Page 73 of Bourbon & Blood

La Croix smiled, but it wasn’t a nice thing. I maybe was a bittoofamiliar with him when I pinched him. He looked down at me sharply and raised an eyebrow. I gave him a meaningful look right back that I hope conveyed –don’t antagonize my friend.

La Croix’s face split into an affectionate smile then, like I had done something cute. Like the same kind of smile you would turn onto a kitten that was trying to be fierce, or like… like a Pomeranian. I scowled and his smile only grew bigger.

“Wow,” Dorian said. “Okay, then.”

“What?” I asked.

“You two have known each other, what? Two days? Three?” he asked.

“So?” I asked carefully, thinking thattechnically,I had only known La Croix a couple three days, but La Croix? La Croix had been watching me for what had to be a very long time. I think he knew far more about me than I could even begin to imagine.

“So, y’all giving some serious long-term couple’s vibes already,” Dorian said. “And I wouldn’t believe it if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes just now, but it’s… it’s kind of cute.”

“Confusing, isn’t it?” I asked softly, and he nodded, giving me a look of understanding and empathy rolled into one.

“Hopefully it’s good, though. Hopefully, itstaysgood,” he said.

La Croix simply gave Dorian a nod and something passed between them. I wasn’t sure what, though. Gay or not, Dorian was still a guy, and it was like I had just witnessed something under a strict guy code.

“You walkin’ with us, brother?” La Croix asked and Dorian nodded.

“How was your night?” La Croix asked me as we struck out, his arm around my shoulders, Dorian walking on the other side of me.

“Oh, my God! We had a bridezilla and I swear her bachelorettes were like mini velociraptors,” I said.

Dorian regaled La Croix with tales of drunken fuckery out of the bride and her party and the absolute meltdown that ensued when it came out that the maid of honor had been fucking the groom-to-be for like the last six months. Predictably, the bride had lost her shit. A catfight had ensued and before the bouncers could wade in, the mother-of-the-bride had broken a martini glass and had stabbed the maid of honor in her boob. Somehow, in doing so, she’d managed to go deep enough to pop the poor girl’s saline breast implant. So,sheended up packed off in an ambulance. The bride was carried off by the rest of her girls, and Momzilla had been taken away by NOPD, screaming about suing the bar; for what, we had no idea but good luck with that, I guess.

La Croix had just shaken his head and had glanced down to me and asked, “You were safe enough, right?”

“Of course! I was behind the bar the whole time and the bar is like Fort Knox. You have to know how the switches work to get back there.”

“Unless someone jumps over it, but you’d have to practically be a gymnast to do that,” Dorian added.

“Exactly,” I said.

We reached my apartment building and La Croix said, “I plan on takin’ Alina with me out to my place. Y’all got a way to talk via the internet? Ain’t no cell service out that way.”

“I can hit you up on social media to check on you,” Dorian said, and I smiled at him.

“I’ll be sure to connect to the internet this time and stay in touch,” I promised. I gave Dorian a hug. “Give my love to Marcus.”

“I will,” he said, giving me a squeeze.

“Later,” he said to La Croix and La Croix nodded at him.

We went inside, and as soon as the lobby door was shut, I said softly, “Thank you.”

“For what?” he asked, following me up the stairs.

“For being nice,” I answered, and I swear I heard him chuckle.

“Not my usual deal, I promise you,” he said.

“I know, which is why I said ‘thank you,’” I replied as I unlocked the apartment’s front door.

His chuckle was unmistakable that time.

“You feel up to a ride tonight?” I asked.

---