She looked confused, like she couldn’t believe that was possible. “Thanks,” she muttered, before Nadine dragged her away, Roxy following close behindthem.
The second I thought they were far enough that they wouldn’t hear me, I burst into hot uglytears.
Logan reached out, pulling me into his chest and smooshing me against hisbody.
“She was alone this whole time!” I sobbed. “I should have gone looking for themsooner.”
That freaking book sat in my car for nearly fiveyears!
“Shhh.” He stroked my back. “She’s here now, and that’s all that matters. We’re going to take care ofher.”
I pulled back and wiped my eyes. “How are we going to afford this? Keegan is bringing new hunters today. All of them will require a salary. We’re going to need to buy more shipping containers, or whatever, so Isaac can build morehousing.”
Logan sighed. “I’ll figure itout.”
I furrowed my brow. “No. We’ll figure it out. Tell me what we need.” I still had fifty thousand dollars left over which was supposed to be Griddish’s finalpayment.
My mate stared at me for a moment before speaking, as if sizing up my stress level and what I could handle. “A shitload of money. Keegan is bringing a busload of shifters. Forty at least. And all the skyborn are coming within the next few weeks, leaving jobs, houses, everything. We need to feed everyone, outfit the new shifters with weapons, and build more housing. I can give scalesbut…”
Whoa, that was a lot. I forgot how much my mate did being in charge of everything. Why couldn’t he have bought Apple stock in the ‘90s orsomething?
“Butwhat?”
He shrugged. “They take years to grow back, and losing too many at once can weaken my powers. I’d need ten scales to outfit us for the next year. The ones Keegan took when Gear got hurt have already been used orsold.”
Ten scales at 50K a pop or only a few of mine at 100K apop.
“I’ll help,” I told him, but he shook his headimmediately.
“Your dragon doesn’t have the control to partial shift. A full shift would bring thehunters.”
“My scales fetch double yours! The last thing we need is for you to have weak magic,” Icountered.
He groaned. “Fine, we’ll work out a plan with Keegan to go to a remote place and you can do a quick shift. We take afewscales and then we’re out ofthere.”
I nodded. Just relieved he would let mehelp.
He looked off into the distance at Casey, who was now standing around a circle of her new protectors. “I searched for them for years.” His voice was so … dark. Like it was hard for him to recount hisloneliness.
I nodded. “Thanks to my mom, they were well hidden, even from their ownkind.”
“Isaac said the Earth hides them,” Loganmused.
I nodded. “My mom’s magic came from deep in the core of MotherEarth.”
Logan raised an eyebrow. “LikeLava?”
I shrugged. “Who knows … but he’s trying to get me to light stuff on fire with mymind.”
Logan chuckled, bringing me closer to him, wrapping his arms around my waist. “I’d like to seethat.”
“Not gonna happen anytime soon. So far I can only shoot a concentrated beam from mystaff.”
“Any headaches?” heasked.
I shook my head. “Nope.”
He looked relieved at that. “Well then, I’d say you’re doing just fine. Come on, we’ve got a wild youngling to keep an eye onnow.”
