Chapter 12: Coffee Confessions
The hunger was a live wire in his gut, constant and low. It had been four days. Ryuu fed him strange, rich foods—rare steaks that bled onto the plate, broths that shimmered with flecks of gold, fruits that tasted of spices Taichi couldn’t name. It helped, but it never fully left. A background hum of need.
The other need, the one Ryuu had so bluntly forecast, was… manageable. For now. It was a persistent warmth, a heightened awareness of his own skin. Walking made him conscious of the slide of his trousers. The brush of his own hand against his neck felt magnified. He was constantly, faintly, wet.
He needed to tell someone. Someone human. The pressure of the secret was becoming a physical weight between his shoulder blades.
Hana was the only option.
She chose the café, a bright spot of normalcy with mismatched chairs and the hiss of an espresso machine. Taichi arrived first, choosing the table just outside the window. He could see the monolithic glass spire of Ryuu’s corporate headquarters from here, cutting into the afternoon sky. A predator’s eye, watching.
“You look different,” were Hana’s first words, sliding into the seat opposite him. She dumped her bag, her eyes scanning his face. “Rested. But also kinda… buzzing. What’s the deal? Did you finally get that promotion? Or,” she waggled her eyebrows, “did the gorgeous CEO finally notice you exist outside of spreadsheets?”
Taichi’s laugh was too sharp. He wrapped his hands around his mug, seeking its solid warmth. “You could say that.”
“Spill.”
He took a breath. The steam from his coffee fogged his glasses for a second. He took them off, cleaned them on his shirt, a stalling tactic. He didn’t put them back on. The world went softly blurred, Hana’s keen expression less acute.
“It’s… it’s more than noticing, Hana.”
“Okay. He asked you out. Took you to some insane, taste-the-rainfall, million-yen-a-plate place. You had a religious experience with a scallop.”
“Not exactly.” Taichi stared into his black coffee. “We… it started at the office. Late. And then it moved to his place.”
Hana leaned forward, her playful smirk softening into genuine curiosity. “And? Is he as terrifyingly perfect in bed as he is in the boardroom? Wait, don’t answer that. Of course he is. The man probably files his orgasms quarterly.”
Despite the knot in his stomach, Taichi snorted. “Shut up.”
“So? Details, Yagami. Is he a generous lover or a selfish god?”
The words spilled out before he could cage them. “He’s… it’s not like anything I’ve ever… I actually like it when he…” He flushed, the heat climbing from his neck to his hairline. He dropped his voice to a murmur only she could hear over the café din. “When he… breeds me. That’s the word he uses. It should be creepy. It is creepy. But I… I like it.”
Hana’s smirk froze. Her eyebrows shot up. “Whoa. Okay. Kinky. A bit medieval, but hey, you’re both consenting adults with a power imbalance that could power a small city.” She took a sip of her latte. “As long as you’re happy. And safe. You are being safe, right?”
This was the ledge. Taichi looked past her, at the glass tower. The sun hit it, flaring. He thought of the warm nest, the humming jars, the gnawing emptiness inside him that was slowly being filled with something other than food.
“Safety isn’t really the point anymore,” he said quietly.
“Taichi…”
“I’m pregnant, Hana.”
She choked. A fine spray of latte hit the table. She coughed, thumping her chest, her eyes wide and streaming. “You’re what?”
“Pregnant.”
“That’s impossible.” Her voice was flat, factual. “You don’t have the, you know, internal architecture for that.”
“He does.” The words were stones. “He’s not… he’s not human, Hana.”
Silence. A long, profound silence where the café sounds—the clatter of cups, the chatter, the grinder’s shriek—felt muffled and far away. Hana stared at him. She looked at his face, then, deliberately, down at his abdomen, still flat under his simple cotton shirt.
“Not human,” she repeated slowly.
“He’s a dragon. A shapeshifter. He’s… centuries old. He’s my boss, and he’s a dragon lord, and he… put a clutch in me.” Saying it aloud to another person made it both more real and more ludicrous. He braced for her to laugh, to call for a psychiatric hold.
Hana didn’t laugh. Her face went through a series of rapid shifts: disbelief, horror, dawning comprehension. She leaned in so close he could see the faint freckles across her nose. “The hunger,” she whispered. “That’s why you’ve been… off. You’re always touching your stomach. You jumped when I dropped a pen yesterday. Your skin is… glowing.”
Taichi nodded, a tight, helpless motion.
“A dragon.” She sat back, hard. The chair legs scraped the concrete. She let out a long, low breath. “Holy shit. Holy. Shit. The intensity, the possessiveness, the way everyone just falls in line around him… it makes a disgusting kind of sense.” She raked a hand through her hair. “Okay. Okay. Medical? What… what does that even entail? How long?”
“Three months.”
Her jaw actually dropped. It hung open for a full three seconds before she snapped it shut. “Three months?”
“It’s fast. And intense. He says I’ll be… different. Needy.” His cheeks burned again. “Constantly.”
Hana processed this. Her eyes were like scanners, taking him in anew. The slight flush, the way he sat—a little carefully, as if protecting a core of new heat. “And you?” she finally asked, her voice uncharacteristically gentle. “What do you want, Taichi? This is… this is beyond anything. You can’t just be going along with it because he’s your boss or because he’s…”
“Because I had a crush on him?” Taichi finished. He met her gaze, his own resolve sharpening, clarifying in the face of her shock. “It started that way. But it’s not that anymore.” He placed a hand on his own stomach, over the silk of his shirt. The warmth was there, a banked fire. “I want this. I want him. The human part and the dragon part. The boardroom and the nest. It’s terrifying. It’s insane. But I want it more than anything I’ve ever wanted in my entire, boring, ordinary life.”
Hana studied him. The fear in her eyes didn’t vanish, but it was joined by something else—a fierce, protective wonder. “You’re serious.”
“Deadly.”
A slow smile broke across her face, wobbling at the edges. “Well, fuck. My best friend is having dragon babies with a CEO.” She shook her head, a laugh bubbling out of her that was half-hysterical. “Do I get to be the godmother? The, what, dragon-aunt? Will they breathe fire? Can I buy them tiny little suits?”
The tension shattered. Taichi felt a laugh escape him too, shaky with relief. “I don’t know. I don’t know anything. But yes. You’re first in line.”
Her smile settled into something more solid. She reached across the table and grabbed his hand, squeezing hard. “Okay. Then I’m in. You’re not alone in this, you idiot. Even if your boyfriend could literally eat me.” She glanced over her shoulder, out the window, at the gleaming tower. “He’s going to know you told me, isn’t he?”
Taichi followed her gaze. The building’s reflective surface seemed to hold the sun captive. “Probably. He knows… a lot.”
“Right.” Hana squared her shoulders, as if facing an unseen threat. “Then you tell him I said if he hurts you, I’ll find a way to file a truly devastating HR complaint. Supernatural beings aren’t above workplace harassment policies.” She let go of his hand. “Now. You’re eating for… how many?”
“I don’t know that either.”
“Right. Well, you’re eating for a litter, then.” She flagged down a waiter, her voice returning to its usual brisk clip. “We need two of the steak sandwiches. Extra rare. And a side of the roasted potatoes. Actually, make that two sides. And a chocolate croissant. And another latte.” She looked back at Taichi. “What? You’re paying. You’re sleeping with a billionaire dragon. And you’re eating for two. Or five.”
As she ordered, Taichi’s phone buzzed in his pocket. A single letter appeared on the screen.
R.
He looked up. Across the street, a sleek black car had pulled to the curb. The driver’s window was down. He couldn’t see the occupant’s face, but he knew. The connection was a thrum in his blood, answering the low pull in his belly.
“He’s here, isn’t he?” Hana murmured, her bravado fading into a note of awe.
Taichi stood, leaving cash on the table. The hunger inside him, quiet during their talk, surged again at the proximity of its source. Not just for food.
“Thank you, Hana.”
“Go on,” she said, shooing him with a wave, her eyes on the car. “Feed the beast. Both of them.”
He walked out into the afternoon light, the hum in his bones becoming a clear, resonant call. He didn’t look back at the café, or at Hana’s worried, wondering face. He looked only at the dark window of the car, and the promise of warmth, and the end of the gnawing emptiness.