Free The Last Assassin by Barry Eisler

looked down into it.
    On the mattress, covered in a blue fleece blanket, was a little person with a dark head of hair. His eyes were shut and he had a tiny nose and I could see his chest rising and falling as he slept.
    For the first time, I understood that all of this was real. This child was mine. I was his father.
    I felt tears trying to surface and blinked them down. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d cried and I wasn’t going to start tonight, in front of Midori.
    “Could I…would it be all right if…” I started to say.
    Midori looked at me, then nodded. She reached into the crib and carefully lifted out Koichiro, still wrapped in his blue blanket. She kissed him softly on the forehead, then looked at me again. Her eyes were wide and honest and I saw that she was afraid. But she was doing this anyway. Fuck, I had to blink again.
    She eased the baby into my arms and stayed close, watching. The boy let out a long sigh in his sleep and turned toward me as though searching for warmth. I looked at him and suddenly the tears were flowing down my cheeks and I couldn’t stop them. I couldn’t even wipe them away. All I could do was blink to clear my eyes and look at that little face until I had to blink again.
    I don’t know how long we stood like that. At some point Midori put her hand on my shoulder and I became aware of an ache in my jaw from the way I had been clenching it. I handed Koichiro back to her and wiped my face while she got him settled again in his crib.
    We went back into the living room. Midori closed the door behind us.
    I looked up at the ceiling and deliberately breathed in and out, in and out, trying to steady myself. A hundred jumbled thoughts were pinballing through my brain.
    “What if…” I started to say, then thought better of it.
    “What?”
    I looked at her. “What if I could get out of the life? Really out of it.”
    She sighed. “I don’t believe you can.”
    “But what if I could?”
    A long moment went by. Finally she said, “I guess we’d have to see then.”
    I wanted her to say more, but I was afraid to ask.
    There was a pad of paper and a pen on the coffee table next to the couch. I walked over and wrote down my cell phone number.
    “Here,” I said. “If you ever need help, with anything, call me.”
    She took the piece of paper. “Is this a phone number?”
    “Yeah. Cell phone. If I don’t answer, leave a voice mail. I check it all the time.”
    “Wow, a number where I can actually call you,” she said, with a small smile. “I guess that’s progress.”
    I smiled back. “Told you I could change.”
    “We’ll see.”
    I reached out and touched her shoulder.
    “Thank you,” I said.
    She nodded.
    I was still touching her shoulder. I realized she hadn’t objected.
    I moved closer, and she didn’t step back.
    I wrapped my arms around her and squeezed. Then, after a moment, she was squeezing me, too.
    We stood like that for a while, just holding each other. I kissed her forehead, then her cheek. Then her forehead again. She smelled good; she smelled the way I remembered.
    She whispered, “Jun, don’t.”
    She was the only one who called me by the diminutive of Junichi, my Japanese given name. It felt good to hear her say it.
    I kissed her eyelids. Again she said, “Don’t.”
    I didn’t care. I didn’t care about anything. I kissed her softly on the lips. She didn’t kiss me back, but she didn’t move away, either. I could hear her breathing.
    She put a hand on my chest. I thought she was going to push me away, but she left it there. It felt warm through my shirt.
    I kissed her again. This time she made a sound that was somewhere between a whimper and a reproach and suddenly seized the sides of my head with both hands. Then she was kissing me back, kissing me hard.
    I put my hands on her and she pressed against me. But when I started to lift her shirt out of her jeans, she twisted away.
    “Jun, stop. We have to stop.”
    I nodded, breathing hard.