Page 43 of The Accidental Dragon Baby

Ace’s fury pounded in his veins. With all the trouble from the baby kidnappers recently, he hadn’t had time to think about other evils in the world. But the thought of Ivo as a mink, bleeding out on an exam table... it made his core burn molten hot inside him. “Do you have a name I can track down?”

“I... I think the boss’ name was Watsonator.” Ivo grimaced. A second later, his eye grew wide. “You’re not going to hunt them down, right? They’re dangerous. There’s a lot of them.”

“We’ll see,” Ace muttered. He scooped Ivo up and sat him on his lap, Mary cradled in his arms. This close to Ace, Ivo felt right. Warm and solid.

“Ace,” Ivo said, his gaze pleading. “I need you to be safe.”

Then his mouth grew pinched.

Without warning, Ivo belched a thick cloud of smoke straight into Ace’s face.

12

A NEST FOR IVO

Ace froze.The smoke from Ivo’s breath stuck to his skin, fine particles clinging to his eyebrows.

Mink shifters did not burp smoke. The only time a non-dragon did, was when they were pregnant with a dragon child.

And Ivo had burped smoke more than once.

He was pregnant.

With Ace’s baby.

A low rumble began in Ace’s chest. “Mine,” he said.

“Y-yours?” Ivo’s eye widened.

“My baby.” Ace covered Ivo’s bare abdomen with his palm, trying to feel a connection to their child. “Mine.”

He nudged his fingertips against Ivo’s soft, warm skin, feeling the give of his body. He rubbed his fingers from left to right, growing disappointed when he couldn’t tell where exactly their baby was. “I can’t feel it.”

Ivo huffed. “It’s only been two days. I don’t even know if it’ll show up on a pregnancy test.”

“It will. Telos’ pregnancy had half the test kits showing positive the day after.” And that had happened in the middle of their rescue mission, right before they’d saved Ivo and his friends.

“Telos is the one who can shift into a baby, right?” Ivo asked.

“He prefers his pterodactyl shape,” Ace said dryly.

“How did he get pregnant? He’s an alpha.”

Ace shrugged. “Feel free to ask him for the details. He’ll probably try to turn it into a book.”

Ivo lit up. “I’ve never read an alpha-alpha story before.”

“Definitely don’t ask Telos and Mav for theirs. I bet it’s all fucking. Maybe even pterodactyl-fucking.” Ace rubbed little circles all over Ivo’s belly. Then he tried to lift Ivo higher, except he accidentally bumped Ivo’s head against the roof of the car.

“Oof!”

Ace immediately lowered him. “Fuck. Did I hurt you?”

Ivo shook his head. “You didn’t do it quickly enough to hurt. What were you trying to do?”

Ace’s cheeks warmed. He mumbled, “I was trying to kiss your belly.”

“Oh.” And now they were blushing at each other, at a loss for words.

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