THE GAME
The house was dark, the defenses on automatic. Her bags were packed and by the front door. Cinnamon Carter slept lightly, she had always slept lightly. When he crawled into her bed and put his arms around her, nibbling at her neck, she came awake at once. There was only one man who could break through her defenses with ease. She smiled. "I didn't know you were in the States," she said softly.
"Just got in," he answered as she turned and settled more comfortably into his embrace. "I heard you had some excitement."
"Mmm, a bit," she confirmed. "You heard about Drake?"
"Yes, want to talk about it?"
Silently, she ran her fingers down the familiar lines of his body, touching him lightly. Then she gave him a brief version of the events of the last few days, keeping in mind his current security clearance as a matter of course.
"So you're back in The Game?"
"For a while. I'll be running Turnkey with Dane."
"Anything I can do?"
She smiled in the dark. She
knew that was the real reason he was here in her bed, the lure of The Game. With an agile twist she moved
on top of him, enjoying the feel of his skin against hers. She shifted comfortably
and he was inside her. Her lips found his and thirty years melted away. For
a moment, they were in a
As they returned to the present she nestled against his shoulder. "If I turned you on half as much as The Game does, we might still be married."
He chuckled at the old accusation that had lost all rancor over time. They weren't right for each other, both accepted that, but there was too much history between them for them to be right with anyone else. Sometimes he thought that they had spent so much of their lies changing their identities they had lost their own. He had once mentioned that to Cinnamon, and in a more serious moment she had agreed, understanding this perspective more completely than anyone else ever could. It had not been enough to keep them together. Cinnamon needed an anchor, a home base. He needed constant change. He was a born nomad. "We would have destroyed each other."She nodded agreement, still attending more to the sensation of intimate contact than any conversation. "If I need you for Turnkey-"
"You can reach me by the usual method."
"Drive me to the airport tomorrow."
"Of course."
She slid off him and curled up next to him, head pillowed in the crook of his shoulder. "Do you think," she asked quietly. "That The Game has destroyed us too?"
"We've faired better than most, my love," he answered without hesitation. "We're alive, without financial problems, or hang-ups. We managed to avoid having children who grew up to hate us, or need to avenge us." He turned toward her, kissing her again and enfolding her in the shelter of his arms. "And we've managed not to hate each other, despite any hurt we've caused over the years."
She woke the
next morning almost convinced that her
“Ah, good, you're up. We'll need to least in a half hour to get you to the airport on time."
"I'll be ready."
They fell into the easy habit of sharing the bathroom and preparing for a trip. She was ready well within the half hour, and he carried her bags to the car while she re-set the automatic alarms. She took a look around the house. It would be several months before she would return, or maybe longer. She would miss her home, but for right now, it would be good to be back in The Game.
Ellen Lindow
April, 1999