Granola Bars and Spaceships Page 15

I grinned and spun my chair around. "Would I do that?"

Eric shook his head. He came over to where I sat and turned my chair back around so we were both looking at the schedule. "Yes. You would." He kissed me on the top of the head. "Thanks."

I reached up to touch his hand where it rested on my shoulder. -I know you miss them. We should be able to get back in time. My parents can drop us off and pick us up.-

"They can?"

-Don't sound so surprised. They schedule us near Earth at this time of its year on purpose, you know.-

"Oh."

Eric sounded slightly stunned, and I tilted my head back to look at him. -You didn't know that?-

He cleared his throat and shook his head.

I patted his hand. -They do try to make sure we can see your Earth family.-

Eric nodded. "I suppose I should have realized. I'll have to thank them."

I took my hand away and reopened the detailed schedule for the upcoming days.

"Wow," Eric muttered. "I knew we were busy right now, but really?"

I looked at the portion of the meetings at the conference center my parents had designated as ours. It was a very impressive list. I frowned at the little rows of highlighted text. "We have way too much to do in the next two days."

Eric rested his chin on top of my head and sighed, the harsh breath ruffling my veeka. "Do you want me to handle the trade agreement with the Vrana and the Skaks?" he asked.

I looked at him over my shoulder. "The last time you talked to the Skaks, you almost started a civil war."

Eric straightened to stand next to me and shrugged. "It wouldn't have been a big civil war." He grinned.

I rolled my eyes. "I'll take the Vrana and the Skaks. You get to go talk to Aeka about the weavers from Kispa Altan."

He groaned dramatically. "Really? You know Aeka's just going to spend half the time quizzing me about kids, right?"

I snickered while I tapped out notes on the screen. "Well, don't try to start civil wars in the middle of council sessions then. Now go. Eet is expecting one of us in a few minutes."

Eric sighed heavily and kissed the top of my head. I listened to him mutter all the way out of our suite.

I left my desk to go get ready to shuttle down to the planet for the trade meeting. On the one hand, I was relieved to be missing Aeka's inquisition. On the other, I was thinking I wouldn't mind little ones. There were a few practical things to talk about first. We'd need new rooms. And we'd need to talk to one of the family specialists about crossing Iska DNA with a Human's.

And then there was the matter of seeing if Eric even wanted kids.

I grinned as I left our suite. As much as he protested my parents' questions, he'd been asking a few of his own lately. I was fairly sure deciding if we wanted them would be a decently short conversation. Then it would be on to the logistics.

I wondered idly what a child of ours would look like. Would the little one wind up with veeka like mine? Maybe they would have smooth skin like Eric, but my ears. I grinned. A Human-looking child with Iska ears. Wouldn't that be something?

Fin

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Geneva Vand currently resides in Northern New England, where she is often either much too hot or much too cold. She has a weakness for Indian food and would probably live off naan and chicken curry if you let her. She reads too much and listens to all kinds of music when she remembers to turn it on. When she is not distracted by reading books of some kind, she can sometimes be found trying to write them. Or you might find her upstairs cross-stitching. She doesn’t much like her day job, but sometimes you can find her there, too.

Geneva blames her current level of sanity entirely on her husband. She’s not sure why he hangs around a silly person like her, but with the help of the cats he keeps her feet firmly planted on the ground. She appreciates it.

She loves to hear from her readers. You can contact her by e-mail at genevavand@gmail.com. You can also find her on Facebook:

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