Ayala came up from behind him, smiling softly, “Not long, cushion, not long.” He laughed softly, her retort reminding him that she had been the only person who had ever thought of him as soft. He turned to her. Their resistance to their mutual attraction had not lasted long after they had been reunited, but as he looked at her now he felt that his feelings were changing once more. He found that as he looked at her now he felt not only the passion that he had forgotten, and the love he had denied himself, he felt that thing he had lost when she had revealed her past to him.

He knew that now, embarked as they were on this seemingly suicidal venture, he trusted her once more, and as he took her in his arms and kissed her she knew it as well. She pulled back for a moment and looked into his eyes, savoring the sight. She had lied to him, endangered him and his career, she had even cheated on him when her duty called her to do so. She had done it all with a clear conscience, knowing the importance of her work, but she had never doubted the risk to their relationship, or the importance of her love for him. He had been the only luxury she had ever allowed herself.

Now, in this new crisis, she knew that all her previous missions may have been for nothing, and with this new perspective she saw that they had been on the same side all along. He, in turn, now knew that when faced with something important enough, he had found himself willing to betray all he had held dear in the name of something greater, just as she had.

He had lied, cheated, stolen, all for the greater good, and in doing so he had become that thing he had spurned in her. She saw that he had not so much forgiven her, as realized that he had nothing to forgive. Reading him as she always had, she realized that the pain she had caused him had come to an end and that they were one again, and she was overwhelmed with how much it meant to her.

He lifted her in his arms and she allowed herself to be a woman, his woman, forgetting all the training, the violence, the killing of her past. He carried her to bed. He was sweaty and smelly and alive. She laughed at how young she felt, how it reminded her of when they had met twenty years before. No more lies. For these precious moments she had no layers, only Ayala Zubaideh as she truly was. And she could think of no possible reason why she would ever lie to this man again.

Chapter 41: A Higher Echelon