The Cuckoo comes in April 8

[svetlanacat6]

For a split second...

Illya had always enjoyed living alone. Wherever, it didn't matter, a garret in an old building, in Paris, Cambridge or London...

Napoleon leaned back against the rail, blinking at the dazzling sunlight.

Spending time by yourself without being scolded, bothered, challenged or chased after was undoubtedly the height of luxury when you'd lived for years in crowded communes whose only rule was the law of the jungle.

He stretched his arm over the rail behind Illya's shoulders, casually.

For years he had coped with, whatever the cost, keeping people – or being kept – at a distance.

Then he had met Napoleon.