“Is she teething?” Ryu asked.
“Probably not, she’s a bit old for that,” Raja said. “She has all her baby teeth already.”
“Thenwhatdoes she want!?” I cried.
Gabriel paused, then said, “Scar, try holding her.”
“What? Why? Will that help?”
“It might,” he said. “Go on.”
I swallowed hard, afraid of what seemed like the daunting task ahead of me. I’d never held a baby, not even once in my life. The closest I got was holding Angel’s carrier in my mouth. But the thought of being responsible for physically holding a baby? What if I dropped her?
“You won’t hurt her,” Raja insisted, as if reading my thoughts. “C’mon.”
Carefully, I wrapped my hands around her crying form and gently lifted her out of the carrier. My arms trembled with nerves and I was afraid something would happen, like my prosthetic arm suddenly failing. Was it really safe for me to hold her like this?
“Hold her against your chest,” Gabriel instructed.
Angel continued to cry. I had no choice but to listen to Gabriel. Steadily holding her, I pressed Angel carefully to my chest and held her head up.
The crying stopped.
Everyone in the room held their breath.
A few moments passed and Angel continued to be quiet. She gurgled slightly as she pressed her cheek to my collarbone, but other than that she had no complaints.
“She stopped crying,” Ryu said breathlessly. “What does that mean?”
Gabriel smiled. “It means she wanted to be held. She wanted the warmth of a parent.”
Those words filled me with joy like I’d never known before. Angel thought I was her parent.
“Look, I think she’s falling back asleep,” Raja commented.
Indeed, Angel’s eyes drooped back down as she rested comfortably against me. My heart fluttered. She feltsafewith me. The trembling in my arms died down. I held her, gentle and firm. I hadn’t known that holding a baby—mybaby—would feel so good. Now that I was holding her, I never wanted to let her go.
“I think you two are gonna do just fine,” Gabriel said with a grin.
Ryu and I exchanged glances. Warmth pooled in my chest as he smiled at me. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d felt so…happy.It was a strange, foreign sensation, one I thought I’d lost a long time ago. But now, holding Angel and knowing Ryu was right here by my side to help raise her, it felt right.
I never wanted to lose it.
“I just remembered that I have a bunch of books in our library,” Gabriel said suddenly. “Maybe I’ll ask Dante if we have any ones about raising babies? If you’re interested in them, I mean.”
“Yes, of course,” I said quickly. “It’d be a big help.”
“Hm… I don’t have any books, but I can ask Lorenzo if anyone suspicious has been in or out of the Cinderhollow barrier recently,” Raja said. “He’s one of the skilled clear magic users who checks on it once in a while, so he might know if that vanishing scent has something to do with it.”
I nodded at Raja. “Thanks. Raising Angel comes first, but I wouldn’t mind kicking the ass of whoever did this to her.”
His cat-like eyes flashed. “I hear you.”
Ryu’s phone vibrated in his pocket and he flinched. The few hours of sleep he got last night must have made him jumpy. We definitely needed to work out a nap schedule if we were going to raise Angel together, or else the lack of sleep would drive us insane.
His brows furrowed as he stared intently at the screen. He began to type back to whatever message he received. I didn’t know what was so important that he was more focused on that than what we were talking about.
“Ryu, is everything okay?” I asked.
