Making Relationships Work

Part 20

Monday June 11, 2018

Soon after they got to work on Monday morning, Walter and Paige asked Cabe if they could sit down and talk to him about some of the ideas they had about moving forward with Scorpion.

"I gotta say kids, I like a lot of what I heard. But I've only got about seventeen months before I get full retirement, so I'm not sure what to do. I really would like to make it thirty years."

"What about vacation time? Is that an option? I know since Scorpion at least you haven't taken any time off, other than when we went to Ireland for a couple of days for Megan." Paige asked.

"Not much more than maybe three months' worth. Homeland is pretty stingy when it comes to handing out freebies."

"So maybe we wait a year to implement anything." Walter put out there.

"No son. You're not going to put any plans on hold because of me. And Paige was right, Baghdad was not on your hands. Whatever debt you think you needed to repay has been, and in spades. You need to start thinking about things differently now. Not only for her, but for him too. Family needs to always come first." Cabe told him, talking about Paige and Ralph. "Let me talk to Homeland tomorrow and see what we can come up with. I've got another meeting with them to go over new protocol for how we are supposed to use some story clouds or some nonsense like that."

"Do you mean cloud storage?" Paige asked, proud of herself for beating Walter to the answer for once, as he was looking stumped at Cabe.

"Isn't that what I said?" Cabe asked sipping his coffee.

"Something like that." Paige said smiling at him.

"Don't you start turning into one of them too. I got enough of them to deal with already." Cabe said back to her with a smile.

Walter wanted to talk with Ralph really quick so he could work on his star tracking app before lunch after getting an idea from something Paige just said.

"Ralph, I think I may have come up with a solution to our problem, well your mom may have."

"Mom helped you with coding? Are you feeling okay?" Ralph asked him jokingly.

"She ah helped without knowing. When we were talking with Cabe she mentioned cloud storage, which made me think about your problem. If we can convert the pivot tables to an open source code, we can get people from all over the world to send images to get your map set up; if we link it to a cloud that is. That takes care of the biggest issue you have left."

"I guess that could work if we could alter the user interface as well.

"How about to a GUI?"

"I didn't even think of a graphical user interface, thanks dad. I'll see if that fixes everything."

"Let me know, I have one other idea if it doesn't, but we would need to change the ASCII to do it which would make linking up with the HTML troublesome. But you need to thank your mother, not me."

At the same time they were talking, Cabe and Paige continued to talk as well.

"You understand any of what their saying over there? All I hear are letters."

"No, not a word. But what I do understand is the two of them should never have been kept apart from each other." Paige told him thinking back to the month they didn't have much interaction together.

"That goes the same for you and Walt. I was close to dragging his ass over to your condo a couple of different times. The kid wasn't doing too good. I'm just glad you guys worked through it. He is much happier with you around I can guarantee you that."

"I should have been here the next morning apologizing and letting him explain what happened. We weren't doing any better than him either, by the way." Paige was telling him when Ralph made his way over. "You guys get whatever it was worked out?"

"I think so, dad said you helped him think of a way it might work, but I need to change a bunch of code on it first."

"Nerd." Cabe directed right at Paige making her smile as she was talking to Ralph.

"OK, but hey about thirty minutes and I need to take you for a haircut before lunch."

"Let me take him. We can pick up some lunch on the way back for everyone, what do you say kiddo?"

"Sounds good to me. Thanks Cabe." Ralph said as he walked off to get to work on his app.

"Any time." He said to Ralph as he walked off. "This way maybe you can have a nice, long conversation with Walt about more computer mumbo jumbo." Cabe told her as Paige flung her pen at him.

The next few days were business as usual at Scorpion. Another Homeland case popped up and this time Ralph was unable to help. It was classified information and was going to take place on foreign soil. Although not the soil they were told it was going to be on. Paige had to make some arrangements for Ralph since it was going to be a job that took the better part of two days to finish.

No bullets were fired, although several punches were thrown. Two of them by Paige Dineen herself. One of the government handlers got a little handsy and crossed a line. She tried to be diplomatic the first time and keep it to a few words with the perv, but after it happened a second time, she took matters into her own hands. She was thrown behind bars and told she would be there for quite some time. Walter was beside himself the whole time until he was able to devise a plan to break her out about three hours later. And if Walter hadn't of also miraculously figured out that one of the dignitaries of the Eastasian government was behind the cyberattack they were down there to solve, they would all be behind bars right now.

Walter was furious with Homeland for sending them into a hostile country like that with faulty intel. Intel that came directly from Director Carson. It seemed to be the last straw as far as Walter was concerned.

"I will not stand for the way Paige was treated today because of the lack of judgement you continue to use. This case should have been handled with a full blown military operation, and you know it. Why would you falsely send us into a country that is known to supply mercenaries and extremist groups?" Walter was yelling at Director Carson as Paige and Cabe stood next to him.

"How was I to know?" Carson said as if not caring one bit.

"How were you to know? Open your damn eyes. Read the damn report you were given. Grow a damn pair and stop being an asshole. How can someone with no sense of morals or ethics get to the position you did? If Paige had so much as had a single hair on her head hurt, I swear to God I would have been back here to kick your ass up and down this building." Walter yelled the whole time at him. Cabe almost stepped in but he kind of liked the dress down Walter was giving Carson.

"I will handle things the way I see fit, you don't like it, I suggest you terminate your contract with Homeland." Carson told him.

Walter wanted to continue to argue with him, but Paige stepped in and told him that Carson wasn't worth it. On the way home Walter was ready to terminate their contract. He was still irate after finding out what Carson had done. Basically, sending them on a mission guaranteed to fail and possibly end in imprisonment or death.

After Paige calmed Walter down the two of them had a discussion as owners of Scorpion and did agree to finally terminate the contract, a decision that Cabe stood behind 100 percent. And after Cabe went to talk with Homeland about what happened he was given the option of a full early retirement if he wanted. One he gladly accepted. He was hired as a full time employee of Scorpion the same morning.

Sunday night 'family' dinners became an instant hit and Paige was more than happy to host at their beach house every week. She loved cooking different themed dishes for everyone. As the group continued to meet, they were informed of the direction Walter and Page were taking Scorpion.

"We decided to end our contract with Homeland last week. Things were getting progressively worse and having Carson to deal with was almost too much." Paige informed them. "Moving forward we are going to try and refocus the direction of Scorpion, more along the lines Walter first envisioned it to be."

"And with Paige, I think we can make it really work this time."

Walter and Paige offered Sly and Happy their old jobs back with Scorpion, ones they accepted instantly. They also extended an official offer for Florence to join their team. She was reluctant at first, but after meeting again with both Paige and Walter, she accepted the position.

Over the next month Toby started going to a councilor to get help with his issues. He made it a point to reconcile with everyone. Especially Walter and Paige. He met with them individually and as a couple and admitted to them what he had done. And more importantly why. They were hoping that eventually they would be able to work everything out. They weren't ready to offer Toby a position in the company quite yet.

The first task they put Sylvester on was seeing what could be done to expedite the adoption process. He was happy to do it, and was able to move it along, making sure by Thanksgiving of 2018 Ralph would officially be Walter's son.

Paige didn't want to wait any longer than she had to before they were married. They settled on Saturday September 22nd, the four year anniversary of the day they first met. That would give her nearly three months to plan the whole thing out. Seeing as how she single handedly saved the day and put together Happy and Toby's wedding in less than twenty four hours, three months seemed like an eternity.

Walter and Paige chased after some bigger clients the next couple of weeks, Richard Elia was of course on board. He was already giving Walter $250,000 dollars a year for his retainer fee and he offered another $75,000 dollars a year for all the help he would need with any other Scorpion related problems that would arise. They were also able to talk a few other clients into the same kind of contract. All told they were able to lock in eight corporations for a total of $540,000 dollars. That was more than enough money to offset the loss of the Homeland contract.

By July first, Scorpion was once again bustling with activity as everyone was busy with experiments and projects. Paige continued to bid on more lucrative coding projects for Walter, Ralph and Sly to work on when they came available, as well as finishing the details on her wedding. Happy, Ralph and Walter were working on improving the prototype crutches they designed. It was going to be the first invention the new and improved Scorpion Enterprises was going to try and get patented. Walter and Ralph also were close to having the new app Ralph came up with for star tracking ready to be sent out for beta testing. Sylvester and Florence were busy working on a new and improved solar powered battery. One that Sly wanted to implement throughout southern California.

Toby continued to come by the garage on occasion to talk with Walter and Paige as he continued to apologize for all he did throughout the years to mess with their relationship. By the end of July, Toby was back on the team, with the understanding that he maintained a certain level of professionalism around everyone.

Walter and Paige took full advantage of their beach house and spent almost every morning walking up and down the shoreline and every evening on the roof top deck admiring the views. Ralph continued to have friends over several nights a week as his house became the coolest one for them to hang out at. Paige couldn't have been happier.

The rest of the summer flew by and before everyone knew it, Paige and Walter's wedding day was finally here. They decided against having a big wedding, wanting only their close friends, who they considered their family, to be there. They flew everyone to Maui for two weeks to share in the experience with them.

The wedding went off without a hitch and exactly four years after they first laid eyes upon one another in Nemos Diner, they were now husband and wife.

"I can't believe it took me four years to call myself Paige O'Brien." Paige told Walter as they were curled up together on a lounge chair back in their honeymoon suite overlooking the ocean.

"I wish I would have told you sooner how I felt about you, Mrs. O' Brien." Walter told her with a smile.

"Hey, I could have told you the same thing. That first kiss we shared rocked my world too you know." Paige reminded him. "Besides, as much crap that we went through over the years I wouldn't want to change any of it right now. Look at us now. Married. In love."

"You're right, there isn't much we haven't gone through, and knowing that anything else we have to go through, we get to do it together now means a lot. I meant everything I said to you in my vows today, I will be by your side without fail for anything and everything." Walter told her before kissing her.

"Mmm, speaking of vows, you took my breath away with everything you said about me today. Thank you for making me feel so special and loved. Not only today, but every day. I couldn't imagine spending my life with anyone but you Walter. Thank you for the present you gave me too." Paige told him with a wicked little smile.

"I um don't remember giving you a present today, Paige."

"You're right, it wasn't from today." Paige told him as her eyes glossed over. "I got a little something for you too." She finished as she handed Walter a small box as he was still not sure what Paige was talking about.

As instructed, Walter opened the box to find a small stick with a single word prominently displayed. By the time he looked back up at Paige she had tears streaking down her face.

Walter couldn't contain the smile that quickly grew across his face. "You're pregnant? We're having a baby? Are um, are you okay with that?"

"More than okay. Are you?" Paige asked shaking her head up and down as she looked right in his eyes.

"Yes, Paige, I am. I can honestly say I would only want to do this with you. I love you so much." Walter told her as a few tears started to roll down his cheeks as well.

"I love you too Walter."

"I didn't think today could get any better than it was, and somehow you found a way to do that." Walter told her before kissing her again and again.

It was several hours later before they fell asleep for the first time as a married couple. And over the course of the next week and a half, not many other people ever saw them. Most of their time was spent together in total bliss.

Before they left to head back to Los Angeles, Paige let them all know they were indeed having a baby and the due date was right around March 8th.

"It's like taking candy from a bunch of babies." Happy informed the group of friends. "Easiest $3500 ever."

"You guys were placing bets on when we got pregnant?" Paige asked. "And who was involved?"

They all raised their hands; Happy, Toby, Sly, Cabe, Allie, Florence, and even Ralph.

"You too? You guys corrupted our son." Paige said as her eyes went like saucers seeing Ralph's hand in the air.

"Corrupted him, he's the one that got it started, Mr. Summer Intern said he had $500 he was willing to spend." Cabe informed them as Ralph's face blushed a dark shade of red.

"Thanks Walt. I figured you would take care of business the same night you proposed." Happy stated trying to give him a high five, causing both Walter and Paige to blush just like their son.

Two months later, on Friday November 23rd the adoption was official and Ralph O'Brien couldn't have been happier. Just in time for Thanksgiving. What better to give thanks for than the family he had wanted for a little over four years.

A/N - Thank you to everyone who has read and enjoyed my stories and to the few of you who take the time to comment on them.