She could feel the tension from all the unanswerable questions begin to tighten the muscles in her back, then her arms, then legs. Gradually it became something akin to torture to continue to lie still and quiet in Michael’s arms when her near overwhelming urge was to flip him onto his back, shake him awake and demand some answers.

Not that demanding answers was the only thing she wanted to do. The longer she lay there, the more intensely she could feel every inch of her skin where their bodies touched, the heat and heaviness of his leg resting between hers, his forehead just brushing her shoulder, his arm resting along the edge of her rib cage, and his hand. The heat radiating from his hand, fingers splayed wide against her belly, his thumb just brushing the underside of her breast, his little finger resting in the hollow of her hip bone, was stirring up aching memories and fresh desires. No, maybe she had flip him onto his back, shake him awake and demand something altogether different, that he satisfy other, equally intense needs, right now.

When she felt she had implode if she lay there a moment longer, she eased herself out of his embrace and left the warm bed altogether, creeping as quietly as she could down the stairs.

Curling up on the couch, wrapped up in the blanket, Nikita tried to focus on what she did know. Not much it turned out. Michael was alive. That was good, she told herself. Apparently healthy. Also good. Apparently not devastated by her rejection, or angry about it, in fact, did not appear to think it important. Very good. Maybe. She decided she had to hold off on calling that one. What else did she know? He was somehow back in the business, but what did he mean, contractual basis? That he was coming back to Section on his own terms full time? That he was planing to work like an outside contractor, job to job? She needed more information before she could answer that one. What else was there? He was suspicious enough of the past to worry that she was, with or without her knowledge, bait in a trap designed to prevent him from carrying out whatever profile he had developed. Not so good, but, she had earned it the hard way. And so she was back to wondering why he was there, what he wanted from her that either could not wait any longer, or was not so important that it could not wait almost two thirds of a year to be resolved.

And what did it mean for him to come to bed dressed in sweats and a thermal shirt – yes, the cottage was cold, but, it was not that cold – was it caution? A road block – stay away, no sex for you?

In disgust at the way her thoughts seemed to inevitably cycle back to the personal and sexual rather than sticking with the professional, Nikita threw aside the blanket and headed for the bathroom. After washing her hands, moved by an impulse she decided not to interrogate, she picked up her toothbrush and went vigorously to work; teeth, gums, tongue. Finished with her teeth, she grabbed for her hairbrush, stroking until her hair began to crackle with electricity in the dry air, then washed her face. After her face was dry she examined herself closely in the mirror. When she realized she had no idea what she was looking for she rolled her eyes and wrenched open the door, striding right into Michael.

With a small yelp of surprise she reeled back, only to be caught and steadied by a strong hand on her bicep, which immediately started to burn under his touch. “Sorry. I didn’t realize you were waiting. You should have knocked.”

“S’okay. Haven’t been here long.” His voice, still thick from sleep, rasped along her already frayed nerves, sending a shiver down her spine.

He looked up at her from under his eyelashes and saw the pink flush of desire in the skin of her cheeks and throat. “Are you going back to bed?”

Nikita had no clue how to answer that. “I’m going to get a glass of water.”

“Would you get one for me too, please?”

“Sure.”

She watched the bathroom door close, then headed for the kitchen sink. As she reached for the glasses and turned on the tap, something about him pricked at her, the way he looked – different from the night before. The first thing she had noticed about him last night was that his hair was much longer than when she had watched him walk away through the forest – actually he was looking a lot like his picture as a twenty-something terrorist complete with weeks worth of unshaven beard. Now, aside from being tousled from sleep, he seemed the same. Long hair, green eyes, light tan, his… Oh dear lord, she realized that he had shaved – his jaw was clean and smooth. She nearly dropped the glass she was holding as the blood rushed to her extremities; the wave of desire passing through her so strong her knees almost buckled.

Stop it! She scolded herself for reading far too much into the simplest of gestures – but Michael did not like to shave…

“Nikita?”

She turned to meet him and their eyes locked, and this time she knew what she read there. Invitation and desire.

“Coming?” He picked up his glass with one hand and extended the other to her, waiting for her to take it.

In a haze Nikita took his hand and allowed him to lead her back up the stairs to the bedroom. He stopped on her side of the bed, took the glass from her hand and placed it on the bedside table. Quickly, he undressed her – goose bumps rising across her skin as the cold air made contact with her naked flesh, her nipples hardening as she shivered in reaction to the contrast between the chill in the air and the heat of his hands. Then he pushed her gently down and into the bed, pulling the covers up around her chin. After stripping off his own clothes, he slipped into bed beside her, urging her over to the middle before rolling on top and kissing her fully, lushly, thoroughly, beginning with her mouth, then her eyes, her cheeks, her chin, her throat, working his way down her body as his hands stroked her skin, burning everywhere he touched.

Nikita’s world narrowed until Michael occupied the whole of it, hands and mouth, kissing, touching, teasing, pushing her to the edge, holding her there and then finally, yielding to her moans and incoherent pleas, pushing her over. When at last, with one sure thrust, he took full possession of her again, the pleasure and pain of muscles and nerves too long unused was too much to bear on top of all the other sensations roaring through her body and her heart. Tears were the only outlet she had left, they streamed down her cheeks and all she could do was hold him to her, in her, as tightly as she could while they rocked together and murmur his name, over and over and over.

*************

Nikita stretched luxuriously, lips curving in satisfied smile. Extending her arm and leg across the bed, she searched for Michael. When she felt nothing but empty space, she closed her eyes tightly against the disappointment of knowing she had had nothing but yet another intensely erotic dream. As she rolled into the middle of the bed, reaching for the other pillow to wrap herself around, she realized the sheets and blankets were impossibly tangled around her legs, that she was naked, and warm.

At that she sat straight up. The sun was shining in the windows, glinting with the particular brightness that came from reflecting off snow, but that was not sufficient to explain that the air in the cottage was warm on her bare skin. As she looked around the room, her brain moving a sluggish one step behind her senses, she took in a haphazardly ransacked pack and a trail of discarded clothes, and the distinctive smell of freshly brewing coffee.

Leaping from the bed, grabbing for the robe slung on the back of a chair, Nikita stumbled and nearly fell as she tried to simultaneously thrust her arms into the sleeves and run down the steep and narrow stairs.

Hearing the thumps and muttered curses, Michael turned and looked up from the stove, a grin spreading across his face as he took in Nikita’s precipitous and half-clothed descent.

He barely had time to brace himself before she flung herself into his embrace, wrapping her arms tightly around him and raining kisses across his face and neck, pausing only to say,

“I was afraid I’d dreamed you again.”

Michael’s warm hands slid inside her unbelted robe, up her legs and around her bottom pulling her still more tightly against him, when he pinched her, hard.

Nikita yelped in surprise.

“You’re not dreaming,” he said with a slight smile.

Nikita’s eyes narrowed slightly, glinting with a sudden challenge. She jerked open the buttons on his jeans, slipped her hands inside and pulled him hard against her.

“Show me. Show me right now.”

************

After her pulse slowed and her breathing returned to normal, Nikita raised her head from Michael’s shoulder – a slow smile glimmering on her lips and in her eyes. As she straightened up, rocking slightly backwards across Michael’s lap, she wrapped her hands around the back of the kitchen chair, planted her feet more firmly on the ground on each side and fixed Michael with a direct stare.

“So, what are you doing here?”

Michael slipped his hands down from the slow circles he was drawing on her back to her bottom and rocked her forward again, raising an eyebrow and lifting up a corner of his mouth in a slight smile.

Nikita let out a throaty chuckle. “Okay. I know what you’re doing – but, why?”

“I missed you.”

Nikita sobered immediately. “The last thing I said to you was that our entire relationship was a lie.”

Michael shrugged, keeping his caresses smooth and steady across her back and hips. “I didn’t believe you.”

Nikita pursed her lips in frustration. “I worked very hard to be convincing.”

“I know. I worried that you might have convinced yourself you told the truth.”

“Rather than live with the lie?” Nikita tried to hide her rueful expression by ducking her head.

Michael lifted her chin back up, then stroked his thumb across her eyebrow in an achingly familiar caress as he said softly, “Just to keep living.”

“I managed to convince myself I told the truth about a million times,” she paused to catch his eyes again before saying firmly, “it never took.”

Nikita shivered slightly, trying to shake free from those memories. Then she reached out and gently traced her finger along the right side of his nose, from his eye to his mouth. “So why did you do this?”

“A little melodramatic, yes?” It was Michael’s turn to allow a rueful smile to play across his lips and shrug. “I was hurt, and so angry, that you would lie about something so important, to you, to me, to us. It was impulse. One I later regretted.”

“Why?”

“I did it hoping to hurt you,” Michael resumed his slow caress along her cheek bone, tracing her lips with his thumb, “as if I hadn’t already hurt you enough over the last six years. I’m sorry, again.”

“It worked.” Nikita slid her eyes away from Michael’s gaze, not sure if she was more angry or embarrassed. “I cut myself the same way, more than once, during the weeks that followed.”

“Ni-ki-ta.” Michael’s whisper was laced with both regret and admonition. It was his turn to trace the line along the side of her nose, his eyes searching hers for clues to her current emotional state.

Nikita slipped her hand around the back of his neck and pulled him into a gentle kiss, seeking to reassure him that she held no grudges, for his behavior anyway, from that awful day. After a brief hesitation, Michael responded, the kiss gradually deepening in intensity and intent.

Michael broke away first, slapped her lightly on the outside of her thigh, and said, “breakfast first.”

Nikita smiled a small, slightly wicked smile, and with a few gentle thrusts of her hips to let him know she knew his blood was stirring again too, said “are you sure?”

“Yes. When you faint, I want to know it is from pleasure and not low blood sugar.”

Nikita cocked her eyebrow as she drawled, “when??”

Michael’s answering smile was much more wicked than hers had been. “When.”

**************

Hours later, even if she could not precisely be said to have lost consciousness, Nikita conceded that Michael had more than made good on his promise. By the time he was willing to release her, she could not move or speak. If he had not rolled her over and re-positioned her arms and legs, he would have had to have slept on top of her or on the very edge of the mattress. In response to his quiet question, the best she could do was to smile and grunt softly – articulation was quite beyond her. She tried valiantly to open her eyes one last time to watch him, something she loved to do, but no such luck. Even that small, instinctive muscle control was short-circuited as she fell into a sound sleep.

They hadn’t actually been able to take up the challenge right away. In scrounging the cupboards to put together a small breakfast it was painfully clear that until someone went to the market they would eat nothing else but wind sandwiches.

This led directly to an argument. Nikita insisted that she go to town alone. Michael thought she was being overly cautious.

Nikita was incredulous. “You spent an entire day roaming the property to make sure I was alone…for all either of us know, there are several watchers on Section payroll in town, probably at least one at the market.”

“I don’t think Operations will try to take me, not right now anyway.”

“It’s a foolish risk.” Nikita folded her arms across her chest and narrowed her eyes. “I won’t do it.”

Michael raised his hands in surrender. “Okay.”

Nikita asked, rather tentatively, how long he had be staying.

“As long as you’ll have me.”

“I have three more days, you can stay as long as you like.”

“Three more days then.”

As she was collecting her car keys, she experienced a brief flash of panic. “Michael…”

Her heart fluttered when he turned to look inquiringly at her, he had pulled back on his jeans and shirt, neither fully buttoned, and when he brushed his hair out of his eyes – her mouth went suddenly dry and heat shot from her belly up her neck.

“What…?”

“You’ll still be here when I get back…?” she immediately despised herself for the tentative way the question came out.

MIchael smiled and shook his head slightly in amusement, reminding himself for the millionth time to stop forgetting how much Nikita feared abandonment. “Yes.”

She blushed slightly, but kept her eyes locked on his, trying to let him know how much this mattered to her. Suddenly he turned for the door. Before she could react he was back in front of her, holding his boots. He presented them to her with a small flourish. “Take these with you. I can’t leave without them.”

She backed up a step and raised her hands to reject the offer, “Michael, I don’t want to trap you here.”

“You’re not.”

The question that had been driving her crazy finally burst out. “Why aren’t you angry with me?”

“I was.” He looked down at the ground, then caught her eyes again. “I’ve had plenty of time to get over it.”

Nikita twisted her hands together as she bit her lip. “Michael, I betrayed you.”

Instantly furious that she blamed herself for a situation not of her own making, Michael snapped, “How did you betray me?”

Nikita stuttered, “Well, uh, I…”

Michael interrupted. “Were you married to someone I didn’t know about?”

“No.”

“Were you sleeping with Mick?”

Nikita could not keep the look of shock off her face as she shuddered with horror that this image raised for her. “NO-O!”

“Were you sleeping with anyone other than me?”

“No.”

“Did you ever set me up to take the blame for a mission failure, real or contrived?”

“No.”

“Did you ever try to evade personal responsibility when your actions jeopardized a mission?”

“No. But sometimes I relied on you to cover for me.”

“Did you ever ask me to?”

“No.” Locating her spine, Nikita added, “usually the opposite.”

“Hmmph.” Michael snorted, then continued, “Did you ever change my mission profiles, before or in the field, to further your own advancement or hinder mine?”

“Well, I. . .”

He cut her off, “For any reason other than to protect an innocent?”

“The Genet mission.”

“Were you acting independently on that?”

“No.”

“Did you ever set yourself up to advance within Section at my expense?”

“No.”

Michael consciously gentled his voice as he asked, “Were you sleeping with me just to gain my protection?”

“Hardly. I would have been safer to stay away altogether.”

With each question, Michael advanced a step and Nikita retreated, until she was up against the wall. Now he deliberately stepped into her personal space. “Yes. You would have been much safer. So, I repeat, how did you betray me?”

“I told you I never loved you.”

“You lied.” Michael dismissed the issue and moved on to what was important for both of them. “Why?”

“I wanted you to run without me, without trying to save me from my own mistakes.”

“Why?”

“So you could be free.”

“What if I didn’t want to be free?”

“Michael – you were in abeyance, they intended for you to die.”

“Was I in abeyance on your recommendation or authority?”

“No.” Nikita dropped her gaze, ashamed still about how thoroughly she had been played. “I was just a mouthpiece.”

“You acted to save my life,” Michael fixed her with hard stare before continuing, “maybe not the way I would have chosen, but the best you could. So, how did you betray me?”

“I didn’t tell you I’d been tapped by Center, that I was working for someone else.”

“How many things did I keep from you, things you would have preferred to know? That would have changed your actions if you had known?”

Nikita looked helplessly at him, they both knew that list was long and ugly and would dredge up issues long set aside.

“Nikita,” Michael’s gaze softened and he reached out and stroked her eyebrow, then her cheek. “Go to town. Get us some food. I will be here when you get back.” And he sealed his words with a light kiss.

As she headed for the door, he quietly added, “I still have a promise to make good on.”

Michael grinned in satisfaction as Nikita missed a step and stumbled lightly into the doorframe.

*************

When she heard footsteps on the stairs, Nikita looked up from the soup she was stirring to see Michael making his way down from the bedroom. As he drew nearer, he stretched and yawned before coming up behind her and wrapping his arms around her waist, dropping a quick kiss on the back of her neck as he pulled her close.

“How long have you been up?” he asked.

Nikita leaned into his embrace. “A little over an hour.”

“What’ve you been doing?”

“Took a shower and started supper.”

“What’re you making?”

“Vegetable soup. There’s some fresh bread and fruit too.”

“Sounds good.”

Michael slipped his hands under her pullover as he kissed the juncture of her neck and collarbone. Nikita closed her eyes and smiled, rolling her head back onto his shoulder to give him greater access to her neck. She could not help shivering slightly in reaction as his hands roved up her sides, then over to cup her breasts giving them a quick squeeze before tugging on her nipples.

“Hey, what are you doing?”

“Copping a feel.” Nikita turned her head to look at him in amazement. “Where did you pick up that phrase?”

“A Cistercian Monastery.”

“Excuse me?”

“There was an American kid spending some time there too, he had a very rich vocabulary for this sort of activity.”

“What were you doing at a Cistercian Monastery?”

Michael moved to her side and sliced himself a piece of bread. “I needed someplace to go to think. The brothers offer retreat in exchange for work.”

“Oh.” Nikita turned to look at him, examining his profile against the shadows cast by the few lights she had turned on. He looked serious as always, but relaxed. Now that she was looking closely, she realized that he was as relaxed as she could ever remember seeing him. As he did not move away or change the subject after letting drop a nugget of personal information, she decided to try asking for more. “How long were you there?”

“Almost two months.”

“So long?”

“I needed the time, and I enjoyed the work.”

“What work?” Nikita began to lay the table for their meal, striving to keep the noise of the dishes and utensils as unobtrusive as possible, but at the same time aiming for the appearance of a normal conversation – as opposed to the one she had been waiting for since his arrival the previous night.

“The brothers support themselves with the proceeds from their winemaking, both from grapes and from flowers. There’s plenty to do in the spring and summer in the fields.” Michael turned to the table and began to help set it.

“Did you go there right away?”

“No.”

“Oh.” Nikita decided to back off a bit, fearing the short answer was an attempt to end the conversation. To her surprise, and pleasure, Michael continued after a longish pause.

“I had a safe house about 120 kilometers from where I left you. I went there first.”

“Did you spend much time there?”

“Four weeks or so.”

“What were you doing?”

Michael looked up from the wine bottle he was opening and smiled briefly before answering. “Sleeping. Mostly.”

“Sleeping?”

“Eighteen to twenty hours a day the first few weeks.”

Nikita could not help it, she stared straight at him. She had never known him to sleep more than six hours at a stretch, usually of course, much, much less. “Were you sick?”

Michael actually chuckled, quietly of course. “No, a little depressed and definitely angry, but in the end I decided it was decades of sleep deprivation catching up with me.”

Rapidly reviewing every women’s magazine article on depression she could remember, Nikita could not help sounding the tinniest bit skeptical. “How did you decide that?’

Michael started pouring the wine. “After about two and a half weeks, I started to wake up – by the end of a month, I was down to about 12 hours a night.”

After a quick review of her own schedule over the last six years, Nikita decided sleep deprivation was not such a bad theory. “So, why did you decide to go to a Monastery?”

Michael handed her a glass of wine. “A la vie.”

Nikita tipped her glass toward him and sipped, then set it down and turned to serve the soup. After they sat down, Michael continued.

“I discovered that I don’t like having nothing to do, that I don’t think well just sitting around.”

“So, you needed a place to think that would keep you busy and out of sight?”

“Yes.”

“What did you think about?” Nikita held her breath as she asked this question, not sure how Michael would answer, if he did.

Michael looked up from his plate and caught her eyes, trapping her gaze with his own. Worried at first that she had overstepped, she realized that his eyes held no accusation or warning. He simply seemed to be searching for something. Apparently, he found whatever he was seeking, for he answered.

“You. Us. Adam. The last two years. Why I was still alive. What to do next.”

Nikita decided to go for a light touch in her response. “No wonder you were there for two months.”

Michael stood and helped himself to more soup before sitting back down. Nikita took the time to berate herself for mishandling the opening.

After he sat back down Michael asked, “Which do you want to know about first?”

Nikita opened her mouth, closed it again, and then raised her spoon in surrender as she grimaced in half embarrassed disgust at her own self-absorption. “I wish I wanted to know about your plans first, but I what I really want to know is why you didn’t believe me when I told you I didn’t love you and how you got over being angry about it.”

“Vanity.”

This was not the answer she was expecting. “What?”

“Vanity. I refused to accept that I could have been so completely deceived by someone I believed I knew better than myself. My choices were that you lied, or I was a fool. I chose to believe that you lied.”

“Oh.” This was not really the answer she was expecting either. Not that she knew what she was expecting.

“Then I made myself consider the possibility that you were telling the truth.” Michael looked away as he continued. “I had to, have to, accept that I have given you more than enough reasons to hate me, to want to deceive me, to repay me for the pain I caused you.”

“You also gave me plenty of reasons to love you.”

“How many of them outside the bedroom?”

“What?!”

“Nikita,” Michael paused, searching for the right words. “I didn’t waste any time wondering if our physical connection was real,” Michael looked up at her and smiled a sweet, suggestive smile, “it is.” He grew serious again. “But that isn’t the same as an emotional connection, as… love. That is based on faith in another person. I knew that your faith in me was shattered, more than once, by my actions. How could love even develop, much less survive that?”

Nikita was not exactly sure how she knew, but for Michael, this was not a rhetorical question; it was more, much more than that. It might even be the one question he had come to ask. Fortunately, it was one she had wrestled with herself on so many sleepless nights. She knew what her answer was.

“The thing about faith, Michael, is it regenerates, and having been tested, it gets stronger, not weaker. Our ‘physical connection’ helped get us, get me, through some difficult moments – but that’s not why I fell in love with you. Those feelings developed slowly, and grew out of coming to know you not as a lover, but as a man who struggled always to do the right thing in an unrighteous world. To look out for the weak and shield them from the strong. To show kindness to those in need. To be endlessly forgiving of others and much too hard yourself. My faith in those things – slow in coming I know,” Nikita caught his eye and smiled briefly, “once found, never wavered.”

Nikita paused to sip some wine, giving herself a moment to gather her thoughts again before launching in the confession she had been longing to make. “I know I didn’t give you much cause to know that though. I pushed you away more than once. I took out some of my frustrations on you because I knew you would not retaliate in kind. I held you responsible for things you could not control or fix. I blamed you for my own confusion and doubts. And I didn’t tell you things I should have. I could ask you the same question. How could your faith, your love, for me develop and survive that?”

“How did you know my feelings for you?” Michael asked.

“Umm, well,” Nikita stumbled for the words. “Your looks, your touch, the little things you did for me – Oh, and yes, repeatedly saving my life.” She grinned at him.

“That’s how I knew what you felt for me. Even when I thought you shouldn’t, that I didn’t deserve your love – or even your friendship.”

Nikita was quick to respond, “Yes you did, you do. Always.”

Michael looked at her for a long time before he smiled slightly and holding out his hand for hers, said, “I love you.”

Nikita slipped her hand into his and gave him a brilliant smile. “I love you too.”

“I should have told you more often.”

“I knew.”

“Yes, but the words matter.” Michael paused, turned her hand over in his and began to gently stroke her fingers with the pad of his thumbs. “It was a long time before I could even admit to myself how I felt about you, and then when I did, I realized I could not tell you as long as you were ignorant of the life I was living with Elena and Adam. By the time I finally could have told you, I’d gotten so used to assuming you knew without the words – that we didn’t need them. I was wrong.”

“I didn’t always make it easy for you to talk to me. I was so busy examining so much of what you did for manipulation, and the lies about Center got so heavy…I was both demanding and judgmental. I’m so sorry now for much of what I said and did to you.”” “Kita, if you want to punish yourself about the past I can’t stop you, but not on my account.”

“But…” She trailed off, not knowing what to say.

“Don’t. You were the only person in Section who held me up to a standard of decent human behavior and found me wanting. It was the best compliment you could ever have paid.”

She looked up with a quizzical frown. “My disappointment was flattering?”

“You could only have been disappointed if you expected better. That was flattering.”

Nikita looked ready to protest again when Michael forestalled her by gently squeezing her hand, asking quietly, “Have you been able to forgive me for all the hurt I caused you?”

“Oh yes.”

“So why wouldn’t I be able to forgive you for being suspicious of my motives when I never explained them, for pushing me away when you were frightened, for being angry when I hurt you?”

Nikita looked down at their joined hands. “I guess I just regret so much now.”

“So do I.”

At Michael’s gentle rejoinder, Nikita suddenly felt tears well up and a lump appeared in her throat.

Michael stood and walked around the table and pulled her up into his arms. Nikita fought, with mild success, to control her dripping eyes and sniffling nose. “Sshhh,” he said stroking her hair, “it’s all in the past. We’re alive and here together now.”

“I’m sorry.” Nikita pulled back in his embrace to look him in the face.

“Don’t be.” Michael ran his thumb across her brow. “None of this has been easy.”

“Only if you stop being sorry too.” She sniffed.

“I’ll try.”

“We’ll both try.” Nikita smiled a rather watery smile.

“Deal.”

*************

Michael put the last of the dishes in the sink, topped off their wine glasses, then took her hand, led her to the couch and then with a light shove, pushed her down while he turned and stoked the fire. After it was blazing to his satisfaction he settled down on the floor and leaned back against the sofa with his shoulder brushing her thigh and his elbows resting on his upraised knees.

Nikita waited for a beat, then reached over and lightly touched his shoulder. “So, what does “offered my services” to Section, mean, exactly?”

Michael turned at looked up at Nikita. The firelight was glancing off her hair, picking up the gold threads among the white blonde and making them shine with a light all their own. “You are so beautiful.”

“Thank you.” Nikita smiled as she looked down at him, the light from the fire turning his hair to burnished copper and his eyes dark green, and thought that he had never looked better. And that he was never going to loose the irritating habit of distracting her from questions he didn’t want to or was not ready to answer. “You didn’t answer my question.”

“I know.” Michael cleared his throat. “It means I’m essentially a private contractor. I’ve received inquiries from Section and three of the other government agencies that I contacted. I’ll submit proposals for the jobs I like and if they can meet my terms, I’ll do them.”

“You’re going to be an independent anti-terrorist?”

“It’s the one thing I do really well. Better than most.”

“Not the only thing.” Nikita purred and batted her eyelashes.

Michael gave her a serious look and raised his hands in a placating motion. “Okay – I considered becoming a gigolo, but decided it was too much work.”

Nikita thumped him on the shoulder. “More work than fighting terrorists?”

“Well, maybe not.” He conceded with a grin, “but I would get bored too fast.”

“Well, we wouldn’t want you to be bored.”

“Oh no.”

“I hoped that free you might choose something safe and boring.” Nikita could not keep a shade of regret from coloring her tone.

“I never wanted boring.” Michael looked up and waited for Nikita to look at him before continuing. “I couldn’t wait to leave Marseilles for University in Paris, and then even Paris wasn’t exciting enough. I joined a terrorist group because I was too impatient to work for change inside the system. And there I discovered I liked living on the edge.” Michael paused for a moment, lost in memory. Then with a brief shake of his head to clear out the cobwebs, he continued. “I thought I was tired of it, but I realized at the monastery what I was tired of was being shackled by Operations and Madeline and bureaucratic infighting – not fighting terrorists. That part of the job I valued. Being among the best at that job meant, means, a great deal to me.”

“I never saw the job the same way you do.”

Michael gave her one of his clear, penetrating looks. “I know.”

Nikita ducked her head to escape his gaze. “When did you realize that you had the option of coming back, on your own terms?”

“When I realized that we had been deliberately boxed into a corner so that our only choice was for me to run while you stayed inside.”

“But you were sent on an abeyance mission.”

“Nikita, if they wanted me dead they would have shot me inside Section. Letting me out while you and Walter were still free agents, not to mention Operations – Once I had time to consider it, was obviously a set up.”

“Wish I’d figured that part out sooner.” Nikita’s tone was rueful.

“Center tapped you a long time ago, didn’t they.” It was a statement, not a question.

“Yes.”

“Young and vulnerable informers are valuable because they are the easiest to manipulate, and once you have their profile, you can play them for a long time before they catch on, sometimes even after. You should know this.”

Nikita decided to ignore this mild reversion to scolding mentor. “I know,” she sighed wearily, “but I never applied what I knew to my own situation.” Her eyes narrowed as she caught Michael’s gaze again. “That’s why you never promoted me to level three, isn’t it.”

If Michael was surprised by this apparent change of subject, he didn’t show it. “Yes.”

“Why didn’t you just tell me.”

“Would that have made any difference?”

“Probably not.” Nikita made a face. Then, with an abrupt jerk she forced the conversation back to the previous subject. “So how did realizing they wanted you to run make you decide they wanted you back?”

“There is no other reason for letting me go. They knew my profile, knew what I valued. It was an extremely good bet I’d come back into the fold, one way or another, and this time, not a as prisoner unwillingly recruited, but as a volunteer – freely committing to the cause. Having come back, I won’t ever be able to leave again.”

“No. That’s why I hoped you’d stay away.”

“If you’d been with me, I would have.”

“Because I asked.”

“Yes.”

“That’s what they told me, too.”

“That’s why separating us was so important.” Michael gazed into the fire for a moment. “Did they tell you what to say?”

“No, but they ran SIMMs which suggested it was the way I’d choose to get you to run – noble self sacrifice for the other apparently being one of my dominant qualities.” She knew she sounded bitter, but it was still galling after all these months to have been so easily anticipated, so ‘predictable.’

Michael wrapped his hand around her ankle and squeezed it reassuringly. “It is one of the ones I like.”

Nikita responded with a dry, “Thanks.” She continued, “So, you’re working independently rather than deal with the whole Section/Oversight/Center thing.”

“Essentially.”

Nikita considered what he had told her for a moment. “And you will learn a lot about what other agencies are up to.”

“Yes.”

“They will regard you as expendable.”

“Of course. Otherwise they’d use their own agents.”

“Certainly living on the edge.”

“I won’t be bored.”

“That should be the least of your problems.”

Into the silence that followed, Nikita said. “You must have some more questions for me.”

“About you relationship with Center.”

“Yes.”

Michael turned and looked at her. “I do. But I think I’ve put most of it together. For the rest, I won’t press you for more than you can tell.”

“I would tell you everything no matter what, but I’m free to tell you all of it.”

“Ahh.”

“Ahh. Yes.”

“It was mostly about me, wasn’t it.”

“Yes. I was your personal Rorschach test.”

“So, why did you agree to do it?”

“First, they didn’t tell me that part, second, its not like I volunteered.”

Nikita folded her legs up on the couch and wrapped her arms around her knees. “First contact came while I was out those six months. One day a man I’d never seen before, or since, walked into the dive I was working in and told me that within three days I would be located by Freedom League, and that I was to allow them to take me. That I would be rescued by Section and re-integrated. From that point on I was to consider myself an informer on Center’s payroll. I would be asked several times a year to report on whatever subjects Center requested, especially regarding key leadership decisions and reactions in the rank and file. When I asked what would happen if I just ran again, he said Center would tell Section how to find me, and how I escaped.”

Nikita looked down at Michael’s upturned face. “I wasn’t ready to die or for you to be punished for saving my life, I had a lot of unresolved issues with Section – and waitressing is an awful job. So, Freedom League grabbed me. I was totally with the program until an asshole guard decided to try to rape me. Then I decided Center could take a flying leap. I killed him and prepared to run again, but I had heard about the raid in Lyons, and I, I….”

“And you came and saved my life.” Michael finished for her, hoping she would see in his eyes that he meant far more than taking out a single opponent.

“Yes.”

“And agreed to come back to Section.”

“Yes. I was going to tell you about Center – which I’d never heard of before that man showed up – and ask you how I should handle it. But I wanted to wait until we were outside Section, and then the whole Jurgen thing…” Nikita trailed off.

“Yes.”

“I was so angry with you that I decided not to tell you – as if you would know that I hadn’t told you a secret.” Nikita rolled her eyes.

“Then during the three weeks I had away after Jurgen’s death, Center contacted me again – this time stressing the importance of secrecy, especially with regards to you, because the evaluation would be skewed if you knew about it. I was still mad, so I agreed. As things got better again between us, I wanted to tell you, but by then the Adrian situation was in play and everyone used the same threat to keep me quiet.”

“My life.”

“Yep.”

After a moment, Nikita continued. “Things just kept happening that made telling you difficult, or impossible. When things were good, I kept waiting for the perfect moment. When things were bad, you had too much else to worry about or I was too angry. I kept rationalizing that I wasn’t DOING anything, just reporting on what I saw.”

Michael reached up for her hands and tugged her down to him. After she settled herself between his knees, with her back up against his chest and his arms wrapped around her, she continued. “Obviously in hindsight this is not amazing, but Center contacted me the day we got back after you broke the Gellman conditioning and reminded me that your life was the price I would pay if I told you.”

“Is that why you wouldn’t move in with me?”

“One of the reasons. You would have figured out that something was up. Also, Center told me I couldn’t. When I asked why I was told that you were now one of the objects of their interest. That they wanted to test Operations and Madeline’s hold on your loyalties by forcing you to live under the conditions Operations and Madeline set.”

“Did they tell you why they allowed the Gellman adjustment to take place?”

“Yes. I was simply an observer, not an active agent. Therefore my life was of little consequence, except as an example of how Operations and Madeline handled personnel issues.”

“Nice.”

“Yeah.”

“When did they make you an active agent?”

“Eight weeks before it all came down. I just about died when Mick revealed himself as Mr. Jones. The crap I put up with from him, it makes me gag even now.”

“I threw him out of a moving car once.”

“And he cooperated fully in the Gellman process.”

“He was also instrumental in helping me break it.”

“So I understand.” She did not sound very forgiving.

“Did they tell you what would happen to me if you got me to run with you?”

“They assured me that it was merely a test for Operations and Madeline, to see how they would handle the inevitable disruption in Section – also to learn just how important you were to Section’s success ratio. That you were the object, not the subject.”

“And when we were taken by Section?”

“They knew Operations and Madeline would choose your life over mine in a heartbeat – so you weren’t in any danger there. Then when Mr. Jones told me that they’d really been testing you, and you’d failed – I thought for minute the world had stopped spinning. Knowing that I’d signed your cancellation orders because I’d pressured you into something you would have never done independently.” Nikita shivered and would have buried her face in her hands if Michael had not stopped her by turning her slightly and pulling her head down onto his shoulder and wrapping her hands in his own.

“Everything after that is a blur, things happened so fast. I’d told myself I was in control of my actions, that I was protecting you by informing on, then setting up Operations and Madeline. Turned out I was about as independent as your average marionette.”

They were quiet for a time, watching the blue flames dance along the hot coals in the fireplace, the heat singeing the skin of their faces and hands.

Eventually, Nikita whispered against Michael’s neck, “They want you back inside.”

“They’ll get me someday.”

“But not today?”

“No. Not today.” And he tilted her chin up and kissed her.

************

Early in the afternoon three days later, Nikita stepped out of the cottage carrying her bag and headed for her car. She smiled when she realized Michael had already brushed off the snow and started the engine to warm it up for her. She had no idea when he had nicked her keys. She tossed her bag into the backseat and closed the door again. Leaning up against the car she tilted her face up to the overcast sky and felt a few stray flakes of snow catch on her checks and eyelashes.

After their long talk the first evening, they had spent their nights, and some of the days, making love and the rest of the time glorying in the simple pleasure of being together. One of the days had been beautiful and they had walked for miles through the snowy woods. They had spent some time replenishing the woodpile. They had finished a long interrupted project to build a workbench and shelves in the garage. But mostly they had sat by the fire. Nikita skimmed through the piles of journals and reports on global issues that she had been collecting for months in an effort to broaden her worldview to include perspectives beyond those of Section and Center. Michael’s months away had altered his perspective as well, and so they had long conversations about global affairs and the role of Section in the world. . The only serious rupture came when Michael suddenly realized that she had gone back to Section and was not safely tucked away at a desk at Center. For Michael, he had come close to exploding.

“You’re what?!”

Nikita was momentarily confused. Then she put it together. “I’m working on a mission profile that deals with Libya.”

“You’re back at Section.”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

And so she told him the same thing she had told Walter, that she had been unhappy and out of place at Center and that she had sought the return to cold op status because she wanted more direct involvement dealing with the dangers Section faced for the sake of innocents. Michael was even less impressed with her reasoning than Walter had been, and said so quite bluntly. Nikita had been too outraged to even answer when suddenly he had started giggling. It was several minutes before she had been able to get a coherent sentence out of him.

“Oh Nikita – I’m laughing at myself. I thought I could put off seeing you because you weren’t in any immediate danger, that you, that we, could wait. If it had occurred to me that you might be back in the field I would have contacted you months ago.”

Nikita had been tempted to brain him with a log from the wood bin, but settled for beating him with a throw pillow, which soon dissolved into a giggling tussle on the floor, with its own inevitable and mutually satisfying conclusion.

Knowing their time was almost at an end, they had spent most of this morning in bed, each of them trying to imprint the other on their senses without acknowledging their fears of what the future might hold.

Nikita heard the door open and looked over to see Michael emerge, pack slung over his shoulder, and turn to lock the door behind him. She watched him glide towards her and cursed herself for a coward and a fool that she had never gotten up the courage to ask when, or if, they would see each other again, and now it was almost too late.

“Michael?”

Michael read her sudden determination to ask about their personal future in her eyes. Reaching out, he placed his thumb over her lips, stopping her words. “Yes.”

Obviously not quite understanding, Nikita opened her mouth to speak. Before she could make a sound, Michael said, “yes, you will see me again. Faith, remember?”

Nikita flushed in embarrassment.

Michael slowly traced her mouth, then ran his thumb lightly up her cheek before slipping his other hand behind her head and holding her steady for his kiss. A kiss that started out gentle, and ended with them locked in each other’s arms, staring breathlessly at each other as they struggled to let go.

He stepped back at last, then in a voice made huskier and quieter still by his intensity, he said. “I love you.”

And he turned and headed for the woods.

“I love you, Michael.”

He turned one last time and gave her a brilliant smile, then walked away from her once again.

Nikita watched until she could no longer see him between the trees, then biting back tears, she got into her car and pulled out, leaving the cottage behind as she forced her attention to the missions on the pad for the weeks ahead.

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