Page 67 of Not All Himbos Wear Capes
I narrowed my eyes as she glided down the hallway toward the elevator. “What are you up to, Kai?”
She spun around with an exaggerated show of innocence. “Moi? I’m going to work and then rehearsal.” The elevator dinged, and she danced inside, leaving me with nothing but the echo of her sing-song voice. “There’s nothing to see heeere…”
And she wonders why I don’t date women!
Slamming my door, I stalked to where I’d carelessly discarded my phone among the empties, intending to text Kai with a mild death threat. I cursed when I saw my battery was dead, but this annoyance turned to horror as I realized the phoneitself was probably fried because of my proximity to Apocalypto Man last night.
FUCK!!!
Glancing at my watch, I breathed a sigh of relief to see I had hours to go before Butch got out of work and called me like I’d asked him to.
Unless he tries to contact me before then…
I raced into my bedroom to throw on some fresh clothes before acknowledging that I did, in fact, smell like ‘swampy man ass.’ Cranking up one of my few supe strengths, I took the world's fastest shower, quickly redressed, and headed down to the garage for my car.
An hour later, I was leaving the store with a new phone in hand and a splitting headache from being forced to deal with people. There were no new messages or missed calls from Butch, but the idiotic technician at the ‘genius bar’ said it may take another hour for everything to download from the omnipresent cloud.
They should try hiring some actual geniuses.
The last thing I wanted to do was return to an empty apartment, so I drove to my warehouse lair. Thanks to my father’s request, the idea of working on my ray gun made my anxiety spike, so I gave up on being productive and took out a WaveRunner instead.
I didn’t know what made me put on my supersuit. Maybe because it was one of the most comfortable things I owned, or that it had special features I could access if something went wrong. Most likely it was that, when I wore it, I got to feel like something more than a slightly enhanced human who didn’t belong among either normies or supes.
Tearing around the Bay worked some of the angst out of my system, even if I was constantly looking over my shoulder for a Biggs police patrol or Captain Masculine.
I haven’t seen much of the big guy lately…
Somehow, I ended up drifting offshore by the secluded beach I’d recently brought Butch to.Ourbeach. Just as I morosely wondered if we’d ever have another chance to pick through microplastics together, my phone buzzed inside my waterproof pocket. I almost dropped it into the depths when I saw it was a message from Butch.
Hottie Himbo:The answer will always be yes, Xan.
I dropped my face into my hands as overwhelming relief washed over me. There was no way to tell exactly when Butch had sent the text, but at some point, he’d decided this relationship was worth fighting for.
ThatIwas worth fighting for.
The events of last night instantly dissolved, along with the stress I’d been carrying today. None of it mattered, because despite our seemingly incompatible existences, Butch and I were going to be together in the end.
As I finished resetting my psychological baseline, I considered my next steps. The first thing would be to see if the USN had information on how supes and normies could legally be together. Then I needed to figure out a way to fulfill my father’s ominous request while laying the groundwork to cut ties with my family completely.
For Butch.
Forus.
Before I could get too sentimental, a pulse of power brushed against my skin, making me tense. My head shot up, and I was startled to findButchsitting on the cliff surrounding the beach.
No, wait…
The way the sun was positioned behind the figure made it difficult to see, butsomethingwas familiar about their particular build… the way they rose to stand.
Oh, fuck.
It was Captain Masculine.
He was close enough to attack, and I’d been too busy mooning over Butch’s text to sense him watching me. Moving as subtly as possible, I slipped my phone back into my pocket and discreetly reached for the submarine function on my WaveRunner. Before I could hit the switch, the Captain raised his hand, and I braced for a fiery death.
Then hewaved.
I gaped at the hero and cocked my head, as if a slightly different angle might explain the mystery of what had just happened.
