by Warren Esby
I think we’re probably safe now since there is no one left who knows about my involvement with the CIA. We may even be able to go back to the States for a visit soon. I’m thinking of seeing if Raffy and Wyatt are interested in hunting some larger game animals. Anya says she’s really interested in going wild pig hunting. I’ve asked her to marry me again as I have done several times over the last two years. She keeps telling me she will as soon as she decides whether to be married as Ann Astor or Anya Astrova. She said she likes the idea of being considered an heiress with a well-known name, but she also likes the idea that she could continue to use her maiden name and have everyone think it’s because she’s adhering to her Russian heritage. I suggested she could be married as Anya Astor Astrova as a compromise, but she said that then her initials would be AAA and she didn’t want to have the same initials as an automobile club.
“But you’re so good in emergencies,” I told her and she laughed and said that wasn’t enough to convince her. So I guess I’ll have to be patient, and she does tell me she loves me all the time as I do her. She is a unique personality.
The problem with life in the Cayman Islands is that it is almost too quiet and too relaxing. There is almost too much contrast with the fear and excitement that was so much a part of my life when I first met Anya. The excitement, of course, is still there between the two of us, but the only remaining fear I have is if someone should happen to say “kill him” and Anya should happen to have her Glock in her hand at the time. I asked her if she thought she would shoot me in the ear as a reflex action if that occurred and she smiled and said it was a possibility, especially if I had been acting like a pig towards her at the time. I told her I would never do that, and I wouldn’t, at least not consciously. I asked her if that would change when we got married but she only smiled and said she didn’t know. But as I said, things are boring for both of us, and we are really too young to retire and do nothing as we have been doing. Neither of us has even reached the age of thirty years old yet.
Well, Anya and I just saw an old movie about a married couple who are both paid assassins. She was very intrigued by the concept since neither of us has killed anyone in over two years, and she thinks there are a lot of people out there who still need to be killed because they are such pigs. She thought that the couple in the film could be a good role model for us and add excitement to our lives. I tried to tell her it wasn’t a real story but she said, wistfully, that it would be perfect for us. I don’t know if she’s really seriously considering it. I told her we would have to get married if she wanted to be like them because they were a married couple. I then told her that we could solve her problem of deciding which name to get married under by getting married twice, once under each name, and use one of those names as the name we use for our assassin activity and one as the name we use as ordinary citizens. She liked that idea and agreed to do it and started making plans to marry me finally, but a last minute snag came up. She said she couldn’t decide which name to use as an assassin and which to use for ordinary life. I told her Astor was a good name for an assassin since no one would expect it. In a way it was like Smith. But then she said she had always killed people under the name Astrova and thought she should keep up with that tradition and said I had also been using the name Astrov when I had killed people. I agreed that we should keep with the tradition we had begun, and I think she’s now on board again and we can get married after all. If we do, I’m sure there will be a sequel to this narrative.
Well, that’s the end of my memoirs. At least for now. Every word of it is true. Well maybe only every third or fourth word is true. But every word of it is a true word, with maybe only one or two exceptions. Well, what do you expect from a CIA doubled agent? Certainly not the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.