The Summer Assassin — Jennie Melville

“What are you?” I asked. “What are you really?”
“You know what I am.” She turned her head away. “Ordinary. In trouble.”
“Not an ordinary woman. You're a raider. Someone who comes in, takes what they want and disappears.”
She laughed. “And you David? What are you?”
“Well, what am I?” I think I'm a defender. Someone who is killed in the end.”
“A defender? My enemy, really.”
“That's right.”
“But you're helping me.” She smiled.
“We're doing something for each other. It's a mutual arrangement.”
She pondered that, then smiled again. “Something for us both? But not everyone would do what you're doing all the same. And I'm frightened.”
“So am I,” I said.

Two people, stranger. Neither had any way of knowing who the other really was. All they had in common was an instinct to survive -- and to survive, they needed each other.