Chapter Thirty-Two
Anton
“ H ey, Da—I mean Ker?” Saranor called out as she came into our bedroom with Zellya trailing behind her. “Can we eat some of those donuts on the island?”
Keryth’s heart leapt when she almost called him Dad , and I decided this needed to be addressed. My viramore was too nervous to tell his girls himself, and it was clear that he and the two younglings wanted it. After everything my viramore had done for me, after bringing me so much love and joy, I could certainly help him with this.
So I walked into the room from the en suite and picked Zellya up, putting her on my hip as she giggled. She loved being carried around and treated like a little princess, and she now had even more people—specifically her new older siblings—to do it. She was getting big, probably too big for it, but luckily for everyone involved, vampires were strong and could carry grown men with ease. A tiny eight-year-old was nothing.
Saranor hopped up on the bed, sitting beside Ker, so I walked over and placed my free hand on my viramore’s shoulder, giving it a squeeze. “You know, girls, I’m sure Ker wouldn’t mind you calling him Dad if you wanted.”
He made a choking noise in his throat, sputtering, but Saranor beat him to speaking. “Really?”
His eyes widened as he stared at her. “You… you want to?”
She shrugged but nodded, looking down in shyness. “Um… you are… our dad. I mean, you, um, adopted us, right?”
“Of course I did. You’re mine. All four of you are. You always have been.” He blinked, his eyes looking wet. “But I… I didn’t think… I mean… I wasn’t sure… if I should tell you to call me that. I didn’t want to force you.”
She looked up and smiled slightly. “Zell and I told everyone at school that you’re our dad already.”
I could feel how much that meant to Keryth as he asked, “You did?”
She nodded and shrugged again, and Zellya wiggled to get down, so I set her on her feet. She climbed onto the bed on the other side of Keryth, saying, “Gemma said it was okay.”
“She did?” He somehow sounded even more surprised. How he didn’t realize they all considered him their dad, I didn’t know. My sweet fae.
“Mhm.” She pushed her hair out of her eyes. “So… Dad?”
He made a sound in his throat before turning and pulling her into a hug, burying his face in her hair as he whispered, “You guys can call me whatever you like, but I… I would love it if you used Dad.” He held his arm out for Saranor, and she moved in to join the embrace.
With a smile, I kissed the top of Ker’s head and walked out, leaving them to their sweet moment.
In my head, Keryth said, “Thank you, Anton.”
“Anytime, my love.”
The smile on my face remained there as I made my way down to my office on the first floor. I had a phone call with Garrick on my schedule. We were planning on talking things over before I added Corbin into the call and introduced the two. We were going to have to work together with many of the Gauhala Territory leaders over the course of this investigation.
Over the last week, Garrick managed to apprehend ten people related to the Legion of Light hunters. They didn’t seem to be hunters themselves, but they were involved in the trafficking ring. Unfortunately, this ring was far bigger and spread over more territories and other countries than any of us ever realized. It was going to take a lot and a long time to shut it down completely.
He'd found out that the group had several old tomes and artifacts from the original Legion of Light. So we’d been right that they’d found them and adopted their ideology into their group about ten years ago, and the group grew from there.
It seemed that we’d taken out most of the actual hunters, and all that was left of the group were the traffickers themselves. But since they were spread out all over the world, it was going to be a big undertaking to find and arrest them all.
Garrick was talking about putting together a special task force to start hunting these people down.
I was all for it.
The threat to my family was gone, at least for the time being. But anyone who sold and profited from the pain and enslavement of others deserved to be taken down. Honestly, they truly deserved to be taken out entirely.
Shaking my head, I pulled my pile of files closer to myself so I could go through them again. Keryth had already identified his kidnapper, and luckily for that human, he was already dead. He’d been killed in our attack on the warehouse.
If he was still alive, he’d be wishing for death by the time I was finished with him.
Trayben was able to identify two more people from the warehouse as having been involved in his kidnapping. Tan and Garrick tracked down all the other victims we’d saved in that basement to identify their assailants and to find out if we were missing anyone. So far, all the people involved with Ralodove had been identified, and only two of them were still alive.
They were lucky my viramore had asked me not to kill them. He and Tray were happy to know they’d spend the rest of their lives locked up in prison, and they didn’t want me to push my luck and wind up going to prison myself for murder.
I’d grumbled, but I saw their point too.
After my hours-long phone call, Keryth came into the room, walked over to me, and rolled my chair toward him before he climbed on my lap. His arms draped over my shoulders, and I rested my hands on his lower back, making sure he wasn’t going to slide off my thighs.
“Hi.” He kissed my lips before I could reply, and I hummed against him.
When he broke the kiss, I rested my forehead against his. “Hi, my darling. You alright?”
He leaned back with a smile. “I am. I just… have a question for you.”
“Alright. Go ahead.”
He chewed on his lip for a few seconds. “So… I never broke my lease on my apartment.”
I froze, waiting.
“I’m sorry. I know I should have as soon as we moved in here, I just… I was nervous because you didn’t want me to pay rent or anything. But then I felt like this really was home, you know? But I still didn’t break it, and I…” He sighed, sounding frustrated. “It took me a while to figure out why, but I think I just… well, we lived there with my mom. It was her apartment, you know? I was just… nervous about saying goodbye to it, I guess.”
“Oh, my darling.” I cupped his cheeks. “There’s no reason to be worried. I’m not upset. You’ve been through so much, and you have kids you have to worry about. It makes sense to be cautious.”
“You’re really not mad?”
“Not at all. And it makes sense not to want to lose that connection to your mother.” I dropped a brief kiss to his lips. “Do you want to talk to Remi about buying the apartment? I’m not sure what we’d do with it, but maybe we could figure out…” I trailed off, unsure of his expression. “What’s wrong?”
“What does Remi have to do with my apartment?”
I opened my mouth, but only a strange choking sound came out, so I cleared my throat. “Uh, he owns the building, doesn’t he?”
A myriad of emotions crossed his face before he stood up, grabbed his phone out of his pocket, and dialed someone.
Even though Keryth had the phone to his ear, I could still hear when Bel answered. “Hey, Ker.”
“Don’t you hey, Ker , me, Belryn Bixidor.”
“Uh, what the hell? Why are you mad at me?”
“You made Remi buy my apartment building, and you didn’t even tell me! No wonder my rent never went up and the super was suddenly actually good at his job and took care of things quickly. Mother of All, Bel, why didn’t you guys tell me?”
Bel was quiet for a long time before he sighed. “I was afraid you’d get mad and try to move out of spite.”
Ker let out a humorless laugh. “That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. I love that apartment. I never would’ve…” He trailed off and sighed himself. “I can’t believe you two did that. You shouldn’t have.”
“The old owner was a speciest asshole that wanted to kick ya out because you’re fae. We weren’t gonna let that happen.”
“He was going to kick us out?”
“Yeah.” Bel huffed. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you.”
“You didn’t. Except for the whole not telling me thing.”
Bel snorted. “I’m sorry. Also, it was all Remi’s idea. I supported the move, but he’s the one that did it.”
“Are you tryin’ to say I should be mad at him and not you?”
He laughed. “No. But I know you’re about to thank me, so I thought you should know.”
“Ugh. How did you know that?”
“You’re easy to read, cuz.”
“Lovely. Fine. Thank you, and tell Remi too. You’re both jerks, but I love you anyway.”
“We love you too, Ker,” Remi’s voice called out, so obviously he was listening in as well.
A hiss wanted to escape at the declaration of love, but I held it back. Clearly, Remi meant it in the family way, not the in-love way. He had his own viramore anyway.
They chatted for a few minutes before hanging up, and my fae came over and climbed back on my lap. “Sorry about that.”
I grinned at him. “If I would’ve realized you didn’t know, I would’ve told you sooner.”
He patted my shoulder. “I know you would’ve.”
After kissing him, I asked, “Did you have something else you wanted to tell me? You seem distracted.”
“Sorry, sweetheart. I think I’m just overwhelmed.” He took a breath. “I want to get rid of the apartment, but I kind of want to go there and… say goodbye to it or something.” His cheeks flushed, but he had nothing to be embarrassed about.
“Alright. Let’s head over there now.”
“Right now?”
“Unless you don’t want to?”
He shook his head and climbed off me. “No, let’s do it. Do you care if the girls come?”
I smiled at him. “Of course not.”
“Tray might want to as well.”
I gave him a nod and followed him out of the room.
In the end, all four girls, Tray, and even Jedediah came with us. I was pretty sure Jed only came because he was the nosiest person I knew, but he was also being sweet with Tray, so I let it slide. Jed was really taking the whole big brother thing seriously with Tray and the girls. He, more than anyone else, made sure to spend time with each of the kids, and he was so good with them.
He'd been great with Tray when we’d taken him to the nightclub to hunt the other night. Jed had really helped with Tray’s confidence, and honestly, the rest of us weren’t even needed with him taking the lead. He was such a great big brother.
Seeing him like that made me wish he’d find someone to start a family with. He’d be a wonderful father.
He’d have to find someone he would actually be serious with, but that wasn’t something I could help him with.
When we walked into the apartment, I gave my fledgling a hug and temple kiss, earning a raised brow, but I simply shrugged and walked farther into the empty room.
Keryth, the girls, and Tray walked around, speaking quietly and sharing memories while Jed and I stood off to the side, watching and listening quietly. After a while, Tray joined us and pressed his shoulder into my arm. He was maybe half an inch taller than Keryth—a fact the teenager never let my viramore forget—but he was still short and slender, the way all fae were. There weren’t very many fae-turned-vampires, at least not that I knew, so he was among the smallest of the vampires I’d ever seen.
He was also still rather shy at times, but he was starting to get more and more comfortable around all of us, and seeing his true personality breakthrough was amazing. His fae magic was also showing hints of coming through, so I was pretty sure that once he settled into his vampirism, he’d be able to call upon his fae aspects with practice.
Keryth wound up walking into my arms a half hour later. His eyes were glassy, but he was also… happy. And lighter.
Pulling him into an embrace, I pushed my thoughts at him. “Are you alright, my darling?”
“Yes. I’m good. I think we all needed this. Thanks for being here.”
“Anytime.”
I kissed him, and we turned to his girls. Keryth opened one arm out, and I was a little surprised that all four of them, even Gemma and Alsira, joined our hug. Before we could settle into it, Ker tugged Trayben in and said, “You get in here too, Jed.”
Jed smiled and joined in as well.
It was sweet, even though Alsira was crying, and we stayed that way for a few minutes.
Finally, everyone pulled back, and Keryth said, “How about we go get some ice cream?”
Zellya gasped. “Before dinner?”
He let out a watery laugh. “Yeah. I think this is an ice cream before dinner kind of day.”
She let out a happy squeal and hugged him around the waist. “Thanks, Dad.”
He laughed again, hugged her, and met my gaze as a tear traveled down his cheek. He’d been sad over his mother and leaving this apartment for the last time before. But now he had a happy tear trailing over his skin because Zellya, his daughter, called him Dad.
They hugged for a few more seconds before pulling back. “Ready?”
Gemma said, “Yeah, let’s get out of here.”
Keryth dipped his head at her, walked to the door, and whispered, “Thanks for keeping us safe.” Then he patted the doorframe and walked out.
The girls and Tray did similar things, and then Jed and I were left inside, staring after the fae that had come into our lives, into our family, and turned everything upside-down… for the better.
Jed sent me a soft smile and gave me an affectionate shoulder-bump before following them out.
Glancing around the empty apartment, I sent a silent thanks out to Keryth’s mother for bringing such wonderful people into my life.
“I’m sorry you didn’t get to stay and raise them, but your son is doing an amazing job.” I patted the doorframe in the same place my viramore had. “I promise he no longer needs to do it alone. I promise to take good care of all five of them. Be at peace.”
Then I walked out to find my family.