned over the plastic toy. Part of the ramble was sheer delirium—he really shouldn't have woken early to see Sarah, but those were his favorite times of the day sometimes—and part of it was just entertaining his spawn. You said, Chuck learned early on, a lot of really dumb things when you took up the mantle of parenthood. You also learned to fix a lot of broken things: scraped elbows, bruised shins, toys like Mr. Hoppy Horse. Speaking of which… "Hey, Megs, can you pass me the glue that's by your elbow?"

There was no answer. Chuck looked up, wondering if he'd been talking to himself the whole time, but Violet was bent over the coloring book in absolute concentration.

"Earth to Megabyte," Chuck said. "This is Earth, calling Megabyte. Bzzt. Megabyte, do you read me? Over."

Vi jerked and looked up at him with a blue crayon clutched in her hand. "What?"

"You back yet?" Chuck asked.

Her little forehead puckered in confusion. "Back from where?"

"From wherever it was you were just hanging out."

"But I haven't left. I'm just coloring."

"Sounds like something that somebody who was secretly visiting the planet Graxxthorp would say," Chuck said, and he and Vi amused themselves by squinting suspiciously at each other for a second. "Hand me the glue, though, would you? A horse's life is on the line here."

"The what?"

"The glue—it's that tubey thing at your elbow. Don't let it bite you."

She looked around and finally spotted it, handing it over. "Is Mr. Hoppy Horse going to be okay?"

"Minimal scarring, some tissue damage. I'm sure he'll pull through with lots of rehab and therapy." Thanks for that, Sir. Carefully, Chuck bent over his task, reattaching the horse's chewed-off leg. He supposed he could have gone out and bought a new Mr. Hoppy Horse, but one of the realities of living with a half-grown puppy that only listened to females was the lost toys, and Chuck really didn't want to shell out for an entirely new collection this far away from Christmas and Vi's birthday.

"Now what?" Vi asked once the leg had been put to rights.

"Now we let his scars heal," Chuck said.

"Whassat mean?"

"Gotta let the glue dry, Megabyte. Oh, there's the door. You stay here and color, I'll get that." It was right around the time that Sarah would have talked to the bosses, and he had a feeling she was at the door to put the kibosh on the plans for Tahoe. So with a sinking stomach, he opened the front door right as Sarah was readjusting the carry-on bag over her shoulder. "Uh, wow, are we going somewhere?"

"No, just me. I've gotta run if I want to catch my flight, but I just wanted you to know, the bosses said yes."

It took a few seconds for the words to break through. Chuck hoped he wasn't gaping like a fish. "Wait—about Tahoe? The bosses said yes to that? We're going on vacation?"

Sarah grinned. "Even better: we're going on unsupervised vacation."

Again, the words didn't immediately set in, but when they did, Chuck's eyes widened. "Casey's not going?"

"Casey is, but..." Sarah deliberately turned her face toward where it wouldn't be visible to the interior security camera and then gestured using only her eyes. And Chuck immediately understood: they were not only going to Lake Tahoe together, there would be no cameras with the all-seeing eye on them.

For three days, there would be no surveillance.

"Is this...is this heaven?" Chuck asked.

"It's vacation." Sarah gave him a very lascivious smile that made his blood pressure spike into dangerous territories. "More details later. I really do have to run, though."

"Wait, where are you going?"

"Tahoe. I have to do recon. I'll be back tomorrow, though, bright and early." Sarah patted him on the arm and Chuck swore he was so ratcheted up from that look that he could feel the lingering heat from her hand, even though it was freezing outside. She read him like a book the way she always did, for she gave him a sunny grin and jogged off, carry-on bouncing against her hip as she headed for her car.

"Oh my god," Chuck said as he watched her drive away. Three days in Lake Tahoe unsupervised (with the exception of Casey, and he was fairly confident they could dodge Casey). No matter what Sarah said, it wasn't vacation. It was heaven. He felt like a kid five days before Christmas, knowing there was an entire pile of shiny gifts awaiting him but having to behave until then. This was going to be absolute torture.

"Daa-aad," Violet said, coming up behind him. "It's cold. Aunt Ellie says we're not supposed to leave the door open when it's cold."

"Oh, right. You're right." Belatedly, he stepped back inside and closed the door. He followed her back to the table and focused on fixing the rest of Vi's chewed-up fleet of toys, though his mind was whirling far too fast for him to really comprehend what he was doing.

"Why does Mr. Nightingale have a dinosaur leg now?" Vi asked, breaking his thoughts.

Chuck looked down at the disaster in his hands. The lion that Sir had half-chewed did indeed have a velociraptor leg now. Since Because I'm distracted by the fact that I get to have sex with Sarah Walker soon didn't seem like that great of an answer to give his five-year-old, he fell back on an innocent look. "You don't think the leg makes him look dashing?"

"He's a lion, not a fa-loss-a-raptor."

"It's like a really cool, claw-y prosthetic leg."

Vi gave him a look that said she was five, not an idiot. With a rueful laugh, Chuck pulled the leg free (at least the glue hadn't had time to set) and surveyed the rest of his work to make sure no other disasters had occurred. Apparently they were safe. "It was worth a shot," he said.

She shook her head at him.

"Hey, criticize your own work, not mine," Chuck said, shaking his head and making a silly face at the same time. "I'm fixing it, aren't I?"

"You're the best," Vi said simply, and focused on her coloring again.

When he resumed his veterinary care on the chewed up toys, his cell phone buzzed with a new message from Sarah: Bosses extended t-share to whole week.

Chuck had to read the message a couple of times to really understand the fact that it wasn't going to be three days in the snow with Sarah—and no cameras—but seven. He choked, but quietly enough not to alert Vi, and sent Queen lyrics back in reply.

The response was almost immediate: Pretty sure real life not fantasy. Bosses covering cost. What's up with the horse?

"Horse?" Chuck asked aloud.

"Hmm?"

"Your old man's talking to himself like he's losing it, nothing to worry about," Chuck said, and then he remembered he'd been holding the drying Mr. Hoppy Horse in one hand when he'd talked to Sarah. He texted back the story and received a Dumb dog! in reply.

He set both the cell phone and the appropriately fixed Mr. Nightingale off to the side and pushed himself to his feet, ambling over to study the calendar that took up half a wall in the kitchen. With narrowed eyes, he studied the week. He only had the government as a client now, so it wasn't like he had to cancel anything, but Ellie and Awesome would have some trouble getting out of work—unless the bosses were overseeing that, too. They probably were, which would make things easier. Chuck didn't notice any social events that they wouldn't mind missing too much.

Until his eyes fell on the weekend at the end of their stay in the cabin. "Crap," he said under his breath.

That was Sophie's weekend to take Vi.

There was absolutely no chance of convincing her to come up to Lake Tahoe, Chuck knew. The cynical part of him pointed out that it was hard enough to convince Sophie to come as far as Burbank. He quashed that feeling, as it didn't fit the positive life he was trying to live, and let out a long breath slowly, his cheeks puffing up as he thought the matter over. She was probably on set filming, but he took a risk and picked up his cell phone again.

"Where are you going?" Vi asked.

"I've got to make a phone call. Why don't you stay here and finish coloring your—" Chuck glanced at the coloring book, but Violet's lines had made the drawing unrecognizable. "—thingamajig, and I'll be right back."

"It's adult stuff again, isn't it?"

"Hey, don't be so quick to grow up, I like you tiny enough to squash like a bug." Chuck tousled her hair. "So you never forget who's king."

"Uncle Awesome?"

"That's exactly right. I'll be right back."

He stepped into the living room so that he would be able to listen for any catastrophe on Violet's part and hit Sophie's entry. It was in the speed dial in case of emergencies, but he didn't use the number much. He didn't expect her to answer, so he nearly fumbled the phone when she picked up on the second ring.

"Chuck," she said, and he could hear the wariness in her voice. "Is Violet okay?"

"Yeah, she's fine. She's in the other room coloring."

"Oh. Then what's up?"

He scratched at the back of his neck. "You're not on set or anything? I'm not interrupting, right?"

"I'm in my trailer." That was code: nobody was listening, which meant she could talk freely. "And alone. What's she coloring?"

And that, Chuck thought, was the reason why he couldn't hate Sophie Marston, even when he really wanted to. Bryce Larkin aside, he'd never really hated anybody, but every time he saw the look of sadness cross his daughter's face, and every time she asked him why the others all had mommies to go to the playground with her and she only had an aunt, every time something like that happened, he wanted to hate Sophie Marston.

But he'd never quite managed.

"It looks like some kind of cross between a sea horse and Godzilla. She's coloring it blue. She's still on that kick." Casey had mentioned he liked blue, but Casey was one of the things Chuck couldn't tell Sophie about. "Listen, I'm calling about the weekend after next."

On the other end of the line, Sophie paused. "I don't think I'll have to cancel. There's no need to check on me all the time."

"It's not that," Chuck said. "Ellie and Aw—Devon, they got a time-share for that week, so I was wondering if it might be possible to switch weekends? That way we don't have to cut our trip short."

"Chuck, I can't do that. You know how much work I put in place so that nobody will be able to spy."

Chuck pinched the bridge of his nose. "I don't suppose flying up to Tahoe and meeting us there would be an option?"

"Tahoe's a pretty popular place this time of year. If I was spotted there, it would be noticed. And somebody might start putting pieces together."

It was on the tip of his tongue to tell her that that wouldn't actually be a problem—the government had plenty of reasons to keep their Intersect out of the tabloids, and Sarah had already implied that they would be willing to pay millions to assist with any cover-ups—but he remembered at the last moment that he wasn't allowed to inform Sophie of that. "You could be careful," he said instead, and immediately wanted to kick himself.

"I'm very careful, Chuck!"

"I wasn't saying you weren't," Chuck said. Every conversation with Sophie recently had gone like this. She was on the defensive even if he wasn't on the offensive and they did nothing but circle around. No matter how many times he told himself that he understood, that she felt guilty and had probably always had that ‛lash out first' mentality, that understanding was cold comfort when he was the one picking up the pieces of their daughter's broken heart after Mommy cancelled or Mommy cut their weekend short. He ran his hand down his face. "Never mind. We'll cut our trip early so we can make it back in time for you to pick her up. That's fine."

It was two days less with Sarah without the cameras, but Violet had to come first.

"Or we could just do it next month," Sophie said.

"She wants to see you. You missed last month—"

"She'll be having so much fun in the snow she won't even miss me," Sophie said. Her voice was light but Chuck could still detect a quaver in the words. "I'll make it up to her next month."

"Sophie—"

"Oh, they're calling me back to set. I'll send her a teddy bear or something. Bye, Chuck."

"Bye," Chuck said, but he was already left with dead air. He lowered the phone and stayed where he was for a moment, hand still over his face. When that moment had passed, he slipped the phone back into his jeans pocket. Another missed month. Sophie only saw Violet about fourteen times a year: one weekend per month and Christmas and Violet's birthday. That was it. Sure, she paid child support and sent packages like clothing and other things, but it in no way made up for the fact that his child had an absent mother.

He looked up as he felt the garage door opening rumble through the house. Ellie had come home early from her shift, apparently.

Sure enough, the door to the garage opened, and he heard, "Chuck! Violet! Anybody home?"

"In here," Violet called back. Chuck shoved all of his disappointment with Sophie back inside and ambled into the dining room, where he and Violet had set up camp for the coloring-and-or-veterinary-procedures of the afternoon.

Ellie set all of her shopping bags on the counter. "You'll never guess what happened," she said.

Chuck had a pretty strong suspicion he could. "You bought half of Los Angeles?" he guessed instead, counting the shopping bags. Some of them were groceries—which was his job this week, so he didn't mind—but some of them were from Waldbaum's, the local department store. "Or is that just a quarter? I can't tell."

"Oh, you think you're so funny," Ellie said, patting his cheek as she walked by.

"That's 'cos he is," Violet said, and she grinned up at Chuck as Ellie gave her a hug-snuggle combination and dropped a kiss on the top of her head. "He's Dr. Charles Carmichael, and he fixed Mr. Hoppy Horse."

"That dog again, huh?" Ellie asked, looking at the chewed up toys.

As one, they all turned to look out at the giant puppy napping in the sun on the back porch. "Yep," Chuck said. "You had news?"

"The timeshare office called," Ellie said, bustling back to the bags and beginning to unload the groceries. She shoved them toward Chuck, and he took this as a signal that he should put the food away. "There was a mix-up in the paperwork with our place and it wasn't originally available for the time we swapped it for."

"Oh, no," Chuck said. "Does that mean we're not going?"

"Actually, the opposite. They fixed the problem and they're comping us for an entire week."

"What?" He'd probably over-acted that, Chuck realized, when both Ellie and Violet blinked at his exclamation. He covered with a wide-eyed look. "They're giving you an entire week up there? For free?"

"I know, isn't it great?"

"What's a timeshare?"

"Do you remember last year," Ellie said, coming around the counter to crouch beside her niece and smooth back her hair, "when we got to play in the snow? It's okay if you don't remember, you were really little then."

Violet scrunched her face up. "Kinda?"

"It's where we got Bun-Bun," Chuck said.

Immediately, Violet's face cleared as the information obviously dawned. "Ohhh! Are we going back there? I liked that place. Are we getting another Bun-Bun?"

"You don't like the Bun-Bun you have?"

"Yes, but isn't more better?"

Ellie laughed and deliberately moved so that Violet's attention would be on her instead of Chuck. "We're going back to Lake Tahoe," she said. "And it will be really fun. They've got lots of snow this year, so we'll build snowmen and have lots of hot chocolate. Won't that be fun?"

"Is Uncle Morgan coming again?"

"Regretfully, yes," Ellie said.

"And Daddy?"

"I wouldn't miss it. And Sir, and Uncle Devon, too, they're coming, too," Chuck said, since he knew those questions were next.

"What about Major Casey Sir?" Violet narrowed her eyes, as if expecting to be challenged. "And Sarah, too, Sarah can't miss it."

Ellie shot Chuck a smug look over her shoulder, and Chuck shrugged. He wasn't going to argue if his daughter wanted Sarah there. The feeling was mutual. "That's up to them, but they've been invited, so we'll see," Ellie said.

"Sarah said she's game," Chuck said, and he remembered that since he'd only found out about their stay being a whole week, Sarah wouldn't know either. "Well, for a couple of days. I'll have to talk to her about staying the whole week."

"Maybe she can visit some of the Tahoe restaurants for her blog," Ellie said, rising to her feet and moving back around to help Chuck put the food away.

"Maybe. She could use a vacation just like the rest of us, though, so I don't know." Curiosity had him poking through some of the Waldbaum's bags; he lifted an eyebrow as he pulled out a tiny purple jacket. "What's this?"

"Oh, that was supposed to be a surprise," Ellie said, but Violet had already spotted it. She whooped as she raced across the kitchen to try the parka on.

Chuck winced. "Sorry."

"Not a big deal. There's one in there for you, too. Yours was getting a little ragged last year."

"You didn't have to do that, you know," Chuck said as he dug through the bag to find his new coat. It was a lot fancier than one he would have bought himself.

"I wanted to. I don't feel obligated, Charles." Ellie raised an eyebrow at him as she helped Violet zip up her new coat. "There, Vi-Baby, what do you think? Gonna be warm enough?"

Vi spun circles in place, her arms out. "I love it, I love it, I love it."

"Guess she likes it, then. Go check it out in a mirror, baby-cakes. And try yours on, Chuck. I want to make sure I got the size right. If it's too small, I can exchange it on the way to work tomorrow."

As Vi scampered off to preen in front of the mirror in the front hallway, Chuck pulled the jacket on. It was a dove-gray color and much warmer than the ratty jacket he'd been wearing for years, which he'd bought at a military surplus store in Palo Alto, when he'd finally worn out the jacket his father had left behind. He wouldn't even need to layer a couple of hoodies underneath this one. "Nice, El. Thanks."

"It looks good on you. Which is good because I hired a photographer and we're getting a family picture done in the snow."

"Aha, the ulterior motive reveals itself."

"And you and Sarah could maybe get some pictures that are just the two of you," Ellie said. "And maybe some with Vi, too."

"Subtle, sis. Real subtle."

Ellie's smirk told him that she knew exactly what she was doing and felt absolutely no shame. "You'll want those pictures someday, trust me."

Someday wasn't something Chuck was really allowed to think about when he was still the Intersect, but he kept the smile plastered on his face as he shook his head at her. "You think you're so smart."

"That's because I am, duh."

"I beg to differ, but thank you for the coat." Chuck gave her a hug right as Vi came running back into the kitchen, which of course meant that she made a beeline straight for them, crashing into Ellie and wrapping herself around Ellie's waist. Chuck broke the hug with a laugh, though Vi continued to cling to her aunt. "What do you say, Megabyte, when somebody gives you something?"

"Thank you. Thank you, thank you, thank you!"

"Guess that's it, then," Ellie said, picking Vi up and setting her on the island counter, which was a sign that she was about to start dinner. "We're going to Lake Tahoe."

"It's going to be so much fun," Violet agreed, nodding sagely.

Chuck certainly hoped so. He decided he'd wait to bring up the conversation with Sophie until much, much later. There was no need to put a storm cloud on anybody else's day, after all.

A/N the Second: Man, Chuck is in for such a surprise when he finds out that Casey knows. Muhaha.