Page 67 of Lovesick Titan (Lovesick #2)

“Hey, guys, sorry,” Andre said, entering with a clang of several items in his arms that he set on a table by the med room door.

“Running out of places to put some of this before I catalogue it. Plus, you got about five minutes before Lynn drags you off for tests in the other room.” He pointed at Danny.

Danny groaned, using the show of annoyance to turn away and brush the tears from his eyes, not to hide them from Andre—Andre saw—but to wipe the slate clean for now, ready to move forward.

“What’s all that?” Mal asked. It looked like a jumbled pile of junk Andre had scattered over the table.

“There wasn’t much left after the implosion,” Andre said, spreading the items out, one by one, including a few larger pieces of rounded glass.

“We found some things later that wouldn’t have been native to the mirror world, so must have been expelled like you guys.

There were remains of the mannequin,” he held up what Mal saw was a plastic hand, “a chair,” the leg of the chair, “and this,” a sparkle of black fabric from—

“The Invisible Man,” Danny said with a frown.

Mal sat up straighter. The remains were flimsy, wrecked shreds, but still, it came with a few too many bad memories.

“I can remake it,” Andre said and held up both hands when Mal and Danny both began to protest. “Don’t say no, I have good reason for wanting to, but we can talk about that later.

There’s one more thing Ludgate must have been keeping in the mirror world that I wanted to show you.

” Sifting through the pile a little further, from beneath more scraps of the sparkly black fabric, he finally unwrapped something about the size of a fist that shimmered far more brilliantly than any piece of glass.

The Winterheart Diamond.

Mal marveled at it as Andre handled the jewel with all the care of a major-league pitcher, tossing it into the air before coming forward to hand it to Danny.

“I forgot all about this,” he said, cradling the diamond in two hands in utter contradiction to Andre. He stared at the way it glittered, then held it out to Mal.

Taking it, Mal twisted it against the light. Beautiful. He’d spent a good many months preparing to steal this thing, and couldn’t help the grin that spread across his face.

“You can’t keep it,” Danny said.

“You’re the one who handed it to me.” Mal brought the diamond to his chest like a greedy child, enjoying the pout from Danny and roll of his eyes. “It is technically still missing. No one would ever know.”

“Uhh…” Andre raised his hand.

Mal shot him an unamused look.

“Please don’t get arrested the second after you saved the city,” Danny reprimanded.

“Now you’re just spoiling my fun on purpose,” Mal said but slowly uncurled his arm and held the diamond out again. He watched it pass from Danny to Andre and then return to the table with the rest of the ‘debris’.

It would be so easy to reclaim it at some point. Mal was already plotting about five different ways it could go ‘missing’, when John appeared in the doorway.

“Dad,” Danny lit up, despite having seen each other plenty the past several days. “Lynn’s about to steal me away. Did you want—”

“Actually, I was hoping to talk to Cho for a few minutes, if that’s all right. Alone.”

Mal stiffened. Before now, John had been kind enough to keep the shovel talk to a firm glare and mutual understanding to never discuss the details.

“Uhh…sure,” Danny said, looking at Mal helplessly before getting up and walking with his sluggish gait to meet Lynn at the door. “I’ll, umm…see you soon, okay? ”

As John entered with a diplomatic smile, Mal propped himself up a bit better against the pillows behind him. “How can I help you, Detective?” he asked.

“After all that’s gone on around here, I think you can call me ‘John’. If I can call you ‘Malcolm’?”

“You can call me ‘Mal’,” Mal offered, if the man was going to insist on first names.

“Well then, Mal , don’t think I’m here to corner you.

You don’t have to say anything. Any reservations you might have, anything you think you need to say to me, only needs to be said to Danny.

This is his life. He can decide what he wants.

If that’s you , I won’t be the one telling him to change his mind.

That is an impossible task as it is,” he chuckled.

Mal fell into chuckles with him and quietly admitted, “I don’t want him to change his mind.”

“Good. Then maybe you can convince him to move some of his things into your apartment.”

“ What ?”

John chuckled again. “He’ll recover better there. I know my son. He’ll want to be close to you after all this. Once you’re both allowed to leave, let him dote on you a while. For a week, at least. I know he’ll want that, he just doesn’t always know how to ask for what he wants.”

Mal had purposely been avoiding thinking about what came after being laid up in the morgue because it was scary, just as Danny had said—all the unknowns.

But he would be lying if he said he didn’t feel warmed by the thought of Danny being there when he came home.

Making dinner for him. Curling up on the sofa together.

Being normal and domestic while still being them.

“After Danny’s mother died,” John’s words brought Mal back to him, “all he wanted, all he really needed, was for someone to be there, and I didn’t do my job.

I’ve had my time to mourn my wife. I don’t want to be on the sidelines to Danny’s life anymore.

But that doesn’t mean keeping him at home or keeping him away from you.

It means letting him live his life and always being there to support him. ”

Mal supposed it was a fool’s errand to try to convince either of these men that their faith was misplaced, but at the same time, he didn’t want to let either of them down. It was an alien feeling, being unconditionally believed in when only Lucy and Dom had ever…

Steeling himself, Mal blamed it on the medication in his IV for being so emotional.

He nodded once, and instead of denying anything John had told him or trying to sidestep what had been asked of him, he simply said, “Thank you,” for not being treated like the trash he’d feared he was for much of his life.

When Danny returned later, John was still there. They’d moved on to discussing the newest roster for the Olympus City hockey team. Apparently, Mal and John were both bigger sports fans than Danny.

R

“Zeus!” Michael’s bright voice preceded his entrance.

Danny moved around much easier now, and Mal was almost ready to get out of bed too, if only he could get permission.

Lynn must have told Michael he was allowed to assault them because he didn’t hesitate to throw himself atop Danny in the chair next to Mal, and then attack Mal with equal gusto, without causing the physician to flinch or tell him to hold back.

“Mom wouldn’t let me see the news, but everyone was so worried,” Michael said, pressing his head to Mal’s side before he pulled back. It still amazed Mal how he could accept such wanton affection without the age-old grimace surfacing when it was Danny or Michael or so many of the others.

“We’re fine now, Michael,” he said, patting the boy’s back.

He’d managed to get Lucy to go to his apartment to bring some of his own clothes for the remainder of his recovery, though naturally she’d found the Zeus sleep pants and insisted on bringing those.

Michael poked at a lightning bolt teasing out of the blanket.

Danny stood up to let Michael take the chair between the beds, and Lynn immediately pushed him into his own bed when he wobbled—albeit only slightly and possibly only because a ten-year-old had recently been attached to him .

“I’m almost 100%,” Danny asserted.

“I’ll be the judge of that,” Lynn said. “Both of you need to stay in bed until I give the okay. Enough getting up and moving around without permission. You’re only a few feet away from each other.”

Danny pouted dramatically, and Carla laughed from the doorway, where she held a very alert baby Mai. She was growing so fast already.

“Michael,” Lynn said with an authority that made the boy straighten like he’d been called on by his teacher, “I’m putting you in charge of making sure they both stay in bed. Got it?”

“Yes, Miss Lynn,” he said dutifully.

Danny’s troubled expression told Mal that they were going to have a much harder time skirting the rules now.

Mal couldn’t help it that he was getting restless, and Danny was far worse than he was.

They just wanted to be close to each other while they recovered, until they could, well… be close to each other again.

They caught up with Carla for a while, and Oz soon joined them as well, both giving Mal updates on how the neighborhood was faring without him. Everyone had seen the news, of course, so there was no pretending that Prometheus hadn’t been there to back up Zeus against a more dangerous threat.

Worse, though, was that despite Ludgate having started to broadcast their fight late enough that there were no vocalizations of Danny’s real name and John’s face had never been shown, the entire city had heard Zeus say, “I love you, Mal,” before the feed cut out for good.

If the people of Mal’s neighborhood hadn’t suspected earlier, they definitely knew Danny was Zeus now. Oz insisted that everyone was being cool about it, mostly pretending they didn’t know a thing; no one running to the tabloids or anything, not that Mal would have worried.

“Mrs. Pak swears she knew from the second she met you,” Carla smiled.

“Probably true.” Mal shot Danny a look. “You are the literal worst at keeping your identity secret, but a handful of additional trustworthy people shouldn’t make too much of a difference.

Though they’ll likely fawn over you even more now.

” He would have groaned at the thought if he was the one who’d receive the attention, but Danny merely ducked his head and smiled, happy that anyone would care enough to fawn over him.