Second Chance: M/M Mpreg Alpha Male Romance

by Aiden Bates

  Both of those things were true. Maybe the sedatives had insulated Ty from some of the pain before, or maybe he'd just pushed it to the side when he was dealing with strangers. Now that he had the safety of Ben's presence, he could fully acknowledge the pain that he was in and it sucked. He tried to keep his mouth shut about it, because people kept offering him painkillers that he didn't want to take while he was pregnant, and arguing with them exhausted him almost as much as the pain itself did.

  He tried to breathe through it, or to sleep through as much of it as he could. The first few days were the worst, but Ben held him through it. The cops tried to help too, in their way. They kept him updated on how the residents from Gray House were doing, and most of them were doing well. All but six of them had been treated and released that same night, either at the scene or from the E.R. A couple of the boys had needed to stay in the hospital, like the kid with asthma, and there had been some very small children from the battered women's side of operations that needed intensive treatment.

  Ty didn't have to stay in radio silence for long. The police told him on Thursday that they thought they'd gotten everyone involved with the fire, although he'd continue to have a police detail outside the room for the duration of his stay. Ty could have sobbed with relief at being able to talk to his friends again, even though Ben had to be the one to call them.

  They had their first sonogram on Friday. It still hurt that Ben hadn't been there to hear Bean's heartbeat for the first time, but at least he could be here for this. They watched together, transfixed, as they looked at the distinctly bean-shaped form of their future child. "This is really real," Ben murmured, hand on Ty's chest. "We have to start thinking of names and stuff."

  Ty beamed at him, perfectly content despite his current situation. "We have time." He chuckled. "I like Ben."

  Ben's cheeks turned bright red, gratifying Ty. "What if Bean is a girl?"

  "Benjamina."

  "Seriously?"

  "Come up with something better, then." Ty pulled Ben down for a kiss as the sonographer rolled her eyes and grinned.

  Penny brought Stuart and Musa to visit after work the same day that they were allowed to know that Ty had survived. "I should be pissed at you," Penny told him, glaring, "but I know it wasn't your idea to let us all think you were dead."

  Ben shook his head. "Trust me. They had him on lockdown. They took the phone out of the room and had a cop in here making sure he behaved."

  "Dude, really?" Musa made a face and looked out the window. "That's just not right."

  Stuart nodded his head in agreement with Musa. "You should've seen your alpha," he offered in a shy voice. "He broke Hartmann's nose."

  "Would've done more but that cop was there," Ben muttered.

  Ty knew he shouldn't encourage that sort of thing, but he smiled at Ben anyway.

  It took him another week to get out of the hospital. The doctors wanted him on oxygen at least that long and would have been happier to have him on oxygen for longer, but Ty couldn't stay still for so long. He needed to be back in his own place, with his own things. The doctors agreed, but only if he agreed to go on bed rest until at least the end of August. That meant no running, no work, no helping with the move until then.

  He didn't have a choice, so he agreed and Ben brought him home in a flurry of mother-henning that had to be against the Geneva Convention. Ben deposited him on the couch and all but buried him in blankets. "Can I get you anything? Water, something to eat?"

  Ty sighed. "Ben, come on. I'm okay."

  "You've still got burns. And your lungs are still screwed up, man. They don't want you doing anything stressful at all until August." Ben shook his head.

  "Sexual frustration is stressful." Ty thumped his head against the couch cushion. "Come on, Ben. I'm still an omega. I still need my alpha. Am I that repulsive now?" He turned his eyes over to Ben.

  "You could never be repulsive to me." Ben shook his head and returned to the couch. "I just — I love you, and I almost lost you. I'm scared. I don't want to hurt you."

  "How about this." Ty reached up and grabbed Ben's hand. "We enjoy each other as much as we can, and if I'm at all uncomfortable I'll tell you. And you'll pay attention to me, and if I seem to be having any trouble breathing, you'll pull back. Sound good?"

  Ben took a deep breath, looking doubtful, but then he nodded. "Can I bring you to the bedroom?"

  Ty bit back a shout about how he could walk there just fine, thank you, and let his mate carry him back. After all, if Ben carried him then he got Ben's hands on him for longer.

  Ben stripped Ty's clothes off slowly and carefully. The bandages were gone from Ty's burns now, what had been angry and blistered now looking no worse than a very bad sunburn. "These okay?" he asked, letting his eyes fall on the burns so that Ty couldn't mistake his meaning.

  "Just fine," Ty told him. It had been so long that he was already half hard just because he was naked and in Ben's presence. He should probably be ashamed of that, but he couldn't find it in himself to be.

  Ben disrobed too, and climbed into the bed. Ty scooted over to lie beside him, wanting as much skin-to-skin contact as he could possibly get. They'd only been forced to keep their hands off of each other for two weeks, but it felt like eternity. "You know I love you, right?" he asked Ben, a hand on the sharp cut of his hip.

  "I know." Ben stroked along the side of Ty's torso, seemingly aimless contact that made Ty feel more alive than he had since the fire. "I was so lost, when I thought you were gone. I didn't know what I was going to do."

  "I'm here now." Ty pulled Ben's face down for a kiss. "I'm not going anywhere. I'm here now, and I'm under your hands, and I want you."

  Ben chuckled. "Yeah you do." He ran his fingertips up the underside of Ty's cock, a feather-light touch that had Ty hissing. "You just lie back and take it easy though. You let me do all the work, okay? You're not supposed to be exerting yourself."

  Ty muttered under his breath about not bringing Dr. Madison into the bedroom, but he nodded. He didn't care how they did it, he just wanted Ben.

  Evidently Ben had missed having Ty under him as much as Ty had missed lying with Ben, because he took the time to reacquaint himself with every inch of Ty's body as he went along. He supposed it made sense on more than a sentimental level; after all, between the lung damage and the burns, there was a whole new landscape to Ty that Ben had to learn if he wanted to do this without pain. Personally Ty wasn't going to get upset if Ben slipped a little, he knew that this was all new to him, but Ben wanted to do this a certain way and Ty wasn't going to push back too hard.

  Ben started at the top of Ty's head and kissed his way down the jawline. They were just little kisses, almost chaste, and for a minute Ty wanted to scream in frustration. He wasn't made of glass, damn it. He was injured, sure, but he was also an omega who needed the touch of his mate to recover. As Ben moved down past Ty's ear and toward his neck, Ty noticed that the kisses increasingly included playful little bites. He forced himself to relax and follow Ben's lead. His alpha had never led him astray before; and those little nips felt damn good on his hypersensitive skin.

  Ben moved down his neck, adding just a tiny bit of suction as he mouthed along his slender throat. Ty moaned softly as his skin heated up. Ben wasn't sucking hard enough to leave a mark, they weren't in high school for crying out loud, but he was sucking just hard enough that it felt incredible.

  Ben licked, sucked and nibbled his way, tantalizingly slow, down toward Ty's oh so sensitive nipples. "Oh God," Ty gasped, as Ben's tongue just grazed the left one. "Oh God, Ben."

  "Too much?" Ben pulled back.

  "Don't you dare." Ty's burned hand whipped out to grab the back of Ben's head and bring it back to where it was supposed to be. "Don't stop."

  Ben hesitated; he didn't like the slight wheeze that had come into Ty's breath. Still, he continued. This wasn't entirely altruistic, after all; his own pupils were dark with lust and his cock was rock hard as he rocked against Ty's
thigh.

  Ben had to shift positions as he brought his mouth further down, and he decided that this would be a good time to change Ty's position too. He gently rolled Ty onto his belly, propping him up on pillows so he didn't have to rest any of his weight on his painful forearms. He reached out for the lube and started to open Ty up, working at the same tantalizing pace that he had been to begin with.

  Ty rocked his hips backward onto Ben's fingers. Sex had never been like this before. Before Ben, it had run the gamut from okay to pretty darned good. With Ben, the range had tightened up from pretty good to mind-blowingly awesome, but it still didn't quite stack up to this. Every little detail stood out for Ty — the threads in the sheets, the drops of sweat that dripped from Ben's hair, the little whimpers that Ben managed to pull from Ty every time his magic fingers grazed his prostate.

  It was the thrill of being alive. Ty had read about the phenomenon, but he hadn't had the experience for himself. He would have thought that he was too far removed from his own brush with mortality to experience the benefit, but here he was. When Ben slowly pressed into him, bare and hot and thick and perfect, Ty almost couldn't contain himself.

  They didn't last all that long. Apparently the enormity of the situation got to Ben as much as it got to Ty, because he lost his rhythm early and it was all he could do to get a hand around Ty and bring him to orgasm before he spilled inside of him. Ty didn't care. When Ben pulled out to avoid collapsing onto Ty's burn, he came back to clean Ty up and apologized for his performance.

  "Are you kidding?" Ty rolled over and looked directly at Ben, so he understood that Ty meant everything he was about to say. "First of all, I love you. All we have is incredible sex, because I love you. Even when it's only pretty good, it's incredible, because it's you. But Ben, this was amazing. I've never felt this alive. I can't even explain it. I feel like I could go run around the Gaslamp right now."

  "Please don't," Ben said with a wince, taking Ty into his arms. "I don't think my heart could take it."

  "I won't. I'm pretty sure I'd hack up a lung somewhere near the House of Blues." Ty pressed himself up against his mate. "But Ben?"

  Ben looked down at him.

  "Thank you. That was incredible."

  Ben gave him a soft smile, and Ty closed his eyes. Things were going to get back to normal.

  ***

  Once Ty got home from the hospital, Ben went back to work. He'd have liked to stay home with his beloved, but life didn't work that way. Maybe if he had ten years in at the construction company they'd have considered it, but he didn't even have ten weeks in. Plus, Ben wasn't the kind of guy to stay at home and fuss. It would just make him too anxious to live, and he was already showing signs in that direction by the time Monday morning rolled around. Plus, he was starting to think in terms of "my beloved," and that kind of thing just needed to be nipped in the bud before he started growing out his hair and reading poetry or some crap like that.

  The firm, and the union, were both more than understanding about the situation with Ty and with Hartmann. They cooperated fully with the police, even when it might have made them look less than awesome. They made sure that Ben was available for Ty and didn't work more hours than he had to. They could have used the overtime, but he wasn't going to think about that right now. They both had money saved, and they weren't exactly hurting. They'd find a way.

  People at the shop were uncomfortable around him at first, but he didn't say anything about the fire and they left it alone too. Soon enough things settled back down to normal. Maybe in some places, fancy lawyer-type places, people sat around and talked about whatever it was that they had going on in private. Maybe that stuff was even relevant for those kinds of people, Ben didn't know. Mechanics and construction guys, they didn't need to air that stuff. They needed to focus on the job in front of them, or they could get hurt. For Ben, at least, it could be a good way to fight the absolute terror that surged in his chest every time that he thought about Ty being out of his sight and away from his protection.

  Construction equipment didn't randomly turn murderous. A front loader didn't become obsessed with a guy and decide to eliminate the competition. If a grader decided that it was going to catch fire, it was because something was physically wrong with it, not because it thought killing over a hundred women and children was an awesome way to say, "Hey, alpha guy, I'm totally the right guy for you!"

  He needed to not think about those things. He needed to focus on construction, on repair. On making things whole again.

  Ty chafed at the combined restrictions of his injuries and the pregnancy. Ben couldn't blame him. The insurance he had through Gray House let him go out on long-term disability, which was generous and meant that they still had some income coming in on that side of the family. The thing was, though, Ty had always been an active guy and he was seriously emotionally attached to the kids at Gray House. He tried to keep a good face on it, but as his pregnant body got softer and rounder and he drifted further and further from the community that had sustained him for ten years, he seemed to withdraw further and further into himself.

  Ben couldn't have that. He loved Ty, he knew that Ty loved him. Some of the changes were inevitable, as the pregnancy took more of Ty's body, but he could do something about the way that the damage from the fire affected his mind.

  He called a meeting with Dr. Madison and with Dr. Sar, and with Ty of course, and laid it all out on the table. "This bed rest thing isn't working," he pointed out, around mid-August. "I'm pretty sure he's revised his thesis ten times, and he's going to submit a thesis about the damn duvet if we don't do something."

  "It's a nice duvet," Ty said with a glare. "Plus Penny made me a sweet afghan, with daisies." He rolled his eyes. "It'll make for a great contrasting argument."

  "Anyway," Ben said, exaggerating the word, "he needs to go back to work. I know that's not what you all want, but he needs to at least give it a shot. Sitting alone in the apartment all day is killing him, and I've almost lost him once."

  "Well, keeping the baby safe is the primary goal." Dr. Sar folded his arms across his chest and pouted, actually pouted.

  "Okay, but how much danger can Bean really be in if Ty goes back to work part time? That should mitigate some of the stress of working, and it will take off all of the stress he feels about walking away from the place that's been his only home for ten years." Ben shook his head. "I think we need to find some kind of balance, because while yes, Bean is important, so is the fully real and adult person who needs to carry Bean."

  Sar blushed and nodded. "My apologies. I didn't mean to imply that your omega was less important."

  Ty cleared his throat. "I think I can handle part-time work. I do. I can probably handle full-time work, to be honest, but I don't want to risk Bean. Look. I'll be careful. The new office space is crowded as it is; I'm pretty sure that they'll be willing to let me work from home whenever possible. And I'm committed to this baby, I am. If I'm feeling like it's too much, or like I'm getting at all sick in any way, I'll let you know. I'll stop. I'll develop a new fondness for live tweeting daytime television and heckling the talk show hosts. But please. Just let me try to actually do some good."

  Ben's heart broke to hear Ty begging, to hear him thinking of himself as not doing any good, but he took his mate's hand and nodded.

  In the end, Ty returned to work on a very limited, strictly part-time basis. That much did the trick. Ty perked right back up. He didn't seem to mind the loss of his hard body quite so much, although he still had moments of insecurity.

  Gray House wasn't going to go away just because the building burned. The stone structure remained, after all, and they had plenty of insurance to rebuild. While their neighbors complained about how they'd attracted violent crime — in the form of arson and attempted murder — the condo associations couldn't do much given that Gray House owned their land outright.

  While Gray House rebuilt, the different divisions were separated in different temporary shelters around
the city. The Teen Division found a home in a disused dorm on Ty's college campus, which worked out well for Ty because he didn't have to travel far to talk to his thesis advisor. Ty settled in there as well as he could given his part-time nature.

  The kids, though — Ben was astonished at the way they wouldn't allow Ty to exert himself even a little bit. The residential kids were more assertive about protecting their hero than the day kids but that was just a matter of degrees. Everyone knew that Ty had been willing to risk his life for them, and once Stuart spoke to them they all knew that Mr. Ty was one of them too.

  Gray House used this opportunity to rebuild to its fullest. They had insurance, after all, and the insurance company had to pay out while the litigation played out. The building would exist in the same shell, but the new space would be completely different. It would be green space for one thing, something that made a great impression on Ty, even if Ben was more interested in how the contract for the build was going to be awarded.