Page 42 of Go Luck Yourself
“Mm.”
A pause.
Coal sighs. “You’re not going to listen to me, are you?”
I pretend to be tipping over onto the bed. “Falling asleep already. Can’t talk. Love you. Good night.”
Coal barely gets out a “Don’t think you can—” before I hang up.
And because my inhibitions are still lowered, I pull up the text thread with Iris.
I started messaging her again after seeing her in Coal’s office, but it’s only been in response to her texts, nothing I’ve initiated yet.
Now, I flip over to some of the links Wren sent of the tabloid sites with their shots of Loch and me from earlier today.
Yeah. Wow. I do look miserable. Smiling, but my eyes are screaming,Kill me.
I scroll down, screenshot a pic of Loch, and send it to Iris.
IRIS
I never sent you his picture—he’s a prick, but here, character study. How many googly eyes do you think it’d take to recreate those motherfucking cheekbones
IRIS
well look who’s coming back into our little game with a ringer
On second thought, his ego definitely doesn’t need to be fluffed any bigger.
She’s quiet for a long time. Well, maybe like a minute or two, but I watch the ellipses pop up and go away and pop up again.
IRIS
hmmmmmm
i’ll get to work adding prince lochlann to my character study sheet
get some sleep monsieur ambassador
Why does everyone keep telling me to do that?
What was that unnecessarily longhmmmfor?
This whole day has left me swaggeringly exhausted, but there’s no way I’ll sleep more than a few hours tonight, if that. Coal and Iris don’t know what they’re talking about.
I mute my phone and dig a T-shirt out of my bag, a bright green one that says100% That Grinchin swirling red script. When I change, I immediately feel better.
Throwing back two preemptive ibuprofen dry so Tomorrow Kris doesn’t hate Tonight Kris too much, I slip out into the hall.
I came here with a job. And goddammit, I’m going to do my fucking job.
That’s all that matters.
Chapter Five
It’s pitch black in the hall. No sounds come from any direction, so either everyone’s gone to bed or Loch and his sisters live in a different wing. I vaguely remember the route he took to get me here from the dining room, but there were other passages that branched off, and a place like this has to be full of secret doorways and hidden shit.
I pull my phone out to hit the flashlight and swivel it up and down the hall.
