Multiple people turned to look at her, and she thanked God her dark skin protected her from flushing red.
“Someone stepped on my foot,” she explained to no one because they’d already forgotten about her. Their focus was back on the scene that was playing out in front of them. Through a plexiglass window, she could see that two women were currently using a double-sided dildo. Stella leaned forward, tilting her head to the side as the women shifted positions. She couldn’t understand how they could possibly be comfortable like that, but by the way one was throwing her head back in ecstasy, Stella imagined she was enjoying it, although over the music (and maybe the walls of the room were soundproof?), she couldn’t actually hear anything, which was weird. Did people like to just watch with no sound? It was like watching porn on mute, and that was something Stella could do at home.
She broke away from the crowd, turning on her heel tooquickly to stop her body from colliding directly with the tall and broad-shouldered man who was standing right behind her. Stella also couldn’t prevent her boobs, which often had a mind of their own, from pressing directly into the glass in his hand, tipping it over, and spilling his drink down the front of his white pressed shirt.
“Fuck me,” Stella muttered.
The man, who’d been staring down at the stain now spreading on his shirt, looked up at her then and his lips twitched.
“If that’s what you wanted, all you had to do was ask.”
Three
Maximo “Max” Martinez Williams did not want to be out tonight.
For starters, it was Valentine’s Day. Max wasn’t anti–V Day like some other single people, but that didn’t mean he wanted to spend his evening—a work night, no less—dodging happy couples fawning all over each other on the streets of New York. And he certainly didnotwant to spend the night in a sex club.
Unfortunately, as was the case his entire life, he could not figure out how to say no to his younger brother, Miles.
When Miles had appeared at Max’s office a few hours earlier, Max should’ve known trouble was afoot. Max had been in the middle of signing off on a new project one of his teams at AIX, his artificial intelligence company, wanted to launch. It was all about expanding the capabilities of voice recognition to understand multiple languages without having to change the settings, making them more ideal for bilingualhouseholds. Max, who’d been born and raised in the Dominican Republic for the first seven years of his life before being adopted by white parents who didn’t know Spanish, thought the idea was brilliant. Not only would it make communicating with their technology more seamless, but it could also help multilingual families communicate with each other. He couldn’t wait to see the project take form.
Max had been so lost in looking over the proposal, it had taken him a minute to realize Miles was leaning against his doorway.
“How long have you been standing there?”
Miles pushed off the doorframe with a grin and bounded over to Max’s desk, shifting some papers so he could sit on top of it even though there were two available chairs. Max rolled his eyes.
In looks, Max and Miles were almost twins. They had the same dark brown skin, hazel eyes, and over-six-feet height that had practically forced them both onto the basketball team in school. (Miles stuck with it through college; Max didn’t even make the junior varsity team.)
They both kept their hair short and buzzed to a nice fade, but whereas Max was broad and big-boned, as his mother liked to say, Miles was on the lankier side, always in the gym trying to build muscle mass even though his body continued to resist.
Where they most differed, however, were their personalities. Whether nature or nurture was to blame, Max was always the responsible elder sibling who preferred tinkering with code rather than going to parties, and Miles was theyounger brother who constantly broke the rules and somehow always got away with it.
Despite this, ever since Max had returned home to New York to build his company rather than go to San Francisco, where most of his competitors were based, Max made time to see Miles and at least attempt to keep him out of trouble, something Miles didn’t always appreciate. Still, Max loved his little brother, and no one knew him better than Miles.
“Happy Valentine’s Day, bro!”
Miles held out a fist, which Max simply stared at for a moment before bumping his own fist against it.
“I didn’t realize this was a holiday you celebrated,” Max said, focusing his attention back on the proposal.
“Love is love, my brother,” Miles said. “Isn’t that what your people say?”
Byyour people, Miles meant the LGBTQIA+ community. Max came out as bisexual to his family years ago, yet in moments like this, he wondered if perhaps staying in the closet wasn’t the better option.
“What do you want, Miles?”
“What makes you think I want something?” Miles asked.
Max only gave his brother a sidelong look.
“Alright fine. I need you to come out to a club with me tonight,” Miles said.
“No,” Max said, not even looking up this time.
“Come on. I need you to tell me if it’s a good investment or not, and you are the most impartial person I know.”
“Still no,” Max said.
