Post The Burning, set when Dempsey breaks into Harry's house and tells her about Joey.
This, she thinks, is where they begin anew. Dempsey sits, tense, in the chair, having made the biggest confession in their entire partnership and she sees a man who is the same, but different. Hears more than he might think she does. Her quip that she has nightmares about him belong to a past life.
His words eclipse, but give clarity, to those which accompanied his hang dog look when he told Spikings that he'd had sex with Angie Hughes. She'd felt bitter disappointment, betrayal and a surge of jealousy for a dead woman. Her hope was that this undeniably attractive man might be kinder, less sexist and wiser than she first judged when he'd whipped away the towel. At first it was amusing, his attempts to flirt with her and she enjoyed the attention, she always has. Had he been the man who sits before her, she would have easily been tempted to his bed, to have had him ruin her as he touched her. As his dark eyes fall on her and study her face, watching and waiting for her summary, she doesn't think he realises that each time he's human, she falls a little more. Somehow she's lost the upper hand but she doesn't feel in the least bit unnerved.
Back then, fresh from the plane he'd stayed with Gloria, just for a moment, not long enough to do anything but rile her as she stood by the car waiting for him like a chauffeur. She had thought, when he calmed her down after the terror of the plane and his faith in her, that he had changed but maybe it was a glimpse of who he could be, who he really was. Harry hadn't considered the homesickness that must have been flowing through his veins like an all consuming spirit.
These words add context to Dempsey's cautious look of apology when he had wrapped her in his coat and returned the car keys. And the feel of his clothes around her made her vow to protect him a little more than she had before. Maybe he had realised his worth when he returned from Heathrow, or hers.
His words do not compare to his quick apology in the high rise flat. When the pillows they'd fashioned between Debbie and Danny seem to have been discarded and he'd held her against his chest, their bodies pressed into each other. She'd been slow to move from him and cover herself with his shirt, wanting to test his resolve but instead Dempsey, not Danny, had told her, in not so many words, that he respected her, his hand running softly on her cheek. Dempsey had the look of man she could love.
Now she thinks she might understand why Dempsey had been so careless with himself, and protective of her, that his urges to keep her on desk work were maybe less about sexism and more about being safe. He was, she recalls, always ready to shield her with his body, to protect her when she had no weapon. Perhaps he was fearful he'd put her danger, like Joey? Life is hard, when one spends months feeling responsible for a murder. She could barely deal with herself over Sims and Wee Jock. These words give weight to his, then, unexpected gentlemanly behaviour when he took her home from Stringfellows, as if he didn't want to screw them up, even she was willing to risk it. Somewhere in those hours and days, she'd gained more of him, not less.
His words change her perception. She wonders how often he wanted to tell her. She shudders.
"If you want a new partner..." He says, railing off and Harry realises he's misunderstood her physical reaction.
"No, not at all." She is quick to reassure, stresses how she feels. "Really, I don't. I was thinking that you make sense."
"Really, you wanna write that down?" Dempsey teases lightly, his face is kind.
"I was thinking of when you went to Heathrow and if I had known, how it might have been..." She fumbles for words, lost as she is in this different dimension. "I don't want another partner."
"I'd understand if you wanted time to think." He says, then more firmly, "You should think about it."
"Spikings knew?" She asks, it would also explain why her boss kept them both under scrutiny.
"Only him, nobody else." Dempsey leans forward as if to make a point. "Even my mom doesn't know the full story. I wanted to tell you so many times, I felt like I was living a lie but the terms of the deal...your safety. "
"... was unfair." Harry interjects, because it is. Unquestionably awful for a man whom she knows is unpredictable but deeply rooted in honesty. "To you, to everyone."
"Thank you." He says, heartfelt and she wants to hold him close.
He rubs his eyes wearily and she feels her heart somersault in her chest. She can't let him go like this. Not have him capitulating to Mara and undoing his fragile state, unconvinced of his partner's commitment. "I should go."
"There's hot water, a change of clothes..." She points to the luggage bag and he notices his shirts hanging on her wardrobe door. Once he wasn't allowed in this space. She offers an explanation. "I've been keeping an eye in your place. Someone has to water our plant."
Harry won't tell him that she slept in his bed when he was absent in the longest six weeks. "When did you last eat?"
He shrugs. Food is fuel to him, but he looks drawn. She takes the beer away from him.
"Get showered, I'll make you something." She's determined to keep him here tonight. It'll stop her roaming the streets for Coltrane and shooting the bastard. She'll fire the bullet if she must.
Dempsey looks bewildered. "I thought you'd kick me out."
"Why? I have no reason to." And she goes before he questions her, for she'd fall into him and destroy his sorrows if she could.
Harry places a tray of toast and tea on the bedside table. When Dempsey comes in, dressed in sweatpants and a t-shirt, he is surprised to see it. "I was gonna sleep on the couch."
"You can stay here." She waits for a cocky remark but he sighs wearily, and sits cautiously on the bed. Drinks the tea. The air is pregnant with possibilities and unpredicted behaviour.
"I didn't come here for anything I don't deserve." He mumbles, looking sadly at her. "I should go."
"Are you expecting Mara?" She can't help the curse of jealousy that creeps into her voice. She isn't sure if what she can offer is enough. Caring requires commitment and Mara has none of those things. No ties. No 'save my life whilst I look at your arse.'
"Nope." He almost growls as if he is a dog she needs to return to the shelter. He has to understand he's more than this. "You need to sleep."
Whilst she was in the kitchen, she tried to assemble Dempsey's story in her mind for it is a refrain she can identify with. Now, in the peace of her bedroom, her thoughts make more sense. "When my ex-husband cheated on me with my so-called best friend, I had a choice."
Her words seem flimsy compared to his, but she wants to even this out. She rarely talks about her marriage and Dempsey is immediately caught by her confessions as she knew he would be. He eats toast and look at her with curious eyes. Relaxes into the pillows a little more.
"I could have slept with with his friends, and not felt anything. I was numb to everything for a while. But I was bound my protocol and rules. And I have had to be saintly to get the divorce through, no men, no flings. Most of my so-called friends also vanished, they took his side. He is the lawyer with the contacts. It hurts, being on the outside when you're used to be in the middle of things."
Dempsey listens quietly with a pained look on his face. She hopes he understands what she wants to say.
"I regret that I acted like I did." He confesses after a moment, and his body seems to lift after releasing the weight of the words. He looks suddenly wiser. Tired, she thinks, of running away from himself.
"I don't think you should." She replies thinking of all they've been through. "You wouldn't be asking if I minded about Mara if you hadn't experienced regret."
Dempsey nods and drinks the tea.
"Did you use a condom?" She has to ask but isn't sure she's ready for the answer. She doesn't want to hurt him, or herself. She feels sick. "With Mara?"
"I haven't... There's no love affair or anything with her or anyone else for months." Dempsey says gently, and she realises that she already knows that he doesn't want to use his body for the gains of the job like a cheap shot. "There'll be another way."
"It would have been a bittersweet revenge if you did?" She wonders if he had thought of that.
"And I'd have felt nothing." He repeats her words back with meaning. She glances at him, of course he knows.
"Wouldn't you?" She tests.
"Nothing much has any meaning since I got here, just you." Dempsey hesitates before he swings his legs onto the bed. "You sure 'bout this?"
She nods and he slips his feet into the duvet with a soft moan of contentment. She switches off the light and listens as he nestles down beside her, a decent distance away. They've never shared a bed, not as themselves, not with this confession.
"Just me?" She asks, breaking the silence with her nervous question.
"Nobody else." He says in low tones. "You're too important."
"So are you." She says quietly.
She's just on the verge of sleep when she hears it. The hitch of his breath, one she knows well because goodness knows she's lain here and felt the same. She slides her hand across the cold sheets and finds his fingers, tugs him closer.
In the dark, his head nestles into her shoulder and she mops away his sorrows with her fingers, kisses his hair.