“Hey, wait a minute, why don’t you get any evenings off?” he demanded with a frown as he did the math. Shit, what the hell was that butler doing, working this female to the bone—
“Oh, I do, but I never take them. I don’t like to simply sit around.”
Tohr rubbed an eyebrow with his thumb.
“If you’ll excuse me,” she murmured, “I’ll go down to the training center and get started now.”
“When will you be finished.”
“Probably about four in the afternoon.”
“Okay.” As she turned away, he put a hand on her forearm. “Ah, listen, if you go into the locker room during daylight hours, always knock and announce yourself, ’kay?”
The last thing anyone needed was her getting a gander at one of his naked brothers.
“Oh, of course. I always do.”
As she disappeared around the corner, he watched her go, her limping form carrying an innate dignity that he abruptly felt he hadn’t been honoring.
“We have a date, remember?”
Glancing to the right, he shook his head at Lassiter. “Not in the mood.”
“Tough shit. Come on—I’ve got it all set up.”
“Look, no offense, but I’m not good company now—”
“When are you ever?”
“I really don’t—”
“Blah, blah, blah. Shut the fuck up and get your ass in gear.”
As the angel grabbed hold and pulled, Tohr gave up the fight and allowed himself to be dragged up the staircase and down the hall of statues—and out the other side. They went past his room, past the boys’ rooms, past Z and Bella and Nalla’s suite. Out into the staff quarters. Over to the entrance to the movie theater.
Tohr stopped dead. “If this is another Beaches marathon, I’m going to Bette your ass until you can’t sit down.”
“Aw, look at you! Trying to be finny.”
“Seriously, if you have any compassion in you at all, you’ll let me go to bed—”
“I have peanut M&M’s up there.”
“Not my style.”
“Raisinets.”
“Feh.”
“Sam Adams.”
Tohr narrowed his eyes. “Cold?”
“Downright icy.”
Tohr crossed his arms over his chest and told himself he was not pouting like a five-year-old. “I want Milk Duds.”
“Got ’em. And popcorn.”
With a curse, Tohr yanked open the door and ascended into the dimly lit red cave. The angel made everything seamless once they got up there: Deep-dish ass palaces engaged. Sam Adams with backups on the floor in a bucket with ice. An embarrassing caloric display with, yup, a yellow box of Milk Duds. And the damn popcorn.
They sat down side by side, and kicked up the footrests.
“Tell me this isn’t a fifties-era sex-ed film,” Tohr muttered.
“Nah. Popcorn?” the angel said as he hit play and offered a bowl. “Extra butter—the good plastic kind, too. Not that bullshit real cow crap.”
“I’m okay right now.”
Up on the screen, some movie studio’s intro played along with a bunch of credits. And then there were two old people sitting on a couch. Talking.
Tohr took a pull of his beer. “What the hell is this?”
“When Harry Met Sally.”
Tohr lowered the longneck from his mouth. “What?”
“Shut it. After this, we’re going to watch an episode of Moonlighting. Then An Affair to Remember—the old-school one, not that stupidity with Warren Beatty. Then The Princess Bride—”
Tohr hit the switch by his hip and straightened the chair up. “Okay. Right. Have fun with this—”
Lassiter hit pause and clamped a hard hand on his shoulder. “Sit the fuck back. Watch and learn.”
“What? How much I hate rom-coms? How ’bout we just stipulate that and let me go.”
“You’re going to need this.”
“For my second career as a pussy?”
“Because you have to remember how to be romantic.”
Tohr shook his head. “No. Nope. Not going to happen…”
As he hopped on the over-my-dead-body train, Lassiter just kept shaking his head. “You gotta remember it’s possible, buddy.”
“The hell I do—”
“You’re stalled, Tohr. And whereas you might have time to fart around, Wellsie doesn’t have that luxury.”
Tohr shut up. Sat back. Started to pick off the label on his beer. “I can’t do that, man. I can’t pretend to feel… that way.”
“Kind of like you can’t have sex with No’One? Just how long do you plan on going on like you are?”
“Until you disappear. Until Wellsie’s free and you’re gone.”
“And how’s that working for you. You like that dream you woke up with today?”
“Movies aren’t going to help,” he said after a moment.
“What else are you going to do? Jack off in your room until No’One comes back from work—then jack off next to her? Oh, wait, let me guess—pace around aimlessly. Because it’s not like you’ve ever done that before.” Lassiter shoved the bowl he’d offered into Tohr’s face. “What the fuck is it going to cost you to hang here with me. Shut up and eat your half of the popcorn, asshole.”
Tohr accepted what was in his grill only because it was either that or he ended up with Orville all over his lap.
One hour and thirty-six minutes later, he had to clear his throat as Meg Ryan told Billy Crystal that she hated him in the middle of a New Year’s Eve party.
“Sauce on the side,” Lassiter said as he got up. “The answer to everything.”
A minute later, young Bruce Willis came onscreen, and Tohr sent up a prayer of thanks. “This is much better. We need more beer, though.”
“Got it.”
A case of lager later and they had blown through two epis of Moonlighting, including a Christmas one where the cast and crew sang along with the actors in the last scene.
Which did not make him clear his throat again.
Really. It didn’t.
Then they tried to get through An Affair to Remember. At least until Lassiter took pity on them both and started to rock the fast-forward button.
“Chicks say this is the greatest,” the angel muttered, as he hit the button again and whoever it was started speed-emoting. “Maybe this one was a mistake.”
“Amen on that.”
Okay, the princess movie did not suck—that shit was funny in places. And, yeah, it was… cool when the pair got together at the end. Plus he liked Columbo as the granddad. But he couldn’t really say any of it was turning him into a Casanova.
Lassiter glanced over. “We’re not done yet.”
“Just keep beering me.”
“Ask and ye shall receive.”
The angel handed him a freshie and disappeared into the control room to switch DVDs. As he came back down to where they were sitting, the screen lit up with—
Tohr jacked forward in his seat. “What the hell!”
As Lassiter’s big body cut through the projection onto the screen, a gigantic pair of flapping breasts covered his face and chest. “Adventures in the MILFy Way. A true classic.”
“It’s porn!”
“Duh—”
“Okay, I am not sitting through this with you.”
The angel, still standing up, shrugged. “Just wanted to make sure you know what you’re missing.”
Moans rumbled through the surround sound as those boobs… those frickin’ boobs looked like they were slapping Lassiter in the piehole—
Tohr covered his eyes at the horror. “No! Not doing this!”
Lassiter cut off the movie, the sounds disappearing. And a quick intrafinger check indicated that it was a stop, not a pause, mercifully.
“I’m just trying to get through to you.” Lassiter sat down, cracked open a beer, and looked tired. “Man, this angel crap… it’s so fucking hard to influence anything. I’ve never had a problem with free will before, but for shit’s sake, I wish I could just I Dream of Jeannie you to where you need to be.” As Tohr winced, the angel muttered, “It’s okay, though. We’ll get you there somehow—”