nonvenomous | Inbox

“I’ll settle for your company, and an invitation for the next time you infiltrate a gambling ring specifically to cheat them of their winnings.”

One last mug -- Oghma willing, he won’t need to entreat her for anything so dire as an amputation.

Otherwise clean, cool, collected, he pauses at the door, and hefts the borrowed packet. Any hesitation has left him, and taken translucence with it. He’s as opaque as a stapler on a desk, and about as remarkable at a glance.

“Thank you for the drink. I’ll have these back to you before the week is out.”

She drifts after him with the mild affect of politeness which showing just about anyone out should merit, though her smile as it flashes briefly over the prospect of cheating is more crooked than appealing and potentially more genuine for it.

"Enjoy them. The man's a true artist of conspiracy."

With a flick of the wrist, the door is unceremoniously drawn open for him. Lest he escape from the lion's den unscathed, however (or due to the old habitual inability to leave a loose thread unpulled)—

"You look well in it, by the way," she says, her sharp cheek set jauntily against the edge of the door and expression made up entirely of roguish eyebrows. "The coat."

Oh. Half-turned back for the purpose of easy farewell, Richard turns fully back to her face in the frame. Such cheekbones.

“Thank you,” he tells her, earnest in his appreciation. Also, whiskey makes a brief appearance for him to hazard a mild (and slightly wary):

“I’m gay.”

In case that wasn’t clear. Helpful information for her to have, and a handy reminder for him in this moment, also.

Up go those eyebrows, quirking briefly toward her hairline and then— settling, as easy as her cheek at the edge of the door or her hand curled light about its latch. Her mild observation as he'd picked through her trunk.

Yes. Well.

"That's fine."

And for the best, really.

Having essentially delivered a fistfull of verbal pocket sand, Richard looks away, briefly, to assure himself that there’s nobody else stepping out at the same time to have overheard this declaration. There isn’t.

He looks back to her, eyes bright, critical, and says, “Mm,” because he is less convinced that it is fine.

Imagine being a spy and not dumping Charisma. He turns to go in earnest -- he has important letters to slowly open and read three or four times without processing what they say.

There is something there on the tip of her tongue - an impulse, the itch of a face down card from a deck she hasn't counted carefully.

(It's very easy to win with her own; she's had it for long so that the wear on the backs is as telling as its faces.)

But whatever it is she holds just a beat too long, and then the opportunity has evaporated. So she trades it for the far more definitive "Good night, Richard," and decides she is satisfied with it. When it is perfectly polite to do so, she withdraws. The door is snipped shut.

The room, with its scattered assortment of things is regarded.

"Mm, he says," she repeats for its benefit.

Inbox - Fade Rift

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