Chapter 24

"Where's my baby?"

The female voice interrupted the couple in their tender moment. They had stopped kissing a while ago, Charlie drooping with fatigue, and Steve had sat cross-legged beside him and was running his fingers through his hair. He knew the dragon caretaker loved this caress and he could feel him falling asleep under his attention, until his mother's voice burst their bubble. Steve withdrew his hand from the red hair and moved a few inches away from his man. He wanted to give him space with his parents and let him choose how he would tell them about their relationship; he himself would have liked to have had this opportunity with his own mother.

The injured man only had time to open his eyes and sigh when a redheaded, plump woman with brown eyes and a face bathed in love and concern entered the room.

"Oh by Merlin! Charlie!¨

¨Mum, I´m f..."

He didn't have time to finish his sentence before he was suffocated by the hug his mother drew him into. Without touching his bandaged torso, she had managed to wrap her arms around his neck and nuzzle his face into her own neck.

Steve reflected that if anyone else had forced themselves on Charlie like that, he'd have sent them flying across the room by now, but now he looked on with a smile. The woman hadn't seen him yet, focused as she was on her son, and he was in no hurry to signal his presence.

The cuddle was interrupted, however, by the arrival of Bill and a man with just as much red hair as the others, green eyes, tall, thin, with glasses.

"Molly darling, why don't you let him breathe, he's been through enough these last few hours!¨

¨Oh, you're right. Sorry, darling."

Molly pulled away from Charlie, tears in the corners of her eyes, just enough to let her husband take their son in his arms in a much less invasive way. She couldn't remove her eyes from the bandages covering the wounded man's belly, one hand over her mouth, as if realizing how this could have ended. The patriarch of the Weasley family noticed Steve as soon as he released his son.

"Who are you, sir?" he asked, staring him straight in the eye.¨

¨Excuse me, I'm Steve, sir.¨

¨Steve, sir? I seem to have heard your name before.¨

¨He is my companion, Dad."

The simplicity with which Charlie had laid out their relationship warmed Steve's heart; he, who had discovered his homophobic mother only days earlier, was reassured to see that the dragon caretaker´s sexuality was not an issue in this family. In fact, he could see the love they all shared, just by the way they acted around each other, and Charlie had huffed and puffed when he'd learned of his parents' arrival, but it was easy to see that he was glad they were there.

"Companion?" repeated Molly.

¨Yes, for twelve years.¨

¨What? But why didn't you introduce us to him before?¨

¨Mom...¨

¨Twelve years! But you should be married!¨

¨Mom...¨

¨Have children...¨

¨Molly! Stop it."

At last she fell silent; Charlie had closed his eyes, tired from the exchange. There, Steve understood why his lover hadn't been thrilled to hear about his parents' arrival; he knew this conversation was coming.

"Steve, welcome to the family," declared the patriarch. ¨Call me Arthur."

The former military man rose from the bed to shake the outstretched hand with a smile.

"Thank you Arthur, it's a pleasure.¨

¨Steve, darling, I'm so happy to meet you."

The young man had no time to react as he was locked in the matriarch's bear hug. He heard the two brothers giggling as he wondered how long he could last before needing air.

"Mom, please don't choke him.¨

¨Yes, sorry, I'm just glad you have someone by your side," she apologized as she released him. ¨Charlie, darling, what happened to you? When I saw your needle on 'life-threatening', I... I...¨

¨Mom, I'm fine."

He exchanged a glance with Steve and Steve understood that he was inviting him to leave if he wished, but he did not. He returned to sit in the middle of the bed, behind Charlie, and took his hand. He was then honest with his man's parents, explaining the death of his mother, then his father, Wo Fat and Shelburne, his quest to find out who she was, the obstacles that had stood in his way and finally the meeting with Shelburne, his mother. He then explained how Doris came to Hawaii with him, how he wanted to reconnect with her, how Wo Fat fled, followed by his mother's staged escape. He ended with Doris returning home while Charlie was there.

So far, Molly had been sympathetic, wanting to hug Steve several times, but Bill had stopped her, asking her to let him finish first.

"She flatly refused our relationship and let it slip that she had something else planned for me. That's when I realized she was paying some people close to me to direct my life, including one of my friends, Catherine, that she was paying for me to make a life with her."

He didn't miss Charlie's face closing at his words, nor Molly's, which went from sympathetic to annoyed.

"Charlie wanted to come back here, but I didn't want him to leave because of her. Since I had to work, I left him at a friend´s. Doris met me at my office and repeatedly asked me to leave Charlie."

Here, the concerned man's face turned saddened, while his mother seemed to go from annoyed to furious.

"I told her to leave my house or I was the one leaving. Later that day Catherine asked to see me urgently, when I met her she told me Doris wanted to kill Charlie."

Steve squeezed his man's hand in his own, he could see that he was touched to hear the reason why he had been attacked told in this way, even if he tried to hide it. Molly was beyond furious, her whole face showing she was ready to commit murder. She had grabbed Charlie's hand and was trembling as she squeezed it.

"By the time I got to the friend's home where I'd left Charlie, he'd taken two bullets to the gut, he just managed to tell me he couldn't go to a Muggle hospital before he lost consciousness.¨

¨Steve," Molly intervened in cold anger. ¨Your mother wanted to kill my baby because she disapproves of your relationship?"

The ex-military man swallowed, the mother of the family was terrifying and he was convinced she'd be capable of traveling to Hawaii to kill Doris or even kill him, right there, right now, to make sure her "baby" would be all right. He braced himself though and answered her, preferring her to know everything now rather than find out later.

"I don't have proof, but I think so."

He braced himself for the wrath of the furious mama bear in front of him. Charlie tightened his fingers around his hand. Molly rose, leaned over her son, grabbed Steve by the collar, forcing him to kneel on the bed and let go of his man's hand, and drew him into her arms.

"My poor darling, it must have been so hard for you to have your mother back in your life and to see her acting this way."

To say Steve was surprised was an understatement, and his astonishment stamped itself on his face making Bill and Arthur laugh, and Charlie sigh with relief, that same sentiment made its way into the military man's heart.

"Charlie is the most important thing in my life," he whispered so that only Molly could hear.

¨I'll never replace your mother, darling, but if you're willing, I'll be happy to think of you as a son.¨

¨Thank you."

When she released him, Steve had tears in his eyes, and he hurried to wipe them away and sit back down, but he couldn't take his eyes off the tear-drenched face of this radiant woman.

After an emotional moment of silence, Arthur spoke up.

"Tell me Steve, you're a Muggle, aren't you?"

Bill and Charlie burst out laughing, which turned into a wail of pain for the youngest. His mother handed him a potion in a second, which he happily swallowed, the eldest sibling left the room to make tea and Steve returned his attention to his father-in-law.

"Yes, sir.¨

¨Arthur, I told you, Arthur.¨

¨Yes, Arthur.¨

¨So, explain to me what kind of bullets you were talking about just now?"

Steve saw Charlie roll his eyes and then turn to his mother to exchange a whisper. So the military man found himself explaining to Arthur what a gun was and how it worked, over a cup of tea.