They were all welcome words, but not his actual message.
He didn’t need to say it aloud. She heard anyway.
This wasn’t just a fuck.
I love your body.
I’m not going anywhere.
SHARKPHOON
INT.OVAL OFFICE – NOON
DR. BRADEN FIN stands with GIRL IN BIKINI #3 before the president, his tight swim briefs covered only by his white lab coat, both still splattered with the blood of his fallen, chomped-upon colleague. He’s also wearing safety glasses and a look of grief and determination. The president is staring up at him, steely-eyed, elbows on her desk, fingers steepled.
PRESIDENT FOOLWORTH
You’re wasting my time. This is no emergency.
BRADEN
Madam President, it is. You don’t understand. The typhoon is so powerful, the sharks so enormous, nowhere is safe. Not our aircraft carriers. Not our nuclear facilities. Not even here, with the Reflecting Pool so close to the White—
PRESIDENT FOOLWORTH
(smiling coldly)
The Mariana Trench is a continent away. You’re dismissed.
A gust of wind and the sound of breaking glass. A shark crashes through the Oval Office windows and bites the president in half, then gulps down the otherhalf too and disappears out the same window in pursuit of other victims.
Girl in Bikini #3 lays a consoling hand on his arm.
GIRL IN BIKINI #3
You tried to tell her.
Shaking his head sadly, he puts his arm around her and goes back to work.
18
IN THE END, APRIL ORDERED YET MORE TAKEOUT FORdinner—steamedchicken and vegetables for Marcus, red curry with shrimp and rice for herself—and he accepted her invitation to stay the night. Cuddled together on the couch, they binge-watched an old season of his favorite British baking show until it was much too late, before finally stumbling back to her bedroom.
There, they rested on their sides in her bed, naked, legs entwined, face-to-face in the blackout-curtained dimness of her room, only the distant glow of a bathroom nightlight illuminating their expressions.
With one hand he held hers. With the other he played with a strand of her hair. For a first-time sleepover as a couple, the silence between them was surprisingly comfortable. Not strained, or full of unspoken tension and awkwardness.
Still, she was going to break that silence and possiblymakethings awkward.
The question might seem less fraught in the darkness, though. At least, she hoped so. “Marcus?”
“Yes?” He sounded remarkably awake, given his efforts that day. Against her kitchen counter, of course. In bed. Then, just an hour or so ago, with him kneeling on the floor of her living room, her legs draped over his shoulders as she reclined on the blanket-coveredcouch and clutched a throw pillow and moaned and came so hard against his eager, inventive mouth, she wanted to bronze his tongue. But only after she was finished with it, naturally.
“Do you ever worry...” she began.
She paused. Brushed an exploratory fingertip along that elegant cheekbone, down that slightly battered nose, along that famously sharp jaw.
“Do I ever worry about what?” The prompt was encouraging, rather than impatient.
