Doubull Indemnity

16

Isla, L̶u̶c̶k̶y̶ Bad Penny

Greg covered for me. Without missing a beat, Greggy covered for me. Kept covering for me. He lied to his own hot, posh client to cover for disastrous old me.

The door slammed shut behind Dagny, and Greg's shoulders relaxed. Just a fraction. A little, teeny bit. And it reminded me of his stretch on the hotel sofa. Of that lazy, relaxed way he woke up. Slow and steady as the tide coming in, and suddenly a yearning current swept me out to sea too. I rode the wave till I came crashing down against the shoreline of Greg's salty lips.

He tensed. Mouth still and cold and frigid. Freezer burned ice cream, sans ooey gooey melting hot fudge.

"Luckypenny," he murmured against my lips.

Lucky penny.

The safe word. Our safe word. Crap.

Phoebe, lingering somewhere over my shoulder, gasped. "Seriously, what did I miss?"

I un-suctioned my lips from Greg and wiped my mouth with the back of my hand, like smearing off the spit could erase the stupid kiss altogether. "My bad! You don't have morning breath, if that's what you're—" Greg pressed his lips into a tight line. "I—just thought, obviously I read the room wrong, but last night, we, um, we were having fun."

Fun? We had fun? Oh, that was lame.

"Isla, last night—what happened—it can't again."

"You keep saying that, but we keep having fun."

"Woman, put the finger guns away and stop saying fun," said Phoebe, seeming to voice my own thoughts. But then she went ahead and added, "and maybe, just, recap exactly what kind of fun you precisely had, as a reminder, for no one in particular."

The ghost of a smirk cracked the corner of Greg's mouth at fun. He ran a hand through his hair. Which, of course, was useless. That same flop of black always found its way over his eyes, just as quickly as that barely-there smirk vanished.

"I don't think it was fun to take advantage of you in a vulnerable state," he said, voice and gaze so low they were directed at the floor.

Oh. Oh. Greggy felt bad about last night? That was why he'd been acting weird, because he thought he, what, made a scandalous ruin of my virtue and shatter all hopes I had of wooing a wealthy, pedigreed husband?

"Oh, bud, don't worry about it," I blew an over exaggerated sigh (bud? Gag me, please). "It's chill. You didn't do anything wrong. Kind of saved me from magic overdosing, so, you were actually being heroic. Thanks for that."

Phoebe groaned long and loud, stomping past us and plopping herself down into the chair behind Greg's desk. It spun. A file folder fluttered in the phantom breeze she created. "That's it, I'm dead. The suspense—you know, the suspense that's been building since last night because I couldn't get ahold of either of you for hours—well that suspense is killing me a second time, kiddos. Killing me, you hear that?"

"Phoebe, could—"

"Phoebe," Greg interrupted me. "We need a moment of privacy, if you please."

"Fine. Fine!" she said, whilst still kicking her feet up onto Greg's desk. I raised a brow at her, she sighed, and swung her feet back down to the floor. "Yeah, yeah, tell him fine. I'll be on the roof playing Yahtzee with the pigeons, because that's so much more entertaining than whatever this is about to be, if you need me."