All those walls that had built up around Ruth's heart, all those doubts about the future, all those worries over their safety and the safety of others, all those convictions Ruth had held about why she and Harry couldn't be together and shouldn't be together, all of it…Harry held her in his arms and all of it just melted away.

Ruth felt the lump in her throat and the tears stinging her eyes and a part of her wanted to break down and weep. But another part of her took over. She lifted her head and looked into Harry's honey-hazel eyes. Ruth's hand, seemingly outside her control, moved up to his face and her fingers brushed his cheek. And there was a lightness that appeared in his eyes, a warmth that used to scare her when he looked at her like that. It was a look that plainly spoke of his affection for her. His love for her. But after years of being afraid and now weeks of being torn apart by the guilt and anxiety that his love caused her, Ruth could look at him now and know he loved her and feel that warmth of him. She craved it. She craved him.

With a slight tilt of her head, Ruth raised her lips to his. Harry, master of reading her as he was, met her kiss without hesitation. And oh, she had missed his kiss so desperately. She'd been without him for two years after they kissed goodbye on the docks, and she's not missed him as much as she'd missed him in these last ten days. So close and yet so far. And finally back where they both belonged: together.

The love in Harry's kiss quickly turned to hunger. His lips moved over hers with such magnificent want. His tongue surged into her mouth, and Ruth moaned at the beautiful sensation of it. Harry held her tight, his hands moving over her body. Ruth hardly realized that they were moving when her back bumped into the wall by the kitchen door. She was started out of the kiss, gasping to catch her breath.

Harry's lips moved to her cheek and her jaw and to the pulse point behind her ear. Ruth's head was swimming. She hadn't come here with the intent to have Harry kiss her senseless. Though she hadn't come here with any real intent at all. She had no idea, truly, what she was going to say to him when she arrived. But Harry waited for her and let her speak and allayed her worries in a way that made her feel somewhat silly for having those worries in the first place. Almost as though he had it all planned from the beginning.

Ruth lightly pushed on Harry's shoulders. "Harry," she said, trying to sternly get his attention. But her voice was a bit breathier than she intended.

He lifted his head. His chest was heaving slightly as he caught his breath, and his eyes were dark with desire.

She tried to swallow back her own desire. "Harry, how did you know?" she asked.

Harry frowned. "How did I know what?"

"How did you know I'd come around on this?"

He took a step away from her. And Ruth saw the mask of Sir Harry Pearce, MI-5 Section Head come over his face. He'd done that enough times for Ruth to know what it meant. When Harry donned that expression of professionalism and detachment, he was doing his level best to hide from her.

Ruth reached out and put her hand on his arm, not wanting to lose the connection between them that they'd just regained. "Harry…"

His eyes were cold. "I didn't think you'd come around. I thought you were coming here to end things once and for all. Is that what you'd like to do?"

She shook her head. "I don't want to end things. Why did you think I would?"

"Because you've been trying to leave me for weeks, and I didn't think you'd be put off any longer. You have a tenacity that frankly borders on the outrageous at times."

"I'm a stubborn mule, is that it?" Ruth tried to insert some levity, tried to tease him just a little to get that hard expression off his face.

"Something like that, yes," he answered flatly.

"So that's all? You thought I came to end it because I'm stubborn?" she pressed.

Harry's jaw was set in obstinate determination. "And I thought my luck must have run out. I have not been rewarded in my personal life as a rule, so why should now be any different?"

Something cracked inside Ruth's chest. "So you don't believe in a happy ending for us?"

"Aren't you the one who's told me that you and I don't deserve a happy ending together?" he fired back.

And all of a sudden, the heartbreak that had always caused Ruth to crumble in the past instead somehow lit a fire within her. Perhaps it was all the horror she'd been through or perhaps it was the glimpse of happiness that she and Harry had experienced or perhaps it was everything or perhaps nothing. The cause didn't quite matter just now.

Ruth did not say a word as she took Harry by the hand and led him through the house to his bedroom that they had shared for more than half the nights since their engagement. She still did not say a word as she gave him a light shove to sit on the bed. And she remained uncharacteristically silent as she pulled his jumper off over his head and removed her boots and lifted her skirt so she could straddle his lap. Harry, wearing only his vest and trousers now, put his arms around her likely out of habit more than anything else, keeping her from losing her balance.

"Promise me something," she said at last. The determination in her own voice was a surprise to her ears, despite the well of feeling that had overtaken her.

"Promise you what?"

She smoothed back his hair that had gotten ruffled when she took off his jumper. "Promise me that I can always come back home."

Harry frowned in confusion. She didn't blame him.

Ruth explained, "I want you to promise me that when I get scared and run or when something happens to take me away against my will, you will be here for me when I come back. You're my home, Harry, as ridiculously sentimental and trite as that is. But it's true. The Security Services and all of London and this house, they're home for me because of you. I love you with everything in me, and I know I get in my own way, but you've loved me anyway, haven't you?"

He nodded gravely. "I have loved you longer than I knew, and I will love you until my dying breath," he vowed. "How's that for sentimental and trite?"

She took his face in her hands. "I don't care if it's trite, I like hearing it. And I need to hear it, even when I might not want to. That's what I'm getting at, Harry. I—"

Harry interjected, "Ruth, I promise you now just as I promised you the day I put that ring on your finger: I will always love you, and I will always want you, and I will always be waiting for you to come back to me. And in answer to your question downstairs, I didn't know you'd come around, but I truly hoped you would."

The heartbreak mended, and Ruth felt her chest swell with her love for this dear, terrible man. "And I promise you that I will always come around. I thought my mind knew better than my heart, but I've always been too clever for my own good. But my heart is yours Harry, and it has been since long before I had to leave you on the docks all those years ago."

At last, Harry smiled. He smiled and the mask of Sir Harry Pearce melted away. Ruth's own Harry was back with her again.

"I've missed you," she murmured.

"And I you," he agreed. "And I'm hoping you brought me up here and started undressing me so that we can reunite properly."

Ruth couldn't help but grin at that. "That was the plan, yes," she laughed.

He beamed back at her and dropped a little peck on her nose. "Good."

Harry then proceeded to undress them both as best he could before Ruth had to stand up so they could finish the job. They were under the covers of the bed before they knew it.

Downstairs, Billy the cat hopped up on the kitchen table and knocked over the forgotten teacups in protest of being left alone.