Catherine pulled Sergei on to her, kissing him and wrapping her arms around his neck to bind him to her.

“Hurry, Sergei.” 

She continued kissing him.   

“You will take Lana to America.”

“Yes.  Now fuck me.”  She tried moving, but he held too tightly.

“Pay attention.”

She tried squirming again but was unable to move against him.

“I am paying attention.  We will take Lana to America.  We will do that when you get your next leave.  Now fuck me.  Jesus, Sergei, you have no idea what this feels like.  I know you want to talk but talk later.  You have me.  I’m yours.  Fuck me.”

“I will talk, you will listen, and then I will fuck you.”

“Fuck me while you talk.”  She squirmed again, but he just held her tighter.

“Catherine, everything they told you was a lie.”

“It’s Russia, Sergei.  Of course they lied.  Now fuck me, and then tell me which lie is today’s lie.”

“Our position here.  My job, your job, our future.  All lies.”

“Okay, fine.  We leave Siberia and go back to America.  We say we are taking a vacation.  We are both long overdue.”

“I fly to Syria tomorrow.”

“No.” 

She pushed against him but could not move his weight.  She grabbed his hair, then his ears.  Somehow grabbing him would stop him from leaving.  He waited for her to stop pulling at him.  He was a patient man.

“Yes.  I leave at dawn.”

“You are base commandant.”

“I was commandant for a week.  Now I am not.  All a lie.  To you and to me.  A way to get you to Siberia.  Now you are here.  You will stay here.  I will be in Syria the next year.  If they choose, they will keep me there another year, and another.  My life will be Syria.  Your life with be this base.  Or worse.”

Catherine studied his face.  She saw pain.  He was telling the truth.

“We will wait for you here.  Lana will study ballet here.  They have a good school.  We checked.”

“The school is closed.  It is too dangerous for woman and girls to be out.  There have been problems.  Too many problems.”

“But…”  Catherine could think of no way to finish that sentence.

“Catherine, use your connections.   That huge Black woman.  Jackson.  FBI.  Get her help.”

“She…” another sentence Catherine couldn’t finish.

“Everything about you is known.  You have connections.  Use them.  Get Lana out of Russia.”

“What do you know about Jackson?”

Catherine was no longer interested in sex.  She stared up at Sergei.  She had been taught to study faces.  She carefully studied his.

“You and Jackson found a traitor at Fort Meade.  NSA.  You became friends, then lovers.  She has been your control the whole time you have been in Russia.  We knew that.  We used that.  We put you at embassy events in Poland so you would hear what we wanted you to hear, and pass along information we wanted passed along.  Misinformation.  You were to load the NSA with misinformation.  You did it well.”

“Maybe I did, maybe I recognized bullshit when I heard it.  So what?  We talked about all of this in Poland.  Putin will invade the Baltic countries next.  You and I will be assigned to the Estonian embassy and do what we do.”

“Change in plans.  I will go to Syria.  You will be kept on base until they decide what to do with you.  I think they will move you and Lana farther east.  Don’t let that happen.  Get her out of here.”

Catherine stared into his face.  Pain.  He saw the future.

“Fuck me, Sergei.  Now.”

She kissed him, and he began rocking into her.  She felt his breath on her face and his hand on her ass.  His arms tightened round her.  She could barely breathe.  She could no longer move. He took her.  His woman.  Maybe for just one more night, but she was his.

When he was done, he continued to hold her.  Silence.  For a moment she was afraid he might cry.  There was so much pain in his face.

“Sergei, I will find a way to get Lana to America, and you will find a way to join me.”

“Russia is a dead country.  All the good, all the young are leaving.  Things are dangerous now, and they will get much more dangerous.  Only the old, the weak, and the vile will be left.  Don’t let Lana grow up among them.”

Another silence.  She pulled his head down and kissed him.

“You know my home in Wisconsin.  You will fuck me there.  That old house will shake when you take me.  My parents will wake up in their room and smile.”

“We will watch Lana grow.”

A much longer silence.  Catherine kissed him and waited.

“Catherine, don’t let them put you on a train.  They will execute you or take you some places farther east.  Farther north.  You and Lana will vanish.  Find a man who will help you.  Be good to him as you are to me.  Do what he asks.  You will need such a man to survive.  Pick one who can protect you and Lana.  Maybe Colonel Korsakov.  Maybe Major Shirokov.  Use your judgment.”

“Hold me.”

He held her with one arm and caressed her with his other hand.  Hair, thighs, ass.  She pressed herself against him, her lips never leaving his neck.

“We will live like this in Madison.  You and I.  Each night you will hold me just as you are now.  Mornings we will both walk Lana to school.  We will help her with her schoolwork, and we will drive her to ballet lessons.  We will be proud of her.  You and I.  We promised to watch her grow, and marry, and have our grandchildren.  We will keep that promise.”

She looked up at him as she talked.  She didn’t see tears.  She did see pain.

At dawn he got out of bed, dressed, and packed.  One khaki colored bag.  The same bag used in every army in the world.  He carried it to the door, then got Lana and laid her next to Catherine.  He sat on the edge of their bed and played a bit with their hair.  Lana giggled.  Catherine smiled until the very end.  He kissed each of them, tucked the covers around them, and left.

“Is Daddy traveling again?”

“Yes, Sweetie.”

“When will he be back?”

Catherine hesitated and instantly saw concern build on Lana’s tiny face.

“He may be gone a while.  He will write and tell us more when he knows more.  He will ask about you.  What will you tell him?”

“I will tell him I am still practicing my ballet steps, and I am learning Ukrainian.”

“Yes, he will like to hear that.  Now kiss me.  Let’s sleep a little longer.”

Lana kissed her mother and pushed up tight against her.  She played a bit with the pillow they shared, then slept.  Catherine tried.  Instead, she silently wept. 

Sergei.  Lover.  Husband.  Nemesis.  She had risked a quick trip into Moscow to find a new troll farm that was doing real damage in America.  It was a trap.  Sergei was waiting for her.  He took her, and he kept her.  Huge, strong, she had once punched him in the chest and seen no impact.  He played with her like a cat playing with a mouse.  He used her.  And, one night he had taken her.  Trapped in a room, she was his.  He had wrapped massive arms around her and held her.  But he was also gentle.  His huge hands caressed her.  He kissed her lightly – and often.  He gave her time.  He waited until she was ready.  And then he took her like no man ever had.

A year later he had tricked her.  His granddaughter was in an orphanage.  Mother dead from drugs.  Father dead from gangs.  Catherine didn’t know Lana was his granddaughter.  She knew a three-year-old girl needed a mother, and Catherine needed someone to love as she wandered the emptiness of Moscow.  Sergei had hovered.  Ever closer.  Ever kind.  The right words, the right gifts, the right hugs.  They became a family.  Catherine adopted Lana and married Sergei.  Now a Russian wife and mother.  American intelligence approved.  She would have married him anyway.  Years together at the Russian embassy in Warsaw.  Years together.  A family.

Now Syria?  The Foreign Ministry had not liked how things had ended in Poland.  So there was punishment.  Her banished to Siberia.  Him off to Syria.  Would she ever get her husband back?  Maybe.  That was the best assessment she could make of their situation.  Maybe.  Certainly not soon. 

She still felt his hands, his kisses.  How much longer?  How long would she need to protect herself and their daughter?  She was vulnerable in so many ways.  Novosibirsk was the capital of Siberia.  Thousands of kilometers from Moscow.  Half a world from America.  The Trans-Siberian Railroad came through town, and there was an airport.  She would not be allowed access to either.  And Sergei was probably right.  There were so many ways things could get worse.  Small towns farther east.  Farther north.  She and Lana could be moved to any of them.  Given new names.  Hidden away.  Impossible for Sergei to find.  She and Lana serving some logging camp or refinery.  Vanished into the vastness of Russia.

Catherine slid out of bed and crossed to the tiny kitchen.  Sergei was her husband.  And her protection.  He was gone.  How long before they came for her and Lana?  How long before they were taken?  She made a pot of oatmeal.  Maybe their last meal.  It would be heavy, and large.