Only twenty minutes later Lucas was handcuffed and sitting in the interrogation room in Thames House. He was alone but knew he wouldn't be for long. He closed his eyes and thought of Maya. At least she was spared from all of this. Meanwhile outside the room a major argument was brewing.

"You have to let me go in there," Harry said. Both Dimitri and Beth were telling him he'd snap if left in a room alone with him, while Tariq was beating himself up because the laptop substitute hadn't worked.

"Harry you'll kill him if he doesn't tell you what you want to hear," Dimitri said.
"I won't," Harry said.

"I think Dimitri is right," Beth said.

"If neither of you get anything out of him, do you really want the weight of Ruth's death on your conscience?" Harry said, his eyes burning. "If its me in there and I fail, I have no one to blame but myself. I need to do this."

Beth looked convinced but Dimitri had doubts. "Harry, you need to stay calm with him. If you lose it, he won't give you anything."

"I've been doing this far longer than you have, you think I don't know what I have to do? How to handle a corrupt spy? I have been the betrayer or been betrayed by everyone in my life. Except her. I won't fail her." Dimitri moved away from the door, letting Harry be able to open the cell door. "Thank you. Have people ready to go when he gives me an address." He opened the door.


"Are you going to ask me anything or just sit there?" Lucas asked after ten minutes of silence. An agonisingly painful ten minutes for Harry as he imagined life draining out of Ruth with every second that passed.

"We both know what I want," Harry said. "Why aren't you talking?"

"I spent eight years being tortured in a Russian prison. Do you really think I'm going to break to you?"

"I am hoping that you are going to see that no matter what you do now, no matter what happens, you aren't getting out of here in the near future. Do you want her death on your conscience as well as everything else?"

"All you had to do was give over Albany," Lucas said. "Then she'd be fine, and I'd be on my way to a knew life with…"

"Maya?"

"Where is she?" Lucas asked quietly.

"Where's Ruth?" Harry countered quickly.

"If I tell you where she is, you'll lock me up and never bother with me again. I won't be forgotten so easily."

"No one's denying that," Harry said. "I couldn't forget you. How longs she got? Before you've murdered her?"

"I honestly don't know. Maybe two hours, if she's lucky."

"And you're just okay with that?" Harry asked. "That in a couple of hours you would have killed one of your colleagues? What's the point? Now that you're here you have nothing to lose by telling me where she is."

"Once a murderer, always a murderer," Lucas said dispassionately. "My MI5 career began with a murder, seems fitting it will end that way."

Harry couldn't help it. He got up and quickly threw a punch at Lucas's jaw. It felt very satisfying. So he hit him again, this time in the stomach. "Tell me where she is!" Harry demanded as Dimitri tried to pull him off of Lucas. "Just tell me where you're hiding her!" He kept shouting even as Dimitri bundled him out of the room. The young spook was stronger than he looked.

"Was it necessary to hit him?" Dimitri asked, letting go of Harry both breathing heavily.

"Maybe not, but it felt good."

"You might have to entertain the possibility that he won't talk," Dimitri said quietly.

"I know because its all I can think about. What do I do if she suffers a fatal overdose? How do I cope, knowing it was my fault. That I'm the one who killed her. How do I ever get past it?"

"She isn't dead yet."

"It won't be long," Harry said. "No matter how much you try to stay positive, I know it won't be long."

"Let me try with him," Dimitri said. "Either way, you're not going back in there."
"Fine," Harry said. "I'm going to work with Tariq on finding possible locations she could be."

"Do that."


Which way do you want it to go? Or put another way, how much will you hate me if Ruth dies?