Finn squeezes his eyes shut and exhales through his nose. Embarrassment turns his palms sweaty and sets his empty stomach roiling.
When Nix rounds the corner, his hair is sticking up with static from his hat, and his nose twitches at the scent of melted cheese and spices.
Maybe if Finn wishes hard enough, the pizza would return to its former heart-shaped glory. Perhaps if the Goddess is kind, They have suddenly imbued him with the Talent to stop time.
He cracks an eye open.
Nope. Still extraterrestrial—and horrifyingly so. As if Dexter and Ellen Ripley had collaborated on a cooking show and won forMost Macabre, Space-Themed Crime Scene Pie.
Nix, pink-cheeked from the cold, unwinds his striped scarf, blinking at the pizza and then at Finn. “Oh. Wow. Uh…you made dinner? It looks…delicious.”
Sure it does. If you like your pizza looking like it belongs onCSI: Star Wars.
“It’s pizza.” Finn thinks if he tells Nix what it’s supposed to be, his mate won’t think about what it’s not: heart-shaped and appetizing.
Nix tilts his head. “Yeah, I got that. Smells amazing, but, uh…why does it look like a murdered alien?”
“It’s not an alien,” Finn mutters, scowling at the clearly alien-shaped pizza. He can’t deny that the sauce and pepperoni make it look like the poor visitorhad been made over by a serial killer. “Who makes an alien for Valentine’s Day?”
Nix grins, already pulling out his phone—the camera app open, the shutter click-click-clicking. “I like it. Was this supposed to be a distress signal to the Mother Ship’s CSI unit?”
“It’s a heart. For Valentine’s Day.” Finn turns the pan this way and that, trying—praying—to find an angle that maybe resembles the symbol of love he’d intended it to be. “A culinary symbol of love.”
Nix hums theStar Warstheme as he snaps more and more photos. There’s even a whoosh as he attaches one to a text. The phone in Finn’s pocket tells him it was sent to the pack’s group chat.
“Nix.” Finn isn’t proud that it sounds like a whine. “Please delete those.”
“No way. This is evidence, Finnie. Chain of custody and everything. The forensics team will want samples for testing.”
“Nix—”
“I mean, for real. NASA should really know about this discovery. Wait—this might actually be Area 51 worthy…”
Finn groans, rubbing a hand down his face. “It’s not that bad.” He opens the utensil drawer and, after some unnecessarily aggressive (it was totally necessary) rummaging, brandishes the pizza cutter.
Using the sharp blade is remarkably cathartic as the alien-esque face is reduced to several misshapen slices of cheese-laden dough. It looks less like a crime after it’s been disassembled than when it was whole.
Nix wastes no time grabbing a slice and inspecting it. Taking a huge bite, he hums and, with full cheeks, says, “Finnie! This is really good. Mmm.” He winks, licking sauce off his fingers. “You nailed the cheese blend, and the crust is perfect. So chewy.”
The sight short-circuits Finn’s nervous system, and for a moment he forgets to be embarrassed about his pepperoni-scented culinary failure.
He did? It is?
Taking his own bite, Finn chews thoughtfully—hot, cheesy goodness combined with the right ratio of pepperoni and sauce on a surprisinglygood crust. “Not too bad.”
Nix grins. “This pizza is like the universe—chaotic, mysterious, but ultimately beautiful.”
Like you,Finn thinks as he tries not to focus on the tiny dot of sauce on his mate’s perfect nose or his satisfied food noises that sound a lot like other ones Finn likes to hear coming out of his omega’s mouth.
Regardless, he still manages to roll his eyes. “You’re spending too much time with Luca.”
“No such thing.” Nix flips an oddly shaped slice upside down, as if daring the toppings to ooze off in a final humiliating ode to Finn’s cooking debacle. “Look! It even defies the laws of physics.”
Finn snorts. “Love and pizza both transcend space and time.” He means for it to sound like a joke, but it comes out more like the declaration of devotion it truly is.
“Yeah, they do. All jokes aside, thanks for making this. It’s delicious.” Nix leans in, brushing flour (or sauce?) from Finn’s cheek. “And besides, one thing’s for sure.”
“What’s that?”
