You Had Me at Halo(9)

xxx

“So let me get this straight, you’ve been put into therapy and given a two day pass back to earth?” Gemma said several minutes later once Holly had explained it as best she could.

“I guess you could say that.”

Gemma shook her head. “The whole thing is extraordinary. I mean who knew that heaven was such a bureaucracy?”

“Yes, they certainly keep all this body-swapping business quiet.” Holly snorted.

“It does take a bit of getting used to,” Gemma agreed before suddenly hitting her forehead in annoyance. “I feel so bad that I didn’t believe you sooner.”

Holly sniffed. “I probably wouldn’t have believed it either, but at least you know now. That’s all that matters.”

“Er, I’m afraid that’s not exactly true.” Gemma winced as she searched for her cell phone and frantically started to stab in a number. “You see when I saw you sitting outside my apartment I panicked a bit.”

“It’s okay,” Holly tried to reassure her. “I’m honestly not mad.”

“No, but Todd sure was. You see as soon as I saw you I thought you must be stalking me, which is why I called him. He should be here any minute,” Gemma said miserably. “And he didn’t sound happy.”

Of course he didn’t. Holly groaned. On a day like this, it made complete sense





CHAPTER FOUR


“This will be him,” Gemma said ten minutes later as someone knocked on the apartment door. Despite her urgent calls, Gemma hadn’t been able to get back through to Todd’s cell phone to let him know everything was okay. “So what do you want to do?”

She really should have just kept her big mouth shut when she was up in heaven and then none of this would be happening. Tyrone had certainly warned her enough times. Why hadn’t she just listened to him? Perhaps if he’d given her a heads up on the whole being shoved into a computer nerd’s body thing, she might’ve paid a bit more attention.

There was another knock on the door. “Well?” Gemma said.

Holly twisted the fringe of Gemma’s bedspread as she tried to decide. Half of her longed to go throw herself at him, but the other half (possibly the half with the better self preservation skills) wasn’t so keen on the idea of getting punched.

“Just tell him you made a mistake and that I’m not here.”

Gemma raised an eyebrow. “Since when do you lie to Todd?”

Holly raised an eyebrow before glancing down at her long lean legs.

“Oh yeah, good point,” her friend conceded. “But perhaps you should explain it now and get it over with?”

Holly had been thinking the same thing, but had reluctantly dismissed it since it was becoming more and more obvious that she wasn’t going to get very far on her mission if she didn’t have a bulletproof plan. And the only thing worse than not talking to Todd now, was talking to him and screwing the whole thing up even more.

“I’m sure,” she said firmly. “Now go and tell him...but act casual...and smooth down your blouse, it’s wrinkled up the top.”

Gemma snorted. “Well at least I know you’re definitely Holly, only she would say something like that at a time like this.”

Holly sighed as her friend left the room. If only it would be so easy to convince Todd.

xxx

It was no good. No matter how hard Holly tried, she couldn’t hear a word that was being said and unless she wanted to open the bedroom door and risk getting her face punched by the man of her dreams, she was just going to have to wait until Gemma came back.

She padded back across to the dressing table, just like she used to. Gosh, that was a nice lipstick. It was sort of like a lip-gloss but with a matt finish. Interesting.

“It’s all done.” Gemma pushed the bedroom door open. “I just told him I’d made a mistake and...Holly, what are you doing?”

“I’m trying on your lip-gloss. Is it new? Anyway, tell me what else Todd said. Did he...What? Why are you looking at me like that? Is there a problem?” Holly frowned. It wasn’t like Gemma to worry about a bit of makeup.

“Yes, there’s a problem. I don’t think Tropical Pink Crush really goes with your stubble.”

“What...? Oh crap.” Holly groaned as she looked in the mirror. This was ridiculous. She could not spend the next two days in Vince Murphy’s body.

She reached over for the makeup remover and quickly smeared it on her face. Except it wasn’t her face at all. Gone were the brown eyes with the heavy lashes, the pointed chin and the nose that was slightly crooked. And instead, staring back at her was Vince Murphy.

It was going to take a bit of getting used to. Though, really, if you took away the attitude he wasn’t such a bad looking fellow. Mind you, he could use some sun. But despite his pale face, he had a nice pair of blue eyes and light brown hair that flipped and flopped all over the place. She puckered her lips. Actually, they were quite full weren’t they? Weird she’d never noticed before.

“Are you okay?” Gemma was looking at her strangely, and Holly realized she’d been checking out her own face. Well Vince’s face. Which was sort of her face since she was the one on the inside. Oh dear, this was getting confusing. She finished wiping the makeup off and quickly turned away from the mirror.