Page 72 of Lovesick Titan (Lovesick #2)

“Hey, Danny,” Oz peeked out of the doorway, holding baby Mai, who was even more alert now as a one-month-old, starting to hold her head up and blink around at what she could see with ever-growing curiosity.

“Carla still at work?” Danny asked.

“Heading home soon. I’ll tell her she missed you. But you can bet I’ll be at the morgue tonight.”

“Awesome. Yeah, I wish she could join us too.”

“Next time. For now we have to trade off. She needs to expand her babysitters. I hear your dad’s on the short list,” he snickered.

That didn’t surprise Danny at all. “See you later. And see you Sunday, right?” he smiled down at Michael. “Keep it cool until then, buddy, okay?”

Michael nodded and clutched his Prometheus doll closer.

The apartment smelled like lilacs when Danny entered. Mal had cleaned. He must be nervous about Sunday—he always tidied excessively when he was nervous, something new Danny had learned since moving in with him.

“Mal?” Danny called as he kicked off his shoes at the door. The lights were on, but he didn’t immediately see his boyfriend.

“Jumping in the shower!” Mal’s muffled voice responded from upstairs.

“‘Kay!” Perfect. Now Danny had the chance to present Mal his gift with a bit more flare, something he knew Mal would appreciate. But how to do it?

Setting the box on the coffee table so he could put his jacket and messenger bag away, he looked around the room.

One thing that always stood out to him in the apartment was Mal’s Mapplethorpe nude— Thomas, 1987.

It focused on the physical form, but to Danny, the photograph was about the struggle within, constantly pushing back at a world closing in around you, sometimes barely able to stand, but it was a fight no one could escape.

Once, that might have seemed pessimistic and daunting, but now, Danny saw it as inspiration to keep fighting even when he faltered.

Maybe he could hide the package—

His phone ringing interrupted him. Pulling it from his pocket, he smiled at the Caller ID. “Hey, Stella. No, I’m home actually. We’ll head to the morgue soon. You?” He glanced at the box again. Maybe the Bond villain closet.

Heading over to it, Danny touched the panel to open the hidden room. The wall slid aside, and he looked in on the new pair of goggles Andre and Priestly had finished, boots, a few sets of brand new cleaned and pressed black bodysuits, and Mal’s amplifier. All that was missing was…

Danny snorted.

“Something funny?” Stella asked.

“Oh, just something of Mal’s he’ll have to explain.” Reaching into the closet, Danny pulled out the neatly displayed Winterheart Diamond. Mal couldn’t possibly have expected Danny to miss it.

“How do you two compromise your…opposing lifestyles?” she asked with a grin in her voice.

Danny held the diamond in one hand and his phone in the other. Not the closet. “Every stumble is just another chance to get to know each other better.”

“Right,” Stella snickered.

“Besides, we’re always honest with each other about the things that matter. The rest, well…‘opposing lifestyles’ can actually be kind of fun.”

“I’m happy for you, Danny. Really. See you soon?”

“Can’t wait.”

Ending the call, Danny clutched the diamond tightly. He knew exactly how to give Mal his present.

R

Mal hadn’t meant to clean the apartment.

It certainly didn’t need such thorough attention.

But he’d gotten anxious thinking about the event on Sunday.

One thing had led to another until the place was basically spotless.

He was good at making speeches. He loved capturing the attention of the masses with a dramatic show.

He’d just never done it for a good cause before.

Refreshed from his shower, Mal stepped out of the steaming bathroom with a towel tucked neatly around his waist. He’d already laid out something to wear for the rest of the evening.

Nothing too dressy; they weren’t exactly having a candlelit dinner but a simple get-together at the morgue in celebration of reaching one month since they’d finally gotten their one-up on Ludgate and since Mal and Danny had moved in together.

Friday nights were often busy for patrol, but they’d be on call if anything came up.

“Out of the shower yet, Mal?” Danny called from downstairs.

“Just getting dressed!” He appraised his outfit a moment before deeming it the right choice—his teal button-down and jeans.

“Fill out your heroics for the day yet, Sparky?” The game on Danny’s tablet had been improved over the weeks but still entailed a sort of living journal and checklist he went through every evening.

“Yep,” Danny said, closer now, maybe halfway up the stairs, while Mal reached for his underwear. “Nothing beats a winning kiss from Prometheus.”

“I can think of a few things…” Mal said beneath his breath, though loud enough that Danny likely heard him.

“Hey, Ice Man. Catch.”

Mal turned, underwear in hand, standing in nothing but a towel, to see a sparkle of light headed toward him. His reflexes were bar none—other than Danny’s maybe—and he caught the item thrown at him easily, though he lost his underwear in the process.

The Winterheart Diamond. He knew Danny would find it eventually.

“About this,” he began, “I’ll return it some…day…” but his voice trailed off as he noticed Danny poised at the top of the landing with bare feet and bare legs, leading up to the hem of a navy blue… “Is that…?”

Danny toyed with the zipper, which was the only thing keeping him from exposing that he was definitely wearing nothing underneath.

“A present?” he said, devilish grin on his utter lie of an innocent face.

“ I know how bummed you were about the damage to your old duster, couldn’t get it repaired right, couldn’t find another one as good as the first. So I had one made for you. ”

His duster, down to the very last detail—aside from the Lightning Elemental currently inside of it. Mal had been wearing a simpler jacket the past few weeks, which was utilitarian but not as imposing or memorable.

“I hope you like it. Andre helped with schematics from camera footage and photographs, but I used a tailor for the final touches.” Approaching Mal slowly, he moved the hand not playing with the zipper to tease along the collar.

Mal had just stepped out of a hot shower, skin still flush, basically naked save the towel.

The sight of Danny wearing nothing but the duster was enough to bring him half-mast all on its own, even without the impish expression and teasing hands.

“Are you sure you’re not the devil, Sparky?

Coz I’ve never known temptation this cruel. ”

“Who says it’s cruel if you can have everything you see?” Starting to unzip the duster further, Danny got about to his navel before he paused. “I thought we could play a game.”

“Isn’t that what we’re doing tonight, which is why we should be leaving?”

“We have time.”

Mal eyed the hand at the zipper, holding it in place, forcing him to conjure the image of what lay beneath, which he knew well now, but he still loved when Danny made him work for it. “What kind of game?”

“If you come first, you have to return the diamond.”

Resisting a scowl, Mal pulled the diamond tighter to his chest. “And if you come first?”

“The game continues. You can hide the diamond again, anywhere you want, and the next time I find it, we play again. Deal?” He drew the zipper down another inch.

Mal was already tenting the towel. Envisioning Danny hard beneath the duster, naked inside of it before Mal had even worn the damn thing, was the best way he could imagine breaking it in.

Reaching out with the diamond, he tapped the sparkling rock against Danny’s chest. “What would Captain Shan think of this arrangement, I wonder? ”

Danny shrugged. “The diamond will get returned eventually.”

Shuddering, Mal watched Danny drop his hand, leaving only the smallest bit left to be unzipped, though Mal could see the tease of dark ginger hair. “I think I might be a bad influence on you.”

“Mmm…yep, and I’ve never been happier.”

Those words, they were one of the phrases people just said . An exaggeration no one ever meant. But that was just the thing—Mal knew Danny meant every word.

“You, Sparky, are better than anything I’ve ever stolen,” he said, leaning forward but not closing the final gap just yet.

“And you are better than anything I’d ever ask for.

” Hovering closer, mere breath between them and barely any tangible space, Danny didn’t close the gap either.

He took the diamond, which Mal gave up willingly—for now—and dropped it into the duster’s pocket.

Then he reached between them and divested Mal of his towel. “Gonna return the favor?”

Shifting his hips forward, Mal let Danny feel how hard he was as he brushed the kid’s bare thigh. “Not yet. Gotta christen this piece of equipment properly. Now come here.”

R

Andre raised an eyebrow at Mal when he and Danny entered the main room of the morgue a while—maybe a long while—later. “I thought you were the perpetually on time one.”

“We got held up,” Mal said. At least he’d won. He still had to decide where to hide the diamond next.

“So who held who up and who held the other down?” Priestly asked from his place on the floor beneath Arty in a recliner. The room had been transformed into a lounge for the night, with multiple places for seating and a flat-screen TV. Both of them had controllers and at least one eye on the screen.

“Depends on the mood, the night, and if any props are involved,” Danny said.

“ Danny ,” Stella chided him, covering Joey’s ears maternally.

The teenager rolled his eyes, but Danny cringed. “Sorry.”

Mal was far too proud of the scandalized expression on Andre to be upset by the comment, not that it would have upset him anyway.

“Lucky bastard,” Dom muttered, with a beer in one hand and a controller in the other, which she juggled whenever she needed to perform a certain task.