If he’s hiding the pregnancy, he’ll have to start now, not months from now, when his belly swells and he’ll have to change his clothes to fit. So he pulls the baggiest shirts from the thrift store racks, flipping through them for both sweaters and thin shirts. His brother’s money sits heavy in his wallet. I have no way to pay you back right now.
Taylor had sent a text after the call. Promise me you’re going to eat well.
It means setting aside some money for the child, buying groceries other than frozen pizzas, making sure he takes the scent suppressants in the mornings. Felix wants to drink, to forget, but he can’t do that to his—their—child. So he curls in on himself, the weight of all those words compressing his heart.
Then Kade had said “You don’t look okay,” and of course he doesn’t look okay. He isn’t okay.
He doesn’t want to be back in Meadowfall, doesn’t want to be pregnant, doesn’t want to be next to Kade when Kade can say You expect me to trust you again, after you embarrassed me? and Felix has never felt more alone in his life.
His vision blurs before he knows it, a hole in his chest gaping open. He needs to get out of this place, needs to not let Kade see him break like this. But he can’t move, can’t see the floor to step away, and Kade’s in front of him, pulling him close, tucking Felix’s head under his chin.
Felix chokes on his breath, shaking. Why are you doing this? We’re not back together and you don’t owe me anything. But he sucks in a breath, and all he smells is cedar and pine and Kade.
Kade’s arms slip around him, strong and warm, holding him together like a cocoon. It feels like all the other times Kade has held him—when he failed his math classes, when the bullies taunted him, when he said I promise to be yours. Felix can’t hope for them to return to that time.
The whimpers he hears don’t sound like his own. He struggles to breathe, thinking about the bundle of life growing inside him, and he aches to say I’m pregnant. It’s ours. But Kade won’t want the child—never wanted to have a child—and Felix is entirely responsible for this.
He presses his face into Kade’s shirt, sobbing until the wave of self-pity passes. Kade strokes a soothing hand down his back, and Felix shakes harder, knowing Kade will reject him if he finds out. He doesn’t want to lose this.
Kade’s arms tighten around him.
When Felix gathers himself back together, he feels wrung out, hollow. His nose has stopped, his eyes still prickling.
“Better?” Kade murmurs. His nose brushes through Felix’s hair, lips trailing against Felix’s forehead. Felix shivers.
“Yeah,” he croaks. “Sorry.”
“You gonna tell me what’s wrong?” Kade’s breath feathers through his hair, damp and warm.
Felix shakes his head. “It’s nothing.”
Kade snorts. “Nothing, huh?”
But his arms curl around Felix, pulling him against his strong chest. Felix releases a shuddering breath. “I’m fine.” I will be fine.
Kade threads his fingers through Felix’s hair, massaging his scalp with slow, careful strokes. Felix’s eyelids flutter shut. He tilts his head into Kade’s touch, luxuriating in it.
He hasn’t had this in a while. No one touches—knows—him like Kade does, and he’s comfortable, safe in his alpha’s arms.
“Shop’s closing,” a man’s voice calls from the other side of the store. “Take your necking elsewhere.”
Felix jerks away from Kade, heat creeping up his cheeks. That hadn’t been anything important. Just a hug. But Kade’s touch had sent a thrill through his body, just like back at the gas station, when Kade had said He’s mine.
Felix steps away, looking down when his foot catches in a pile of clothes. They fell off his shoulder when Kade hugged him.
“We’ll go somewhere else if you don’t have enough,” Kade says.
Felix shakes his head. “That’s plenty.”
The man at the counter—omega, by his apple blossom scent—scans the tags on Felix’s clothes, before bundling them into a large plastic bag. “That’ll be forty-seven fifty, sir.”
Felix peels his wallet open. Kade’s gaze prickles along his skin, and he tries to ignore it, pulling crisp ten-dollar bills out, the smallest denominations he found in Taylor’s safe. You’d better take a thousand at least, Taylor had texted. Felix had compromised and withdrawn five hundred dollars.
A minute later, they step out of the shop into the cool evening air. Felix blinks at the royal-blue sky, and the streaks of pink-edged clouds floating overhead. “I didn’t think it was this late.”
Kade hands the spare helmet over. “You took your time picking clothes.” After a pause, he asks, “That enough for you? You weren’t ready to leave.”
Felix thinks about the tiny paycheck he’ll receive for this week, and shrugs. “I’ll get more next week,” he says. “This is enough for now.”
Kade studies him with narrowed eyes. “Tell me if you need a ride anywhere.”
“I shouldn’t. I’ve been imposing.” But the offer makes his pulse quicken anyway. He hadn’t thought Kade would want to see him again.
Kade clicks his tongue. “Like a ride is imposing.”
It reminds him of the last time he’d had a ride, and heat slips down his body. He doesn’t need that to happen again. He’s gotten into enough trouble because that had been just one ride. And now he’s pregnant.
He tugs his helmet on, then climbs onto the bike behind Kade, swallowing when their thighs bump. He wants more of that warmth. It doesn’t seem like enough, now that Kade has touched him and held him. Kade’s woodsy, musky scent steals into his nose. The plastic bag of clothes sits bulky and rustling between them, pressing Felix back against the motorbike trunk.
At least I can’t rub up against you this way.
The ride home passes too quickly. He leaves the visor open, breathing in the wisps of Kade’s scent carrying into his helmet. Felix sags when they pull into
