Set season 9 between episodes 5 and 6

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Chapter 10

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Ruth sat in the briefing room, with a shawl wrapped around her shoulders and her chin cradled in her hands. She was exhausted. It was half past two in the morning and, by all rights, she should be back home, tucked up in her bed. That, however, was not the case. Here she was, sitting in an evening dress and a shawl, debriefing after an operation that she should never really have had to be a part of.

It had been a last-minute arrangement. Harry had grabbed her as she made off the Grid, earlier that evening, and told her that he needed someone to plant a bug in a young French diplomat's hotel room before his meeting with their target, the next morning. The plan, Dimitri had explained – once the two of them coaxed her through to the briefing table – was foolproof. Andree Michel, the young Frenchman, had a thing for older brunettes, so Ruth would gain access to his room by allowing him to seduce her back there. Once inside, she was to suggest drinks and spike his with the tranquilizer that she would be carrying in her handbag. After installing the bug in an appropriate position, she was then to half-undress the man she had entered with and leave him there to assume he had fallen asleep sometime during their frivolities. The tranquilizer would put him out for about three hours and leave him with about thirty minutes of memory loss, the young officer had told her, so it was best to work quickly.

Ruth had never been involved in a honey-trap in her life – for good reason, in her opinion. Her initial reaction, then, was one of mirth. That changed, however, when she saw the looks on Dimitri and Harry's faces. They were serious about this. They actually thought she could seduce a thirty-something, not unattractive young Frenchman back to his hotel room.

But we don't want you to seduce him, Dimitri had argued back, when she had expressed her disbelief at his plan. We want you to let him seduce you. Men want what they cannot have, the younger man had explained, as Harry watched on awkwardly from the end of the table. Pretend you're a bored trophy wife, trying to amuse yourself while you're husband's at a meeting in some other part of the building. Andree Michel is a serial collector of other men's wives – he's had affairs with two out of four of his business partners'. He likes a chase, so give him one. Seriously, Ruth, Dimitri had smiled, add your sparkling personality to the mix and you should be fine.

His argument made more sense when Harry had apologetically explained that they had nobody else suitable to play the role. Still, it had taken a lot of convincing to get her into the evening gown and kitted up for the night. Beth Bailey had done most of it, taping the wire securely down her back and winding it into the hem of her dress, applying the hair and makeup as she tested Ruth on her legend. Once she was done, even Ruth had to grudgingly admit that it was a halfway decent job. She was never going to be a beautiful woman – genetics had not dealt her that card – but she was pretty enough, with her hair half clasped back, an expensive shawl draped around her neck and an even more than expensive dress wrapped around her back. It had been fitted for another operation, during which Beth had been playing an oil-baron's daughter, but it worked well enough. They were almost the same size, Beth had commented, tugging the sleeves smooth against Ruth's arms, but Ruth looked better in it. The dark colour brought out her eyes.

The operation itself had gone smoothly enough. Ruth had never been so nervous in her life, but she had Tariq's voice to guide her through. Tariq and, much to her surprise, (as it was rare for to see him personally oversee an operation of this size) Harry.

Her boss's disembodied voice in her ear was probably the only thing which had got her through with it; playing the bored wife of a much older businessman, making clever conversation about the young Frenchman's homeland as he wooed her back to his room. Concentrating on the static of her comm. line, to hide her disgust, she allowed Michel to slide his hands down her arms and kiss her neck. She let him sweet talk her for a minute, then distracted him with drinks, slipping two drops of the tranquiliser into his. As the younger man began to get hazy, the drugs taking hold, she guided him back to the bed, startling herself by not even feeling the slightest bit of remorse.

She had finally done it, she thought, as she unbuckled her target's belt and pulled off his trousers, listening to Harry's voice telling her 'well done' and to 'complete the objective'. She had finally turned into a real spy, like all of the others around her. Spook, she thought, remembering Harry's words from all those years ago. She was a born spook.

The thought gave her confidence and, as Tariq muttered 'try and get the bug fitted inside the casing of the lamp, gazelle,' into her earpiece, she had nodded and gone to it. Slipping Monsieur Michel's shoes, shirt and vest off, so all that he was left in was his boxer shorts and his socks, she abandoned him to the after effects of the tranquilizer, (which would conveniently mimic an epic hangover) and turned to her objective of the evening.

The procedure was just as she had been talked through, back on the grid. Screw off the bottom part of the ceiling lamp, catch the trim, slip a hand inside and find the rim upon which the wiring sat. The bug slotted in just nicely, held in place by a piece of kit so new and inventive even Tariq had taken a while to think of it – blu-tack. Once finished, she had jumped back down to the ground and replaced the chair she had used to stand on, breathlessly reporting her success to the others, on the Grid.

'Bug planted, home.'

'Then bring us in, gazelle,' Harry's voice had told her, soft and proud and warm.

Ruth, high on adrenaline and the two glasses of champagne she had quaffed at the bar, whilst playing hard to get with the Frenchman, had all but skipped from the building. The feeling of success was liberating. For the first time in months, she felt light and strong and beautiful. She felt untouchable. As she was in the taxi back, however, the glow that had surrounded her out in the field began to fade. Yet again, she realised, she had prostituted herself for the service. Leaning her forehead against the cold glass of the window, she felt the victory fade back inside her.

Sure, the closest Andree Michel had got to her was a brush of his lips against her neck, but the thought was suddenly enough to turn her stomach. She felt nauseous. She felt slightly faint. And Harry had been listening the whole time, she reminded herself, darkly. Harry had talked her through it all. They were so twisted and broken, she thought, closing her eyes. What sort of man talked the woman he supposedly loved through the process of seducing another man? They were spooks, she tried to remind herself, born spooks – but was that enough excuse? Shouldn't their humanity shine through, just occasionally? Shouldn't his iron-clad control have flickered, just a little? God, she had been in this game for far too long to know, anymore.

Climbing out of the taxi at Thames House, she had made her way back upstairs and endured the applause from the small team still on the Grid. Lucas and Dimitri, who had been playing barman and waiter, arrived about ten minutes later and the three of them were led through to debrief, still in their finery.

After it was done, Lucas went home and Dimitri had slipped off to shower, Beth remaining in the briefing room to help Ruth remove the wire, which had been attached with a strange temporary glue-type substance, from her skin. (Ruth wasn't entirely sure why the glue had been necessary. It had been Tariq's decision, something about an earpiece not being suitable, in case the target was close to her neck, and glue being better than tape to hold this other type of wire in place, just in case it was warm and she was perspiring slightly. Technical officers...) Beth had just started stripping the substance painfully away from her skin, however, when a junior analyst had stuck his head in and called her away again. With a sigh and muttering that she wouldn't be long, she had left Ruth sitting as she was now; half-wired and exhausted, at the briefing room table.

That was almost twenty minutes ago.

Ruth sighed. She shouldn't have expected anything less. It was her place, in this business, to be overlooked.

Turning her mind from her situation and from self-pity, she concentrated on the sounds of the building around her. At half two in the morning, it was almost silent. All non-essential staff had cleared the Grid hours ago. Lucas had left immediately after the success of their mission, claiming a personal issue to sort out. It was just Tariq, Harry, Dimitri, Beth and a junior analyst hanging about now. There were none of the usual rings and noises from the hallway outside. Nobody on the phone, or rushing back and forth with files and coffee. Just the occasional, distant sound of a door opening and closing. Then nothing.

Ruth rubbed her forehead.

What was she still doing this, she asked herself. Why was she still playing this game, after all these years?

Footsteps, then a knock at the door interrupted her thoughts.

"Ruth?"

The door slipped open, Harry's head appearing in the frame.

Ruth felt a familiar stirring of nerves, deep in her belly, accompanied by a tiny flicker of ironic mirth. Here she was, neck and arms and upper chest exposed on front of Harry for the first time, and they were in the bloody briefing room, of all places. How typical.

"Hello," she greeted him, a little listlessly.

His eyes flashed over her, looking slightly worried. "How are you?" he asked, eventually.

"I'm fine." She pulled on a tight smile, trying not to look as if the situation was bothering her. "Waiting for Beth, but she seems to have forgotten about me."

"Yes, she had to run something to C Section – it was their man we were looking out, tonight." Harry gave an apologetic half-smile. "I should have asked her to finish up with you, first." His eyes danced over her again and his expression looked suddenly a bit more nervous. "Are you...?" he trailed off, not sure how to say this.

"Still wired." Ruth nodded, wearily. "I don't fancy tearing half my skin off, trying to pull free from the front."

"Right." Harry watched her for a moment, then stepped fully inside and shut the door behind him. "Would you like a hand?" he asked, slipping his own hands into his pockets, wearing an expression which told Ruth that he was fully aware of how awkward this was for her.

A little flame of warmth licked up within her.

Sweet Harry. It had been a perilously long time since she had seen sweet Harry.

Things had been very tense, between the pair of them, over the past few weeks. Her bungled attempt to explain her rejection of his marriage proposal, up on the Thames House rooftop, had upset Harry more than Ruth initially realised. It had been a good while before she had managed to reconcile the manner, too. Things had just been so confusing.

At first, as they had stood, facing each other on the rooftop, Harry had appeared to agree with her assessment of the situation. But then, over the next few days, he had seemed to change his mind. He started avoiding her at work, started acting slightly odd when they did have to interact – little things, so small that Ruth had almost convinced herself that she was exaggerating them in paranoid mind. As the days passed, however, it had become very clear to her that that was not the case.

Steadily, Harry had pushed her further from his confidence. He shied away from being alone with her off the Grid and refused to have personal contact out of hours. All of that, Ruth could have dealt with, but then he had started to get testy with her on the Grid, as well. He had snapped at her for doubting his judgement, on front of the others, and drawn back from trusting hers. He had been irritable, haughty and borderline dismissive. He had been a complete ass, to be perfectly frank, and Ruth had been completely taken aback by it. Never once, in their long history, had he been anything less than courteous to her. She supposed she was one of the few, but she had never had to see that side of Harry and having it directed so fully at her, had been quite startling.

What made it more confusing still was the fact that Ruth was not sure which part of what she had done it was, that had caused such offense. Sure, her explanation of why she had refused his proposal had been something of an excuse. (The fact that she couldn't see a place in their life for a cottage in Sussex and dinner with the neighbours was true, but she hadn't really told him the full story. The truth was, she could imagine them together, but not without a lot of compromise, on both sides – and considering that Harry thought they were some great 'fix-all' for all the wrongs in his life, she doubted that would happen anytime soon). Why Harry reacted so severely to her statement, however, Ruth could not understand. They had euphemised and glossed over everything they had done, over the past seven years. Why was this any different?

It was only after a week, or so, that she realised it was not how she had refused, but what she had refused that was bothering Harry. Marriage had been, quite literally, all he had left to offer her. He had tried getting her to date him, tried pushing their friendship into something more intimate, tried giving her time and letting her come to him, tried comforting her when she was in pain, tried being patient, tried being kind, tried everything else. Marriage had been his last hand and he had misplayed it, badly.

He was frustrated. It was as simple as that.

He was hurt and frustrated and, with no other way to get what he wanted, he was throwing all of his toys out the pram.

Realising this, Ruth had resigned herself that there was nothing she could do. Harry would burn through his anger eventually, she reasoned, so she sat back to wait it out. She had treated his show of teeth with as much composure as she could manage. She overlooked the remarks that were meant to sting, rather than reacting. She refused to back down and avoid him, on the Grid or in his office. She began talking to him again, when they passed in the hallway, though he quite clearly did not want to. For a while, it had only seemed to make him worse – he had lashed out at the rest of the team and made a few rather dodgy field decisions – but then one of those decisions backfired and it seemed to stall him completely.

A man he had allowed to escape, in the field, had gone on to acquire a deadly biological agent and, suddenly, pettiness of what he had been doing seemed to hit Harry somewhat. He had emerged from his cocoon of frustration and started acting a little more like himself.

By the time the paroxocybin was in their custody and their suspects were either dead or dealt with, he seemed, to Ruth, to be more weary than angry. After all involved were debriefed and reports were handed in, the two of them had made their silent way down to a bench by the river and sat there, actually talking, for the first time in over a fortnight. On unspoken, mutual agreement, the subject matter of their discussion was restricted to work but, as Harry got up to walk away, he made some little comment; 'sometimes you have to give a man a chance, to show you who he really is' and Ruth had read the dual meaning of the statement in his eyes. He was asking for another chance. Cards run out, tantrum over, he was asking to be dealt another hand. He still wanted to play the game, despite it all.

Ruth had watched him go, afterwards, feeling completely and utterly worn out by it all. For just a second or two, she had thought she might be done. She had thought she might be through with the ridiculous, convoluted story they were weaving around one another, with the swings of high and low emotion, with insanely complex Harry and his insanely complex world. She had thought she might be done with it all. Then, she had sat for a minute and the slow surging of the river had soothed her frayed nerves.

This world was insane and complex, but it was her world.

Harry was dark and complex, but he was also hers.

They belonged here, together, and – while she stood by her decision to say 'no' to his proposal and she did not entirely agree with the tantrum he had thrown, afterwards – she had to admire his tenacity. Years on, countless pushings-away and rejections under his belt, Harry still wanted this. He was still pursuing her.

Perhaps, she thought, this was what had needed to happen before they could move forwards. Out with the old ways, in with the new. Perhaps this was what had been necessary, for Harry to realise that things could never go back to how they had been, before she left; to make him realise that all she was capable of, at the moment, was what she had offered shortly before Ros's death – to take him out for a drink, or to have coffee, or lunch sometime. She wanted to start again at the beginning and try and find a way they could fit into each other's lives, because marriage wasn't going to fix them. They had to find a way for them to work alongside their current commitments and multitudes of issues, rather than bulldoze through. Few battles were ever won by brute force.

That said, thought Ruth – looking up at Harry as he watched her across the room – if she recalled her history books correctly, quite a few had been won by tenacity.

A low sigh escaped her throat.

He had offered to help and, tonight, she was too exhausted to read any further into it.

"Okay," she admitted, lowering her palms to lie on the table. "I could do with a hand."

Harry stood for a moment, looking a little surprised by her decision, but also a little pleased. He nodded. Walking over, he pulled one of the chairs around, so that it was arranged closer beside Ruth's. As he cautiously took up residence in it, the analyst felt a quiver pass through her, pulling with it a wave of nostalgia.

How many years had they been doing this, she asked herself, as her boss leant forwards and inspected the wire and the back of her dress. How many years had they been placing themselves just close enough to feel each other's heat? Five years? Nearly six? A tiny smile graced Ruth's lips as she pulled her shawl up around her neck, feeling Harry's fingers ghost against her shoulder to. Six years. It had been a long dance, even for two people such as her and Harry. Six years...

"I'm afraid Beth is a little enthusiastic about securing these in place," Harry commented, as he reached out and tugged gently at the wire on her back, only the over-lightness of his voice betraying the unease he felt at being so close to her. "Apparently, Dimitri still has the red patches on his back, from last week's adventures."

Ruth could see why.

"I don't understand why we couldn't use one of the small pin mikes," she told Harry, reproachfully. "They're much more convenient."

"Yes, but the audio we can get off these is off the charts, in comparison," Harry explained. "We actually managed to pick up most of the conversations that were happening in the restaurant and in the private conference room next door, while you were chatting to Michel, in the bar." He threw her a slightly awkward look. "They are still a little experimental, we don't know exactly which scanners we can get them through, but I reasoned it was a minimal risk situation. There were no security gates, no one was going to be patting you down, and Dimitri and Lucas were nearby anyway, in case anything did go wrong." He paused, glancing back to her nervously as he picked away the first few millimetres of glue.

Ruth watched him steadily back. She knew he was expecting her to react to being given experimental equipment to test, but she didn't have the heart to have moral objections, tonight. Tonight, she was just far too tired.

"Did you get everything you needed?" she asked, after a moments' pause.

Harry looked up, eyes just a little darker, hinting that he wanted to answer her question in a strictly non-professional sense.

Ruth swallowed. Over the last few days, as they had started to work together again – as they had the team had stopped the Chinese from getting their hands on Dr Jiang and destroyed the desalination technology – they had begun to heal things between them again. They had started talking. Harry had started to seek her out to ask her opinions again. He had even made a little joke and a warm comment, or two, in her company. But everything was still at that delicate stage; easily fractured, easily broken, always just a wrong word away from sending them back to that dark place they had been inhabiting.

"From the bug, I mean," she clarified, meeting Harry's eyes steadily. "Is it a decent enough audio feed?"

"It's excellent." He held onto her gaze for just a second longer, then sighed and looked back down. "We had a little vibration of the lamp casing, at first, but Tariq says he should have the software to compensate by the meeting tomorrow morning."

"Sorry," Ruth apologised, softly. "I thought I had it in properly."

Harry shook his head, frowning at the glue on her back. "It is perfectly fine."

A long pause.

Ruth bit at the inside of her lip, watching her boss out of the corner of her eye as he went about his task. Rapt concentration was pressed across his face. Lines marking out a frown on his forehead, lower lip slightly petted as he became more absorbed in his movements. Unlike Beth, Ruth noted, he was taking time to soften the glue with his fingers, loosening it before pulling it free. It took a little longer, this way, but it was far less painful. Ever grateful for his attentions, Ruth thanked him gently.

"I'm sorry for keeping you," she added, with a half-hearted smile. "I'm sure you have more important things to be doing."

"It's no bother," he shook his head, in reply. Ever the gentleman, despite circumstance and awkwardness, despite the spine-tingling tension in the air. "Really it's the least I can do, for having you up so late." There were a long few seconds of silence, then he paused in his ministrations and looked back up, to meet her gaze. "I meant to thank you earlier, actually. You rather saved the day, by stepping in. We were going to use Rebecca Curtis to plant the bug but she came down with the flu."

"Rebecca probably would have carried off the legend better."

"Don't sell yourself short. You were wonderful, out there."

Swallowing hard, Ruth glanced sideways at her boss.

He was wearing no tie, or suit jacket, in concession to the lateness of the hour, and she could see the dark dip at the base of his neck through his slightly open collar. As she watched, the shadow in it danced a little faster, his breaths quickening under her scrutiny. In. Out. In. Out. Calm breaths, always, but just too even not to be forced. This facade of cool was just an act, then, she thought, turning her eyes back forwards but continuing to watch Harry out of her peripheral vision. He might look composed on top but, underneath, her boss was feeling the tiny glances of electricity that passed between them every bit as much as she. As his fingertips dipped beneath the edge of her dress, unpicking the wire from where Beth had entwined around the zipper, Ruth's breath caught slightly and the situation hit home for her.

She shouldn't be allowing this. This closeness was what led to most of their misunderstandings. Desire led to impulse, impulse led to action, and action led to tangled awkward moments; Harry moving too fast and her standing too still.

"I'm glad I didn't make a mess of things, with Michel," she murmured, trying to bring the conversation more solidly back to work. Work was safe. They were good at work. "I was fairly sure my hands were shaking from the moment I walked up to the bar."

"You did wonderfully," Harry repeated, his voice a little lower this time, just a little bit smoother. "He didn't suspect a thing."

"I almost slipped up, when we were talking about his job at the embassy. I almost let on I knew who he was."

"You didn't slip up, though."

"He almost caught me, too, when I was dropping the tranquiliser into his glass."

"But he didn't catch you, did he?" Harry glanced up. "You gained access to the room, took out the target, planted the bug. You managed everything we asked of you."

"I suppose so..." Ruth swallowed, thinking of her interactions with Michel, earlier that evening. "Still, I'm glad I don't have to do that every day."

A pause.

Harry exhaled softly.

"So am I," he told her quietly. "The urge to drive over there and throttle your target was a little overpowering."

Ruth closed her eyes, melting inside.

He had been bothered by it, then. The facade of professionalism had been just that.

She breathed out, slowly, falling into the pleasure of Harry's soft fingers, against her back. This was not fair, she thought dimly, at the back of her mind. They were not fighting anymore, but she still should not be letting them touch. She should not be closing her eyes or resting her cheek sideways, against her shoulder, to give him better access to her skin of the back of her neck. This was giving out mixed signals, Ruth told herself, as Harry's nails scraped slightly, against her skin. This was not fair; rejecting his offer for marriage then indulging in what was admittedly one of the most erotic encounters of her last ten years.

It was not fair at all, but she could not stop. He felt so good and she was too tired to protest. She was too tired to do anything, anymore. Thinking to the future was exhausting, thinking on the mistakes of their past was more exhausting still. It was all she could do to comprehend a way to survive the present. And, presently, Harry felt incredibly good...

She breathed slowly out as he leant closer, fingertips warm. His hands, so much larger and stronger than hers, drove shivers down her spine as they made their steady progress down into the 'v' shaped dip of the back of the dress. It was a conservative neckline, so they did not descend so very far, but he had never touched her like this before and every moment carried with it virginal thrill. Warm fingertips over skin. Ruth tried to slow her breaths, tried valiantly not to show her growing excitement, all the while knowing that he would be able to feel every quickening heartbeat through her back. She felt giddy, her body too warm, almost too alive, singing out with expectation. Harry's fingers rubbed and pulled. She was so tired. She didn't want to fight anymore. She just wanted to feel. Feel him. Feel this.

Harry traced down an inch, pushing at the neckline of her dress, feeling down the length of the wire. Fingertips gentle, voice soothing. "Almost have it," he murmured, rubbing at the last glob of glue. It tugged sharply against her skin, causing a little rush pain.

Ruth jerked back to reality, eyes springing open, head turning back towards Harry. He was only a foot or so away and his eyes were darkest hazel; little flecks of brown and golden-green around wide black iris; beautiful and intensely focussed on her.

"Sorry," he murmured. "I thought it had softened."

"It's fine," she whispered back, swallowing hard. They were so close. He had his hands on her back. She shouldn't have allowed this, she scolded herself. It could so easily end in tears. Still, she couldn't quite convince herself to feel guilty about it.

"Did I hurt you?" Harry asked, fingers hovering over the half-unpicked glue.

Ruth shook her head. He had a little, she supposed, but only a little and she deserved a little discomfort after all of the damage she had caused his heart, these past few weeks. "I'm fine" she told him, giving him a tiny smile. "I barely felt it." Stretching her neck, she took a moment to register the pleasure of not being restricted. Her skin felt her own again – almost. She frowned. There was still a tightness just to the left of her spine. Glue remaining. "I, I think you missed a little bit, though."

Harry held her gaze for a few seconds, that strange, veiled expression slipping across his face. Warm, but cautious.

Ruth squirmed slightly, inside.

Poor Harry. She did not blame him for being cautious, in showing his feelings. Look at what had happened last time, after all. He had thrown himself at her, asking all he had left to ask, and she had turned her back on him. Now, the ball was completely in her court and he had absolutely no control. And Harry hated not being in control. He hated all of this, she could tell. He was confused and hurting, over what she had done to him. He was completely at a loss for what to do next. He was frustrated because there was nothing, really, he could do. But, despite it all, the love was still there. That warmth in his eyes was love and it was still there, despite what had happened to them, despite what she had done to him. What had she ever done, Ruth wondered, to deserve such devotion?

"You know what," she murmured, suddenly feeling a little overcome and completely unworthy of the man sitting opposite her, "don't bother about it. I'll get it off later," She told him, shifting in her seat. She leant forwards, meaning to pull her shawl back up around her neck and stand up from her seat. She never got there, however.

Harry reached out, placing his palm flat on her back.

"No you won't," he told her, with an air of calm command to his voice that made her freeze in place. "Just hold still, for a moment." Giving her a slightly reproachful look, he slipped his hand up to the back of her neck again, fingertips seeking out the substance marring her skin. "Have some patience."

Ruth felt her eyebrows shoot up. The unease in her stomach suddenly vanished, on account of her disbelief. Have some patience? Have some bloody patience indeed. Who did Harry think he was, she asked herself? Her entire life was about patience. Harry was the impatient one. Fixing him with indignant eyes, she watched as he gave the back of her neck a rub, pulling the last few bits of glue free and feeling the tacky consistency of the residue it left behind. Have some patience, indeed...

"Pots and kettles coming to mind?" her boss asked her, quietly, after half a minute had passed.

Ruth felt her cheeks flush pink, in answer to his question.

Harry nodded, watching her intently for a moment, before returning his eyes to his work.

"I have been patient, Ruth." he murmured, eventually. "I know it doesn't feel that way, to you, right now, but I have been."

Ruth looked down at the table, tightening her jaw so stop herself from speaking. The truth was, she didn't think there was anything she could say, right now, which they would not later regret. Nothing had really changed, over the years, she thought. On the surface, their situation looked completely different. Underneath, however, they had the same base problem. She was afraid of change because of the risk of failure and Harry always pushed too fast.

"I know that, perhaps, I did not approach the situation in the best manner," he started again, voice a little hesitant, "but I wanted more, and-,"

Swinging her eyes sideways, Ruth met his gaze, interrupting his words.

"-Perhaps? Harry, you asked me to marry you. At a funeral."

Harry stared back at her. Wordless. A little cowed.

"It was a little impulsive."

"It was too much," Ruth stressed.

Harry sighed.

They sat and watched one another.

"Okay, I agree, it might well have been too much. But this..." he gestured around them, at their current situation. "Ruth, this isn't enough." He paused, his eyes travelling across her face, imploringly circling her mouth and her eyes. "It's been almost six years."

"It's been six years for me too," she pointed out, quietly.

"Well, I think I feel it, physically, more than you do."

Ruth blinked, slightly taken aback.

She had not expected that to come from his lips. She was not entirely sure what exactly he meant by it, either; that he felt the physical strain of their uneasy relationship, that he felt physical desire for it, that he had been without the contact he wanted from her for almost six years. If it was the latter, she could not help but feel a little surprised. But, she supposed, if she had not met George during her time in Cyprus, she would probably be in the same situation.

Six years of waiting. She eyed him, wondering if it was true, wondering if he had found his release the same way she did, wondering if he thought of her.

He probably did. She thought of him.

Swallowing, Ruth tried not to focus on how her muscles were suddenly aching with a combination of weariness and unrepentant lust. So much tension. So many years of accumulated want. Harry had been right, she realised, her fingertips tightening their hold against the side of the briefing room table. It had been a long time since she had seriously considered the physicality of them. In early days, she had spent a lot of time on the subject but, later, the way she thought about them had changed. She forgot, sometimes, in all of her idealising, that she and Harry were only human. She forgot, in her haste to analyse their emotional problems, that they both had physical needs eating away at them. She had placed sex aside, long ago, in order to consider what she had prioritised as their bigger issues. Now, just touching on the idea was almost overpowering.

Six. Years.

This was almost intolerable, Ruth told herself, looking away from Harry again. The desire. Her exhaustion. Their utter lack of ideas for what to do with each other, now. What were two people supposed to do, after all that they had been through? She wanted Harry in her life, of course she wanted him, but she how were they supposed to fit together in a long term scenario. They didn't make sense. They had never made sense. He could not fit into her life right now. She could not fit into his. Their neuroses and issues left no room for one another, alongside the chaos of their daily commitments.

For a long moment, the two of them sat in silence.

Beside her, Harry gave one last rub of her skin with his thumb, then pulled away, leaning back in his chair.

"All gone," he told her, smoothly.

"Thank you."

"Feel better?"

"Yes," she lied.

"Good."

Ruth watched him, mind reeling. What was this thing, between them? What were they? Something of the past? Something with a future? It was far too confusing. She was far too confused. And it was two in the bloody morning. It was too early to be sitting so close to him. It was too early for any of this.

She swallowed, hard.

A foot or two apart; it might as well have been miles, it might as well have been nothing. She could read every little movement of his face. She knew what he felt. She knew what he wanted and needed, yet she could not reach out and touch him right now. As much as she wanted to (and she did ache for him) she knew it wouldn't fix anything and she did not want them to start something which could only end in anger and regret. Conversely, however, she was too tired to pull away – too tired to fight anymore. So, she would stay the same, she decided, for lack of a better choice. She would sit tight, for now.

Maybe they would work something out, in the months to come. Maybe not. She was just interested in surviving the present, for now. She had more or less given up on everything else. It was going to take enough strength to salvage their working relationship out of this – never mind a personal one. She was going to have to earn back Harry's trust and his confidences.

She would not tell him her suspicions about Lucas North yet, she decided, watching him sit across from her, stripping the last of the glue from the wire and setting it back on the table. She was not in his best books, right now, and a disagreement about Lucas – who Harry trusted out of a mixture of familiarity and guilt – would be the straw that broke the proverbial camel's back. But, she could not deny that there was something afoot, with the younger man. She was not sure what, yet, but she had seen him lurking in one of the server rooms, just before that business with the missing money that young officer Stephen Owen was arrested for. And there had been a flicker in Lucas's eyes when she told him about Owen, too; just a flicker, nothing more, but a tell nonetheless. She would keep an eye on him, Ruth decided. She would gather evidence before she came to Harry with anything. Hopefully it would all come to nothing.

And if it didn't, well, then Harry would have one more traitor in his life and a little more sadness in his heart – one more thing she couldn't fix.

.

Behind them, the door slid open and Beth Bailey came stomping in, heels loud against the hard floor. Taking in the scene, the younger officer either completely missed the tension hanging in the air (highly unlikely) or decided to ignore it, to avoid further embarrassment (far more likely). Fixing Ruth in her sights, she strode forwards as if nothing was amiss, heaving a heavy sigh.

"I'm sorry I took so long," she apologised, in a businesslike tone. "Officer C Section would have tied me to his desk and interrogated me for another hour if I'd let him." She turned to look at Harry. "I've given him the report and all of our recording details. Tariq is liaising over the audio."

"I hope we've kept the cover we got, of the restaurant and meeting room, to ourselves?" he asked her, calm and collected as ever – as professional as if the last few minutes and their semi-intimate encounter had never happened.

Ruth looked between him and their younger colleague somewhat admiringly.

Spooks. They were real spooks. She could only ever pretend to be like them.

"I've got it all covered," Beth nodded.

They all watched each other for a moment, then Harry gave a hefty sigh and stood, running one weary hand over his forehead.

"Then you should both go home for the night." His eyes passed over Ruth, lingering for just a second, just hint of the heat that had been there earlier flitting across his gaze. "Get some rest."

She nodded.

Behind Harry, Beth nodded too.

Harry turned and walked from the room.

A long moment passed, then the younger woman turned to Ruth and asked her if she wanted to share a taxi back. Nodding wordlessly, Ruth stood up and the two of them left the Grid together, collecting their belongings on the way out. It was oddly comforting, Ruth thought, for the first time since she had grudgingly accepted Beth into her apartment and her personal space. It was comforting to have someone to head home with. Even if it was the wrong someone. Even if the rest of her life was a shambles.

Closing her eyes, Ruth let herself nod off to sleep in the taxi back. Beth would wake her when they arrived and she needed all the rest she could get. The next few weeks were going to be a trial. She and Harry probably wouldn't even discuss what they had said to one another, tonight. They just didn't work like that. Neither of them were emotionally forthright enough. But maybe, she thought, in a couple days' time, or a couple of weeks', they would find themselves in another private moment and they might talk a little more – get a little further, sort a little more of the tangled web they were weaving around one another. She was just going to have to get through until then, she told herself, and cross any bridges pertaining to their future when and if she reached them. For now, she was just too tired.

Just survive the present, she told herself, the future will make sense eventually.

.