As always, thank you to everyone who reviewed recently! I've gotten some really sweet, meaningful reviews, and I really appreciate it.
Anyway, I wanted to warn my readers that my summer job with my local community theater will likely interfere with my posting schedule over the next few weeks, as my life is going to be totally crazy. However, I'm hoping to post at least two or three chapters over the next two weeks, and I've nearly completed the story, so don't worry-I'm not leaving this story uncompleted.
Joe looked at the brand-new picture on Matt's desk, in its white wooden frame.
"She's beautiful." He said, looking at the photo of the proud parents with their three-month-old baby daughter. It had been taken the weekend before. They were standing in front of a blossoming cherry tree, with the Jefferson Memorial in the background. Rachel and Matthew were beaming, and the chubby-cheeked baby with blue eyes gazed directly at the camera from her place in her mother's arms.
"I know. Everyone keeps saying she looks like me, but I think she looks like Rachel."
"She has your coloring, but I think she has Rachel's nose. And chin. Although, with a name like Cameron Morgan, no one's going to have any doubt who she belongs to, anyway."
"That's what I told Rachel at the hospital when Cam was born. If she ever gets lost wandering around Pentagon City Mall, someone will know exactly what to do with her."
Joe laughed.
"You know, you could have just named her Future Deputy Director of the CIA Morgan."
"Oh, Joe. Don't doom the kiddo to a desk job already. Besides, it's Director or nothing."
Joe finally set the picture down, and leaned against Matt's desk.
"What, you don't want her to have a nice, safe desk job?"
"I will support Cammie in whatever career goals she develops. However, I do think it's a little premature to think about that just yet, because she doesn't even understand object permanence. Also, she is going to be a pavement artist like her old man, so it doesn't matter."
"Really? You think a Cameron will be a pavement artist?"
"Father's intuition." Matt leaned back in his desk chair, and crossed his arms behind his head. He sighed. "Listen, Joe,"
"Of course."
Matt shook his head indignantly.
"Don't pretend that you know what I'm going to ask."
"Of course I do. You want me to promise to look after Rachel and Cameron in case anything happens to you."
Matt nodded, slowly. Of course Joe already knew.
"Yeah."
"And of course, I will. Rachel already asked me to look after you and Cameron if something happens to her."
"When did you see Rach—forget I asked. Of course she did."
"Abby asked me if I wanted to share custody of Cammie as a dysfunctional Aunt and Pseudo Uncle tag team in case something happened to the both of you."
"Of course she did."
After Matt finished rolling his eyes, the two men were stuck in a state of brotherly, affectionate nodding for a moment.
"Anyway, you should drop by after work and meet her. She's at the stage now where she's not quite so small that you have an existential crisis every time you pick her up."
"Maybe I will." Joe shrugs. Joe has never really liked kids and babies—Matt knew this—he just didn't really know what to do with them. But surely, he could deal with his best friends' baby. "I have a gift for her."
"What is it, baby's first sniper rifle?"
"It's baby's first polygraph, actually."
The two men laughed as quietly as they could, conscious of the fact that they were in the middle of the office's bullpen, surrounded by their co-workers in their own cubicles.
"What about baby's first comms unit? She can't talk yet, but I'm certain it would have a better range than the baby monitor my parents got us."
"It would go well with baby's first signal scrambler."
"In a few years, we'll give Cam her first repelling cable so she can escape from her own crib."
"For her fifth birthday, I'll give her her first switch blade—it'll be hidden in a pinwheel."
"What about—"
Matt was about to suggest another horribly inappropriate present when a third man appeared over Joe's shoulder.
"Hello, Morgan."
"Hello, Edwards."
Maxwell Edwards was holding a large stack of files in his hands. He set them down on Matt's desk, giving a polite nod to Joe, and quickly glanced at the new photo that sat next to the Georgetown mug where Matt kept all of his pens.
"I'm sorry to have to give this to you on your first day back from paternity leave, but this is the transcript from your debrief after Osaka. As usual, initial and sign on the dotted lines. How's mother and baby, by the way?"
"They're both doing great. They're both perfectly happy and healthy."
"You named her Cameron?"
"Yeah. We to give her a family name for Rachel's side of the family, but that was the only family name we really liked."
Edwards shrugged.
"Well, I was given a family surname for my first name. I like Cameron, it's strong, and it's not a bad family name to carry. Anyway, I need to get to a meeting with Morrison and Newman. Give my regards to Rachel." And he turned and left.
Matt looked, dismayed, at the new pile of reports that he needed to look over, and then turned and looked up at Joe.
I've never liked him, Joe mouthed. Matt shrugged in reply. He didn't either, but he really wasn't in the mood to think about the things he didn't enjoy.
Their earlier jovial mood killed, Joe clapped Matt on the shoulder, and left him behind to go and tackle his own paperwork.