Nineteen:
Death on a Pale Horse
The part where Lucas picked her up and carried her on his shoulder, his shoulder poking into her stomach awkwardly and making her want to vomit into the gag, was the worst part of Ruth's abduction. He was actually quite solicitous for being a psychopathic lunatic, which was a jarring disconnect between them.
After a couple minutes of fumbling with the equipment, he came over and pulled her gag off. "Do you want some water?" Lucas inquired.
"No."
"Suit yourself," he said, pulling up a chair and studying her. "Why did you have to be so good at what you do, Ruth? Why did you have to be the legendary Ruth Evershed instead of just looking the other way?"
A muscle in her cheek ticked. She weighed her words very carefully, then said, "Do you know what Albany is, Lucas?"
"I don't know, and I don't care," Lucas said firmly.
"How can you not care?" Ruth shot back furiously. "How can you not care about the fate of millions of people?"
"There's only one person whose fate I care about right now," Lucas said simply. "And that's why I'm doing this, Ruth. Have you ever felt so strongly for someone that you would do anything for them? Anything at all to protect them and keep them and nurture them?"
She cocked her head to the side, unable to believe that he had sold out his country for love. It would take so much more than that for – and she stopped herself short. Her train of thought derailed completely, and she closed her eyes, knowing that Cotterdam had been her Albany. "Yes," she whispered. "Yes, I do."
Lucas looked her straight in the eye and said, "Harry?"
"Don't," she said warningly. "Don't you dare try to think that for one moment you are doing something noble, Lucas. Albany is a genetic weapon. It will kill millions, if not billions, of people. What you have done is unconscionable at best."
"Why should any one nation have the ability to launch an attack like that?" Lucas asked, smiling a little. "Why not give it to them all and watch the world collapse?"
"You're mad," she whispered.
"No, I'm just a glass half-full kind of a guy," he said with cheer in his voice. "And my name isn't Lucas – you already knew that, though. Nice to meet you, Ruth… I'm John Bateman. Too bad we can't shake hands, but I don't trust you not to use some of those tricks Harry's taught you."
She exhaled and licked her lips. "Maybe I will take some water," Ruth said. "But from an unopened bottle."
He rolled his eyes. "Please. If I wanted to drug you, you would know it. If I wanted to kill you, you would definitely know it."
"How would you do it, then?" she challenged.
"A bullet, back of the head. Messy and painful, but quick," Lucas replied cheerfully.
She swallowed, tensing up a bit. Her shoulders began to ache from the way her arms were tied back. "Why are you doing this? Surely you know Harry and Ros won't give Albany to you. Especially not now. Not after you've taken Jamie and Emma – they're children, Lucas. We're not civilians – you can do what you like with me – but children? You're a monster."
"Yes," he agreed. "Yes, Ruth, I am. I've killed more people than you will ever know. I don't want to kill you; I don't want to harm you at all. Maybe in a different time, we could have been friends – maybe even lovers, if you hadn't met Harry."
She shook her head. "No," she said quietly. "If I hadn't met Harry, I'd still be married to Rose's father. And I would be miserable."
"When did you meet Harry?" Lucas inquired.
"Why do you care?" she shot back. "You don't care one fig about me; you've made that patently obvious."
"Harry used to do a lot of field work," Lucas said. "They usually sent me as his secondary. He used to pull women at the pub like it wasn't even a thing – I remember once when he took home twin sisters…"
Ruth gritted her teeth; she knew Harry had a less than stellar track record with women. "Make your point," she ground out.
"I remember when everything changed," Lucas said. "He was posed as a teacher; I was a janitor. We were just finishing up the op and he wanted to go pull at the pub, like always. Funny thing is, that time, I managed to get out of there with a hot piece of ass faster than he did – he was mooning and swooning over some mousy little thing in the corner, and I took a supermodel wannabe back to the hotel. I didn't see him for the entire weekend; he was shacked up with whoever he took home. A week or so later, he came back to work and after that, he didn't so much as look at a woman. So what makes you so different that he had to have you?" he challenged.
Ruth lifted her chin defiantly. "Keep your supermodel wannabes," she hissed coldly.
"When did you meet Harry?"
"None of your business."
His hand suddenly shot out and he grabbed her chin, hard. "We've still got an hour," Lucas said. "There's a lot I could do to you in an hour…"
"You're hurting me," she forced out. Her jaw still ached from when she'd hit her head a week prior, and he was squeezing hard enough to make her want to scream.
"I don't care," he said. "Answer my question."
She swallowed hard. "I met Harry in Cheltenham. At a pub," Ruth choked out. "I was out with some friends from work on a Friday night. He was charming and I was lonely."
Lucas's eyes narrowed. "You're the one that changed him," he accused.
"Maybe so," she acknowledged. "Maybe for the better."
Lucas sneered at her. "Right," he scoffed more than slightly sarcastically.
"You asked if I had ever felt that kind of love," she said sharply, "and Harry is it for me. Over and done, Lucas. I wouldn't touch another man now –"
He looked at her full-on, and she immediately regretted saying that. The darkness in his eyes was beyond madness, beyond frightening. And somewhere in that depravity, two and two made a bushel of potatoes.
And she was bound at the wrists and the ankles.
Lucas put the gag back between her lips. "I don't want you to tell Harry about our little… indiscretion…" he said softly, almost kindly. "And he only need know that you're alive and well for him to do what I need."
Ruth bit back a sob; she'd cried and cried and begged him to stop, but he was intent on making someone pay the price for his dive off the deep end of sanity. Her skin crawled where he'd touched her so gently, turning her body's reactions against her. The worst part was feeling him inside her, where Harry should have been – it hurt, and she hurt emotionally and physically. Harry would never forgive her; she would never forgive herself.
Lucas pressed a kiss to her forehead, and he said, "Now I know why Harry was so beguiled."
She almost vomited.
She retreated into the shell of herself, ignoring everything around her. It was the only way she would survive. But now she didn't want to survive; she didn't want to live another moment feeling Lucas's hands on her.
Ruth startled when he sat down beside her. "I've got to step out," Lucas said in a calm, cool voice. "Be a good girl for me," he murmured, sliding his arm around her. She recoiled, but he was stronger than she was, and held her close. She cried out in surprise when she felt the needle.
"NO – what have you done?" Ruth sobbed, but he just held her, rubbing her arm, murmuring things that were meant to be soothing. She felt her heartbeat slow, her eyes get heavy, and she wondered…
Was this what it felt like to die?
She didn't want to wake up; the voice telling her to wake up was annoying. She swatted weakly at the source of the voice and mumbled under her breath. The voice grew more insistent, and Ruth finally managed to open one eye.
"Oh thank god," Harry breathed, cupping her face in the palms of his hands. "She's alive –"
She was disoriented, everything was too loud like a percussive wave, and she felt sick to her stomach. Someone pulled an IV line out of her hand, and she moaned, mumbling about the horrible dream she'd been having.
A few minutes passed, and clarity slowly returned. Ruth felt the sedative slowly release its grip on her, and she began to realize that the nightmare had been real. She pulled away from Harry and stumbled over her feet, falling over and landing on her bum hard enough to rattle her teeth in her head.
"Ruth –"
"No, don't, don't touch me," she whispered. "Please don't. I can't – Harry, I can't bear it if you touch me." His hands fell to his sides, clenching into fists. "Harry, did you give him Albany?"
"I gave him the secondary file," Harry said. "After he synchronized the codes, it began to wipe the hard drive. Whatever he gives his benefactors, it will be useless."
She hesitated, then nodded. "Please tell me Jamie is safe –"
"Let me help you up," he sighed, extending a hand to her. She took it only long enough to get to her feet, then she shied away again. "Ruth, what –"
"Ninety minutes is a long time," she whispered, looking away from him. "A terribly long time."
He took her hand and whispered, "You need to be looked over – and have a rape kit performed."
"How can you be so calm?" she asked, flinching at the rising hysteria in her voice.
"I'd like to kill him, but it won't do me any good," Harry commented dryly. "So I'm being calm for your sake, Ruth."
"Don't think you should have to be calm for my sake," she whispered. "I feel dirty and sick and god, I hate myself –"
He pulled her into his arms and whispered, "No, please don't hate yourself. This is not your fault, Ruth. It is the fault of a madman –"
"John Bateman," she said. "His name is John Bateman."
"We're going to the hospital," Harry said firmly.
She shook her head. "I'm fine – I will be fine."
"You were –"
She shook her head and muttered, "He tried to make it good. That's why I hate myself; I reacted."
Harry's face was unreadable. "You're alive and in one piece," he said softly. "I suppose that's the best outcome we could have garnered."
"I need to see Jamie," Ruth said quietly. "I need to know he's okay."
"He's fine," Harry murmured. "Lucas – John – didn't hurt him. Or Emma."
She hesitated, then nodded, wanting to tell him that it was good that he hadn't hurt the children, because he had hurt her so badly she could barely keep breathing. It was emotional, not physical, in her case. She could hardly breathe, and the gentle pressure of Harry's hand against hers was enough to make her feel like her world was about to shatter around her.
"She needs time to get the sedative out of her system," the medic was saying to Harry, "but if you feel more secure using your own facility's emergency services, Sir Harry…"
"I do," Harry snapped. "Ruth, let's go back to Thames House."
She nodded and followed him slowly and meekly.
"No, Harry," Ros said. "I don't care what Lucas says – you at the DG. You are not meeting him. I will meet him, and I will bring him in. That's final. You need to be here, with your family."
Ruth stroked Jamie's hair and held him closely on her lap as he slept. She wanted to sleep, too, but no one would let her; the lingering effects of the anesthetic meant she could go too far under and not wake up again. So Harry was watching her like a hawk.
"You're right," Harry agreed, "but you need to be here, as well –"
Ros shook her head and said, "Harry, in this job, it's selfish of us to love anyone. He's got a bomb at a Tube station – and it's selfish of me to think that staying here and protecting my daughter is more important than protecting the lives of everyone else in the country. He holds you and I responsible for this; and we are responsible for his… lover… dying. This is what broke him. We broke him."
"Rosalind, you be careful," Harry said very quietly. "You've cheated death many times –"
Ros smiled wanly. "It's my turn," she said. She glanced at Ruth and murmured, "If anything happens to me, I've named Harry as Emma's guardian. Just so you know: I want you to adopt her, raise her well."
"Nothing is going to happen to you," Ruth murmured.
Ros shook her head and said, "If I don't come back, promise me, Ruth."
"I promise," Ruth said automatically.
"I've cheated death too many times," Ros said. "And now I'm looking down the barrel of mortality, and I don't like it at all."
"No one does," Ruth breathed, closing her eyes for a long moment. When she opened them, Ros was gone and Harry had Emma on his lap as she slept.
"They've got two bodies," Tariq said very quietly. "He shot Ros and then dove off the top of the Tower."
Ruth met Harry's unflinching gaze, and he kissed the top of Emma's head. She was cheerfully playing with his thumbs, and babbling quietly, not knowing that her life had just changed forever. It was devastating. It was terrible.
It was so very Ros, charging in cynically to save the day…
Ruth wondered if maybe, just maybe, Lucas had shot her, and she had kicked him off the roof.
The idea brought a smile to her lips.
A vindictive smile.
Vindictive thoughts.
But they blew away as quickly as they had begun, and she knew that Death had only called home those who had needed to go to restore balance and harmony to the universe.
For every evil that died, so must an equal amount of good.
Harry very quietly said, "We need to figure out where Emma is going to sleep."
Ruth glanced at him; he was braver than anyone she would ever know, standing out on the wall, stronger than every other man. The least she could do was not let him stand against the elements alone.
END PART NINETEEN