Don smiles. Genuine or not: it doesn't matter. It's a way of marking time.
"That sound," he says, shaping his words delicately as you might blow smoke rings, "is the one thing everyone in this city fears." His posture shifts, shoulders turning toward her, hand falling away from his glass. He leans forward, his gaze probing and at the same time receptive, inviting.
"You have it—somewhere in the back of your mind, the moment where it's them on one side of the door and you on the other." He looks at her—transparently appraising, and yet there's something disarming in that transparency—then sits back, shrugs. Smiles again, an almost helpless quirk of the lips. "What if I told you you didn't have to worry about the other side of the door?"
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"That sound," he says, shaping his words delicately as you might blow smoke rings, "is the one thing everyone in this city fears." His posture shifts, shoulders turning toward her, hand falling away from his glass. He leans forward, his gaze probing and at the same time receptive, inviting.
"You have it—somewhere in the back of your mind, the moment where it's them on one side of the door and you on the other." He looks at her—transparently appraising, and yet there's something disarming in that transparency—then sits back, shrugs. Smiles again, an almost helpless quirk of the lips. "What if I told you you didn't have to worry about the other side of the door?"