Jorah finished healing me, but said, “I can’t get it all. You’ll have to get Dad to help.”
Hiro asked, “But he’ll be okay?”
Jorah sent him a smile. “Yeah, Hiro, he’ll be just fine.”
Hiro blew out a breath, sagging a little, and kissed my forehead. I heard him mutter, “Thank god,” to himself.
Thayer walked over, carrying Blaze in bearded dragon form, and set him on my chest. My Bonded was still hurting, just as badly as me, so he snuggled his head under my chin and rested there. I gave him a few weak pats and said through our Bond, Thank you for saving me. Are you okay?
He sent me waves of affection and love, so I sent them back and settled, knowing he’d be okay.
Thayer held up something that looked like a coin for everyone to see and said, “Found this on one of them.” My vision was a little blurry from blood loss, but I knew what it was immediately and groaned, making Hiro tense.
Jorah made a disgruntled sound in his throat. “They were the Order of Salvation: Faction Sixteen. Mother of All, how many factions are there?”
“What in the hell is that?” Hiro asked.
Since I was having trouble breathing fully, Jor answered, “They’re an ancient order set out to destroy the Three and claim the power for themselves. They keep sending factions after us, each one with a different plan, but this is the highest number faction we’ve seen.” He sighed and rubbed his forehead. “All the witch murders, you felt their energies, right?” Thay and I nodded, and Jorah blew out a breath. “They must’ve been trying to collect as much energy as possible to take us down. They’re smarter than they look. They somehow placed phone calls earlier or had someone else do it, and they waited until Bas walked away and we were separated to attack. Choosing Armina this time, it wasn’t a coincidence. It was a trap.”
I felt Hiro’s concern grow, but a bunch of BCA agents arrived on scene, so everyone was hustling and bustling around us. Hiro helped me sit up, using his chest to lean on, but we didn’t otherwise move. Thay had called Ailin as well, so I figured we could just wait here for him.
After we were questioned, Hiro whispered, “How do you feel?”
“Like I got stabbed in the fucking stomach.”
He frowned. “What can I do to help?”
“Sit there and be my eye candy while we wait for my dad to come save my ass like he always does.”
A gasp to the side made me turn my head as much as I could to find Ailin standing there with wide eyes. When those greens met my gaze, he whispered, “Did you just call me your dad?”
I held his gaze. “Yeah… I did.”
He walked over to me and pulled me into a hug—I ignored the pain—and whispered, “I love you, kiddo. You know I’ve always considered you mine… my son.”
“I know… I know… Dad.” That felt foreign on my tongue, but also sort of right. Weird for sure, but I think I liked it.
He squeezed me tighter, and I felt his magic wrap around me. It was familiar and had always made me feel safe, and this time was no different as he healed me, then healed Blaze further. Once Ailin healed us, he went to help a few other people, but Hiro and I had to answer a bunch of questions. Since I was exhausted from magic use, being injured, and being healed, Hiro stayed behind me, holding me up and letting me use him as a chair.
Alec came over to me and pulled me forward a little, out of Hiro’s arms and into a hug, muttering, “I’m glad you’re okay.”
I awkwardly patted his back because what the hell?
He released me—Hiro pulled me to his chest again—and I sighed. “I’m sorry for earlier. I tried to talk Petunia out of taking him in, but she wouldn’t listen.”
“She listened to me,” I said.
He snorted. “I think calling her ‘The Bitchiest Bitch to Ever Bitch’ probably did it. I’ll remember that for next time.”
I snorted and Hiro said, “Please tell me he didn’t really say that to the fuckin’ leader of the country.”
“I totally said that,” I said.
Hiro groaned.
“What? She knows me, so it’s not like she was surprised. She’s known me since I was a teenager. Trust me, I’m much better now.”
“That’s what you think.” Alec chuckled before sighing and saying, “Listen, Bas, I owe you a huge apology. I know I’ve been coming down on you a lot over the months, and I just want to say sorry. It isn’t an excuse, but once your numbers went down, I was getting a lot of shit from Petunia and the other officials for letting things slide with you. You’re expensive sometimes when you blow shit up, but I’ve always been able to justify it because you bring results. When that stopped happening, they cracked on me even harder than usual about spending costs. They kept saying I was biased because you’re family, and no matter how many times I said it had nothing to do with that, they didn’t believe me.”
“You should’ve told me that to begin with. You were acting like you hated me,” I said.
“Bas… Please tell me you don’t really think that. You know you’re like my little brother, right?”
“Yeah, I guess.”
“I’m sorry.” He scrubbed his hand over his face. “When I found out Aspen was pregnant again, I was stressed. You know her last pregnancy wasn’t an easy one, so I’ve been worried about her on top of work shit. I didn’t mean to take it out on you.”
I could tell he meant it, so I said, “It’s fine, Al.” I shot him a grin. “But now you owe me about a million favors.”
He sighed. “That’s probably fair.”
“Or just one big one.”
He eyed me. “What do you have in mind?”
“Hire Hiro as my partner.”
Alec stared at me for a few seconds, then nodded. “Done.” He slapped me on the shoulder and stood. “Hiro, come to my office next Monday to fill out the paperwork. Bas, take the rest of the week off to relax. Come in on Monday with your viramore.”
“Thanks, Al,” I said.
“Thank you,” Hiro called to his retreating back, then said to me, “Glad he finally apologized to you.”
“Me too. So I told you I’d get you a job at the BCA.”
“You sure that’s what you want?”
My head jerked around, trying to see him. “What? Yeah, it is, but it’s more about what you want. I know you’ve been working alone for a long time, so is this what you want? You’d still use your hunting skills, but you’d be all official.”
He squinted his eyes.
I added, “Okay, mostly official. You know I like bending the rules when I need to.”
“You crazy rulebreaker you.”
“Would you answer me, dimple face?”
He snorted out a laugh, pressed his nose to my hair so his mouth was by my ear, and whispered, “The only problem I see is bein’ able to keep my hands off ya long enough to catch our marks.”
I snorted. “I’m sure you’ll manage.”
He groaned. “We’ll see about that. Maybe you’ll have to wear a giant sweatshirt or somethin’ to cover yourself better around me.”