Reno couldn't help but chuckle at the woman seated next to him at the bar, leaning forward, putting a hand on his knee, laughing too loudly at his jokes and doing her best to bat her eyelashes coyly, but just ending up looking like she was about to pass out. She was trying so hard and failing so miserably.
Beneath the makeup, unless he was affected by the alcohol much more than he thought, she looked an awful lot like Triss, but he didn't like to think about that for very long because it raises the question of why and why so many of "the women" looked like Triss and Reno was not happy about the answers his mind came up with.
Now the woman's hand was sliding up his thigh. While he was lost in his thoughts, she had sidled closer to the Turk.
Reno sighed and gave her a smile he didn't feel. He knew how tonight would go, how "tonight"s always go. They would go back to her place, he would throw her on the bed, couch, table, floor, counter and rip off her clothes and hold her too tight and kiss her too hard, but she would love every second of it and he would yell too loudly and squeeze his eyes shut and pretend that he hadn't spent every second of it comparing this woman to her, because this woman would walk too slow and take too long and wiggle too much and kiss too sloppily and scream too loudly so he has to yell to drown her out. And he would button up his shirt and yank up his pants and rush out because, honestly, this woman's place would be disgusting.
But then he'll go to her place and he'll wash away all the signs of this woman whose hands were drifting far too far. And then, then he'll walk out of the bathroom and see her and she'll smile that smile, that beautiful "It's okay, I forgive you. I understand. I don't blame you. You're here and that's all that matters. And please don't ever not be here. Please come back to me. Always." smile.
She had so many different smiles- "You're so funny when you're stupid." and "I know you want me, but there's not a damn thing you can do about it." and "Good morning, handsome." and even "I know it and you know it, but I'm not going to say it. I'm just going to sit here and smile at you because we both know anyway." But none of them held a candle to the smile that turned him from Reno the Turk to Just Reno, who would crawl under the covers with her and "that word they never used" her because, really, there's no one he'd rather not use that word with.
"Always."