A/N: M-ish content here also. Thanks to readers and reviewers. This story is now 10 chapters in length.


Harry enjoyed driving. The freedom to be had from being cocooned inside one's own bubble while moving through the world, utterly detached and relatively safe, had a peculiar calming effect on him. For these few short minutes – less than an hour – he was in control of the circumstances of his life. It appeared to him that the traffic avoided him, and terrorism was something which happened elsewhere. His shoulder was still painful, but it was a pain which served to remind him that he lived, and he lived hard, and that he was no longer a young man. For much of his adult life he had lived with some degree of pain. His pain never let him forget that he was mortal, and so perhaps also fragile. What he needed was to see Ruth, to hold her close, and and to have her hold him. He also suspected he needed her more than she needed him. They were both loners, and how they planned to manage their separate needs for solitude in a long term relationship was a subject they had not yet broached, although they must. Harry leaned across to where his mobile phone rested in its cradle on the dashboard, and he pressed Ruth's number. "Do you want a visitor?" he asked once she answered his call.

"So long as it's you," she replied, her voice lightening. "I couldn't bear to see anyone else."

"I'll stop on the way and pick up dinner .. if that's all right with you."

"That's very all right with me, Harry."

"How does Indian sound?"

"It sounds wonderful. You know what I like."

He did, of course. She liked Madras lamb curry, while as always, he'd have the butter chicken. By the time he ended the call Harry felt lighter in his being than he had in some time. Her early departure from the Grid had worried him. Ruth didn't take early minutes. Aside from Tariq, she was first at work in the morning, and last to leave in the evening. Harry told himself that she did that to be near him, and maybe there was a truth in that, but Ruth also enjoyed working. He suspected that something had happened to take the shine from Ruth's working day. He hoped that it was nothing he had done.

While he was waiting at the Indian restaurant for his order to be filled Harry allowed his mind to wander back six weeks to the first time he and Ruth had become intimate. Afterwards they had been very proud of themselves. Ruth had snuggled against his side, and he'd been aware he was grinning like a fool.

"Aren't we clever?" Ruth had said, her breath tickling him under the arm he had wrapped around her.

"I was sure that it was never going to happen," he replied.

"Why? You're a man, and I'm a woman, and well .. certain things are inevitable."

"We've been a man and a woman for a long time, Ruth. It was looking less inevitable by the day."

Harry had then felt Ruth's lips kiss his chest just above his left nipple. Her touch had sent a shiver through him so that he turned on his side and looked into her eyes. "Ruth," he said quietly, not sure whether he'd be brave enough – and foolish enough - to get the words out. "I was wondering .. although I know this is probably not the right time, or even the right thing to be asking you -"

"He wasn't," she said, equally as quietly. "He wasn't like you .. in bed. You are so much gentler."

Harry had pulled back a little, chiefly so he could better see her. "How did you know .. what I was thinking?"

Ruth had playfully placed a finger on his lips, a gesture to which he'd automatically reacted by pursing his lips against her finger. "I know everything you're thinking, Harry."

"Hopefully not everything. It's best you don't know .. some of what I think about."

"How would you feel were I to ask how I stacked up against your ex-wife, or .. any of your former lovers?"

"You make it sound like there were hundreds of them."

"Were there?"

"Of course not. The secret service is rife with rumour. In no time at all the truth becomes lost."

"All you need to know, Harry, is that you were wonderful .. are wonderful. You are the perfect lover .. for me."

He'd watched her closely, just in case she was fibbing. "Thank you, and I'm sorry for thinking .. what I was thinking. It was unfair of me."

"Perhaps, but it was also human to speculate."

They had left the discussion there, and neither had since brought up the subject of George, but Harry was still curious. He knew he had no right to be asking, and she had no need to answer, but his curiosity had remained. Had George been amazing in bed, and did she miss his touch? Just thinking that thought had lifted the lid of the box in which he hid his insecurity, allowing it to pump through his body like adrenalin, convincing him he was far too old, beaten and broken for a woman like Ruth. He'd watch her with Lucas or Dimitri or Tariq, and she appeared so relaxed and happy, while with him she was so often careful, even anxious. Did he do that to her? Was he so .. difficult that she had to tread carefully around with him? If so, what was the matter with him?

When he arrived at Ruth's flat she let him in, closing the door behind him, while he placed the bag carrying the Indian meal on the hall table and removed his coat. When he turned back to her she was standing very close to him. He watched her, willing her to make the first move. Without a word Ruth reached up to grasp the lapels of his jacket, and pulled him to her, lifting her face for a kiss. His arms enveloped her and drew her against him before he kissed her thoroughly. This was nice. She was warm, and her flat, while hardly a palace, felt comfortable and inviting. He allowed his hands to rest on her bum, and he pressed against the softness of her buttocks, pulling her into him. They fit together so very well, and he could already feel the stirring of his own flesh. Slowly and carefully he pulled away from her. "We should eat first," he said, so setting a goal for the evening.

Over dinner they again put aside the no-work-discussions-at-home rule. "I have to ask you something, Ruth. It's about Ros." Harry noticed the small `tell' that fluttered free from Ruth's calm demeanour at the mention of Ros. "I've suggested she work from home, beginning as soon as possible."

"But she's a field agent, Harry, and a very good one."

"So she'll have to adapt. She's losing her mind at home. I was wondering ..."

"You're asking me to organise something for her .. laptop, VPN, and a list of daily tasks."

"Yes. If you wouldn't mind. I trust you."

"I know you do. I can .. and I can take it around to her and explain her new job to her."

Harry waited, watching Ruth's face. It was when she smiled that he allowed himself to relax. "If you're sure," he said quietly.

"I am. I .. need to do this."

He nodded. "Yes. You do." With that out of the way, Harry had to address one more thing. "Is there something else?" he asked carefully, his eyes flicking up nervously, and then back to his plate of food. "It's just that you left work early .. at least, early for you."

Ruth's eyes darted upwards, but he was focused upon moving his food around the plate with his fork. "Not really. I just needed to get out of there. I had a moment when I couldn't bear that we are sitting back and doing nothing while waiting for a man to be murdered. I do understand why, and I know what he's done, and probably still capable of doing, but ... I had a moment where I needed to be … somewhere else. That's all."

Harry lifted his eyes and nodded his understanding. "That makes sense. I'd been worried that you might be annoyed .. with me."

"I understand what you have to do, Harry, and I'm not annoyed with you .. at least, no more than usual." Her smile told him that she was not being altogether serious, and he sighed his relief. "There is something I need to say, though." With those few words from her, Harry's smile disappeared. "I need you to keep me in the loop. No more trying to protect me. If, as it appears, everybody in the world of security knows about us, keeping me in the dark is hardly an act of loving protection. I need to know what is going on .." She tapped her forehead, ".. up there. Your decisions affect me, so I need to know what you're thinking."

"Of course," he replied, and that was all that was said on the matter. He would need to become more transparent .. with her, which was something he had not been in any of his relationships with women in the past. The leopard needed to change his spots.


Meal eaten, and only the dregs left in the bottom of the wine bottle, they sat together on the sofa, the TV turned on but the sound muted. Neither was actually watching the screen, although their eyes were turned in that direction, the flickering images giving them each something external on which to focus whenever watching one another became too intense. Harry stretched both arms, and then rested his arm across the back of the sofa behind Ruth, who giggled at the gesture, commenting that no-one had tried that move on her since she was 14. "And how did it work for the boy in question?" Harry asked, turning his eyes on her.

"Not well. I told him that if he left his arm there it would mess up my hair, so could he please remove it."

Harry nodded and then turned his eyes back to the TV. Since they'd settled on the sofa Ruth's hand had been resting on his leg close to his knee, her fingertips feathering circles on his inner thigh. Over time Ruth's palm moved away from his knee and further up his thigh, as did her fingertips. He thought of his day on the Grid. He thought of the dilemma of Ros' slow recovery from injury. He imagined Lucas helping Ros out of bed and down the stairs. None of those images worked, so he conjured an image of Tariq busy at his work station, but still Ruth's fingers formed small circles over the material of his trousers, the friction sending impulses to his brain which in turn he interpreted as being so pleasurable that he could no longer remain silent. As he let his head rest against the back of the sofa a deep sigh escaped him. With that, Ruth's fingers stilled. "Don't stop," he said. "Please don't stop."

Harry's eyes were closed, so he did not see her reaction, but he felt it. Ruth's fingers renewed their circular motion against his inner thigh, while her other hand slid between the buttons of his shirt, searching for bare skin. He opened his eyes and turned towards her. Her gaze was on him, her mouth turned up in a half smile. He smiled back before reaching down to kiss her. As they pulled out of the kiss one of Ruth's circling fingers glanced across the front of his trousers, and again he sighed deeply.

Having unfastened several of his shirt buttons Ruth reached down and kissed his bare chest, while her wandering hand slid between his legs to cup him. Her actions rid his mind of all conscious thought and intention. He would leave the logistics to her. She clearly had an idea of where they were going, and how they should get there.

"Come upstairs," she said, her mouth close to his ear.

"Breakfast meeting," was all he could say. He hoped she understood what he meant, and that he couldn't stay overnight.

Ruth pulled away a little, a slight frown drawing her eyebrows together. "This won't take that long, Harry. I'll let you leave afterwards."

How was it she could speak in coherent sentences when he barely knew his own name? Were someone to ask him his mother's maiden name, he'd have had to answer with `Smith'.

Within minutes they were lying together on the sofa, their heads resting on the pile of cushions at one end. Harry felt Ruth's fingers unfastening his trouser buttons, then slowly opening the zip before pushing the garment over his hips. Next she slid her fingertips inside the waistband of his trunks. Eyes closed, Harry's whole body felt alive and thrumming. She briefly left his side to remove her own clothing, since he was almost incapable of anything other than responding to her.

When she returned to the sofa she pushed her hips against him and kissed him slowly, both hands cradling the back of his head, and he knew it was time. They made love on the sofa, with Ruth wrapping her legs around him, while he strained to sink himself deeper into her, then faster, the way she liked it. It was at once deeply moving and exhilarating, and neither noticed the late movie, a rerun of "Pearl Harbor", beginning on the TV across the room.

Afterwards Ruth sank against him, while he wrapped his arms around her and rested his head next to hers on the cushions. "I need you to know that I didn't come here tonight expecting sex," he said after they had rested, and once again he had his breath back "I thought we could eat a meal together, engage in a kiss and a cuddle, and then I'd go home."

"Stay," she said, her voice equally as soft as her flesh.

"As much as I don't want to leave you right now, I must. I'm really sorry."

She nodded. She understood. This would not be the last time this would happen.


Ruth was woken by the ringtone of her phone from inside the pocket of her skirt. She turned over and reached down to grab it from under the pile of clothing beside the sofa. Harry had covered her with the duvet from her bed, so she had slept deeply and warmly. "Good morning sleepy head," Harry said, sounding much too chipper for first thing in the morning.

"What time is it?" she managed to grumble.

"It's almost six. My meeting begins in thirty minutes."

"Why are you telling me this?"

He chuckled into the phone, and despite her irritation with him for waking her, she smiled. "I thought you'd rather hear my voice than that ridiculous alarm tone on your phone."

Several weeks earlier Lucas had `borrowed' her phone, and without her knowledge loaded an alarm tone of a rooster crowing. The first she'd known of it was the next morning at 6.15 when her alarm had sounded, causing her further alarm, and not a lot of amusement. Harry had been staying the night, and he'd turned over in bed saying, "What the fuck was that?"

"I'm still on the sofa," Ruth said, having not a lot else to say, especially at such an hour.

"That's good. That was my intention."

"Where are you?"

"I'm being driven to my meeting by my driver."

"Some people have it tough. I'll have to take the tube this morning."

"I was wondering," he began tentatively, "whether I could send my driver to yours after he drops me off."

"Absolutely not! What a waste of taxpayers' money, Harry. Besides, it's probably illegal."

Again Harry laughed lightly into the phone. They had had the same conversation before, and Ruth had always reacted with outrage on behalf of the taxpayer. If only their representatives in government had similar concern over how taxpayers' money was spent. "I just needed to hear your voice," he said, "before I enter the lions' den."

"Well, you've heard it, now I need another ten minutes of shuteye."

"All right. I'll let you go. I love you."

"And I you."


A little over five miles away Ros Myers had just received a call from Lucas to say he was not free to help her with her morning routine. "I hope she's worth it," Ros replied sarcastically, heaving herself up in bed, and then leaning back against her pillows.

"She's a he and it's work. Dimitri asked me to visit him. He's currently undercover on a housing estate in Wandsworth."

"What do you expect me to do?"
"What you're eventually going to have to do, Ros. Get out of bed, get dressed -"

"All right, if you insist, but if I find you've been lying -"

"I'm not lying. You can ask Dimitri. He's in the next room."

"I'll pass on that. Thanks for letting me know, Lucas."

"I'll come by later this evening."

"Don't bother. I'll be too busy being independent. Chances are I'll be out clubbing."

Lucas said goodbye and quickly ended the call, turning to face Dimitri, who had entered the living room from the dark, poky kitchen, a mug of coffee in each hand. "White with two," Dimitri said, handing Lucas the mug which was least chipped, although the slogan on one side read, `Father of the Year'.

"I take it you're not referring to that loud mouth downstairs who lives with the two women."

Dimitri smiled over the rim of his mug, and then took a tentative sip of his coffee. "So you've met Terry Noakes."
"Not met, no. I just heard him shouting something about anyone not born in Britain needs to go back to where they came from."

"He's the welcoming committee for this housing estate. I've been here four days, and the Iranians are not the problem, but Noakes definitely is."

"So it's a domestic problem," Lucas said, already disinterested. "The housing authorities either move the Iranians or they move Noakes."

"Noakes won't move, and he's threatening to bomb the flat where the Iranian men live."

"Which is where?"

Dimitri tipped his head to the right. "Next door."

"To you?"

"Uh huh. I'm planning to pay Noakes a visit to ... shake him up a bit. Do you want to join me?"

Over the top of his coffee mug Lucas grinned. Do one-legged ducks swim in circles?