Greta had discovered the ‘Nordic Wellness’ fitness club, situated only 600 meters from her apartment, about three weeks earlier, while strolling around her neighborhood.
She had immediately fallen in love with the vast, superbly equipped fitness center, which had all the kinds of weightlifting and exercising equipment she needed. Since then, she had made a point of going there every evening, whenever her work made it possible.
That allowed her to both keep in top shape and to change her mind from the frustrations she often felt about her embassy work. The place was also very close to the barracks of the Swedish Life Guards Regiment and thus was quite frequented by Swedish Army officers and soldiers. While Greta was no sex fiend and was very mature for her age of thirty, she was starting to miss the comradery she had known while serving with her battalion in Camp Lejeune. As well, the social and moral tolerance to be found around the Swedish society was for her a refreshing change from the often prudish and hypocritical morality of too many Americans, so she had started during the last couple of weeks to open herself more to others when off work.
As she was bench-pressing an impressive amount of weights, a tall, blond and impossibly handsome man in his late twenties sat on the bench facing hers and started pumping a pair of small weights up and down. He at first stayed polite and discrete,
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avoiding to stare at her, but the remarkable display of strength and stamina by Greta soon took the better of him and, while still not staring, threw more and more frequent looks at her. On her part, Greta started herself to throw discreet glances at the athletic young man as he pumped weights up and down. Once she finished her present series of weight-lifting, she sat up on her bench to recuperate from her effort and smiled to the man.
‘’Hi! Do you come here often, mister?’
‘’At least three times a week, when my duties allow me enough free time. I serve with the Life Guards Regiment and work next door, at the cavalry casern. By the way, my name is Alexander Akerman.’
‘’And I’m Greta Visby.’ replied Greta, who got up from her bench and took two steps to go shake hands with the man before returning on her bench. ‘’I work at the American Embassy.’
‘’You’re a local employee there, Miss Visby?’
‘’Hell no! I am a captain in the U.S. Marine Corps and am part of the embassy attachés.’
Akerman suddenly had an air of revelation appear on his face and he smiled while pointing an index at her.
‘’Greta Visby, from the U.S. Marine Corps? Are you the one who got nicknamed
‘the Viking Shield Maiden’ while serving in Somalia and Afghanistan?’
‘’That’s me!’ said Greta, grinning. Alexander Akerman also grinned in turn.
‘’Fantastic! You made the front pages of the local newspapers and online blogs in Stockholm more than once.’
‘’Really? I didn’t know that my reputation extended beyond the United States.’
‘’Well, it does, especially here in Sweden, for obvious reasons. After all, you are said to be Swedish by birth and you do bear a very Swedish-sounding name. I even caught one of my troopers with a poster of you stuck to the inside of his kit locker at the barracks.’
Greta couldn’t help chuckle at that.
‘’That’s rich! And how much clothes was I wearing on that poster, Mister Akerman?’
‘’Please, simply call me ‘Alex’. To answer you, don’t worry: it was a blown-up picture of you showing you standing in the middle of a dirt street in Somalia and aiming
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your rifle. I believe that it was taken as you were about to blow up with your rifle-mounted grenade launcher an armored car coming at you.’
‘’That’s correct, Alex. I destroyed an armored Range Rover belonging to a pirate kingpin who was trying to flee our assault force. Another nickname I earned from that incident was ‘Calamity Jane’.’
‘’Calamity Jane?’ repeated Akerman, obviously confused. ‘’Who was that?’
‘’Calamity Jane was the nickname given to a Far West woman adventurer of the late 19th Century who was known to be a top rifle shot and who also was considered quite a shit disturber.’
‘’Sounds like she was an interesting woman, Greta.’
‘’She definitely was, Alex. You said that you had troopers under your command.
Are you an officer?’
‘’Yes! I have the rank of captain and my unit is part of the royal guards.’
‘Better and better!’ thought Greta, who was starting to warm up to Alexander Akerman, who could easily be described as a young Viking god. She then prodded him as delicately as possible.
‘’Do you live at the barracks or do you have an apartment here in Stockholm, Alex?’
‘’I live in the single officers’ quarters of the casern, Greta. My room is small and far from luxurious but it is more than sufficient for me: I always was the frugal type.’
‘’Me too! I was raised in a small log cabin in Lapland until the age of fourteen, then moved with my father to Nome, Alaska, after my mother died. I spent those early years hunting, fishing and trapping, until I joined the U.S. Marine Corps at the age of nineteen. Do you have many women in the Swedish Army?’
‘’Uh, not as many as you may think, Greta. Women are still exempt from conscription and, if they join voluntarily, they can’t serve in what you would call a combat unit.’
‘’Oh?! I thought that the Swedish society would be more open to women’s military service than that.’
‘’Well, we are quite open and liberal about many things, Greta, but there is still some public resistance to the idea of women fighting in wars. That was one of the reasons why your story got so much coverage here in Sweden. Talking about your nickname of ‘Viking Shield Maiden’, you could easily play that role at the historical
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reenactment fight club I belong to. It is situated in Uppsala, about one hour drive to the North, and it teaches fencing with longswords, shields, sabers and rapiers.’
‘’Hey, that interests me!’ happily exclaimed Greta. I always wanted to learn sword-fighting but never found the time or occasion to do so. Does your club do reenactment of combat in the Viking Era?’
‘’It sure does’ , replied Alex, grinning, ‘’and I am sure that they would love to have you as a member. By the way, the club is named the ‘Uppsala Historical Fencing School’. I was due to drive tomorrow morning to Uppsala, to go practice at the club for the weekend. Would you like to come with me, visit the club and watch us train?’
‘’Hell yes!’ answered Greta before thinking about something. ‘’But I don’t own old swords or armor, except for an Arab scimitar I bought at a bazaar in Somalia. By the way, you should have seen the panoply of firearms, blade weapons and even explosives you could have found in that public market.’
‘’Don’t worry about finding and buying swords and armor here: they have a couple of shops well stocked with period reproduction pieces. I could pick you up tomorrow morning before leaving for Uppsala.’
‘’That would suite me fine, Alex. If you are finished training for tonight, I could show you where my apartment is, so that you could find it more easily tomorrow.’
Alex repressed a smile with difficulty at that thinly veiled invitation.’
‘’Deal! How about having a short sauna session together before leaving the fitness center? Saunas are a great way to relax your muscles after exercising.’
‘’Uh, saunas in the U.S.A. are segregated by gender. Are saunas in Sweden still open to both genders?’
‘’They are, Greta. The only rule is to have a towel with you, so that you could sit on it rather than put your bum directly on the benches: it is more hygienic that way.’’
‘’Then, I will meet you at the sauna.’ replied Greta before getting up and walking towards the women’s locker room.
A few minutes later, Greta showed up at the door of one of the three saunas, marked as ‘Men and Women allowed’ in Swedish and English. She was wearing only a towel wrapped around her torso, with the towel barely going down to the level of her groin, plus a pair of plastic slippers. She removed her towel as soon as she was inside the sweltering sauna, which was occupied by three men and one woman, all equally as
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naked as she was now. While the men, including Alex, simply glanced at her nude body, the woman stared with near shock at her powerful, muscular legs.
‘’My God! I wish I had legs as strong as yours, miss. You must be some kind of fitness champion.’
‘’I’m only a soldier, miss, but I do take care of staying in top shape. You need strong legs to walk long distances with big loads on your back.’
‘’I didn’t know that we had women infantrymen in the Swedish Army, miss.’
‘’I am in the U.S. Marines, miss, not in the Swedish Army.’
‘’Oh, okay!’
Alex, who was listening to that exchange, chuckled and patted the place next to him on the top bench, where the temperature was highest.
‘’I saved a spot for you, Greta.’
‘’Thanks, Alex!’
Climbing the two lower benches, Greta then laid her towel on the burning wood planks before sitting on it, gluing herself to Alex’ side. It took only seconds before she started sweating quite profusely.
‘’Whew! This is about as hot as in Somalia, but way more humid.’
‘’You visited Somalia, miss?’ asked the same woman who had stared at her legs.
‘’Er, not exactly, miss. I went there to fight Somali pirates and Islamist extremists.’
That earned her a renewed attention from the two other men present in the sauna, while the woman finally started to realize who she was.
‘’Wait! Your name is Greta, you serve in the American marines and you fought in Somalia. You aren’t the famous ‘Viking Shield Maiden’, by chance?’
‘’I told you that you were famous in Sweden, Greta.’ said triumphantly Alex, making Greta do a facepalm.
‘’God! I am not sure that I like being this well known around.’
22:49 (Sweden Time)
Unit # 11, # 46 Lovisag, Ostermalm District
‘’My apartment, provided to me fully furnished by my embassy.’
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Alex looked around the long room, which included a kitchen corner, a dining area and a living room, with a small balcony visible through the windows giving on the façade.
‘’Not bad at all, Greta. My own suite at the barracks is quite smaller than this.’
‘’Wait! You haven’t seen yet my bedroom and the bathroom. Follow me!’
Walking behind her, Alex ended up in a fair-sized bedroom containing a large bed, a chest of drawers, a closet and a chair. As he looked around, Greta walked to him and stopped nearly nose to nose with him while smiling.
‘’You want to try the bed, Alex?’’
‘’Of course! The bed is the most important piece of furniture in a single’s apartment.’
Both of them enlaced together and exchanged a long kiss, while their hands roamed up and down. They then quickly undressed but, before they jumped on the bed, Alex knelt in front of Greta and started giving her cunnilingus while she held his head with both hands. She had to keep in her scream of pleasure when she attained orgasm.
However, Alex was not finished with her. Quickly making her lay down on the bed while she was still on her plateau, he then penetrated her and started pumping inside her while grinning to her.
‘’Watch out for the cavalry charge by the Swedes, you American marine.’
07:58 (Sweden Time)
Saturday, July 22, 2006 ‘C’
Greta’s apartment
Both of them were still in bed and exchanging caresses when Alex’ phone buzzed, making him sigh in exasperation.
‘’Damn! What a lousy timing for a call. Sorry about that, Greta: I won’t be long.’
Sitting on the edge of the bed and grabbing his flip-phone, he opened it and pressed the
‘talk’ button.
‘’Captain Akerman speaking!... Yes!... What’s up, sir?... Uh, I understand, sir. I will be at the caserne in half an hour.’
Closing his phone, Alex then gave a dejected look at Greta.
‘’I’m sorry, Greta, but our trip to Uppsala will have to wait another weekend: my unit has to prepare for an unannounced welcoming parade for a visiting European royalty.’
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‘’I understand, Alex. Duty is duty. Will that parade take long?’
‘’The parade itself, no, but my unit will have to practice it to perfection, so that may take most of today, while the parade will take place tomorrow morning at the royal palace.’
‘’Do they allow tourists to watch such parades, Alex? I would like to go see you on parade tomorrow.’
That attracted a gentle smile on Alex’ face.
‘’Yes, they allow spectators to watch from a distance. I will be happy indeed if you could come tomorrow.’
‘’Then, I will be there, I promise, my beautiful stallion.’
Both of them chuckled at that joke before Alex dressed up and left with regret Greta’s apartment.
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CHAPTER 14 – BACK IN LE BOURGET
09:20 (Paris Time)
Monday, June 18, 2007 ‘C’
