The arrival of their supper offered them both a brief respite, and an opportunity to consider their words carefully before they next spoke. There was something different about this sort of silence, it seemed to Harry; there was something thoughtful, and comfortable, and almost safe about sitting with this woman he loved, knowing that he had shared one of his darkest secrets, a secret that had spelled the end of his marriage, and she had been, if not untroubled, at least not troubled enough to leave him. She was still here with him, sharing her meal and her time and her comforting presence in the anonymity of this hotel room, and for that he was duly grateful. He would always be grateful for her, his Ruth, his sure and steady compass, the living embodiment of his beating heart.

It had frightened him, the honesty required of him to speak the truth to Ruth, the truth about Elena, about his infidelity, about the child who could so easily have been his. Yet it had not escaped his notice that Ruth had secrets of her own to share with him, secrets that apparently included a child as well. Quite the pair, aren't we? He mused as he watched her, eating delicately and eyeing him speculatively all the while. Both of us with secrets to keep, with burdens to bear.

The temporary distraction afforded them by their meal would not last indefinitely, he knew; supper would draw to a close, and the conversation would continue, picking up from where they'd left off. And what an interesting starting point that would be, he thought as he finished his meal, and rose from his chair to open the champagne. Ruth did not appear to be angry with him; though she had expressed some disappointment, upon learning that he had been foolish enough to bed Ilya Gavrick's wife, her final comment on the matter had been it must have been horrible for you. He'd been pondering that statement, all through their quiet meal. She had not spat out accusations, had not been cross; she had been sympathetic, upon learning how he had been duped into believing the boy was his. She had seen straight through the salacious details to the heart of the matter, and she had offered him comfort, rather than recrimination.

But then she always did, his Ruth. Those eyes, so bewitching in their brilliance, had always possessed the ability to look past his bluster and bravado, and into the depths of his very soul. It was to her that he turned, when he was uncertain, when he was in need of someone to confide in, someone to discuss the difficult decisions that comprised his life. And every time he did, he found her counsel to be a balm to his weary spirit, her soft voice reassuring him, even when she told him that he was wrong. Not for the first time he found himself wondering what he would be without this woman, and shuddering at the very thought.

Carefully, Harry poured them each a glass of champagne, and Ruth accepted hers with a little smile. They clinked their glasses together, and he resumed his seat, sipping his drink, and watching this woman, this glorious, utterly incomprehensible woman. He might not ever know the truth of her thoughts, the inner workings of her mind, but he knew her well enough, and he loved her for it.

"Thank you for telling me about Elena," Ruth said finally, pushing her plate away and leaning back in her chair, cradling her glass in her hand. "That can't have been easy."

"I probably should have told you years ago," he confessed. She quirked her eyebrow at him, and he smiled ruefully at her. He hadn't intended to say that, to reveal that he had thought of her as his for so long now that he had almost forgotten they'd only been together for a few days. She owned him, heart and soul, and always had. Even before he knew that he loved her, knew that he needed her, he had found himself drawn to her, captivated by her and everything that she did.

"Is that all of it, then? You had an affair, she lied about the boy, Jim told you the truth and you ended it?" As always, her analysis was succinct and to the point. Even now, when the subject at hand was so very personal, she seemed able to navigate the murky waters of his past, and to understand them.

Harry nodded. "Yes. I promise you, Ruth, she's nothing to me now. She hasn't been, from the moment I learned she was a spy."

It was Ruth's turn to offer him a nod in acknowledgement. "I suppose that means it's my turn," she said with a little sigh. Harry hated to see her worrying so, to see her looking so forlorn as she sat across from him, her shoulders hunched as if she were cold and trying to draw into herself, looking for a piece of warmth. She had kicked off her shoes and tucked her feet up beneath her, and that coupled with the rosy blush the champagne had brought to her cheeks and the artful tumble of her hair made her look so young; in moments like these, Harry looked at her and saw the girl she had been, when she first came to him, naïve and unused to his world of horrors, but still trying so damn hard to be good, to be brave, to be strong. He had harbored deep affections for that girl, but he loved this woman she had become.

"Ruth, you don't have to do anything you don't want to," he told her softly. It pained him to say those words aloud; he wanted, very much, to hear the story she was about to tell him, but he worried for her, worried that the effort of such a revelation might be more than she could bear. She had always been painfully private, giving details of her life so sparingly that when she was stolen from him in the wake of Cotterdam he had realized that he did not even know the names of her cats. They each wore little collars, with little tags on them; without those tags, he would have been forced to create new names for them. He smiled as he recalled that, remembering the hour he had spent trying to corral them at her home before whisking them off to his. Ruth saw that smile and looked at him strangely, and he took the opportunity to school his features once more into a neutral expression, not wanting to explain to her that he had been thinking about her cats.

"I want to tell you, Harry," she said. "You've been honest with me tonight, and I want to be honest in return."

"Then I'm all ears, Ruth," he responded. He folded his hands together on the table and gave her his undivided attention as she began to speak.

"Peter was two years older than me," she began in a halting sort of voice, refusing to meet his gaze as she laid out her tale of woe. "We were teenagers when our parents married; they weren't well-suited, David and my mother, and Peter and I knew it. They argued, all the time. He and I used to sneak out of the house when they started to snipe at each other; sometimes we'd have a meal, see a film, but mostly we just wandered around. He was…he was always a troubled soul, Harry."

At this she looked up at him, and he saw all too plainly the pain swimming in the depths of her eyes. They had never spoken about Peter, he and Ruth, apart from the day she had come to ask if she could take off work to attend his funeral. He'd read the psychological reports, had read that Angela Wells had been deeply insecure in her relationship with Peter Haig, and that she blamed Ruth for it. And Ruth had refused point-blank to discuss her stepbrother with the psychologist, which was telling in itself. At the time of Angela's breakdown, it had seemed the obvious choice, to send Ruth in to speak with her, to prey on her fears and speed the inevitable crumbling of her resolve. At the time, he thought it had worked. Now, though, knowing everything that had come after, he wasn't so sure.

"One day they were…particularly cross, so Peter stole the keys to his father's car, and we ran away. We went to Blackpool."

I told her I slept with my stepbrother.

She was quiet for a long time, thinking, and Harry was quiet for a long time, watching her. Did it matter, he asked himself, if Ruth had slept with Peter Haig? Yes, they'd been stepsiblings, but as she'd said, they were teenagers when they met, and there was no blood between them. He could understand it, in a way; he was sure that young Ruth had been as hesitating, as withdrawn as the woman he knew her to be now, and it made sense that she would trust her stepbrother, the only other person who understood what she was going through without having to be told. And besides, it had all happened so very long ago, and Peter Haig was dead, and Harry himself had had his share of questionable liaisons. No, he decided, it didn't matter, really, beyond the fact that he was concerned for Ruth, and the scars she might bear as a result of it.

"What happened in Blackpool, Ruth?" he prompted her gently.

Her eyes snapped back to his face. "We stayed there for a week," she said, watching him carefully all the while. "He was always kind to me, Harry, and we really did think our parents were going to break up."

"But they didn't?" he supplied.

Ruth's mouth quirked up into a rueful almost-smile. "No. When we came home my mother was furious. I've never seen her so angry in all my life. But they wouldn't break up. I went to Oxford in September, and I never came back."

But what about the baby, Ruth? He wanted to ask. He wanted, very much, to hear the rest of the story, but Ruth was, as ever, vacillating; she seemed to him to be right on the very edge of falling apart entirely. Her hand trembled as she placed her glass on the table, and then wrapped her arms around herself. Her eyes were a little wild, refusing to light on any one thing, though she was now staunchly refusing to look him in the eye.

"Blackpool wasn't the only time it happened," she said finally.

Harry fought very hard to keep his surprise from showing. No wonder she'd been so hesitant, he realized; spending one mad week with Peter and then coming to her senses was one thing, but doing it again was something else entirely.

"I was young, Harry, and I was half in love with him. He came to see me at Oxford, and…he stayed with me, for a while. He was between jobs, and he wasn't getting on with his father. And then I found out I was pregnant."

There it was. So the child was Peter's, after all. It explained some things, to his mind, explained why she kept her heart so sheltered, why she did not readily share any piece of herself with another. To bear such a secret must have made her unwilling to trust anyone at all, lest they find out, and judge her for it.

"Peter wanted to… get rid of it, but I couldn't. We argued, and he left. I never saw him again," she confessed in a tiny voice.

Harry reached out and took her hand in his own, thinking that it was a good thing Peter Haig was dead; if the man were still alive, this man who had left Ruth all alone, eighteen years old and pregnant and estranged from her family, Harry would have killed him himself, would have made sure he answered for the pain he'd caused her.

"The baby didn't make it. I don't know why. I tried to tell myself it was for the best, but I still can't help but think…that's the closest I'd ever been to having a family of my own."

The sorrow in her voice was more than he could bear; Harry stood, and pulled Ruth to her feet and into his arms. She buried her face against his chest, and began to weep.

"It's all right, Ruth," he murmured. "It's all right."

He ran his hands up and down her back, trying to soothe her, trying to let her know without words that he loved her, that he was here for her, that her secret would not send him running.

It was strange, really; whoever had sent those photos had surely intended to tear them asunder, but facing the grim reality of their pasts had only served to make him feel closer to her than ever before. In the morning they would worry about the implications, the hows and the whys and the whos, but now he simply held her, and counted himself lucky for having such a woman to share his life and his bed.