It was still early in the evening, and there was only one other vampire party across the bar at a reserved table. Standing against the bar itself were pockets of humans that had poured in from the front street entrance.
Bite Back was a vampire bar first, but it served regular alcoholic drinks, and a lot of humans liked to come in for the risk, the vibes, or the opportunity to pick up or be picked up by a vampire. By midnight it would be packed.
Luis’s pocket buzzed again, and across the table Karim’s eyes flickered up to him as he pocketed his phone.
Before he could give Karim the satisfaction of pulling out his phone to check, Minnie popped up beside their table.
Minnie was a small thing, but her acid green hair and steel-toed boots meant people didn’t often try to fuck with her. Just a month ago he’d seen Minnie strongarm a drunk human out the backdoor when they’d gotten belligerent.
“If it ain’t my favorite regulars,” Minnie smiled at them, but her gaze stayed on Julien. Minnie’s interest had never been subtle, but to Luis’s knowledge, Julien had never reciprocated. Not from Minnie or Gabe or Olly or Alexander.
Probably because they’re monogamous. Luis was going to bring that up to Cassie the next time she tried to push it.
“So, who’s first, Jay?” Minnie asked. She had the scheduler in hand and was scrolling through it. “Your regular just came in, Fineus.”
Julien turned toward Karim. “Darling, I think you should go first, you've had a hard week.”
Karim nodded, already starting to slide out of the chair. He looked exhausted, Luis realized.
Minnie tapped something at the device. “Great, back in a bit,” she said, and then led Karim back to the privacy curtains at the rear of the bar.
“He okay?” Luis asked, when he was certain Karim was out of earshot.
For a moment Julien didn’t reply. He was still looking in the direction of the curtains. There was no discernible expression on his face, but that didn’t mean there was nothing going on. Julien kept everything locked up tight.
“It’s been a difficult week,” Julien said again with a sigh. “There was… an anniversary this week, one that’s always hard for him. And then there was a problem with the website. Some kind of data loss, andapparentlyGerald hadn’t backed up recently, so we lost a lot of inventory listings. It took two days to get it running again, and Karim took on rewriting the listings himself and personally emailing the clients whose orders ended up lost. It was a good distraction, but he’s run himself a bit ragged.”
An anniversary? Luis wanted to ask, but it likely wasn’t Luis’s business.
Julien continued to gaze at the curtain. Luis could just pick out the tensed muscle in his jaw.
“Gerald sounds bad at his job,” Luis settled on instead. “Isn’t this like the fourth thing he hasn’t been able to manage for you guys?”
“Yes,” Julien said. “But he’s a favor to a family friend, even if he really doesn’t have the experience we need.”
A favor?
Luis kept his mouth shut on the offer he wanted to make. Website management actuallywasLuis's day job. He’d discreetly taken a look at Julien and Karim’s antique business website a few times, unable to help himself, and mentally bookmarked at least a dozen things that needed to be fixed.
Luis had offered once before to do the fixes, but Julien had politely turned him down. At the time it had stung as a rejection. He’d only known them two months then, and had taken that to mean Julien didn’t want or trust him to do the work.
It soothed that old wound to learn now that Gerald was a favor. The rejection hadn’t been personal.
“That sounds… like a headache.”
“Quite.” Julien waved his hand, as though to dispel smoke. He turned away from the curtain. “But that’s behind us now. We are here to relax, right?”
He smiled at Luis. It was like an arrow to the heart every time, that smile. But it didn’t mean anything. Julien and Karim were married. They’d celebrated their fifty-second anniversary last year.
To crush on either of them was the definition of futile.
Or the definition of pathetic.
“Tell me, did you have a chance to watchLa Belle et la Bêtethis week?” Julien asked.
“Yeah, I watched it,” Luis said, reaching for his drink for something to do with his hands. “Didn’t have the same… uh, charm as the Disney film.”
Julien smiled again, and Luis averted his eyes so he wouldn’t fumble his words like he’d done a handful of times before. “Charm, yes. Disney does make very… charming monsters. But the actor in Cocteau’s film, Jean Marais, he has his own charms, I think,” Julien said. “He and Cocteau made a very handsome couple in their time.”
