London – late May 2009 – evening:

Ruth curled her feet underneath her as she picked up the remote control and scrolled through the channels on the ancient TV in the corner of the room. It was rather a nice safe house in many ways, so why the crappy TV? She grabbed a throw from over the back of the sofa and pulled it over her knees. She had already turned on the gas fire, but the room had not yet warmed up enough to have taken the chill off the air. She has just settled on the sofa, her mind switched into Mindless TV-Watching mode, when she hears a key in the front door. She knows it will be Harry, turning up to check on her, and she smiles to herself.

The footfall is not Harry's. His tread is heavier and slower, while the footsteps she hears are light and quick. Ruth feels a chill pass through her before she quickly turns, her eyes on the doorway, her body ready to get up and run.

"And here was I expecting to see you with your head buried in one of your books. Who knew you to be a closet reality show connoisseur."

"Ros …... you scared me."

Ros pulls a chair from beside the table, and places it next to the sofa before she curls her long body onto the seat. "Harry sent me. He ordered me to stay with you tonight. I'm carrying a firearm, just in case."

"I don't need you to ….." Ruth breaks eye contact with Ros, who, despite Harry's faith in her, she still doesn't quite trust.

"Babysit you? I thought it might be nice. It sure beats running and jumping and all that other physical shit for which I'm getting too old."

"Would you like some tea?" Ruth has already muted the sound on the TV, and is about to get up when Ros puts out her hand.

"I'll make it. In here is it?"

"That's the kitchen, so yes. The things for making tea are on the -"

"I see them. How do you like yours?"

"White with one sugar."

Ros brings Ruth her tea already made in a mug, and then she bypasses the chair she'd brought from the table when she'd first arrived to sit on the arm of the sofa. Ruth briefly wonders does Ros do that deliberately in order to maintain height – and so power – over her. She wouldn't put it past her.

"Harry thought it more ….. proper that I look after you tonight, and I have to agree with him."

"The flat has two bedrooms, and I don't need looking after. I'm fine. I could have hidden in my own home. There's no need for ….. all this." Ruth sweeps her hand around to take in everything in the room.

"Were it up to me, I'd be letting you remain in your home, but with someone nearby with a gun. This is Harry's idea, and I have to tell you that to me it looked like an opportunity for the man to have his way with you."

"That's ridiculous," Ruth says, keeping one eye on the TV, where Ant and Dec are bouncing around in front of the camera, blathering on about the next contestant on Britain's Got Talent. She blows across the surface of her tea, and then warily takes a sip. She wouldn't put it past Ros to have spiked her drink with sodium thiopental - the truth serum.

"Protest all you like, Ruth. Both Lucas and I think that Harry is very protective of you."

"Of course he's protective. I'm his analyst. He needs me."

Ros has leaned her back against the back of the sofa, her cup of tea nestled between her hands, and on her face is one of her expressions from The Book Of Definitive Ros Myers Expressions. Her whole face, apart from her mouth, is totally impassive, while her lips are drawn back in a leer. Predatory Ros scares Ruth, especially when she talks about Harry.

"If you say so. I'd rather it were Harry in my place, and I told him so. So do you know what he said to that?" Ruth shakes her head, her eyes still on the TV screen. It's clear to her that the judges didn't like that particular act, and she immediately feels sorry for the middle-aged man who had just (silently for her) sung his heart out. "He said that you and I need to bond a little."

Suddenly Ruth's head turns and her eyes dart up to meet Ros'. "I don't believe you. Harry would never say that."

"There's a first time for everything, even with someone as old as Harry" Ruth bites back the words, `Harry isn't that old,' and Ros continues. "In this instance I agree with him."

"You and I will never be friends, Ros, and you know why that is."

"Still blaming me for turning you in back in 2006?"

Ruth sighs, placing her half drunk tea on the coffee table in front of her. A quick flick of her eyes towards the TV sees the poor man receiving three crosses, and a sympathetic and apologetic look from Amanda Holden. Ruth considers that he should have limited his singing to the shower, and ignored the friends and family who told him his voice was good enough for him to be singing on TV, because apparently it's not.

"No," Ruth says, turning again to face Ros. "I just don't think we have enough in common to be chums."

"I agree with you there. We need to be able to communicate, though. At this point in time we generally communicate through Harry."

"And that works."

"Mmm, maybe."

Suddenly Ros gets up from her perch and takes her mug back into the kitchen. Ruth is relieved. She hopes Ros is planning to have an early night. Besides, she wants to watch the rest of Britain's Got Talent, and it's already half way through. When Ros re-enters the living room she is carrying an opened bottle of white wine and two glasses. "Something to oil the wheels of communication between us," she says, pouring out two generous glasses of the wine. "Here's to friendship," she says, handing Ruth her glass, and then sipping from her own.

"Here's to staying alive," Ruth replies, lifting her glass towards Ros before taking a gulp. As she sees it, this evening may not be a disaster after all.

2 hours later:

They are on their third bottle of wine, and Ruth is beginning to feel quite friendly – perhaps even loving – towards Ros Myers.

"Tell me," she says, "where did the wine come from?"

"Grapes on a vine somewhere in Italy," and Ros giggles to herself at her lame joke.

"No no no no ….. I mean -"

"Harry put it there. I think he was planning to seduce you tonight, Ruth."

Ruth has noticed that while she is slurring some of her words, Ros appears to be as jober as a sudge. Ruth chuckles quietly. "He wouldn't dare."

"I think his master plan was …. one, to create a diversion by telling us all that Drago Micić, once red-flagged by you, had threatened to kill you."

"Just because he's threatened doesn't mean he'll go through with it."

"Two, to insist you spend the night in a safe house while Lucas and Co flush out Micić. Three, to accompany you while you hide in here, and then four -"

"To send you in his place."

Ruth watches Ros through her eyelashes. She is beginning to notice that Ros is significantly soberer (is that even a word?) than she is.

"There's something I've been meaning to talk to you about," Ros says, pretending disinterest, which puts Ruth on alert …. or as alert as she can be under the circumstances. "You shouldn't continue to hold him at arm's length. It's not fair ….. to either of you."

"Hold who at arm's length?"

"Oh, please. Spare me the innocent act, Ruth. Do you know how he felt when you came back to London with a whole new family in tow? Do you know what it does to someone when the person they have waited all their lives to meet chooses another over them?"

Ruth is not so drunk that she can't figure out the subtext here. "You're talking about you and Lucas, aren't you?"

In an instant, Ros' eyes are sharp and flinty as she spits out her words. "I'm talking about you and Harry, and how you manage to keep him just where you want him, but you won't allow him any closer. Do you have any idea what that does to him?"

"But you're also talking about Lucas. I know he's hurt you. You deserve someone better than that, Ros."

"And in my opinion Harry deserves someone who will at least let him close enough so that he can have a real relationship with them."

"And how do you know we haven't?"

"I just know. I know he's in love with you – God knows why, poor man – just as you have carried a torch for him for years, and yet you refuse to sleep with him." Ruth suddenly sits up straight, and is about to give Ros a piece of her mind. "Save your breath, Ruth. Everyone can see it. It's written in the air around you whenever you're together. I just wish you'd either bloody get on with it, or let him know you're not interested in him. The tension between the two of you is unbearable."

Ruth holds her empty glass out for a refill, but Ros gets up quickly and heads to the kitchen. They all know. Once upon a time Ruth would have been devastated by that little piece of news. Now …... now it's just the way things are.

"Only a half bottle left," she says, filling Ruth's glass, and pouring only a small amount in her own.

"You're trying to get me pissed," Ruth says, closing one eye so that she can better focus on Ros' face …. the same Ros who is not such a bad sort after all, even if she doesn't know when to shut up.

"I think that ship has already sailed. Besides, I have to keep my head straight."

"In case Mikitch … Misitch ..."

"Yeah, him. In case he finds you …... which he won't. I still have to keep my wits about me."

"Y'could always breathe on him." Ruth falls back against the sofa, laughing at her own comment, which she is also aware is not terribly funny …. or original. It's just that everything either of them says seems hilarious to her ….. apart from all that about her and Harry. That's not even the slightest bit funny. In fact, Ruth finds it terribly sad.

The next thing Ruth knows the room is dark and she is lying on the sofa, covered by a thick blanket. She can see a glow from through the curtains in the living room, but that could be from the streetlight outside the safe house. She sits up and looks around her. Ros Myers is curled up on a comfortable upholstered chair. From there she'd be able to see anyone who enters the flat. Despite the room spinning around her, Ruth feels quite safe. She knows that Ros wouldn't turn her in as she had in August 2006. Both she and Ros have changed since then. They'll never ever be friends, but they now share a new found respect; they have each suffered unbearable loss and survived, which makes them sisters in arms.

"Go back to sleep, Ruth."

Until she'd spoken, Ruth hadn't known that Ros was awake, but she is standing in Harry's stead, watching over her, protecting her. Ruth smiles and closes her eyes.

7.12 am:

Ruth is in the middle of a dream – a really lovely dream in which she is woken from sleep when Harry leans over her and kisses her awake.

"Ruth … wake up. It's morning."

"Go away, Harry."

"Ruth," he says again, and this time Ruth feels his hand warm on her upper arm as he tries to shake her awake. She sits up suddenly and opens her eyes. Harry is bending over her, his eyes surprised.

"Oh, God," Ruth says as the room spins around her, and she feels the slight roiling of nausea from deep in her gut. Although she is sitting up, and has again closed her eyes, inside her head everything spins. "Make it stop, Harry," she says, putting her hands over her eyes. "Make the room stop spinning."

Harry smiles at her, but she can't see him. "Open your eyes, Ruth. You need to drink this." When Ruth opens her eyes he is holding a glass filled with some fizzy orange stuff. "Berocca," he adds. Ruth takes the glass and drinks it slowly. She knows her body needs fluids, but her stomach objects. "Now for the water," Harry adds, gently taking one glass from her hand, and handing her a large glass filled with water. "Take your time. I'll go upstairs and pack your things."

Ruth stops drinking mid sip, trying to remember what she'd unpacked the evening before. Sadly she can't remember any details prior to her conversation with Ros, when Ros had told her to give Harry more than her friendship. Even last night, in her inebriated state she knew Ros had been right.

"It's alright, Ruth. I've lived with women. Nothing you have is likely to shock me."

"But Harry, you're my boss."

Harry stops just inside the doorway and turns to look at her, his eyes gentle, his gaze intense and personal. "I'm much more than that, Ruth, and you know it."

Of course she knows it. She just hadn't wanted to admit it.

"Ros?" Ruth asks, chiefly to change the subject.

"She stayed awake all night, so I sent her home to sleep."

Harry drives her home, and mostly they travel in comfortable silence. When they are only fifteen minutes from Ruth's flat, Harry tells her about how Drago Micić had been apprehended at just before 5 that morning.

"He was headed towards your house, Ruth. He was in the next street and approaching your house."

"Who was it captured him?"

"He wasn't captured, Ruth. He put up a fight, so he was shot …. dead."

"By whom?"

"Lucas."

Ruth nods, sorry for both the man who wanted to kill her, and the man who had had to kill this man. It's a mad business they are in.

Harry carries her bag into her house, and makes her a pot of tea. "I don't want you coming into work today until you feel up to it, Ruth. I need you at your best."

"Alright."

Harry lifts his eyebrows in surprise. "Not even an objection?"

"I've decided I no longer want to fight with you."

Harry had been about to leave her kitchen, when he turns to look at her closely. "Any reason why not?"

"Yes. Several reasons. I'm tired from fighting with you. You're not the reason I've felt bad since my return to London."

"Anything else?"

Suddenly, on the cusp of saying something life-changing to Harry, Ruth has a bout of shyness. She takes a deep breath, and looks up to see him smiling at her. "Yes, there is."

"Are you going to tell me?"

"I'd like it if we could …..."

"Be friends? I've always been your friend, Ruth."

"I'd like it were we more than friends. I'd like it were we ….. not tonight or tomorrow night, but perhaps the next night ….. to have a drink together after work. And then soon after that I think we should have our second dinner together. If you'd like to, that is."

As she's been speaking, Harry has very slowly walked towards her. He has stopped just short of touching her, and Ruth notices how his eyes are shining. He is not smiling. To her he looks wary, but his eyes are shining …. she hopes with joy. He reaches out towards her, and takes one of her hands in his. "I would like to very much, Ruth. You have no idea how long it is I've waited for you to say ….. what you've just said."

"Since I came back to London?"

"No. Much, much longer than that."

They stand like that for several minutes ... he holding one of her hands, both looking into the eyes of the other, surrounded by the domesticity of Ruth's small kitchen.

"I really ought to try to sleep some more before I come in to work."

"And I have so much to be doing I don't know where to begin …... but right now, I don't want to be anywhere but here."

Ruth steps close to Harry and reaches up to kiss his cheek. Kissing him on the lips is out of the question since she surely smells like a winery in late harvest. "Go, Harry. We'll wait. Friday night we can go for a drink after work -"

"- and we can have dinner on Saturday night."

"It's a date. Now, go."

Harry passes his fingers down Ruth's cheek, and then turns and quickly leaves.

Ruth sits at her kitchen table and pours herself a cup of tea. She mustn't forget to thank Ros Myers for interfering. She only wishes she could return the favour, but she fears that Lucas North may have permanently moved on from Ros. Ruth hopes Ros will again find love, because of all the many forces in the universe, love has the power to transform the hardest of spies.

Fin