Fic: Figuratives Mark Figures A and B
Title: Figuratives Mark Figures A and B
Rating: M
Spoilers: Through 'Revelations'
A/N: For stiletto_freek who wanted pole dancing, and I THINK I found a (slightly cracked-out) way to make it work.
Bill was the first to broach the elephant in the room. Elephants. Skinny and metallic and randomly placed. And he was able to come up with something almost thoughtful and scientific-something other than the what the frakking hell…? that was written over all their faces.
“They’re not wide or sturdy enough to be support beams.”
Laura’s hand had landed on his instead of the metal underneath and stayed there, without pretense of any other intent. “Well, they don’t seem especially decorative, do they?”
Caprica Six stepped forward, approaching one of the other poles and running her fingertips down its shiny surface. “Maybe it’s some kind of metaphor, an homage to their God.”
“Their God is one horny bastard if he needs all these frakking beams to-”
“Saul!”
“Then you tell me why there are so many frakking mirrors, lady. It’s like a godsdamned funhouse in here.”
“Maybe to make up for the lack of windows?” Lee tried, probably thinking the flashlight-riddled darkness hid the fact that his hand had linked with Kara’s. “Create the illusion of space?”
“No windows….” Kara scanned the room with her flashlight and a frown. “You think they were at war?”
“Would explain the destruction.”
In the silence, everyone carefully looked not at the Cylons, or, for the most part, each other.
“Might explain these cages.”
Human and Cylon reached an easy (unspoken) consensus here: for all his so-called genius, Baltar could be rather an idiot-the poles were one thing, but nothing would adequately explain the cages.
Of course, the one still-standing building on Earth, and they had no idea what the frak to do with it.
There were suggestions. And implications that were suggestions all their own. Tigh figured they might as well blow the frakking thing to the ground and write the whole of Earth off as a failure. Tory had taken one look inside, turned an unhealthy gray color, and hadn’t been within fifty feet of the building since.
Laura’s speech was pragmatic and inspiring, even if her voice was a little flat: they should embrace the culture and tools they’ve found here, keep looking ahead. At its close, she quietly stated that they would clean up the building and use it as a combined military headquarters and seat of government until better accommodations could be built for both. With Bill’s arm around her waist, no one questioned her-as D’Anna put it: What the frak else are we gonna do anyway?
It became their refrain.
Some things were self-explanatory. Cottle and Tyrol hadn’t dropped dead ten minutes after swilling whatever the frak was in those strangely-named bottles behind the bar-Jack Daniels. Smirnoff. Bacardi-which opened them up to both human and Cylon consumption. In large quantities.
“No ambrosia, but it’s not so bad.” The Chief’s glass, apparently, was figuratively half-full today (literally, in need of a refill).
“Tastes like the runoff from the Demetrius,” Cottle grumbled after his second shot, slamming the glass on the table and lighting another cigarette. “This stuff should be illegal.”
“Not stopping you from drinking it.”
“Course it’s not going to frakking stop me from drinking it.”
It helped everything blur a little around the edges, seem more amusing and less strange. The random assortment of clothing (if it could be called that) that Dee and Athena uncovered went to those who would take it rather than those who needed it. And it was no surprise to anyone when Baltar’s followers become increasingly decked out in little more than sequins and bits of lace.
It wasn’t until the knuckle-draggers had figured out the archaic wiring system and ingeniously managed to hook the building up to an idling Raptor that things slowly began to fall into place. And then they almost wished they hadn’t.
Laura stood on the dais at the front of the room when the power came on, trying to figure out how to use the space as a seat of government, a gathering place… anything. If they put a podium there, then maybe all these frakking poles would-
A soft whir, a click, and then a baseline that pounded straight through her skull-such a surprise that she had to reach out to grab one of the poles to keep herself from falling. The lights were on, but the room seemed somehow darker for them, everything illuminated in color, but as far as actual light….
A startled cry a few feet away brought an end to any further exploration-and everyone’s eyes to the front of the room, though that probably was the opposite of its intent. “Uhh, Madam President… you might want to….”
Lee’s teeth, the collar of his shirt underneath his jacket, were glowing-a white so bright that it tinged on blue. But before Laura had even half-a-second to ponder this (or look down), Bill all but pounced on her, nearly lifting her off the ground in his hurry to drag her off the platform. He stopped once he had her backstage, the look on his face one that she couldn’t read, and not just because of the relative darkness.
“What are you-?”
“That…” he reached forward, tracing the strap of her bra with a single reverent fingertip, the garment glowing through her shirt as though it had been lit from within, “… is for my eyes only.”
“Oh my Gods. What the frak do you think…?”
“I don’t want to.” Ever the (frighteningly possessive) gentleman, Bill shrugged out of his coat and helped her into it-not at all doing a very good job of pretending he was only after saving the President’s dignity. He stepped back to admire his handiwork (and his woman) with a sharp nod. “Looks good on you.”
“The jacket or the light?”
He only grinned, leaning forward to steal a kiss, and repeated, “Looks good on you,” making the answer yes or both or everything depending on how far the question was taken. “We need something to drink.”
The Earth drinks had been flowing freely ever since it had been discovered that they wouldn’t cause (immediate) death-even stopped burning the throat in that slightly unpleasant way and becoming almost appealing after three or four. Couple that with the face that someone had decided it was high time to pull out a stash of something very like New Caprican weed (the where, what, and how of it didn’t matter in the slightest-the stuff was frakking good), and it was almost a regular celebration.
The (lack of) thinking was this: They had alcohol, atmosphere, drugs, shelter. They might as well frakking make the most of it. What the frak else were they going to do anyway?
D’Anna had set herself up behind the bar, snarling at anyone who tried to nip a drink from the array of bottles she’d lain out before her. Tyrol had taken to mixing drinks, some more potent (or palatable) than others, but everything went the moment he set it down. On a nearby stool, Gaeta relayed some story involving sweeping hand gestures to a pair of rapt Leobens, spilling his drink over all three of them. Cottle was much more suave with whatever he was saying to a group of Sixes, the four blondes hanging on his every word. A little ways from the bar, Anders had already passed out under a table-jolting back to consciousness long enough to grab Dee as she tripped over his legs and sprawled to the floor beside him. And on the dance floor, Lee and Kara, Athena and Helo, Baltar and a centurion that had wandered off the baseship, swayed or tripped or tried to stay standing to the music.
Suffice it to say, everyone was a bit silly.
Also suffice it to say that no one really gave a flying frak.
Laura was laughing. Caprica honestly had said something rather amusing, though the President couldn’t quite remember what it was. The only one to not down or inhale the artificial merriment, Caprica instead kept Tigh standing while he clung to her like a second skin-she was obviously enjoying it, he was drowning his sorrows, and a pack of Eights, for whom drugs and alcohol seemed to have the effect of making one-eyed Cylons simply irresistible, hovered hopefully nearby.
“One woman is more than frakking enough,” Tigh grumbled to the bottle which Caprica carefully took from his hands.
“They just want to dance.”
“I’m not going to frakking dance with any of them.”
“Then dance with me.”
The solution seemed to startle Tigh-too much so for him to do anything about it as Caprica excused them both from Laura with a small smile, taking his hand and leading him around Dee and Anders’ suddenly-twisted legs and onto the dance floor. Once Tigh forgot his surliness (or at least sure as frak wasn’t going to let the woman lead), he was almost a good dancer, pulling Caprica into something more or less like a tango that almost actually followed the beat.
“Maybe this won’t be so bad,” Laura murmured to-but where the frak was Bill?
Where the frak Bill was turned out to be a small out-of-the-way room which took ten minutes and the rest of her drink to find-and then a few extra moments to discern the real Bill from his mirrored companions on the room’s walls (and even the ceiling)-so it was a small wonder that her tone was just south of accusatory. “You didn’t tell me you were leaving.”
Bill jumped at the sound of her voice (all the mirrored Bill’s following suit and looking equally sheepish), hastily folding the paper he held in his hands. “I did.”
“You didn’t.”
“You were talking to the-to Caprica.” All the Bills took a lazy drag from joints they were holding, and all were kind enough to offer them to Laura as she stepped into the room. “I told Saul to tell you I’d be right back.”
She took the offering, inhaled and let the breath out slowly. “You may as well have told the table.”
“I found something.”
“I can see that.”
“No, I mean, I think I.... Here.” He handed her the crumpled piece of paper, trading it for the joint, and nodded at the pole in the center of the room-the only furnishing aside from the mirrors (if they could be called that) and a leather couch almost over-filled with large, plush pillows. “They’re for dancing.”
“Dancing?” The evocative woman caught mid-writhe on the cover of the flyer had Laura blushing, her eyes wide as she glanced from the flyer to the pole and finally to Bill. “You can’t be-”
“What happened to embracing other cultures?”
“This is just ridiculous. Who would find…” She studied the flyer again and tossed it aside, grabbing onto the pole and doing her best to imitate the pose: the arm on the pole raised behind her, a foot kicked back and propped. “… this at all appealing?”
Every once in awhile, there was a moment or two when Bill wasn’t at all a gentleman. And now-his suddenly salacious smile and his eyes following her curves as he visibly swallowed, caught somewhere between laughter and jumping the President of the Twelve Colonies right then and there-was definitely one of those un-gentlemanly moments. “The lady in the flyer had a lot less clothing.”
“William Adama,” Laura scolded lightly, laughing and swinging herself around. “Are you really implying that-”
Even with an unfinished question, the answer was yes.
Bill swooped in, an un-gentleman on a mission, one hand bracing them both against the pole while the other slid around Laura’s waist, his mouth pressing heavy and desperate against hers. On the walls, a myriad of mirrored Lauras from as many angles responded with just as much surprise-turned-enthusiasm, every last Bill as roughly and gently demanding as the real thing. Even sound seemed to echo and multiply, the hitched gasps, the soft moans, something that was very much like a growl taking on a life of its own and reverberating wildly off every solid surface.
“-Okay then,” Laura breathed (when he let her)-the words both matter-of-fact and coated in giggles.
“Okay.”
“Yes.”
Common sense had already more or less been handed off to drugs and alcohol-it was high time clarity jumped ship as well. It wasn’t like they needed it.
“Laura….”
“Less clothing?”
“Yeah….” He was already divesting her of his jacket, fumbling to work at buttons and other devilish inventions, not bothering with the clasp on her bra and simply slipping a hand underneath. “And less talking.”
“Frak!” Bill’s hands were hot, but shouldn’t physically burn-she had enough presence of mind for that, at least. “You’re going to set us both on fire.”
“That’s poetic of you,” he mumbled around her left nipple. “And also talking.”
“Give me that.” Commands had a tendency to not sound as threatening when giggled, but Laura was a woman who generally got what she wanted-whether it be the Admiral, his hands just-or the makeshift cigarettes he still held between two fingers.
“Still talking.”
“And what are you doing? Singing?”
“I could.” He hummed something into the space between her breasts to prove it-that had her answering in harmony-and then pulled back. “Do it again.”
“What?”
“That.” A ridiculous little shimmy, a nod at the pole to which she was still clinging…
“You know there are other poles I could-frak, yessss.”
… his hand slipping inside her pants, fingertips dipping, exploring, and his breath hot on her ear. “Not such a bad custom when you get right down to it.”
“No, it’s actually-Gods….”
Let it not be said that the usually so carefully-planned, thought-before-action Bill Adama could not get right (in)to the frakking point when he wanted to-which, in this scenario, was often and still not often enough for either of their liking. Laura’s leg wrapped around him, the pole digging into her back where he wasn’t able to cradle it, and she decided that she had never liked the sound of his voice more than when it was muffled by her breasts. Bill likewise appreciated the particular keening pitch of hers, so it was a good match, even if the so-called conversation was somewhat lacking in coherence (to anyone else-to Bill, to Laura, fingers on bundles of nerves, hands clawing backs, lips and mouths and more lips, filled in the gaps between words).
“Frrrrak!”
“Gods, Bill…. The mirrors….”
“That’s… frak. Are you-”
“Mmmm. Keep going, it’s-”
“Laura. Almost-”
“Oh my Gods….”
The way things had gone-the rush and lack of thought and the haze of good drugs-they should have ended up on the floor, somehow tripped their way over to the couch: Bill first, flat on his back, Laura draped over him, face and laughter buried in his chest.
“That can’t be their real purpose.”
“If it’s not, it should be,” Bill muttered, eyes closed as he rubbed her back in slow, soothing circles. “You all right?”
“Yes. For now.” Propping herself up on her elbow, Laura took a long drag from the joint she had somehow managed not to drop, leaning down so Bill inhaled the smoke as she kissed him, long and lazy, her hips pressing into his. “In a few minutes, though, I think we should test a few alternate theories.”
“Yeah? A few?”
“Mmmm. First the-”
Neither of them heard the door shutting or the hoarse chuckling behind it. Cottle took a few puffs from his cigarette, coughing through his amusement, and wandered off in search of a celebratory drink. “About frakking time they started filling the right prescription.”
Rating: M
Spoilers: Through 'Revelations'
A/N: For stiletto_freek who wanted pole dancing, and I THINK I found a (slightly cracked-out) way to make it work.
Bill was the first to broach the elephant in the room. Elephants. Skinny and metallic and randomly placed. And he was able to come up with something almost thoughtful and scientific-something other than the what the frakking hell…? that was written over all their faces.
“They’re not wide or sturdy enough to be support beams.”
Laura’s hand had landed on his instead of the metal underneath and stayed there, without pretense of any other intent. “Well, they don’t seem especially decorative, do they?”
Caprica Six stepped forward, approaching one of the other poles and running her fingertips down its shiny surface. “Maybe it’s some kind of metaphor, an homage to their God.”
“Their God is one horny bastard if he needs all these frakking beams to-”
“Saul!”
“Then you tell me why there are so many frakking mirrors, lady. It’s like a godsdamned funhouse in here.”
“Maybe to make up for the lack of windows?” Lee tried, probably thinking the flashlight-riddled darkness hid the fact that his hand had linked with Kara’s. “Create the illusion of space?”
“No windows….” Kara scanned the room with her flashlight and a frown. “You think they were at war?”
“Would explain the destruction.”
In the silence, everyone carefully looked not at the Cylons, or, for the most part, each other.
“Might explain these cages.”
Human and Cylon reached an easy (unspoken) consensus here: for all his so-called genius, Baltar could be rather an idiot-the poles were one thing, but nothing would adequately explain the cages.
Of course, the one still-standing building on Earth, and they had no idea what the frak to do with it.
There were suggestions. And implications that were suggestions all their own. Tigh figured they might as well blow the frakking thing to the ground and write the whole of Earth off as a failure. Tory had taken one look inside, turned an unhealthy gray color, and hadn’t been within fifty feet of the building since.
Laura’s speech was pragmatic and inspiring, even if her voice was a little flat: they should embrace the culture and tools they’ve found here, keep looking ahead. At its close, she quietly stated that they would clean up the building and use it as a combined military headquarters and seat of government until better accommodations could be built for both. With Bill’s arm around her waist, no one questioned her-as D’Anna put it: What the frak else are we gonna do anyway?
It became their refrain.
Some things were self-explanatory. Cottle and Tyrol hadn’t dropped dead ten minutes after swilling whatever the frak was in those strangely-named bottles behind the bar-Jack Daniels. Smirnoff. Bacardi-which opened them up to both human and Cylon consumption. In large quantities.
“No ambrosia, but it’s not so bad.” The Chief’s glass, apparently, was figuratively half-full today (literally, in need of a refill).
“Tastes like the runoff from the Demetrius,” Cottle grumbled after his second shot, slamming the glass on the table and lighting another cigarette. “This stuff should be illegal.”
“Not stopping you from drinking it.”
“Course it’s not going to frakking stop me from drinking it.”
It helped everything blur a little around the edges, seem more amusing and less strange. The random assortment of clothing (if it could be called that) that Dee and Athena uncovered went to those who would take it rather than those who needed it. And it was no surprise to anyone when Baltar’s followers become increasingly decked out in little more than sequins and bits of lace.
It wasn’t until the knuckle-draggers had figured out the archaic wiring system and ingeniously managed to hook the building up to an idling Raptor that things slowly began to fall into place. And then they almost wished they hadn’t.
Laura stood on the dais at the front of the room when the power came on, trying to figure out how to use the space as a seat of government, a gathering place… anything. If they put a podium there, then maybe all these frakking poles would-
A soft whir, a click, and then a baseline that pounded straight through her skull-such a surprise that she had to reach out to grab one of the poles to keep herself from falling. The lights were on, but the room seemed somehow darker for them, everything illuminated in color, but as far as actual light….
A startled cry a few feet away brought an end to any further exploration-and everyone’s eyes to the front of the room, though that probably was the opposite of its intent. “Uhh, Madam President… you might want to….”
Lee’s teeth, the collar of his shirt underneath his jacket, were glowing-a white so bright that it tinged on blue. But before Laura had even half-a-second to ponder this (or look down), Bill all but pounced on her, nearly lifting her off the ground in his hurry to drag her off the platform. He stopped once he had her backstage, the look on his face one that she couldn’t read, and not just because of the relative darkness.
“What are you-?”
“That…” he reached forward, tracing the strap of her bra with a single reverent fingertip, the garment glowing through her shirt as though it had been lit from within, “… is for my eyes only.”
“Oh my Gods. What the frak do you think…?”
“I don’t want to.” Ever the (frighteningly possessive) gentleman, Bill shrugged out of his coat and helped her into it-not at all doing a very good job of pretending he was only after saving the President’s dignity. He stepped back to admire his handiwork (and his woman) with a sharp nod. “Looks good on you.”
“The jacket or the light?”
He only grinned, leaning forward to steal a kiss, and repeated, “Looks good on you,” making the answer yes or both or everything depending on how far the question was taken. “We need something to drink.”
The Earth drinks had been flowing freely ever since it had been discovered that they wouldn’t cause (immediate) death-even stopped burning the throat in that slightly unpleasant way and becoming almost appealing after three or four. Couple that with the face that someone had decided it was high time to pull out a stash of something very like New Caprican weed (the where, what, and how of it didn’t matter in the slightest-the stuff was frakking good), and it was almost a regular celebration.
The (lack of) thinking was this: They had alcohol, atmosphere, drugs, shelter. They might as well frakking make the most of it. What the frak else were they going to do anyway?
D’Anna had set herself up behind the bar, snarling at anyone who tried to nip a drink from the array of bottles she’d lain out before her. Tyrol had taken to mixing drinks, some more potent (or palatable) than others, but everything went the moment he set it down. On a nearby stool, Gaeta relayed some story involving sweeping hand gestures to a pair of rapt Leobens, spilling his drink over all three of them. Cottle was much more suave with whatever he was saying to a group of Sixes, the four blondes hanging on his every word. A little ways from the bar, Anders had already passed out under a table-jolting back to consciousness long enough to grab Dee as she tripped over his legs and sprawled to the floor beside him. And on the dance floor, Lee and Kara, Athena and Helo, Baltar and a centurion that had wandered off the baseship, swayed or tripped or tried to stay standing to the music.
Suffice it to say, everyone was a bit silly.
Also suffice it to say that no one really gave a flying frak.
Laura was laughing. Caprica honestly had said something rather amusing, though the President couldn’t quite remember what it was. The only one to not down or inhale the artificial merriment, Caprica instead kept Tigh standing while he clung to her like a second skin-she was obviously enjoying it, he was drowning his sorrows, and a pack of Eights, for whom drugs and alcohol seemed to have the effect of making one-eyed Cylons simply irresistible, hovered hopefully nearby.
“One woman is more than frakking enough,” Tigh grumbled to the bottle which Caprica carefully took from his hands.
“They just want to dance.”
“I’m not going to frakking dance with any of them.”
“Then dance with me.”
The solution seemed to startle Tigh-too much so for him to do anything about it as Caprica excused them both from Laura with a small smile, taking his hand and leading him around Dee and Anders’ suddenly-twisted legs and onto the dance floor. Once Tigh forgot his surliness (or at least sure as frak wasn’t going to let the woman lead), he was almost a good dancer, pulling Caprica into something more or less like a tango that almost actually followed the beat.
“Maybe this won’t be so bad,” Laura murmured to-but where the frak was Bill?
Where the frak Bill was turned out to be a small out-of-the-way room which took ten minutes and the rest of her drink to find-and then a few extra moments to discern the real Bill from his mirrored companions on the room’s walls (and even the ceiling)-so it was a small wonder that her tone was just south of accusatory. “You didn’t tell me you were leaving.”
Bill jumped at the sound of her voice (all the mirrored Bill’s following suit and looking equally sheepish), hastily folding the paper he held in his hands. “I did.”
“You didn’t.”
“You were talking to the-to Caprica.” All the Bills took a lazy drag from joints they were holding, and all were kind enough to offer them to Laura as she stepped into the room. “I told Saul to tell you I’d be right back.”
She took the offering, inhaled and let the breath out slowly. “You may as well have told the table.”
“I found something.”
“I can see that.”
“No, I mean, I think I.... Here.” He handed her the crumpled piece of paper, trading it for the joint, and nodded at the pole in the center of the room-the only furnishing aside from the mirrors (if they could be called that) and a leather couch almost over-filled with large, plush pillows. “They’re for dancing.”
“Dancing?” The evocative woman caught mid-writhe on the cover of the flyer had Laura blushing, her eyes wide as she glanced from the flyer to the pole and finally to Bill. “You can’t be-”
“What happened to embracing other cultures?”
“This is just ridiculous. Who would find…” She studied the flyer again and tossed it aside, grabbing onto the pole and doing her best to imitate the pose: the arm on the pole raised behind her, a foot kicked back and propped. “… this at all appealing?”
Every once in awhile, there was a moment or two when Bill wasn’t at all a gentleman. And now-his suddenly salacious smile and his eyes following her curves as he visibly swallowed, caught somewhere between laughter and jumping the President of the Twelve Colonies right then and there-was definitely one of those un-gentlemanly moments. “The lady in the flyer had a lot less clothing.”
“William Adama,” Laura scolded lightly, laughing and swinging herself around. “Are you really implying that-”
Even with an unfinished question, the answer was yes.
Bill swooped in, an un-gentleman on a mission, one hand bracing them both against the pole while the other slid around Laura’s waist, his mouth pressing heavy and desperate against hers. On the walls, a myriad of mirrored Lauras from as many angles responded with just as much surprise-turned-enthusiasm, every last Bill as roughly and gently demanding as the real thing. Even sound seemed to echo and multiply, the hitched gasps, the soft moans, something that was very much like a growl taking on a life of its own and reverberating wildly off every solid surface.
“-Okay then,” Laura breathed (when he let her)-the words both matter-of-fact and coated in giggles.
“Okay.”
“Yes.”
Common sense had already more or less been handed off to drugs and alcohol-it was high time clarity jumped ship as well. It wasn’t like they needed it.
“Laura….”
“Less clothing?”
“Yeah….” He was already divesting her of his jacket, fumbling to work at buttons and other devilish inventions, not bothering with the clasp on her bra and simply slipping a hand underneath. “And less talking.”
“Frak!” Bill’s hands were hot, but shouldn’t physically burn-she had enough presence of mind for that, at least. “You’re going to set us both on fire.”
“That’s poetic of you,” he mumbled around her left nipple. “And also talking.”
“Give me that.” Commands had a tendency to not sound as threatening when giggled, but Laura was a woman who generally got what she wanted-whether it be the Admiral, his hands just-or the makeshift cigarettes he still held between two fingers.
“Still talking.”
“And what are you doing? Singing?”
“I could.” He hummed something into the space between her breasts to prove it-that had her answering in harmony-and then pulled back. “Do it again.”
“What?”
“That.” A ridiculous little shimmy, a nod at the pole to which she was still clinging…
“You know there are other poles I could-frak, yessss.”
… his hand slipping inside her pants, fingertips dipping, exploring, and his breath hot on her ear. “Not such a bad custom when you get right down to it.”
“No, it’s actually-Gods….”
Let it not be said that the usually so carefully-planned, thought-before-action Bill Adama could not get right (in)to the frakking point when he wanted to-which, in this scenario, was often and still not often enough for either of their liking. Laura’s leg wrapped around him, the pole digging into her back where he wasn’t able to cradle it, and she decided that she had never liked the sound of his voice more than when it was muffled by her breasts. Bill likewise appreciated the particular keening pitch of hers, so it was a good match, even if the so-called conversation was somewhat lacking in coherence (to anyone else-to Bill, to Laura, fingers on bundles of nerves, hands clawing backs, lips and mouths and more lips, filled in the gaps between words).
“Frrrrak!”
“Gods, Bill…. The mirrors….”
“That’s… frak. Are you-”
“Mmmm. Keep going, it’s-”
“Laura. Almost-”
“Oh my Gods….”
The way things had gone-the rush and lack of thought and the haze of good drugs-they should have ended up on the floor, somehow tripped their way over to the couch: Bill first, flat on his back, Laura draped over him, face and laughter buried in his chest.
“That can’t be their real purpose.”
“If it’s not, it should be,” Bill muttered, eyes closed as he rubbed her back in slow, soothing circles. “You all right?”
“Yes. For now.” Propping herself up on her elbow, Laura took a long drag from the joint she had somehow managed not to drop, leaning down so Bill inhaled the smoke as she kissed him, long and lazy, her hips pressing into his. “In a few minutes, though, I think we should test a few alternate theories.”
“Yeah? A few?”
“Mmmm. First the-”
Neither of them heard the door shutting or the hoarse chuckling behind it. Cottle took a few puffs from his cigarette, coughing through his amusement, and wandered off in search of a celebratory drink. “About frakking time they started filling the right prescription.”