Chapter 2 of The Paramedic’s Witch is the chapter where the full strangeness of Dean’s new life gets laid out in one truck ride. He is driving to visit Jaz Errington — the demon hunter who saved his life in book four — alongside their teenage daughter Jo, who came back from the future specifically because Jaz, in that future, needed help she couldn’t ask for. Readers who love urban fantasy with genuinely unusual family dynamics will find this chapter one of the warmest and most quietly funny in the series.

Why readers love the “time-travel child who knows her parents’ future” dynamic

Jo is fifteen, self-possessed, and mildly insufferable in exactly the way that makes her immediately lovable. She knows that Dean and Jaz end up together. She knows Jaz needs help right now. What she cannot do is manufacture the organic connection her parents haven’t built yet — and the chapter is largely about the three of them navigating that awkwardness. When Jo calls Dean “Dad” for the second time in the book and he notes he is “still getting used to this whole family man thing,” it is funny and quietly moving at the same time, in a way that rewards readers who have been following his character arc since book one.

Jaz Errington grieving alone

The chapter’s most emotionally textured moment comes when Dean and Jo arrive at Jaz’s apartment and find her red-eyed, trying to push through the administrative nightmare of her parents’ estates and the remains of the family security company. For readers who love urban fantasy series in which characters are allowed to grieve and struggle outside of their professional competence — not just when they are fighting or running — this is a quietly important scene. Jaz is one of the most capable characters in the series, and seeing her reduced to trying not to cry in front of her paperwork makes her feel real in a way that action scenes alone never could.

The right way to build a slow burn

Jaz explicitly addresses the elephant in the room: she and Dean are not going to force a relationship simply because their future daughter arrived to confirm it happens. “If we end up as more than friends in the future, it will have to happen in its own time and can’t be forced.” For readers who love slow-burn dynamics in their urban fantasy — characters who are clearly suited for each other but who are not being pushed together by plot convenience — this chapter is the series at its best. Dean jumps in to agree. Jo’s “Ew, Dad” response to his phrasing lands the whole scene perfectly.

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CHAPTER TEXT

The Paramedic’s Witch — Chapter 2

Dean drove the few miles back to his apartment, located over a detached garage in a residential neighborhood on the outskirts of Elk City. When he pulled up out front, Joanna was there waiting for him in the driveway. She was dressed in shorts and a tank top, carrying her purse on one shoulder. They had gone shopping for some new clothes when they returned from their rescue mission in the mountains to the west. Jo had been transported back in time pretty much with just the clothes on her back. Her outfit at the time was not what a normal teen in this day and age would wear. Apparently, twenty years from now, the fashions revisited what he would have called nineteen-sixties’ “hippie” style. Now, at least, she looked like any other teen he saw walking down the street.

“Hi, Dad,” she said as he climbed in the pickup with Dean. “I appreciate this. Mom will, too, I think. She’s having a problem adjusting to being the last living member of the Errington clan. She’s overwhelmed with all the responsibilities to run the security company, plus having to manage getting her parents’ estates in order.”

“Did she invite you or are you inviting yourself to go help?”

“She would never ask for help. You know that, Dad.”

Dean was still getting used to this whole family man thing. A week ago, he had been a normal single guy. Okay, maybe not normal, but certainly not the father of anyone – especially not a fifteen-year-old girl. Now he not only had a teenaged daughter, he also had a future – what would you call her? Wife? Girlfriend? Baby-momma? He still had trouble seeing him and Jaz Errington getting together, even with the apparent proof that they did sitting in the truck next to him.

“Have you given any more thought to how and when you’re going back to when you came from?” Dean asked.

“I can’t do it on my own. I have an idea of how it’s done, but the spell has to be cast on me by another witch. It took a group casting to send me back here. It might take more than one of us to send me back.”

“We should contact the local coven then. They sent you back here in the first place, at least their future selves did.” Dean was getting a headache trying to wrap his brain around the whole time-travel thing.

“I want to stay a little longer and help Mom out. She is all alone now. She doesn’t even have you to lean on yet. She needs someone else to help her through this.”

That comment brought them to an awkward silence. They were mostly quiet the rest of the ride downtown. Jaz had taken an apartment about a block away from the location of her family’s bombed-out building. The fire marshal and the feds at the ATF had determined that it was not a mere gas explosion as had originally been reported in the news. Since they were federal security contractors, it was being treated as a potential terrorist incident, given the company’s federal security ties, especially since Jaz and her team had just returned from an unnamed mission in Syria. Dean knew from the news how dangerous that middle-eastern country was. It was a testament to how tough Jaz was, and to her skills as a demon hunter that she had been sent there and survived to come home again.

Dean found a spot on the street, thumbed a few quarters into the parking meter, and followed Joanna into the building. They caught the elevator up to the sixth floor where Jaz was staying and knocked on the apartment door.

Jaswinder Errington opened the door. She could have been Jo’s older sister, they looked so much alike. Dean saw right away she had been crying. He knew that she would be embarrassed by his noticing it, so he shot her a big grin when she looked his way and pointed to Jo.

“Look, I brought you a teenager to lend you her snarky comments while you work.”

“Oh, joy,” Jaz said stepping back and gesturing to them. “Come on in. I told you I didn’t need your help, Joanna. It’s busy work for the most part. It’s stuff that I just have to slog through and get it done.”

“No one should have to do this stuff alone, Mom. Besides, Dad is off for the next two days so he can stay and help, too. Together we can get it done faster than you could do it alone.”

“I told you, Joanna. Stop trying to force Dean and me together. I don’t doubt that we are your parents anymore. That is something I accept now. I do doubt that we are going to become more than friends just because you keep coming up with ways for us to stay in close proximity to each other.”

“Jaz is right, Jo.” Dean jumped in to help Jaz out. “If we end up as more than friends in the future, it will have to happen in its own time and can’t be forced. I mean, you didn’t want us to just start jumping on each other as soon as you snapped your fingers, did you?”

“Ew, Dad, don’t be gross. That is not an image any daughter wants to think about.”

“Well, then, leave us alone,” Jaz said. “Let things happen naturally. You aren’t even born for almost five years, right? Dean and I have plenty of time yet to get to know each other.”

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