"Nice ass."
Damn. And there wasn't much I could do about it. The ice was going to continue to rattle into the plastic bag for, well, a good few more seconds, because it came out in a pre-measured quantity. And if I pulled the bag away at least some of the ice would escape onto the hotel carpet β and that would get me in trouble. I'd certainly have to clean it up because she'd almost certainly check. And I didn't feel like getting down on all fours to fish around for ice cubes. And I was already going to have to load up the mechanism a second time because if I had less than a full plastic square ice thingee when I got back to the room, I'd be in trouble β and, well, you get the idea.
So because the slot mechanism was evidently 'sized' for a child, I was just going to have to stay bent over awkwardly, holding the plastic bag to the clear sleeve from which the ice cubes continued to pour, giving her the free range visual opportunity to examine my naked ass at will. But it wasn't as though it was anything she hadn't seen before. Speaking of which, it was unfair of her to follow me down and give me a hard time in mid-task. But there wasn't anything 'unfair', or 'off-limits', for the next little while β not really, so I was just going to have to hold my tongue and insert the second quarter. Which I did. Although not without almost dropping it. And almost dropping the neck of the plastic bag of ice cubes which I was squeezing in the palm of my left hand.
Then I had to wait. Not long, probably, the ice was filling the pre-measured sleeve fairly quickly. But it seems longer when β what was I? β that's right: 6 stairs then turn and climb 5 more then turn yet again and climb another 6 stairs, and, oh, about 40 feet of corridor to the door. And I didn't imagine she would rush upstairs to unlock and let me in.
So be it resolved, well, more accurately probably, be it accepted that I was going to be at least spotted, by someone, whilst skulking stark naked through the labyrinth of hallways and staircases of this older downtown hotel. Which at least was a hotel. So it was in a city other than our own. Which was something.
"Most guys would at least react."
That's when I realized it wasn't Penny's voice.
Terror slows the whole world. Ever noticed? It's as though everything goes into that slow motion semi haze but it's not really slow motion because you certainly can't do anything fast enough to prevent what's going to happen. All you can do is watch it come at you. I did manage to figure out that if it wasn't Penny's voice it probably, yes, looking up at a place where her image was reflected in the front of the ice machine I could see it definitely wasn't Penny. I didn't try to find out too much else because I didn't want to risk eye contact, even in the reflected realm of the front of the ice machine.