Chapter Seventeen #2
“I mean, I can, but what kind of movie?” Scrolling through the tablet offered a lot of options.
“Romance?” Julien suggested.
Karim made a face. “Action,” he countered.
“Action-romance?” Luis suggested. Karim groaned.
It took another ten minutes to find something with a good plot and some romance that Luis didn’t think would offend too much.
The lights in the room went down as the movie started. Luis settled in and he found, at some point when he hadn’t been paying attention, Karim and Julien had both scooted in closer.
Much closer. As in, their thighs were now definitely brushing his own.
Luis tried to focus on the screen. On his left, Karim had slouched down, making himself comfortable but also almost leaning into Luis. Julien was still keeping some distance, but he could still feel his presence.
The ex-lovers assassin plot on screen started taking shape, but Luis kept getting distracted. Karim would shift or Julien would make a soft oh subvocalization about something happening on the screen, and Luis’s heart rate would pick up. His skin would prickle where they were touching.
Thirty minutes later, when Julien’s phone rang, Luis jumped, too tense for the unexpected sound. Julien quickly grabbed for it, apologizing.
“You’re supposed to silence your phone for a movie,” Karim whispered.
Julien let out a belabored sign. “It’s the emergency ring, I have to take this,” Julien got up and slipped out.
Luis watched him go. “Should we pause the movie?”
Karim was already doing so. “Emergency ringtone means it’s something with the site.”
“Again?”
“Yeah. Again,” Karim said, clear annoyance in his voice. “I’m going to have to fire Gerald. Julien doesn’t have the heart to do it, and we can’t keep going on like this.”
“He seems terrible at the job,” Luis said.
“Not even degreed or anything, self-taught. Not that you can’t be good at it with self-teaching,” Karim said, “but he’s just not.”
“I’ve looked at your site,” Luis admitted, “there’s a lot of bugs that he should’ve fixed like… a while ago.” Not that Luis had been keeping tabs on it.
Karim looked at him thoughtfully. “You do website stuff, don’t you?” Karim’s phone buzzing interrupted him. He grabbed it and read through a text, then quickly typed something back. “Julien will be a while, he said we could go on without him. What do you think?”
Luis shrugged. “I guess? Does he need help though?”
But Karim was shaking his head. “No, if I go in there, I’m just going to fire Gerald and it won’t be nicely either. Jules always gets annoyed when I do stuff like that without discussion first.”
“Ah.” Luis could definitely see that.
“Best to leave him to it until I get the green light.” Karim grabbed the remote. “Movie?”
“Yeah, alright,” Luis conceded, and the movie started again.
Karim had kept silent while Julien was in the room, but now he started a running commentary on the characters and plot holes as they watched.
“There is no way a normal human would get up after that,” Karim said when at the climax the assassin took an eight-story leap to the ground and then kept going.
“He’s clearly not a normal human,” Luis replied. The amount of damage he’d taken and kept going with was bordering on comical.
“It would make more sense if they’d just made him a vampire,” Karim added.
Luis had to agree.
“There’s only one rule you shouldn’t break,” Karim mocked, whispering in his ear ten minutes later. Luis got goosebumps. He and Karim were touching from shoulder to thigh, and man’s weight and heat was pressing into him. “So, what does he do?”
“It’s no fun if he doesn’t break the big rule. It’s movie law,” Luis said.
“So predictable though.”
“Oh, so you foresaw the evil twin brother twist?” Luis asked with a laugh.
“No, but I knew something was fishy, the way he cornered her, his hand like–” Karim demonstrated by sliding his own hand up Luis’s thigh. All of Luis’s thoughts stuttered to a stop. “Talk about a tone-shift.”
“Right,” Luis said even though he no longer had any idea what Karim was talking about.
The vampire lifted his hand off with a laugh. “Enough to distract me, make me question things.”
Luis swallowed hard, keeping his eyes on the screen. “Yeah,” he said.
On the screen something exploded, which helped cover his uneven breathing.
Get a hold of yourself, he’s just messing with you.
“That was fun,” Karim said when the credits began to roll. “Good choice,” he said, patting Luis’s thigh. “Makes no sense that they expect you to believe a human can survive all that, but I was entertained.”
“Thanks,” Luis said. He wanted to push into the touch, wanted to shove Karim’s hand away.
“Too bad Julien missed the rest, he would’ve liked the ending,” Karim said, “he’s a sucker for a love-triangle ending in a throuple.”
Luis could tell he was being teased by the way Karim said it, but his cheeks still got hot. “I didn’t expect her to want them both,” Luis said.
Karim’s thumb began to rub idle shapes against his jeans.
Arousal spurred to life so fast that Luis had to concentrate on not jerking away guilty.
“Well, they both brought something different to the table. Steadiness versus danger. Reliability versus excitement. Sometimes you want a little of both…” Karim crooned.
Luis cleared his throat. “Right. Yeah.”
That thumb was still moving. “Did you like the ending?” Karim asked.
Luis turned his head to look at him, and they were close, so close.
“I did, yeah,” Luis said. “I don’t like love triangles.”
The corners of Karim’s mouth tipped up. “Me either. I don’t believe anyone should be left out.”
“Me either.” Luis’s throat was dry. He licked his lips and watched Karim’s eyes follow the motion.
Heat spiked through him.
“Luis,” Karim’s voice was almost a whisper, his breath tickling Luis’s cheek.
“Yeah?” His nerves were buzzing, his pulse thumping hard. Was it–was he–?
“Can I–?”
Karim’s phone started ringing loudly, making them both jump.
“For fucks sake,” Karim groaned as he pulled out his phone, hand sliding off of Luis. “What?” He barked into the phone.
There was an exchange with Julien, but Luis’s head was a swirl of thoughts about what had just happened. Had they almost…?
“You understand I’m going to fire him, right?” Karim growled. His eyes flickered back to Luis briefly, an up-and-down that made a new wave of heat wash over him.
He wasn’t imagining it. It was real.
But what was it? And was it allowed?
“Alright, coming. Just a second.” Karim hung up the phone and then levered himself to his feet. “Julien’s requested help, c’mon.”
Luis stood on autopilot. “Okay.”
“We’ll come back to this later,” Karim added as he led the way out.
Luis didn’t think he meant the movie.
“Okay,” he said again.
By the time they arrived at the office, Luis had shoved what had happened in a box. He wasn’t going to jump to anything. He was practicing being a braver person, but there was a line between making himself go to the grocery store and kissing a vampire’s devoted husband.
But as they entered the room and Karim threw him a glance, Luis couldn’t help but hear those words again, spoken soft but earnestly.
I don’t believe anyone should be left out.