#vdova.

She came to him with a proposal, a straight-forward undercover assignment, one he didn't think to turn down. But maybe he should have. Because it's easy—it's too easy. And it gets easier every day. He wakes up beside her in the mornings, shares her bed (and sometimes more) at night. They eat together, make conversation over coffee at midnight and detail new leads and information over breakfast at the table. She cleans his guns and sharpens her knives while he flicks through tv channels; she reads while he plays jazz piano for a few hours at a time. They wait for the neighborhood to fall asleep and then slip out like ghosts, to patrol the perimeter and check the dead drops. And then they come home and stretch out on the couch, laying opposite directions so when he knocks his knee against hers one time too many times all she has to do is sit up and shift herself over him, straddling him like she was born to do it—like she's been doing it every night for years. Like she'll do it every night for the rest of their lives if he asks.

And he enjoys himself. And he forgets. Forgets, sometimes, that the game is still on, that it's all (mostly) a charade. He forgets that they're being hunted and that they're also doing some hunting of their own. He begins to realize that if he doesn't remind himself he starts to lose track of the time, of his grasp on their original reality; he forgets that she's not his wife and that they're not in some unlikely love story and that this is not their life to live.

Sometimes, his heart wrenches in his chest when he remembers that they're just playing house with sniper rifles and throwing knives.

Sometimes, he forgets they're not in love.