Page 71 of On the Power Play

He laughed again. "I'm sorry. I can see both of your hands, and you're nothing like those guys on the apps."

"Do you know the guys on the apps?" She crossed her arms in front of her.

"I know plenty of guys who would be guys on the apps."

Delia didn't know where to go from there. Jack was leaning toward her, his dark hair mussed, his forearms flexed, making the swirls of ink over his left forearm pop with colour. His hands were nice. She'd noticed them the first time they'd sat across from each other. His knuckles were broad, and his nails short and clean. They looked rugged. Capable.

Shit. This was a spiral. Delia tapped her elbow.

Jack lifted his hands, and Delia couldn’t stop staring. He took a step past the couch, walking toward the kitchen. Good. That was good. She needed more space.

"Do you want a drink?" he asked.

Delia nodded. "Just water." She drew a breath through her nose and exhaled after he disappeared around the corner. Maybe she was the one who needed to think about this differently. This was work for her, too, and she could figure out how to view kissing Jack as a business transaction, couldn’t she? Felt a little whorey, but not impossible.

In all her therapy appointments over the years and through all the reading she'd done on productivity and basically how to seem like an average person, she'd picked up plenty of strategies. She was religious about setting alarms and then second alarms on her phone. She surrounded herself with people who were more organizationally functional than she was so they could pick up the slack when she was in full-blown creative mode. She still carried fidget toys with her in her purse and?—

Yes. That was it. She just needed something physical to link her thoughts to the reality of the situation and bypass her emotions. She'd done that plenty of times before. In grade twelve, she'd carried around a smooth rock she'd found in a river on vacation. She’d created a friction groove in it by the time her finals were over. That, combined with deep breathing techniques, progressive muscle relaxation, and tapping, had gotten her through.

But this had to be something inconspicuous.

Simple.

Something she could employ in seconds without drawing attention to herself.

Delia brought her hands together and pinched the tip of her left forefinger between her right thumb and pointer. She pressed for three seconds. That would do. Every time they touched, she could press and allow it to remind her that this thing with Jack wasn't real. It was a job. Touching him had nothing to do with real feelings, which definitely did not make her like those creepy guys on the apps. According to Jack. Her business partner.

Jack returned and handed her a glass of water.

"Thank you." Delia took a sip.

He sat back in his chair. "So. What kind of kiss?"

Delia nearly choked on the water in her mouth. She quickly swallowed and blinked to clear her watering eyes.

"Sorry." Jack set his glass on the table.

She shook her head. "Wrong tube."

Jack exhaled. "It can't look unnatural."

"The kiss?"

He nodded. "It has to look like we've been doing it regularly because what couple would kiss for the first time in public?"

"Mmhmm."

"That's it, then. We just have to do it regularly."

She was blacking out. Was she blacking out? The world shimmered like she was having an ocular migraine. "I'm sorry, what?"

Jack shrugged. "Maybe that would make it less weird. If we just . . . kiss. A lot."

His words and her understanding were like oil and water. They danced around each other but didn’t mix. "Like, just start kissing." Had Jack taken something while he’d been in the kitchen?

He rubbed his chin. "I don't know, it seems like that would make it more believable."

I don't do things halfway. Delia's mouth went dry. He seemed sober. And dead serious. "How often is ‘regularly?’"

---