“Look. I don’t want to push you into anything, but do you maybe want to —” “Call Magnus? Look, that’s a dead end, I know you’re trying to be helpful, but —”
“—kiss me?” Jace finished.
Alec looked as if he were about to fall off his chair. “WHAT? What? What?”
“Once what would do.” Jace did his best to look as if this were the sort of
suggestion one made all the time. “I think it might help.”
Alec looked at him with something like horror. “You don’t mean that.”
“Why wouldn’t I mean it?”
“Because you’re the straightest person I know. Possibly the straightest
person in the universe.”
“Exactly,” Jace said, and leaned forward, and kissed Alec on the mouth.
The kiss lasted approximately four seconds before Alec pulled forcefully
away, throwing his hands up as if to ward Jace off from coming at him again.
He looked as if he were about to throw up. “By the Angel,” he said. “Don’t
ever do that again.”
“Oh yeah?” Jace grinned, and almost meant it. “That bad?”
“Like kissing my brother,” said Alec, with a look of horror in his eyes.
“I thought you might feel that way.” Jace crossed his arms over his chest.
“Also, I’m hoping we can just gloss over all the irony in what you just said.”
“We can gloss over whatever you want to,” Alec said fervently. “Just don’t kiss me again.”