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Athena frowned and her worry rose even more as she opened her door for Bobby. He had sent her a text shortly before the end of his shift asking if she was home and if he could come by. She had just come home from her own night shift, just in time to bring May and Harry to school, and she hadn’t expected to see Bobby until later in the day when they both would have had a chance to catch a couple of hours of sleep.
“Hey,” Athena said as Bobby practically fell into her arms. He looked devastated and as if he hadn’t found a single minute of sleep during his shift.
Bobby wrapped his arms around her in a tight hug and inhaled and exhaled slowly without saying anything. He clutched his hands against her back, and she felt him tremble.
“Let’s sit down,” Athena ordered softly and after a moment of hesitance, Bobby followed her down the stairs and let her push him down onto the sofa. “Do you want to talk about it?”
Bobby braced his elbows on his knees and buried his face in his hands. “Sometimes the simplest calls can be the most heartbreaking.”
Athena nodded silently and rubbed one hand over Bobby’s back. She knew that kind of call.
“We were called to that accident. An elderly man had been trapped between the gate and his car because the handbrake of the car failed. I think I knew right away we wouldn’t be able to save him. Buck was taking care of the husband while the rest of us freed our victim and tried to save him. Soulmates. They were soulmates.”
“Oh.” Athena sighed, only too aware of how the tale would end.
“The husband knew it was too late before any of us were ready to give up on our patient. He pushed Chimney away to take his mate’s hands, leaned down to kiss him goodbye, and died right there with all of us gathered around them. Buck was … he didn’t want to give up on either of them. I think it’s the first time he has seen soulmates die together in this fashion. He has no idea how it feels to lose their soulmate. It was their bonding day to top the tragedy off. 48 years.”
Athena cupped the back of Bobby’s head and pulled him to her until his head rested on her shoulder. He was shaking and she knew how much this reminder had to hurt. Everyone knew that he had been bonded to Marcy and that the only thing that had kept him alive after her death had been his children. Bobby never talked about Marcy, but Athena knew intimately how painful a broken bond could be even years later, and how difficult it was to move on and not succumb to death themselves. Many never even tried to survive their soulmate’s death.
“They are together now again,” Athena whispered. “Neither of them had to suffer the separation for long.”
“Sometimes I wish I could have just done the same,” Bobby whispered brokenly.
Athene kissed the top of his head. “I know.”
Bobby shook his head. “You can’t—”
“It’s been twenty-eight years since my soulmate was murdered mere weeks before our bonding ceremony should have taken place.”
Bobby froze and then he sat up abruptly, his eyes red and his face wet from his tears. “What?”
Athena took a deep breath. “I don’t talk about Emmett. Some colleagues know because they had already been colleagues of both of us back then. My parents know, of course. I told Michael when we decided to build a family. And that’s it.”
“I…” Bobby closed his eyes and shook his head. “Thank you for telling me. I’m so sorry for your loss.”
Athena took Bobby’s hands and laced their fingers together. “I would have told you eventually. I just … I think I was waiting for the right opportunity where it wouldn’t just be…” She trailed off with a shrug. She hadn’t known how to bring it up. Bobby was probably the only person in her life who could understand the pain of those memories, but that also meant telling him about Emmett would inadvertently remind him of his own pain and loss.
Bobby swallowed. “Yeah.”
“I’m grateful for every person who doesn’t experience this pain,” Athena whispered. “I hope neither Buck nor anyone else on your shift will ever be able to understand.”
“Yeah,” Bobby agreed and cleared his throat. “It hit Hen hard as well. It was the first time she had this kind of call since she and Karen bonded. She has seen it happen before, but it’s different when you know one day you might be in the same position. She took Buck off my hands, at least. I don’t think I would have been able to face his questions. Not today.”
Athena chuckled. “Sometimes he just doesn’t know when to stop asking questions.”
“How did you…” Bobby took a deep breath. “I mean … I can’t imagine that anything but my children could have kept me here in the first few months. Hell, probably the first one or two years.”
Athena nodded slowly. “Emmett interrupted a robbery. I had asked him to get something on the way we didn’t even need so he wouldn’t come home before I had a chance to put away my dress again. I had just shown it to Mom. If I hadn’t…” She closed her eyes and shook her head. “For years I wished I would have never asked him for that errand.”
Now it was Bobby who pulled her against him, rubbing one hand over her back as she leaned against his chest heavily.
Athena blew out a breath. “It’s a cold case. To this day, we don’t even have a single clue who the robber could have been. Wanting to find the guy who took Emmett and our future away from me was the only thing that kept me going for years. Eventually I … people around me kept telling me that Emmett would have wanted me to live and not just exist, and to reach for my dreams even if I had to reach them alone now.”
“And so, you did,” Bobby whispered.
Athena was silent for a while, not sure how to put into words the thought that had led her to propose to Michael the kind of relationship they had had until just over a year ago. People in general didn’t understand it, but for Bobby, it might just be different. “Children had always been part of my plan, long before I ever met Emmett. I found that I … couldn’t stand to pursue any of the dreams I’d shared with him for the future. It would have only been a reminder of how alone I was. Though I have done some of the things we dreamed of in the meantime and … for the most part I have reached a point where it felt … satisfying to do those things and remember him while doing so. We had talked about children, of course, but it wasn’t an idea that had only come after meeting him. It wasn’t an idea I felt belonged to Emmett. It still took me a while longer to agree to this kind of commitment, because … I knew if I had children, I would have to hang on to this life, to fight against my broken bond, for as long as I possibly could.”
Bobby rested his chin on top of her head and hummed. “And so you met Michael?”
“I already knew Michael,” Athena said quietly. “And I knew he wanted to have children. It was … we never had any illusions about what the basis of our relationship was.”
Athena knew people had made all kinds of assumptions about Michael and her during and after their divorce; accusing Michael of lying to her, of cheating; or pitying her for letting herself be led astray. The truth was that she had always known Michael’s preferences, and the only reason she had been hurt during their divorce was that she had believed he would never overcome the nightmare his mother had been and would never want to seek a relationship with a man even after his mother’s death. Athena had fully expected to never fall in love again after Emmett’s death, and she had been happy to have found a life partner even if there was no sexual attraction and no romantic love between them. She hadn’t expected to ever feel romantic love again, and she had been glad to have a partner who would never develop that kind of love for her.
“You were a surprise,” Athena said. “I didn’t think…”
“Falling in love again seemed to be something that should have been impossible,” Bobby agreed softly. “I would like to…” He took a deep breath. “May I tell you about what happened to Marcy?”
Athena swallowed and said with a rough voice, “Yes, of course.”
She knew Bobby had never told anyone here in LA how exactly he had lost his soulmate other than it had been during a fire in their apartment building that he and his children had barely escaped themselves. He also hadn’t ever spoken about the reason for taking his children to LA afterward.
Bobby leaned back and Athena rested her head against his chest, one arm wrapped around his waist.
“I’ve never spoken about this with anyone,” Bobby began in a whisper. “Not the investigators, not my therapist, not even Sam. And he uprooted his whole family when I decided we couldn’t stay in St. Paul.”
Athena hummed quietly. She had only recently met Bobby’s brother-in-law. Marcy had been his younger sister, his only sibling, and Bobby was sharing a duplex with Sam’s family here. Sam and his wife Nathalie took care of Brook and Robbie when Bobby was on shift and were very protective of Bobby’s family. That protectiveness went doubly for their four girls, even the youngest one, Emily, who was a year younger than Harry. The girl glaring at Athena for the whole time she had been there had been hilarious, but Athena had learned very fast that she needed to win the trust of every single one of them and not just of Bobby’s own children. Losing Marcy clearly had bound them together tightly, and Athena was glad Bobby had had that support. She had seen too often how a catastrophe like the one they had suffered could also completely rip apart what was left of a family.
“You don’t need to feel pressured to tell me anything,” Athena said.
Bobby chuckled. “I know. But I feel like I … I feel for the first time, that I want to talk about it.”
Athena nodded silently.
“There wasn’t an alarm when the fire broke out,” Bobby began hesitantly. “It was one of the many failures in the building that I hadn’t taken any notice of. And I will always wonder … it doesn’t much matter that people tell me it wasn’t my fault, you know? I should have noticed those security issues, that’s my job, damn it!”
“You aren’t a fire marshal,” Athena said with raised brows, though she understood his sentiment. People told her it had been bad luck, that Emmett had just been in the wrong place at the wrong time, but it had still been her to send him there. Even now, after she had long moved on as much as she could from losing her soulmate, she still often wondered about the life she could have had if she hadn’t asked him for that useless errand.
Bobby huffed. “Whatever. I had been sleeping on the couch that night because we had fought about my returning to work already. I had taken a fall not too long ago and Marcy said I wasn’t healed enough yet, but I just wanted to go back to work.”
“Was Marcy a doctor?” Athena asked confused.
“No,” Bobby said amused. “She was a healer, though, at least for the kids and me. It was something she had discovered after I had broken my back on the job just after Robbie was born. We had already been bonded for a couple of years and the first time Marcy could come to visit me at the hospital she just … she trailed her hands over my spine, and I felt my bones knitting back together. That was a lot more than the usual boost in healing soulmates can give each other. It never worked for anyone but Brook, Robbie, and me. Not even for Marcy herself. Three weeks after I had broken my back, it was as if the bones had never been damaged.”
“That’s a very handy ability for a mother and soulmate of a firefighter,” Athena said.
“It was,” Bobby agreed. “I think if we hadn’t fought that day, if I had slept in the bedroom with her, we would have all died. But because I was in the living room, I smelled the smoke. I think part of why Marcy wanted me to stay home longer was also that she had twisted her knee the week before, but when we argued about it, I didn’t even think about it. She was wearing a brace during the day, but not while she slept. And when I woke her, we just took the children and left. We didn’t even take our coats. Just the kids and the backpack with all the important documents I insisted we keep ready near the door. Bobby and Brook were both holding onto their boots because we didn’t want to take the time to tie the laces before we weren’t out of the building.”
Athena hummed encouragingly. Bobby still kept such a bag he had mentioned besides the door in his home here, and he had convinced her to do the same. It was hidden, of course, so that no guests would stumble over it, but it would only take a second for her to grab it in an emergency. He had been so convincing about it, and Athena wondered now — though she wouldn’t ever ask about it — how much help it had been afterward.
“Marcy carried Brook in the beginning,” Bobby whispered. He cleared his throat. “But one flight of stairs down, her knee gave out. I took Brook as well, and Marcy told me … to hurry ahead. That she would come down behind us as fast as she could, but that I couldn’t wait for her. I didn’t even argue. I kissed her and turned around, shouting to her that I would come back and carry her the rest of the way as soon as the kids were safe outside. And I don’t know what happened after that, but when they found her, she wasn’t on the staircase anymore. She had left it on the sixth floor for some reason. I felt her die … when I was running down the last flight of stairs.”
Bobby paused and inhaled deeply. “I felt the bond break and … we fell down that last flight of stairs. That’s why Brook broke her arm. Robbie was on my back, and I managed not to topple over, but I was carrying Brook on my front, and I didn’t manage to … I didn’t even try, honestly, to break my fall. I was so shocked about my bond with Marcy being gone. I don’t remember how I got us out. I guess someone else helped us, or maybe the drive to protect my children drove me to go on, but I honestly don’t remember. The next thing I remember is sitting outside in the snow, Brook crying in my arms and Robbie shouting at me that I needed to go back in and save Mom. He didn’t want to believe me when I told him I had already felt her die. It took years before he believed me, honestly. And a lot of therapy.”
Athena closed her eyes and rubbed small circles over Bobby’s chest right beside her head. She didn’t know what to say, and she knew from her own experience that there was nothing one could hear to take the pain away or to even just lessen it. People generally didn’t understand what it meant to lose a soulmate, to share such a strong connection with someone and lose that. It had felt like a gaping hole in her chest, and it had taken years and a lot of dedication to learn to live with that hole, and even longer for it to get smaller. She doubted she would ever feel truly whole again, but at least Emmett’s loss wasn’t all-consuming anymore.
“Sam and Nathalie took us in, and the first two weeks or so I only functioned for Brook and Robbie. If they hadn’t been there … Or worse yet, if I had lost them, too…”
“I think, whatever happened to Marcy that she left the staircase, she was glad to know that you would bring your children to safety,” Athena said softly. “And I know without a doubt that wherever she is now, she is grateful and proud of the way you raise your children, and the family you have built here with her brother.”
Bobby chuckled wetly. “She would have loved LA. She hated the cold winters in Minnesota, but she also never could imagine moving away from her family.”
“What caused the fire?” Athena asked.
“There were several apartments under construction and in one of them, an electrical space heater had been left running when the construction workers left. But the wiring in the wall was faulty, overheated after several hours, and because there wasn’t a single safety measure against fires working in the whole building, half a floor was already ablaze before anyone noticed the fire.” Bobby was silent for a moment and pulled her even closer to him. “The company who owned the building threw money at all survivors and the families of the victims to avoid a lawsuit. I hated that money, but when we decided to move here, it was enough to buy our house and give us a good start despite the ridiculous living costs in LA.”
Athena blew out a breath. “Thank you for telling me.”
Bobby chuckled wetly. “I think … I never wanted to talk about it because no one would understand.”
“I know,” Athena agreed. “Most of the time I’m glad so few remember that I lost my soulmate. I hated how people would look at me, how some still look at me.”
“And how others question the bond I shared with Marcy because I’m still here when she isn’t,” Bobby whispered. “That’s especially true for those who have a soul bond of their own.”
Athena huffed. In parts, she even understood those people because, in the beginning, she had often wondered herself why she was still here, why she was holding on. But being judged in that way by others felt infuriating, and often as if they were invalidating her pain. It would only get worse now because people would judge both of them for moving on. Surviving the death of a soulmate was uncommon but not exactly rare as long as the survivor had something to hold onto. But society tended to believe and to teach in many stories, that those remaining behind with a broken bond should stay alone and that moving on to a new partner was a betrayal of their late soulmate.
***
Bobby turned around and pulled Athena against his chest as soon as she had settled down beside him in their bed. His day had been long and exhausting, but his sleep had been restless and often disturbed, either by nightmares or by his thoughts circling around the events of the day. He had expected to work in the destruction of earthquakes and wildfires when he had moved to LA, but he hadn’t ever expected to work in the middle of the tsunami.
“What time is it?” Bobby murmured sleepily. He had been able to go home long before Athena, but tossing around as he had done so far had made him lose any sense of time.
“Just after eight,” Athena whispered. “I got to see the kids for a moment before Sam took them to school. They were all four worried, and not just about you and me but about everyone from your shift.”
Bobby hummed and pressed his face into her still-wet hair. “How did the rest of the night go after we were sent home?”
“As expected. A lot of chaos and grief, but also joy when people who were separated found each other again. After a day like this, we just have to be thankful for every single person who finds a loved one again they were separated from, right?”
“Yeah,” Bobby agreed.
“Tell me about Buck and Eddie,” Athena said. “I have heard the wildest rumors.”
Bobby sucked in a breath. “Those rumors are probably pretty accurate. We were on a short lunch break after our last call when Eddie suddenly folded into half and called out for Buck and Chris. I never knew what to make of those fairy tales, but I have to think now they’re all true. Their bond formed with miles between them. As far as we know it happened the moment Buck saw the wave and recognized the danger Christopher and he were in. Eddie said he saw the pier. He could talk to Buck the whole time while we were trying to get to them.”
“I heard stories about an off-duty firefighter who walked through all of Santa Monica after the water had received, helping people, directing first responders to those who couldn’t leave on their own by talking to his soulmate in his head,” Athena said.
Bobby huffed. He hadn’t been able have either Eddie or Buck’s back in this situation, and he worried about them both. At least Buck had worked way past the point of total exhaustion.
“Their knack … it’s not just talking to each other with miles separating them. It’s also … Honestly, I have no idea what to call it. Eddie was led to people who were in dire need of help. I was with him for the first couple of hours and he’d just know where to go to find people who needed help as soon as possible. Once the water was gone, it seemed to have been the same for Buck. They just kept following that feeling. I have no idea how many people they saved today. It kept them apart until early into the night.”
“And Chrisopher?” Athena asked.
“When we found the engine they had found shelter on, there was a patient who needed an air evac. Hen got Chris out with helicopter and Karen picked him up. Last I knew, Eddie’s grandmother was at Hen and Karen’s place, too, cooking for everyone.”
Athena laughed. “That sounds like Isabel Diaz.”
“How big are those rumors?” Bobby asked.
“Big enough that it’s the story every big broadcasting service is talking about,” Athena said. “The people want to see heroic stories to cancel out as much of the tragedy as they can. And a lot of people are very willing to talk about the heroes who saved them.”
“Bonding while so far away from each other is the stuff of legends,” Bobby whispered. “I don’t think we can keep that quiet, too many people witnessed Eddie losing his mind when the tsunami hit. I was careful at first about how much we’d reveal to dispatch about Eddie’s knack, but at one point after Eddie went on without me he gave that up so he could direct help in Buck’s direction.”
“There are reports of something like this happening in similar circumstances before,” Athena said. “They aren’t completely unique in the way their bond formed. And also not in their mental connection. But that will probably not lessen the public interest in them. I knew they had grown close since Buck’s injury, but I didn’t know they had become that close.”
“I don’t think they were there already,” Bobby said. “Eddie clearly hadn’t expected a bond with Buck. I cleared it with Chief Alonzo that Eddie won’t need to return to work for a week to sort out everything with Buck. Buck has two more weeks of completing his extra training ahead of him before he is supposed to return to work. I’m not sure yet how that will be handled. I assume we’ll have to face some changes in how they work together, too, but we’ll only be able to figure that out when they are both back.”
“I remember the moment when Emmett and I bonded,” Athena whispered and sighed. “It was such a soft and warm moment. We had been on a date the evening before, but that day we had spent at home, just lazing around. Each of us reading a book, cooking together, then a movie, just something random that was being shown on the TV that day. It was a Thursday, but with our shifts as they were, it was basically our Sunday. The first time we both had a free day at the same time in three weeks.”
Bobby smiled and hummed encouragingly. Before he had fallen in love with Athena, talking about Marcy had always been a burden, always something he had avoided as much as possible. With Athena, it had become easy to talk about Marcy, to remember her, and he was glad that Athena seemed to feel similar about talking about her own soulmate.
“I don’t remember the movie,” Athena said, chuckling. “I don’t even remember the genre. The bond was just suddenly there, and I felt completely wrapped up in Emmett’s love for me. He was also very amused about something that had happened in the movie a moment ago, but mostly I just felt his love and his contentment at that moment. And then of course the surprise and joy when he noticed what had happened.”
“That sounds like a perfect moment to bond,” Bobby said quietly.
“It was,” Athena agreed. “And then Emmett jumped up and vanished in the bedroom, only to come back a moment later to present me with a beautiful ring. I think I said yes before he even got the whole question out. He was a little disgruntled later that the bond took away his chance to ask me to marry him properly.”
Bobby grinned. In most parts of the world, a soul bond equaled marriage for those who weren’t already married when they formed a bond. He could understand that Emmett might have been a little unhappy about the bond happening when he had clearly already planned how to ask Athena to marry him. Bobby had prepared a proposal twice in his life now, and he would have been disgruntled in Emmett’s place as well.
“Marcy and I were already married when we bonded. I was hoping for a bond, of course. I was sure that we could achieve one, that our love and trust and devotion for each other would be more than enough to create a soul bond. Marcy used to laugh about it when I mentioned it. Her parents were the kind of people who don’t believe in soul bonds, and they had taught that to their children. And then both Sam and Marcy found partners they bonded with. So, for Marcy, it was a complete surprise when we bonded, and for me, it was a … recognition of what I had known all along.”
“She can’t have been opposed to a bond then,” Athena said.
“No,” Bobby agreed. “It was a romantic fairy tale for her. Her parents despised me, though, for dragging their daughter into my delusions, as they called it.”
Bobby bit his lip with a frown. The chasm between Marcy and her parents after they had bonded had been the only thing he had ever regretted about their soul bond. Before that, Marcy had had a good relationship with her parents and had managed that by avoiding any topic with them she had grown up to look at differently than them. Avoiding mentions of the soul bond had been difficult and often impossible, at one side because it changed people to be bonded in a way that could seldom be missed, and on the other side because her parents had kept poking at it, belittling them and their bond at every chance they got.
“We bonded when we learned Marcy was pregnant with Robbie. Not at the doctor’s, but earlier, when we saw the result of the test she took at home.” Bobby smiled over that memory, remembering the joy about the news of the pregnancy and then being overwhelmed by sharing that joy with Marcy. “We were a mess for the rest of the day because we didn’t know what to concentrate on first and we were just circling around and around by being overwhelmed by both.”
“Does Robbie know that story?” Athena asked softly.
“Of course. Sam and Nathalie are telling that story every time on his birthday. They were the first we contacted, so they witnessed the full depth of our headless and confused joy. They told the story in great detail during our bonding ceremony a year later. And they always credit us for bonding themselves. Because Sam had had a much harder time letting go of what their parents had taught him. He likes to say seeing Marcy so happy and giddy about our bond made him wish for a bond as well. Nathalie and Sam bonded just three months after us.”
“Their parents had to hate you,” Athena said chuckling.
“Oh, they did. They do,” Bobby agreed. “They were one reason why we left St. Paul. They tried to tell everyone who would stop and listen that I had killed Marcy. That I had been responsible for the fire, that I was an addict, and a danger to my children. Our whole family has a restraining order against them, and they aren’t allowed to see either Robbie and Brook or Sam’s children.”
Athena took a deep breath. “Brook told me her grandparents are dead.”
“She tells that everybody who asks, yes,” Bobby said. “Because that way she doesn’t need to explain anything. She hates it when people ask about it, and in a way, they are dead to her and Robbie both. They had just lost their mother, and they had more or less witnessed their mother’s death, and all their grandparents did was make the situation worse for them. They will have the choice to reach out to their grandparents when they are eighteen, but I don’t think they’ll do it.”
“Is their accusation about you being an addict the reason you aren’t touching any alcohol?” Athena asked softly.
Bobby shuddered. “No. I had … a very near brush with alcohol addiction after I broke my back. Marcy could heal me for the most part, but there were still things … that I needed to work on for a long time in physical therapy. I started to drink more than I should have at that time. Marcy, Sam, and Nathalie managed to make me stop before I developed an addiction. Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if I hadn’t shared a bond with Marcy, you know? She felt that something was wrong with me, there was no hiding from her. And she knew exactly how much to push because she could feel all the reactions I tried to keep from my face.”
Bobby closed his eyes and fell silent for a while. He could have tried to hide his emotions from Marcy, there had been moments during his job when he had needed to shut off their connection with each other as much as he could, both to not be a burden to Marcy and to not be distracted by her. The confrontation with Marcy, Sam, and Nathalie had been difficult and painful, but he hadn’t contemplated retreating from Marcy in that way until much, much later when he had wondered how it could have gone differently.
“I could stop from one day to the next,” he continued eventually. “But I know their intervention came practically in the last moment. So, I don’t touch alcohol and am careful with the drugs I get prescribed when I’m injured or sick. If I were an addict, I wouldn’t even cook with alcohol. It took several years before I trusted myself with even that again. And with the way how tempted I was after Marcy died, I know it’s not a misstep I can ever allow myself to make. I know without a doubt, if we hadn’t bonded and I had lost the children together with her, I would have sought out my death in alcohol. There were times … some very, very dark moments when I couldn’t deal with the kids’ grief on top of my own, where I came close to giving up, where I wished to just let the bond take me.”
Athena was quiet for a long time, and Bobby tensed a little more with every second she didn’t say anything. He was just about to roll away when she grabbed the front of his sleep shirt and leaned back just enough to look at him.
“Thank you for telling me,” she said softly. “If you ever feel tempted again, let me know, and we will make sure there is no alcohol in the house for the time being.”
Bobby nodded with a strained smile. “Thank you.”
“You said Marcy could heal you and the kids,” Athena said. “Did you gain any knacks through the bond yourself?”
“The cooking,” Bobby said hesitantly. He was quite happy with the fact that most people that knew him here in LA just assumed it was something he was passionate about it. It wasn’t a completely wrong assumption, and he tried to support that belief wherever he could so no one would question it further. “And the knowledge of … what people need for a meal at any given moment, either emotionally or for a nutritional value.”
Athena raised her brows in surprise. “Really? So, when you make some special breakfast for the kids because one of them has something big going on in school, that’s more than just knowing them really well?”
Bobby grinned. “I have made you special breakfast or dinner in the past for the very same reason as well. I can’t really explain where it comes from. I hug you, or see you come home and know what to cook to make you feel better.”
“Is that limited to family?” Athena asked. “Like Marcy’s healing was?”
Bobby shook his head. “No. I need to concentrate more with strangers, and sometimes need a moment of skin contact, but I can do it for everyone. It’s a lot easier, though, with family, or even with the people on my shift.”
Athena hummed and raised her brows, grinning. “Who are also in some way your family, aren’t they?”
“I guess.” Bobby shrugged uncomfortably.
Athena sighed and leaned against his chest again. “Sometimes I wonder if Emmett and I would have discovered anything like that if we’d had more time. And what it could’ve been.”
“I didn’t even notice the cooking thing in the beginning,” Bobby admitted. “Not until Marcy had healed my back. I just had never cared much about gaining a knack through the bond or not. I was happy to have that connection to Marcy and that was all I needed.”
“I often wonder if people who covet that part of the bond never gain it for that very reason,” Athena said. “I mean, there are studies proving that someone who is adamantly opposed to a bond will never form one, never be forced into one. I think in this case it might just be the other way around, that the soulmate magic doesn’t give someone a bond who doesn’t want one, but it also doesn’t give those people a knack who only wanted a bond for some extra abilities.”
“I have always seen soulmates and the bonds as a gift of God,” Bobby said quietly, startled by Athena mentioning magic at all.
Athena nodded. “It’s a gift given to us by God, I agree. But I believe the logistics are handled by another force, and magic is the best word I have found for it. And often, it gives us what we need exactly at the moment when we need it. Like it did for Buck and Eddie today. It gave Eddie a way to know, to be sure, that his son and his soulmate were safe throughout the whole day. And the stories we know about the kind of ability Eddie and Buck share now are all similar, aren’t they?”
Bobby hummed thoughtfully.
“Buck and Eddie won’t have an easy time,” Athena said. “I doubt anyone will accept their privacy. What they both did today had too much of an impact on the people around here. I don’t know how often I heard about the guy on the firetruck repeatedly going back into the water to pull others out. No one knew his name yet last I heard, but it won’t take long before they’ll connect him to the same guy who walked through Santa Monica to help others until he was too exhausted to take one more step. And for the record, I want to ground Buck for the firetruck and the walking around instead of getting help himself.”
Bobby laughed. “If Eddie doesn’t succeed with that, Isabel Diaz will. That woman is fierce.”
Athena huffed.
“I would have wished them to have a much quieter moment to bond, and also a moment to themselves. I can’t even imagine having to share that moment with anyone else but Marcy,” Bobby said. “It was such a special moment, a … a magical moment.” He chuckled quietly. “Maybe you are right about it being magic.”
Athena nodded. “I can’t imagine it either.”
“Buck already has a huge public profile because of the ladder truck,” Bobby said grimly. “This will only increase it, and I don’t think … I fear the department might want to use this publicity.”
“Then we’ll make sure they’ll have a save place with us to hide when the publicity becomes too much,” Athena said. “There is no way to control how much attention their circumstances will get.”
***
Athena helped Bobby down the four steps to their living room and steadied him when he very carefully sat down on the couch. By some miracle, the projectile had missed all of his internal organs and had been slowed down enough by his turnout coat that there was only damage to the muscles in his abdomen, but it would still make his life very difficult for a little while.
“I still can’t believe you walked into a burning building,” Bobby muttered. He leaned back and closed his eyes, pressing a hand over the gunshot wound.
Athena rolled her eyes. She had lost count of how often Bobby had repeated that very same sentence, and she didn’t believe she needed to repeat her answer anymore. “I’ll make you something small to eat so that you can take the pain medication they prescribed you.”
“It’s not that bad.”
Athena eyed him with raised brows. “Tell that someone who doesn’t know how it feels to be shot.”
“You went by Buck and Eddie’s room before you went to get me, right?” Bobby asked. “How are they?”
“Didn’t you spend half your day yesterday with them?” Athena asked loudly as she went to the kitchen to put together a light sandwich and get a glass of juice. “I would think you know much more about how they are than anyone else.”
“I don’t believe they were honest with me,” Bobby said tiredly. “I believe they would be much more open and honest with you than with me.”
Athena laughed. “Probably. They are good. I don’t think you need to worry about them. Eddie is healing fast, and I think it’s good for Buck that he didn’t need to leave his side other than to take care of Christopher.” She knew that Buck had at first tried to argue to keep working, though much less than anyone was used from him. He had been relieved to stay with Eddie, she had seen that today, and probably only insisted he should work at first because he felt obligated to do that. “Eddie is looking forward to going home the day after tomorrow.”
“Maybe I’ll be fit enough tomorrow to cook them something,” Bobby said. “So that they won’t need to bother with anything when they come home.”
Athena scoffed. “You will rest and let for once everyone else cook for you. Isabel will be taking care of Eddie and Buck. As far as I know, she has already taken over the guest room, though they don’t know that yet.”
Bobby grinned when Athena came around the fireplace and put the plate and the glass on the table in front of him. “Everyone needs a grandmother like Isabel Diaz.”
“I’m sure if we ask, she’ll send some meals over to us,” Athena said.
Bobby’s grin got even wider. “Maybe a good idea. I’m not sure I trust anyone in this house not to burn my kitchen down!”
“We survived just fine on my cooking before you came along!”
“Speaking of everyone else in the house, where are the kids?”
Athena sat down beside Bobby with a soft smile. “They are staying with Sam for tonight, to give you time to settle. Even May has joined everyone in their slumber party. She’ll bring Harry and Brook over just after breakfast, and Robbie will come home after his training in the afternoon.”
Bobby nodded. “I told him he shouldn’t miss it just because I got hurt on the job. He can’t slack off if he wants to keep that scholarship.”
“One missed training session wouldn’t do that,” Athena said scoffing. “They have all four been very worried about you. They were sad they couldn’t properly hug you when I brought them to visit you yesterday.”
“I felt the same,” Bobby said. He glared at the sandwich for a moment before he sighed and took the plate. “I’m really glad how they knitted together as a family, as siblings. When I asked you to marry me, that was my greatest worry. More so even than the logistics of moving in together with four children in the tow.”
Athena nodded, laughing. She turned so she could watch Bobby and leaned against the backrest, one arm propped up on it. “I didn’t even know Michael had prepared to eventually add another floor to this house. Having to find or build a new house would have been a nightmare.”
Bobby laughed and made a face, pressing his free hand against his abdomen. “I’m not surprised he didn’t tell you he planned to eventually invite either his or your parents to live here when they got too old to maintain their own houses. I’m not sure why he thought it would be a good idea for anyone involved. But it did come in handy.”
Athena shrugged and rolled her eyes. They had invited Bobby’s whole family and Michael to a barbeque here for an impromptu family party three days after Bobby had proposed on Christmas day after the children had gone to bed. Harry had frowned, crossed his arms over his chest, and declared that he didn’t mind sharing his room with Robbie for a night or two, but he wouldn’t do it forever. Before Athena had been able to digest that reaction Michael had already explained that no room sharing would be necessary and that they would just put a second floor on the house.
It had been a good solution, and thanks to Michael’s contacts, Harry, May, and Athena had just needed to move in with Bobby and his family for a summer before the remodeling of their house had been done. That didn’t mean she wasn’t still salty that Michael had prepared their house for a second floor without ever asking her about it. All four of their kids had opted to move into the new upper floor which had freed up May and Harry’s old rooms as guest rooms. Those were very frequently used either by Sam’s children or other friends the children invited.
It was lovely to have so much life in the house, and Athena already felt wistful that Robbie would leave for college in autumn, even though he would only move to a dorm on the other side of town. May had already left to live in her own apartment months ago, and Athena didn’t look forward to letting another child go. Suddenly Athena understood very well her parents’ reluctance when she had moved from Florida to California, and especially when she had settled here instead of returning to her hometown. Athena wasn’t looking forward to the time when Brook and Harry would leave as well, though they had at least a couple of years left with them.
“I’m not happy that Sam stole our children for the night,” Bobby muttered around a bite of his sandwich. “They wouldn’t have bothered me, they are too careful about that. And I would be really glad to have them around me.”
“I’m glad to have you for myself for today,” Athena admitted. She carded the fingers of one hand through Bobby’s hair, yearning for any kind of contact between them after the events a couple of days ago. “I could have lost you. And I’m glad our children aren’t aware enough of the situation, don’t know enough about the situation, to know how close we came to losing you. The people in command had already decided that it was too dangerous to let anyone come after you. Between the fire and the sniper, they thought sending anyone inside was nothing else but a pointless sacrifice.”
Bobby was silent while he ate. Despite the gratitude he had voiced more than once while he had been in the hospital, he had also agreed with Athena’s superiors and his own that it had been foolish on her part to go into the burning building. Athena knew that, and secretly she even agreed, but she could never have made another decision.
Bobby leaned back slowly after finishing his sandwich and taking his pills. He pressed his head slightly against Athena’s hand. “When I asked in the hospital you didn’t tell me how you got into the building and where you got the turnout gear from.”
Athena chuckled quietly. “It took some arguing to convince Hen and Ravi to help me. They got the extra turnout gear for me from your truck and helped me sneak up onto the roof. Hen distracted everyone so that they wouldn’t notice Ravi and me climbing up the ladder.”
These few minutes while arguing with Hen had been the only moment during the days after Eddie had been the first victim of the sniper where Athena had wished Buck was working instead of staying at his soulmate’s side. With Buck she wouldn’t have needed to argue her case and losing time over it. With Buck, she would have probably not even needed to say anything. Even Buck had recognized that when she had visited him and Eddie and had laughingly complained that she had waited to rival his recklessness until he wasn’t there to help her with it. He had also noted that she had lost all rights to ever again lecture him about the things he did to protect the people he loved. She hadn’t agreed with that part, but she expected him to remind her of it the next time he did something to be lectured about.
“Ravi helped me to get inside, and I ordered him not to follow me,” Athena said.
Bobby huffed. “You are talking about Buck’s Probi. Who he practically adopted in the middle of a tsunami. I’m surprised you thought he would comply with such an order.”
Athena shrugged and grinned. “He thankfully waited long enough that I could take out the sniper before following me. That was really all the time I needed. I wouldn’t have wanted anyone else to be shot because I pulled them into that kind of danger. And I’m glad he followed. I’m not sure how I could have gotten you out of there on my own.”
Bobby had barely been able to walk alone, and Athena had been glad that Ravi had been there to support him. Between the turnout gear and the air tank on her back and the heat all around them, Athena had barely been able to get herself out of the burning building. Without Ravi, they would have needed to wait for backup to arrive after she had called in the sniper’s death, and she didn’t know if they would have had that much time.
“If Buck had been there, he wouldn’t have let you go in alone at all,” Bobby said. “And Ravi will know to not let that happen again either. You aren’t trained to walk through a burning building.”
“I’m glad that Chimney made sure that Ravi won’t get into any trouble because he helped me,” Athena admitted.
Chimney had been acting Captain of the 118 with Bobby trapped and out of communication, and he had argued with the police and the incident commander about getting Bobby help while Athena had sneaked into the building. She had very deliberately decided against asking him for help or even just notifying him of what she was doing through Hen as soon as Ravi and she had been on the roof, but Chimney had still not hesitated for a second to take on the responsibility for what Ravi and Hen had done. There wouldn’t be much of a fallout for the situation because of the overall circumstances, thankfully.
“Our shift won’t ever leave anyone behind.” Bobby closed his eyes and reached blindly for Athena’s free hand. She laced their fingers together as he raised their hands to press a kiss against her knuckles. “I’m so grateful you came for me. I wouldn’t ever want to leave you and the kids behind, but I didn’t see any way to get out of there on my own.”
“I’ll always come to get you,” Athena promised, much the same as Bobby had done months ago when Athena had been trapped in the mudslide.
Bobby laughed. “Maybe we should have that engraved on our wedding bands.”
“We should,” Athena readily agreed.
She pulled Bobby’s head down a little and leaned up to kiss him. She felt content and happy in a way that sometimes still surprised her. Athena had learned to not feel guilty about it anymore, though. Sometime over the last year, she had come to believe that Marcy and Emmett both would be happy for them and that, if there really was something like an afterlife, they would fit together as a family with them just as easily as their family in this life had fit together.
Something warm spread through Athena’s chest and she tightened her fingers in Bobby’s hair as they both pulled back at the same time, just enough to stare at each other wide-eyed. She remembered this sensation, she was sure no one who had ever had the privilege to feel it could forget it. Her own surprise and wonder were mixing with Bobby’s, and then she felt her own joy wrapping around Bobby’s pain.
“How…” Bobby blinked and shook his head slightly.
Athena smiled softly and shrugged, she didn’t have any idea what was going on, or how it was possible. She understood Bobby’s pain, and she felt her own heart constrict slightly as she thought of Emmett and the last time she had felt this kind of connection to another person. The hole in her heart she had carried with her ever since Emmett’s death was still there, still as big — or small compared to how it had felt in the beginning — as moments before, but the bond to Bobby nestled right beside it.
“I love you,” Athena just said eventually.
Bobby chuckled wetly. “I love you, too. In a way that I hadn’t felt possible ever again. And I … I felt guilty about it for a long time, felt as if I wasn’t holding onto Marcy’s memory in the way I should. But when you came for me in the fire the other day, I just knew that … Marcy would be glad I found someone who would always have my back, who would never hesitate to come for me, to protect and support me. She wouldn’t resent me for moving on, and she wouldn’t resent you for being part of my life now.”
Athena nodded. “I have thought the same about Emmett for a while now.”
Bobby swallowed and leaned his forehead against hers despite the pain that movement caused in his abdomen. Athena felt the echo of that pain and pushed him back so that he was leaning against the backrest again without putting any strain on his wound.
“I would have never thought … People say a second bond is impossible,” Bobby whispered. “This is … I would have wished for a bond with you if I had thought it possible, but I made myself not think about it because I was convinced that it just couldn’t happen.”
“I don’t care how or why this is possible,” Athena whispered. “All I care about is that the bond is there now. I sometimes thought about it, dreamed about it, what it would be like to share the same kind of connection with you that I once shared with Emmett. I wanted it. I … at the same time also didn’t want it.”
Athena frowned and bit her lip, turning her head to the side. Sharing a bond with Bobby was precious, and already she didn’t remember anymore how they had coped when she hadn’t been able to feel him inside her. It felt as if the connection had always been there. It was so easy to decipher Bobby’s emotions mixing with her own, much easier than it had been with Emmett in the beginning.
Bobby pulled her against him, wrapping one arm around her shoulder, and pressed a kiss at the top of her head. “I’m sorry for the mess I am.”
Athena chuckled and shook her head. “Don’t be.”
Concerning their soulmates — their first soulmates, and how strange it was to have to be that specific about it now — they were at very different points on their journey to grief them, and not only because it had been many more years for Athena since losing her soulmate than it had been for Bobby.
Athena had gotten the chance to finally find the answer that had initially helped her to resist the pull of the bond and to stay in this life. She had found closure with Emmett’s murderer finally being found that she hadn’t even known anymore she needed. None of the answers she had gotten had been in any way satisfying, but she at least had those answers now. She didn’t need to wonder anymore, and she knew Emmett’s murderer would get punished.
Bobby, on the other hand, would probably never learn what exactly had happened to Marcy, why she had left the staircase at all instead of continuing her way down. He would never know if she could have escaped the fire as well if she had stayed on the staircase, if they had thought about the brace for her knee before leaving their apartment.
Athena closed her eyes and pushed her love and acceptance in Bobby’s direction through their bond.
“I still feel the broken bond to Marcy,” Bobby whispered.
“Yes.” Athena sighed. “It is the same for me. It’s not a replacement for what we had before, it’s an addition. And I wouldn’t want to have it any other way. Would you?”
“I don’t think I’ll ever be able to let go of Marcy completely.”
“And I’m not asking that of you. I wouldn’t be able to do that with Emmett either.” Athene wet her lip and stared at the fireplace without seeing anything. “I think we should keep this to ourselves. There aren’t any regulations for either of us that we have to disclose a soulmate, and…”
“Yeah,” Bobby agreed without hesitance, tightening his arm around her shoulders. “I wouldn’t want anyone to poke at us.”
“I don’t want to share it with anyone,” Athena said. “I wouldn’t care what anyone had to say, it would just be a repetition of everything we already heard when we married, and I didn’t care for that then either. But I … this is ours, Bobby.”
Bobby was silent for a long time, and she could feel his agreement battling with doubt. Athena remembered what he had told her about how Marcy had used their bond once during her intervention about his drinking, and she could see clearly now how that would have worked. There hadn’t been any big arguments between her and Emmett in the mere eleven months they had shared a bond, and as far as she remembered Emmett’s emotions had never been this clear to her. She wondered for a moment if that was something unique to Bobby, or if it originated in knowing Bobby a lot better than she had known Emmett. They had both been so young back then, inexperienced in life, and the time she had known Bobby had already far exceeded the time she’d ever had with Emmett.
“We might need to tell some people at one point,” Bobby said after a while. “Our doctors, of course. And our family.”
Athena shook her head.
“I don’t see myself surviving again if I lose you,” Bobby said.
Athena sat up abruptly, cold shock overwhelming her. “What?”
“I went through that pain once and held on for my children,” Bobby said quietly. “They were so young, and they barely understood what had happened at all because they were too wrapped up in their grief and yearning for their mother. And I know that Harry and Brook have still a lot of growing up to do and that even Robbie and May are much too young to lose either of us, but I know them to be well cared for now between Sam, Nathalie, and Michael.”
Athena stared at Bobby while his words sank in.
“We have both dangerous jobs,” Bobby continued. “We can be careful as much as we want, but there will never be a guarantee … we will always live with the risk that one of us doesn’t come home. Our children have lived with that threat on the horizon for all of their lives, and I think they are very capable of coping with that situation. They deserve to know that … if one of us doesn’t come home, the other might not come home either.”
Athena sucked in a breath, overtaken by the grief and guilt Bobby felt over his words. She knew exactly where he was coming from, though she wouldn’t have thought about this possibility for a long time if he hadn’t brought it up. She thought of their children and what it would do to them to lose them both, but even with that, she couldn’t disagree with Bobby. Alone thinking about losing Bobby, about feeling that same pain again she had felt so many years ago with Emmett, took her breath away.
“You are right,” Athena whispered. “But I still want to … Or maybe especially because of that I want to keep it to ourselves for a while. To enjoy our bond as something that is ours alone.”
Bobby smiled sadly. “Yeah, okay.”
***
Bobby watched Athena from his place on the couch. Harry and Brook were tightly tugged against his sides, each of them resting their heads on one of his shoulders and their arms wrapped tightly around him. They were both shocked about what had happened over the last couple of hours and Bobby was happy to provide them with all the comfort they needed. Athena stood at the door to the patio, keeping hold of Robbie who had crossed his arms over his chest and had his chin raised defensively without looking at anyone.
Athena’s colleagues were still busy talking with several of the guests Michael and David had invited over without Athena’s knowledge. Bobby had agreed to their plan when Michael had called him, but he had been under the impression Athena had already known about it as well. He wasn’t impressed with Michael’s continued tendency to make decisions that impacted Athena without talking to her, but talking with him about that would need to be put aside for at least a couple of days.
Bobby’s inside had been frozen with fear after Athena had called him about Hudson and her suspicion that he might be on his way to their home or might even have already been there. He had felt Athena’s desperation and fear, and as much as he wanted to reassure her, he hadn’t been able to push his own fear away. All the way over from the station to their house he had prayed that their children would be safe, only to arrive and find Hudson tied up at his hands and feet with zip ties, cursing out Robbie who stood beside him with a grim face and Harry’s baseball bet in his hands.
Athena and Captain Maynard had arrived just seconds after Bobby and the appearance of the police had brought some kind of order into the chaos that reigned among the gathered neighbors. None of them had known what had made Robbie attack Hudson, and apparently, Robbie hadn’t been very forthcoming with information other than they needed to call the police.
“He wanted to kidnap me,” Harry whispered, and it was the first time he had spoken since Bobby had pulled Brook and him to the couch. “He told me he would hurt Dad and Brook and Mom if I didn’t come with him. And then Robbie was suddenly there and hit him over the head. I helped him to tie up the man’s hands and feet because everyone else was just staring at us, even Dad in the beginning.”
“It would have been pretty startling for everyone,” Bobby said. “No one would have known Hudson had threatened you, would they? I’m glad Robbie overheard him.”
Harry shook his head. “He didn’t. Robbie said he recognized him as the man Mom should have testified against when the blackout started. And that it couldn’t be right that he wasn’t in jail, so we needed to call the police.”
Bobby rubbed his hand over Harry’s back and kept watching his wife and their older son. He could feel Athena’s fury and took as much of it in as he could to keep her calm. Bobby wasn’t any less angry about Hudson invading their home, but all he felt about the situation they had found when they had arrived here was pride over his son’s vigilance and actions to protect their family.
“Robbie told me to get my phone and call 9-1-1 when he came out of Harry’s room with the bat,” Brook whispered. “I didn’t do it because I didn’t know what was going on or what I should have even told them.”
Bobby chuckled softly. “In the end, that didn’t much matter, right? Athena and I were already on our way when Robbie recognized Hudson. I’m glad he recognized him.”
“I would have gone with him,” Harry confessed quietly. “So that he wouldn’t hurt anyone. I had already agreed when Robbie…”
Bobby took a deep breath and decided that Athena and he would need to talk about this with Harry together when all of them had calmed down a little from this night. He stayed where he was with Brook and Harry and was glad when Maynard came to him at one point to tell him she had spoken with Chief Alonzo and arranged a couple of hours off for Bobby. He would need to return to the station in the morning for the rest of the blackout, but he had a couple of hours to take care of his family.
It took two hours before all the neighbors had been sent home, everyone had given a statement to the officers, and their family was finally left to themselves. At one point during that time, Sam and Nathalie had arrived with their children in tow. Nathalie and David had taken over the kitchen and prepared a midnight snack for them all while Sam was corralling the children around the table in front of the couch. Michael had left because May had requested a couple of hours off as well and he was getting her from the dispatch center. Athena had at some point pushed Robbie into the armchair, and was sitting on the armrest, one arm wrapped around his shoulders and talking quietly to him.
“What a day,” Sam said as he sat down once the various snacks were placed on the table and Michael had returned with May.
“I’m sorry,” Michael said into the silence that followed. “I thought I still knew all the neighbors around here and that it would be good for the neighborhood to band together in a time like this. I should have put a stop to it when I recognized how many people I didn’t know.”
“I’m sorry as well,” Athena said, and raised her hand to grab May’s hand when she grabbed her mother’s shoulder standing behind the armchair where Athena and Robbie sat. “I should have warned you as soon as I learned Hudson had escaped earlier today.”
“I don’t think anyone but Hudson is at fault for what happened here today,” Bobby said. “And in the end, thanks to Robbie, everything turned out just fine. That’s what we need to concentrate on. And I very much appreciate that all of you came over as soon as you heard that something had happened.”
“I guess now is as good a time as any to announce that Nathalie and I have been discussing for a while to move into the neighborhood,” Sam said grinning. “We really miss sharing the house with you, and evidently you need some minders who don’t live half an hour away.”
“Yes!” all children shouted, including May and Robbie despite May living in her own apartment and Robbie living in a dorm on campus most of the time.
Bobby smiled. “That sounds like a wonderful idea. It wouldn’t have necessarily changed anything today, but having you live around the corner will make family gatherings a lot easier.”
“The Monteros three houses over are planning to move up to San Francisco in a couple of months,” Michael said. “They haven’t put their house on the market yet, but they asked me about advice and contacts when they were here earlier. The house is big enough for four children and two adults, and from what they said earlier it’s also in good condition. They asked me to come over whenever I have time to continue the discussion before they left.”
Sam laughed startled. “I wouldn’t have thought it would be that easy.”
Michael grinned. “You just need to have the right connections.”
“You mean you established your own little private and unofficial business of putting people in contact with your colleagues in this neighborhood,” Athena muttered and rolled her eyes.
Michael shrugged. “So? Our neighbors get help with their houses and can be sure the people they are asking for help are trustworthy. And I can help along my business contacts, which makes them more likely to come back to work with me again. Everyone wins, and no one is scammed either by people who won’t pay their bills or by people who do shoddy work on their houses.”
“I’m happy to use your contacts,” Sam said. “We looked into houses listings and estate agents, and all of it seemed to be very confusing. I don’t know what changed since we moved to LA, or why it changed, but it was a lot easier to find a trustworthy estate agency in 2015 than it seems to be now.”
Nathalie huffed. “It wasn’t. We just were in a hurry, didn’t really know what part of LA would be a good fit for us, and had incredible luck not to end up in some dead-end part of town.”
Michael laughed. “That sounds like a story the three of you need to tell us more about at one point!”
“Moving halfway through the country sucked,” Robbie muttered. “Please wait with this discussion until I’m not here anymore! If I ever hear about that move again it will be too soon!”
“I thought it was the best adventure our family ever went on!” Emily, Sam and Nathalie’s youngest, chimed in with a wide grin.
Athena chuckled. “Then you will need to tell me all about why it was such a great adventure sometime. But maybe not while Robbie is here. He is the one who saved the day today, so we should adhere to his wishes.”
Emily made a face but nodded with a deep sigh. “Okay.”
“What I would like to know,” David said, his gaze drifting from Athena to Bobby, “is what’s going with Bobby and Athena. Because the two of you have been behaving very strangely tonight.”
Bobby raised his brows. “Strange how?”
“The two of you have been strangely aware of each other even when there wasn’t a direct line of sight between you,” David said. “It’s not the first time I noticed this, but it’s been the most obvious tonight.”
Bobby swallowed and looked at Athena. It had only been four months since they had bonded, and he knew their behavior had changed during that time, it was just par for the course for a bonded pair. The awareness the bond gave them of each other was overwhelming and all-consuming, and Bobby found it even harder to ignore his bond with Athena even temporarily than it had been with Marcy. He was not surprised that they had run out of time to hide their bond from their family.
In the beginning, Bobby had been more shocked than anything else, and he was glad that with the way soul bonds worked Athena hadn’t needed to fear he didn’t want the bond despite the shock. For weeks Bobby hadn’t known what to think about it, had felt guilty for enjoying the emotional connection it created between them. Athena had thankfully borne all of his doubts with patience and love and had supported him through a new bout of grief for Marcy that he hadn’t expected was still in him.
Despite all those struggles, Bobby had always know that they couldn’t keep their bond a secret and had really never wanted to do that. He understood Athena’s hesitance, though, and he full-heartedly agreed that only their close family and closest friends would ever learn about it and be sworn to secrecy.
Athena sighed and shrugged, pulling at their bond when Bobby pushed love and reassurance to her.
“See, that’s what I’m talking about!” David said and pointed at them both in turn.
Brook huffed. “They’ve been doing this for months. Can’t keep any secrets around here anymore. If one of them knows, the other knows as well, even if I’m sure they haven’t had a chance to talk to each other in the meantime!”
“Trying to sneak your boyfriend in when Mom told you she wanted to meet him first might not have been your best idea, to begin with, big sis,” Harry snickered.
“What boyfriend?” Robbie asked, leaning forward with a frown that hovered somewhere between disapproval and worry.
“Do not try to distract us on behalf of your parents!” Sam said amused. “You can interrogate Brook later. I didn’t notice anything between Athena and Bobby, which is only one reason more to move into the neighborhood and spent more time with you.”
Bobby rolled his eyes. “That’s debatable.” He felt Athena’s joy teasing him and frowned in her direction.
“And again,” David said, his lips pursed in thought. “You are behaving like … Wait, no. That’s not … Did you bond and not tell anyone?”
Bobby’s surprise was doubled by Athena’s as they both stared at David open-mouthed. Bobby hadn’t expected anyone to guess that.
“That’s not possible,” Robbie said skeptically. “Dad was bonded to Mom.”
“And Athena to Emmett,” Michael whispered. He was holding David’s hand tightly and didn’t seem to doubt his boyfriend as much as everyone else.
“We did some research,” Athena said with a deep sigh. “It’s very rare, but it is possible to bond again after losing your soulmate and surviving it. People who do so very rarely talk about it, though. What we found were mostly diaries and letters made public by family members after the pair who was able to create a second soul bond died. And most people doubt those sources and claim they are phony.”
“So, David is right?” Nathalie asked quietly.
Bobby nodded, wondering about how eerily quiet everyone was. Usually, neither part of this family expressed any kind of emotions quietly. He could only hope that it was a good sign that neither Harry nor Brook had pulled away from him and that Robbie had leaned back again, pressing his shoulder against Athena, with May still firmly standing behind them.
“We bonded the day I came home from the hospital earlier in the year. You can probably imagine how shocked we were ourselves.”
“I’m happy for you,” May said softly, smiling and her chin raised in a way that was a startling mirror of Robbie’s defiant stance earlier while the mess with Hudson was sorted out. She held onto Athena’s shoulders with both hands now. “I’m happy that you found each other, and that you found this kind of love a second time in life.”
“I agree with May,” Sam said hurriedly, and then everyone else chinned in with similar sentiment.
Bobby looked at Athena and smiled reassuringly as their gazes met and he felt her being overwhelmed with relief. He knew there would be others outside their close family — like her parents — who wouldn’t approve, who would probably not even believe them should they ever have to tell them, but he had never doubted the people they had gathered around them at this moment. They had grown into this family through a lot of hardship, and today had proven how tightly they would stand together even before their bond had been brought up.
“Would you have ever told us?” Michael asked quietly.
“Eventually,” Bobby said when Athena only sighed. “We won’t tell many people, though. And we needed some time to get used to it ourselves. I still wake up sometimes in the middle of the night and can’t believe it.”
“I mean, that part is not exactly unique to any bond,” Nathalie laughed. “That’s still happening to me once or twice a year!”
Bobby smiled and nodded at her. “And it isn’t…” He paused and took one hand of Harry and Brook each to squeeze them. “It’s not a replacement of the bonds Athena and I shared with Emmett and Marcy. The remnants of those bonds are still there. And sometimes it’s as if I can feel that other bond Athena had. I think that feeling’s gotten stronger over the last weeks, even. It’s an addition to what we once had, and it is incorporating what we once had.”
“So, you won’t forget Mommy,” Brook whispered.
Bobby pressed a kiss on top of her head. “I will never forget your Mom. In the same way that Athena will never forget Emmett. And the same way that you and Robbie will never forget Marcy.”
“Neither Emmett nor Marcy might be physically here with us anymore, but they are still part of this family as it’s gathered here because all of us will always remember them, and their memory will live on through all of us,” Athena said.
There was solemn silence for a while before Robbie asked, “Will you have a bonding ceremony next year?”
“No,” Bobby answered. “We also won’t tell anyone else but you about our bond at all for the moment. We might tell our friends eventually, but we haven’t decided anything about that yet. It’s … A bond is intensely private anyway but, in this case …” He shrugged.
“People would be nosy and question you,” Michael said, nodding. “As they already do about your relationship and marriage anyway. I can understand that you wouldn’t want to have to deal with that.”
“We could still do a very small family gathering, a party just with us around,” May said. “I think your bond deserves that recognition.”
“I fully agree with that,” Robbie said.
“I…” Bobby blinked and looked at Athena, lost for words.
“You won’t even need to do anything,” Brook promised eagerly.
And Harry added nodding, “We’ll do all the planning and organization and cleaning up.”
Athena grinned and a moment later Bobby and she both started to laugh. The whole constellation of their family might be unusual and might look like utter chaos from the outside, but they were perfect. Bobby didn’t know how they could wish for anything more or anything else than exactly what they had.
“Okay,” Athena said. “Surprise us with your party. And maybe we will be able to have that party in your new house, Sam and Nathalie, instead of here. That would be even better because then I can just go home without having to worry about cleaning up anything you missed.”