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Chapter 4 – Jurisdiction
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Harry had never enjoyed the bustle and clamour of the Home Office. He had hated it when he had first been brought here, as Section Chief to Section D's previous Section Head, and he hated it now that he was the responsible figure, leading Erin Watts and Ruth Evershed down the building's long halls, towards the offices of the Home Secretary. At least Towers was less of a prick than the man who had sat in the chair when he was a young officer, thought Harry darkly, glancing sideways at his colleagues.
Erin looked like she was thoroughly enjoying herself. Despite her assurances that she had no desire to be a politician, Harry's Section Chief was more at home within these walls than Harry could ever hope to be. She walked with a quick, proud step slightly to Harry's left, long hair bouncing slightly with each footfall. She was a fairly beautiful woman. It was probably part the reason she fit so well, Harry thought silently. Unless you were born with a silver spoon in your mouth, or a silver tongue, the halls of politicians were a place for the beautiful and ambitious. Erin was both. His Ruth, on the other hand... Well, she was just beautiful.
Harry hid a smile as he glanced over his other shoulder. Ruth was busy ferreting through her bag for something, looking delightfully annoyed. Though she had grown used to being dragged along on errands, such as these, Harry knew she was far more at home working her magic on the Grid, or down in archives. She was an analyst, not a field officer and, though she knew enough to put half of Harry's junior field officers to shame, he knew she would always be reticent about stepping outside her job title. She was beautiful, but if she had had any ambitions beyond being an analyst, Harry suspected she would have left him for them, long ago. Let him be thankful that she didn't, he thought, as they stepped closer to the Home Secretary's receptionist. Today, he was going to need all her wits about him.
"Sarah," he greeted Towers' receptionist, by name.
A tall blonde-dyed woman, Sarah had been working in the department for nearly three years. Harry had plenty of cause to know her over the years. He was in and out of these offices as frequently as many of the men who worked in them. Over the years, he had learned that she was on close and personal terms with the Home Secretary. Thus far, however, he had refrained from mentioning it to anyone. It might come in useful, in the future, he told himself.
Harry liked Towers, as much as he could like any politician, but he had learnt his lesson about trusting men who sat in his chair. The great offices of power attracted men of great ambitions and very few of those were squeaky clean. That said, Towers was a lot more down-to-earth than many of his predecessors. He wielded his power with a moderate amount of humility and Harry hoped that he was as fair as he seemed. There was the personal aspect of the relationship too, he supposed. Towers had helped him back after Albany, had stuck his neck out by giving him support, during the tribunal. Still, Harry doubted he would ever stop collecting information on him. He was a spook, after all, and good spooks collect information on their friends as well as their enemies.
"Sir Harry," the receptionist shuffled papers on top of her desk. "The Home Secretary will be along very shortly. He has unfortunately been held up in traffic."
Unlikely, thought Harry, though he nodded anyway. Towers was probably holed up somewhere else in the building. When he had called Harry, earlier that morning, it was from a Home Office line.
The woman, Sarah, nodded towards the meeting room. "Feel free to go through. The others are already inside."
Harry gave a noise to the affirmative and headed towards the great dark door. Erin fell into pace beside him, Ruth in tow. Truth be told, Harry would much rather be heading in the opposite direction. In fact, he would much rather be heading in any other direction, but this was his job, his duty, the path he had chosen. As nauseated as he felt at the thought of spending the next half an hour in an enclosed space with his SIS counterpart, Harry knew it was a necessity.
As they stepped into the room, then, he forced his personal feelings away, allowing calm to flow in, in its place. Game face, he told himself, trying to look as stoic as he could. Erin and Ruth stepped into the room behind him and the three of them made their way towards the large table at the centre, their footsteps muffled by the thickly carpeted floors. The other three occupants of the room looked up as they entered, their eyes remaining rooted on Harry and his officers until they came to a stop beside the table.
Harry nodded to the assembled group.
"Richard," he greeted his counterpart with a smile.
Richard Neilson, London Branch Chief for the SIS, was a man in his early sixties. Though a good five years older than Harry, he conspicuously lacked a single grey hair. Rumour had it that he dyed what he had almost weekly. It was absurdly black. Harry rested his hands on the back of an empty chair as he took in the rest of the man on front of him. Neilson had always been rather stout but, over the last few months, he had become markedly slimmer. It was not uniform weight loss, however. Though the weight had left his midriff, his face remained relatively rounded. When he smiled, as he was doing now, Harry could not help but be reminded of a well-fed cat. It was the languid way his muscles moved, and the way his smile did not quite stretch to the eyes.
Best be wary, Harry reminded himself, even well-fed cats had claws. Neilson might look like an upper-class minion, but he was anything but harmless and Harry knew he would best remember that. Still, a little barb here and there could be constructive. He needed to find a tell, a weakness, and a little sarcasm went a long way.
Giving the man a taut smile, Harry pushed politely into conversation.
"I trust the drive over from Vauxhall Cross wasn't too taxing?"
"Oh, we just about managed," Neilson mirrored Harry's smile, eyes every bit as cool as before. "My congratulations, by the way, on your reinstatement," he added. "I don't think I've had the chance to talk to you, since. I expect you will be glad to have it all behind you. It was such a nasty business."
Ah, Harry grimaced internally. Albany. Why did it always come to Albany? Harry tried valiantly to maintain impassive expression. It was natural, he supposed, for his colleagues to be interested in his treason – and especially the reasons behind it. He would be just as interested if one of them had committed such an act. Suddenly, however, Harry felt very glad that he had not yet introduced Ruth by name. It would have made the situation ten times as awkward if Neilson had known she was the woman he traded state secrets for.
And as for the woman...
Though she was doing well not to look particularly interested in Neilson's comments, Harry noticed her shoulders had tensed as soon as the subject of Albany arose. Would she be as uneasy if they had not just come from having coffee, Harry wondered, trying to take in her expression without turning his head. Would she be awkward when they left the Home Office and headed back to work? Should he say something, when they leave, apologise? Should he defend her now, or just obliquely let Neilson know that Albany was a taboo subject? What would Ruth want him to do?
The boundaries of their new relationship were vague, at the moment. Harry supposed he would learn them, in time.
Working together was going to be harder than he had expected, though. Harry had realised that, that morning. Their gentle chatter, over coffee, had been warm and easy and wonderful. Apart from a few hiccups, they had made it all the way from her house to the coffee shop and out again without any moments of crippling embarrassment. Then, there had been that awkward moment, as they had walked back to Thames House together, dawdling in the cold air. What she was thinking, Harry still could not be sure, but it had to be something about their dual nature of their relationship – employee and employer and couple, now, as well. Was it going to be a problem, in the long run? Harry had never thought it would be, but then he had never thought many things would happen.
Eventually, Ruth had pushed through the stiffness of the moment and kissed him gently. Adrenaline and endorphins had taken over, after that, and made everything right again. It was still early days, Harry reminded himself, now. They were still so new. He should not expect everything to be easy, right away. They needed time to get their bearings.
That said, Harry had absolutely no desire to slow things down between them, especially not after what Ruth had asked of him, earlier. She had invited him over to her house – Ruth had invited him to her house, he still had trouble believing that – and whether it was for dinner, or coffee, or more, Harry would be there. The cautious part of his brain was telling him not to lay too much on what might happen. The base, primal part of him, however, was crying out for contact. And she had lust in her eyes when she looked at him, earlier, Harry reminded himself. You are not alone in this. She wanted him every bit as much as he wanted her.
She wanted him.
It took a lot of will power to focus his mind away from Ruth again and onto the current situation. This was work time and he had to be on top of his game. He was meeting with the Home Secretary and Neilson. He was supposed to be having a conversation...
He brought his mind around, just in time to catch the end of his counterpart's sentence.
"...honestly say, I didn't expect to ever see you again," Neilson exclaimed, with a smile. Still talking about Albany, then, thought Harry with a sigh. Would it ever grow old? Neilson pushed blithely on. "From treason, to garden leave, yet here you are."
"Here I am," Harry echoed.
"It will be fifteen years you've held your current post, soon, won't it, Sir Harry? Has anyone else lasted so long, in the job?"
No.
"They're all saying you're indestructible!"
"Just hard wearing," Harry replied, curtly.
Neilson gave a short laugh.
"Not many men have the friends to weather such a storm as you did."
"As you said, I've been around for a while." Harry appraised the man on front of him, deciding to move the conversation onto a subject less emotionally-charged. He could feel Ruth shifting uncomfortably behind him. "I must say, Richard, you're looking remarkably slimmer than the last time we met," he noted, nodding towards Neilson's waistline. "You haven't gone over to the dark side and taken up golf, have you? Not out putting with the politicians?"
For a brief moment, a shadow passed over the man's eyes and his upper lip tightened. Then, he forced another languid smile and leant back in his chair, giving a slow nod.
"Atkins diet, I'm afraid. The wife has me on it. She's a terrifying woman, when she sets her mind to something – I daren't come off."
Harry instinctively doubted that Neilson's story was the truth. When a man such as his counterpart changed from a pattern he had held for most of his adult life, the natural assumption for a spook was that that man had suffered a change of circumstances; a family death, a break-up, a new mistress, perhaps. It was all leverage, in their line of work, so when he had first heard of Neilson's rapidly diminishing waistline, Harry had seized upon the subject with glee. After a couple of weeks of searching, however, Neilson's change of change of circumstances was none the more apparent and Harry had run out of avenues to pursue. There were no additional hints today.
The two spooks watched each other warily for a moment longer, then Harry turned his attention back Erin and Ruth. He introduced them politely to Neilson, paying particular attention to Neilson's reaction to Ruth's name. There was not much, to be honest. The man had a poker face like a marble statue. After nodding to the two women, he introduced the two he had brought – a 'Smith' and a 'Brown'. The irony of them having the two most common English surnames was not lost on Harry.
Once the introductions were finished, Harry took up a seat opposite Neilson at the table, Erin and Ruth sitting either side of him.
A few awkward moments passed in silence.
Over the years, Harry and Neilson had come to grudgingly respect one another, but there certainly was no love lost between them. Even before they had been direct counterparts, things had always been strained. They might have come up, through training, together, but they played the game on different levels, for different masters, for a long time. It had put them up against one another more than once and, because of that, they were never likely to be more than civil to one another. Conversation, therefore, was stilted and limited to the obligatory and work-related. Thankfully, however, the silence did not last long enough to provoke small talk – a pastime Harry was rather ill equipped for. With a bang and a clatter, the Home Secretary pushed his way in, through the door, followed by his entourage. The assembled spooks turned to face him.
Despite the earliness of the hour, the Home Secretary looked full of wrath. By his dishevelled appearance Harry guessed he had been at the Home Office for several hours already, if he had indeed been home at all last night. His shirt was wrinkled, his tie slightly askew. His forehead was furrowed deeply, too, as he strode into the room.
"Buggering fool wouldn't have had the first clue what was going on if we hadn't told him," he growled at a young man trotting at his side. The man had impossibly coiffed hair and was dimly familiar to Harry. One of Towers' many aides and advisors – a police liaison, Harry thought, but wasn't sure. "You make sure you tell him that," Towers continued to snap, "and he can stuff his jurisdictional qualms, they are of no bloody use to either of us!"
Out of the corner of his eye, Harry caught Erin and Ruth exchange a glance. The subject of the Home Secretary's chagrin was something that they already knew about, then, Harry thought. Sometimes, he felt a little out of the loop only reading the synopses of current threats. Then again, he hardly had the time to learn all the cases that went through his section back-to-front. That was a job for the analysts on each of his teams. On Erin's team, that was Ruth's job.
Ruth knew more than him, he mused, briefly.
Though it had probably always been true, it felt suddenly more intimidating now that he was dating her.
Across the room, Towers young liaison bobbed his head and muttered a quiet 'yes sir' and darted back out the door from which he had come, his shoes clapping loudly off down the hall. Harry watched him go and then the rest, as Towers dismissed them with a wave of his hand. He waited until they were gone before heaving a sigh and turning to scan the room.
"Harry, Richard," he greeted each of them, in turn, nodding to the others. "Sorry about the wait."
He sounded genuinely apologetic.
Neilson nodded and made conciliatory replies about traffic being dreadful that time of morning, while Harry held his silence, not bothering to express faked belief in the Home Secretary's previous whereabouts. The receptionist may well have told them all that he was stuck in traffic but, in Harry's eyes, Towers had the look of a man who had just emerged from another meeting; presumably in the same building as they were in now, as he was not fresh-faced from the cold or carrying a coat. It was probably something with the Prime Minister, Harry figured. He knew that the PM was not currently as abroad, or as on holiday, as Downing Street had led the media to believe.
"Right," Towers gave a long sigh, looking terribly harassed as he flopped down into his chair. "I suppose we should get started." He turned to Harry. "What on earth are we going to do about Torrance Wood?"
Harry let out a low sigh.
Torrance Wood was a problem every bit as ridiculous as his name. British consul in Shanghai, he had returned to the country following an incident at the embassy two months ago involving a failed bombing, which resulted in no casualties but plenty of structural damage. Pending an investigation into the matter, by the very thorough (and, in Harry's opinion, unduly interested) Ministry of State Security, Wood and his family had been relocated back to London while some of his people remained in Shanghai to deal with proceedings.
None of this, in itself was any of Harry's business.
However, as the investigation finished up in the people's republic of China and Wood had been preparing to return, he had received a death threat, followed by another attempt on his life.
Now, that was Harry's business.
A threat against an official consul of the United Kingdom was tantamount to a threat against the country itself, or its sovereign, and it was Harry's job to identify and prevent whomever had made said threat from making any further. In Harry's humble opinion, as fifteen-year head of Counterterrorism, his team would be able to handle the matter just fine without Secret Service stooges sticking their noses in. Due to the sensitivity of the work Wood was doing across seas, however, the Foreign Secretary had obliged the Home Secretary to involve Neilson and the SIS. So here they were, far too early in the morning, sans coffee or anything pleasant to eat, cooperating in the name of Her Majesty's government. It was all a show of courtesy that Harry could have done without.
Erin smothered a yawn on his left and Ruth leant forwards slightly in her chair, folding her hands atop a copy of the report they had sent to Towers the previous night. It contained a security assessment on Wood and his family and a detailed account of all of his previous official dealings and any threats he had received for them, in the past. Known anti-British activists of the Shanghai area were also included. The list was very short and each candidate was, in Harry's opinion, as unlikely to try to kill Torrance Wood as the next. If the Section Head had to lay money on the real attempted assassin, he would put it on a mercenary, hired by the oil consortium Wood was about to put out of business, with his renewable energy deal. A cheap mercenary, if the botched bombing was anything to go by.
"What to do with Torrance Wood..." Harry mused aloud.
Towers sighed again. "As if we don't have enough on our plate, with the preparations for the summit next week."
"We could always send him back to China," Neilson suggested, with a light shrug. "That would eliminate the need for your involvement, Harry." He turned to Towers, then, and continued. "I know the Chief is only too happy to assign more officers to the case on our end. Let the SIS work alongside the MSS on this one."
If Neilson had thought to tempt them with that, then he was more of an idiot than the Harry had thought.
"And miss the pleasure of your company, Richard? I don't think so. No," he turned to the Home Secretary, "we already have a new security plan outlined for Mr Wood. If we can collate information on the attack in Shanghai, including details on what Wood was working on prior to it, then I am confident we will be able to make a thorough threat assessment. Once we identify the attempted assassin, we can identify who he was paid by and put a stop to this."
"All the information from us and Six will be in the brief I sent you, ten minutes ago," Towers told him, smothering a yawn. "I'm afraid I'm rather short on analysts, so ours is a bit of a mess. Richard's is organised in your usual format."
Harry swung his gaze to Neilson, who was watching them from across the table.
"And is your offering comprehensive, Richard?" he asked.
Neilson's expression did not shift, but Harry thought he spotted a flicker in his eye. Laughter, perhaps, if men such as Richard Neilson ever truly laughed. "Of course, Harry," he replied, softly. "What on earth do you take this for, if not full cooperation?"
A veiled attempt at diplomacy, Harry bitterly suggested, to himself – a laying down of bait, to distract, while Neilson slunk off to fuck them all from behind. God knows what this was, but it was not full disclosure. Men like Richard Neilson did not do full disclosure. Harry knew that because he was a man like Richard Neilson. They were creatures of shadows, living in a world made up of a thousand shades of grey. There was no black and white here, no absolute truth. Official Military Intelligence policy was that the two services were open to one another, sharing all relevant information upon a request with the correct clearance. The reality of the situation was, of course, slightly different.
Certain intelligence was held back by both parties and for good reason, thought Harry. It was the failing of intelligence services the world over that they had to employ a vast number of personnel. That meant that they had to factor human error and human corruptibility into every decision they made. Information was held close, even within each individual service. Sharing across services had to be approached very tentatively.
Harry knew that Neilson had not given them all the details of what Consul Torrance Wood was working on because he wouldn't have, in Neilson's position. Forging delicate deals with flighty allies was a tricky business. Neilson would want as few people to know as possible and the chances of such details leaking out would increase exponentially once they were added to the MI5 mainframe.
"I need a run-down of what deals he was working on," Harry demanded, softly.
"That will all be in the file we sent you."
"I need details on any unofficial, preliminary talks that he is involved with, too."
Neilson gave a half-grimace.
"Not really a possibility, old boy," he drawled. "I'm afraid it would rather frighten off the other parties at the negotiating table, if we were to start rooting around in their private business before they had signed on any dotted lines."
"And having their negotiating partner blown to tiny pieces is not frightening?" Harry asked, politely.
Towers shot him a warning look, but he needn't have bothered. Far from take offence, Neilson looked mildly amused. A few moments passed, then a movement to their left caused all three men to turn slightly. Ruth was leaning forwards against the table, eyes bright.
"May I?" she asked him.
Harry hid his surprise and nodded for her to speak.
"Mr Neilson, we understand the need for discretion, but we need to know who he's working with – even tentatively working with." Her voice was soft, wonderfully soothing after the sharpness of Harry's, but still firm enough to echo loudly in the quiet of the cavernous meeting room. "I can assure you, I'll be working on this case personally, within a closed unit," she continued. "It would be just as easy to work with information transferred on hard disk, or paper."
Eyes only, Harry read in her words.
"There is no need to enter them into our system at all," his analyst finished, sounding most sincere. "And I can report updates on the case to your liaison, personally."
A moment passed, while Neilson regarded Ruth pensively. Then, he gave her a taut smile and nodded slowly in reply.
"Of course. We'll make the arrangements. Like I said to Harry, we support full cooperation."
Harry could have kissed his analyst on the spot.
It was the same deal he would have made, of course, but the way she had formed the offer was infinitely better. The haggling and snapping he had envisioned lasting the next twenty minutes, faded delightfully away in to the distance. She had always had a gift for smoothing ruffled feathers, thought Harry, hiding his smile beneath a fresh layer of impassivity. Erin Watts was an excellent Section Chief – she was fearless in the field and adhered so closely to protocol that sometimes Harry had to drag her away from it, kicking and screaming – but she had nothing of Ruth's natural talent at the negotiation table. Perhaps that would come with years of experience, Harry thought to himself.
Though he still did not think of her as such, having known her since she joined, Ruth definitely qualified as an experienced spook. She had been on the team for nearly eight years, now, Harry reminded himself, far longer than most made it. And what an eight years it had been. Together, they had been through the best and worst days Harry had ever experienced, on the Grid. They had seen relief and victory and she had seen bone-crushing defeat and loss. And Ruth had been never less than brilliant, the whole time.
"I can have the information sent over, within the hour," Neilson told her, before turning back to Harry and the Home Secretary. "I do have a few requests, however."
Terms and conditions always hampered the efficiency of his team, but Harry nodded anyway.
They needed this information. They had a job to do.
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The rest of the meeting was taken up with haggling, over the details of their new information share. As Harry had expected, Neilson had several requests to be met, in return for his cooperation. Among other things, he required that they report back their findings twice a day to a member of his staff, in person.
In the course of negotiations, Harry learned that Six were running their own investigation into the failed bombing at the embassy and was assured that he and his team would be fully apprised of the relevant information. The phrase 'relevant information' made him shift uncomfortably in his seat, but he held his tongue on the matter. That was a bridge to be crossed at another time. Right now, they had managed to convince Neilson to share what the Consul had been up to, in Shanghai. That information would prove very valuable. Whomever had been making threats towards Wood in this country, had no doubt had quarrel with him in China. A couple cross-checks and conversations with assets abroad and they would know who wanted Wood dead and, therefore, be able to figure out a way to stop them. Harry almost smiled to himself. The meeting had gone smoother than he could have hoped.
Terms negotiated, everyone shook hands and Erin and Harry made their way over to the door with the Home Secretary as Ruth ran through some last-minute details for the file exchange with Neilson and his colleagues. Harry was perfectly happy to leave them to it. The less he had to interact with the SIS man, the happier he would be. He continued to watch them, however, until the Home Secretary touched him lightly on the arm, requiring his attention.
"I have you meeting with Torrance Wood tomorrow," Towers told him. "Half ten. I hope you will be able to shed some light on the situation, by then?"
Harry nodded, lifting his eyes off of where Ruth was haggling over the use of one of Neilson's assets and turning back to the man on front of him. Standing again, Towers looked even more woebegone than he had looked at the table. His Saville Row suit was wrinkled and he was a couple hours short of having stubble. Long night, Harry thought, wondering what horrors he might have to look forwards to, over the next few days. Politicians rarely pulled all-nighters unless there was something particularly important going down. And particularly important meant particularly spectacular, when it all went wrong. And when it all went wrong, guess who was called.
"My team will have a succinct threat assessment," Harry assured Towers, with a sigh. Hopefully whatever he was up to would manage not to go up in flames until after dinner with Ruth. Maybe even after Harry had had a few days off. He could really do with a break. Get some sleep, get some perspective. "Miss Evershed's preliminary has given us plenty of avenues to pursue," he continued.
"There is also an asset I'm pursuing who claims to have information on the matter," Erin offered, from the side. "She sounds promising."
Towers nodded, looked a little encouraged by this. There was nothing those outside the business liked better than a good asset, thought Harry. Chances were, Erin's would turn out to be nothing. Still, it was worth a shot and if it perked the Home Secretary up a little it couldn't be all bad news.
"We'll have something," Harry confirmed.
"Good, good." Towers shuffled his feet a little and straightened his tie. "God knows the death of a government minister, at a foreign militant's hand, is the last thing we need before a multicultural bonanza like the one we are hosting, this summer."
Harry thought it was a little much, hoping that there were no cultural clashes between now and the Olympics, but he decided not to say. Towers looked like he needed his hopes to hold onto, right now. Sending Erin on ahead – to obtain their driver and work out the details of their meeting with Wood, tomorrow, with Towers' secretary – Harry was about to go and rescue Ruth from Neilson's clutches, when the Home Secretary quietly caught his attention, again.
"Harry, could I have a quick word?"
Harry turned his head, one eyebrow raised.
"It's about Ruth Evershed," Towers said, quietly.
If there ever were four words to strike fear into Harry's heart, it was those four. Albany was the first thing that flashed through his mind, accompanied by a rush of confusion, as Towers had helped him out on the Albany matter – even if only to return and battle with the Gavriks. That was all over, now. Surely Towers was not going to use that help against him? Leverage did not seem to be his style – politician or not.
"What sort of word?" Harry asked, trying not to sound too defensive.
The Home Secretary looked fleetingly sympathetic. Then he shook his head. "Not that kind," he assured Harry, then heaved a sigh and continued. "I need a translator, for a meeting with an ambassador from Shanghai. He's come over to discuss the embassy fiasco. No one was injured, but these things can cause a lot of tension, you know..."
Harry nodded. He knew. Better than most.
"Anyway," Towers continued. "I was wondering if it would be possible to borrow her for the afternoon. I need someone familiar with the case, capable of analysis, who speaks Wu and Mandarin. From the report filed at your trial, her analysis skills seem more than satisfactory."
"She's very good," Harry agreed, trying not to let the lump in his throat rise any further and turn his voice nervous.
The thought of the Home Secretary 'borrowing' Ruth brought a strange mix of feelings to light; predominantly jealousy, rich and irrational. Towers' interest was purely professional, Harry knew. He needed a translator who could function as an analyst and he knew Ruth to be useful and trustworthy. Logically, it made sense. That, however, did not stop a strange refrain from rushing through Harry's mind at the thought of her being parted from his side. Ruth was his; he was her boss, her sort-of partner and they belonged solely to each other. It was the sort of primal, possessive rhetoric that he could never share aloud with anyone, most of all Ruth. It was illogical, but no less potent.
"I can ask her, then?" Towers enquired, somewhat delicately. "Your team can cope without her, for the day?"
He sounded as if he were treading on eggshells.
"Of course," Harry replied, with forced nonchalance. Best he did not reveal just how nervous he was about anyone parting him from his analyst. It would draw the wrong sort of attention. "I'll make sure to have Erin free up her schedule, on our end. The rest of the team can pick up the slack. I'll need her back if there is an immediate threat, of course," he added, as if work was foremost among his thoughts.
Towers looked very slightly surprised, as if he were expecting a different answer.
"Good. Well that's settled then."
Ruth chose that moment to appear at Harry's shoulder, chin lifted, eyes large and unabashedly interested in what they had been talking about.
"Hello," she greeted them, a little breathlessly.
So new to all of this, Harry thought, giving her a fleeting smile. She had only been at a few of these meetings, during her time with him. Quite contrary to what he would have expected, she was enjoying it.
"Ruth, if you don't mind, William needs you for a moment," he said, nodding to Towers.
Covering her surprise with a polite 'of course', Ruth turned to the Home Secretary.
Harry decided to leave them to it. Muttering something about going to find Erin, he picked his feet up from the carpet and forced them to carry him out through the door that his Section Chief had left ajar. The corridor beyond it took him gladly, his footsteps sounding loudly off the hard floor and high ceilings. Their sound was soon lost amongst the dozens of other footsteps. Aides and administrators strode hurriedly up and down, no doubt preparing for the onslaught of another day in the Home Office. Harry spotted few politicians amongst them. Then again, he reasoned, it was very early in the morning. Most of the politicians he knew did not roll up to work until past nine.
Harry took a couple of paces down the corridor, then pulled up against the wall and took his phone from his pocket, pretending to scroll through his messages as he waited for Ruth to finish up inside.
She took longer than expected. By the time she emerged, Neilson and his colleagues had already passed and Harry had had to endure their farewell, plus greetings from a number of Home Secretary's rather over-enthusiastic junior staff. The curse of being in the Home Office every other day was notoriety. As a man who had spent a large proportion of his life trying to stop people from finding out his name, Harry found it mildly disconcerting. He was just considering heading downstairs, to lurk with Erin in the car, when the meeting room door opening and Towers' voice turned his head.
"I look forwards to hearing from you, then. See you tomorrow," his voice grew closer, then both the Home Secretary and Ruth emerged from beyond it. "Good luck with the case," Towers nodded to Ruth, and clasped her hand in a shake which lasted – in Harry's opinion – just a moment too long. Glancing up, then, he noticed Harry standing there and nodded. "Harry."
On reflex, Harry nodded back. Before he had a chance to say anything, however, Towers turned on his heel and strode off in the opposite direction down the corridor, towards his office. A young aide who had been loitering near the receptionist's desk picked up his feet and tore after him, proffering a file in one outstretched hand. Harry dimly heard Towers swear, then they both turned the corner and were lost to the general hubbub of the building.
Harry turned his attention back to Ruth, who was watching him from the meeting room doorway.
A strange tightening spread across his skin and he was suddenly and very acutely aware of her gaze. Was it okay that he had waited? Not once, he realised, with a jolt, had he considered if she would want him to wait. Not once had he considered if that might look a little patronising to do so. Now that she was watching him, however, it seemed a very obvious possibility. Thankfully, however, after about five seconds of careful attention, Ruth gave a tiny smile and started forwards. Breathing a sigh of relief, Harry turned and fell into step beside her, stowing his phone once more in his pocket.
"Anything wrong?" she asked, as they approached the staircase. "You were looking at your phone."
Harry shook his head. "Nothing yet. All calm on the western front."
"Good."
They stood and watched each other for a few heartbeats.
Then,
"You waited," his clever analyst stated, softly.
"Yes," Harry replied. Because I'm an over-jealous, over-protective idiot, he added, inside his head. He could not say that, though. It was what she was worried about, why she had avoided their relationship for so long. He couldn't give her cause for concern, now, not after they had come so far. He could not watch her walk away again. Losing her would kill him. "I prefer backup, when walking through the lion's den," he joked, instead, trying to lighten the mood with humour.
It sort of worked. When Ruth glanced up at him, there was laughter in her eyes, but she did not let it reach her lips. Instead, she bit at the inside of her lower one and quickly refocused her eyes back downwards, at their walking feet.
They continued along for almost half a minute before Harry could bring himself to say anything else.
"If you're worried about what the Home Secretary will think, don't bother. He already knows," he told her, in an almost-whisper. Nobody walking by was listening into their conversation, but it was hardly a topic that his lady would feel comfortable discussing in public.
Indeed, she looked a little frightened when the words left his mouth.
"Knows about...?"
"Us," Harry confirmed. "Not the fact that we're seeing each other," he elaborated, when Ruth frowned slightly, "or that I'm madly in love with you, just that we have history." Not quite how he had intended to word it, Harry grimaced internally, but the point was across.
Ruth's eyes widened slightly.
Harry's heart trilled faster.
How was it, he wondered, that a man holding a gun to his head could not shake him, but the shifting nuances of Ruth's beautiful face could send him into near cardiac arrest? Surely this wasn't right? Surely he was stronger than this? He was Harry Pearce, for God's sake! Half the men who walked these halls were scared of him. He had a reputation. He had been spying and killing and influencing foreign government agenda for more than twenty years. He was the boss spook, he told himself, get a grip...
The problem with that, of course, was that he did not really want to get a grip. The idea of laying himself down for her, letting his heartbeat race as her eyes flashed, was growing more appealing with each passing second. Taking a steadying breath, Harry cleared his throat and realised that they had come to an almost-halt, half-turned to face each other in the wide hall.
"Erin will be waiting, with the car," he told her, softly, nodding in the direction of the exit. "Shall we?"
His analyst looked like she might not be able to reply, so he took her silence for acquiescence and set off again. After a few paces, Harry heard her footsteps and he breathed a sigh of relief as Ruth's footsteps sounded loudly on the floor and she caught back up with him, choosing to walk alongside rather than half a pace behind. For the rest of the corridor, she did not say anything. As they reached the end, however, and Harry held the door to the stairwell open, she paused just on front of his outstretched arm. Inches away, she lifted her eyes to meet his and all Harry could see was love there – no blame, no discomfort.
"Thank you," she murmured softly. Her fingers brushed across his hand as she made her way through the door. Curling them around his thumb, they gave him a brief, gentle squeeze then were gone again – her touch so light that Harry could have almost imagined it.
Her heels clicked loudly against the stone floor as she walked away.
Taking a steadying breath, Harry let go of the door and followed her. All the way down the staircase and out the building, he hoped desperately that their problem with Torrance Wood was one which would be easily solved. An oil deal, gone awry, he suggested to himself, or an old grudge from his life before politics – nothing which would cause him to miss dinner with Ruth. If he made it through until tonight, he pledged, he would never complain about being woken at six am again. He would happily work for a month straight, if the gods could spare him just this one night without terrorism. Just one, he sighed, it was not a lot to ask, surely?
As they crossed the great entrance hall to the building, Harry sped up to walk beside her and they reached the door together.
Erin was waiting, face grim.
"Problems on the Grid," she told Harry, sharply.
"One a scale of one to ten?"
Erin frowned. "We've had worse," she shrugged. "Semtex discovered during a raid in Brixton."
Harry sighed. Sometimes he missed Ros Myers, with her ability to put a succinct number on chaos.
"I suppose we'd better get going, then."
Ruth began tapping something into her phone. "I'll call ahead," she murmured, absently. "I have an open file on a explosives threat, which I was working up with Calum. GCHQ intercepted chatter on a possible sale, last week. Could be related."
Harry glanced sideways at her, as they got into the car. How she kept so much information inside her head was completely beyond him. As was why on earth was he thinking of loaning her to Towers. How was he possibly going to survive a whole afternoon without her? He held his silence, as Ruth made her call and the driver pulled out from the curb. Erin in the front seat was on the phone too. Traffic was hectic. It would be more than twenty minutes across to Thames House. Plenty of time, thought Harry, to banish lewd thoughts on his analyst and replace them with good sensible thoughts, about men with bombs and would-be assassins.
Staring out the window, the Section Head gave a little sigh.
What a life they led...
.