December had been a roller coaster that Patrick would’ve paid money at any point to get off of. Learning that his old captain was in truth an immortal had been one of those moments where everything about living just hurt. The gods had fucked with Patrick his entire life, and to learn that someone he considered a brother and brother-in-arms had betrayed him like that was still a raw wound deep down inside.
He’d forgiven Gerard though, because Patrick had learned—with Jono’s help—that closing himself off from everyone wasn’t helpful. Sometimes the gods themselves didn’t get a choice. Gerard had proven that when, as the warrior Cú Chulainn, he had promised the goddess Cailleach Bheur he would return to Ireland once the Morrígan’s staff was found.
It was finding the damned thing that was the problem.
Once locked away in the United States’ Repository, it had been stolen by Medb after the Thirty-Day War ended three and a half years ago. They’d all thought Ethan Greene and the Dominion Sect had been behind the theft, but it turned out the gods weren’t above stealing from each other. In the fight at the Gap of Dunloe on winter solstice, the Dagda had forced Medb to keep her promise and tell them where the Morrígan’s staff was.
There was only one problem with that win. The fae of any court were experts at twisting words, and Medb had only said it was in the mortal world. After weeks of chasing down leads gleaned from chatter, the SOA—along with the Preternatural Intelligence Agency and the US Department of the Preternatural—had agreed it was most likely going to be sold on the black market.
They just didn’t know where.
Something must have come up though. Setsuna had called Patrick yesterday while he was in the field to tell him she would be in town for a few days, and that they were meeting that morning. Patrick hadn’t seen her in person since last June when he was in the hospital recovering from breaking up Ethan’s sacrificial spell and getting his soul bound to Jono’s. Patrick wasn’t looking forward to today’s meeting at all.
Whiskey in his coffee would’ve made everything better, but Jono was a stingy bastard.
When Patrick stepped into the living room of their top-floor Chelsea apartment, he was greeted with a kiss and a mug of coffee that had cream and nothing else in it.
“I’ll pour my own whiskey,” Patrick muttered against Jono’s lips.
Jono laughed, nipping gently at his bottom lip. “You’ll do no such thing. Are you hungry? I’ll make you a fry-up.”
“You can go back to bed, you know that? Only one of us is working today.”
Jono pulled away and retreated to the kitchen. “I don’t mind getting up with you.”
Patrick watched him go, a warmth settling in his chest that had nothing to do with the central heat that Jono had turned up. The gods might have maneuvered Jono into his life, but Jono was everything Patrick never knew he needed.
He joined Jono in the kitchen, relishing their time together. Breakfast was a quick affair, and they ate it standing at the counter rather than at the dining room table. Patrick leaned against Jono as he ate, sipping at his second cup of coffee every now and then.
“Anyone come to the bar for help last night?” Patrick asked.
Jono shook his head. “No, but we were busy enough.”
Busy was an understatement. Ever since Jono had accepted Emma’s pack near the beginning of December and two more packs on Christmas Day as his responsibility, more and more packs had come to Tempest asking for protection. The other god pack of New York City, headed up by Estelle Walker and Youssef Khan, still maintained control of the five boroughs, but Jono’s announcement of his own god pack meant the werecreature community was a ticking time bomb these days.
Most of the packs who had switched allegiance were smaller ones, located outside Manhattan proper. Nearly half the independent-ranked werecreatures who called the five boroughs home had asked Jono for protection before the end of January. Patrick anticipated the rest would shift allegiance before the end of February. Nearly every single pack who had asked to be governed by their god pack had been accepted—except for one.
The Falcon pack, out of Manhattan, was a moderately large pack of werewolves whose alpha had come to Tempest one night three weeks back. Eduardo had been earnest and willing to submit to Jono’s rule, ready to show throat, but Jono had taken one look at the man and told him no.
Sage Beacot, their dire, had promptly kicked Eduardo out, along with the few pack members he’d brought. When pressed, Jono had simply said the Falcon pack couldn’t be trusted. Later, Jono had confessed to Patrick that Fenrir had told him not to take the pack on. Patrick usually didn’t trust gods, but the immortal Norse wolf that had teeth and claws sunk deep in Jono’s soul wasn’t one they could argue with.
Rarely did animal-god patrons bestow werecreatures with their guidance and blessings. Given the choice, Patrick would wish Jono free of the immortal, but he could grudgingly admit that Fenrir gave their pack a legitimacy no one else had—they just weren’t announcing the god’s favor yet to anyone outside their pack. Whenever they did, Patrick knew shit would go down.
Right now, bringing in packs and independent werecreatures they could trust made it easier for them to expand their pack boundaries. Their small, four-person god pack literally only had one werecreature who carried the god strain of the werevirus. Jono was enough though, and the rest of them backed him. So far, the people who’d opted to accept their protection were fine with taking orders from a werewolf, a mage, a weretiger, and a fledgling fire dragon, even if most people thought Wade Espinoza was just an annoying teenager.
“See you tonight?” Jono asked as he walked Patrick to the front door.
Patrick slapped his hand against the doorframe, strengthening the threshold wrapped around their apartment with a quick burst of focused magic. “Monday nights at the bar are always my favorite.”
“We won’t stay late. I know you need to sleep.”
“Just because I need to sleep doesn’t mean I can let pack duty slide.” Patrick rose on his tiptoes to kiss Jono goodbye. “I’ll be there.”
Jono pressed a hand to the small of Patrick’s back, keeping Patrick close as he deepened the kiss just enough to be a tease. Patrick groaned, hating that he had to go to work.
“Be safe,” Jono said when he finally pulled back. “I love you.”
“I will.”
Patrick didn’t say the other words back—hadn’t said them since Jono first confessed his love on Christmas Eve. They were buried down deep, spread through actions and touches, but never voiced. Some part of Patrick was too scared to say them and then lose what mattered most in his life these days.
The gods had given Jono to him as a weapon after all, and what the gods gave, they could take away.
“See you tonight,” Patrick said as he left the apartment.
The door didn’t close until he rounded the landing below. Patrick went to work with a smile on his face, Jono’s care warming him better than the fae-given heat charms embedded in his leather jacket.
The coffee in the SOA’s New York field office tasted like burned sludge, but Patrick drank it anyway. Fueling his bad mood with shitty coffee was just par for the course some days. He checked the time on his cell phone again, but the numbers still showed that his meeting with Setsuna—which was supposed to start at 0900—was delayed. It was nearing 1000 and she was still ensconced with SAIC Henry Ng on a different floor.