Inspired by the wonderful ladies of 3/8. Thank you :)

Malcolm knocked on Harry's office door with trepidation. "Yes?" He opened the door and went in, not sure if his news would be welcomed. "Malcolm, what can I do for you?"

"I need to talk to you," he said, noticing the whisky glass resting on the table and the fact that Harry had loosened his tie a bit, the end of the working day. Again Malcolm was struck by the fact this wasn't going to be an easy conversation.

"You seem serious," Harry said. "Sit down."

Malcolm did. "I take it you heard of the death of Oliver Mace."

"I did," Harry said with satisfaction. Mace had been attacked in prison, probably because he'd wound somebody up, and prisoners didn't have the same restraint as ordinary citizens. A week ago he'd been found dead in his cell. Undignified as it was, the news had made Harry smile all the same. "Couldn't have happened to a nicer man."

"Well, quite," Malcolm said. "Anyway, I hope I haven't overstepped, but I started looking into how to clear… Ruth's name." He paused before saying Ruth, because no one had ever dared bring it up in Harry's presence. It was clear the subject was off limits, and no one argued. When her name was spoken Harry's eyes showed a desperate hope. The rest of his face hadn't moved at all, and yet Malcolm knew that he needed information that said she was alive and well.

"Is she okay?" Harry asked quietly after a moments silence.

"As far as I know she's fine," Malcolm said. Harry sighed with relief.

"I haven't looked into her," Harry said. "I can't. I can't look at CCTV pictures of her knowing that she has a whole new life and I'll never see her again. So, I haven't looked for her."

"I know," Malcolm said. He didn't speak for two or three minutes, waiting for Harry to collect himself.

"Go on."

"There were only two pieces of evidence against her," Malcolm said. "The photographs which we doctored, and the eyes only document that Mick Maudsley left for Ruth to find. The rest is circumstantial, because people believed that someone in section D had to know about the torture scandal." Harry nodded in agreement. "Well, the photographs… vanished off of government computers and the physical copies were destroyed." Harry's lips twitched with amusement.

"I assume they vanished with your help," Harry said.

"Yes," Malcolm said. "They were fake anyway, and wouldn't have held up under scrutiny in court. So removing them wasn't difficult. The trouble was the document. I couldn't destroy it, too many people know of its existence and it relates to more cases than just Ruth's. So I've dug around Mace's estate, now he's dead. His wife was accommodating. Apparently his life insurance has made her a millionaire. Caring for her late husbands secrets wasn't high on her list of priorities."

"What did you find?"

"A tape recording." Malcolm got the recording out of his pocket and placed it on the desk. "I didn't like listening to it, but essentially it means Ruth is innocent, which we can prove and… if she wants, she can come back to the UK."

"Are you… serious?" he asked. "She's cleared?"

"Not officially," he said. "I think that would require you talking to the Home Secretary. But there's nothing against her Harry." Malcolm bit his lip as Harry stared at the machine, almost in disbelief. "I found her address." Harry's eyes went to Malcolm's, shock there again.

"What identity is she using?"

"Rose Evans." Malcolm took a folded piece of paper out of his pocket and placed it next to the tape recorder. "The identity Zaf arranged for her. Call me if you need anything. Any time."

"Malcolm?" Harry said as he reached the door. He turned to look at his boss and oldest friend. "Thank you." Malcolm nodded and left, closing the door. Harry quickly went to the blinds, pulled them and then locked the door before pouring himself an extra large whisky and undoing his top button. Then he looked at the tape recorder. Not knowing what he was about to hear he pressed play.

"So its agreed. We'll send them to Egypt." Mace's voice. Harry would recognise that voice anywhere. The second voice was male too, and Harry recognised it instantly, filling him with ice.

"I think that's best. We can get the information we need out of them there." The voice belonged to Nicholas Blake. Oh, Harry was going to enjoy the conversation with the Home Secretary tomorrow.

"I'm worried about section D," Mace said. "They have a tendency to stick their nose in when its not wanted."

"Is there any way we can eliminate them?"

"Maybe," Mace said. "Harry Pearce has one weak spot."

"Are you talking about…?" A pause. "Oh you are. So you noticed that too?"

"The mousy lapdog who follows around after him with her tongue lolling out?" Mace said. Harry felt his fist wanting to punch him for describing Ruth that way. And it was surely Ruth he was talking about. "I think he enjoys the attention," Mace continued. "His midlife crisis, trying to make sure he can still get a woman fifteen years his junior."

"Really?" Blake said easily. "I always thought it was more than that between them."

"Please," Mace said condescendingly. "Harry Pearce wouldn't fall for Ruth. She's so… opposite to his type."

"Say what you want about her, she is fiercely intelligent. Most of the information Harry shows me comes from her, and I'm damned if I know how she gets it."

"Granted," Mace said with grudging respect in his voice. "Another drink?" There was a lull in the conversation as glasses were refilled. Harry felt his impatience biting at him. Come on.

"There's absolutely no chance anyone from section D will come on board?" Mace asked.

"None," Blake replied. "They are all far too honourable and believe they are doing the right thing. And if that weren't enough they are all blindly loyal to Harry Pearce. There will be no turning them."

"I thought as much," Mace said. "I'll have the minutes from our meeting redrawn. Destroy the originals. Add in her name."

"Harry will kill you," Blake said simply. "Don't put her name, put a code on it."

"Harry doesn't feel that much for her, I can assure you," Mace said.

"Maybe not, but he would want to kill you for setting up any member of his team," Blake said. "Put a code on it. And eliminate my name."

"Should I remove my own information?" he said wryly. "After all, if you're wriggling out of this…"

"Put Collingwood down. He's already disgraced himself, and he was high enough to give authorisation to something like this."

"Fine," he agreed. "But you sell me down the river Blake, and I will ruin you."

"I know," Blake said. "You know too much."

"I do," Mace agreed. "Until next time then." A crackle over the tape and then the recording ended. Harry felt the fury bubbling up inside him, and he listened to the tape twice more. He switched it off, curled his hand into a fist and punched his desk. It made his hand throb but was dully satisfying so he did it again. He pinched the bridge of his nose and took in a deep breath. They'd set her up, and so callously. Clinically, like it was just business. Like Ruth hadn't thrown three years of her life away for something she never did. He was so angry that his vision blurred. He steadied himself, which took several minutes.

Then he looked at the address. Cyprus. She was alive and well, and living in Cyprus. God, he thought to himself. For so long he'd wanted to know where she was, and here was the information sitting right in front of him. She was a few hours away by plane. He could go and see her. He would have to, he realised. To make sure she was okay.

Harry had longed for her every day of her absence. He missed her terribly, more than he thought he would. During the day at work he refused to think about her, because then that would be all he thought about. It was when work finished and he was home alone that it was most difficult. Because his mind was free to wander and it usually settled on her. The last time he'd seen her. That kiss they'd shared. Urgent. Desperate. A kiss that was the prelude to three long years of separation. He'd pushed her away in his mind, because there was no hope that he'd see her again. Only now did he have the freedom to think of her without telling himself not to.

Jarred into motion, Harry suddenly typed in her name on the MI5 network. Her file came up within seconds, accompanied by a picture. It wasn't a great picture, but he didn't have any other photographs of her. The woman he cared about most in the world, and he didn't even have a picture. Harry stared at her image until she began to blur. Then he read the end of her file.

Ruth Evershed was an apparent participant in the Cotterdam torture scandal. While evading capture she drowned. Her body was dragged from the Thames. File closed. That simple? Harry thought. No. He would get that expunged from her file, but first he had to have a conversation with the Home Secretary. He needed her passport back.

Ruth awoke with a jerk, breathing heavily as if she'd been running. She'd dreamed of Harry. That in itself wasn't unusual. She dreamed of Harry often. Much more often than she would even admit to herself. No, what was unusual was that Harry was in the urgency of an operation, running through London streets in terrible danger. Her dreams usually consisted of Harry kissing her, or reliving the memories of the romance they'd almost had. In her dreams she escaped the hectic madness of the grid, but this one had been awful.

He'd rounded a corner and found a gun pointing at his chest. The assassin had pulled the trigger, and the gunshot had woken Ruth up. Or rather, the adrenaline rush that had gone through her had, but it felt like the shot. "Please don't be dead," she whispered to herself. She needed Harry to be alive and well. It was the reason she'd left Britain after all. If he was dead...

"Hmm?" Came George's voice next to her.

"Nothing," she said. "Just a nightmare. Go back to sleep."

He groaned and then did just that while Ruth tried to slow her heart rate down. God, that had felt so real. She rubbed her face vigorously, praying that Harry was all right, and above all, staying away from guns and bullets.

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