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Originally, he’d been Nero’s doctor, and later brought on to conduct a medical examination to present to the court.

As a na?ve eighteen-year-old kid, Calix hadn’t realized just how strange that was, but he’d started to wonder more and more about it when he’d attended the Academy.

The only reason he’d never been able to ask Bruce about it had been the slight fear the chief would also realize how overly involved Titus had been.

It wasn’t like he could reopen the case, and Cal didn’t think Bruce would have done that to him anyway, but still.

Sometimes it was better to count your blessings and move on, even if you didn’t fully understand the whole process. That’s how Calix had chosen to view that entire period of his life, and he didn’t appreciate how often the director tried to ruin that for him.

“I have no interest in facing my demons,” he plainly stated.

“Unfortunately, Detective, that isn’t going to work for me. I let you get away long enough, don’t you think? You’ve had your fun and your freedoms. It’s time to come back.”

“To what?” Cal shook his head. He was trying to distract him with nonsense.

“They needed you to explain Nero’s current state and how it’d happened, how the impact from my hovercar bruised his front, but that his spine broke from hitting the pavement.

How the force with which he fell after you viewed the video proved I’d slammed on the brakes as soon as I realized what I was doing.

But…None of that makes any logical sense.

None of that is viable proof in a court of law on any planet. ”

Why hadn’t he noticed sooner?

Why hadn’t anyone?

“Don’t try so hard,” Titus suggested. “Some things don’t make sense.”

“Did you have something on the judge?” His brow furrowed. “On Bruce?”

“Nothing like that.”

“Then…?”

“I made them feel like they needed me there. I made them feel like they needed me in general.”

If anyone else had said that, Calix would have laughed in their face and called their bluff. But the director wasn’t bluffing, and what’s more, Cal believed him. More than one person had discussed feeling odd in the director’s presence, himself included.

“Does that have something to do with you being a Connect?” Calix wished he’d paid more attention to Troya, his partner, when the guy had started talking about what Titus was.

“‘Coy and Unattainable’,” Titus repeated, ignoring his question. He quirked a thin black brow. “Is that how you see me, little monster?”

He straightened in his seat. “Don’t. You said that before. I don’t like it.”

“Oh? And I suppose the rest of this is to your liking?” The director laughed. “I’m sorry I come off that way to you. For the record, I never wanted you to think of me as unattainable. That would defeat the purpose of all this effort I’ve put into having you, after all.”

“I won’t fall for any more of your tricks.

You or Aodhan’s.” He’d bought into the doctor’s act, had believed there was something between them.

Maybe it wasn’t anything that could be lasting, but all those times the other man had comforted Cal and made him feel less than a freak? They’d meant something to him.

“Did you go through all of that just to get me to drop my guard and come here? Why?” Why not kidnap him elsewhere?

What was so important about having them at their home?

Or… “Was I just unlucky? Did I stumble on you and Amory and that’s why you’re doing this?

What was she even doing here? Why’d she come after you? ”

As far as he knew, Amory wouldn’t have had any reason to target Titus or Aodhan.

They’d wrapped the case just before Bruce’s funeral, and while they still didn’t have a clear motive for Amory, messages and the search history of Rhett’s devices gave clear signs he’d killed people in a twisted sense of retribution for their ill loved ones.

“That’s a good place to start actually,” Titus said, ignoring his comment. “Something about me. I’ve been with my boyfriend for around two years now. He’ll say it’s closer to three, but I don’t count the…courting period the way he does.”

After their exchange in the kitchen, Cal sort of had an inkling, but hearing it confirmed like this…

“Do you think that’s going to somehow make me jealous?” he forced himself to grunt. “Now? No way. You two psychos can have each other.”

“Careful,” Titus chided. “Aodhan could return at any moment. We wouldn’t want him hearing you say something like that. I was able to calm him down, for now, but it won’t last. He’s too impatient, too eager to get things started.”

“There are marks all over me!”

“I made him take it easy on you,” he insisted.

“If Aodhan had his way, you’d be waking sitting on his cock, not in that chair.

I thought we should perhaps try to reason with you first, but I’m starting to see that might have been a mistake.

He’s spent more time with you than I have.

Maybe he really does know you better than I do. ”

“Is that what this is really about?” Calix asked. “Are you doing this because I messed around with your man?”

“It’s cute that you think I’m the type of person who wouldn’t be aware of his lover's every move,” Titus replied. “Cute, but misguided.”

So he’d known the whole time that Cal and Aodhan were getting close. That only bolstered the theory that the two of them had been in on this together.

But why?

“Why didn’t you stop us?”

“Why would I want to stop something I helped start?” Titus took a single step closer, stilling when Calix tensed, as though he cared about making him uncomfortable.

“There. That’s something else about me. You might have figured this out already, but then again, maybe not.

The night of the reunion? Aodhan planned to do a lot more. ”

“You say that as though what he did do wasn’t a big deal,” Calix repeated incredulously. “Easy for the guy who wasn’t shredded on someone else’s dick to say.”

“Please. We both know how much you enjoyed it, Detective. Or should I replay the video again for you so you can take a closer look?”

Cal dropped his gaze, inwardly cursing himself and his cowardice.

“Don’t be ashamed, your reaction wasn’t that uncommon. We’ve talked about this before. Think.” When Calix clearly didn’t follow, Titus sighed and continued. “Misattribution of arousal.”

Oh right. That conversation they’d had in his office again. They were circling back, only Cal found himself less eager to change the subject this time around.

“I’m fairly certain you called it a misattribution of desire that day,” he stated dryly.

“Only because I felt the word ‘arousal’ wasn’t very fitting of the overall situation.”

“As in, you thought there was a higher chance of me shooting you if you said it like that?” Calix rolled his eyes.

“I was hoping you’d take my words to heart,” Titus disclosed, seemingly disappointed. “That you’d be smart enough to apply it to your reaction that night with Aodhan at the reunion all on your own.”

“Looks like you’ve given me too much credit. Why don’t you unchain me and let me go, since I’m not who you thought I was?”

“Aodhan likes to do that as well, hide behind witty remarks and deflection. The only difference is that yours is self-deprecating.”

Yeah, Calix couldn’t picture the doctor thinking poorly of himself.

“We’ll start from the beginning, so listen carefully, all right?

” Titus said in a tone that left no room for argument.

“You were drugged and out of it, your heart was racing, there was a sense of fear and danger spiking your adrenaline levels, and you were getting physical stimulation to your sexual organs.”

Cal grimaced.

“You became aroused because of all of those factors. Your body mistook the heightened sensations you were feeling and turned them into something it understood. Attraction.”

“Some people just like pain in the bedroom. You don’t—” Calix clamped his mouth shut, realizing his mistake. He had felt guilty and gross all this while because of how he’d reacted that night, but not for the reasons Titus seemed to believe.

Should he set him straight? That seemed risky with no real payoff…

But…

“I didn’t report it to the police, who I’ve been working with these past few months, because I didn’t care enough to bother,” Cal told him.

“You thought you deserved to have bad things happen to you because of Nero.”

Bad things like the events at the reunion had always happened to him. Nero had nothing to do with it.

Cal grunted. “The only thing I considered bad about that night was the fact it’d been Heathe who’d gotten the better of me.”

He was definitely being too honest, but the admission poured off his lips almost haughtily.

Titus seemed to think so too, because he chuckled, the sound rich and dark, instantly sending a shiver down Calix’s spine that wasn’t entirely unpleasant.

“Are you trying to one-up me by proving how much I don’t understand you, little monster?

I’m almost tempted to allow you to believe it’s working, but that would defeat the purpose of why we’re here. ”

“Right, that whole having me bullshit,” Cal refused to backdown.

“The way I see it, you two are just psychos who happened to catch me while I was vulnerable. Aodhan planned on doing more that night? So, what? He was going to kill me? Can’t really blame him since, as you put things earlier, it would have been a great cover.

Heathe was spotted leading me upstairs. Aodhan happened to pass by and take advantage—”

Titus made a sound of frustration that instantly had Cal quieting. “You’re smarter than this. You can’t honestly still believe Heathe was the mastermind behind that night, can you? That moron was just doing as he was told. Aodhan paid him to bring you there.”

“Okay. But why? What’d I ever do to him?”

“I may have,” he took another step closer, but Cal was too engrossed in his words to notice, “ accidentally left an old newspaper clipping of the trial out on my desk for him to find.”

If the way he’d said accidentally hadn’t given him away, the fact he was talking about printed newspaper articles would have.

Even eight years ago, finding a printed newspaper was nearly impossible.

People still enjoyed physical magazines and books, but news was consumed through delivery directly to everyone’s devices.

Forget about why the doctor had targeted him.

“Why would you do that?” Calix didn’t get it. He tried, but no matter how many times he spun it around in his brain, he couldn’t fathom why, after eight years, a man like Titus Mercer would go through that sort of trouble.

“So the two of you would meet, of course.”

He shook his head. “We were going to meet anyway. Aodhan was the hospital's contact for the case. You’re the one who assigned him.”

“That would have been different. He would have viewed you as a work assignment and nothing more. I needed him to be interested in you, Calix.”

He blinked at him. “And if he hadn’t grown interested and really had killed me that night?”

Titus’s expression never altered. “Then you wouldn’t have been the one.”

“Wow.”

“It’s all right. I knew you were. I’ve known you were a good match since that day eight years ago when I saw what you’d done to your classmate.”

“It was an accident .”

“Was it?”

“You testified as much!” Cal tugged on his bindings, stilling when Titus rested a hand on his right shoulder.

The touch was gentle, yet he felt as though the weight of the entire universe was suddenly pinning him down to the chair, keeping him immobile while the terrifying man in front of him bent to make them eye level.

“Want to know a not-so-secret secret?” Titus asked in a quiet voice. He smiled. “I lied on the stand. I’m rather good at it. You and I have that in common.”

“What do you have in common?” a new voice called from the doorway, and when Titus pulled away, Calix saw Aodhan enter the room.

He was using a cloth to wipe blood stains from his hands.

“How much we both want you,” Titus replied without skipping a beat, slipping his hands back into his pockets, “of course.”