"It's a bit warm."
"Turn the AC down."
"Fancy a drink?"
"It won't douse the fire inside me."
"Sure it isn't a different kind of fire?"
"Hmph—shut up!"
Evening, at Slater's place.
On the living-room sofa Hunter cradled Slater, who lay like a sleepy kitten,
languidly half-closing her eyes, utterly spent.
His hand glided over her satin-smooth back.
He glanced at his shoulder and arm,
where the woman still furious over his half-month silence had bitten deep crescents.
For a moment he'd honestly thought she meant to tear a chunk out of him—or bite him dead.
Luckily, in the contest of strength and endurance,
Hunter had emerged the victor.
"Not angry anymore?"
His other hand flicked where she couldn't see,
and a pack of cigarettes appeared.
Hunter didn't really crave nicotine;
days without a smoke left him untroubled.
Yet ever since some unspecified moment, a post-coital cigarette had begun to feel essential.
Slater, lying beside him, noticed the new pack at once.
With practiced fingers he flicked the box; it sprang open,
a cigarette flipped out, arced, and landed perfectly between his lips.
Then, with a casual twist of his wrist,
the pack vanished, replaced by a lighter.
The swift switch felt almost like stage magic.
"How did you do that?"
Slater asked, intrigued; she'd watched closely—his arm was bare, her gaze never left his hand, and the pack hadn't dropped.
That was exactly what puzzled her.
Even as she spoke she reached out, took the lighter from him,
and lifted it to light his cigarette.
Hunter drew in a lungful, not rushing to answer.
Only after exhaling a slow stream of smoke did he reply,
"Magic is only magic because it exploits perception and psychology—it's a con."
"Once you know the secret you'll say, 'That's all there is to it?'"
"So—do you still want to know?"
The first two lines came straight from a beginner's guide to magic Hunter had bought recently,
penned by a world-famous illusionist.
He had indeed picked up a few tricks from it,
but what he'd just performed had been no trick at all.
It was nothing more than the usual act of taking things out of—and putting them back into—his private space.
Long ago Hunter had convinced Slater that he knew a few magic tricks.
The beautiful lockpicking master had never doubted him.
So by now he no longer hesitated to produce small items from his private space right in front of her.
Of course, in front of anyone else Hunter still rarely showed off like that.
Let too many people see and some clever soul would eventually spot the oddity.
Hunter's answer clearly failed to satisfy Slater.
Although her body had been satisfied, he hadn't contacted her once in more than half a month.
For the past twenty-odd days the beautiful lockpicking master had been tossed between hope and loss, tortured by a strange emptiness.
That kind of torment couldn't be erased by merely one or two sessions of the great harmony of life.
Hunter realized that showing up so late had already provoked the beautiful lockpicking master's displeasure.
Still, since he had come to see her, he was fully prepared.
He caught Slater's hand, the one holding the lighter.
Hunter's own hand hovered a short distance above hers, gently cupping and stroking the air.
Slater was wondering what he was doing when, suddenly, his palm pressed against the back of her hand.
Then it slid slowly upward along her hand toward her wrist.
Just as Slater thought he was teasing her,
the cool touch on the back of her hand and wrist finally told her something else was happening.
She instinctively looked at her wrist and immediately saw
a diamond bracelet made of dozens of small stones and one diamond of at least three carats.
The stones were all set in platinum, blazing brilliantly in the evening sun that had not yet set.
"A gift for you."
Hunter tapped gently on the forehead half-hidden by Slater's tousled hair.
Softly he said, "I searched for ages before I found something worthy of you."
He had indeed searched—through the spoils he had taken from Stanfield.
Stanfield's collection did contain jewels far grander and more luxurious.
But those were too valuable; anyone could see their worth at a glance.
Slater was not a woman who talked money or chased vanity.
Otherwise, when she learned that Hunter had stolen tens of millions of us dollars in gold bricks from Stanfield,
she could never have acted so naturally, showing no curiosity at all.
So after some thought
Hunter finally chose this diamond bracelet from Stanfield's hoard—valuable, yet not so expensive that Slater could not accept it.
The costliest part of the bracelet was that three-carat diamond of decent quality.
In this era its real value was only sixty or seventy thousand us dollars.
All told, the whole bracelet was worth at most around a hundred thousand us dollars.
Still within the range Slater could accept!
Sure enough,
as Slater listened to Hunter's sickeningly sweet words and watched him gently fasten the bracelet around her wrist,
after a brief silence she suddenly pressed a kiss to his cheek.
"Thank you!"
"I love it!"
Her eyes shimmered as if brimming with complicated, rich emotion.
Hunter understood at once.
He lifted Slater into his arms and headed for the bedroom.
The sofa had been too narrow; he'd already found it uncomfortable.
Only when they'd first arrived home had Slater bitten his arm so hard that, in pain, he'd settled for the couch.
Now a new battle was about to begin.
Only this time the intensity might be even greater...
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