Thank you for all the comments on the last chapter. No Beth, don't do it, don't do it!

It would be tempting though, right? I like to think that I wouldn't be tempted to betray a stranger for the good of my family, but I think in reality it would have been a very hard thing to refuse. I'm sure many people were manipulated into becoming informants out of fear or love for their relatives. Beth's facing a difficult choice.

On with the story!

…

'No, nothing, Commandant Blake. I don't actually see that many people.' She gave him her sweetest, emptiest smile.

Commandant Blake considered her for a moment. 'All right, Beth. But I want you to come to me if you see anything or hear anything strange. For your father's good.'

When she'd closed the office door behind her she let go of the tight grip she had on her anger. Hideous man.

Lori was back from lunch and noticed the grim expression on Beth's face. 'Has he done anything?' she whispered, nodding at the commandant's door.

'No, no,' Beth said quickly. 'I ... was thinking about a fight I had with my sister.'

'Your sister? I could have sworn that your expression was something to do with a man. I looked like that for weeks when Rick and I were breaking up.' Lori took out a cigarette and began smoking it thoughtfully.

Beth thought there was a touch of wistfulness about Lori whenever she spoke about Comrade Grimes. There was certainly regret. 'Are things are really over between you and your ex-husband?' Beth asked, going to her desk and sitting down. 'You might find a way to move past the terrible thing that happened to you both one day.'

Lori chewed the side of her nail, her eyes unfocused, lost in memory. 'It wasn't just losing the baby,' she said. 'We'd grown apart. We didn't have the same ideals any more. He was getting more serious with the Party. He said I was frivolous.' She looked down at her silk blouse, her painted nails, the Kent cigarette she was smoking. 'I think he was right. But I think you have to live in the moment. Things are so …' she dropped her voice even more and leaned forward toward Beth, 'uncertain here. The frivolities, they take me out of myself.'

It would be so easy, Beth realised, to close your eyes and ears to the injustices everywhere and enjoy what privileges you could scrape together. But what Lori didn't see was that she was paying a supreme price for her lifestyle. She'd lost her husband and she was mistress to one man while seeing another. That had to make things even worse for her, and then she'd just need more frivolity to mask her unhappiness.

I'm not going to wind up like her, Beth thought to herself, fitting a sheet of paper into the typewriter. I'm going to find value in my life, even here.

…

'Fraulein Greene.'

Beth started at the sound of the masculine voice. She was just a few blocks from Stasi Headquarters and on her way home, and her immediate impulse was that the voice belonged to Daryl. But it wasn't Daryl who appeared at her side.

'Comrade Grimes,' she said in surprise. And then her heart leapt. Maybe he had some news about Daryl. Maybe they were in league together. She was glad all over again that she hadn't given into that wild, foolish impulse to tell the commandant what she'd seen at the party.

'I know we don't know each other, but I want to presume on your friendship with my ex-wife. I have a favour to ask you.' He smiled at her as he walked by her side, but the smile didn't reach his blue eyes. He was a handsome man with an open, friendly face. He would probably be magnetic if he was happy. Beth had a sudden wish to see him laugh, for his sake. She had a sense that both he and Lori were lost without each other. His warmth would melt her brittleness, and her liveliness would energise him. But their lives were in such a tangle that things seemed hopeless for them.

She was disappointed that he wasn't talking to her about Daryl, though. 'Of course. Anything I can do to help.'

He smiled again. 'Thank you. I have something for her, and it's in my car around the corner. I wanted a woman's opinion on it.'

If he wanted her back Beth could already tell that he was going about it the wrong way. Lori didn't need more things. She needed love and understanding. She needed someone to give purpose to her life. She needed to get away from Commandant Blake. But she walked with him, keeping these thoughts to herself, wondering if she would tell him some pretty lies or if she would tell him the truth. Not about Lori's relationship with Blake, but about the things that Lori needed.

'That one,' he said, pointing to a cream Lada sedan, and walking over to the boot.

They were down a secluded side street without lamplight and there was no one else around. Beth suddenly felt a prickle of unease. She didn't know anything about this man. She hung back, not liking to get too close to him or his car. Quickly, she looked about for anyone else who might be creeping up on her. The boot popped up.

'Goddamn it, Grimes. I'm stiff as a corpse.'

Beth's heart stopped for a second. She knew that gravelly voice. In the dim light she saw something move in the boot. Someone sitting up.

Daryl.

She pushed past Comrade Grimes and flung herself into his arms. He was still sitting in the boot, wearing his black coat and covered with a tartan blanket. She could barely see him but she could feel him. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders, buried her face in his warm neck and breathed him in.

Daryl stiffened, and then he laughed softly and his arms went around her. He gave her an awkward pat but there was a tightness to his embrace all the same.

Her voice was muffled by his clothes. 'I thought you were gone forever.' She pulled back. She could just make out his face in the darkness. His stubble was longer and he look tired and pinched, but he was alive and in one piece and back on her side of the Wall. It was more than she'd hoped for. Far more. 'What are you doing here? Isn't it dangerous?'

'Yes it is, so let go of him so I can close the boot,' Comrade Grimes said. 'We were on our way to a safe house when he insisted I fetch you.'

He had? Beth smiled as she pulled away.

'Need someone to tell me what our favourite commandant's been up to,' Daryl muttered as he lay back down.

Comrade Grimes closed the boot and they got into the car, Beth's feet tapping happily on the floor. Daryl had been in her life for such a short time but he'd made such an impact that she'd felt like a piece of her was missing without him in it. She had a purpose now, with or without him, but given the choice she'd much rather have him in her life than not.

Comrade Grimes drove them across the city and parked in a quiet side street. 'Daryl knows where to go,' he said, not cutting the engine. 'Get him out of the boot. As soon as you have I need to drive away.'

'All right,' Beth said, wondering about Comrade Grimes and how he got involved with Daryl. 'And thank you.'

Daryl was stiff with cold and needed some help getting out of the boot. As soon as Beth closed it Comrade Grimes drove away and they were alone. 'Which block?' she asked.

He looked around. 'That one,' he said. 'Fourth floor, number twelve.'

He walked slowly at first, but then his muscles warmed up and he walked a little faster. Beth held onto his arm to support him and he felt as cold as iron even through his sleeve. Outside number twelve he felt above the lintel for a key, and then opened the door. Beth was glad to see it was kitted out with furniture, unlike the last safe house. She went to the gas fire and lit it, and shepherded Daryl onto the sofa.

'Sit down and get warm. I'll make coffee.' She was burning to ask him a hundred questions but she could see he was in a bad state, half frozen and exhausted.

The kitchen had coffee and sugar and tinned food. When the water had boiled she added an extra spoonful of sugar to Daryl's.

'Here,' she said, handing him the cup. He was still wearing his boots and coat and she wanted to help him out of them, but it felt to intimate. They drank their coffee in silence, the glow from the gas fire painting their faces red.

'Ain't got any questions for me, factory girl?'

He was coming back to life, and she grinned. 'Thousands. Can I ask them yet?'

He gave her a small smile. 'Go on.'

'How did you get back? Where have you been? How long were you in the boot of Comrade Grimes' car?'

He rubbed a hand over his face. 'I've been stuffed inside metal boxes for a year. Feels like it, anyway. Got inside a secret compartment in the hold of a tourist bus around eleven last night. Crossed the border mid-morning. Got into Rick's boot sometime this afternoon. Waited till nightfall. Waited till my favourite Stasi secretary left her commandant's office.'

Beth blushed and looked at her coffee, hoping that in the red light it didn't show. 'So Miss Two Fingers could make you coffee as well, you mean? Honestly, that feels like all I'm good for lately.'

He nudged her foot with his. 'Ain't true. Kept your head after the other night. Ain't in a cell somewhere.'

'I did lose my head. I was frantic. They killed Ana, Daryl. I thought they'd killed you, too.'

He shook his head. 'Fuckin' gunned her down. She was surrendering, goin' back to them, but they shot her anyway.' He fixed her with an intense look. 'I didn't leave her behind. She got away from me, panicked …' He sighed heavily.

Beth realised he was worried that she blamed him. 'I never thought you did. It was six against one. I knew you had no choice. They were on you as soon as you went in. I saw it all.'

Daryl stared into the fire. Beth realised he was still in the clothes he'd been wearing the other night. 'There's hot water. Why don't you shower and I'll fix us dinner. Just tinned stuff, but you must be hungry.'

He nodded, getting up. 'Yeah.' But he didn't look happy. She saw that Ana's death was laying heavy on his mind.

While he showered she sorted through the food. There was tinned steak, another of green beans, and a jar of pickled cabbage. It would do. She fried the steak with a slightly withered onion and boiled the beans in their tin.

Daryl came back a few minutes later wearing his dirty trousers and a clean white t-shirt. 'Too small,' he muttered, yanking at it. 'Least it's clean. I'm gonna burn that other one.' He came up behind her and looked over her shoulder. 'Smells good.'

It felt so domestic all of a sudden, and the nape of Beth's neck prickled with awareness of him. She turned and handed him a plate and a fork. 'Here.'

'Thanks.' His long hair was wet and dripped onto the collar of his t-shirt. It was too tight. He was broad with strong upper arms and the t-shirt bunched at his underarms. She looked away quickly and picked up her dinner.

'My commandant,' she said while they ate sitting by the fire again, wrinkling her nose to show what she thought of 'her' commandant, 'wasn't expecting Ana to be one of the escapees. Said he thought she was broken.'

Daryl chewed for a moment, forking through his steak. It was tough and a little gristly here and there, but tasty.

Better than squirrel, Beth thought.

'So he didn't know who was gonna escape. Just how.'

'Yes, that's what I made of it. It was the only thing I overheard. He and Comrade Walsh were talking in his office the same morning you went over the Wall. Or under it, rather.' She watched his face darken, and he chewed like he wanted to take chunks out of somebody. 'Merle,' she said, guessing his thoughts.

'Yeah. Fuckin' Merle.' He stabbed his fork through a green bean.

'I went to your apartment after the soldiers left the bakery. It – it was stupid, but I didn't know what else to do. He was there. I accused him of throwing you to the Stasi. He seemed genuinely shocked that you were taking someone through that tunnel. "Daryl's the traitor?" were his exact words. That emphasis.'

Daryl looked into the fire, not speaking. Then he shook his head. 'I don't know what to think. Merle's an opportunistic bastard.'

'But he's your brother. Even he –'

'You can't trust anyone now,' he said sharply, looking at her through his fringe. 'I told you that.'

Beth bit her lip. 'But you trust me. Or – or you seem to.' She shrugged, looking around her. Here she was, in another of his safe houses, learning his secrets.

He looked at her a moment longer. 'Yeah, I do.'

'Why?'

He was silent a long time she thought he wasn't going to answer. 'You ain't done anything out of selfishness. You ain't just considered how things are gonna benefit you. That's rare this side of the Wall. That side of the Wall too, come to think of it.'

She studied him. 'Daryl. You've just described you, not me.'

He lifted his eyes to her in surprise. Then he shook his head and went on eating.

'Daryl,' she said again, taking a shaky breath, 'I don't think you should trust me.'

…

Daryl felt warmed through, even in a t-shirt and bare feet. He hadn't thought he'd ever feel warm again after the day that he'd had. Buried alive, it had felt like, trapped in those metal boxes, relying on someone else to get him out again. Freezing cold and no room to even scratch his nose. All he'd thought about the whole time was Beth, wondering if she'd been taken in. They knew about the tunnel. What if a dispatch of soldiers had stormed the safe house, too, and they had taken Beth? Finally, in the evening, Rick had been able to tell him that she was just where she should be at that time of day. Outside Blake's office, tapping away.

Cramped and cold as he was he made Rick wait till Beth got off from work, saying he needed her at the safe house. Needed her? It wasn't exactly true. She might have information, but it wasn't urgent. He hadn't really thought about the reason why it was important. Wanted to see her with his own eyes, he supposed. Just to make sure she really was okay.

'Daryl. I don't think you should trust me.'

He put his plate aside, feeling human again. It was a good meal. 'Why?' He looked at Beth. She was pale, agitated. There were circles under her eyes like she hadn't been sleepin'. Was that on account of him?

'Do you remember when you showed up at that party as a waiter? I saw Comrade Grimes slip you something. A piece of paper, I think.'

Observant thing she was. 'Yeah. So?'

'Today the commandant told me some lies about needing me to become an informant so we could see my daddy in prison. I was so angry. But I was also thinking about what I'd seen at the party, and …'

Daryl studied her. She looked upset, but she wasn't agitated or guilty-looking. 'Beth, you didn't tell him anything.'

'How do you know?'

Cos you wouldn't. I just know.

She took a deep breath. 'No, I didn't tell him. But it crossed my mind, and I feel terrible about it. That's why I don't think you should trust me.'

He sat forward. 'Beth. You ain't gotta apologise for lovin' your family. You were thinkin' of your daddy. It would be weird if you hadn't.'

She shrugged, still looking miserable.

'Like I told Maggie and Glenn, this is a goddamn hard thing to be involved in. And it don't get any easier. Never.' She was still shaking her head and not meeting his eye. She was ashamed.

'I was going a bit crazy thinking you were dead,' she whispered finally, plucking at a loose thread on the chair. 'And then when I thought you were in West Berlin and gone forever. I was going to keep going,' she said, raising her eyes to his, needing him to believe her. 'I was going to work out a way to get Maggie and Glenn out. But it was going to be so much harder, without you. For so many reasons. Not just because of what you can do.' She looked down at her hands.

He thought about earlier, about how she'd hugged him like he was her life preserver and she was drowning. Ain't nobody hugged him like that in his life. She'd felt good in his arms. Smelled good. People had been grateful and people had relied on him, but that was because of the things he did, not the person he was. Beth could look after herself. She had it in her to look after herself. Lead her own group. So her needing him for who he was was the goddamn sweetest thing anyone had ever said to him.

Millions of people this side of the Wall. Could still be fuckin' lonely. He watched her till he realised he was staring. Then he looked away and said, 'Well, if those are Blake's conditions then I guess we gotta give him something.'

Her eyebrows shot up her forehead. 'What do you mean?'

'I mean, let's give that fucker something juicy. Somethin' real juicy.'