Topic: Bought and Paid For

Stepjan Grieg

Date: 2012-12-12 20:30 EST
`BEGIN TRANSMISSION ~~~~

`GATEWAY GHJL47SH490VSD32NL1000.02GR
`AUTHORIZATION KEY: N3S11000HJ7L53BRJSPEN
`ID 0GA5DRI5EL
`AUTHENTIFICATION ***********
`INSTITUTION/ACCT 00043894687000489236340007823
`AMOUNT 80000 CURR GSSC
`REC INSTITUTION/ACCT 820379F23296000042987R29O000323

`AUTHORIZE TRANSACTION Y/N? _
`AUTHORIZE TRANSACTION Y/N? _
`AUTHORIZE TRANSACTION Y/N? _
`AUTHORIZE TRANSACTION Y/N? Y


He leaned across his desk and pressed the intercomm button on his phone. His secretary answered on the second ring.

"Yes, sir?"

"There is a file in my directory labeled Amitiel. A-M-I-T-I-E-L. Look up the location in the report there and book passage for me for tomorrow. Arrange lodging and process a currency exchange."

"Yes, sir. How long do you plan to be traveling?"

"Plan for two weeks. With luck, it won't take that long."

"Yes, sir."

Stepjan Grieg

Date: 2012-12-17 20:01 EST
He arrived on Monday morning. It was the soonest all of the appropriate transport could be arranged and his travel papers for the journey be put in order. It amused him to conform to the strictures, rules to make their little game of cat-and-mouse more interesting.

She'd almost pinned him down a year ago, on a business trip to New York City that left him dissatisfied on many fronts, but her efforts then - and admittedly, the women she used to get close to him - were intriguing. He still had no idea what she wanted. He had his suspicions, of course. Nothing he could confirm. However, competing distractions in the form of a crisis in his Stockholm office and some unknown intervention on her end pulled them both away before either one closed their trap. But it was enough to put him back on her scent and oh, did he breathe it deep.

That her name showed up on his news trailers was sheer luck. The fact that it was in connection with a charity date auction simply tipped a cincidence into the realm of divine comedy, and he had first-hand knowledge of those. The seredipitous hit was all he needed to feel the thrill the hunt engendered rise within him again.

Gerte put him in a hotel in an upscale sector of the city called New Haven, arranged for a driver to convey him to it from the portal, and made the usual arrangements for meals and company. It was perfectly arranged and precisely as he liked it. All that remained now was to put his plan in motion. This time, he would be the victor, and everyone knew the saying about that. He thoroughly intended to enjoy the spoils.

Stepjan Grieg

Date: 2012-12-23 11:45 EST
On the third day (he loved his little ironies), the note arrived at his angel's door. It was written on the hotel's stationery, the paper heavy, crisp and expensive. Where his wrists touched the paper, a faint trace of his cologne remained in the fibers so that when the envelope was opened, a ghost of his presence might fill her lungs. It was an unintentional intimacy.

The front of the envelope read, simply, 'Amitiel'. He'd written the directions for delivery on a separate sheet of paper.

With the letter came a box. Inside that, was an intentional intimacy.

He did love his little ironies.