Page 77 of Edge of Eternity (The Century 3)

"The best part is getting to know you."

"How sweet. Thank you."

"It's really changed my life."

"Surely not."

This was not going the way Cameron had imagined. They were alone in the deserted streets, speaking in low voices as they walked close together through circles of lamplight and pools of darkness, but there was no feeling of intimacy. They were more like people making small talk. All the same he was not giving up. "I want us to be close friends," he said.

"We already are," she replied with a touch of impatience.

They reached Great Peter Street and still he had not said what he wanted to say. As they approached the house he stopped. She took another step forward, so he grabbed her arm and held her back. "Evie," he said, "I'm in love with you."

"Oh, Cam, don't be ridiculous."

Cameron felt as if he had been punched.

Evie tried to walk on. Cameron gripped her arm more tightly, not caring now if he hurt her. "Ridiculous?" he said. There was an embarrassing quaver in his voice, and he spoke again more firmly. "Why should it be ridiculous?"

"You don't know anything," she said in a tone of exasperation.

This was a particularly hurtful reproach. Cameron prided himself on knowing a great deal, and he had imagined she liked him for that. "What don't I know?" he said.

She pulled her arm out of his grasp with a vigorous jerk. "I'm in love with Jasper, you idiot," she said, and she went into the house.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

In the morning, while it was still dark, Rebecca and Bernd made love again.

They had been living together three months, in the old town house in Berlin-Mitte. It was a big house, which was fortunate, for they shared it with her parents, Werner and Carla, plus her brother, Walli, and her sister, Lili, and Grandmother Maud.

For a while, love had consoled them for all they had lost. Both were out of work, prevented from getting jobs by the secret police--despite East Germany's desperate shortage of schoolteachers.

But both were under investigation for social parasitism, the crime of being unemployed in a Communist country. Sooner or later they would be convicted and jailed. Bernd would go to a prison labor camp, where he would probably die.

So they were going to escape.

Today was their last full day in East Berlin.

When Bernd slid his hand gently up Rebecca's nightdress, she said: "I'm too nervous."

"We may not have many more chances," he said.

She grabbed him and clung to him. She knew he was right. They might both die attempting to flee.

Worse, one might die and one might live.

Bernd reached for a condom. They had agreed that they would marry when they reached the free world, and avoid pregnancy until then. If their plans should go wrong, Rebecca did not want to raise a child in East Germany.

Despite all the fears that troubled her, Rebecca was overcome by desire, and responded energetically to Bernd's touch. Passion was a recent discovery for her. She had mildly enjoyed sex with Hans, most of the time, and with two previous lovers, but she had never before been flooded with desire, possessed by it so completely that for a while she forgot everything else. Now the thought that this could be the last time made her desire even more intense.

After it was over he said: "You're a tiger."

She laughed. "I never was before. It's you."

"It's us," he said. "We're right."

When she had caught her breath, she said: "People escape every day."

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