Greg Rucka - Critical Space

When I came down the second time I looked over to Alena, hoping that she'd seen my success, and was somewhat disappointed to find that she hadn't, engrossed in a problem of her own. She was launching a series of pirouettes, and at first it looked to me like she was doing fine – certainly a world better than my own sad attempts at dancing – turning around and around in demi-pointe, three, then four, then five times. It took me another minute of watching to realize that she was trying to push it to six, and that she was growing frustrated, or at the least, annoyed.

I waited for her to try again, and when she started spinning, opening her arms to second position, I moved in to spot her, putting my hands to her hips. She turned from the fifth to the sixth easily, and I thought she would stop, but she kept going another two times around before stopping.

"Try it again," she said, and I let her go, stepping back.

She put her weight on her working leg, swung the other up and into the turn, her arms again opening to second position, and again I moved in. She gave me some of her weight, spinning in my hands and then, at the sixth pirouette, coming out of it, pausing, and then going into a leap. I brought her up, set her down again, assisting as she went into a low arabesque. Her arms swept forward and up, and I guided her as she rose, her torso straightening as her right leg stayed extended behind her. I brought her against me, my hands on her hips, and when she was upright, the leg perfectly perpendicular to us, I lifted and turned. She spun fast, putting distance between us. I moved, trying the first of the leaps I'd been practicing, and I wasn't an ox, and when I turned back, the length of the floor was between us. She paused, then launched a grand jete. I tried one of my own, and we ended an arm's length apart. She took my hand, and spun back into me, her arms raised, her body arched back against mine, my hands on each side of her chest. After another moment, she let her arms descend.

Neither of us moved.

We had ended facing the mirror, and I saw her reflected, her eyes closed. Beneath my palms I could feel her breathing, her heart pounding. Mine was doing the same; we were both out of breath.

Her eyes opened and she watched me in the mirror. She gave me more of her weight to hold.

"That was dancing." She was still out of breath, and perhaps even surprised.

I managed a nod, still focused on our reflections.

I wasn't sure I liked what I was seeing.

I wasn't sure I didn't, either.

I thought about the fact that I needed to let go of her, and that after almost four months of contact between the two of us, of rubdowns and massages and teaching, her body and my own had become simply tools. Intimate though the knowledge of them was, they had become almost abstractions.

Now they seemed very real.

She turned her head from the reflection.

"Have you thought about it?" she asked, looking directly at me.

"I have." I let go, backing off a step, moving my eyes from her reflection to her person. "We shouldn't. We can't."

"No." Her voice was low. "We can't."

After a second, she moved to the post and began fighting her invisible foes.

The laptop on the counter began screaming for attention.

She beat me to the computer. The P7 was on the counter by one of the monitors, and I took it up as she checked the screen.

"Perimeter, someone on the driveway," she said. "One vehicle, coming to the house."

"Stay here," I said. As I hit the stairs she called something after me and I shouted back, "I mean it! Stay there!"

I didn't hear her answer, taking the steps two at a time to find Miata waiting for me at the top. With the gun in my right, I glanced around the corner into the living room, and seeing it clear, moved through to the back. I stopped and checked again, this time looking outside, and I saw no one. I doubled back across the space, sweeping the gun around with my survey. Alena stood at the top of the stairs, holding the Neostead shotgun from the weapons locker. I glared at her.

"It's not him," she told me.

I intensified my glare and gestured to her to back off. She shrugged and fell back to the stairs, backing up them and out of sight. There was a knock on the door, heavy and rapid and hard. I made my way to it, Miata at my heels.

There was another pounding at the door, and I thought that if it wasn't Oxford, whoever was outside was either forward, foolish, or insane. Using the wall to cover my back, I edged to the window that looked out to the front porch, taking a quick peek.

She'd been right. It wasn't him.

It was Chris Havel.

And Bridgett was with her, holding a gun, and looking like she meant to use it.

The only thing I could think to say as I opened the door was, "It's not what you think."

She had the gun up to my face before I'd finished the sentence, was starting forward with a snarl.

"Fuck you, where is she, you sack of…" Bridgett said, and then she stopped, the barrel of her SIG perhaps an inch from my nose, and for the first time since I'd known her, she looked like she couldn't think of a thing to say. In my peripheral vision, I could see Miata hesitating, looking up at Bridgett, and then he lowered his head and headed out the open door, brushing past her bare legs.

Bridgett didn't even notice, didn't move at all, the gun still in my face.

"Hi, Chris," I said. I didn't look at her.

"Atticus," Chris said. "What happened to the glasses?"

"Contacts."

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah. Soft lenses, Bausch and Lomb."

"Those are nice. The Vandyke doesn't really suit you, though."

"It's temporary. I'm hoping to shave soon."

"Sure," Havel said. "You going to invite us in?"

"I'd like Bridgett to lower her weapon first."

Havel waited. I waited. Bridgett held the gun on me a moment longer, then lowered it. She left the hammer up. Her expression had frozen, but now it was starting to crack. Bridgett doesn't hide her feelings well, and I was reading a long string of emotions that started with shock, touched on relief, switched to rage, and now was mostly suspicion. After another second's silence she looked past my shoulder, into the house.

"Where is she?" Bridgett demanded.

"Why?"

She tightened her jaw, pushed past me, bringing the gun up again. I gestured for Chris to follow her through, then checked outside. An old Army Jeep, painted a combination of rust and blue, was parked in the drive. I didn't see anyone else. I closed and locked the door.

They had made it into the living room, each of them reacting very differently to the space. Havel had the same leather book-bag hanging from her shoulder as the last time I'd seen her, and was reaching into one of the pockets while taking in her surroundings. She was grinning, and when her hand came out of the bag, she'd produced a pad and a pen. If she'd been a six-year-old about to meet Mickey Mouse, I don't think she could have looked more delighted.

Bridgett, on the other hand, was scanning the room as if searching for someone to shoot, which I suspect was just what she wanted to do. When I came back to join them, she stopped long enough to glare at me, her rage once again naked and in control.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing?" she demanded.

"It's complicated."

"Fuck you, uncomplicate it, uncomplicate it now. You look like an asshole, you look like you've gone fucking diesel on me, here, as well as crazy. Jesus Christ, what have you been doing?"

Havel, who had started taking notes, stopped long enough to glance up at me. "You look really good. Except for the Vandyke. You lose weight?"

"Some," I said.

"Where is she?" Bridgett asked. "Is she here?"

"She's here," I said.

"I'm going to kill her."