After Happily Ever Afte- Astrid Ohletz Page 0,22

enjoyed The Cat Emergency, you should check out Chris Zett’s Irregular Heartbeat, the novel in which Diana and Emily fell in love in the emergency department, or Heart Failure, the novel where Jess met Lena, and they healed each other’s hearts.

Love Is Not Nothing

by Lee Winter

Part One: Masks

Requiem

Natalya Tsvetnenko entered the Wellness-Oase in Spittelberggasse and pushed her sunglasses onto her forehead. Soothing nature sounds filled her ears as she glanced around the foyer. This was one of the most luxurious massage salons in Vienna and, during the past three years Natalya had lived in this city, it had been invaluable for easing the side effects of excessive cello practice and playing with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra.

That some of her aches came from injuries sustained in her former career was neither here nor there. Explaining her old war wounds had actually resulted from encounters with underworld assassins was not exactly high on her agenda. Nonetheless, Wellness-Oase’s highly trained massage therapists were the model of discretion. And Natalya paid well to have their deep-tissue, full-body, elite athlete’s massage that did wonders for her sore points.

She was greeted at the counter by Lotte, an angular, distinguished woman in the white waffle-weave kimono robe and Japanese clog sandals all her staff wore. Lotte raised her hand with an elegant swish. “Christiane erwartet Sie bereits in ihrem üblichen Zimmer, Fräulein Tsvetnenko.”

So Natalya had Christiane this week, who was waiting in Natalya’s usual room. She picked apart German easily these days. Natalya nodded to Lotte and followed her instructions, pleased to have her preferred room, far from the others, which added to her sense of privacy.

She padded softly down the off-white, carpeted hallway, finding room twelve by the usual potted plant on a stand outside it. A sad little Alocasia sanderiana.

Natalya leaned forward to inspect it and came away disheartened. Under-watered. Her lips thinned. She would point this oversight out to Christiane. It was always disappointing when the details were overlooked.

Stepping into the cream-coloured room, she smelled vanilla incense and something else with a touch of spice to it. Pleasant enough. In one corner was a crock pot of hot rocks slowly warming. For the next client, most likely, as Natalya had little interest in the latest new-age fads.

Her gaze drifted higher, to the peace symbol mobile dangling from the ceiling, then trailed to the framed prints of bamboo forests and a small bronze Buddha statue on the windowsill under the timber horizontal blinds. She wondered whether Christiane realized the Buddha was about as Japanese as her faux kimono robe was.

The masseuse in question turned at Natalya’s arrival and offered a polite greeting, then pointed to the table. Her gelled-back, blonde hair was pulled into a perfect bun that shone under the warm lighting.

“Machen Sie sich bitte frei, Fräulein Tsvetnenko. Ich bin in fünf Minuten wieder da.”

Natalya translated that to “Please get ready, I’ll be back in five minutes”.

She shed her clothes, folding her black linen pants, leather jacket, crisp white shirt, and undergarments into an exacting pile, before lining up her polished, black ankle boots together under the chair in the corner.

Naked, she arranged herself on the table, placing a towel over her rear to signal her readiness. Natalya had no modesty concerns, especially when it meant Christiane’s expert hands could fully access the pressure points and aches in her backside and lower back from too many hours spent sitting.

Natalya had never suffered from modesty anyway. When she examined herself each morning, mapping her scars, she saw power, control, discipline, and beauty in her muscled flanks, strong shoulders and glossy, straight, black hair. And, sometimes, she also saw delicate hands slipping around her waist and clutching her tightly against an equally naked body, still warm from the shower.

Natalya’s lips twitched at the pleasing memory.

It was hard to believe it had been three years since she’d settled here, after a year of touring all over Europe. Four years away from her former life in Australia. A life that was nothing as she’d imagined it would be when, as a teenager, she’d first sought sponsors to allow her to take up a cello scholarship here in Vienna.

The sponsors, associates of her stepmother, Lola, had turned out to be a Melbourne underworld crime family which had sought its pound of flesh, training her as their deadliest of tools. No one would expect a female, especially one so young, and a musical prodigy at that, to be a crime gang’s secret assassin. This was what had made her so