“To post online?” he nodded vigorously. “Okay. I’ll do it.”
“Not to post online,” I said. I wasn’t magically a different person, after all. I was still semi-famous as an asshole. The last thing I wanted was for him to get abuse on the internet because of who he was dating. I hadn’t had social media for a long time, but if he posted on his, I would surely be recognized. “To send to our friends. With love hearts around it. Remember?”
“Which ones?” Ace asked. He didn’t even hesitate.
“All of them. The wedding group.”
He only thought about it for a second before he nodded. “I told you – anything you want. Take it now.”
For a moment, I thought about not taking it at all. The agreement was enough. But there was still a little flash of doubt in my mind. We’d kissed in public before, after all – taken risks. Xavi had caught us. But going fully public and telling everyone we were together was a completely different thing. Maybe if I pressed him on it, he would chicken out at the last second and stop me.
“Alright,” I said. I lifted my phone in the air, turning on the camera. “Cute boyfriends pose – ready?”
“Ready,” Ace said with determination, not even questioning the word ‘boyfriend’, and then turned on the sunniest, most beautiful smile I had ever seen towards the lens.
I snapped the shutter, our heads close together, our bodies entwined, the angle of the shot from above so it was obvious we were closer than just friends. I had to take a second to look at the image, just look at it, before I did anything else. My hands were shaking.
“What?” Ace asked. “Aren’t you going to post it?”
He was so eager it almost made me laugh. “You’re that keen?”
“If I can’t have you until this is done, then I need it to be done now,” he said fervently. “Five minutes ago. Yesterday. Last week.”
I chuckled and shook my head. “Damn it, Ace.”
“What’s the hold-up?” he asked impatiently.
“I was just thinking about how damn beautiful you are,” I said, leaning over to kiss him again. I could feel his heart hammering through his thin t-shirt, his pulse racing against my hand when I touched his neck. “Alright. Here we go.”
I found our group chat, where we’d organized the whole trip, and sent the photo. It only took me a few seconds to think of the caption. Ace had tacitly agreed to the wording already, after all.
Cute new boyfriends pose time
Ace breathed, and I felt his whole body relax. It was done – and he didn’t want to go screaming down the street like I’d thought he might. Instead, he tucked his head against my shoulder. I saw his reflection in my phone screen as we both watched three moving dots indicate that someone in the group was typing. He looked… peaceful.
Out of all the expressions I had expected, peaceful was the least among them.
I held him tighter against my side.
The first ping announced a reply, and I quickly read it out loud. “Xavi says… yawn, old news?”
Ace snorted. “How can it be old news if we only just agreed on it? He’s cheating, anyway. He saw us.”
“I’ll tell him that,” I said. I typed out my message:Okay, we know you saw us. But this news is for everyone else!
The blinking dots were replaced by a message from Olly.We already knew, too.
I tilted my head.
“What? How?” Ace muttered.
We saw you kiss that first night at the hotel, Keaton wrote as if he had heard.I saw you getting thrown out so we rushed after you to see if you were okay. And… you were!He finished the message with a thumbs up and a winking face that had me groaning and shaking my head.
I saw you in the hotel corridor as well, Cade posted.In the hallway on the last day – we had to duck inside our room so we wouldn’t get a free porn show!
It was nauseating, Aiden confirmed.
“Oh, my god,” I said, laughing in surprise. “They all already knew.”
