Package Deal (You’ve Got Alien Mail #7)

Chapter 1

Earning Her Keep

Cetus

Dove Foxton does not stay in her assigned quarters like a sensible guest.

I discover this approximately forty-seven minutes after showing her to the guest room, when I find her in the main control center studying my atmospheric monitoring displays with the focused intensity of someone who actually understands what they’re reading.

“You have a pressure differential building in sector seven,” she says without looking up. “See this fluctuation pattern? I’ve seen this before on Jepler-442. Usually indicates a coupling failure in the sensor array.”

I move to her side, examining the data. She’s correct. The pattern is subtle—I would have caught it during routine diagnostics, but she identified it within minutes.

“You have atmospheric monitoring experience.”

“I deliver to remote stations. You learn to read weather systems or you die.” She glances at me, and display light catches in her dark eyes. “Also, I’m not great at sitting still when there’s a storm outside trying to kill me. Reviewing station data is soothing.”

“Soothing.”

“Comparatively.” She pulls up another display with the ease of someone familiar with station architecture. “Your infrastructure is impressive for a single-operator facility. Most terraforming stations I’ve seen are held together with optimism and expired hull sealant.”

“I prefer systematic maintenance over optimism.”

“I noticed.” She gestures to the meticulously organized monitoring schedule. “Everything color-coded and cross-referenced. It’s very... you.”

“You’ve known me for six hours.”

“And you’ve already alphabetized my cargo containers, so I feel confident in my assessment.

” Her smile takes any sting from the observation.

“Look, I know I’m stuck here, but I’m not good at being a passenger.

Let me earn my keep? I’m decent with systems, I can cook actual food that doesn’t come from ration packs, and I promise not to corrupt your daughter too badly. ”

“Tavia doesn’t require corrupting.”

“She asked me if humans shed our skin like snakes. I think she’s doing fine on her own.”

Despite myself, warmth spreads across my shoulders—visible, I’m sure, in the brightening patterns. Tavia’s questions have become increasingly creative during our isolation. Having another adult to direct them at might provide relief.

Might also be dangerous, given how quickly my daughter has decided Dove is fascinating.

“If you wish to assist with station operations, I won’t refuse competent help.” I pull up the sensor diagnostic. “This pressure differential—you said you’ve seen it before?”

“Yeah, on 442. Turned out the primary coupling had degraded from thermal cycling. We rerouted through the secondary array using interpolation algorithms from the ship’s nav system. Unorthodox, but it worked.”

“That violates three standard safety protocols.”

“It also kept us from getting fried by an electromagnetic storm.” She leans closer to examine the data, and I catch the scent of vanillax and cherricus fruit, it’s so uniquely her. Warm. Distracting. “Sometimes field solutions beat textbook answers.”

She’s not wrong. Terraforming often requires adaptation when standard protocols meet reality.

Also, she’s standing close enough that I can feel warmth radiating from her body, and I’m running hotter than atmospheric conditions warrant.

I step back deliberately. Professional distance. “I’ll schedule the sensor repair for tomorrow. If you’re willing to assist, your field experience might prove valuable.”

“Translation: you want to see if I actually know what I’m doing or if I got lucky.”

“I already know you’re competent. You landed a damaged ship in enhanced gravity during atmospheric instability without incident.” Heat floods my chest before I can control it. “I’m interested in your unorthodox problem-solving approach.”

“Interested in my approach. Sure.” But she’s smiling like she knows exactly what my skin is broadcasting. “I can work with that.”

Before I can formulate a response that doesn’t involve my biology betraying me further, Tavia’s voice carries from the kitchen. “Papa! Are you teaching Dove about the station? Can I help?”

“Your daughter has excellent timing,” Dove murmurs.

“She has persistent curiosity and no concept of privacy.” But I’m already moving toward Tavia’s voice, because three years of single parenting has made me attuned to every variation in her tone.

I find her in the kitchen, standing on her step-stool to reach the food preparation station, educational modules scattered across the counter.

“I was thinking,” she announces with the careful innocence that signals incoming schemes, “that since Dove is staying with us, we should make a nice dinner. Not ration packs. Real food.”

“We consume perfectly adequate nutrition.”

“Papa.” She fixes me with a look that’s pure Seraphina—loving exasperation at my practical nature. “We have a guest. Guests deserve real food. Dove, do you know how to cook real food?”

“I know how to make food that tastes like something other than nutritional obligation,” Dove says diplomatically. “What kind of ingredients do we have access to?”

“We maintain standard supply provisions,” I start, but Tavia’s already pulling up the inventory.

“We have everything!” Her yellow markings pulse bright with excitement. “Papa orders extra because he worries about supply chain disruptions, so we have lots of variety. We never use it because he doesn’t know how to cook anything except protein synthesis.”

“I can prepare seventeen different nutritionally complete meals.”

“They all taste the same,” Tavia says with brutal honesty.

Dove’s trying not to laugh. Failing. Her shoulders shake with suppressed giggles that make something in my chest warm in a way that has nothing to do with Lividian biology.

“Tell you what,” she says to Tavia. “How about you and I make dinner together? I’ll teach you some basics, and your dad can supervise to make sure we don’t violate any kitchen safety protocols.”

“Can we make pasta? With actual sauce? Not from a ration pack?”

“We can absolutely make pasta with actual sauce.”

Tavia’s markings blaze with delight. She launches herself at Dove, hugging her with the unrestrained affection of a child who’s been starved for female company. “Thank you! Papa, Dove’s going to teach me to cook!”

Over my daughter’s head, Dove’s eyes meet mine.

Understanding passes between us—recognition that this hunger for female company goes deeper than pasta sauce.

Tavia lost her mother three years ago. She’s been surrounded by male engineers and automated systems and a father who loves her fiercely but can’t replace what she’s missing.

The storm will clear. Dove will leave. Tavia will hurt.

I should maintain distance. Should prevent attachment.

But my daughter is smiling wider than she has in months, and Dove is looking at her with genuine warmth, and my carefully controlled existence is already fracturing.

“I’ll supervise,” I hear myself say. “To ensure kitchen safety protocols are observed.”

“Of course.” Dove’s smile is knowing. “Very important, kitchen safety.”

The kitchen becomes controlled chaos.

Dove moves through the space with confident efficiency, teaching Tavia how to prepare fresh pasta while I hover at the periphery, ostensibly monitoring but actually observing how naturally they work together.

And observing other things I shouldn’t be noticing.

Like how Dove’s hands move—capable and sure, flour dusting her fingers as she demonstrates technique. How she bites her lower lip when concentrating. How she pushes her sleeves up to her elbows, revealing forearms that are somehow both soft and strong.

“Okay, so you want to make a well in the flour like this,” Dove demonstrates, her hands creating a crater in the white powder, “and crack the eggs into the center.”

“How many eggs?”

“For three people? Four should do it. Here, you try.”

Tavia cracks an egg with careful concentration, getting shell fragments in the mixture. “Oops.”

“No problem, we’ll fish those out. Everyone gets shells sometimes.” Dove helps her pick out the fragments, patient and encouraging. “My first attempt at pasta, I got so much shell in there it was basically an egg-and-calcium supplement.”

“Really?”

“Really. The smuggler I was apprenticed to said it built character. And strong bones.”

I find myself stepping closer, drawn by their easy warmth. “You apprenticed with smugglers?”

“Long story. Involves being seventeen, broke, and making questionable life choices.” She guides Tavia’s hands through mixing the dough. “The food skills transferred to legal employment, so it worked out.”

“What were you smuggling?”

“Mostly medical supplies to planets with import restrictions. Some contraband spices. Once, accidentally, a very angry lizard creature that we thought was cargo but turned out to be a stowaway.”

Tavia giggles. “What happened to the lizard?”

“He became the ship’s mascot. Named him Pickles, actually—before the AI. I have a theme.”

“You name things after preserved vegetables?”

“I name things after my emotional state when I encounter them. I was very stressed when I found both the lizard and the AI core.”

Heat spreads across my shoulders again. “This explains concerning amounts about your decision-making process.”

“Hey, my decision-making is excellent. Chaotic, but excellent.”

She’s not wrong. The evidence suggests unconventional brilliance rather than poor judgment.

Also, watching her teach Tavia—patient and encouraging, making my daughter laugh while actually instructing—makes something in my chest constrict pleasantly.

“Now we knead it,” Dove says, demonstrating the technique. Her hands fold and press the dough with rhythmic precision. “You want to fold and press, fold and press. It’s very satisfying. Therapeutic, even.”

I’m staring at her hands. This is inappropriate. I force my attention elsewhere.