Whoever said space was cold, never found love from the stars ... Some people never learn. This is the tune playing once again in Alex Beaumont’s head when he sees a vision in white attracting odd glances in the quiet little seaside resort of Padstow. He came to get away from it all, to bury himself in work, to forget every man he ever falls for eventually needs to get away ... from him. Adrift in the universe, Mani searches for a place to call home. The planet he finds is cold and inhospitable, not at all what he was expecting. He feels lost and alone, until a stranger’s smile warms him. And with that smile comes another kind of heat, one he’s never before experienced. Love is not what Alex ever imagined it to be. They say space is infinite, but the distance between what Alex wants and what he has experienced romantically seems to be growing ... until now. Like a shooting star, he’s about to fall long and hard. Will he crash and burn, or find the love he’s always dreamed of when looking at the night sky?

Space, Man

Alex sank into the seat behind him, putting his hands up to his face, his fingers clawing into his hair, as though trying to keep his brain inside his skull. Nausea crawled through his stomach; breathing grew tight.


“You’re an alien,” he panted. “A goddamn alien is standing in my mother’s living room.”


Mani crouched in front of him and gently touched one of his hands. Alex gazed out at him from under the untidy slept-on cloud of his hair.


Good to hear, but that didn’t even come close to giving Alex all the information he needed. “Where do you come from?” he managed to gasp out.


“Why are you here? I mean, are you going to harvest the human race or something equally nasty?”


A small frown now accompanied the smile. Alas, the expression just made Mani look adorable. “I was just looking around. Your planet seemed…interesting.”


Chapter 13