A/N: I'm having to post a bit quicker than I'm comfortable with, as my muse is still a slave-driver.
It was his daughter who'd proposed he get out more. She'd seen his sadness, and she'd suggested he could do with someone in his life – someone to care for, someone to take his mind off whatever it was had been troubling him. He couldn't tell her that there had been someone – almost – and that he'd allowed her to leave him to go into exile. He hadn't been able to hold on to his hope that they would meet again one day. Such were the dreams of poets and fools, and he was neither …... although he had to confess to having been a fool where she'd been concerned. He'd stood by and allowed her to turn down his second dinner invitation. He'd not come back to her when it was clear she felt strongly towards him, and worst of all, he'd watched as she left the dock in a tug boat, and he'd done nothing at all to stop her leaving. Fool was too light a word to describe his short-comings. Bloody idiot came closer.
Since that day he'd only dipped his toes into attempting to find her, with the hope of bringing her back home one day. His efforts had been desultory and ineffective, and he knew why that was. He was afraid - that he'd not be able to find her, and that if he did, she'd not want to come home …... or worse still, that she would no longer want to have anything to do with him. In his eyes, he had failed her, and she no doubt felt the same.
Catherine was right. He needed someone. He had to move on. It had been two years since Ruth had left, and he wasn't getting any younger. He had a need to do something different. Wallowing didn't suit him.
So for a few months he'd visited wine bars and pubs, where the clientele were mostly under the age of forty. He had a few unsatisfactory one night stands with women almost young enough to be his daughters. He'd leave their beds feeling soiled, predatory, even though he knew that the women had been the predators, with him the one being preyed upon. Women with father compexes, most of them.
It was at a reception for the Chinese delegation that he'd met Alison Andrews. She was part of the security detail based at the hotel where the reception was being held. Late forties, blond, elegant, taller than he when wearing heels, intelligent – but not brilliant – a good listener, and all round lovely person. Harry had attended the function alone, and Alison had had to move around the room alone, her eyes on several things at once, an earpiece in her ear through which she'd listened to conversations of others.
"My Mandarin isn't what it should be," she'd said close to his right ear.
For a moment, he was thrown back in time to another woman – a brilliant one – whose Mandarin was everything it should have been. Harry was about to mention her, before he remembered that he didn't even know where this woman was, or even if she was still alive.
"Perhaps you need to act as though you can speak it well," he'd suggested. "It usually works for me."
"You're suggesting I fake it, then," she'd said, smiling, both of them conscious of the innuendo. Harry had felt a heat beginning in his groin, a good sign in his estimation.
She'd introduced herself, and an hour later, he'd asked her out to dinner the following week. The dinner had gone well, as had the next one and the one after that. After their fourth dinner, Alison had asked him back to her place for coffee, although they both knew that more than coffee was on offer. They had made love in her bed, and he had left first thing in the morning, after they'd both woken, giving himself time to get home to shower and change for work. By the time they'd been seeing one another four months, they had progressed to dinners cooked by Alison in her house, and him staying overnight, and going to work from her place. They were almost an item, but not quite.
By the sixth month, Alison was wondering why she hadn't seen Harry's house. She didn't even know where he lived. She knew what he did for a living, and so understood that there was much of his life which would remain out of bounds to her. She'd even asked him if he was married.
"Whatever made you ask that?" he asked. They were lying in bed in post-coital quiet. His arm was around her shoulders, and she was snuggled against his naked shoulder. Her question had bothered him, leading him to consider getting out of bed, dressing and leaving. He didn't. He and Alison had been seeing one another five and a half months, and so she deserved to hear the truth.
"You've cut parts of yourself off from me, Harry. There is a large part of you which remains out of my reach. I've experienced that before with men, and it's almost always a sign that they're married, or that they are committed to another. I've never seen your house. I've not met your children. I've not met any of the people you work with. Does the woman you love work with you? Does she live with you?"
Harry sighed. He really liked Alison, but he didn't love her, and doubted he'd ever be able to. "I'm not married," he said, "and I live alone. I prefer to come here because I rarely use my house for anything other than sleeping."
Alison did not pursue the subject any further, although she was not convinced. There was a part of him which was always just beyond her grasp. And there was the business of the woman's name he'd called out as he'd climaxed the first time they'd had sex. It hadn't been her name. It had only happened the once. Since then, he was generally quite silent during sex. He was also rather mechanical, like he was making love by numbers. She'd also experienced that before. It meant that the man was trying hard to move on with another woman …... a woman other than the one they wanted.
Alison Andrews was prepared to bet her house and everything in it that Harry Pearce still loved someone who had either died, or who had left him. He was not a man to handle rejection well. It was also clear to her that he didn't love her, and probably never would. Despite that, she enjoyed his company, and was not quite ready to give up on him. She had grown rather fond of him. Most of all, he was a wonderful kisser.
Six weeks later, Harry surprised her by inviting her to the George hotel for drinks and dinner to celebrate the birthday of one of his work colleagues.
"What shall I wear?" she'd asked Harry, suddenly nervous.
"It doesn't matter," he'd said, smiling at her. "You look wonderful no matter what you wear."
Alison had smiled back, recognising that had Harry loved her, he would have added: "But I prefer it when you're wearing nothing at all." He'd never suggested anything like that to her.
It wasn't until they arrived at the hotel together that Harry told her that the guest of honour was a friend of his, and that it was a late birthday celebration for the man's forty-ninth birthday.
"He was away when he had his birthday. It was between Christmas and New Year. He does that every year to avoid a celebration. This time we caught him out. He thinks we're gathering at the pub for a late meeting."
Alison had stood next to Harry, her hand tucked in the crook of his arm, when the group of rowdy, but friendly people around her had clapped as the grey-haired man joined them at the table.
"Malcolm, this is Alison Andrews," Harry said, his hand resting on the small of her back. "Malcolm Wynn-Jones. The most honest man I know."
Alison had liked Malcolm on sight. He had a lovely smile, and there was a shyness about him that Harry didn't possess. Harry could be enigmatic and moody, but he was definitely not shy. They talked easily and comfortably, and Harry soon drifted away to join the others.
"Malcolm," Alison said at last, "you've known Harry a while."
"I have, yes. We've worked together for well over ten years. We're not especially close, but we know one another well. Neither of us are easy to get close to."
She saw this as a natural way in. "Tell me if I'm stepping over a line, Malcolm, but I'm finding Harry difficult to reach."
They were sitting at a small table apart from the rest of Harry's team. Harry was holding forth telling stories about some ghastly past operation in which everything had gone wrong. Alison watched him for a short time. He was in his element. This was a side of him she'd not seen, and she suddenly realised that she didn't know Harry at all. Malcolm had also been watching Harry, having noticed that he'd not paid Alison any attention since he and she had sat together by the wall, away from the others. Harry was behaving like a single man, as though he'd forgotten he was there with someone.
"Harry is a complex man," Malcolm began, not wanting to betray Harry's trust – the Spooks Code.
"So I've noticed. Malcolm …... is there another woman in his life?"
"You need to bring this up with him, Alison. His story is not mine to tell."
"I have. He avoids the subject. All he's told me is that he lives alone, and that he's not married."
"That is true, yes."
"But there's more, isn't there?"
Malcolm hesitated, not wanting to betray Harry, but recognising that this woman was an innocent in all this. She deserved answers.
"There is more, yes. You need to talk to Harry about Ruth."
"Ruth. Yes, he mentioned her once."
After they left the hotel, she and Harry went back to Alison's house for coffee.
"You're not staying, are you?" she'd asked him.
"No, I'm not."
"Before you go, will you at least tell me about Ruth?"
Harry lifted his head so fast, his face so dark, that she sat back in her chair. "You called out her name the first time we had sex."
"I did?"
"Yes."
"I'm sorry. That was …..."
"You need to tell me about her, Harry. If we're to ever …..."
"If we're to ever what, Alison?"
"If we're ever to be more to one another than fuck-buddies."
"Is that what you think we are?"
"It's not what I think, Harry. It's what I know. Your heart isn't in it."
"I'm sorry you think that way. I still want to keep seeing you."
"Why?"
"Why? I like you, Alison. You're good company."
"Do you enjoy sex with me?"
Harry made the mistake of hesitating. The truth was that he liked Alison a lot, but he sometimes found sex with her to be a chore. That had never before happened to him, and he was hoping it wasn't anything to do with the process of aging. "Most of the time," he said quietly.
"You'll never love me, though, will you?"
Harry sighed. "No. I won't."
"You still love this woman, Ruth."
"I'm not prepared to talk about her."
"Which means yes, you are."
"I think I'd better go," Harry said, rising to his feet. He bent to kiss Alison, and she put her hand around his neck and held his head, while she opened her mouth under his. Harry enjoyed the kiss, and he was tempted to stay, but he needed to go home. He had a busy day next day.
"Ring me when you know what you want, Harry," Alison said, as he opened the door to leave.
Harry looked back at her, and nodded. He liked her a lot. He just couldn't get emotional about her. His emotions were locked away somewhere deep inside him, and only one person in the world held the key to that place.
Harry had planned to ring Alison next day to apologise for his strange behaviour, but he had visited the head of the FSB in London, Viktor Sarkisiian, and had ended up bound and gagged in the boot of a car. Two days later, he was sold on to Indian Intelligence, who took him to a disused warehouse in London, his hands tied, and sat him in a chair.
Then they brought a woman into the room. The woman was Ruth. It had been two years and eight months since he'd seen her, and in the moment he first saw her, he knew that she still owned his heart.