It was a hard four days on both Anna and I. She hardly slept at all and well I rarely slept much anyway. We were in Prague and waiting for night to come on the fourth day. Anna had insisted on coming, but I had made it clear that she would remain a safe distance from the action.
Anna had been helping me dress for the last hour in our room. Chantry had done his part to see that I survived the coming fight. I was wearing several million dollars worth of the most cutting-edge protective gear ever made and no one would have ever known it.
The body armor went on in skins that were repeated over and over, but despite the many paper thin layers of armor I still had a complete range of motion and as the operative who had dropped the armor off had said, 'It breathed like Egyptian cotton'.
I just hoped I got to keep it after this, because it was already making me feel better about my chances of survival.
I checked myself in the mirror and tugged on the white suit coat a little, "That should do it don't you think, Anna?"
My eyes shifted to her weary face and she held out the white fedora hat and I took it from her. It was heavy for a hat, but just my style. I put it on at a slight angle the way I liked it.
"How do I look?"
"Like my white knight in shining armor." She responded and I smiled glancing back at her.
She wasn't smiling though and my smile fell off my face as I could read what she was feeling. I hugged her to me and her arms squeezed tightly around me.
"I love Kevin and I love you! I want you both!" She said crying into my chest.
I kissed the top of her head as my hands rubbed her back, "And God willingly you shall have us both. Now stop this crying. Soon you'll have both of us and then we are going to go away for a very long vacation somewhere warm."
"You promise?"
"I promise! Now I have to go Anna. You'll be able to see when they get Kevin from the control room from their head cams."
She nodded, but I had to practically pry her arms off of me. She let go suddenly and grabbed my face and we kissed for a long moment.
Her eyes were stormy as she drew back, "Now you come back to me Nikolai Gravitausky!"
"Yes Mrs. Gravitausky."
And then I stepped away and out the door to make my way down the hall.