by Helena Maeve
“I wonder if there are snakes here,” Grigory mused.
Oksana-Francesca stilled abruptly. “Get to the point.”
This was the trouble with sleepers. They spent so much time undercover that they became comfortable in their false lives. They resented the shepherd sent to bring them back into the fold.
Grigory stuffed his hands into his pockets and turned back to the warehouse. Glassless windows offered a clear view into the vacant brick building. “We need to burn a Section agent.”
“One of ours?”
“No.”
The furrow between her eyebrows dispelled any trace of immaturity from an otherwise youthful face “I don’t understand.”
At least she was honest enough to admit it.
“Suspicions have been raised that someone within the SIS may be collaborating with us—or another agency.”
“Suspicions raised…by the SIS?”
“Yes.”
“You want me to give MI6 a double agent…that we don’t have.”
Grigory held her gaze. “Dead or alive. Although dead would be preferred.”
“Oh.” Gradually, Oksana seemed to recall it wasn’t her job to work out the intricacies of SVR stratagems. “Did you have anyone specific in mind?”
A warm breeze rolled in from the river, carrying inland the sour-sick stench of brine.
“His name,” said Grigory, “is Karim Awad.”
* * * *
The bar in Piazza Novona was too crowded for the brush of fingertips against Grigory’s spine to mean anything on its own. But the tantalizing touch coupled with a whisper in his ear dispelled any doubts he might have held.
“This is becoming a habit,” Karim observed. “What will your superiors think?”
“That I could do with a stint in a re-education camp?”
“You still have those?”
Grigory smirked into his brandy glass. From the corner of his eye, he saw Karim gesture to the bartender, as nonchalant and confident as he’d been two nights ago. Exit the shrinking violet that had fled Grigory’s hotel room as if chased—enter Don Juan.
Karim caught him looking and raised his brandy glass in toast. “Congratulations, by the way.”
“What for?”
“The wet job in Ravenna.”
Grigory blinked, slowly and deliberately. “I haven’t the faintest idea what you mean.”
“Really? Retired CIA operative takes a nap behind the wheel in his garage and forgets he’s left the engine running?”
“You’re right. That does sound suspicious…”
Karim’s throat bobbed as he took a slow, meditative sip of brandy.
“A guilty conscience is a terrible thing,” Grigory added.
“Tell that to Langley. Company’s out for blood. Better watch yourself.”
“Oh, I’m sure I’ll be fine…” He flung a glance over his shoulder. “What with the combined forces of Moscow and Her Majesty’s finest to look out for my well-being.”
The tight press of bodies in the bar concealed far more than the odd pickpocket. Grigory had spotted the SIS as soon as he’d stepped inside. They were the patrons stretching a single glass of watered-down gin and tonic with slow sips. The pair mechanically going through a conversation neither party was really paying attention to.
Other than Karim’s, no faces stood out from the night of his abduction, but like called to like. Grigory recognized his fellow spooks in the wild.
Karim twisted a little in his seat, orienting himself to meet Grigory’s gaze. “It’s our pleasure.” Heat radiated from his strong, muscular body, as enticing as a comfortable bed at the end of a long day.
“I’m not convinced you know what the word means.”
“Didn’t hear any complaints the last time we spoke…”
“And you won’t hear any now,” said Grigory. “Think of it as a play by hand.” Chess metaphors had served them well in the past.
Karim narrowed his almond-shaped eyes even as he affected an incredulous half-smile. “I’ll believe you’d make an unplanned move when pigs fly.”
“In a world where James Bond turns out to be your prime minister, anything is possible.”
It was a poor joke, but Karim rewarded it with a snicker. “Were I at liberty to discuss Craft, I might be tempted to tell you that there’s a difference between sanitizing reports and our brand of tradecraft…”
“Are you saying we’re the same?” Grigory returned the smile. He blamed the kernel of genuine pleasure that took hold in his chest on the brandy.
“I’m saying we have something in common.”
Like Karim had done the other night, Grigory leaned toward him, dropping his voice an octave. “Are we still talking about intelligence gathering?”
He didn’t expect Karim to concede the game without making him work for it, but the brush of a fingertip along the crease of his slacks was telling enough.
The shadow of the bar concealed the stray caress from prying eyes, but didn’t stop dread from stabbing through Grigory like an ice-pick.
“Do you have something for me?” Karim asked, the flat delivery at odds with the ardor in his gaze.
“The Company is not the only one in Uncle’s sights.”
“You don’t say.”
“I do say.”
“Anything more specific than that?” Karim wondered. “Not to be rude, but my superiors expect more than vague hearsay…”
“The prognosis for the next few days is wet. I’d recommend that all SIS operatives remember their umbrellas.”
He waited for understanding to twist at Karim’s features, but the same moue of reluctant interest persisted. They could’ve been discussing the weather forecast in earnest and he probably would have looked just as bored.
Grigory feigned a sigh. “You want more?”
“Do you have more?”
“If you thought I was so useless, I’m surprised you’d take time out of your busy schedule to introduce yourself… Yes, I have more. A name.”
“Will it take another drink to pry it out of you?”
“No.”
Grigory hopped off his bar stool, dizzy with the cacophony of the bar and the brandy in his bloodstream. Before he could think better of it, he tipped into Karim’s body and brushed his lips to the spook’s ear.
“Karim Awad.”
He slithered through the tight pack of bodies before Karim could grab him, the gauntlet thrown.
* * * *
No conspicuously silent footsteps trailed Grigory’s to the hotel. By turns, headlights elongated and erased his shadow in the dark stretches between the sodium glow of street lamps. He turned onto his lane with a sinking heart.
The gamble had paid off. Section would be scrambling now, too busy chewing over the SVR’s interest in Karim to pay attention to Nathaniel Jennings. Oksana’s wet job would free Grigory of the shackles he’d been laboring under for the past few days.
Center need never know anyone had tried to turn him—but if they found out, proof of his loyalty would lie in the scalp Oksana delivered on his orders.
As soon as he was in his room, Grigory shed his trench coat and shoes, and fumbled for the Murattis he’d bought earlier. His hands shook around the lighter. It took a couple of tries to kindle the flickering flame.
He blew out his first smoky breath right into the ‘No Smoking’ sign on the coffee table.
The rap of knuckles against the door startled a gasp from his throat. It was only Karim, somber and alone, shadows pooled in the hollows of his eye sockets.
“You didn’t bring the cavalry?” Grigory quipped, doing his best to hide the traitorous skip-race in his chest.
“I don’t like to share,” Karim rasped and surged into a breathless kiss.
With his very last shred of self-awareness, Grigory nudged the door shut and hurried to flip the flimsy latch.
Karim’s fervor backed him into the wall, impact vibrating from the roots of Grigory’s hair to the tips of his to
es. Quick on its heels, arousal trickled into his veins, igniting the banked coals of his need.
Grigory made to give back as good as he got, but as soon as he raised his right hand, Karim pulled away, hissing through his teeth. Sizzling ash had crumbled from the tip of Grigory’s cigarette onto his shoulder.
“Careful,” Grigory taunted. “Don’t hurt yourself.”
His mouth ached from Karim’s plundering retort, words set aside in haste. Karim pinned him there with hands around his wrists and hips digging ruthlessly into Grigory’s. He hadn’t been particularly gentle the first time they’d tumbled into bed together, but this took that excess of zeal and ramped up the ferocity by a few good notches.
And Grigory loved it.
He arched into Karim’s hold, squirming just to feel the clasp of fingers tighten around his forearms. His cock throbbed in the confines of his slacks. His nipples ached with every delicious drag of Karim’s chest against his. The friction building between them was good but not enough. There was no room to beg for more, no indication that Karim might heed him.
Drunk on that heady, helpless illusion, Grigory whimpered as a flicker of burning ash touched his wrist. He tore his mouth away from Karim’s.
“Fuck, that hurts.”
Karim snorted against his cheek. He had little trouble grabbing the cigarette out of Grigory’s lax fingers and tossing it to the green-yellow carpet. The lit end died, crushed beneath the sole of his shoe.
“They’ll bill me for that.” Grigory pouted.
“Expense it.”
The cigarette was gone, but Karim’s enthusiasm seemed boosted by its absence. He turned Grigory over like a rag doll, shoving him into the wall with little care for bruises. The bulge in his slacks punctuated the renewed assault. He kissed and bit haphazardly at Grigory’s neck as he wrestled with his fly.
“Ah, wait…” Grigory’s fingers were suddenly too big, too clumsy around the buttons that ran down the front of his shirt. He struggled to undo them.
They’d done the frenzied, quick one-night stand already. He wanted to be naked for this, to savor ache and pleasure as if for the last time.
If Oksana delivered, it would be.
Karim seized the plackets of his shirt with both hands and yanked. Buttons pinged off the wall with the rattle of stray bullets.
“Fuck,” Grigory wheezed, as eloquent as his literary heroes. He didn’t know or care if Karim heard him.
A shiver raced up his spine as Karim made short work of his slacks—no tearing, mercifully, though the seams gave a protesting creak beneath the harsh pull of his fists—and underwear. Grigory swallowed hard, keenly aware of how exposed he was, and spread his legs in mute invitation.
Karim clenched his fingers in his hips and sank his teeth into Grigory’s shoulder.
“You have anything?”
He must not have been as far gone as Grigory thought if he could still ask.
Grigory shook his head. He hadn’t come to Italy looking to get laid. The few times he’d paid for the pleasure of a man’s company, when the sympathetic comfort of his own hand no longer satisfied, he had been more than content with the slow drag of fingers around his cock.
“You can—”
“Shut up,” Karim bit out.
There was a soft, rustling sound behind Grigory. He braced himself for the worst.
Warm breath ghosted over his tail bone.
“Son of a bitch,” he gasped, in Russian, as the puzzle pieces clicked into place.
A lifetime ago, in Lyon, a Frenchman had rolled Grigory over in bed and revealed to him what rimming was. He’d been too embarrassed to ask it of any lover since and he always became tongue-tied around the men he paid, but Karim didn’t have to be cajoled or teased into it.
He laved Grigory’s hole with expert flicks of the tongue, teasing at the ring of muscle as though he knew exactly how to drive Grigory out of his mind. It was comforting to think of Karim as inexperienced in something, but the evidence was fast stacking up against it.
“That’ll have to do,” Karim gritted out, pulling back after a protracted moment.
He met little resistance when he pressed in with a single digit.
Still reeling with illicit pleasure, Grigory rose up on tiptoe, blowing out shuddering breaths into the wallpaper. He would’ve settled for Karim’s hands on him if nothing else was on offer, but he was ravenous for whatever he could get.
He didn’t think to steady himself against the wall until Karim had aligned them, jut of his knuckles grazing Grigory’s cleft. The first slow, unflinching press acquainted Grigory with the ache he thought he’d forgotten. On reflex, he made to pull away, but there was nowhere to go and his chest was already flat to the wall.
Karim trapped him with his body, panting into his ear. “Stay still. Stay very, very still…”
The pain intensified with a sense of fullness unlike any Grigory had felt in years. His eyes watered. He choked on a whimper, trembling from his knees all the way to the useless tug of fingers against the wall.
Karim was both longer and thicker than he’d anticipated. He was going to split him in half. There would be pain tomorrow to make him feel thoroughly ashamed.
Grigory sucked in a shuddering breath, rallying. He could end this. The ache wasn’t worth it.
Something Karim did as he pulled out and pressed back in effectively obliterated his thoughts. Grigory let out a mortifying, incoherent noise and arched his back.
“Right there?” Karim rumbled in his ear. “You like that, huh?”
His thrusts angled into and found Grigory’s prostate.
Grigory was beyond speech. He tasted salt on his upper lip and wondered, distantly, if some of the water beading behind his eyelids had trickled down his cheeks. It didn’t seem to matter.
If Karim’s mouth on him had been a sweet, graceless experience, then this was the polar opposite. Karim caught his wrist with one hand and slipped the other around Grigory’s hip to grasp his cock. He didn’t seem surprised find him soft. Within a handful of strokes, he had him rigid, pre-cum beading in the slit.
The touch made every nerve in Grigory’s body sing. Karim took his sweet time fingering his foreskin, strangely gentle despite the harsh pounding he was delivering with sharp rolls of his hips.
Lungs burning despite the seesaw of quivering, wheezing breaths, Grigory gave up trying to pick his way between pleasure and discomfort. He surrendered to both, to Karim, a strangled cry spilling from his throat.
As Grigory spent all over his fist, Karim buried himself with a deep, final thrust, and tipped over the edge. His release was all but silent. Only the hitch of his syncopated breaths against Grigory’s nape and the rattle of his heartbeat revealed his climax.
In a moment, he would pull away, fix his clothes. Leave. Pretend this didn’t happen.
Just like the last time.
Grigory collapsed against him, letting Karim take his weight. He chafed with the thought but told himself he was too winded from his orgasm to speak.
He didn’t have to.
Karim gently smoothed the sweat-damp hair at his nape with a trembling hand. “I’ve got you,” he whispered, pressing the words into the crook of Grigory’s neck. “I’ve got you.”
“Something you heard in a porno once?” Grigory scoffed, voice quaking.
He hissed when Karim yanked on his hair, but the ache lessened, shifting to the cage of his ribs as Karim twined their fingers together. He desperately wanted it to be true.
Chapter Five
There were no saccharine goodbyes at the gate. If Karim had known that Grigory had a flight to catch in the morning, he hadn’t let on as they drifted off to sleep. He was gone when Grigory got his wakeup call from the front desk. The only sign that he’d ever been in Grigory’s room was the black stain of a cigarette butt on the carpet.
The thought of him had been set aside before Grigory even left the bed. By the time he’d boarded his flight to Moscow, Karim was already a pleasant me
mory. Self-preservation and duty to the motherland took precedence over soft hands and a smiling mouth.
The wintry chill of the capital numbed any other lingering pangs.
It was only October, but Moscow had already draped itself in white flurries, furrows of brown-black slush crisscrossing the few wide boulevards visible from the ring road. Poplar and birch trees thinned as the car veered in toward the city, but they were still a long way from the cobblestones of the infamous Red Square.
Grigory’s ride—a black sedan with a military driver—dropped him off about a kilometer away from the ring road, in the concrete quadrangle of Yasenovo District. The SVR’s sister-agency got a Neo-Baroque monstrosity that dominated Lubyanka Square for its headquarters, but foreign operations were managed from the relatively new Y-shaped building south of the city. Beyond the checkpoint, identification was paramount and intruders severely punished.
Standing in the foyer of the Center, Grigory was less than thrilled to discover he was already dripping ice water onto the shiny parquet floors.
He lingered a moment in the vast entryway, wondering if he would’ve felt any different in legendary home of the KGB, of the Cheka before them. He’d been to Lubyanka Square once or twice—a tourist captivated by the propaganda-spouting tour guide charged with recounting the history of the ancient building. The museum next door had been a strangely cheerful sort of place. He’d made it his first stop as soon as the guide finished reciting her sales pitch. He’d brought his handful of carefully edited half-truths to the office the next day.
What else was he going to decorate his desk with, if not Lenin’s portrait?
If any mention of the prison cells beneath the former KGB headquarters was made, it was packaged as an exciting bit of trivia. Torture, after all, was bad for PR.
They didn’t have that problem in Yasenovo.
Grigory shook himself and turned for the stairs.
He had to identify himself three more times before he even made it to the directorate floor, and still it was a quicker admissions process than the FSB headquarters in the heart of the city. The soles of his shoes were mostly dry by the time he finally reached the director’s third-story office.