Page 28

Ezra

What was this conversation with Titan even going to be like?

He had only just started to come around to the idea that maybe Titan wasn’t a total asshole—he wasn’t ready to settle down and start a family with the guy.

He wasn’t ready to settle down and start a family with anyone. Commitment wasn’t something he did.

And then there was the matter of the pregnancy itself.

Jude and Kyle hadn’t been able to offer any explanation for how it could have happened unless the two of them really were True Mates, but nothing about his experiences with Titan thus far had screamed “fated love.” Up until recently, his experiences had mostly been “why do I keep hooking up with this guy who makes me homicidal just by speaking?” That didn’t seem on par with what Al and Jude had shared about their relationship, and if he understood correctly, the chances of both Al and Titan finding their True Mates in the same place—or even at all—were astronomical. None of it added up.

But that didn’t change the fact that he was pregnant. The test might have been an iffy metric, but Ezra trusted Kyle, who had put one hand on him and been able to confirm with his telepathy what Ezra had hoped he wouldn’t.

There was at least one Titan Jr. hanging out in there.

More than one, probably.

A whole clutch of oopsies.

And while, yeah, Ezra was pretty okay with Jude’s kids, being an “uncle” and being a father were drastically different responsibilities, and it wasn’t like his own experience with fathers had been any kind of teaching tool.

He couldn’t even remember his bio dad’s face, and while his late stepdad had been nice enough, they’d never had the kind of parent/child relationship that Ezra had had with his mother.

How was he supposed to be a dad when he didn’t even really know what that meant?

Way deep in his feelings, Ezra stopped pacing and flopped dramatically onto his bed, covering his face with his hands. He was nauseous, and he couldn’t pinpoint if it was from the stress, the pregnancy, or a funky combination of both.

Absurdly, he found that he kind of wanted to cry.

“I need,” he muttered to himself, “a hug.”

When there finally came a knock on his door, he wasn’t sure how much time had passed, but he did know there had been no hugs to be had.

Heart heavy, he sat up and brushed the water out of his eyes, then trudged across the room like a man to the gallows to have a conversation he desperately did not want t o have.

“Ezra?” Titan called from the other side of the door while Ezra was on his way. “Are you located in your unconsciousness quarters, as you stated you would be?”

“Yes,” Ezra replied, pulling the door open. “I?—”

The rest of his words died in his throat.

Titan—the maybe-not-an-asshole—stood there in a very nice button-down shirt and slacks, a chaotic, hand-picked bouquet of white yucca flowers in hand. They had been pulled up from their roots and were shedding chunks of crumbling dirt onto the floor around Titan’s feet.

Titan held the bouquet out to Ezra, who accepted it in stunned silence.

The bouquet was so unwieldy, he had to hold it with both hands.

“What the fuck?” he whispered in lieu of hello, knitting his eyebrows together. He looked from the flowers to Titan, who was beaming at him. “What is this?”

“It is a romantic gesture,” Titan explained happily. “Humans appreciate receiving flowers, despite the fact that removing them from their natural habitat results in their death. I killed these flowers for you to show you that I have care for you.”

“You… okay.” He glanced around and gingerly set the strange bouquet down on the top of his dresser, then brushed off the dirt on his hands onto his sweatpants. “Um… thanks?”

“You are welcome,” Titan said. He bounced on the balls of his feet for a moment, peering into Ezra’s room, then asked, “May I enter?”

“Oh, yeah, of course.” Ezra beckoned him into the room, closing the door behind him with a click. “Sorry.”

“No need for sorries. It is the first time you have invited me into your private space, and as such it is natural you might forget such things as remembering to invite me inside. I do not take it to be a sign of hostility.” Titan’s expression brightened.

“Quite the contrary, in fact—I am honored to have been invited here. What is it I can do for you, Ambassador Ezra?”

Ezra’s stomach churned.

Oh, yeah.

The flowers and Titan’s strange behavior had thrown him off, but they hadn’t changed the fact that he’d called Titan here for a reason. “I need to… we need to talk.”

Titan frowned. “Are you all right, Ezra? You appear distressed.”

“Yeah, well, that’s because I am distressed, man.”

“I do not wish for you to be distressed,” Titan said with a hum of displeasure. “You deserve to be content at all times. How may I assist in making you feel content again? I need your guidance.”

I need your guidance. The words were so earnest that they gave Ezra pause.

Admitting the need for help was not something Titan did.

He was constantly boasting how he knew the answer to everything, but here he was, standing before Ezra asking for help, and he was asking it because he wanted to know how to make him happy again.

That was the last straw. The stress was finally too overwhelming.

Completely against his will, Ezra burst into tears.

“Oh no,” Titan said in alarm. “Why do you have ocular wetness?”

“Something happened,” he struggled to say. “We… You… Goddamn it, just…” He lifted his shirt up to his ribs and took hold of Titan’s wrist, guiding his hand to his bare belly.

“What am I—” Titan started to say, but Ezra interrupted him.

“Don’t talk. Just… concentrate, okay?”

Titan’s frown deepened, but he did not argue.

He gave Ezra one last look, then let his eyes flutter shut.

A wrinkle of concentration formed along his forehead.

Silence set in and lasted for several long, long seconds, until Titan suddenly yanked his hand away with a gasp, as though he had been burned.

His eyes snapped open and he stared at Ezra in shock.

Then, slowly, he reache d back out with both hands and placed them on Ezra’s stomach.

“How is this possible?” he breathed, searching Ezra’s face.

Ezra shook his head. “I don’t know,” he said in a watery voice. “I was hoping you would be able to tell me.”

Titan sucked in a deep breath, gaze lowered and eyes far away, like he was searching the distant corners of his mind for something—anything—that might explain the life growing inside of Ezra. His lips tightened, and with a little shake of his head, focus returned to his eyes.

His hands slid slowly from Ezra’s bare stomach to his hips, then beyond that to his lower back.

Titan took Ezra carefully into his arms and held him there in a loose hug.

“I do not know,” he admitted quietly—vulnerably—speaking into Ezra’s hair.

“It should not be possible. Most human males are incapable of conception, and there is no reason why your body would have changed for me, as we do not share a True Mate bond, yet there is no denying it. There is life inside of you, Ezra. Life we have made together.”

Defeated, Ezra slumped against Titan’s chest. “I don’t understand.”

“Perhaps it is not a thing that wishes to be understood,” Titan reasoned, running his fingers soothingly along the course of Ezra’s spine.

“There are a great many such things in the universe, much to the disappointment and frustration of our very good scientists. Perhaps it is enough to say it is possible because it wants to be—because even the universe knows that I am yours, and you are mine.”

Titan held him closer, his arms tightening protectively— possessively —around Ezra, and Ezra could take it no more. Tears streaming down his cheeks, he flung his arms around Titan’s neck and held him as though if he let go, he would be sucked up into space.

Titan didn’t fa lter.

He held Ezra through it all and never let him go.

“It is not weak to fear the unknown,” Titan whispered as Ezra cried, soothingly running his fingers through Ezra’s hair.

“It is a survival mechanism common amongst all sentient beings, regardless of the complexity of their intelligence. Your fear is strong in the face of such a thing, but it will not be strong forever. All will be well. I will make sure of it, as I will be here with you, next to you, supporting you, so you will not need to face this fearful unknown on your own.”

Titan’s sweet sincerity only made Ezra cry harder.

How could he say such things when they were barely more than strangers? When Ezra turned him down at every chance he got, and had gone out of his way to avoid Titan as best he could?

No one stuck around—not his dad, not his stepfather, not even the boyfriend who’d said he’d loved him—yet he was supposed to believe this literal alien from outer space would be the one to buck the trend?

His head, poisoned by the pain of old heartbreak, insisted it was impossible…

but his heart, never one to remember its own pain in its desperation to love and be loved, wasn’t so sure.

He lifted his head from Titan’s chest and looked into his eyes, the pink in them now splashed with blue, as though Ezra’s own sorry emotional state was causing Titan great sorrow. It was beautiful, and it was tragic, and it was made so much worse when Titan smiled a little smile for him.

A smile that showed Ezra he empathized and understood.

And with that little smile, Ezra’s foolhardy heart won.

He kissed Titan not with lust or greed, but with a desperation that spoke to how scared and broken he felt inside. He kissed Titan because, in that moment, he couldn’t imagine not kissing him. Not giving in. Not letting himself be vulnerable. Not letting himself believe.

And Titan kissed him back with warmth, and confidence, and something that felt a lot like love.

The kiss deepened, and one touch of their lips at a time, Ezra’s brain shut off, taking with it his anxiety.

He could do this—he would do this—but it could wait.

There was time. Right now, he thought as he drew Titan into the room and pushed him onto his bed, there was something—or rather, someone—he needed to do much more.