She arrived home exactly five hours late. Climbing out of the taxi with a sigh, she stretched her legs, using physical movement to push down the unease she'd been feeling since leaving Moscow.

There had been 'issues' at Sheremetyevo with her passport. She'd been pulled aside at departures and taken to a vaguely threatening office, where the border police- staring at her- had rifled through her bags and paperwork.

'Visiting relatives?' One had asked her, his voice cool and detached.

'Yes,' she'd replied, just as cold. 'My brother and his family.'

'Oh. Your brother has a wife? Children? What is his name again? Your brother?'

Helena froze, unwilling to reply. But the border officer gave her a sharp smile.

'They must be proud, to have such a noted celebrity in the family.'

'I'm not a celebrity,' she immediately protested. 'I'm an academic.'

'An academic, of course,' he'd leaned closer, and she could smell the sharp, chemical cleanliness of his uniform. 'Your papers are being closely watched, Yelena Mikhailovna.'

He'd released her then, escorting her back to departures, handing over her passport and emptied rucksack.

'Where is my laptop?' She demanded, clutching her bag. 'It has important research work on it and-'

'Confiscated for further investigation,' he snapped. 'Have a safe flight, Doctor.'

Now, back in Cambridge, she consoled herself over it's loss.

It's not like they'll find anything of note on that computer anyway, she told herself. If they can even get through my firewalls, that is.

She's not an idiot. All the really important files she keeps on an encrypted laptop that never leaves her office. But all the same, she continued to feel uneasy as she picked up her bags and walked to her front door.

Something was distinctly wrong when she stopped to look at her home. For one thing, the lights were inexplicably on and a quick sweep of her mailbox confirmed that it had been emptied. More than that, her curtains had been closed, and she was certain- almost certain- that she had left them open.

Nervous now, she turned her key in the lock quietly, opening her door slowly and peering down the hall. Almost immediately, she noted an overnight bag neatly placed by the stairs, a pair of polished shoes by its side. Instantly, her body relaxed.

Putting down her own bag, she kicked off her boots and shed her coat and scarf. Walking into her living room, she felt a warm surge of affection course through her. Because asleep on her sofa, his feet dangling off one end and his head off the other, lay Kwame.

She kneeled by his side, prodding his forehead with her finger. He smiled as he opened his eyes.

'You are five hours late,' he said accusingly.

'And you are a day early,' she returned with a smile. 'My flight was delayed.' Sighing tiredly, she turned and rested her back against the sofa, her head lightly touching the solid expanse of Kwame's chest.

'I used the key you gave me. I wanted to get here before you did,' he offered by way of an explanation. But she only shrugged. She didn't care that he was here early. That he was here at all was enough in itself.

'Where's Sam?' She breathed, closing her eyes.

'At home.'

'Sam is not coming this weekend?' Helena couldn't keep the disappointment from her voice.

'No. We both thought I should come alone for this.'

His words were gentle, but something in them, a vague undercurrent of trouble, made Helena open her eyes.

'Alone for this?' She repeated. 'Alone for what?'

With a groan, Kwame lifted his tall frame into a sitting position. He reached into his pocket and pulled from it a white envelope. He handed it to Helena wordlessly.

She took it gingerly, looking at Kwame questioningly. But he only nodded, gesturing for her to open it. The stationary was embossed and velvet to the touch, the address calligraphed on with gold-leaf ink. Helena had little experience of the finer things in life, but still, she knew expensive goods when she saw them. And it didn't take much to realise that this weighty wad of paper was clearly expensive.

'This is... how do you say it? Fancy?'

Kwame grinned, but the corners of his smile didn't quite reach his eyes and instantly, just like that, she knew exactly what this was.

'Oh,' she exhaled, when she peeled open the envelope to find three pieces of folded paper inside, each scented with bergamot. 'Oh.'

Kwame laid a comforting hand on her shoulder. 'You see know why Sam thought I should come alone.'

Helena fingered the papers with unsteady hands. 'Is this one yours or mine?' She asked, before another thought struck her. 'Or am I not to receive one? Perhaps I am not invited. Perhaps he does not want me there and...'

But Kwame shook his head. 'I brought in your mail earlier. There was one for you too.'

She looked again at the paper in her hand. It was addressed to Kwame, plus one.

'Plus one?' She queried with a frown. 'He knows about Sam, yes? Why would he write 'plus one'?'

'Linka, this is a wedding invitation written in gold-leaf ink. Look how neat the handwriting is,' Kwame smiled. 'I do not think Wheeler wrote any of these himself at all.'

'Trish,' Helena said blankly.

Now it was Kwame's turn to sigh. 'Yes, I should imagine so. Are you alright, old friend? Linka?'

But Helena was too busy staring at the invitation in her hand, her mind rendered empty but for one thought: that this was a wedding invitation.

An invitation to Wheeler's wedding.

She swallowed hard.

'Will you go?' She asked. 'You and Sam... I mean, you and your plus one?'

Kwame gave her arm a gentle squeeze. 'Do not be unkind, Linka.'

She nodded, licking her lips. 'Forgive me. But will you?'

Kwame shrugged. 'I think the real question is will you?'

'Trish will not look kindly on my attendance,' Helena replied.

'It is not Trish I am thinking of right now.'

She turned her head to give Kwame a long, hard look. 'Do you think he would want me there? Really?'

Kwame appeared to think for a moment. 'Why would he invite you if he did not wish for your presence?'

Helena closed her eyes again. She almost laughed. 'Because he must. We were the Planeteers. He must invite all of us, or none of us.'

Kwame sighed. He stood, and Helena stared at him. She always forgot just how tall and imposing he was until he was here, dwarfing her tiny flat. 'I am going to make tea,' he told her. 'I took the liberty of bringing milk. I know you have been in Russia this last week.'

'Yes,' she said, laying her head against the sofa again.

Kwame looked at her from the doorway, the normally steady warmth of his features furrowed with concern. 'Linka,' he spoke firmly. 'It is the same for us. Either we all go to his wedding, or none of us do.'

Helena bit her lip. 'Do you think Gi will go?'

Kwame shrugged. 'If the invitation even reaches her, perhaps. When did you last hear from her?'

Helena sighed. 'Maybe... maybe two years ago? You?'

'Same. She sent a card when Sam and I married.'

They fell silent, both lost momentarily in the past. When Helena spoke again, it was with a rueful smile playing upon her lips.

'Of all the Planeteers I had thought to stay in touch with after...' she paused, 'after the Planeteers, I never thought it would only be you.'

Kwame didn't look offended by her statement. Instead, he smiled gently. 'Nothing worked out as we thought it would, did it?' He exhaled lightly. 'Well, I'm going to make that tea. And when I come back, you will tell me all about Russia. About Misha. About why your flight- which, when I checked, arrived at Heathrow on time- was so delayed.'

Helena groaned. 'Kwame...'

'You will tell me, Linka,' he said firmly. 'No lies. You weren't on that flight and I want to know why.'

When he left the room, Helena pulled herself to standing, going across the hall to the little office where she kept her in tray and personal administration. True to form, Kwame had placed her mail from the last week in a neat little pile by her laptop. Quickly, Helena rifled through it, until her fingers found the elegant wedding invitation, wedged between her telephone bill and an alumni magazine.

Dr. Yelena Orlova was delicately inscribed across the front, and Helena frowned to see her name, so formally written, from Wheeler. She opened the envelope without any care for it's value, ripping the expensive paper apart and pulling out the invitation within. She felt a deep stab of pain that she momentarily indulged. Because this was Wheeler's wedding invitation. Wheeler's.

And it was scented with bergamot.

'Bohze Moi,' she whispered, pushing the pain away.

Yelena, plus one she found written inside, and that turned her pain into a muted kind of fury, because just as she knew about Trish, she knew- she knew- that Wheeler must have known about Richard. Just as he knew about Kwame and Sam. He'd reduced the most important relationship of her adult life to two paltry words, and if he'd been in the room right then she would've kicked him.

But she was honest enough to admit that she might also have kissed him too.

Moments with Wheeler had always been kiss or kill, she admitted to herself. That was just how they were.

It was probably how they would always be.

She sensed Kwame in the room before he had a chance to say anything.

'I am not going to go to that wedding,' she decided, turning to him. Wordlessly he nodded, handing her a steaming mug of tea.

She sipped at it thoughtfully. Wheeler could not possibly think she would go to his wedding. He cannot have it both ways, she thought bitterly. He cannot do what he did to me then expect me to live happily with his choices.

'Linka...'

'No,' she said, firmer now. 'No. I wish him well, Kwame. I really do. I wish him many... how do you say it? Commiserations?'

'Congratulations,' Kwame corrected her kindly.

'Whatever the word, I am not going. I will do for him what he did for your wedding. What Gi did for your wedding. I shall send a card.'

'Actually,' Kwame looked uncomfortable. 'Wheeler sent more than just a card for my wedding.'

Helena stared at him.

'He paid for Sam and I to spend our honeymoon at the Four Seasons in Paris. Three nights. He was very generous. And the note he sent... I think he wanted to come. I really he think he regretted that he could not- or perhaps would not- attend.'

Helena felt grief, just as raw as the day it first struck her, run through her blood. She paled, gripping the mug in her hand so tightly that it was a wonder that, just like her heart, it hadn't shattered into a thousand pieces.

'Do you still blame him?' She whispered, and saw Kwame visibly recoil. 'Do you think he still blames you?'

'No,' Kwame answered tightly. 'No. I think we are past the blame stage now, Linka. What happened back then... rather than coming together as we should have done, we turned to grief and anger. But I am no longer angry at him. Just as I am no longer angry at Gi. Or at you. It was not our fault, Linka.'

'I miss him,' she confessed, and her admission felt like a weakness.

But Kwame only sighed, coming towards her and folding her into his arms. 'I miss him too. Just as I miss Gi. And Gaia.'

'And Cap,' she added quietly, and felt Kwame's arms turn to stone around her.

'Yes,' he whispered. 'And Cap.'

'Did you ever tell Sam about...'

But Kwame, it seemed, was no longer in a mood to talk about the past. He kissed her temple, pulling away and motioning to her tea. 'Drink it. And now, tell me about Russia.'

They moved back through to the living room, where Helena spoke warmly about Misha, his wife, her terrible cooking and their three boys. But Kwame would not be distracted, and after half an hour, he held up his hand to her.

'Tell me about why you missed your flight home. I spoke to you at the airport earlier, and you assured me you were there and on time. What happened?'

She paused. 'Would you believe me if I said that I was shopping in duty-free?'

He smiled. 'No.'

She nodded. Taking a steadying drink of tea, she decided to be blunt. 'They stopped me at passport control again and-'

Kwame stood, exhaling with frustration. 'Linka... Linka, this is getting ridiculous. This is... what? The fourth time now?'

Helena bit her lip. 'The fifth.'

'You need to stop travelling on your Russian passport,' Kwame ordered.

But Helena shook her head. 'It is the only passport I have,' she argued.

'I'm sure the U.K government would give you a passport if you applied. The French government gave me one, after all, for my services to their nation and...'

'That is different,' Helena immediately returned. 'Your home country is at civil war. Mine is not. And you work with African migrants in Calais... I work with birds and dusty old books of paper. The U.K government will not give me a passport.'

'Well, what does Richard think?'

'Richard?' Momentarily, Helena had forgotten about her boyfriend.

'Yes, Richard. He is British, is he not? What does he think? He must worry... Sam and I worry about you all the time and...'

'He wants to marry me,' Helena interjected bluntly, and Kwame stared at her.

'What?'

'Richard. He wants to marry me. If we marry I will be eligible for a British passport.'

Kwame stood, open-mouthed, his tea still held halfway to his mouth. 'He asked you to marry him? Is that what you are saying?'

'Yes.'

'And what did you tell him?'

She shrugged. 'I told him I would think about it.'

At those words, Kwame seemed to slump into her sofa. 'If you do not love the man, you should not toy with him, Linka. Wheeler was one thing. Greg was another-'

'I never toyed with Greg,' Helena argued, but Kwame held up a hand.

'I never said anything at the time,' he said, his words slow and deliberate. 'But I knew Linka. And I thought it was wrong, what you and Wheeler did while he was with Trish. What you did when you were supposedly with Greg.'

Helena paled as guilt, stark and cold, struck her hard. She swallowed. 'What did Wheeler tell you?'

'Nothing,' Kwame said. 'He never said a word. For a long time... we all thought things were better between the two of you. The arguments had stopped. Wheeler dropped all the cheap lines. You were warmer. Gi and I talked about it, and we decided you had both grown up. That you both had matured. That Trish made Wheeler a better man, and Greg made you happier woman. Ma-Ti was there for that conversation, and he was so quiet the whole time... I started to wonder what he knew that we didn't. And then we went on that mission- where was it? Norway? Finland?'

'Iceland,' Helena supplied quietly. She remembered that mission.

'Iceland,' Kwame nodded. 'Iceland. We were staying in that village... we drank all that Bren... bran...' he struggled for the word.

'Brennivin,' Helena said. Because yes, she remembered that mission. She remembered that night.

'You and Gi got up to dance... and Wheeler...' Kwame sighed. 'Wheeler watched you. The whole time, he couldn't take his eyes from you. And I knew. I just knew. The man looked at you with absolute love in his eyes. And not the puppy love he had as a teenager. He looked in that moment like a man who knew real happiness, and at one point, you looked up to smile at him and I just knew, Linka.'

Helena was silent. For a moment, hearing Kwame speak, she'd been taken back there. To Iceland. To five friends drinking schnapps under the Northern lights. To Wheeler's mouth, hot on her body, and his hands, electric to the touch on her skin.

'He didn't sleep in his room that night,' Kwame finished. 'He told Ma-Ti and I that he'd been waylaid by a friendly local. But that was a lie. He was with you.'

Helena nodded. There was little point in hiding the truth now. 'Yes,' she said, clenching her hands tightly so that sheer wistfulness would not be evident in her voice. 'Yes. He was with me.'

With a sigh Kwame stood, coming to kneel before Helena. He took her hands in his, and rubbed her fingers gently.

'Why is it I have an invitation to Wheeler and Trish's wedding? Why is not Wheeler and yours?'

Linka swallowed hard, trying in vain to withdraw her hands from his. But Kwame held tight to them, his earthy brown eyes drawing truth from her like water from a well.

'Kwame,' she exhaled miserably. 'I was not enough for him. My reality did not meet the expectations of his dreams. He wanted us to be friends, but he did not want us to be more than that. I was not enough.'

'Nonsense, Linka,' Kwame shook his head. 'Wheeler adored you. He adored everything about you and...'

'Kwame, no,' Helena forced herself to be firm. She forced herself to acknowledge the truth. 'Kwame... he left me. He ended it.'

Kwame's face was filled with disbelief. 'He ended it?'

Helena nodded. 'He ended it. He didn't love me, and he ended it.'

She closed her eyes, seeing - once again- Wheeler's face as he dealt the crippling wound to her heart. 'This has been fun, but it's done now, you know?'

Once again, she felt that stab of pain, that torrent of grief and shame and hurt and embarrassment. Because under all her pain there was a good degree of mortification. Wheeler had chased her for close to three years. But it took less than six months in her arms and bed for him to grow bored and look for the next challenge.

She hadn't been enough.

And to Linka Orlova, that had been a fatal blow.

And she'd decided then and there that Helena Orlova would never make the same mistake.

Later that night, when Kwame is ensconced in her spare bedroom and probably talking on the phone to Sam, Helena dumps the wedding invitation into her kitchen bin.

She doesn't see the scrap of paper fall from the envelope. Hastily written, it is just a few messily scribbled numbers and words on a torn piece of newspaper.

A phone number.

An address.

And underneath, a plea.

Linka. Babe.

Please.