The Sniper's Kiss

Chapter Thirty

Five days later, Mia and Alexia stood together among the spring blossoms in the Rose Garden.

“So this is the White House,” Alexia said. “I hadn’t expected it to be so simple.”

“Compared with your tsarist palaces, I suppose it is. But then, we didn’t have five hundred years of autocracy flaunting its wealth.”

“Your head of state is now…?”

“Harry Truman. Much less scary than yours. He’s less inclined to execute people who disagree with him. I wish I could have brought you back to more stability, but everything changed all at once. The war in Europe ended, Mr. Roosevelt died, and my job has almost finished. I’m at loose ends myself.” She touched Alexia’s hand lightly, not daring to hold it. “But I’m sure it’s much worse for you.”

“Yes. I feel like I’ve leapt a great chasm and that I’m still in mid-leap.”

Mia turned to face her directly, smiling at the new hairstyle. “Are you having any regrets yet?”

“Many of them. That I was not kinder to the friends I lost. That I wasn’t present when my grandmother died. That I wasted so much time as a Kremlin ornament rather than as a soldier. But no regrets about coming home with you, my dear Demetria. None at all.”

Mia began strolling again. “Well, the US is not paradise. We have our own problems. Negroes still don’t enjoy the ‘freedom’ we’re all supposed to have, and people like you and I must still live in secret.”

“But at least we don’t have to fear labor camps or execution,” Alexia said.

“No. No execution. And can you feel it? That both our countries are changing? Perhaps one day, before we’re too old, we can return to a kinder Russia without Stalin, and locate Kalya and Klavdia.”

“Yes. That’s something to look forward to.”

“In the meantime, you have a job at Georgetown, thanks to Miss Hickok, and we have a sunny room in a boardinghouse until we can get our own apartment. I still have to tie up the loose ends of Lend-Lease for Mr. Hopkins, so I’m employed for another month. After that, we have our whole lives to do what we want.”

“And you’re still allowed in the White House?”

Mia laughed. “Don’t worry. Mr. Truman has given me all the time I need to transfer my records to Mr. Hopkins’s Washington office and move my belongings from my room.”

“So we can sleep there tonight? That’s good. I want to be able to say one day that we made love in the White House.”

Mia snickered lewdly at the thought. “We’ll have to do it quietly, you know.”

Alexia brushed one shoulder against her. “We can be quiet. We’re snipers, remember?”