Turn Of A Card

by Amelia L. Rodgers
©2003 all rights reserved
E mail author
Not to be used without author's permission.
Turn Of A Card (previously also titled Homecoming, but reedited in 2003 to make changes I wanted) a UFO CSI story (sequel to Longer than Always).
Dedicated to Tae, who took the time to help me complete this story when pieces went missing, without that kindness you wouldn't be reading this story, and my Ed-Claire saga wouldn't have any continuity.
And as always, that extraordinary guy named Straker.

"Good morning Paul, what did you want to see me about?"

"You know what I wanted to see you about. I don't think this sentimental clinging to Straker's memory is doing the organization the least bit of good. Nobody around here is acting as if they have any common sense. I mean, take a look at this office. Nothing's changed. Not even his damn pens have been moved. I don't think I need to tell you we're fighting a war here, and we need somebody new to be in charge."

"Then you're wasting your time and mine, because I've heard this song and dance from you before. Now if you'll excuse me --I have an organization to run."

"Look at yourself Alec. What are you now, in your seventies? It takes discipline and youth and know-how to make this place work, and all you and your ilk have is tired old ideas from the seventies. You couldn't make your marriage work, what makes you think you're capable of running this place?"

"Trying to goad me into a fight so you can get me determined unstable, Paul? The whole I'm stronger, I'm leaner, I'm more virile, I'm younger than anyone else is something you're big on, isn't it. I seem to remember that Straker saved your little overdeveloped arse when the aliens attacked your aircraft. The same Straker that you thought was too old and too feeble. Where you had brawn, he had intellect. Where you had youth, he had will power and wisdom. Ed would have found a way to survive."

"He's dead, Alec. He's been dead for months. There are a couple of us that would like you to finally come out and acknowledge it. The Straker legend blew to bits in that helicopter you gave him on a whim, and he burned with it. His property almost burnt to the ground along with him. Let's face it, you don't want to look at the facts."

"You have a problem with my style, Foster, take it to the Commission."

"With Virginia Lake in charge? I wouldn't have a prayer. She won't even answer my calls."

"Maybe you should have taken her to more expensive restaurants when you two dated. I hear women like that sort of thing. She might be holding a grudge."

Alec took a cigar out of Straker's pail and began to unwrap it.

"I want a crack at command of Shado, Alec."

"I want to sleep with Marilyn Monroe, but neither of us has much chance at making our dreams a reality, do we?"

"I'm taking your job, one way or another, Alec. It's nothing personal. This doesn't have anything to do with you, it has to do with the welfare of the organization."

"You really believe that, don't you? What a crock. I always wondered why Straker never leaned harder on you. I'd appoint Captain Ford in my place before I'd ever allow you to hang your hat on the studio office hat rack, and Keith would be a hell of a lot more successful because unlike you, he's got a heart. Now get the hell out of here, before I ring up Constantine to do still another psychological study on you. I figure the more she does, the more chance I have of finding a legitimate reason for kicking you out of the sky and making you a baggage handler at Heathrow." Alec jabbed the door button. Foster snarled, went to the door, turned in the doorway. He pitched his voice high enough for all the operatives in Control to hear him.

"This isn't over, Colonel Freeman. You're putting everyone in jeopardy with your loyalty to a man who is dead and gone. I have the guts to tell you so, even though nobody else seems to."

"Mrs. Claire Straker has never believed he is dead."

"Straker's wife? Everyone knows she's balmy. Someone has to face the reality of the situation. This isn't over."

Alec watched the door close, studied the cigar, and tossed it back in the cigar pail in disgust. He picked up the phone.

"Harry, get me a secure line to Mrs. Straker, and then ring me back. No other calls."

"Righto." Harry Andrews said on the other end of the line.

Alec got up, stretched, yawned.

The phone rang. He grabbed it.

"Hiya Alec," Claire said. "What's up? Graham told me you were on the phone. I was just looking over some receipts."

"Hi gorgeous. Foster's on my back again."

"You're just as bad as Edward was, you know. Letting him get to you. I suppose he isn't happy with me?"

"He thinks you're nuts."

"Well, let's see, I paid an enormous amount just to buy another Palladian window to install in the master bedroom. That qualifies me, I think. Or it might be a few nights ago at the fund raising dinner for Edward's Foundation, Foster made a big play for me. He actually kissed my hand for the cameras, all the while talking about how grand I was for continuing in Edward's footsteps. I smiled and Graham and I ushered him into my office and I slapped the hell out of him. With my prosthesis on too. Must have scared the shit out of him when my fake fingers went flying."

"You're kidding!"

"The prosthetic fingers stay on with suction, and they work well, but I don't think they were designed to stand up under fist fights, Alec. Anyway, I think Graham put his nose out of joint after that. Literally. By the time Graham threw him out of the party, and Yvonne tossed his butt into his car, he already had the makings of a shiner. If he's saying I'm insane, that's probably why. Men and their wounded male egos. Excluding you, of course."

"Of course. That makes two Strakers that have beat the hell out of Paul Foster," Alec said appreciatively.

"Alec how are you holding up?"

"Me? How are you holding up?"

"You first. I heard about your marriage breaking up. I'm sorry, Alec."

"Don't be. Yetunde and I agreed to seek a friendly divorce. I'm seeking custody of Ayomide and Yetunde isn't contesting it. I found a wonderful woman to look after Ayomide, too. My daughter's getting to the terrible twos, you know, and she won't shut up. I had to attend a Commission meeting to get funding to train new personnel, and the nanny I usually use was sick, and Yetunde's visiting Carmella, helping her with Carmella's new baby daughter, which unfortunately looks like Nate. So I had to practically toss Ayomide in my attaché case and take her to the meeting with me. She was a big hit, she told them all about her Barbie or whatever doll it was she insisted on taking. I got the funds without any problem at all."

"Edward could have used her back in his negotiations with the General," Claire chuckled. "As his secret weapon."

"Ed would have put her on the payroll. How are you doing?"

"I keep myself busy. Graham and Yvonne nag me to keep going, Frances and Angel make sure I eat. The Foundation is considering extending from funding Mayland Hospital and children's causes to include homeless. I've been hiring homeless to work on Silk Wood Manor with the backing of the Shelter organization, and we house and feed them as they learn a new trade. I tried to keep Angel out of it, but he insisted on incorporating saving their souls while the Foundation improved their lives. I haven't had any complaints yet. Angel converts you so subtly that you're baptized before you even realize he got you in the chapel. If you're really a tough case, Frances feeds you and you're a goner, you'll memorize the entire Bible to get another meal."

"How are you really, Claire?"

There was a long silence on the phone. Alec really didn't need to ask the question. He knew what she'd say.

"I miss him, Alec. I miss him so much. I replaced the oil painting of him that was in Mayland's lobby with one of the publicity photographs he took for the Foundation press kit. I had the oil painting put in the lounge of Silk Wood Manor, over the marble fireplace so it'll give me the feeling that he's watching over me. Alec, the restoration after the fire is coming along well, can you come for dinner tonight, and I can show you around? The new dining table and chairs should finally be here by then." she laughed quietly.

"I'll try Claire, but work is piling up here and I'm swamped. I'll do my best."

"You always do. Goodbye, Alec I won't keep you."

"Goodbye."

Alec looked at the phone for a minute before he replaced it in the cradle. How many more times could he use work at Shado as an excuse not to see her? Every time he saw her it was just heartbreaking proof that Ed Straker was lost to them. Probably for good. The terrible emptiness in her eyes always reminded him of Ed's absence. He would have given anything to just turn his back on the job and take Ayomide with him, maybe go back out to Australia, show his aging Mum her grandchild, help her with the station. Let Foster have what he wanted.

He picked up one of Ed's fountain pens.

"You're why I won't do it, you lousy beggar. You'd never forgive me. You won't let me go."

Alec hurled the pen against the wall. Then he got up, bent and retrieved it, and put it gently back where it belonged.

* * *

"You aren't eating much again." Frances scolded.

"I was hoping Alec would show up. This damn rain is getting to me. I think I'm going to just go home and up to bed, now that I have one. Staying in that hotel was suffocating me."

"You could have stayed with us, Child," Angel said, pausing between his bites of shepherd's pie.

"I know that, Angel. I just wanted to come home to Silk Wood Manor instead, and now that it's practically completely finished, I can stay there. Wait until you see the gorgeous oak canopy bed for the master bedroom that was delivered finally. Yvonne and I found it in the most beautiful little antique shop in London. We bought all the linens at Harrods. Paintings and furniture are still arriving."

"When everything is finished, we will have a housewarming party for you." Frances said, "Angel and I will come see Silk Wood Manor when you are done with it."

"I'd love that. Thank you for the meal and your company. I'm going to go home now, Graham, where did I leave my coat and umbrella?"

"On the coat rack, Ma'am. Let me get them for you."

"I can manage, Graham. My first night back in Silk Wood Manor. It sounds just wonderful. Dinner was marvellous, as usual, Frances. Goodbye Angel. See you in the morning if weather permits."

"Not tomorrow, Child, it's Saturday and Frances and I are going to relax for once." he chuckled.

"I don't expect that the workmen will miss you teaching about heaven when all they want is a square meal, a roof over their heads and their paycheques." Claire grinned, kissing them both on the cheek.

"A little religion never hurt a soul, but it's saved many," Angel declared with a laugh.

"Quite frankly I've never liked the idea of all those men being in so close a proximity to the Manor when you're all by yourself. Some of those men are ruffians, if you ask me. They scare me. "

"They're homeless, Frances, they barely survive even when the weather is good. The work on Silk Wood Manor is almost finished, and as soon as it is, the temporary structure they're housed in will be turned into a house, and they'll be gone. Besides, I have Graham and Yvonne staying with me, and Edward watches over me too. Good night."

Angel and Frances walked Claire to the door, and waited until she drove away.

"Poor, poor thing. It just breaks my heart to see her, Cupcake."

"She has faith Edward will find his way home to her, and faith is all that is carrying her, Stanley, and if she believes that he is alive, then I do."

"Darling, I think Q-tip is really gone. I think deep inside her she knows it."

"Oh Stanley, why would the Lord allow such a thing? Sometimes I think there isn't any God." Frances went to the sideboard and poured herself a brandy.

"We both know better. Frances, you're beginning to worry me the way you drink these days. Next thing we know, you'll be in the sacramental wine," chuckled Angel, joining her and holding out his own snifter for her. "You're practically turning into Alec."

"Stanley, you know perfectly well that I rarely touch it. Besides, dear Alec hasn't touched a drop since our Edward disappeared. He's become a perfect father to his little girl, and he works himself silly at Shado. I'm worried about him."

"You worry over everyone. That's why I love you. Now stop this getting yourself in a tizzy over nothing."

"Over nothing? Edward is dead, Stanley! Edward is dead!" Frances broke into a sob.

The reverend sighed.

"I know. I think Q-tip would want us not to mourn him, and go on with our lives. After all he died doing what he loved best, fighting the alien beasties. Come on, Frances, my sweet. Leave the cleaning up for the morning. Let's go on up to bed. I'm needing the feel of you in my old arms."

* * *

"Now don't forget, the guards will be patrolling the perimeter, but you have to remember to lock the main doors and turn on the security system for the Manor itself before you go to sleep. Graham and I will be within yelling distance in the staff's quarters, just push the button on the wall. Sure I can't talk you into going to bed so that I can do it myself before I leave?"

"I'm not tired yet. I'm going to finish my coffee and sit and read here a while. Goodnight Yvonne."

"Good night, Claire. Don't forget the security settings. Sleep well." Yvonne sighed.

Claire curled up on the small velvet couch that faced the fireplace, and studied the gilt framed painting hanging over the mantel. The painter had captured her husband sitting in a forest green wing chair, mouth barely curved in a crescent of an impatient smile, white-blond hair perfectly groomed, Navy double-breasted suit and striped tie immaculate, shoes shined, hands in lap, one hand resting on his Swiss wristwatch. She listened to the logs crackling in the fireplace and to the rain pounding on the windows as she sipped a little coffee then put the delicate porcelain cup and saucer on a nearby oak bookcase.

"Where are you, sweet Edward? Do you have enough to eat? Are you in pain? When are you coming home? This is your home, you know. Silk Wood Manor isn't really mine. I share it with you. Edward, you have to come home, darling. I'm not doing very well as the grieving widow. I know you're alive somewhere, somewhere far away. You left during a storm like this, Edward, do you remember? Can you hear me sweetheart? I think I'll sleep here; I'm too tired to go upstairs. No. That isn't true. I just couldn't stand to be in a bed that doesn't have you in it. Nothing I eat has any flavour. Nothing I drink satisfies my thirst. They want me to have a service for you so that everyone can have closure. I won't, Edward. I'll wait for you until hell freezes over. They can all go to hell. Everybody thinks I've turned into a real business executive, taking care of the homeless and running your charity. If I didn't have something to do, I'd lose my mind. Maybe I already have, talking to your painting. Know what would tickle your sense of irony, Edward? One of the only things that wasn't damaged in the fire were the Grade 2 gates you hated so much." Claire chuckled softly, then suppressed a sob. "I'm tired, Edward. I think I'll sleep now. Good night beloved."

Claire lay on the couch, pulling a chenille throw in soft pastel colours halfway over her, and cried herself into an exhausted sleep. The doors to the Silk Wood Manor remained unlocked.

Eventually, the fire in the fireplace died down and the light in the lounge faded away with it, leaving near-darkness in its place. The rain settled down to a mere icy sprinkle. The grandfather clock in the Great hall chimed the Westminster chime to inform the Manor occupants that it was midnight.

The heavy oak door to the Manor opened a cautious crack, and the newly installed security system, useless because the activation code had not been punched into it, failed to register the fact.

A bearded, scarred figure limped in, leaning on a hickory cane, and closed the door behind him quietly, and waited for his good eye to adjust to the darkness. The rain dripped from his bedraggled, patched clothes. Then he crossed the hall wearily and unrolled his sleeping bag in front of the fireplace, set down his rucksack, removed his shoes and peeled his socks off and settled into it, and fell asleep almost at once, oblivious to the woman who slept a few feet away on the settee.

The woman who unknown to him, was his wife.

Graham Lancaster went to the master bedroom with a breakfast tray while Yvonne surprisingly remained asleep. It was rare to manage to rise before she did but not only had he taken his morning shower and fully dressed, he had managed to steal into the kitchen with its shiny new Aga, and fry two eggs sunny side up, and cook up a rasher of bacon. Claire liked grapefruit juice, coffee and toast as well. It had become a game between Yvonne and he to see who looked after Mrs. Straker better. He rapped lightly on the door and opened it.

"Rise and shine."

She wasn't there.

Oh sod all. She'd stayed up all night again and probably was asleep downstairs. That often happened in the suite he'd shared with her at Claridge's. She wouldn't sleep, and then she'd be practically sleepwalking through the day. It wouldn't do. Americans were so exasperating.

He walked down the stairs and as he expected, there she was on the couch, dozing. What the? There was someone fast asleep on the rug in front of the fireplace. Male by the look of things. One of the unkempt men she had hired through the charity. All very heart-warming, but enough was enough. He put down the tray on the sideboard noisily, and coughed meaningfully. The unforgivable thought entered his mind that perhaps she was having a liaison with this stranger? Absurd. She could have had her pick of the bachelors among the aristocracy of England. She loved Commander Straker even now; despite the fact the Master had been dead for nearly a year. The thought was unworthy of him; she didn't possess the guile to invite a man secretly into her bed. Claire stirred, yawned, smiled at him.

"Good morning, Graham. Something smells good. Oh thank heaven, we might actually have some sunshine for a while. What time is-oh my God! Pins and needles! Who is that?"

Although she was fully dressed, she grabbed the chenille throw and covered herself and peered at the intruder over the edge of it.

"I was about to ask you, Ma'am." Graham announced.

The figure on the rug was aroused by their voices and he looked startled, although his expression was hard to make out because of his beard, black eye patch and shock of white hair, which was practically screaming out for a cutting.

"Graham I think you better call Yvonne."

The man gestured at them, shaking his head in a firm no, pointing to his throat. He then put up a hand, with difficulty climbed out of the sleeping bag, which like him had seen better days. He fumbled for his cane, stumbled in the necessity to leave, and would have fallen if it hadn't been for the mantle, which he grabbed. Claire lowered the chenille fortress, the doctor in her winning over her reserve. The man's leg seemed painfully stiff.

"Are you one of the workers? Wait. Don't go. How did you get in? Oh oh, I don't think I locked the door and I forgot to activate the security-Graham close your mouth or the flies will go in."

"Ma'am. How many times must we tell you? This is really quite inexcusable. You're a wealthy woman and the possibility for you being kidnapped is unfortunately quite high."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, now I know why Edward hated security," she muttered to herself.

"Ma'am?"

"Nothing, Graham. Why did you sneak in?" she addressed the man.

He furrowed his eyebrows, shrugged.

"Fancied you could steal something valuable to pawn for alcohol, no doubt." Graham guessed. "Common drunkard."

"Graham, whatever are you saying?" Claire said.

"I can smell him from here."

The man shook his head in defiance, the one good eye blazing at the accusation.

"What on earth is going on?" Yvonne said, wrapping her robe around her and hurrying down the stairs just as the grandfather clock chimed eight times.

"So much for your flawless security detail, this man snuck in during the night, I found him only a few feet away from Mrs. Straker."

"Yvonne, it's all my fault, I fell asleep and didn't lock the door and neglected to turn on the security systems," Claire said sheepishly.

"Tabarnaque!" Yvonne growled. "You. Who are you? Wait a minute; I've seen you about you're the mute. I heard the others mocking you because you don't take your meals with the others. You're very lucky that Mrs. Straker gave you a chance of making a decent living, and you repay her this way? No wonder you aren't liked by the rest of them."

"I do as I see fit," he croaked out in a painfully hoarse voice that sounded like a combination of ground glass and pumice stone. A kerchief he wore around his neck slid down enough for Claire to see that he had scarring that might have been from a cord pulled tightly across his throat. It almost looked like he'd been hung at some point and had somehow survived.

"You aren't even a mute!" Yvonne accused.

"I wasn't the one who said I was." he retorted in that same heartrendingly painful tone. "I am not an alcoholic. I take whiskey for the pain. You think you are better than me," he rasped. "You are wrong. I suppose I am sacked? That suits me, I can work hard, I'll find work. I don't need the lot of you." He looked at Claire. "I'm sorry I disturbed you, and that is the truth. I just thought for one night I could sleep where it was warm and quiet and safe. I'm going."

"Wait. I haven't sacked you, and it isn't them that make the decisions around here. What's your name? Sit down. Wherever you like," she added.

"Have you gone dotty?" Graham asked.

"You should have figured that out when she admitted she didn't lock the door!" moaned Yvonne.

"Leave us alone," Claire said. They stared at her in unison. They left the same way. "Sometimes I'd give anything to just be plain old Claire living in an apartment in the States, with a faucet that leaked," she complained. "Sit down. Are you hungry? Graham always cooks breakfast like he's feeding his old Army unit. There's plenty for both of us."

"The coffee smells delicious," he replied quietly.

"Then come sit with me and share it, and help me eat my breakfast too. Those two don't let me talk to normal people. If I meet one more member of the aristocracy, I may scream."

He chuckled, winced.

"How did you hurt your throat?"

"Accident." he shrugged.

"I'm Claire. What's your name?"

"I'm called Neal."

"Does your throat give you much pain? Were your vocal cords damaged in the accident, Neal?"

He nodded. He steadied himself on his cane and crossed to the black leather wing chair and sat down gingerly, rubbing his knee.

"Have you ever seen a doctor?"

"I don't like them. I manage. Are you sure you want me to be with you?"

"How do you take your coffee? No, don't get up again, I'll fix you a plate. Last night I was having cookies and coffee so I have an empty plate I can put your food on, I only drank the coffee, I never touched the cookies, if you'd like them."

"You're American?"

"Yes. How do you like your coffee?"

"In great quantities," he responded. She laughed.

"Caffeine addiction?"

"I suppose so. Two sugars and a dollop of cream if you don't mind."

He takes it the way Edward likes it, she thought with a smile. Poor lonely man, I bet he just wanted some intelligent company.

The two of them ate in comfortable silence, and she tried to ignore the way he wolfed down his portion so it wouldn't embarrass him, and was a little surprised when he daintily dabbed at his mouth with the linen napkin afterwards. He traced his finger around the empty glass, seemingly enjoying its texture. Then he tapped the rim of fine crystal glassware to hear the reassuring, beautiful tone and she smiled. "Vibration analysis," he said.

"What?"

Neal frowned and put the glass down as if its existence troubled him.

"What's wrong?"

"I don't know. I should go now. This sunshine won't last, I should go get an early start. There is a lot of painting to do. I'm very good at it." He winced again, let his heavily calloused fingers rest for a moment on the patch then fall away.

"Neal, do you have any sight in that eye?"

"It bothers me. I keep it covered up."

"When's the last time you went to see a doctor?"

"No doctors!"

"I'm a doctor. Or at least I was, before I hurt my hand."

"Your hand doesn't look hurt."

"These fingers are prosthetic ones," she chuckled, wiggling them, pulling one off and watching his single blue eye widen.

"How did you hurt your hand?"

"Bomb blast."

"Only your hand was harmed?"

"Yes, why?"

"I'm glad. Glad that a beautiful woman such as yourself-oh. I shouldn't have said that. I didn't have any right to say that."

"Why ever not, Neal? I can tell when a person is being genuine and you were being genuine. I'm flattered. Neal, what happened to you, what caused you to be so crippled?"

"I'm not helpless," he said in rising anger. It sent shivers through her. She wasn't at all sure why. What she was sure of is that this strange man needed some affection, some friendship. Someone that cared about whether he lived or died. My God listen to me, that's the exact thing that got me into trouble with Edward. We're not going down that road again.

"I didn't say you were, but you have a pronounced limp as though one of your legs is shorter than the other, and sometimes that happens when a leg is fractured and doesn't heal as it should. I noticed you have pain in your knee, too."

"You are a doctor. Doctors talk like that," he said in agitation. She grinned.

"We're a pesky lot. Neal, would you let me look at your leg? I promise not to harm you. It won't hurt."

She frowned as his whole body stiffened and he blanched, he seemed as if he wanted to flatten himself against the wing chair, disappear into it.

Here, tear his clothes off and hold him down. Lie still, will you? Do as I say, do as I tell you, lad! I have to straighten that leg out, I know how to do it, done it plenty of times. Otherwise you'll never take a step again, lad. Take another swallow of this, lad and it won't hurt. They'd forced it down his throat until he nearly suffocated. It hadn't helped.

It had hurt. He had screamed. He had remembered he had screamed. Screamed every time they tied his leg to the board, every time they had used a penknife they'd held in the fireplace to kill off the germs, and stuck it into his kneecap, working out the shrapnel embedded in it. He had screamed. And it seemed to him they'd taken a liking to it. He was among monsters.

Nothing they had done to him in those first days hurt as much as when they'd forced his wedding ring off and taken his wristwatch, he had fought it with everything in him, but they'd insisted that he owed them for saving his life. He had wept. Then they'd tightened the rope around his leg again and he'd screamed himself into welcome unconsciousness.

Claire had stood up and gently taken his hands in hers, knowing it might not be a wise decision. Obviously he was lost in some nightmarish memory. He'd wanted a warm, safe place to sleep. What in God's name had happened to the man? Was he a veteran of some war? It was impossible to tell with the matted hair, patch and beard what his age was. He'd been badly treated by someone; that much she was sure of.

"I won't tell! Don't hurt me! I won't tell!" he screamed.

He pitched forward, jerking, starting to seizure, and she caught him before his head hit the floor.

* * *

Alec Freeman, in the long tradition of assailing male guilt with flowers, had popped into the florist's, plunked down change for a bouquet of baby carnations, and was pushing the door to get out when he ran into someone he didn't want to see. He figured karma was out to get him.

"Alec! God, man! Good to see you!"

"Hullo Jack, didn't expect to see you around here!"

Translated that meant that Jack was always broke and always looking for a loan, which he never paid back. So why was he in one of the more expensive Bayswater florist shops with a huge bouquet of roses?

"I've had a bit of luck at poker, can you imagine? Those for the missus?" Jack slapped Alec on the back, and Alec felt his spine decidedly crack into a z shape.

"No. They're for a friend of mine, Claire Straker."

"Listen, Alec. Car's in the shop, do you think you could do me a favour?"

Here it comes. All right, what excuse do I use this time? Illness, maybe. Bubonic plague? Acne?

"What sort of favour, Jack?" he heard himself say cautiously to the man's bulbous nose. Jack had been a boxer in his youth, and Jack was now at the age where Alec doubted whether Jack still knew what the word boxer meant.

"You know how London Transport is, bit of a pain, and car hire is a waste of money. I was wondering if you could drive me round to a pawnshop back home in Liverpool?"

"Liverpool is at least four hours away." Alec groaned.

"Oh we can have a spirited conversation about old times all the way up the M11 to the M1, to the M6 and M56 into Liverpool, won't take but two shakes of a lamb's tail. The new girlfriend saw a sparkly she liked in the window, hard to find a pawnshop these days and I wouldn't be but a moment, and you could give me a lift home afterwards, we'd knock back a couple of pints together?"

"I don't drink these days, Jack. Sure, my car is parked up the street."

"Don't drink? I suppose you've found religion too!" and he slapped Alec heartily, guffawing, and Alec imagined his spine looked like crushed tinfoil by then. After four hours of listening to Jack, his brain would undoubtedly match.

* * *

"Paul Foster? PAUL FOSTER did it?"

Yvonne hurriedly swooped Claire Straker into her Mayland office and closed the door.

"I'm afraid there's more. Foster intends to force Colonel Freeman into resigning."

"Foster needs help zipping up his own pants, Yvonne, he'll never get Alec to resign until Alec wants to. What I'm enraged at is that Foster would have Edward's special hospital room here turned into an ordinary ward, and do it behind my back, and take what was left of Ed's personal belongings and dump them in cardboard boxes. I hope Alec kills him. Because if he doesn't, I will."

Yvonne sighed.

"Pins and needles, Yvonne! What?"

"Foster, rutting bitch that he is, found a little used mandate written into the Shado bylaws that decrees any operative who reaches the age of seventy must be forced to retire. Alec's going to technically turn seventy in less than a month."

"Enforced retirement? What idiot wrote that mandate?"

Yvonne chewed on her lip until she nearly bit it off.

"Oh no. No. Not Edward?"

Yvonne looked down gloomily at the tile floor. Claire burst into heavy sobs.

"I can't stand it anymore, Yvonne! I can't handle this. I don't want to ever set foot in this hospital again. Nobody here stood up to that tin god and told him to go to hell. I thought I had friends here. Nobody even called me or even Alec. They just allowed Foster to bulldoze through my husband's things in the pretence of saving some money when he knew damn well Edward paid for it out of his own pocket and it never cost Shado a cent! They never would have allowed this if Edward were still with us. This is a power grab, Yvonne. And now Alec, using Edward's own law against him! I'm taking the Foundation's support away from this damn hospital and its damn board of ass-kissers, Yvonne. Foster wants to run things here? Fine. He can come up with a way to fund it. I'm finished! I'll have Neal moved, I was going to have someone at Moorfields Hospital look at Neal anyway."

Claire settled down, took a deep breath, picked up the bronze nameplate that said Dr. Claire Spencer, Paediatric Surgery and threw it toward the nearest window. Yvonne gawked as the window splintered.

"He can fund the replacement of that window, too. I'm surprised he didn't have my office carted off, and have me shoved into a broom closet. Come on. Help me with one of these boxes. I'm getting Neal out of here."

Yvonne hoisted the heavy box containing Ed's belongings and trotted after the indignant Claire Straker who acted like she was Cleopatra on her barge. I'm a good Roman Catholic, Yvonne thought, but I never really believed in demonic possession, until now.

* * *

Alec stood around with his hands in his pockets, and listened to the pawnshop owner and Jack discuss local politics until he was sure he'd go potty. Finally he started to look around at what the shop had available, since he still had a few hours before he had to leave and drive to Silk Wood Manor. He surprisingly spotted a familiar looking watch under a glass case, a Certina Certiday. The same brand of watch he'd given Ed as a present on Ed's fortieth birthday. You didn't see many of that brand and particular style these days. He wondered if he should buy it for Claire, or would it be too painful for her? He decided to get it, have it repaired if needs be. Get a new strap to fit her wrist. Resist the inclination to keep it himself.

"Take that watch out of the case, please, I want it."

"Oh yes, good choice Sir, if I may say so, got that in a couple days back, you can always have the inscription on the back removed by a silversmith. Perfect working order, too. Here you go. Will that be cash or credit, Sir?"

Alec turned the wristwatch over, and his face drained of blood. There was an inscription just like the shopkeeper had said. With the date inverted in American style.

To Ed from Alec 7-10-80

Alec actually growled, hurled himself over the counter in an athletic exhibition more worthy of a twenty-five year old man than one aged seventy-four and grabbed the terrified shopkeeper and shook him the way a Doberman might tear into a piece of raw meat. Jack just blinked and stared at Alec as if the Australian had suddenly taken off his Burberry to reveal a pink tutu and tights. Alec shoved him against the wall, and several goods crashed off the shelves to the floor.

"Who brought this in? Tell me! Tell me or by God I will smash your little beady eyed face in until you do! You keep records on everything, right?"

"Y-y-y-yes!"

Holding his prey by the scruff of the neck with one hand, Alec fished in his wallet until he found the card that identified him as Detective Chief Superintendent Cedric Powell of New Scotland Yard, and held it in front of the terrified man, who looked well on his way to forgetting the potty training his Mum had taught him. Alec shoved his wallet back in a pocket. The shopkeeper was feeling a bit like Tokyo and Alec at the moment was Godzilla.

"I want to see everything you have in the way of paperwork on this wristwatch. You've got a video camera in this shop, do you have the footage on whoever brought this thing in?"

"Y-y-yes, I think so, I've been busy with other things, so I didn't erase the tape."

"I want the receipts, and I want the tape and I want it now, or I'll stick you in Her Majesty's prison for so long your balls will crumble into dust before you get out! Now find what I want! MOVE!"

As the man stumbled toward the back, Alec clenched his teeth together. No matter what condition he might be in, or how impoverished a situation he might find himself in, Ed Straker would never have pawned the treasured memento. So that meant Ed might be alive somewhere and someone else had taken it from Ed, and done it.

Alec Freeman intended to find out who.

* * *

Graham Lancaster turned the pages of Country Life in a snit. Here he was, ex-Army Intelligence, had been a hound among the Russian foxes with the best of them, making decent money being one of Mrs. Straker's staff, living in a sprawling manor in a suite of rooms that was better than his old flat, living the good life. And what was he doing on a Saturday evening? Nursing a man that looked like a one-eyed Father Christmas. Not that he envied the chap, the fellow had been through more medical procedures than he'd had exams at university for his six O levels.

Graham checked his watch. He peered at the man in his sickbed over the edge of the magazine. Yes, he appeared to still be breathing. Super. Now where had he seen that article about a ban on hunting? The very idea!

The man was muttering something. Sounded like he was saying don't, don't. He'd been in and out of sleep. At least when they'd done the brain scan on him with the electrodes pasted to his skull they'd had to wash his hair afterward. A good cutting is what it needed, length of the boar bristles on a Kent brush. Honestly, the man looked more like a woman then a woman did. They'd combed it out and collected it neatly with an elastic band. Graham made up his mind to make him cut it, and trim the beard as well, at least, although dispensing of it altogether was preferable. Graham wondered if he could get away with accidentally on purpose losing the man's patched clothes. Graham hadn't bothered to stick them in the wardrobe; he'd merely rolled them up in a ball and stuck them in a drawer, washing his hands afterwards of course. He decided to pretend he didn't know where they were when Mrs. Straker and Yvonne came to fetch him. After all, if he had to be under the same roof with him, he should dress decently. The troublesome fellow certainly looked more presentable in the standard hospital logo pyjamas they'd given him, even if they weren't striped with a monogram over the pocket. Monogram, they didn't even know the beggar's Christian name. Were they going to call him Neal forever? He was beginning to think that Mrs. Straker had adopted the fellow the way you'd take in a stray cat. If she wanted a pet, she could have chosen a better breed. The man had snuck into her home, for heavens' sake. And had she called the police? No. She'd allowed him to stay, even fed him. Americans!

Graham put down the Country Life and picked up the Independent, but his perusal of the newspaper was interrupted by a turbaned chap in a doctor's smock, who entered the ward with a chart, closed the curtains around the bed, and smiled at Graham. God, to think India was now independent.

"How is he doing?"

"Asleep, obviously. You'd be?"

"Forgive my manners, I am just coming off duty after a long day. I am Dr. Mukesh Lokprakash, new on staff, you see and I have the results of the tests we did on him. No indications of epilepsy. But there is much more that troubles me. He has some sort of bacteria in his bloodstream that doesn't seem to be responding to the antibiotics we tried. He seems to have an allergy to many of them. Not having a medical history, this is difficult."

"I'm Mr. Lancaster." Difficult? thought Graham. Trying to repeat your bloody name is what I'd call difficult, I can't be sure if you gave it or if you merely hiccupped. "I'm afraid that isn't my area, my employer brought him in, she is on the staff of this hospital. She tried to have him checked into a private room upstairs but there was some problem with it, and so she went with an assistant to find out what was wrong. Been gone several hours now. Worrisome."

"I see." the doctor pulled up a chair and took Neal's pulse, both at his wrist and at the carotid artery in his neck. "You see the ligature marks on this man's throat? Most disturbing."

"Graham," Claire Spencer said breathlessly, bursting in through the curtain with Yvonne and setting down the box she had been carrying, "We're getting out of he-oh. You assigned to Neal? I don't recognize you. I'm Mrs. Claire Straker, I brought Neal in."

The man stood briefly, shook hands with her then took a chair again.

"Dr. Mukesh Lokprakash, pleased to meet you. I was just getting acquainted with Mr. Lancaster and telling him that I accumulated a wealth of knowledge about this unfortunate man after the battery of tests and the two medical procedures we did on him."

"What procedures? What were the results of the tests?"

"The usual, MRI, Wada, brain imaging EEG, and the like. The brain scans show no indication of brain damage or injury, no sign of what may have caused the grande mal, although there is a faint scar that may be from a past skull injury. He had a corneal abrasion in one eye, which we treated, fortunately it was not serious, but naturally it must have caused him a good deal of pain. He seemed quite stoic about it, and it will heal as long as he follows my directions carefully, is disciplined about using the drops and has a follow up to make sure there are no complications."

"I was about to have him checked in at Moorfields, I'm a doctor, or at least I was, an injury ended my surgical career. I'll make sure he gets the best of care. Go on." "However, as I was saying, this case disturbs me. You will note that he has ligature scars at the throat, evidence of some injury to the vocal cords, accounting for his raspy speech. Findings show that his voice may return to normal, provided he rests it. The scars on his throat and on his entire body trouble me. He has some sort of bacterial infection in his bloodstream that doesn't seem to be responding to the antibiotics we tried, and as I told Mr. Lancaster he even appears to have an allergy to some antibiotics. He had a fracture of the tibia, which has started to heal, but not perfectly, plus a hip and shoulder implant with faint scarring that indicates previous surgeries. We removed some foreign bodies from his knee, which was practically one massive, infected wound. He admitted when the pain from his multiple injuries was severe; he would drink any liquor he could afford that was available to ease it. I fear he is undernourished, obviously underweight. He got extremely frightened, and quite agitated when I would touch him and he refused to try and recall the accident that he had, or tell me where he'd been before he met up with you. He seemed certain that you had abandoned him when he couldn't locate you, and I assured him you would return after he underwent testing. I suspect he is suffering from traumatic induced amnesia and possibly even the seizure was caused by repressed memories breaking through. I would suspect at some time in the past he may have been tortured."

"Tortured?" Claire said in disbelief. Yvonne got uncharacteristically pale and even Graham shuddered. Lokprakash nodded gravely.

"I don't recommend allowing him to go on working, he should have extensive medical and psychological care and in particular have a microbiologist study that bacteria. I think he was intuitively very wise to break into your home, Mrs. Straker. I would say more than anything he requires tender loving care." the East Indian physician chuckled. "I have a list of the drugs and a form outlining the follow up care he needs, here you are. I will sign his paperwork so you can take him with you, and get a wheelchair."

"No wheelchair." a voice rasped decidedly. "I'll walk on my own two legs. I'm not helpless. I'm not returning to Silk Wood Manor. Where are my things? I won't be a burden to anyone or anything. And Doctor Lokprakash, in all respect, your theories are bullshit. Where's my cane?"

Lokprakash grinned.

"Awake finally, are we? Good luck with him, you will need it." He went out.

"If you think you're just going to sail on out of here, forget it. Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world you walked into mine, and I'm keeping you there until I decide to throw you out." Claire snapped. Neal scowled at her.

"I hate Casablanca. Don't quote Casablanca to me."

"Don't tell me what to do, Neal. You work for me."

"Don't use that tone on me!"

"Or what? You'll beat me up? With a lousy eye and a lousy knee and a lousy leg? Guess who would win if we arm wrestled." she smiled. He entered into a staring contest with her. She was triumphant, even if she did have the advantage of two good eyes. His shoulders slumped a little, but only a little. It was one battle lost, not the war.

"I am going to pay for that one safe, warm, peaceful, comfortable night of sleep for the rest of my life?" Neal complained.

"You said it buddy. Now where are your clothes?"

"Unfortunately, Ma'am, I couldn't find them, perhaps they disposed of them in the dustbin," Graham offered.

"Graham Lancaster, don't be rude." frowned Yvonne.

"Sorry."

"You still think you're better than me, don't you, Lancaster? One day you will come to regret your attitude."

"Neal, don't wear out what's left of your voice. Yvonne, bring the boxes to the car. Graham, go get the wheelchair. "

"Yes Ma'am."

"Lancaster," Neal said softly. Graham turned and looked at him without enthusiasm. "One of the plastic buttons on your off the peg blazer is coming off. Thought you'd like to know."

Claire swiftly turned her head so that Graham wouldn't see her face, and with as much composure as she could muster while desperately trying not to giggle, took a robe and helped Neal put it on over his pyjamas. Graham made a sound between his teeth and exited.

"Neal, you are positively evil," she laughed. "Graham's Navy blazer is bespoke and his buttons are gold plated brass." Neal shrugged.

"Gold plated brass, like him. People wrapped up in themselves make small packages. I can tie the sash, you know. I'm not helpless. Listen, Claire. You have to let me pay you back for all you've done for me. I will, you know. Eventually. I'll pay you back."

"You remind me so much of my husband sometimes, you have a wicked wit."

"The man in the painting. Lancaster said he'd gone missing." Was there sadness in his voice? No, she must be imagining it.

"Yes. Come on, let's get you home."

"Home," he repeated, with passion. Their fingertips brushed briefly as she helped him into the waiting wheelchair, and both quickly looked away not wanting to acknowledge the event.

Pins and needles, stop it, he just reminds you of Edward, everything about him reminds you of Edward, down to the colour of his eyes. Don't get involved with this man. Don't. Edward isn't dead. He isn't. Don't you dare get involved with this man.

* * *

I love her and I've never even touched her until just then, and I have to pretend it meant nothing to me. She's so beautiful, funny, caring and sweet. But she belongs to that solemn man in the oil painting, a man from a world I'll never be a part of. Dear God, what am I supposed to do? I can't battle this loneliness anymore, but I have to, I have to, I have to.

Claire's mobile phone rang and she answered it as Yvonne wheeled a sombre Neal toward the car, and Graham loaded the boxes in the boot.

"Hello? Oh hiya Alec. Tonight? Sure, Frances and Angel might come over too. Something to show me? Okay. There's someone I want you to meet anyway. Bye."

I like just listening to her voice. I couldn't possibly have fallen in love with her. I have only known her for a matter of hours. No. That isn't true. Oh don't be silly, of course you don't know her...but I do. I've seen her. I've touched her. We've made oh . . . sweet Christ, stop having an idiotic fantasy. You'd think it was your wife or something. Wife. Sometimes I wonder why she doesn't . . . I don't know. Why does she make me feel so strange? This isn't her car. Something about her car. Oh just stop it, stop it. Your head is screwed up by the drink. That's all. Her hair's gotten longer, I like it like that. She smells like sandalwood. When did she get that brown sweater? Stop it, stop it.

He stared out the window, as Yvonne pulled out of the parking area and headed toward the main roadways. Claire made a brief call to Frances and Angel and told them to stop by, and Frances agreed and mentioned she was trying a new recipe for a chicken casserole and would bring some.

"We have to stop in Knightsbridge, Yvonne I want to pop into Harrods for some things," Claire said. "Neal's going to need some outfits, for one thing. Graham I need to borrow your coat."

"Whatever for, Ma'am?" Graham said, puzzled. Yvonne had been driving for a short time at a leisurely pace, and she grinned to herself knowing what was coming.

"Well, Neal can't shop with me in his pyjamas and his robe, now can he? He'll have to borrow your coat. Neal, it'll only take about, oh, a half hour, do you feel up to it?"

"Yes, I think so. I appreciate it." Neal smiled.

* * *

The impromptu shopping trip took two hours, and Neal sat contentedly in the back seat with his shopping bags.

"That felt like the mad shopping my mother used to do with me just before the September school term started. After the shopping was done came the ritual of having hamburgers and milkshakes downtown, she always had vanilla and I always vacillated between chocolate and strawberry. Her handbag was shiny black patent leather; I remember her looking through it for her billfold. The very next morning my chin would break out in dots, and I'd threaten to throw myself in the river if she made me start the first day of school looking like that. Wonderful memories. She smelled of Evening in Paris, these tiny little bottles of scent. She'd keep the empty bottles in the drawer with her lingerie. I know, because I sneaked an illicit peek in that drawer. Her cashmere sweater was so soft. Every boy thinks his mother is the most beautiful mother in the world, but in this case, she actually was. I know she was..." Neal's voice, still sandpapery, trailed off. Claire noted Graham gave Neal a curious look. She guessed Neal was finally seeming human to the upper class Lancaster, and she grinned.

Claire's mobile went off as the car pulled into the Silk Wood Manor driveway. She noticed that the Brisby's station wagon was already parked there, meaning the Aga would be cranked up at full throttle, knowing Frances. She and Angel had keys to the Manor.

"Hello? Oh, hiya Alec. A little late? No, that's fine. We were all late getting back. Hmm. Oh pins and needles, you're kidding! Oh the poor little thing, Alec, you beast! Hee hee. Okay. Heh, that much? Sure. Okay. Okay. Bye."

"What was that all about?" Yvonne inquired, pulling the boxes out of the back of the Vauxhall estate wagon. Claire had finally settled on a green one to replace her beloved Volvo.

"Alec went to pick Ayomide up from a birthday party she went to with her nanny, and the birthday girl had pierced ears with little jewelled bee posts. So Ayomide insisted she wanted to have hers done too. So she drove Alec nuts about it and he finally gave in, and she screamed and screamed during it. So everyone looked at Alec like he was the Creature from the Black Lagoon for putting a poor child through that. Alec wound up buying nearly thirty pounds worth of Hello Kitty stuff for Ayomide to make amends!" laughed Claire. "They're both on the way here, shouldn't take them too long."

"Hello Kitty?" Neal remarked.

"It's a anime style cat, very big in Japan, all sorts of accessories. I have a niece back in Quebec who loves it too," Yvonne laughed.

"I never heard of Hello Kitty, Yvonne. I feel culturally deprived." Neal reached for the polished walnut walking stick Claire had bought him to replace the handmade hickory one, and she gave him a startled look as he got out of the car.

"Something amiss?" he asked her, with the minute raised volume in his voice when he pronounced the final word in a sentence, in this case, amiss. The way Ed often spoke.

"No, no. Let's go in, I'm starved."

"Sounds good to me. I am too," Neal confessed, placing a hand lightly at the small of her back for an instant as she passed him. It was like jumping willingly into a nuclear reactor with no clothes on simply for the thrill of the experience. So was the bewitching smile he gave her.

Culturally deprived. Edward said that to Nathaniel. Dear God, what's happening to me? Claire thought wildly. Pins and needles, I need a stiff drink. I hope Angel brought some Pimms or something. I'd drink Thunderbird out of the bottle at this point. It isn't possible for Edward to have a doppelganger. Or for me to be falling in love with him.

Or is it?

* * *

At Neal's request he had gone upstairs first, out of the view of Frances and Angel, who were in the kitchen with Graham and Yvonne, having refreshments. The boxes had been placed in her bedroom and Claire managed to stick her coat in the wardrobe in the foyer, escape to the kitchen, grab two glasses of Pimms, and hurry back upstairs. She handed him his glass. He sipped a little, frowned at it and put it down on a nearby table in the hall. The table had a large green plant on it, in a faux Ming Dynasty vase.

"Do you mind if I look around first then shower and dress afterwards? I'd like to look decent before I meet your friends."

"Oh heavens, no, while you're looking around, I'll run you a bath, just remind me and I'll reapply the medication on your knee and bandage it again tonight. Oh, and let me show you where your rooms are."

"You understand I have no way to pay rent now?"

"Neal, simply taking Graham Lancaster down a peg on occasion is well worth having you around." she chuckled.

"I imagine he has redeeming qualities," Neal said, picking up his bags.

"Of course he does."

"I imagine he has them because he bought them on Savile Row."

"Neal, that isn't nice." Claire laughed. "Now, behave, and here are your rooms. You have a tub and shower right in there."

"Why can't I be closer to the master bedroom, nearer where you sleep? I can help look after you, Claire. Goodness knows you need looking after, if you failed to lock up Silk Wood Manor, and allowed someone as nefarious as me to come in."

"I suppose so," answered Claire, "Here, what about in here?"

"You sleep across the hall?"

"Yes, in the master bedroom, which is adjoined to my home office. I hear the door chime, probably Alec and Ayomide arriving, I better get going. Will you be all right up here alone?"

"Of course. Claire?"

"Hmmmm?"

"I just wanted to say your name."

"I uh better go now."

He stepped in front of her momentarily, so close that she imagined she could feel him breathing. Neal reached out and gently caressed her cheek with a solemn expression on his face, then he vanished inside the rooms she'd showed him. Claire stood there for a full minute, then gulped down most of her Pimms and disappeared down the stairs.

When she was gone, Neal stepped into the hall, and peered into the master bedroom. He entered and stood there a moment, looking at the large Palladian window that had been set into the wood panelling. Gloucestershire was a dismal grey, so there was not much to catch the eye other than the raindrops that bounced against it, but he admired the window as though it was fashioned from stained glass. It was not surprisingly cold to the touch. He stepped away, and sat on the bed's edge a while, stroking the beige comforter, touching the smooth cotton sheets. He didn't quite understand the longing and unbearable feelings of loss as though something of his had been taken away, no, not even taken. More like seized.

With a sigh, he rose again, using his walking stick for balance, and noticed something on Claire's desk. It was a small-framed colour picture of her husband, sitting on a white cast-iron bench in what looked like a garden. He was in pyjamas and silk dressing gown, hooked to an IV bottle, looking at the camera with a grin, wanting the business of being photographed candidly to be over. It hardly resembled the grim man in the oil painting, but it was clear they were one and the same.

Neal picked up the photograph, and unexpectedly, slammed it down so forcefully that the glass broke.

"What's wrong with me? What have I done?" he cried aloud. "I don't belong here anymore. I'm called Neal."

He looked at the photo, and carefully worked it out of the frame. It hadn't been harmed. He worked it out carefully, left taking it with him and picked up his shopping bags again, slid the plastic handles down one arm. The glass of Pimms remained where he'd left it. On an impulse, he poured the contents into the plant's soil. He seemed to consider the levity of what he'd done, and grinned. Then he marched purposefully into his rooms, a man on a mission.

* * *

"Did you get an ouchie, Sweetheart? Did that terrible man make you get an ouchie? For shame, but you look so pretty in your new dress and earrings!"

"Can I have cookie, Auntie Frances?"

"Of course you can, and some nice milk too, but after you eat."

"My credit card is what has an ouchie," Alec complained, sipping coffee, and playing with one of the beads on Ayomide's braids. "Say, Claire, when is this fellow you want me to meet going to come down? He putting a mudpack on his face up there or something?"

"Lap! Lap! Want huggies!"

"Mide, Daddy needs to talk business with Auntie Claire."

"Oh Alec, it'll wait until after dinner. And Neal will be here soon, he's probably deciding what he wants to wear; I think he's probably a little nervous meeting strangers for the first time. Alec, you won't believe how much he's like Edward."

"He's like Ed? I've known Ed for more than thirty odd years. Believe me no man on earth is like Ed, Claire. There is only one Ed Straker."

"Alec, we have bad news for you, cherie. Mister Foster is going to have you fired." Yvonne sighed, feeding Ayomide a forkful of casserole.

"Icky!" Ayomide declared, eyeing the freshly baked macaroon cookies Frances had put on the table.

"Mide, you like chicken and pasta, so shut up and chew, or you won't even get a crumb. Now what the hell are you talking about, Yvonne?"

"For heavens' sake Alec must you swear in front of your daughter?" protested Frances.

"Frances, if I lose my job, I may not be able to feed my daughter or myself or make alimony payments so corrupting my little Mide is the last thing on my mind. Now what's going on with that idiot this time?" Alec stabbed into his casserole portion with the fork; clearly wishing it was a sensitive part of Foster.

Yvonne took a deep breath, and described what had happened, adding the business with Foster violating the sanctity of Ed's hospital suite.

"That bloody bastard! Well, he can just forget it. I have a lead I intend to follow, and we'll just see who gets fired in the end. Arrogant little tin headed demigod! And he had the guts to complain that Ed was empire building? Ed busted his arse to save the bloody moron and he does this? I'm going to use his shrivelled balls for a cricket bat."

"Daddy mad again," Ayomide said sombrely, and crammed more casserole into her mouth. Claire grinned at her.

"Daddy's soul needs saving." Angel chuckled.

"Daddy is plotting homicide," grumbled Alec. "It's Uncle Foster's soul that's going to need saving."

* * *

Upstairs, Neal turned off the taps of the shower and stepped naked, still dripping, onto the plush rug, took a large white Egyptian bath towel and wrapped it securely around his waist. He dried himself off vigorously, applied deodorant, and then examined his face in the mirror. Claire had included a small selection of toiletries for him, in particular some Bronnley shower gel in the lemon-lime scent, and he had used almost all the bottle, relishing the smells and the feeling of being really clean. Now he dabbed a little of the men's cologne on. He looked inquisitively in the looking glass. Impulsively he pulled off the black eye patch that he'd taken care not to get wet during his shower, and tossed it into the small bathroom rubbish bin. There, all that remained was the gauze protecting his eye. That was fine.

He picked up the photograph again, and studied it carefully. Then he set it down, and rummaged through the toiletries again. Nail file, no. Comb, yes he'd make use of the comb and its accompanying hairbrush. Hair cream too. Shaving cream. Razor and blade. Yes. But there was something else he needed. The medicine cabinet didn't hold the prize he wanted, so he dug deeper into the packages. Voila! There it was, a tiny pair of moustache scissors. He started whacking at the beard until it was nearly gone, and then he lathered up, shaved carefully, God it felt wonderful. Civilization at last!

He stared at a clean-shaven face that looked back at him with equal wonder. Then he looked at the photograph again.

"I'm called Neal," he said aloud. The voice came, the voice that was never very far from his ears, unless he drank to deaden it, and the pain.

"You listen and you listen up something fierce. You're Neal, boy! Neal Brown, and that's who you are, and if you as much as think otherwise, we'll have to dig into that knee again and straighten that leg, won't we? You're called Neal. You'll be my son now. Blasted son got what was coming to him, wouldn't do chores, wanted to go and do his whoring, I had to discipline him, now didn't I? You saw, didn't you? Blood gushing out like the milk from a cow. Made you watch, didn't I? Tied you down and made you watch. You try and cross me and I'll slit your throat the way I did his. He's rotting in the yard, boy, you want to join him? Whatever life you had before doesn't matter, you understand, boy? I saved you from choking on that parachute line, you would have hung from that tree and suffocated if I hadn't pulled out my penknife and cut you down! You owe me and the wife, boy. You'll work the rest of your life making amends for what you put us through, looking after you when you were messed up. Lots of work to do on this farm, lots. So remember, you're called Neal."

"I'm called Neal."

He looked into the mirror. A tear streamed down his face.

"They hurt me, they hurt me so badly. Monsters. When I had nightmares in Boston, Mother told me there was no such thing as monsters. You were wrong, Mother. But don't worry about me, Mother. They won't find me here. I'm called Neal."

He looked solemnly into the looking glass, and he straightened his back as much as he could. He squared his shoulders.

"I'm called Neal. I always told them I was called Neal, I never said that my name was Neal. My name isn't Neal. I wonder what my name is?"

Strange relief that he didn't quite understand flooded his being. He picked up the scissors again, and stared at his hair. It was going to be like climbing Mount Everest with a toothpick.

"This is going to take a long time," he said in frustration.

It certainly did. When it was finally over, mounds of hair lie in the rubbish bin along with the elastic that had held it together. He examined the results. One sweep of silver hair over his ear was shorter and more scraggily then its companion. Carefully he worked a bit of the hair cream into his hands, rubbed them together and swept both hands through his hair, making a part on the left, like the man in the photograph had his hair parted. Then he quickly dressed, and he headed for the door, hesitated, turned back, looked at the gauze, carefully peeled it away, suppressing a yell of pain at the adhesive pulling his skin. When it was off, his vision was a little blurry, so he waited. It took some time to focus through both eyes, but he soon was ready.

He walked into the bedroom she had assigned him, using his walking stick, and looked in the Cheval mirror at his reflection. Black leather slip on shoes, with snaffles. Black ribbed socks. Grey trousers, with pleats. Black calf belt with silver buckle. Light blue V-necked sweater with a Polo player logo in red embroidered on it. Blue pinstripe shirt with button down collar. No wristwatch, damn monsters had taken it. Taken the ring too. Monsters. Taken everything. Monsters.

The worst one of them all was the one that always came, and promised him a safe, peaceful warm place to sleep, promised him he'd take him home where he belonged, but never delivered on the promise. Just another monster.

Doesn't matter.

She wouldn't let them hurt him again.

He was ready.

* * *

"Claire dear, shouldn't you go up and see what's wrong with your house guest? He's been up there for hours, and the casserole and vegetables are getting cold."

"Yeah, it's starting to worry me too Frances. I'll be right back."

"You say she let this guy stay after he broke in?" Alec said in disbelief.

"He didn't exactly break in, she didn't listen to me and she didn't lock the door. If you ask me, I bet she subconsciously didn't want to lock the Commander out."

"You might have something there, Yvonne. But what I was trying to say is that for the first time in nearly a year, we have something solid on Ed's-"

"MY GOD MY GOD MY GOD MY GOD!" Claire was screaming. Alec grabbed Ayomide and shoved her into Yvonne's arms, ordered her to stay with her, then he took out his gun, and ran out of the dining room toward the great hall, where the oak staircase was. Angel and Frances leaped up and followed.

Alec reached the stairs. In the middle of the staircase, Claire was practically smothering someone who sat on one of the stairs, grasping at him, sobbing, near-hysterical. The stranger was whispering something comforting to her.

"What in the name-" the Australian blurted.

The man raised his head and looked straight at Alec in shock.

"Ed? Ed? ED! EDDDDDDDD!"

Alec hurtled himself joyously at Ed Straker at the speed of a runaway train, while Frances and Angel and eventually Yvonne gasped. Ed made the most heartrending keening sound, a sound that Alec never had heard come from out of Ed's throat, not even when he was the most badly injured. A sound like a wounded, dying animal. A sound like a rabbit's frightened squeal. The sound a person who is terrified beyond all comprehension would make. It grew and grew and Alec stopped, not understanding, frightened, confused.

"Edward, my darling, it's all right, that's Alec, sweetheart, oh my darling, that's Alec, he wouldn't hurt you," wailed Claire. Ed flung himself into her arms, saying something. "Sweetheart, oh my precious, how could I have been so stupid? All this time, oh dear God, all this time you were with me. Edward, I can't hear what you're saying."

"Make him go away, Claire! Make him go away!"

"That's Alec, Alec is your-"

"Make him go away! He was there! He was one of the monsters! He always said he'd help me, and I screamed and screamed for him to help, and he promised, but he never did! He lied! He lied! He let them HURT me! Make him go away!"

"Dear God," Alec said. "Dear God." Alec practically crumbled at the foot of the stairs and Frances and Angel came running over. Ed buried his head in his hands and then clutched at Claire, like a small child wanting the comfort of his mother.

"Alec, he doesn't remember. He doesn't know you." Angel managed to say.

"I've never seen him like this. Never. Dear God in heaven. Never. What did that bitch do to him? I swear when I find her I'll tear her limb from limb, she'll regret the day she was born. Oh Ed. My God. What were you going through to be in this state? Claire, we found Ed's wristwatch. It had the inscription I had put on it. I even double-checked and ran it through the New Scotland Yard lab. The watchband had dried blood on it, and the back of the watch had two miniscule light hairs stuck in the casing. Still had the root on it. Wrist hair. DNA matched. It's Ed's. I've got some friends looking for the woman that brought it into the pawnshop. Elderly hag. The address on the photo identification she gave was a false one, and her prints on the watch were smeared. But don't worry. I'll find her. I'll find her."

Graham Lancaster unceremoniously passed out on the carpet. Nobody took immediate notice, except tiny Ayomide.

"He go asleep." she squeaked. Nobody paid attention, so she skipped into the dining room again. Yvonne, tears streaming down her face, same as everyone else, didn't notice her charge escape.

"Alec, do you have the wristwatch?" Frances asked, the only one besides Ayomide that was barely retaining any composure.

Alec dug in his pocket for the plastic evidence bag containing the Certina wristwatch. It had various labels on it. He broke the seal, took the watch out and showed it to her.

"Yes, Frances, yes! Show it to him. Show it to him," Claire said, rocking Ed in her arms. His mournful keening had quieted to a soft humming sound. Alec made his way up the stairs. Sensing he was coming closer, Ed gasped, and recoiled, but Alec put a hand up.

"Easy now, I won't hurt you, Ed," he said gently as he could.

"I'm called Neal, but that isn't my name. Is Ed my name?"

"Oh yes, darling. Yes. You're my dear, precious husband, and you're finally home, home where you belong. Alec just wants to show you something."

"Look. Do you remember this? They took it away from you, didn't they?"

Ed looked at it.

"That's MINE. Alec gave it to me," he said quietly, still clutching Claire's hand.

"I'm Alec. Look. I had it engraved. On your birthday. Do you remember me coming and taking you to birthday dinner?"

"You were there. You hurt me."

"He wouldn't hurt you darling. Why don't you put your watch on? Let Alec help you, I can't do the buckle with my hand anymore."

"He promised to help me, Claire."

"They hurt you and you cried out for him to help you, to save you?" she said in sudden comprehension.

Alec clasped a hand over his mouth, weeping freely.

"Yes," Ed said ever so softly. "And he came sometimes. He came. He was there. In my dreams. But he always went away. Always."

"Let Alec put it on, and ask Alec to say he's sorry. That's the right thing to do, isn't it, darling?"

"You won't make me stay with those men, outside, will you? I can't stand being with them. I don't like them. I can stay here, can't I? Please."

"Edward, this home, Silk Wood Manor, is not really mine. It belongs to you, and when it was nearly destroyed in the fire I knew I had to --" Claire paused and sobbed, took a breath, "I knew I had to restore it again. I prayed that some day you'd come home, and I wanted it to be like you remembered. Oh dear God, how could I have not known you'd come home for me? You did, you were there, and I didn't even know it. I didn't even know --" she sobbed.

"Don't cry. I'm here. Don't cry," Ed whispered. "Am I the man in the painting? I pretended I was, you know, I wanted so badly to be, you know. Because then you'd love me the way I love you."

"Oh Stanley!" Frances sobbed, and went into her husband's arms, and Angel patted her on the back, tears streaming down his cheeks, mouth moving in silent prayer of thanks.

"You're my Edward, you're the man in the painting, and I love you with all my heart, and so does every person in this room. Edward, let Alec show you the wristwatch," Claire said softly. Ed searched her face, nodded.

"I trust you," Ed said to her.

Alec approached slowly, and although Ed trembled noticeably he didn't flinch, only held out a wrist. Gently, Alec buckled it in place.

"That's yours. You're Commander Ed Straker, my senior officer for more than thirty years, and more importantly, the best thing next to my daughter that I've ever had in my life. You called for me, and I couldn't come, Ed. I couldn't come. I would have torn mountains down with my bare hands to come to your side, but no matter where I searched, I couldn't find you. I couldn't save you. I let you down when you most needed me. Can you find it in your heart to forgive an old Australian? Can you?"

"You couldn't come?" Ed echoed.

Alec bowed his head and sobbed. As did Claire, who buried her face in Ed's chest. Ayomide came in, her mouth full of macaroon cookie, and another in both hands.

"Daddy, here. Cookie make you feel better. Why are you crying? Did you have a fight with Mummy again?"

"Mide Freeman, I thought I told you no cookies!" Alec growled. Ed smiled a little.

"You couldn't come. I thought everyone had abandoned me, but you couldn't come."

"Please forgive me, Ed. I couldn't go through the rest of my life with any peace if you didn't forgive me."

"Alec, for heavens' sake it wasn't your fault if you didn't know where Q-tip was."

"Hush Angel, just let them speak," Claire said, having sat up, barely composing herself, gently stroking Ed's hand. Ed looked solemnly into Alec's craggy face.

"I forgive you. You'll punish them won't you? You won't let them find me."

"Count on it."

Ed extended a hand. Alec took it slowly, and sat across from Ed. Alec's rough fingers closed over Ed's calloused ones, reality hit him in the face like a ten-ton anvil dropping on his head, and he started sobbing again. Ed looked at him and pulled him closer. Gently he laid Alec against his chest.

"I'm home now. Everything will be all right. I'm finally home." Ed said, triumphantly. "I'm not Neal. I'm Ed."

For a long time there was a teary but joyous silence and hugging. Interrupted only by Ayomide's soft crunching of cookies. Finally Graham, like Sleeping Beauty awakened by a kiss, stirred. Yvonne noticed, realised what happened and grinned at him.

"I think someone else has the apology to make, no?"

Graham sat up, stared at Ed, stood, wiped himself off, accumulated some dignity.

"I think I will warm up the casserole and the vegetables for Mr. Straker and then break out some champagne. The Master is home. Late, mind you, and giving all of us a bit of a scare, but home. Will that be acceptable, Ma'am?"

Claire started laughing, as did all of them. Alec wiped away tears, and grinned.

"Oh I do think that is acceptable, Jeeves." she giggled.

"Jeeves?" Alec chuckled.

Graham actually blushed, then grinned for a second.

"Very good Ma'am. As for you, young cookie thief, you are finishing your dinner."

"Oh sod her dinner, let her eat the cookies, it's a celebration at Silk Wood Manor. I'll bake more and start in on Edward's favourite lemon drizzle cake," Frances said decidedly. "And start the coffeepot again."

"Cookies! Yay!" Ayomide skipped away to get what she hadn't yet eaten, which was a small supply indeed.

Angel watched her march into the kitchen.

"Did my Christian wife say 'sod'?"

Yvonne laughed and nodded.

"Two miracles in a day then. I think the good Lord is making up to us for all of us being worried for a year," he said, and followed Frances off. Claire was stroking her husband's hair.

"My poor Edward, what happened to your hair? It's lopsided."

"You try cutting yours with moustache scissors," retorted Ed in an echo of his usual irritation, and Claire chuckled, holding him.

"What's wrong with his voice?" Alec asked.

"Nothing to worry about, just a injury to the vocal cords that is healing. At least it will heal if he rests his voice. And why, Edward Straker, is your patch gone? Do you really want to re-injure your cornea? Come with me." Claire jumped up, pulling him with her.

"Claire . . ." he said, flustered.

"No Claire. Come with me now."

"All right, all right," Ed complained and went hand in hand with her back upstairs.

"He went from one sort of captivity to another. Yvonne, where does Claire keep the good stuff?" Alec said, standing up with a pleased grin.

"You are falling off the wagon?"

"And burning the damn thing behind me."

"Paul Foster is going to be a very surprised man when the Commander returns to Shado," Yvonne determined, pouring Alec a whiskey. Alec took it, took a long satisfying pull at it, then shook his head in a firm no.

"Ed doesn't have his memory back, and whatever they did to him is still going to interfere with his behaviour. He can't return to Shado now. You know what Claire said. That his injuries indicated he'd been tortured, and we can't push him into remembering unless we want to do even more damage."

"But cherie, your job . . ."

"Can wait." Alec smiled. "I have my work cut out for me. I intend to find that woman on the videotape, and when I do, she'll wish it was the aliens and not me that found her. Now, let's go celebrate. Ed Straker is home."

* * *

Everyone sat in the oak-panelled lounge, Ed curled up in a green leather wing chair, his feet on the matching tasselled hassock, eating a piece of lemon drizzle cake, with two scoops of ice cream on it. He ate delicately, delighting in each bite, holding on to the plate possessively. Claire sat on the floor beside him, her hand on his leg, sipping coffee. At intervals, she looked up at him to make sure he was still there. He was, but his food wasn't, and he set the empty plate aside, looking satisfied. Ayomide was playing jacks with Angel, and giggling when Angel lost the ball, which was often. Alec sat cross-legged on the floor next to Ed, making a series of phone calls on his mobile. Graham and Yvonne were opponents in a fierce, take no prisoners game of checkers. Frances tended the marble fireplace between pouring coffee for everyone, using the fireplace poker to rearrange the logs. The fire snapped and crackled.

"Are you happy, Edward?" Claire asked.

"Yes. Can it be this way forever?"

"Can it be how, Edward?"

"Us. Here. I can't remember all of you, but it feels like I'm with my family. I do fit in here. This is my home. I want to see all of it, Claire. I want to see everything I own. I want my life back."

"Wait until you see the garden, Edward dear!" Frances said enthusiastically. "Claire did the most magnificent job in the garden. There's new things as well. There's a stone fountain, and a gazebo, and the new conservatory is joined with the greenhouse, and there's an indoor swimming pool, and a health gym... "

"Who is she again?" Ed asked Claire.

"Frances. Frances, and that's her husband, the Right Reverend Stanley Brisby, except everyone calls him Angel, because of his beautiful voice. When you served in Vietnam-"

"I served in Vietnam?"

"Sure, Q-tip, son. You saved all of us, you finally got the Medal of Honour that was way overdue." Angel smiled.

"Can I see it?" Ed asked eagerly. "Tell me about the fire."

"Not now, Edward. Remember what we discussed? We need to go very slowly. We aren't in any hurry. The important thing is that you are here, and alive and well."

"I'm a little tired, I think I'm going to go up to bed. Are you coming Claire?"

"Of course I am."

"Goodnight everyone. I'll see you in the morning." Ed smiled.

* * *

Everyone had said their goodbyes, and expressed their wishes of gratitude, and gone home, or in Yvonne and Graham's case, to their rooms in the manor. Claire had examined, dressed then rebandaged Ed's knee, and placed fresh gauze over his eye. The two of them wandered through the manor, hand in hand, Ed in silent amazement that everything he saw belonged to him. Finally, when it was long past three in the morning, Ed remembered he'd been weary, and they went back to where the bedrooms were situated.

"Goodnight, Claire. See you in the morning." Ed said, leaning on his walnut stick, then he went across the hall to the room she'd given him.

"Edward?"

"Hmm?"

"You sleep in the master bedroom."

"You're in that room. This is my room."

"You're my husband, we sleep together, we always have."

"I'm your husband?"

"Edward, you remember me, please say you remember me."

He looked at her.

"You're Claire. I feel safe with you."

"Come sleep with me, please."

Confusion clouded his features.

"Claire, I'm frightened of you. I don't understand it."

"You were frightened of Alec and now you're frightened of me?"

"Claire, please don't cry. Please."

"No, I'm fine, it's just a little hard to take. Goodnight Edward. Sleep well. God bless you." Claire turned, put her hand on the doorknob of the master bedroom door, and suddenly her composure was shot to pieces and she sobbed, sliding down the door until she was a fragile mass curled up on the carpet. She squeezed her eyes shut. He watched her in silent agony, tentatively put a hand on her shoulder.

"I've hurt you. Maybe it would have been better if I'd never come home. I'm flawed, I'm the man in the painting and yet I'm not whom you need."

"No! Edward, it isn't you, I'm just selfish to think of myself and my needs when it's obvious you can't remember, when it's so obvious whatever they did to you has traumatised you so much. But is it too much to ask that we share a bed, we don't have to be intimate if you're not ready for it. I just can't stand being without you. I just can't cope without you anymore. Please hold me Edward!"

He lowered himself to the floor and extended his arms toward her, and enfolded her in them, kissing her on her hair. He stroked her cheek, looking at her, deep in thought.

"Claire, I need you to help me remember. That man Alec will lose his job and I will lose my job if I don't get well. He explained to me I have this tremendous responsibility, and when I look at him it's if he isn't seeing what he's always seen."

"He's frightened Edward, he's always drawn strength from you and you from him. He couldn't prevent what happened to you, and that's a heavy burden."

Ed gazed off in the distance, brow furrowed.

"There was a man. A man and he would come; he'd come to my door. They'd lock my room. I hated that room. Claire, I need to look behind me, to remember, and I don't want to remember."

"Edward for tonight let's just hold one another. Just let me hold you."

"Yes. That's my room isn't it? That's our room. You're my wife."

"Yes. You're my husband."

They stood, helping one another up eyes locked on one another; he wiped away her tears with the back of his dressing gown sleeve. He chuckled.

"What is it?"

"Did you see Ayomide's little ladybug posts? The other little girl at the birthday party, she had little bees, so Alec's little daughter got ladybugs. Ladybugs. Ladybug on your wedding gown. Ladybug. Like the little ladybugs on Ayomide's ears."

She laughed.

"Yes, the day we got married. Yes, do you remember that day? Oh God Edward, what's wrong?" she exclaimed in alarm, seeing the fear grow on his face.

"You said he couldn't come, that Alec, that Alec couldn't help me. I couldn't help that man! My God! Stop him someone! STOP! Make it stop, Claire, I'm begging you, oh God, he's doing it! Monster! She's watching it. She's watching so calmly. She's praying. MONSTERS!"

Claire grabbed him, his eyes were rolling back in his head and she feared he might have a seizure. She shook him and he looked at her desperately, focused, sobbing.

"Help me Claire, oh God help me! The voices are in my head."

"Edward, look at me, look-at-me, listen-to-me! Be here! You're HERE with me, and I love you. My voice and the voices of the people who love you and need you are stronger than any voice they put in your head. They cannot change the man that you are. They can harm your body and destroy your spirit but they never can take away what makes you Edward Straker. They chose the wrong person to try and hurt."

He looked at her for a moment, taking in her words. He nodded a little.

"I need to remember what I experienced, so that Alec finds them. I saw him, I saw him kill that man. He killed his son. He slit his throat. There was so much blood. He said it was with righteousness. For the glory of the Lord. I couldn't help him. Oh Claire! Alec promised he'd find them, he will, won't he? He killed that innocent young teenaged boy, slit his throat open, the artery gushed and he made me watch, he made me watch, he-made-me-WATCH!" Ed broke down and sobbed, and she held him tightly, her teeth clenched.

"I swear I'll kill the murdering son-of-a-bitches, Edward. Alec has the woman on video tape, and he'll get New Scotland Yard to tear the countryside apart until they find her and make her pay. She'll know where he is."

Ed suddenly held Claire at arm's length.

"The woman. Jer-Jer something. Jeru-Jerusha."

"Are you remembering, sweetheart? Was her name Jerusha?"

"Yes-yes. Tell Alec. No, I'll call Alec. Jerusha March! YES! He-he was-damn. Biblical, Claire. I'll remember. Where's the phone? I want to call Alec."

"Of course." Claire chuckled a little and he frowned at her as she showed him where the phone was in the master bedroom.

"What is funny?"

"Edward, if the long tradition of you waking poor Alec up in the wee hours of the morning continuing like this is any standard to go by, then you're well along on your road to recovery." she smiled. "Only I'm not sure Alec would want this to be the first trait of yours that came back!" He grinned, and it made her heart leap, it was the old smile that she remembered so well, the boyish demi-smile that signified he was about to do something mischievous, and relish doing it. Ed looked at the alarm clock.

"He can sleep later." Ed decided.

"You're positively evil, Edward."

"You love me anyway," Ed decided, punching in the number. On his own, Claire noted with silent joy. He remembers the number. He's coming back. It'll take a lot of hard work to bring him back completely, but he just took the first step out of the darkness into the light.

"Yes. I'll go get you some coffee."

"Cream and two sugars." he added firmly. Claire recognized it as his commander's tone of voice. She concealed her happiness and wrinkled her nose at him.

"Edward Straker, I know perfectly well how you take your coffee it's you who lost your memory, not me. So save that superior to underling tone for when you get back to work. Alec's in charge, not you." Claire reached forward and rumpled his hair affectionately, then winced, stifled a laugh. His hair stuck out all over his head like he was a platinum hedgehog.

"What?" he said in irritation, running his hand through his hair to straighten it without much success.

"Your hair looks like you cut it with moustache scissors." she giggled. He opened his mouth to protest, then clamped it together in a pretend line of indignant martyrdom at having to put up with her. His eyes sparkled. He pointed at the door, grabbed the phone and dialled Alec.

"Just go get me some coffee, Mrs. Straker! Alec, It's me Ed. Yes, it's Ed. No, nothing's wrong. I have some information for you get a pen and paper-"

* * *

"You're sure you want to see this, Ed?" Alec cautioned. He, Graham and Yvonne, Claire, Frances, Angel and Ed himself had gathered in Silk Wood Manor's media room, where there was a large screen television unit, hooked up to tape and VCR.

"Just run it, Alec. They're killers. What they did to me they could do to anyone. I escaped somehow, and they'll be looking for their next victim. This is no time to cosset me." Ed's voice was full of the old confidence, but he was holding tightly on to his cup of coffee. Alec yawned, Ed gave him a brief grin, and Alec started the videotape rolling. Ed went white, and the cup clattered on the rosebud design porcelain saucer from his hand shaking.

"Go-Go-God-dd, yes, it's her, it's her. Jerusha March. Yes. You s-say-"

"Edward, take a deep breath. That's it," Claire told him.

Ed pressed his lips together until it appeared he didn't have any. When he spoke again, it was with a little of the old authority. What surprised Alec was that Ed's voice seemed to be returning. Where it was once unrecognisable, now it sounded like his throat was merely dry. The Shado Commander made an effort to stay calm, but it was like coming face to face with the devil again, even if it was only on a screen.

"You say that there were no fingerprints on my wristwatch other than my own?"

"Her prints were on it, but too smeared to be of any use to us." Alec corrected. "But now we have undercover men searching every last inch of British soil looking for one Jerusha March, with that face plastered on distributed flyers. We'll find her."

"When, Alec? No DNA. False ID. Nothing to go on but that ugly face." Yvonne put in. "And the entire United Kingdom to search for her in. There just isn't enough evidence."

"Evidence. Well, I disappeared for a year. That woman and her husband took away an entire year of my life. My wristwatch turns up, my wedding ring will. Only a matter of time-hmm. The answer is locked up in my brain. Claire, can you inject me with sodium pentothal and . . .Claire, this isn't any time to . . ."

"Damn it Edward, you push the healing process and we could lose you permanently. You're already having seizures from the trauma of the events!"

"I'd rather have it be you than anyone else. But this needs to be done. You know it needs to be done. Before they kill someone else. Please."

"I'll go to Shado and get some from the medical centre." she sighed.

"No." Ed said firmly.

"Edward, I resigned from Mayland Hospital, they won't allow me to-"

"I'll go and get it myself."

"Q-tip, there are things you don't remember. If that young whelp Paul Foster sees you as being in anything less than in full health, he'll try and steal the very floor from underneath you." Angel cautioned.

"Maybe not, maybe the shock of seeing Edward will knock some sense into him. I'd like to knock some sense into him with the business end of a soup ladle," Frances said firmly. Ed chuckled.

"That isn't very-" Ed hesitated, and they all looked at him. "Not very Christian of you." Ed smiled in satisfaction. Claire brightened.

"You're remembering so much. I wondered when the alien bacteria that was dormant might kick in your body. I wonder if the fact that you were so psychologically traumatised over a year's time prevented it from becoming active? Caroline is studying it now, I better see what she thinks."

"What?"

"You, I and Alec have alien bacteria-uh, I'll fill you in later, Edward. Don't worry, it's benevolent. We think." she grinned. "Maybe it gets unbenevolent real fast when husbands take unnecessary risks and ignore their doctor's advice." The others chuckled, but Ed raised his eyebrows at her.

"Maybe I'm not as safe as I led myself to believe when you're around." he chuckled. "Maybe I was wrong to hire you and Ryan." Ed seemed to hear what he'd said. "I hired you and Ryan, didn't I?"

"What do you remember about it, Ed?" asked Alec.

"I had- I had lost my memory back then, too. I was injured. And you coached me on how to react. Wait a minute-that's it," Ed said triumphantly.

"You want us to do it again? So that you know what to say to Foster?" Alec grinned.

"Actually if I remember the story the way Nathaniel told it, the Commander carried index cards around to help him remember. Suppose we upgrade that a bit?" Graham asked.

"What have you got in mind?" Claire wanted to know.

"A simple transmitter placed in his ear, we can tell him what to say, and we can conceal a camera on the Commander's suit, and see and hear what's being said. That way, there will be no problems. He goes in, tosses that young upstart out on his bum, changes the bylaws of the Shado rules with the cooperation of Colonel Lake at the Commission and Alec gets job security."

"Just when I thought I could finally sack Alec, and get a real professional as second-in-command." Ed said, with a telltale gleam in his eye.

"As if looking after your skinny arse is a plum assignment? You really think you're going to find another Australian stupid enough to follow you around and clean up your messes?" Alec folded his arms.

"Hard to tell they've been friends for over thirty years." Graham said with a grin.

"They enjoy it." Angel pointed out.

"So where do I get these little electronic toys, considering I'm supposed to be conveniently dead as far as Foster is concerned, and I can't just breeze into Shado yet. Hope the voice print identification still remembers me." Ed smiled a little.

"The bastard may have taken your voice out of programming. Well, Harry is on and he'll take you down, and make sure that your voice is re-issued into the machine. The change in your voice won't matter, the machine is meant to pick up on whether someone is trying to impersonate someone else, and your voiceprint is as distinctive as a retinal pattern or a fingerprint. As for the equipment, leave it to me, I have some poker-playing colleagues in MI5 that owe me money," Graham said.

"Considering I wiped you out in last night's checkers game, it's amazing you can win any poker money," Yvonne put in.

"Who said it was poker money? Might be blackmail," Graham said, looking smug. "Besides, I let you win."

"Ha!" she retorted, watching him pick up the phone, and then leave to pick up what was needed.

Claire lovingly poured another cup of coffee for Ed, and then momentarily let her fingers rest on his neck. He took the cup and smiled up at her.

"Everything's going to be fine, Edward. Things could be a lot worse, you know."

"What on earth are you talking about?" Frances said.

"Well, Edward's going to return to Shado this evening. After an absence of a year with no trace. It's bound to shake up Foster, not to mention all of Shado but who'd want to be Captain Ford when it happens?"

Alec started to guffaw loudly. Ed looked perplexed, and Claire started to fill her husband in on the hapless Keith Ford, and Ed's rather strained relationship with him, and Ed began to chuckle.

"What is it with you and Keith anyway? He's a good man, you know." Alec grinned.

"Someday when I have time, I'll tell you," the Commander said mysteriously.

"Hard to believe there's still a story you haven't told me or I haven't told you, Ed." Alec smiled warmly.

"There's something you could do for me, Alec."

"Name it."

"Arrange for a tailor to alter a Nehru off the peg to fit me. Old habits die hard, and I want to make a good first impression."

"Consider it done," Alec said, getting out his mobile.

"Make it cream, Alec, he looks so gorgeous in cream." Claire put in. Ed chuckled.

"You heard her."

"I think he needs a hairstylist sent up here too." Claire said, playing with jagged wisps of Ed's silvered hair, and he grimaced at her, causing her to chortle. Then a smile formed on his lips.

"Kill the fatted calf and stick it in the Aga, the prodigal Commander has come home," intoned Ed dramatically and they all laughed.

* * *

"Well, well, Harry, it's been a long time. I must confess I'm rather surprised you haven't reacted yet. On the way up here, I caused two construction workers to accidentally blow a hole through a set, five starlets to scream, four stunt men to crane their necks and bump into a man dressed as a giraffe, and the security guard to have what he thought was a heart attack but what the studio lot medic branded as simple hyperventilation. I won't even bother to include the receptionist that fainted dead away. So I figured you'd at least get pale. Must be that English stiff upper lip business." Ed gently put his fingers upon the device he was concealing in his ear, grinning somewhat at hearing Alec's laughter at his remarks on it. Then he removed his aviator sunglasses and slipped them into a pocket of the new cream Nehru suit. Ed had chosen to remove the patch, which by now he was using mostly to prevent anything getting into the eye, which was rapidly mending without complications. With a few experienced sweeps of a brush, the hairdresser had fashioned his hair into a version of the style he'd gone back to, parted on the left and swept back, with a touch of gel pretty much concealing his disaster with the moustache scissors. To Harry Andrews, it was a miracle on the same level as parting the Red Sea.

"Commander. You don't know what it's like to be able to see you again. It's like having steady rain for months and suddenly the sun comes out. I did nearly faint when Grey rang me up and pre-warned me. Let me be the first to say welcome back, welcome back indeed. I see you're walking with a stick, hope you weren't injured too badly, Sir?"

"I'm fine, Harry, just need the stick for a while until my leg mends, might need a surgery or two. Is this thing going to work?" Ed had gone into his studio office soon as Harry Andrews punched the key on the desk to open the doors, and immediately he had frowned. "I see Foster did a bit of redecorating. I'd appreciate it if everything was put back the way it was, Harry. Commander Straker," Ed had opened the cigarette box and drummed his fingers in irritation on a desk he didn't recognise. "It appears the good Colonel did indeed erase my voice print. It'll take a lot more than that to get rid of me."

"Sir, it'll be restored within the hour, and so will this office. Harry Andrews."

"Voice Print Identification positive. Harry Andrews," the machine intoned, and the lift descended. Ed plopped down in the chair and was again irritated when he discovered the replacement chair didn't swivel as much as his original had. When the office stopped, he took a deep breath as he rose. He smoothed the edge of the cream Nehru jacket, pulled it down. The only sign of his physical injuries was the walnut walking stick he used for balance. His face turned thoughtful. The perfectly formed lips curved in a peculiar way. The body became as erect as was possible with the injured leg.

"Something wrong, Sir?" Harry said nervously to Ed's back. It looked like the Shado Commander was hesitating. He'd never seen the Commander show fear of anything or anyone.

Ed Straker turned on his impeccably polished black ankle boot heel toward Harry, and nodded, ignoring the frantic pounding of his heart. Then with a deft gesture he pulled off the earpiece, and undid the snap that secured the mini camera to his black turtleneck collar. He dropped both items into Harry's hand.

"Look after those for me, Harry," Ed said, sounding no different than the day when he had first walked into his Shado office and formally taken command. Then he disappeared through the entrance of Shado headquarters.

At Silk Wood Manor, six people just stared in a stunned silence that was broken by a tearful Claire.

"Commander Ed Straker just finally came home," she said quietly.

* * *

Ed Straker walked calmly down the corridor, completely enjoying the commotion he was causing, but not in the least reflecting that in his expression. On occasion, he'd nod formally to some operatives, some he graced with a crisp wish for a good evening, and they all wound up looking like shell shock victims. After a time which in his opinion was comparable to the space of eons it took for man to walk upright and pollute his environment, he entered Control. Jaws fell open. Papers dropped. There were gasps. Eyes threatened to pop out of eye sockets. All that, he could handle and was amused by.

It was the rise of cheering that took him entirely by surprise. It started out softly, then grew, and then was joined by whistling and applause and people getting out of their seats.

"All right, I'm obviously as pleased to be alive as you apparently are to see me alive, but let's continue to get some work done, shall we? Where might I find Colonel Paul Foster?" Ed asked in less than an innocent manner.

"In his-" Lt. Ayshea Johnson, one of the ones who had clapped the loudest, started to say. Ed turned his inquisitive blue eyes on her exotic brown ones, expectantly. She swallowed. "In your office, Sir."

"I have business with him. Tell me, where's Captain Ford-ah." Ed stood there like a gargoyle, waiting for Keith Ford, who had just entered Control, whistling to himself and examining a readout in his folder. Except for the whirring of the computers, the room was absolutely silent. Ford finally looked up and around. And turned green when he saw his nemesis.

"What's- wha-wha-wha-wha-wha-" Ford started sputtering and backed into his station, nearly losing his footing, as the folder and the paperwork in it fell to the ground.

"Might want to have medical centre see if they can help you with that stutter, Ford. Bring me a coffee, will you? Not the sediment at the bottom of the pot, either. Fresh. Light, two sugars. I'll be in my office." Ed said, stressing the possessive word my. He walked off, and there was an almost totally unified round of laughing.

"He-he's-he's-" Ford was gasping.

"Alive? Come back? About time, too. God help Colonel Foster." Ayshea said.

* * *

Ed Straker pressed the button that signalled the occupant of the office of the Commander of Shado, and the doors parted to greet him. Paul Foster was bent over a massive desk, nose in a manual that Ed recognised as being the rules and regulation of Shado. I should recognise it, Ed thought, mildly amused. I wrote most of it. Ed studied the rather ugly painting that had been hung up in place of his electric mural of swirling colours. It looked to Ed as if a giant fly had been swatted with a paintbrush dipped in various colours and the corpse lie in repose on the canvas. And Alec told me Foster once said I was no art lover, recalled Ed. From the moment he'd entered the building, memories were coming back to him as surely and as swiftly as the swallows returned to Capistrano in spring.

"Just put it on my desk, Ford, that'll be all," Foster said, taking a pull at a drink of amber liquid. Well, Ed thought, he at least kept my drink dispenser. I doubt it was from his overwhelming sense of sentimentality.

"No, that won't be all, Foster." Ed growled. Foster half choked on his ale and Ed had to admit for a moment he was truly worried for the younger man. After all, he didn't want Paul to die that easily.

"Ed-Ed-"

"Don't you ever call me that again!"

Ed brought his finger down on the switch that closed the door. Then he picked up his walnut cane and slammed it sharply down on the desk, missing Paul's hand by centimetres. Foster turned white but got a second wind.

"If you think you can frighten me into-"

Ed moved so close to Foster's face the younger man could have easily counted the number of pores on his face. Foster edged back, nervous. He'd seen Straker furious before but never had he been the cause of it.

"Frighten you, Foster? Think? Were you reading that manual? Wasn't throwing Alec Freeman out of the organisation, Alec Freeman, the first and best recruit to Shado, wasn't throwing him out enough for you? Were you determined to find a way to ruin him as well?"

"The law you created states clearly that Alec has to retire. I'm following the law. Your law. "

"So you don't think there should ever be exceptions to the laws, Foster?"

"You tell me. You wrote the law," snapped Foster, all bravado.

"Actually, let me tell you about another law. The one that states clearly that attempted murder is considered not only immoral, but illegal under any law, and treasonous. Punishable by firing squad. The one I ignored to save you years ago when you watched me pass out from lack of oxygen, and then failed to put a bullet in my head. The day you and your companion were directed by the aliens to kill Straker, an action that violated that law. The one I ignored to save your life. That one, Paul. So if exceptions can't be made, and Alec can't be saved, then maybe you have a march to the shooting range long overdue for me to put a bullet through your damn skull. And believe me, Foster, believe me, the next time you even think of pulling a fool stunt like this, I will drag you down there by your inflated ego, and this time I won't deliberately miss. If I ever see you go near my wife again I will beat you so badly there won't even be a DNA trace of you left. Now you're suspended without pay for three months, Foster. When I decide you can return to Shado you will start from the bottom and work your way up again. I am officially demoting you from the rank of colonel to second lieutenant. You'll have duties as a busboy in the restaurant until I decide otherwise."

Foster jumped to his feet, enraged.

"You can't-"

Ed reached forward, grabbed Foster by the scruff of the neck, and tossed him to the side like he was made of paper mache. Foster fell helplessly. Ed felt the blood boiling in his veins and closed his hands into fists, and then controlled his fury and carefully picked up his walking stick, lay it against the wall, and settled into the chair, from fire to ice in an easy transition.

Ford chose that moment to enter, and he handed Ed his coffee.

"FORD! He's lost his mind! Call security!" Foster wildly yelled. Ed didn't look alarmed. Neither did Ford. Foster's overblown dramatics had all the impact of a baby spitting up oatmeal. Foster had had the knives out for Alec, and Alec was one of the few people in Shado that had genuinely showed an interest in Ford. Ford didn't have the power to do anything about it. But the man who sat in the chair did.

"Ford, as of now, Paul Foster is persona non grata in Shado for three months, and his rank is reduced to second lieutenant. He is to be escorted to his apartment by armed guard and he is not to leave his apartment without such. By my order. I also want all department heads to meet me in half an hour for a complete overhaul of the rules and regulations of Shado. Understood, Ford? Oh, and I'll be temporarily on medical leave. Alec Freeman will be filling in for me. When I return, I expect to see everything returned to the way it was when I left. Any objection, Ford?" Ed asked, picking up a telephone and speaking into it.

For the first time in the presence of the man who usually made his blood run cold and his goose bumps flutter their wings and fly South for the winter, Ford smiled.

"None, Sir."

"Good coffee, Ford." Ed muttered after a sip, setting the cup down as Ford turned to go. Ford turned around. Straker was actually smiling at him. Next, Big Ben would probably strike thirteen.

And even that would feel right at this moment.

"Thank you Sir," Ford said, and left with a spring in his step.

"Get up, Foster," Ed said without looking at him. "Turn yourself in to the security detail."

Ed Straker in his entire life, despite his compulsion for excellence and sense of duty, his personal striving for perfection and then some, his somewhat eccentric and a trifle outdated sense of personal style, his self-admitted addiction to the coffee bean, etc etc etc, sometimes made mistakes. Now there were mistakes and then there were mistakes. Cutting his hair with moustache scissors fell into one category.

Turning his back on Paul Foster fell into another one.

Snarling, maddened, Paul Foster jumped up and grabbed Ed around the neck, holding him in a headlock, building up pressure on his windpipe, and Ed suddenly wasn't there at all.

He was falling, and his altimeter was cracked, and the wind was whipping at him sans merci.

Even a Beantown boy has to leave the womb sometime.

Preferably with a chute that worked. And his hadn't. And the earth was coming up fast on him, and he didn't want to be strawberry jelly. Secondary emergency chute, please God, let it work. There was an enormous jolt and whoosh that knocked him out for a few seconds and then he hit something that scratched his face, and then the lines were around his neck, crushing his windpipe, stealing his oxygen, the blood pounding in his veins, vision fading, struggling to survive.

But the spectre with the scythe seemed to be winning. And then someone blessedly cut the lines choking him, someone with a foul smell, and he fell to the ground, a needle sharp pain ran through his knee and leg, a screech of pain knocked out of him like a slug from his Glock. A bullet fired. And he was once again in the place that was a part of him.

A bullet fired. A single bullet, which made a third eye on Paul Foster's forehead almost as if Foster had suddenly decided to wear Middle East garb and had painted a bindi in the middle of his forehead. His hands around Ed's throat went limp and Ed bent over, pulling at his collar and throat, gasping for air, wheezing. While Ed's vision and a decent rate of breathing returned, Foster had slumped to the ground.

And Alec Freeman stood in the doorway, slowly lowering his Heckler and Koch, and slipping it into his hip holster. He went up to Ed and made him sip a little of the coffee. Ed appeared ashen, looked up at Alec wearily as medics and security came in and took away Foster's body. The doors closed behind the macabre parade after Ed waved away Dr. Shroeder and Alec nodded. Ed's expression was tortured as he rubbed his throat.

"It didn't have to end up that way, Alec. Maybe I went too far-"

"Christ, will you listen to yourself, Ed? Don't be an idiot. He was living on borrowed time. He had the potential to make a damn good Shado operative and that's exactly what he was. But instead of gaining wisdom and humanity over the years the way you have, he gained a misshapen idea of his own importance, and thought it was a substitution for the ability to command. You did what you could, Ed. Now let it go. Come on, I'm taking you home." Alec took Ed by the arm, and he noted for once Ed didn't protest very strongly, which worried him.

"I have a meeting scheduled with the department heads."

"It can wait."

"Alec, you can be very annoying."

"Yetunde has said so on many an occasion. What's your point?" the Australian said, handing Ed his walnut stick.

Ed chuckled.

"Alec, I don't think I want you to retire just yet. I think I'll keep you around. It's probably poor judgement caused by lack of oxygen but I'm going to make sure that you are promoted to brigadier general someday."

"Ed, the RAF equivalent is Air Commodore. Sounds more grand to the sheilas." Alec said dreamily.

"Women are going to be the death of you yet, Alec. Besides you're a father now and its time you settled down. You're giving me grey hair."

"Ed, you already had grey hair. Now I asked Nina to get up here while I was driving here and she's on her way, she'll cover for us."

"What made you show up here?"

"You mean beside the fact you tossed aside the transmitter and camera, you bloody idiot?"

"I decided I didn't want to be helpless anymore. The memories are coming back, and I figured if I had to think on my feet, force myself to rely on me instead of technology, that I had a chance."

"Straker versus technology. Anyway, I had a gut feeling Foster might pull something like this," Alec said. "Come on Ed. Let's go home."

"Alec, have I ever told you how much I've appreciated your loyalty and friendship to me?" Ed asked quietly. Alec was silent for a long moment.

"Ed?" the Australian finally responded.

"Yeah?"

"Don't get maudlin on me."

"I'd never do that, Alec."

"Good, see that you don't."

"I won't, I promise."

The two men greeted a stunned Nina Barry and Ed was so weary he just gave her a brief nod of thanks as they went past and all the way out to Alec's waiting car in the studio lot. Ed snapped on his harness as Alec did his up and then picked up speed.

"You could have been killed, turning your back on Foster like that, Ed."

"I still believed in him, Alec."

Alec grew quiet again.

"Ed, have I ever said how much I valued you being in my life and how appalling this year has been without you, most people thinking you were dead?"

It was Ed's turn to be silent for a few seconds.

"I think that may be getting dangerously to the edge of maudlin, Alec." Ed said gently, with a touch of ironic playfulness.

"You think so?"

"Dangerously." Ed repeated.

The two men grinned briefly at one another with enormous warmth, and Ed contentedly lay back on the headrest, and closed his eyes, and was almost instantly asleep. Alec kept one eye on the road but reached behind his seat and picked up a plaid blanket that he usually kept in his car for Ayomide, and smoothed it over Ed's lap, pulling it up to his waist.

Having done that, Alec blinked away tears of relief.

* * *

"I need to do this, Claire. No arguments."

"Will it ruin some grand universal plan if you at least have breakfast before you force me to shoot you up with sodium pentothal, Edward? Will it?"

"I'm not hungry anyway." Ed replied. He was dressed in white pyjamas, blue silk dressing gown and leather slippers. The weather in Gloucestershire was as murky as his mood.

"No, of course not, the great Commander Straker doesn't have to eat!" Claire slammed the silver coffee server down on the dining room table, and Ed watched the resulting splash of coffee stain the Battenburg lace edged tablecloth. Claire ran out of the room.

"What the hell happened to my professional wife?" Ed asked of nobody in particular as he mopped up the spill with a napkin. "This morning is quickly going to hell isn't it? "

"Let me do it." Frances said, getting up.

"No. I can do it, as a matter of fact, I'm perfectly capable of doing it, must you hover around me like that? Don't you have a home of your own to go to?"

"Well, if you're going to be continually rude, Edward! All morning it's been Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde with you."

"You don't appreciate being my houseguest, you know where the blasted Class 2 gates are!"

"Are you throwing my wife out, Q-tip?"

"Why don't you both go home? Now."

"Come on, we have other friends that appreciate us, Frances."

Ed watched Stanley Brisby pick up a half-buttered piece of toast, bite into it, take his now weeping wife by the arm, and lead her out. He looked over at Alec, who calmly looked up at him from over the edge of the Independent, then toss it down.

"All right, all right, everybody else has had their piece of me this morning, jump right in, Colonel."

"You've been a detestable bastard since the moment you opened your eyes this morning. Work often does that to you, but this particular mood's origin lies elsewhere." Alec added some fresh coffee to his already steaming mug, and then pushed the bacon around on his plate with his fork.

"I'm waiting, Alec."

"You're half scared out of your mind. You're asking yourself questions like can I really run Shado after a year's absence, and what will happen to me when I remember the events of the year I lost, will I be able to face it, will I snap?"

Ed just stared at him, and twisted the napkin around. When he spoke again his voice was quieter.

"Fair enough, Alec. Fair enough. Come on, let's go get it over with."

"It'll be fine, Ed."

"I'll remember you said that if it turns out to be a disaster."

"If it turns out to be a disaster, you won't remember a thing. You'll be Neal."

"Reassurance was something I could always rely on you for."

"Glad to be of help, Ed. What's this sodium stuff going to do to you anyway?"

"That's a question for you to direct to my doctor. Go on up and tell Claire to get ready. I'll be right with you."

Ed waited until Alec went upstairs, and he then moved out into the garden for a moment, tightening his robe sash, ignoring the light rain that was beginning to turn into a deluge. He bent and chose a single white carnation to pick, and he went back into the house.

Claire Straker was completely disgusted with herself, but it was difficult to stop shaking. Why had Constantine decided to go on a holiday in Aspen this weekend? That meant she didn't have any other choice but to attempt to retrieve Ed's memories herself. She certainly wasn't going to let the Shado psychiatrist who was filling in for Constantine get at Ed. Rose Mela had assured her over the phone it was a straightforward procedure. It wasn't straightforward when it was your husband who had to go through the ordeal. She knew perfectly well why her husband had turned into the creature from the Black Lagoon overnight. Edward was just as afraid to find out what other nightmares he'd experienced as she was to be the instrument that would lead him down that road.

"All right, Edward, I want you to go back, to go back to the day you disappeared, and tell me what is happening."

"I can't get the doors open, I can't walk, I've got to get out of here, I've got to stop the UFO. Yes! Through there, I can jump through there, a Beantown boy has to leave the womb sometime-falling now, falling oh shit the altimeter is smashed, when do I release the chute? Ground coming up fast, some sort of trees. When? The chute isn't opening! Come on, come on, secondary please, passing out-passing out, leaves hitting me, branches, oh God the lines are twisting around my neck, choking me, choking me! CAN'T BREATHE! CAN'T BREATHE! Someone's helping, oh God the pain, can't see. What is that smell? No wait, listen I'm Ed Straker, please, you're hurting me. Dragging me, where are they taking me? Stay calm. Stay calm."

Ed screamed.

"Ed what are they doing to you?" Alec shouted.

"Edward, it's all right, you can see and hear everything but there's no pain. No pain. What are they doing to you?"

"Strapping me down, must have passed out. Telling me I am Neal. Who are these people? Who are you?"

"You just stay quiet, lad and you do what we tell you. Is it him, Jerusha?"

"Praise the Saviour, for he is good and holy, praise the Redeemer."

"I'm Ed Straker, look let me use a telephone, I'll-oh God, you're hurting me! Stop! Stop!"

"Here, tear his clothes off and hold him down. Lie still, will you? Do as I say, do as I tell you, lad! I have to straighten that leg out, I know how to do it, done it plenty of times. Otherwise you'll never take a step again, lad. Take another swallow of this, lad and it won't hurt."

"Stop! You're making me retch! OH GOD! STOP! STOP!"

"Is it him Jerusha?"

"All praise Almighty God, Hiram, it is him. He shall redeem our sins! He shall cleanse our rotting flesh."

"What kind of monsters are you? Where are you taking me?"

"Get that watch and ring off him."

"Things of the world, Hiram! Worldly goods."

"Get your filthy hands off me! That's my wedding ring, you bastards!"

Ed went limp, and Claire quickly got the blood pressure cuff around his arm, placed the stethoscope in her ears and pumped the instrument, noting when she first heard his pulse and when it faded. She removed the cuff, lowered her stethoscope around her neck, counted his respirations and felt his pulse.

"He'll be all right, Alec. Edward, it's all right, it's about a week later now. Where are you? Where are they? What do you see and hear?"

"My leg is hurting so much they strapped it down to a piece of wood, my knee is burning, they dug something out of it with a small knife, I couldn't stop screaming, they told me it's full of pus. I hear cows off in the distance, a plane. Hum of a refrigerator close by. The only window is shut. I think I'm in an attic, attic of their house. They've got me tied down to a wrought iron bed with wire and ropes, took my clothes, all my belongings, my watch, my ring, all I have left are my Y-fronts on me. Rooster crowing. She'll be up soon, they give me oatmeal, biscuits and water, and what I think is whiskey for the pain, they force it down me. Bucket in the corner for a toilet. Ceiling fan. Walls feel like they're closing in on me, sometimes I scream myself raw in the throat. They keep saying I am Neal. I can't shave, I can't wash up, I don't recognize my own voice anymore. I'm so tired, is this a kidnapping? How long have I been here? Days? Weeks? Months? Must be months. I hear someone arguing. Footsteps on stairs. Sounds like someone is struggling. Loud now. They're here. Got a young man with them, in ropes, another prisoner? What kind of people are they? They think I'm the Messiah, because I dropped out of the sky. They're insane. Oh God, he's got a knife why is he carrying that knife? Monsters! Oh don't let this be happening! This can't be happening!"

"What in the world? Okay, I don't want any part of this, I knew you were insane, you and your ridiculous religion but my God, you've gone too far now!"

"You have sinned! You have sinned with your whoring!"

"Mum, I'm telling you right now, I'm warning you, I'm going straight to the police! Fuck! What the hell are you doing? Get those ropes off me, you fucker!"

"Stop screaming, nobody can hear you. Make your peace with God. Hallelujah, dust to dust, ashes to ashes. Oh great Redeemer, we have brought you a sacrifice, behold, like Abraham we will sacrifice our only son."

"My God, no, don't do this, I'm an ordinary man, please believe me, I'm an ordinary man, oh God, why do you have that knife, oh God, I'm begging you don't do this!"

"No! Stop them, Mister! OH NO! Oh God don't let them hurt me don't let them kill me! I'm only fifteen, Mister! FIFTEEN! Mister! STOP THEM! NOOOOOO!"

"What are you doing? What the hell do you think you are doing? NO! OH GOD, NO! Don't do this! No! MY GOD MY GOD! Oh dear God, oh God, oh God. Monsters! You fucking monsters! I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I couldn't help you! I couldn't help you, oh God, there's blood everywhere, my God they killed him, they killed him, and I couldn't help him."

"Edward, it's all right, it's all right, months have passed now, you're safe, look around, is there anything you can tell us so we can find where they are?" Claire gently wiped Ed's forehead, he was completely soaked in sweat, and softly crying.

"They don't let me go downstairs, they untie me to use the toilet, and sometimes they untie me to eat. My name is Neal. My name isn't Edward anymore. My name is Neal. I have seen many deaths, I have watched the blood flow. They bring people, slaughter them and I witness their transmigration as the living God. Soon I will be returned to paradise and Hiram will be cured of his scourge of flesh, Hiram will be cured of the cancer, brought by the sin of man." Ed's tone was disturbingly singsong.

"Neal, rest for a few minutes now," Claire said, and motioned to Alec to join her as she moved out of range of the video camera.

"We've got to find the sons-of-bitches, " Alec said, clenching his teeth and balling his hand into a fist.

"They caused him through torture and alcohol to have a nervous breakdown and a complete break from reality, Alec, but at some point he escaped, and he may have seen something then that will tell us where he was held. God only knows how many people they killed in front of him. Making him relive the events that led to his escape is our only chance of finding them, and then we have to bring him back, make him see that what happened was beyond his ability to adjust to, that it wasn't his fault."

"Will he be Ed when he comes back?"

"He'll watch the videotape we're making of this and listen to himself, and he'll see what they did to him. I know in Shado they teach you to resist torture, but what they did to him played to all his weaknesses and his phobias. They confined him in a small room, they isolated him, they tortured him, they broke his spirit, they made him helpless, they killed people in front of him and convinced him it was all God's will. They took away a year of his life, Alec. Now he's expected to just go back to Shado like nothing happened simply because he's needed there. He has to heal first, Alec. He may always be different because of what happened to him. It isn't like him to strike at his friends. He has to come to terms with his anger at these monsters and then he can begin to heal, Rose Mela explained it all to me. Some of the anger is coming out but so is the helplessness he was made to feel."

"I swear to God, I'll tear those damn idiots apart with my bare hands."

"Just be his friend and mentor, Alec, that counts for a lot for than just revenge." Claire kissed Alec gently on the cheek, and he hugged her.

"How are you holding up?"

"I'll live. I'll get through this. Don't think for a moment that I don't feel the way you do. I'm a doctor, I know how to cure pain and I know where on the human body and how to inflict it. If I hadn't sworn an oath to heal and not harm- oh God, Alec, he went through all this alone, went through things I can't even imagine."

"He's stronger than we know, and we're right here, and we'll make sure he gets through this. Come on Claire, go on with it," Alec said quietly, squeezing her hand.

"Alec, I can't ever thank you enough for being his friend."

"Claire, you ought to know by now that just knowing Ed is a privilege."

"I sometimes look around me at this house and look at him, and wonder what I did to be so lucky."

"It isn't always easy I imagine. Having to share him with Shado. Or me, I suppose."

"Alec, when he's with you, he's most at ease, he's happy. Even when he's yelling at you, or when the two of you are pretending you can't stand one another. You're so different, the both of you, but you're so alike. You both act like silly little boys, and it's a joy to watch you laugh and be playful. You both have brought so much happiness to me since I lost my Dad and my brother, and Ryan. I don't resent the part you play in his life, but yeah, sometimes I wish I never heard the word Shado. I've gotten through it from just knowing it's a part of him and probably will always be. As long as I have him in my life, I can accept it, but Alec, I don't think-" she began to break down and sob.

"I know. I don't think I could stand to lose him again either. Don't worry, I'm going to nag him into taking a long medical leave even if I have to lock him up in Silk Wood Manor. You okay?"

"Yes. I love him, Alec. That's my strength. I find strength in loving him, no matter what." Claire accepted a handkerchief from Alec and dabbed at her eyes, then sat by the bed again. "Neal can you hear me?"

"Yes."

"I want you to go back to the day you escaped from those people. I want you to tell me what happened."

"No," he moaned softly. Claire and Alec exchanged worried glances.

"Go back, Neal. Tell us what happened."

"He goes away sometimes, and she comes up, and she -- please, don't -- she comes up. She lied, she lied, SHE LIED. She isn't holy! I hate her!"

"Tell me what happened." Claire forced her voice to be matter-of-fact, as Rose Mela had instructed her, but she was torn up inside, Alec could see it in her expression. The two of them forced themselves to listen to what Ed was narrating.

"My baby. You're my baby, Neal. You love your mother, don't you, dearest darling. You love your darling mummy."

"My mother was Ro-Ros- why can't I remember? Stop, don't touch me, you-you aren't-don't touch me. You make me sick, you hear me, you make me sick! Don't touch me, you filthy-"

"Oh stop. I can touch you there, I'm your Mummy, my, how you've grown, you're my little man now. Does that feel good? Suck my nipple now, my little man. Do what I say, or I'll have to use the knife on your knee again, won't I? Get all that nasty pus out."

"Oh Christ let me die, let me die, oh let me die, you make me sick, get away from me! GET AWAY!"

"Shit! Why is Hiram here? He wasn't supposed to come so soon! Don't you tell him a thing about this, do you understand?"

"Edward-Neal, what's happening now?"

"She's gone, she's gone. I hate her I hate them! They don't know-I almost have it off, I'll kill them. I'll kill them!"

"Did she sexually abuse you often, Neal?"

Ed keened brokenly.

"y-Yes. I try not to get an erection- Yes."

"What's happening now?"

"I'm so thirsty. My leg hurts, he'll bring me whiskey soon. I pretend to be more drunk than I am. Then I'll use it."

"Use what?"

"I pretend. So he unties me, lets me sit. Gives me the whiskey. I have been unscrewing the finial on the bedpost. It has a thick, long screw embedded in it. I'm going to kill him, drive it through his skull. Then I'm going to kill her. KILL. Kill her. Quiet, don't let him hear us. He's coming. Alec is here, but I don't listen anymore. I don't listen when he comes. They twisted my leg so badly, flattened it against the wood, piece of fence post, I screamed and screamed and I begged him to help me and he tells me everything will be all right, Ed. He lies. He isn't any better than these monsters. He's one of them. He's-the man is coming. Hiram."

Claire watched Alec move away and turn his back and pound on the wall in frustration, saw his shoulders shake with silent sobs, but she hardened her heart to the sight and whispered to her drugged husband again.

"Tell me what is happening, Neal."

"He's come up. He's drunk, I can smell it on him, he's got a tumour on his leg, it's festering. It makes me retch, I've stuffed cotton up my nostrils from the mattress, I scratched at it until my nails were bloody, and when I was freed, I did it when he wasn't looking. They aren't that careful now. He's bringing me the bottle. Don't look. If they see the finial has disappeared, I'm finished. That's it come closer. He's screaming. Neck, yes push! Push it! Scream you bastard. Again and again and again! Scream. She's come up. She sees him. I'm chasing her, can't move fast, leg is hurting me terribly. Door at the bottom of the stairs, she's locked it. Can't get it to open. I've gone back into the attic again. So painful, leg so painful, can't be healed, can it? He's dead, eyes bulging out. I'm glad. I'm glad. Smashing window now, with finial. Must be a way out, has to be. YES! Got one piece of glass loose, another, how far down? Can't see. Doesn't matter. Doesn't matter. Falling. Falling. Leg is burning, no, doesn't matter. Run. RUN! RUN! Running. Running so long. Fell. Leg twisted under me. Can't go on. Have to stop. Crawling now. Road. I see a sign. A28. Fell. Can't get up. Going black. Can't see anything, voices. Someone picking me up. Black now. Sleep. Need to sleep. Need to sleep. Sleep."

"Alec, I can't do this to him anymore." Claire said.

"Won't have to, A28 is in the Kent area, I'll have my men-"

Alec's mobile sounded, and he took it out.

"Freeman. Yes. WHEN? Fantastic! Bloody fantastic. Yes, yes, all right I understand. Right, right. My God. Yes. Yes I will. Goodbye."

"What is it Alec?"

"My pals at New Scotland Yard spotted her going into another pawnshop, this time with Ed's wedding ring, when the pawnbroker recognised her from a flyer and called the police. They let her pawn it and followed her unseen to a village named Harbledown, in Kent. They arrested her and their initial examination of the small farm turned up Ed's parachute, and some of his clothes, and bodies, bodies on the property grounds. They told me they imagine a lot of gone missing cases will be solved now, once they begin to identify the bodies. One of them has to be Hiram. We've got her, Claire, we've got her."

"Thank God. I'll bring Edward around. He'll want to press charges."

"Are you sure he can take it?"

"It'll empower him, Alec, he'll finally have closure. Come on, he'll want to see and hear a familiar face."

Claire took an ammonia capsule and broke it under Ed's nose. He coughed, choked and cried out.

"Edward, it's all right, it's all right." she stroked his hair.

"I'm Neal --" he said in confusion. "Aren't I?"

"You're Ed Straker." Alec smiled. "The one and only."

"Alec." Ed said tentatively. Then his features contorted. "I remember," he said softly, "I remember almost all of it. My God, Claire, is it really all over?"

"Yeah. You're safe now, and you're home. They've found Jerusha March, Ed. If you feel up to it, you can press charges against her. They've found bodies on the property," Alec said.

"He killed them all and she stood there and did nothing. I'm fine, Alec. I am strong enough to talk to the police."

"Come on, precious, I'll help you get showered and ready. Edward?"

"Yes." Ed replied, eyes troubled. She gently turned him toward her.

"I love you. Remember that. Alway-"

He went into her arms, shaking. Soon the sobs came and Alec put a hand lightly on his back as Claire held him with all her might. Her eyes met Alec's, and she smiled.

Ed Straker stood solemnly, without making a sound. He watched the stooped-over elderly woman in the loud housedress with the potato-sack shaped figure, as the police detective questioned her. Jerusha March, who lived under the illusion that she could play God, and kill, and steal one year of his life away. He, Claire, Graham and Alec watched her through a one-way mirror. She tapped her cigarette ash into a tray made of the bottom of a pop can. Jerusha March looked around nervously, then pulled at the half-smoked cigarette. She appeared physically far smaller to Ed than he remembered. The officer had been questioning her for several minutes. Claire watched him with blossoming concern, after breaking down sobbing he'd watched the videotape of his session in calm silence broken only by intermittent nods. As carefully as she could, she'd explained what Rose Mela had said about the possible aftermath of his experiences. Possible unexplained shifts of mood, feelings of helplessness, anger, nightmares. Ed hadn't responded other than to refuse any psychotropic drugs Claire offered him to ease the transition.

* * *

"I don't know what you're talking about. I told you that. I'm just an old woman. God will punish you for this."

"You don't know what we're talking about? Where did you get the ring and watch you pawned?"

"I told you. I had them. Is there something wrong with wanting to make a little money?"

"Do you know the man in this photo?" The police officer showed her a snapshot of Ed taken from his international driving licence.

"No, should I?" she said, quickly looking away after a quick glance.

"I've had enough of this farce," Ed declared and opened the interrogation room door.

"Ed no!" Alec said, but he and Claire couldn't catch the Shado Commander in time.

The woman screamed when she saw Ed and he threw his cane aside, pushed her back against the wall, his hands joining over her neck, and with all his might he squeezed. It took two police officers and Alec and Graham to pry him off her.

"He's the killer! We tried to help him," she wheezed. "He killed my husband, and my son. He's the killer! You saw what he did!"

Ed, held by the officers, snarled at her, struggling to free himself for a second go at her.

"Monster, you inhumane monster, you filthy lying bitch."

Ed calmed a little and they let him go at Alec's urging. He took Claire's hand, accepted the walking stick back and stared at the frightened woman, stared with an unrelenting frigidity into her dull eyes.

"It's over, Mrs. March. We've only begun to dig up the bodies, and we know what you did. We know what happened to Mister Straker. It was rumoured you and your husband refused to get your baby son Neal any care in hospital when he was desperately ill with fever, but we couldn't prove it. Your worthless husband fancied himself a doctor but the truth was he knew nothing he didn't get out of a book. Then the two of you hide in Kent long enough to take innocent people in as captives, and kill them when they didn't accept your bizarre religion. Finally you killed your older son, and countless others. We expect you buried Hiram somewhere on your property. You'll be in gaol for the rest of your life after your trial."

The woman screamed as they hauled her off. Ed stood there, without expression, watching her until her escort turned a corner.

"Edward," Claire said. Ed looked toward her, nodded vaguely in her direction.

"I'm all right."

The three of them looked at him. Ed's lip curled slightly with amusement.

"I take it you don't believe me?"

"I need a drink." Alec said.

"I do too, but I'll manage without one, but some coffee would be nice. Maybe a drive somewhere. Get some fresh air. Have lunch."

"I love you, Edward." Claire said.

"I'm not Edward. I'm Neal." He watched the frightened look cloud her dark features and softly chuckled. "Sorry, couldn't resist."

She laughed and rapped him on the arm, kissed him gently on the lips. His eyes became somewhat animated, and he took her hand firmly and kissed it.

"You know, I ran Frances and Angel off," Ed said sheepishly.

"Send them a rosebush or something, they'll forgive you."

He chuckled at her, his fingers tightened around hers. "What about you, do you forgive me?"

"Nothing to forgive. I was the one who wasn't acting like the professional I am supposed to be."

"Because you love me?"

"Because of that, because you sometimes let your sense of responsibility interfere with your sense of self-preservation. That's when the people who truly love you have to guide you."

"I suppose I need it sometimes. Friendly advice." Ed nodded, took a final look into the interrogation room.

"What are you thinking, precious?"

"Fate, Claire. Fate dictated by the turn of a card. I was lucky, the others who died at their hands turned up the Ace of Spades, but I lived to shuffle the deck again."

"You can live fully, Edward, you can live it for those who died at those maniac's hands. You can cherish every second of life, no other philosophy honours the dead as much as living life fully does."

"I'd like it if the Foundation could compensate the relatives and friends of the victims, Claire."

"Soon as the police get details of the deceased, I'll get right on it, Edward."

"Good. Come on, let's get out of here. Dismal place. You can almost smell the misery in here."

"I'll buy us all lunch," Graham said, as they walked down the corridor.

"You're buying us lunch? Now that's a true miracle. Ed, you have to sign first for your wedding ring and other belongings, show them that form the Chief Constabulary gave us," Alec said.

"I nearly forgot. I'll be glad to get it all back. I can never get that year of my life back, but small victories count. I guess now that I'm not Neal, I have no choice but to be the best Ed Straker I can be. What is it, Alec?"

"My life was so peaceful with you not here." sighed Alec. Claire rolled her coffee brown eyes, and Ed scowled dramatically.

"What do you care about peaceful? Your idea of serenity is drinking like a fish, starting a fight in a pub and kicking heads around." Ed countered.

"You get out of line and make us worry about you like that again and yours is going to be the first head I kick around."

"Only reason you're threatening me like that is because you know I won't do anything while we're here with the Constabulary," Ed replied. "Wait until I get you in the parking lot."

"Hear that sound? My knees are knocking out of sheer fear." Alec said. Ed grinned.

"Oh here we go again." laughed Claire. "Do you two ever stop?"

"With them still quarrelling, it's as if the Master never was gone." Graham agreed. Ed smiled at the woman on duty as he approached her, she was sitting in her cubicle and reading a tabloid. He passed her the printed form. She was clearly startled.

"Hello, I have my personal belongings - something the matter?"

"You're Ed Straker, isn't it? You went missing, it was in all the papers."

Ed looked glum. Occasionally he got recognised from the rare times he appeared at premieres, and award shows, but with his creation of his Foundation, recognition was becoming a fairly regular event.

"I understand I need to sign a form to get my property back?"

"Oh yes. Let me find them. Yes, a call came in, I had them waiting for you. They gave your name as Straker, had no idea you were the Straker, the ex-Colonel from the United States military who owns the film studio. One moment." She shoved the tabloid nervously into a drawer, vanished for a moment and returned with a cardboard box with his name and an index number on it. He signed the form, picked up the box, thanked her politely. Just as he turned, she spoke up.

"Just so you know, I don't believe a word of it. You don't seem that mean spirited at all. Gossip, that's all it is, I read the rags because my job can be quite tiresome at times, and one enjoys reading about celebrities, but heavens, I don't believe what she said about you. Letting your son die? You don't- are you quite all right? You look faint."

"Tell me what you're talking about," he said urgently, feeling the blood thundering in his head.

"I thought you knew, goodness, it's been in the papers a while, well, I didn't mean any harm."

"Tell me what you're talking about, for God's sake!" he begged.

She frowned, and slowly opened the drawer, and straightened the creases out of the tabloid. She flipped through it and he saw the heading and the blonde woman in the photograph next to his and he gasped, sure that his legs wouldn't support him. The box dropped from his hand, and the contents spilled out. Alec, Claire and Graham echoed his gasps.

The shocking truth about Straker: My life with the managing director of Harlington-Straker Film Studios and the Straker Foundation as told by Mary Rutland, his ex. Exclusive to the News of The World from the shocking expose book soon to be published. Rutland talks about how Straker promised to save his badly injured son by acquiring a drug from America, and then claimed it had been delayed, doing nothing, allowing his son to die. She talks about how his military career was more important to him than his family. Read the first excerpt here!

Ed turned quite white, closed his eyes tightly, and pressed the bridge of his nose. Graham picked up Ed's things, Claire took Ed's arm, and Alec grabbed the offending tabloid from the astounded police clerk.

"Get me home please," Ed said, in a voice barely louder than a whisper.

"We'll handle this, Ed." Alec said tersely.

"We'll get to the bottom of this, Edward, we won't let her hurt you anymore."

"Just get me home please Claire. I suddenly don't feel well," Ed told her, opening his eyes.

They escorted him back to the car, in a sombre procession.

* * *

"Edward, please come in, you're getting soaking wet."

"I will. I just need some time by myself. You go on in up to bed."

"Edward, we have to talk about this, we have to talk about what she's done."

"Tomorrow. Good night Claire."

"All right then." Claire got up off the bench and went back into Silk Wood Manor, leaving Ed outside, a solitary figure in the storm. He turned toward her momentarily, a little hurt, but the door closed with a definite snap.

He dropped his head in his hands, as the rain beat down on him relentlessly, without mercy.

It was the worst storm he could remember since he'd moved out of his flat to the manor. It suited his mood perfectly; it felt as if his very soul had a storm raging inside it. He'd sent his friends away, wanting to be alone, but Claire's absence hurt most of all. The rain was somehow soothing and it hid his tears, after all, men weren't supposed to cry, now were they? Least of all, Shado commanders.

The door opened again, startling him and Claire came out, and gently put his Burberry trench around his shoulders. She was wearing an old Barbour that had been a gift from Frances. Without a word she settled down next to him, took his hand in hers.

"What are you doing?" he said, relieved she was there.

"I've decided to have pneumonia right along with you. That's what a good wife would do when her husband is devastated by what's happened to him and can't express it, and he pushes everybody out of his life, and he tries to drown himself in a downpour."

"Claire, don't be stupid. Go in."

"Forget it, Straker."

"All right, all right, you win. Come on, let's go upstairs to bed."

They went in quietly and Claire led Ed to the bathroom, took his soaking things off, and hung them up, and rubbed him vigorously with a bath towel until he was dry, smoothing his hair down, trying to ignore the scars on his pale skin. She handed him his pyjamas and she watched him put them on as she dried herself and slipped a nightdress on. He was so dreadfully thin, he still looked ill, and now he had to cope with his past again.

"What am I going to do about Mary?" he asked, sorrowfully.

"You can't allow her to condemn you in front of England like that, Edward, to humiliate you that way. She didn't have the decency to do it while you were around, she did it when you went missing. She's a filthy, disgusting woman, and you can't let her win. Edward, whatever you had with her is finished, and you need to accept that. She wouldn't take responsibility for her part in your son's death, she allowed you to carry the blame. And then when Rutland got involved with that arms dealer, she hoped you'd kill him and get him out of her life. She tricked you and she got you shot."

"I suppose Alec told you all about that?" he asked resignedly.

"When you disappeared he came for a while and told me all kinds of stories about you. He'd come every night, but I'd be grieving, and after a while I don't think he wanted to be with me. So he'd phone, make sure I was all right. All right. God, what a stupid phrase that is. All right. How could I be all right when you were gone, Edward? You'll never know how much I missed you. Or what it's like to feel you close to me like this. Edward, don't you understand, that when you hurt, I hurt? I won't let her do this to you. I won't let her break your heart. None of us could stop what happened to you at the hands of Jerusha and Hiram March, but we can't stand by, we won't stand by, and watch that bitch destroy you now. You have to fight her, Edward."

"A part of me still wants to love her Claire. I won't lie about it."

"You won't look at her without the rose-coloured glasses, Edward. You'll never be free of her until you do."

He sighed. "I suppose not. I don't know what's the matter with me. Come on. Let's go to bed. I'm exhausted."

"Edward, fighting her is more important now than it's ever been."

They climbed the stairs, and entered the bedroom. Claire drew the shades across the massive Palladian window and turned on the porcelain-based lamp on the night table. She then slid under the covers next to Edward. He was alarmingly cold.

"Why?" he asked. He turned on his side, and rested his chin on his fist.

"Because up until the end, you couldn't fight what those maniacs were doing to you, and they tortured you, forced you to be helpless, until you no longer had your own identity."

"Claire, has it ever occurred to you that maybe I wanted to be Neal March? After all, Neal March didn't - forget it. I'm tired."

"Neal March didn't what, Edward?"

"I'm tired," he repeated bitterly.

"He didn't what?"

"God damn you, don't push me like this." he warned.

"I'm waiting."

"He didn't let his son die! All right? Satisfied now? I couldn't stop them from killing their own son but am I any different from them really? I allowed Johnny to die. Who was the truly insane one, Claire? If she hates me she has a reason to hate me. I'm a monster. I could have saved John and I didn't. Why shouldn't the world know what kind of man I really am?"

"Ed you were responsible for more than one small boy fighting for his life. You didn't neglect him out of some bizarre religious scenario you'd concocted in your head, or because you didn't love him or because your career was more important to you. You made the only choice you could. And you know what, Edward? Your son will never be at peace until you forgive yourself for what happened that night."

"How can you say that to me? You're only telling me the things I want to hear! Why shouldn't I carry the guilt? My God, my son, my little boy, don't you know what I am saying? I let him die."

"You've always carried the guilt, Edward, and what happened to you has made the nightmare come alive again. I don't have to be Caroline Constantine or Rose Mela or even Douglas Jackson to know that your terrible pain serves no purpose, Edward. Johnny loved you dearly. He wouldn't have any peace knowing his father was in agony like this. Edward. Oh my sweet darling, you have to let it go. And you have to stand tall with your head in the air, and fight back, because this is one skirmish you can't afford to lose."

"God. God. I don't know what to do. I don't - " he said brokenly, weeping.

"Edward, have you ever in your life asked for help? Really, truly asked for someone's help?"

"I don't know, I suppose. Claire, out there in the garden-out there just now-"

"Did you think I turned my back on you?" she said, encircling him in her arms, tearful herself. "I have to earn your trust again. I've lost your trust."

"You came for me." he said quietly, resting his head against her.

"You came here, Edward. You came back looking for a warm, safe place. Where you wouldn't be judged, where you could do or say anything and not be ridiculed and have someone love you for who you are. I love you and I need you. It's time that you let me help you, that for a few days you put down that shield you carry around, and let the people that most love you help you. The only way you're ever going to heal is to first admit you're wounded."

"Claire."

"Yes?"

"You talk too much."

She chuckled softly.

"Probably. I have to make up for the year you weren't here."

"I suppose I'm in for an earful then. I never should have disappeared like that and left you alone."

"Oh for God's sake are you going to add that to the sackcloth and ashes and barbed wire of guilt, Edward? I managed perfectly well without you," she lied.

"You said five minutes ago you missed me."

"I stretched the truth. I had a new dishy Commander I smuggled into Silk Wood Manor and hid under the bed."

He looked at her, paused and then bent to look under the bed, while she laughed.

"I find him, he's a dead man," Ed announced.

"But Edward, he's attractive, and strong, and he'd never let his ex wife walk all over him."

"Ouch."

"I call them as I see them." She smiled.

"Claire."

"What?"

"Do you think there's any more of that lemon drizzle cake left downstairs in the refrigerator?"

"Come on, let's go find out, husband." She pulled back to get up but

He grabbed her and pulled her close, bent his head and covered her lips with his in a gentle, tentative kiss. Then he moved away a little.

"Does Mr. Under-the-bed kiss you like that?"

"Oh him? Oh sure. A thousand times better," she said dreamily.

"I want a divorce."

"Before or after the lemon drizzle cake?"

"After."

"Figures. Edward?"

"What?"

She took a deep breath. "Make love to me." she said quietly.

His lip disappeared and appeared again, transformed into the familiar slit that signified he was troubled. It didn't surprise her.

"Claire," he answered quietly, "I don't know if-"

"If you'll just be reminded of what that monster forced on you. I promised myself I wouldn't push you my precious, but I need you. I need to be your wife again. If you'd rather not, I can wait, I know it's selfish, I'll understa-"

He silenced her with another kiss, seemed to take inventory of how he felt, slipped the straps of her nightdress off her shoulders, and swept her hair away from her neck, kissing her just below the ear and teasing the warm skin there with the tip of his tongue. She pulled her nightdress down to her waist, baring her breasts to him and started to unfasten his buttons, gasping as his kisses grew more intense.

Eventually they both were free of their clothing and he brought himself down, guided himself into her, and their sensual dirge and bodies melded into one.

Downstairs, the grandfather clock chimed, and the Westminster chimes and their desperate groaning that accompanied shared pleasure was the only sound that filled the manor. Outside, the storm raged, and hail began to patter across the windows.

Eventually, the rain stopped altogether.

* * *

Ed Straker dreamed. He was trapped in the attic room again, and this time he was sitting on the bed, and they brought the boy up the stairs. Horrified, he tried to free himself, and to his amazement, he wasn't tied. Yet he couldn't make himself move.

The boy was his John. And he had to let the boy die. He had his duty to Shado.

"My God, no, don't do this, I'm an ordinary man, please believe me, I'm an ordinary man, oh God, why do you have that knife, oh God, I'm begging you don't do this!" Ed cried. "Don't make me do this, I can't do this, don't force this decision on me!"

"No! Stop them, Dad! OH NO! Oh God don't let them hurt me don't let them kill me! I'm only nine, Dad! Nine! Dad! STOP THEM! NOOOOOO!"

"Johnny!" Ed screamed in agony. But the hooded figure pulled back his son's fair hair, and his neck jutted out, and the knife blade ran across the fair skin and the blood gushed out. The body pitched forward, twitched once and laid still. The hooded figure slowly removed his hood, and stared solemnly, coldly, with finality.

It was his face.

Ed screamed, and Claire shook him awake.

Recognition of where he was and who she was set in, and he collapsed in sobs against her.

"My God, just hold me. Just hold me, Claire, and promise me you won't walk out on me. I need you, I'm losing my mind. Claire, I need - I need help."

"What was your nightmare about?" she said softly.

"That boy's death. Only - only it was John. He was begging me to help him. I wasn't tied up, but I couldn't move. I watched John's throat get cut open by a man in an executioner's hood, and he removed it and stared at me. He had my face."

"Edward, close your eyes, and imagine yourself in the room again."

"Claire, no, no psychological games, please."

"Edward, you asked for my help. This is the only way I can help you to help yourself. This is a technique Rose taught me after Silk Wood Manor caught on fire, and I'd have nightmares about it. Now take a deep breath and close your eyes and imagine yourself there, and describe to me what is happening. Remember, I'm right here."

Ed trembled, but he did as she asked. "I hear them coming up the steps. Yes, it's them. I'm sitting, I'm not bound, but I cannot move. Johnny's screaming at me to help him. I can't. The man is lifting the knife, oh God Claire!"

"Edward, tell John you had no choice, and tell him you love him."

"I had-oh dear God, Almighty God, you have to believe me. I didn't have any choice. If we had been able to reach that alien in time, it might have meant an end to the war. It might have meant no bodies would ever be stolen for harvesting, no men and women and children attacked, no mutilations, no organs, it would mean I could have an ordinary life. The end of the war. John, I'd never hurt you, never. Please forgive me for what I did. Please. Please. I loved you, I would have done anything, I would have given anything, I would have gladly died in your place. Oh Claire, my son, my son, my son." Ed sobbed against her.

"I know he hears you. I know that he hears you. I know he would tell you there is nothing to forgive. Edward, try and sleep now. It isn't even dawn yet."

"Claire, don't ever leave me. I couldn't stand it," he said quietly, holding on to her hands.

"I will never ever let you go. Some part of me made that promise to you years ago, when I first walked into your room, and looked into those eyes. You mean everything to me, Edward. You're loved, and cherished, and you always will be. Sleep now. You're safe. You're safe."

"Do you think that he hears me?" Ed said softly, nestling against her as she drew the comforter around him. It was the plaintive question of a child, she thought with great sadness.

"He hears you," she said gently, believing it with all her heart. Claire held Ed until she knew by his deep breathing that he'd fallen asleep again. Only until she heard him begin to snore did she allow herself to follow him into sleep, holding him tightly. He was where he belonged. Home.

* * *

"Do I look all right? Did Alec really have to pick this time to go pick up someone in his car and leave me helpless like this? Did you notice he wouldn't tell me who it is? Emergency, my Boston ass. He's probably having Mary killed by the Australian mob and he's gone off to make the initial payment to them. Christ, they're swarming out there like ants on a picnic table. I can't do this, Claire, I'm going to soil my new suit. Why can't you do this? Give me hoards of aliens anytime. I hate the press. I'm a filet mignon about to be thrown at a stray dog in a back alley. I'm toast."

"Edward, I love you. Here's your cane. Get ready."

"You're staying by me, right?"

"Right here. Go on now, show the press what Edward Straker is made of."

"At the moment, jelly." he grinned. She chuckled. She smiled at the official looking gentleman who came out to greet them.

"All right, Mr. Straker, can't say I like these things either, but we better get it over with. I'll make the initial statement, then you read your part and then they'll be questions, and believe me, I'll make it clear that the question time will be brief."

"Thanks, Detective Superintendent Ward." Ed shook his hand, and then Claire smiled at Ed. Ed was dressed in a black suit, white shirt, burgundy sweater vest and burgundy paisley bow tie. As they stepped out in front of the audience, the first rows made up completely of hungry press, flashbulbs popped, dazzling her. Her grip on Ed tightened.

His face was the usual professional mask. A few inches away, Yvonne stood with Graham not far behind. Yvonne's look clearly begged for someone, anyone, to try something. Still, Claire found herself missing Nate, and she knew Ed did as well.

"Thank you for coming. As you are aware, Jerusha March was recently captured, she is suspected of having helped kidnap and kill eighteen people, including her teenaged son Anthony. We are still in the process of exhuming and identifying bodies on her farm in Kent. The only victim who survived was Mr. Ed Straker, of Harlington-Straker Film Studios and the Straker Foundation. Mr. Straker, who had gone missing after a helicopter mishap, miraculously escaped after a period of nearly one year of captivity and torture and brainwashing at her and her deceased husband Hiram March's hands. She was recently imprisoned and will face trial in two months. We are confident that she will be found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment. We are pleased and delighted to have had Mr. Straker assist in the capture. He will make a brief prepared statement and then will be available for a brief period of questions. Mr. Straker?"

"Thank you, Detective Superintendent Ward. I would like to first thank the press for coming to this briefing, but most important of all I would like to thank my wife Dr. Claire Straker, for continuing with the important work at my Foundation, and for her love and support for me, which have helped me tremendously to get through this ordeal. My immediate plans are to have necessary leg surgery that may allow me to walk normally, along with psychological counselling to help me deal with what happened. I will be away from my position for a still undetermined amount of time. You will receive extensive details of what happened after this press conference. All right ladies and gentlemen, I will take questions. Yes?" Ed pointed to someone in the front, a balding fellow with no less than three cameras.

"First Mr. Straker I'm sure I speak for everyone here when I say we are delighted that you were found alive. My question is, will you be testifying at the trial?"

"I'll be providing a videotape of events for the court to witness. I won't be present, I want to put this behind me as soon as I can and go on with my life. Yes?"

"What were the extent of your injuries?"

"The major injury was to my leg, which had been broken, and I'm told Hiram March was a doctor who had lost his medical license, and he reset my leg in a way that caused it to heal incorrectly, affecting my mobility."

"How were you tortured?"

"I'm not going to answer that. I will say that I've been informed all of the victims were tortured in some way or another, and the police have been able to identify the majority of the bodies as having gone missing without a trace. Yes, you, there, yellow shirt."

"Have you any response to the book coming out that's been written by your ex-wife Mary Rutland?"

God damn them, Claire thought, they were briefed not to ask about it but here it comes.

Ed hesitated a split second as the cameras flashed. Then every word he uttered made Claire's spirits rise. His clear, distinctive voice needed no microphone. It reached and bounced off every corner in that room. Suddenly, people were hushed.

"I intend to seek an injunction to stop the book from being published, I have made a complaint to the PCC about the newspaper involved, I firmly and unequivocally point out that this is merely an attempt meant to sully my reputation and my personal life. I intend to sue all parties involved with this project. I intend to fight as soon as I find a suitable solicitor. I'm standing here alive today because I never gave up, some part of me kept fighting. I won't stand for this. She believed me dead, ladies and gentlemen of the press. That is the only reason she went ahead with this absurdity. All right, I'm tired, no more questions, thank you for participating."

There were a few weak protesting Mr. Strakers, but mostly there was a steady hum of lowered voices. Ed had spoken from the heart and for once she thought the jaded crowd of reporters had got his point.

"If I could say something," Claire heard herself say. Ed looked with surprise at her, but he allowed her to approach the dais. Cameras and tape recorders clicked on.

"This public admission of your adultery with the guy under the bed?" he whispered to her off-mike. She grinned widely at him.

"I just wanted to say that the man Mary Rutland described is not the man standing beside me, who suffered unspeakable things at the hands of real life monsters, and still fought on. The man I married, Ed Straker, the man I am proud to know and love, is a man who has done incredible work for several charities, in particular those that assist children and he's contributed money without publicity to causes that most needed it. So if Mary Rutland wants a fight, I say bring it on."

"You'll have to forgive my wife ladies and gentlemen of the press, she seems to have forgotten that she took an oath to first do no harm." Ed said softly, and several people in the audience laughed, chuckled or snickered appreciatively. Ed was about to lead Claire off stage, when he was aware of a ruckus next to him. Yvonne and some police officers were stopping an elderly woman from approaching the dais.

Ward crossed over, had a word with her, then sighed, and joined Ed again. "I do apologize, Mr. Straker, but she's harmless, that's Edith Bedford, her husband was missing for over four years, and he was recently identified as one of the victims we dug up. She wants to speak to you."

"Edward-" Claire said, worried, knowing how Ed would react. With cameras flashing, Ed walked carefully over to the woman, guiding himself with his walking stick.

"Mrs. Bedford, I'm Ed Straker."

"Oh I know. I know, Mr. Straker. I was hoping. I was hoping you'd tell me if you saw or spoke to my darling Peter, this is his picture. Please tell me he didn't suffer?" she sobbed.

Ed took the photograph with some hesitation and went quite white with recognition, and it took all Claire's inner strength not to yell at the woman for obviously making him relive the horrible memory, and then she instantly cursed herself for even thinking it. Ed was alive and with her, and this woman, who must have been in her late seventies at best, had lost her love. He placed the photograph in one of her hands and held her other gently.

"I saw him die, they forced me to witness it, Mrs. Bedford, he faced them with dignity and courage, and he died quickly, with little pain. He wasn't afraid, he said, he was going to his God. You should be proud, I hope that relieves a little of your grief. Is there anything I can do for you?"

"Oh thank you, no, God bless you, your Foundation sent me a wonderful cheque, it paid for Peter's burial, and a good deal more, my pension doesn't cover much you see." She broke into tears, and Ed took her into his arms for a moment.

"God bless you, Mrs. Bedford. A fund has been set up for all the victims. I think it appropriate that I try and do what I can for them. I've got to go now, Mrs. Bedford. If you find yourself in need, you telephone the Foundation. Goodbye."

Ed walked with Claire backstage and he sank into the nearest chair, looking frail and desolate.

"I hadn't remembered him, up until that second I hadn't remembered. He told me to be brave. Me, Claire, me when they were about to cut him open with no more emotion than if they'd been cutting into a cake."

"Oh Edward." Claire said quietly.

"I'm okay. Let's go home, see what Alec's been up to." Ed got up slowly seeing the police representative approach.

"I'll see that she has more than enough money to get by, Edward," Claire added.

"You know, Mr. Straker, usually I don't get personally involved in these things, but I hope you win your case against your ex-wife and I wish you a speedy recovery."

"Thanks, thanks for everything, Detective Superintendent Ward." Ed smiled, and rose and gently guided Claire out to their waiting car.

* * *

In her flat, Mary Rutland turned on the afternoon news later that day, and gasped at the televised and exceedingly alive Ed Straker. Then her expression hardened when she saw and heard Claire and she shut off the television.

"This isn't over, Ed. This isn't over. I'm going to make you pay."

* * *

"What on earth are all these opened boxes doing in the Great Hall? There must have been ten delivery lorries pulling away in the driveway outside. What's going on?" Ed accepted a clipboard from a uniformed woman, signed his name, tipped her, and accepted a small box along with a saucy smile and a wink from her. Claire smiled at his responding sour look. He recognised the Nevada return address as being Gil Grissom's. Claire recognised it too and wrinkled her nose.

"Flowers, packages, telegrams, and there's a visitor for you I think you should see, he's waiting in the sunroom, Sir." Harry Andrews told Ed with a smile. He'd been helping mind Silk Wood Manor along with Frances and Angel while Graham and Yvonne were with Ed at the press conference. "Oh and there's a package from Dr. Caroline Constantine, I put that on your bed, and Mrs. Brisby will have luncheon ready soon."

Claire had parked her green Vauxhall sedan in the spacious garage, next to Ed's bronze Shado car, and gone around the manor, back up to the path that led to the front door, and stood in the lobby, which Ed had named the Great Hall for its immense size, tapestries, velvet benches and elevated ceiling with oak beams. More than practically anywhere else on the estate, it truly was castle like. Claire had done a good job of recreating it.

"I hope that box from Gil doesn't contain anything with feelers," Claire said, before retreating toward the sunroom.

"Whoever it is waiting for me, get rid of him," Ed called after her, leaning on his walnut stick.

"If it's my dream man under the bed, I'm keeping him," she shouted back. Ed grinned, and then his grin faded. Even though he knew she was nearby, not having her at his side made him feel empty. He went upstairs and into the master bedroom, picked up a silver curved letter opener that had been given to him by Constantine, and broke the seals on the package. He wondered idly if it was wise to have Graham check all the packages for anything that ticked. Security should have been the first thing on his mind, but just for once he wanted some semblance of normality.

Inside the box was a book, Tao Te Ching, along with a CSI Las Vegas logo bookmark and a lengthy hand written letter from Gil, requesting that Ed allow the investigator to interview him. Ed skimmed moodily through to the last paragraph.

-I know it's probably the last thing you'd want, Ed but it would be immensely helpful in my work, and enabling me to have the information would be one way of undoing the damage. Making sense of no sense at all. I could come anytime this month, stay a weekend, I'm taking a brief holiday, and I'd love to see what Claire has done with your house. I spoke to her often when you disappeared. She wanted me to come down and investigate, but cases just stockpiled on me in Vegas and I reluctantly had to turn her down. I'd like to see if your insect population changed after the fire. I'd like to have Mrs. Brisby stuff my stomach, too. Enclosed you'll find Tao Te Ching, and I've always found it a peaceful read. I hope it will help you to find your inner healing and wisdom. Ring me and let me know your decision.
Affectionately, Gil Grissom

Ed sighed, and opened the book at a random page.

He who follows the Tao
is at one with the Tao.
He is virtuous
Experiences Virtue.
He who loses the way
Feels lost.
When you are at one with the Tao,
The Tao welcomes you.
When you are one with Virtue,
The Virtue is always there.
When you are at with loss,
The loss is experienced willingly.

Ed smiled, and flicked through the parchment-like pages again with rising interest.

Claire came into the room, wide eyed.

"What is it?" he asked, setting the book and letter down.

"The man downstairs in the sunroom, Edward. Cedric Marchmain."

"Name sounds vaguely familiar."

"Should be. He's one of the richest philanthropists in England. "

"Ah, I think I met him at some conference. He's contributed to Mayland Hospital in the past. What's he want with me?"

"Edward, after you gave your brief talk, the press spoke with Edith Bedford, and they discovered you'd contributed money to all of the victims' families and friends through a trust in your Foundation. Well, they were impressed with that little detail because you hadn't announced it. Nothing they could write off as a self-indulgent publicity stunt. So it got around. It was in the afternoon papers, apparently. It and the whole story about just what you'd endured started off the deluge of telegrams and gifts and flowers for you. You've become a celebrity, a hero."

"I'm a hero?" Ed sounded more than irritated.

"Always. So just get used to it. Now stop pouting, run a comb through that hair of yours and come down and meet him."

"Tell him I have a migraine and I've gone to bed." Ed started to sit on the edge of the bed and she grabbed his hand, handed him his stick and pulled him up and out the door, and he muttered to himself all the way down the stairs. Eventually they entered the sunroom, and a short, bright-eyed bald man in jeans and black sweater got up from a Queen Anne chair, extending his hand.

"Good to meet you again Ed, wish it wasn't under these circumstances."

"Good to meet you, Sir, what brings you to Silk Wood Manor?"

"Took a good deal of ferreting out information to find out where you lived, Ed I dare say. Yes indeed. Beautiful home, your wife was telling me your Georgian home burned in an electrical mishap? Pity, pity. Beautiful estate. In any case, I have something for your Foundation, and for you."

He handed Ed a cheque made out to the Straker Foundation for twenty million pounds. Ed's eyes widened. The blue eyes widened further, a feat in itself, when the man handed Ed a cheque made out to Edward Straker for seven million pounds.

"Good Lord!" was all Ed said.

"The Good Lord doesn't have the bankroll I have, Ed. I made that second cheque personally out to you because I want you to be indulgent. I don't want it spent on charity. I want it to go to you and your wife. If I hear, and I will, that you've spent it in any way other than recklessly, I'll take both sums back. It so happens Edith Bedford's husband was a friend of mine. We used to go fly fishing together. I've just come from Switzerland, three month skiing holiday with the wife, you see, didn't even know Peter had gone missing. Terrible shock when I heard the police identify his remains. Then I rang Edith when I saw her with you on the morning news coverage. After all you'd gone through, you didn't have to allow yourself to share her grief. Good of you, man. Solid bloke, you are. I heard you'd instructed your wife to write a personal note to each and every one of the victims' friends and family, as well as having that trust finance anything they needed. Always knew it from your charity work. Sod your ex-wife. Believe me, if anything she'd said had a kernel of truth to it, I wouldn't be speaking to you now. God bless. I'll see myself out. Good day Mrs. Straker. You look after your stunned young man there."

"Drive safely, Mr. Marchmain, and offer my condolences to Mrs. Bedford again." Claire said, waving. Ed was just staring at the cheques in a stupor.

"You all right, my enormously wealthy Edward?"

"Good God, I didn't even say goodbye to him."

"He's known to be eccentric, darling, he really will come back if you don't spend it on yourself. Come on, let's see what Caroline bought you, she said she had it specially made for you."

"Christ, I better deposit these today, before I lose them," Ed said nervously.

"Any idea of what you'll buy yourself?"

"None!"

"More Nehru suits? Personal hairdresser? Another PDA you can toss in a drawer? Your own personal Austrian alp? French concubine?"

"Very funny," he said as they walked upstairs. Yvonne was happily arranging flowers everywhere, and he rolled his eyes, as Graham gave orders about where the gifts should go, and Angel just wandered around, bemused.

Ed took off his clothes and changed into a beige V-necked sweater decorated with beige leather trim and jeans, with a wide leather belt finished off with a burnished bronze buckle. It wasn't quite his usual fare, but Claire had bought it for him when he believed he was, and it was comfortable, and warm. He took off his polished oxfords and slipped his feet into braided leather mocs. He heard the loud chime of the doorbell. Christ, now what?

Claire was changing into jeans and a green frilled blouse, and she grinned at the moody expression on his face. She handed him the box from Constantine. He ripped it open and pulled out a light blue T-shirt with white lettering.

I WAS CAPTURED AND TORTURED FOR A YEAR BY MAD KILLERS AND ALL I GOT WAS THIS LOUSY T-SHIRT.

Ed started laughing and Claire giggled, shook her head, rolled her eyes. Ed promptly removed his sweater and pulled the T-shirt on, and paraded around with it.

"Frances will have a cow if she sees that, Edward. I don't think she appreciates Caroline's offbeat sense of humour. Or the fact Caroline making you laugh in her supposedly non-compassionate is her way of helping you heal. Poor Caroline is still in Austria, with a broken ankle from skiing."

"Serves her right. I was going nuts listening to Rose Mela seriously tell me all the things I could expect during my breakdown. I could have used Constantine's lighter style."

"What did Gil give you, and is it crawling somewhere?"

"No, he gave me a leather bound book on Tao, and he asked if he could stay with us a while, ask me some questions about the March couple. I haven't decided yet, but he did say it would help him out. Give him more insight into the criminal mind."

"Take your time deciding Edward, I know it will stir up memories, and I don't want that until you can handle it better." she said gravely. He kissed her, and then nuzzled her neck, started to undo her blouse buttons and he frowned when Graham showed up. Claire blushed.

"Don't you believe in knocking?"

"Sorry Sir, door was open. It's Alec and Ayomide and someone Alec brought. A solicitor, he said. Lunch is ready, Sir."

"Already? Leave it to Alec to interfere with my life and hire someone without my permission or even consulting me." Ed grumbled.

"If Alec's broken secrecy and brought him here, he must think a great deal of him, you know that. At least speak to him Edward." Claire pleaded. Ed sighed, nodded.

"You going to lunch with that on, Sir?"

"Oh I suppose not." Ed said, and removed it, and squirmed into his more conservative sweater again.

* * *

"So what is this friend of yours going to think when you just burst in on him and his extended family?"

"I wrote him a letter Catherine," Gil responded calmly, thumbing through his copy of American Entomologist, and leaning back in his seat.

"In which you said you could come anytime this month."

"Why Catherine, you read over my shoulder?"

"Now you're on the Concorde to Heathrow, and you dragged me along with you."

"You were getting slightly unhinged with Lindsey away at summer camp."

"You think waiting to see if he wanted you to come might have been a good idea?"

Grissom put the magazine back down in his lap and lowered his glasses and looked down at his nose at Catherine. She was wearing jeans and a chambray tank top with a white jacket, strappy sandals, diamonds in her ears and a tiny peace sign on a delicate chain around her neck. Gil wondered if she had brought anything warm in her suitcase. If not she was going to be subjected to the rigors of British weather in Las Vegas attire.

"Catherine, how much have I told you about Ed?"

"All I know is that we got that yummy basket from Fortnum and Mason from him. I can still taste the beluga caviar."

"When I met Ed he came, no, correction, he barged into where I was talking with the police, demanding them to move on finding his missing wife. Very intense man. Controlled. Ex-military. Perfectionist. Used to having his own way and heaven help the person that tried to interfere. More to the fellow than met the eye. Disciplined. Not comfortable with emotions. Well we eventually traced his wife who's been raped. Naturally hard on her doubly hard on him, didn't have any control over the circumstances. So now this month his face is in the British newspapers, and for two reasons. One, his ex-wife is doing a hatchet piece for money on him. Two, he survived a year of being mentally and physically tortured by a couple of religious fanatics. Apparently he crashed into their back yard when his parachute failed and they took it as divine intervention. Believed he was their God. So in a neat little progression, they killed people in front of him, made sacrifices to him to heal the husband's cancer. This all happened without him being able to do anything about it. He had sex forced on him by the wife, who wasn't as pious as she led him to believe. Eventually he formed a delusion he was another person, named Neal. Seems her firstborn son Neal died when the woman refused to get the baby treated for a high fever, and her husband forced Ed to start thinking he was their reincarnated son, grown to adulthood."

Catherine cringed. "How did he get away?"

"Unscrewed the finial on the bed he was usually bound to and used it as a weapon. They captured the woman when she attempted to pawn his wedding ring."

"You want to interview this guy?"

"For more insight into the criminal mind."

"That really why you're imposing yourself on this man?"

"That's what I said in the letter."

"But the truth is-?"

"That I think I can help him find his way home. He's been shattered, Catherine, and one of the things I do is put evidence together to look at the whole picture. In this case, he is a crime scene with two legs, in the middle of a nervous breakdown. I pulled some strings and called in some favours and looked at the shrink confidential reports on him. When I met him I didn't know he was a claustrophobic and he had posttraumatic stress disorder. Now they're expecting depression, possibly with suicidal ideation, flashbacks, lifelong irrational outbursts of anger, survivor guilt, lack of control, severe anxiety, nightmares. Whole gamut from A to Z." Gil stuck the magazine in his carry-on bag and came up with a tiny container.

"Hellish." she said.

"That's where I hope I can make a difference. Make him want to survive."

"You should have asked him first."

"I would have gotten a no. Chocolate covered myrmecocystus? Honeypot ant. They're the tastiest." Gil opened the tupperware container of specks and she winced.

"No thanks, I'll stick to the complimentary peanuts. Damn I wonder if Lindsey's okay?"

"Here we go again. Put on your harness. That's the seat belt, Catherine. Better start brushing up on your British English. We're about to land."

* * *

Claire fretted. Ed had reluctantly secured himself a copy of the tabloid.

"Excuse me a moment, I have homework." Ed picked up the tabloid and went upstairs. Claire followed him and was about to go up when she noticed something astounding. Ed had angrily flown up the winding oak stairs. Without his cane. Without a limp. She bit her lip so she wouldn't cry. Her brain buzzed, trying to figure out whether the alien bacteria was finally elongating the bone, or whether the limp and twisted leg were all psychological symptoms. She heard a loud crash and dashed in to see what happened, followed by everyone else. Ed turned toward them in irritation. A vase laid in rigor mortis on the oak floor.

"Can't a fellow have a temper tantrum without the entire household rushing up here? For crying out loud! I'm fed up with the way you're all starting to coddle me! Get the hell out of here!"

"That was my favourite vase Edward, did it suffer much?" chuckled Claire.

Ed looked at her in surprise, then quietly reached for her. She took his hand.

"I needed something to be Mary's head," he said with a slight smile.

"In that case-" Claire said, and promptly stomped on a broken shard, which in her mind was showing signs of recovery.

"You not only have forgotten your do no harm vow, you've demolished it." Ed grinned. The doorbell rang. "Oh Christ, what now? No more press! No more gifts! No more surprises! Find out who is ruining my Saturday! No wait, I will!" Ed stormed past Alec and Alec raised his eyebrows.

"Alec did you notice that he's-"

"No stick!" Alec said in astonishment.

Claire beamed and nodded. Then panic set in. In his current state, Ed would probably eat any press representative in a single gulp. Fortunately when he practically pulled the huge oak door off its hinges, Yvonne and Graham were close by.

"Now you LOOK, whoever you are. No interviews! No nothing! Go home!"

Catherine Willows had somehow unfairly earned the karma of being the one nearest the door when Ed opened it. Willows jumped back and scolded Gil.

"No wonder you wanted me to see him first. I should have known. All Eds are like my ex, have the temper of elephants in heat. Listen, buddy, don't you raise your voice to me, Grissom made me come with-"

"Gil! What in the blazes? I just got your letter this afternoon. Who have I managed to get to hate me by my rude behaviour? Wait, must be Sidle or Willows. Can't be a girlfriend of yours, a girlfriend of yours would have a ovipositor."

"A what?"

"Just ignore him Catherine, he's showing off his knowledge of insect anatomy. Ed, this is Catherine Willows, I brought her along, hope you don't mind. We drove straight here, didn't bother to look for a hotel. Can we come in?"

"Of course you can, you won't need any hotel, you know you're welcome here, Gil and Miss Willows, I apologise, I've had a difficult day. It's a true pleasure to meet you. Come in, come in, have some iced tea and I'll have Frances make spaghetti and meatballs for dinner."

Alec let his eyes travel up and down the highway of one Catherine Willows as if he were hunting for a place to park.

"I'm so glad to see you, Gil. Pleased to meet you, Catherine. Please come in. Did you like the drive down here? I'm Claire, Ed's wife. That's Alec Freeman, Ed's partner in the studio, Graham Lancaster, butler and personal bodyguard, Yvonne Lane housekeeper and security expert, Frances Brisby, our friend and cook and Reverend Stanley Brisby, an old military friend of Ed's."

Frances muttered something about Americans coming unexpectedly and went away. Angel grinned, waved and trotted after her.

Ed extended a hand to Catherine. She examined it briefly for toxins, a detail that made Gil grin slightly and then she took it.

"A pleasure to meet you." Ed repeated.

"Is it? You don't know me." Catherine said, allowing Graham to take her jacket and disappear outside to collect the luggage.

"I know you're Gil's partner, I know he chose you to accompany him, I know, like and admire Gil greatly, I know what you do, and what you've done, and that's more than enough for me. Want iced tea? Iced coffee? Or maybe a drink before lunch?"

Catherine smiled and meant it. "You make me a mean martini sour and I'm your friend forever. Gil, can I see you privately for a second?"

"Would it do any good to refuse?" Gil calmly stirred his frosty glass of iced tea and Claire pointed them in the direction of the new sunroom. Whatever comment she was going to make was lost when she saw the view. Sunlight filtered through the trees and flowers, and the view continued as far as the eye could see.

"Look at that, damn, the man lives in a picture postcard. They own all this?"

"I think Claire mentioned about four hundred acres to me, and she's still building and planting. Yes, they own it. As much as any human owns this earth, at any rate. Insects and trees were here long before man was. What did you want to talk to me about? If you aren't sure about staying here, forget it, you'll love it here, and they'll be upset if you refuse. He's a very wealthy man, and having us as guests is good for him. Did he mean what he said? Yes. Never known Ed not to mean what he says, unless he's joking, and he won't do that with you not until he gets to know you. What did I miss?"

"You didn't tell me the man was that much of a fox."

"Catherine, Ed isn't a specimen of Vulpes vulpes."

"You know damn well what I mean. You didn't tell me how good looking he was."

Gil found a rattan chair, and sat in it, sipping his tea. Catherine settled into its match and watched Gil.

"If he wasn't settled with Claire, you two would make a good pair. He isn't like Eddie at all. Different breed, Ed."

"I never saw you as the matchmaking type," Catherine said with interest.

"That's not good. You should always expect the unexpected. You're just assuming characteristics about me without seeing the evidence."

"And the evidence never lies, yeah, Gil, does he know you took an entire month off just for him?"

"You read over my shoulder. Tea's excellent, Catherine, hint of mint. Claire has it imported. Brewed especially for-"

"That isn't you, Gris. You're all about work and bugs. But this one man itches and you suddenly come all this way to scratch it. How come?"

"I wasn't in a position to help Claire. It bothered me. So I'm righting a wrong. I should have known he was alive somewhere, even though the report was they found the wreckage of his helicopter, and blood, even skin tissue, solid DNA. The evidence said he was dead. I didn't stop and consider his will power. I didn't want to be the one to tell Claire. I let her down. She deserved more from me than that, with Ed gone."

"Self-incrimination isn't like you."

"Besides, Silk Wood Manor is bug Disneyland." he grinned.

"Figures. Oh hello Ed, I was just asking Grissom about this property. It's gorgeous."

"After the snug, or sitting room, this is fast becoming my favourite room. Enjoy the sunshine, it won't last long. Here, martini sour, courtesy of Graham who not surprisingly adds bartending skills to his resume."

"Delicious. Where's yours?"

"Tea for me, I don't drink. How are you, Gil? You having withdrawal yet?"

"I beg your pardon, Ed?"

"You get facial tics if you go without having something to dust for prints. I can have someone killed, I wouldn't want it said that Ed Straker lacked in hospitality toward his guests. I could spill the tea and pretend its blood spatter." Ed settled into a brightly pattered floral print chair across from Gil.

Gil studied him carefully. "Ed, you know, you look like crap."

"That's what I like about Gil, he so knows how to make his host feel appreciated," Ed said calmly. Catherine nearly choked on her drink from laughing.

"You look fine to me, Ed. Never mind him. Gil took an entire month off, just for you, you must be special. Even with that name."

"I thought you came for a holiday, shows I'm not up to snuff yet. You like holidays about as much as I do, I should have realised that. I'm stuck here on medical leave after my experiences, what's your excuse?"

"Guilt. Powerful motivator, as you well know. I felt I'd let your Claire down. Felt I owed you something. Felt I could help."

"Nonsense, Claire was delighted to see you. So delighted, I suspected you were her man under the bed. Guilt isn't necessary Gil. I'm learning that, or trying to. Everything pointed to my being dead. She alone held out. I don't know if you place much value on matters of parapsychology, but she's somewhat psychic, woman's intuition, if you prefer. I believe in it. I'm very glad to see you, very glad to have you here. Besides, I came into some money, unexpected windfall, and I know that lab of yours could always stand to be newly equipped. So consider me your job, and naturally you'll be paid. I can see by your expression you're already trying to figure me out. Gil, I have to be 100 per cent, and I have to be 100 per cent as soon as possible."

"You don't force a blue fly out of its pupae before its time, Ed."

"I'm at about 44 per cent now. Besides, I'm not an insect, Gil. I know it would make it easier." Ed chuckled.

"You're not listening to him, Ed. He's telling you you have to stick it out if you want to get better. He told me what happened to you, and what happened to your wife."

"I see," Ed said, a trifle icily, with a knowing side-glance at Gil. "What else did he say, and is that why you came out?"

"She needed to know, Ed. I brought her because her people ski-"

"So this is where everyone was hiding. The first course is ready, although lunch will end up practically supper now since Frances pulled rank and is making a sauce from scratch against my wishes, and according to her a good sauce needs to simmer all day. Graham chose two rooms for you in the upper suite, overlooking the garden. We have plenty of guestrooms so if you prefer something else, just yell. Come on. You must be starving by now."

Claire had a long pinafore over her customary jeans and frilled blouse, and Catherine thought she looked every inch the little woman, and idly wondered if that was the kind of woman Ed preferred. Except when Catherine glanced down and saw she was missing three or four fingers.

Gil nodded at Catherine's shocked look.

* * *

"You worked where?" Frances said, startled.

Catherine Willows paused in mid-twirl of her spaghetti into the rich Bolognese sauce with the meatballs floating in it. This was going to mean extra hours at the gym when she got home but it was worth it, and so was the wait. It was fabulous, and Frances had even baked up some pre-made dough for French bread, so the slim baguettes were fresh. It was food to die for. She noticed Gil was on his second plate, and so was the one named Alec. He'd been giving her the eye all during the dinner.

Aside from Ed, who was delicately twirling his spaghetti into a spoon and then savouring each bite, most of the men had been giving her that look. The 'I wonder what she's like in bed' look. Sometimes women had a hard time with her, thinking they had to compete, but Yvonne had just been polite, preferring to be at friendly odds with Graham, and they'd gone upstairs to have dinner in their rooms. Frances was just interested in the food, however Claire had genuinely smiled at her with real warmth, making Catherine decide she genuinely liked Claire back, as Claire had told her what she did for a living, or had done before the injury. Another woman professional, without a true jealous bone in her body, an ex-surgeon who preferred pediatrics. Claire had explained earlier the prosthetic fingers were driving her nuts in the unexpected heat so she'd just popped them off. Ed had listened with pride to her accomplishments and then grinned at her about the fingers. So that was what love looked like, Catherine thought. Her first impression of Ed had been wrong. Straker adored his wife, took pride in her and didn't care who noticed. She wondered what that was like for Claire, suddenly envying the smaller woman.

"French Palace, I was an exotic dancer." Catherine sat back and sipped at her wine, studying the men's reactions. "Stripper. Danced nude for men. Some women, mostly men. That's where I met my ex. Eddie."

"You went from one dangerous job to another, Catherine." Ed reflected, thoughtfully dissecting a meatball with a faultless sterling silver knife bearing a rococo pattern around an Old English monogrammed S. It was so polished, she could have checked her mascara in it. By this time, she liked Ed, and was beginning to see what Gil saw in him. Just that very true statement, with an undertone of quiet concern. Not the look that Freeman was giving her (God, how did Ed get along with that old lech. If he kept it up she'd smack-oh wait, the old lady looked ready to have a stroke or something, yes, Gil had noticed it and was expectant.

"What's the matter, Frances?" Catherine said, defiant.

"How can you talk about it like that? Like-like-"

"Dear, I think you should-"

"Stanley Mitchell, you're interrupting me."

It was clear who wore the cassock in that marriage, Catherine thought. Ed had some offbeat friends.

"Like what, hon?" Catherine said casually, knowing what was coming. God, how she despised those holier than thou types. The trouble was, they were as plentiful as the one armed bandits on the Strip.

"Like it was something to boast about, doing something that evil, parading your body like that in front of men for money."

"I danced in my skin and I liked it, hon, and I made more money in one night's work than you could dream would show up in the church collection plate, hon. I danced to make a living and put myself through college until I found something that really excited me, really turned me on, almost as good as sex, and that was forensics, crime scene investigation and I became a CSI 3 and never looked back."

"I expect you ran into trouble on occasion while you were stripping." Ed said simply. Gil looked over at Ed and then at Catherine. God, the man either had ice water where blood usually ran, no-Gil wouldn't have come all the way down here if he were like that. He was just unique. A lot like Gil. He took her at her word.

"I've always taken care of myself. One of my friends got stabbed, was killed. Yes."

"I'm so sorry, Catherine." Ed sighed.

Damn, she thought. He meant it. He was. He was one classy guy.

"I used to get a lot of you girls in the ER, patch up what the guys had done to you. Came in almost as frequently as the gunshot cases. Thank God you do what you do now. It must take guts to dance like that. But you had to have a way to feed yourself and the girls used to tell me that for once they were independent. Some of them came in with OD's and rapes and God knows what else, so Catherine, you're a lucky woman." Claire pointed out.

"Yeah, I was resilient. I met my ex there, Eddie. At first I couldn't believe my luck, and then he cheated on me, and he'd toss me around, give me bruises, treat me like shit. But out of it came my Lindsey, and she's worth it."

"Lindsey? You have a daughter? Any pictures?" Ed asked.

Claire laughed as Catherine grabbed her purse, and produced her wallet, and a zig-zag of plastic fell out, showing at least ten photographs. Ed accepted them and oohed and ahhed over her little girl and Catherine smiled. Gil hadn't mentioned Ed was a lover of kids, but it showed.

"Ed, you start her off like that, she'll never shut up. That's why I brought her here to the relative peace of England. Her daughter's in camp."

Ed chuckled. " Now I see. Nervous breakdown time, huh? First time she's ever been away from Mom, huh? You have a beautiful daughter, Catherine. Why don't you call her on the mobile?"

"Yeah. Poor kid. Girl scout. Somewhere on Lake Mead, in a lousy tent. Might get eaten by bears. Anyway, they won't let me talk to her on mobile unless it's an emergency. They have a shortwave system up there I could use, but I haven't had time to find somebody into ham radio."

"Are there carnivores in Nevada, Gil?" chuckled Ed.

"Yes, but I suspect nothing will try and taste Lindsey," Gil answered calmly, duelling with a meatball.

"Just wait until David does an autopsy on her, Grissom. And you have to see her poor little bear-gnawed body on the slab. You'll be sorry then." Catherine teased.

"She might get poison sumac, but I doubt Dr. Robbins will be doing an autopsy on her for that." Gil replied.

"Calamine will clear it right up." Ed grinned. Catherine smiled at him.

"You have kids of your own, Ed?" Ed shook his head slightly, the familiar sadness welling up in him. He reluctantly handed the photos back. Claire squeezed his hand. "Not any more. My nine-year-old son died due to complications after a car accident and my fiancée had a miscarriage. We-broke up. My wife and her unborn child died in a car accident. You have a lovely daughter there, why-"

"You and Claire didn't have any kids?"

"I'm going through menopause, I can't have children. Besides, I have enough to deal with, looking after Edward, he often behaves like a five year old."

"That's a male thing, Claire. It's in their DNA. The male professors in biology just never admit it." Catherine joked.

"Males are intelligent enough to understand human biology?" Claire asked innocently drawing a laugh from Catherine.

"I heard that, Mrs. Straker." Ed said, smiling a little. Claire chuckled, leaned over and kissed him, licking the sauce off his lip, and batting her lashes at him. Ed gave her a faux warning look. Catherine had first pegged her for a mouse in bed, but the playful flirting made her remember the old saying about it being the quieter ones you had to watch out for, and she guessed the two of them would sear the bed linens on fire on a regular basis. And Claire's dark beauty wasn't the kind that hit you in the face right away. But it was there, like music playing softly on a radio in a back room, Catherine mused.

On the other hand, Ed's attractiveness and sexuality was the entire Mormon tabernacle choir on your front porch. He seemed unaware of it. He was like her Grissom in that, too.

"I still can't understand how you can live with yourself, having exposed your body like that to men. It's evil. It's disgusting. It isn't Christian at all. I'll pray for you." sighed Frances.

"Stop it Frances," Ed said. Something in his voice alerted both Catherine and Gil, and Claire quickly dropped her hand comfortingly onto his thigh.

"Edward, she's showing a poor example for her daughter."

Catherine stood up, threw her napkin down. Ed automatically rose with her.

"I don't need your preaching and proselytizing, especially because I don't need some two-bit religion to have common courtesy toward a stranger, but it's clear you don't know how to do even that. I'm going to go take a walk, and I hope you aren't here when I get back, you old bitch," she told Frances.

Frances sputtered in reply, trying to form words. Angel's jaw dropped but he didn't say a word. Gil just went on eating.

"Catherine, go upstairs and look in on Graham. He's got a shortwave ham radio and I'll bet he could get through to Lindsey in no time. Tell him I sent you. He and Yvonne always prefer to have dinner on a tray in their rooms. Old school. Go ahead." Ed said quietly. Too quietly, was Claire's thought. Oh God. How thick can Frances be? I warned her.

"Thanks, Ed!" Catherine scurried away, and Gil smiled. Then he saw Ed's face.

"Ed-" he said cautiously.

"Do we always have to put up with your fucking superior attitude because of your damn religion? Religion! Religion! RELIGION! Who are you to judge her, Frances? I've had it up to here with people who spit out ethics and morals and religion and then kill! KILL! Kill people for no reason at all and explain slaughtering innocent civilians away as being all in the name of religion. That woman rattled about God to me, day after day after day and when her husband wasn't there, she raped me orally. Was that in the name of God too? Some divine plan? You make me sick Frances! She is my houseguest, do you understand? Don't ever mention Christianity in my home again, I never want to hear it I never want to see it I never want to smell it again! How can I make you understand what it was-"

"Edward, I won't allow you to yell at me in such a disgraceful-" Frances snapped, standing up.

Ed yelled an obscenity, picked up his half finished dish and hurled it directly at her. Luckily Angel grabbed Frances, because the shock of Ed's uncharacteristic rage had turned her into a hapless rabbit caught in the headlights of an oncoming car. He pulled her aside just as the dish shattered on the opposite wall, showering everyone present with sauce. Ed was visibly shaking, his hands balled into fists. Claire led him firmly away, out the door. He didn't fight it, his expression was crumbling, and she knew he would not want them to see his agony when the rage wore off. Gil gave Frances an odd look, then he stood up and followed them out.

"I think you two ought to go. Now," Alec Freeman said angrily.

"Now see here, Alec, she didn't-"

"Angel, I don't want to put you in a situation where you have to take sides, but she pushed him. And right now he's fragile, and you know it."

"Stanley Mitchell Brisby, you take me home. Alec Freeman, you tell that man I will never set foot in his home again!"

Frances stomped out.

Angel sighed, gestured helplessly to Alec. Alec wasn't having any of it. Angel went after her.

* * *

"Edward, talk to me." Claire said, rubbing his hands. He was shivering, although there was just a mild breeze, and the sun was actually shining. He lay his head against her chest, her blouse wet with his tears. They sat on the mock rattan bench Claire had replaced his favourite bench with after the fire had ruined it. He hadn't said anything for eternities. She waited, watched a bird alight on a branch, twitter something in what she interpreted as compassion, then flit off, causing the first of the autumn leaves to fall. Ed watched it too.

He often enjoyed watching the wildlife at Silk Wood Manor. She felt his heartbeat, took solace in his presence. She'd come so close to losing him.

"Claire, I was close to killing her back there," he finally whispered, and sat up, holding on to her hands like his life depended on it. He often thought it did, especially now. Her brown eyes didn't hold the pity that sometimes he saw in Alec's. He couldn't stand pity now, especially not from her. And he was finally beyond tears, he'd descended into the hell of sobbing as soon as she'd brought him out of the sight of prying, horrified eyes. Knowing she never judged him as being any less for it helped.

Knowing he didn't have to live up to terrible standards that he himself established. He didn't have to live up to anything with her. He just had to live.

He concentrated on what she was saying. "Edward, I think just about everybody in that room save for maybe Angel, felt the same way you did when she started that sin crap. You know what was happening, don't you? For an instant, Frances became Jerusha March to you."

"God, Claire, in truth I don't know anything anymore. I just feel like screaming and never stopping. When is it all going to end?"

"Edward, you just have to face it head on. You remember that old toy the Chinese finger trap?" Claire smoothed his silky soft silver hair. It was finally beginning to grow to a decent, uniform length, and she watched with pleasure as the breeze toyed with it. Ed relaxed against her and chuckled faintly.

"I see where you're going. You think I'm pulling. The more I pull, the more trapped I become. If I just relax-"

"You'll be free." she nodded. "You're fighting this too hard. You need to just let go and let the triggering happen and come to it's own conclusion. People will understand. Besides, I personally think Frances did all this just to get a new rose bush out of you."

"Oh stop it. Claire, for God's sake what was the matter with her in there?"

"Besides being forced to cook common spaghetti and meatballs on a moment's notice?"

"Will you be serious for ten seconds?" he grinned at her, knowing it was true.

"I think she is having a crisis of faith yet again. I think what happened to you really scared her, the idea of her God setting up circumstances where one person after another died, and all in the name of religion. Not that it hasn't happened in the past, or the present, look at the Twin Towers disaster. This time, it happened under her nose. There's nothing wrong with spirituality, Edward. Or certainly not prayer. I'm a surgeon, I saw miracles happen when people prayed. I never question miracles. You're sitting here beside me, evidence that miracles are real. I never discount them. Or the power of prayer. I think the tinker-toy pieces of belief fall down when people start organizing religion. Your God can't beat my Goddess. That kind of slop. She thought what Catherine did was sinful."

"Catherine doesn't strike me as being sinful. She did what she had to, so that she could have a roof over her head, clothes on her back, food in her mouth. Sometimes enforced morality just screws up ordinary every day living."

"Tell me about it. I used to grow headaches on my headaches studying ethics in college, and I won't even tell you about the maze that they call medical ethics. Do we keep this 94 year old man alive by artificial means even though he's knock knock knocking on heaven's door, and he's tying up life support that might be better used on a seventeen year old? Do we slip a seven year old in the last stages of pancreatic cancer a little more morphine in her IV so that she dies without pain? Do we perform abortions? Do we implant new livers in adults with alcoholism? It just goes on and on and on." She sighed.

"I never thought of you as having to make those kinds of hard decisions. And here I thought your life was rosy." Ed smiled at her, kissed the flesh where once her fingers had been.

"The easiest decision I ever made was coming to England to find you. You were in hell when you disappeared on me, and you're in hell now. I just want you to know you'll find your way out of hell, but not alone. Never alone. I'm with you every step. We all are, Edward. The evil can't touch you anymore. Catherine dancing wasn't evil, Edward. True evil is manifested in people like Hiram and Jerusha March. Those two are the epitome of sin."

"Or is mankind? If we let that kind of thing flourish? The world is a dangerous place to live, not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don't do anything about it." Ed recited. "Albert Einstein said that, and he was dead right. I was exposed to their ugliness, their sins and if I'm not careful, that ugliness and sin will grow in me."

"When you look long into an abyss, the abyss looks into you," a familiar voice said.

Ed and Claire turned around, and Gil took the bench across from them. "Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil."

"Hello Gil. Why don't you join us?" Ed said, not surprised to see him.

"Don't mind if I do."

"Gil, Nietzsche went insane in his forties." Claire reminded him.

"There's a fine line between genius and insanity," Gil informed her.

"Oscar Levant, wasn't it?" Ed said.

"A plus, Ed," Gil replied. "How are you feeling?"

"You're the scientist that studies insects like me under the microscope. You tell me." Ed said bitterly. Claire frowned at him.

"I prefer to study insects in their natural setting. Like this garden. I saw a Calopteryx splendens while I was trying to find you. Banded Demoiselle. Common type of dragonfly. Besides, Ed, most dragonflies I study aren't like you. Know why that is?"

"No, but I'm sure you'll tell me."

"Not many study me back."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning you aren't as inhuman, or as mad, as you seem to be so determined to think you are."

"Gil, I was telling Claire I nearly killed Frances back there, I wanted to, I was struggling with my emotions. I kept seeing Jerusha's face, I kept-" Ed hesitated. "No," he said, almost to himself.

"The Chinese finger trap, Edward," Claire said softly. Gil furrowed his brow, and then caught on. He nodded. Waited.

"I was there as a piece of meat for her pleasure. The woman. The way Catherine danced before those men. Only I had no choice. I never had any control over my climaxing. It was disgusting. I'd try to focus on Claire, but I couldn't. As much as I hated her, all I could do was just wait for it to end. Sometimes I could get through it without saying a word. She'd get tired of me quickly when I managed that, I couldn't do it often at the beginning. Later, as I moved closer and closer to losing what made me unique, and I started to believe I was Neal, it all happened without me seeming to even be there. I let go."

"Dissociation. You became Neal. Neal could handle it. It's a guess but I don't think she was comfortable with normal intercourse on a regular basis. She more than likely required her partner to be bound against their will as you were to achieve sexual satisfaction or too weak to protest. I imagine she also gained sexual satisfaction from the murders. Ed, you know, you encountered irrefutable evil. You can't lie down with canis familiaris and not get up with siphonaptera," Gil said, still studying him. "What you're experiencing, the rage, the temper flaring up, the crying, is natural. Even healing."

Ed chuckled at Gil. "You can shake the fleas off after a while, exterminate them, cage them. But no matter what I do, I seem to be always wrenched back to that experience, I can't hold on to the real world."

"Then don't. We're here to guide you back out of the abyss. You didn't volunteer to go in, that's what makes the difference. It may not seem like it, but you'll get back home," Gil said.

"Nietzsche never made it back home," Ed said sombrely.

"Nietzsche didn't have a wife and friends who loved him as much as we love you." Claire said. Ed smiled at her.

"Hey . . . Hi, Alec told me where you guys might be." Catherine said, approaching them.

"Catherine, have a seat. It's nice out here, and this weather won't last long. In Gloucestershire late summer is when the rain gets warm, or so the saying goes. My old Bostonian bones tell me we're due for a storm tonight. Besides the one that I had after you went away."

"Yeah, well, Ed, I shouldn't have come down so hard on that old self-righteous biddy like that. Alec told me what happened, and he apologised to me for ogling me. You know, I had him pegged as a lecherous old man, but he's got a heart." Catherine shared the bench with Gil.

"Alec? Alec has a heart the size of Australia. I saw him looking at you. He's still in advanced puberty, that's all. He's dated strippers before. I'm surprised he didn't come looking for me."

" All of humanity's just a crossword puzzle with a few blank spaces." shrugged Gil.

"Maybe. You still doing advanced crossword puzzles?"

"You're changing the subject, Ed. We were talking about you, remember?"

"I can go, take in the scenery," suggested Catherine.

"No Catherine. Sit, you're Gil's barometer."

"He changed the subject again." grinned Claire. Gil nodded.

"He did indeed, few people are as good as he is at that sport, but I want to hear this. Go on."

"You were going to tell me earlier that her people skills were better than yours. Let's face it. Alec has been at my side for years, possibly drawn to me because we're so different. You're drawn to me because we're so alike. But you don't have the instincts to determine when to say things, when not to say things. Not really. Catherine's your barometer. She isn't all that different from Claire in that she's down to earth, and yet she really cares about people. That's my instinct about her. You'd use anything at your beck and call to solve a case, and to help you fill in my crossword blanks, you're using Catherine. You trust in her to help you see things differently. In terms other than the scientist's black and white. To see minutiae you missed. How am I doing so far?"

"I'm fascinated, go on." Gil said.

"I saved the best dish for last, like any good host would. Sure, you wanted her to have something to think about so she wouldn't worry about Lindsey. I'll buy that. But the real reason you brought her along is that you genuinely care for her. You like being with her. What was it you said to me once about an emotional tsunami? I see it happening as you sit next to her. My guess is the only reason you don't act on your attraction is that you don't think you'd make a good father to Lindsey. Nonsense, if you ask me. Otherwise you two share a lot of interests, have a lot in common. Dedication for one. A need to speak for those who have no voice. The dead have no voice. There. Lecture over."

"Gil, you're blushing." Catherine pointed out. Claire chuckled.

"Cite your source." Gil said quickly. Ed grinned.

"My eyes, dummy. Ed, I actually spoke to Lindsey. She was mortified that I'd actually call her, but I promised her I'd bring her a lot of souvenirs and presents from England. I feel much better now. She didn't miss me as much as I thought, and it was a blow to my ego. Thanks. Oh, and Graham and Yvonne told me to inform you it's going to take at least a week to get the spaghetti sauce out of the wallpaper and the carpet in the dining room."

Claire laughed and Ed chuckled.

"They would see it as just a matter of removing stains. I've always suspected they think Silk Wood Manor belongs to them, and it's just on hire to us, and we do a lousy job of taking care of it."

"Hamleys." Ed exclaimed suddenly. "We'll go to Hamleys for Lindsey."

"Huh?" Catherine responded.

"Oh it's just the biggest toy store in England," laughed Claire.

"Biggest in the world, Claire." corrected Ed.

"Talk about minutiae." she rolled her eyes and he grinned at her. "But no Hamleys yet. You can't change subjects and get away with it with me, I know you too well. We have to talk about what happened to you. We have to talk about Frances."

Ed groaned. "If I keep yelling at her like that, I'll have to buy them another house to make amends." Ed sighed.

"You bought them a house?" Catherine said, eyes widening.

"About ten minutes drive from here. Claire, what's wrong with her anyway? Do you honestly think she's having a crisis of faith?"

"Edward, she doesn't know how to behave around you anymore. She's always seen you one way, and now you've become unpredictable to her. So she's clinging to the familiar. Church. Prayer. Ethics. Sin. The simplicity of it all."

"There's nothing simple about life." frowned Ed. "Nothing simple about sin. Nothing simple about God. Certainly nothing simple about evil. No matter what her religion tells her."

"The more simple something is, the more complex it gets."

"Who said that?" Gil wanted to know, looking at Catherine.

"Philosopher I bet even you never heard of."

"Not a chance."

"Five bucks says there is a chance."

"You're on. Name the philosopher."

"Catherine Willows." Catherine grinned.

"You win."

"They always win, Gil. The weaker sex." Ed teased.

"Weaker sex? You're in need of an education." Gil responded. Ed winked at him.

"I'm sorry about Frances. I don't think what you did was sinful in the least."

"Don't worry about it Ed. Trust me, I won't."

"Ed, you all right?"

"Hiya Alec, wondered when you'd show up."

"Unfortunately Frances left in a huff. Angel went with her."

"Angel has so much more common sense than she does," sighed Ed. "My guess is she'll never understand. I can't condemn her for that. It isn't her fault that she triggered me. If I had stopped her from insulting one of my houseguests in the first place, it never would have happened."

"Pins and needles, Edward, don't tell me you're starting to blame yourself for what happened with the circumstances you went through." Claire slapped him on the thigh, and he gave her an amused look.

"Ed, if you hadn't been a victim of the March couple, then I'd say you were right. However you were no more culpable for the insult to Catherine than you were culpable for the murders you were forced against your will to witness. You spoke earlier of the dead having no voice. If anything holy came out of that unholy experience, it was your testimony for those dead, and your kindness to their friends and family. Remember that. Hold on to it." Gil urged him.

"Damn. I hate scientists." Claire muttered. Ed looked at her in bewilderment.

"What? Why?"

"I've been trying to find the exact way to get across that very thing to you and he sums it up in a few sentences."

"Heh heh heh. He's used to condensing evidence down to a definitive solution," replied Ed. Gil nodded. "He's also right. The living is what I should concentrate on. I just don't know how I'm going to get home, the way I'm dwelling on the abyss against my will." frowned Ed.

"Omnes viae Romam ducunt. There are a lot of roads that lead back to Rome. Ed, you just have to find the one that fits you, and you'll get home."

"I pray you're right, Gil." sighed Ed.

"Edward, I promise you, once you're home, the abyss will seem so much smaller to you from the outside." Claire urged, wiping away tears.

"I know. I know." he smiled, pressed his hand against hers and gave her a brief, warm kiss. It led to another, lingering one, and it was Alec who broke their romantic interlude.

"So what do we do now? I'm free the rest of the weekend. At the last minute Yetunde decided she wanted to baby-sit Ayomide, so she calls me on the mobile and I dropped her off. What are a couple of single guys like us going to do on a summer weekend?" Alec playfully inquired.

"Never mind that, I'm hungry, Edward decided to toss his plate around like a Frisbee and I couldn't finish my spaghetti." Claire winked.

"Well, our late lunch got spoiled, I apologise profoundly. Let's drive into London, I'm sure we can find a pizza with all the trimmings on it somewhere." Ed suggested.

"Harrods has everything. We can have a party afterwards. A housewarming for the new improved Silk Wood Manor. " Claire said excitedly.

"Without Frances and Angel? They'd kill us." Ed reminded her. "Although Graham and Yvonne will probably have a nervous breakdown if I drop anything else on the carpet. Well, look, there you go. Knew it was going to rain. Hurry up, we'll distribute coats to everyone and take off."

"Ohhhh, I'm going to get pneumonia in this outfit, I just know it," squealed Catherine.

"Just where did you think you were going in that ensemble? Back to Miami? England is cold in late summer early autumn." Gil said, glancing at her as they all hurried back into the house.

"Grissom, what was I supposed to do? All you told me to do was pack. I packed. I don't remember you mentioning a cold climate."

"Of course not. All you could talk about was Lindsey being away from her mother for the first time. Now aren't you ashamed for underestimating your daughter's ability to take care of herself?"

"No. And shut up."

"Aren't you her supervisor? Should she be giving you mouth like that?" Ed got into his Burberry trench, started handing out Barbours, and helped Claire into hers once they got into the house. Catherine sighed to herself. A fox and a gentleman. She's a lucky woman.

"I'll be a tyrant come next review time. Fire her." decided Gil.

"You do and a hundred clubs in Vegas will take me. Fake boobs or no fake boobs." Catherine said, wrinkling her nose at the Barbour Ed handed her.

"Now, that's a new tartan Bedale we keep for guests and it's clean, so it must be the style you don't like. You'll change your mind when you put it on and see how warm it is. Edward gave Gil the reefer."

"You gave Grissom some weed?" Catherine winked at Claire and Claire chuckled.

"That's the style of the Barbour, Catherine. I'd no idea you had such a droll sense of humour. You won't have to strip at the French Palace when I fire you. You can hit the comedy clubs. Ouch!" Gil exclaimed when she smacked him in the middle of his back.

* * *

Yvonne. Alec, and Graham climbed into Yvonne's Range Rover, and Catherine, Ed, Gil, and Claire shared Claire's green Vauxhall sedan.

Claire turned on her CD player, and the strains of Lionel Richie and light conversation filled the air while Ed drove. The only other sound was the click of the wipers on the windscreen.

"I don't remember you having that music. Who is that?" Ed asked.

"You don't know Lionel Richie? Where have you been? I took Lindsey to see him at the MGM Grand last year." Catherine said. "He's fabulous."

"Do you know that is one of the few CDs I have left, that Renaissance one? A lot of our music collection, Ed's old LP's included, were destroyed in the fire. We just have to start all over again." Claire sighed.

"We had plenty of insurance, but insurance doesn't replace-never mind." Ed muttered, his voice trailing off.

"Ed." Gil said meaningfully. "Don't censor yourself."

"Gil, it wasn't important, I just had some crayon and watercolour drawings my son did for me at school. I normally kept them in the safe. Claire was planning on having them framed for me as a surprise, so they were in her desk drawer. Gone."

"Do you have any pictures of your son?"

"One or two. Had them among my things I kept at Mayland, thank God for that. Like to see them?" Ed asked Catherine. He handed her his wallet.

"Oh what a darling little boy."

"Yes, he was, yes."

"Who's the blonde holding him in the second picture?"

"My ex-wife. The person who said that our wedding night was dull and unimaginative, and that as soon as I was finished with her, I went to sleep."

"WHAT?" exclaimed Claire.

Ed chuckled softly. "I take it you didn't read the excerpt from the tabloid? Yeah, but that wasn't what made me exterminate your vase. It was her statement that I was a bad father, and that I regularly didn't show up for my monthly visits to John. All her statements are lies."

"Sounds like someone's helping her with that little piece of trash. Filling it out. Putting in things that would make it more acceptable to the public's love affair with gossip." Catherine said. "I know there's nothing that a ex won't do to make your life miserable, believe me."

"I just can't believe she can be that big an idiot, and especially after everything Edward did for her." Claire snapped.

"Believe it." Ed responded.

"Those gossip sheets bring in a lot of money," Gil said thoughtfully. "Maybe Mary has some debts. Greed is one motivation for what she's doing. So is jealousy. Nobody could sit and listen to the way the timbre of your voice changes when you talk about Johnnie and be convinced you weren't a good father. It was one of the ways you defined yourself. Executive, military man, father. You claimed earlier that maybe I didn't consider myself a proper father for Lindsey, but you've never explained why you didn't seek custody of your son, Ed."

"I-couldn't. Mary's rationale for filing for divorce was that I'd committed adultery. Not that it matters after so many years, but I hadn't. Her mother convinced her into having a detective follow me, they photographed me going into a colleague's house and that was that. I wasn't in a position to fight for custody." Ed shrugged.

"Regrettable. As for the rest of her statement, anyone who observed your body language and your rich use of your hands, your appreciation for anything tactile, would come to doubt her accusation of you being inadequate in sexual intercourse."

Several heads turned and looked at Gil momentarily. He smiled slightly. "Just simple observation, Ed. Your thigh is against Claire's thigh, and it has been there all through the drive."

"This Vauxhall is a cramped car, Gil," Ed claimed.

Claire laughed. "That's why I bought it." winked Claire. Ed rolled his eyes at her.

"I was thinking those two sear the linens on a regular basis earlier. It's the quiet, introverted, erudite types that you have to watch out for. Real animals in bed, I always say." Catherine said evenly. Gil didn't at first see that she was looking directly at him, until Claire started giggling and Ed laughed. Finally Gil looked puzzled, and looked at Catherine. He blushed.

"Don't you agree with her, Gil?" Ed asked innocently.

"Women," was all Gil said.

"Listen, I came into a windfall of seven million dollars. So anything you see in the stores that you can't live without, just buy it. I have a running account with most of the stores here."

"Seven million dollars?" blurted Catherine.

"The cheques are in my purse." grinned Claire.

"Yeah, and I'm supposed to spend it on myself. I enjoy giving presents. I'm supposed to pick out some things for myself and Claire as well. I'm just not sure exactly how I'm going to do this."

"How did you come by the money?" Gil inquired, and Ed explained about Marchmain.

"Look at it as a puzzle. A game," Gil finally said, intrigued.

"A game?" Ed said thoughtfully. Then his eyes gleamed. "A game. Yes, yes. I have a few ideas. All right. But we stop and let Frances and Angel play it too. I'm going back to get them. I'm not taking no for an answer."

He pulled the Vauxhall around, and headed in the direction he'd come from.

"Edward, they don't want to ever come to Silk Wood Manor again."

"All talk. I'll handle it, Claire."

"What happens if it doesn't work?" Catherine asked.

"Then I leave them behind me in the abyss. Life is just too short for me to struggle about it." he sighed. "I think the world of them, but I have to get well."

"I love you, Edward, I hope for your sake they wake up," Claire said sadly.

"I do too," he said softly.

* * *

"No son. You know how stubborn she can get. Just no talking sense into her sometimes. You go and have a nice evening. In time she'll understand." Angel said. Ed frowned.

"If she doesn't want to see me, then she'll have to tell me that herself."

"Ed, son, don't make this any more difficult than it already is. Frances just doesn't want to face up to what happened to you. You read that kind of stuff in the newspapers, like those two little girls Holly and Jessica, such a pity."

"Yes, yes, I've been following that. What kind of world are we living in, Angel? It's been a feeding frenzy for the scum that prey on children. Still, the reality is it happened to me, and if I keep it inside me, I genuinely will go insane. She has to see that sometimes the world doesn't fit into a nice little package. Not everything is solved by turning one's back on the ugliness of the world. Angel, I beg you, let me go and talk with her."

"You know I can't refuse you anything, but you know too, I'll be living on brew and crisps in some hotel when she finds out I let you go up."

"Rest assured, I'll pretend I took you by force, and you had no choice." Chuckled Ed.

"God bless and keep you, Ed."

"I don't know if that's an advantage anymore, Angel. How do you have respect for a deity that apparently looks the other way when children like Holly and Jessica are brutalised? " Ed sighed.

"It's faith, Ed. You may have left God behind in that attic where you were tortured, but God hasn't left you behind. You'll see, son. You're his special child."

"Thank you Angel. At least you understand."

"She didn't see what we saw in Nam. Keep that in mind, Ed."

"I'll try." Ed patted Angel on the back and climbed the stairs.

* * *

Outside, Alec and Gil stood in the rain side by side. Both men had offered to accompany Ed inside, but Ed had turned them both down.

"You need to understand that this is his battle to win, Alec."

"I don't remember allowing you to call me by the name my friends do."

Gil chuckled softly. Alec sneered at him.

"You think this situation is funny? Ed's going up there and all he's doing is exposing himself to more pain. She can't see beyond her God-fearing, aristocratic, Christian, flower planting, biscuit baking nose. Ed's taken enough, we nearly lost him. He finally lets down that damn armour plating he carries around, and she gives him a Sunday school lecture. It's not what he needs."

"I don't consider the situation amusing in any way. Ed is empowering himself by confronting her, and making her understand. He's making her look into the abyss, and not allowing her to pretend the abyss doesn't exist. In doing that, Ed confronts and challenges the abyss himself. Rung by rung, he is climbing out of it."

"Your psychological crap doesn't impress me, Grissom. As a matter of fact I don't know what you're doing out here anyway. Why don't you go home to your bugs."

"I will when my job is finished, Alec. Tell me, what do you see when you look into the abyss? "

"Oh stuff it. Sod your overeducated, bug studying arse."

"You see me as replacing you as Ed's confidante and friend. You see us, Catherine, and myself, as a threat. You observe Ed and me, and the bond we have, and it disturbs you. I'm younger than you, more intellectual, a scientist like Ed. You think Ed prefers my company and respects me more."

"You're right full of shit, you know that?."

"Alec, I envy you," Gil said quietly.

The Australian opened his mouth to curse again, and then he stared at Gil. The unmistakable honesty in Gil's tone couldn't be disputed.

"You envy me? Why?"

"I can take a fiber, put it under the Raman spectrometer, trace it back to its origin. I can tell by the insects in a woman's vagina whether she's been sexually violated or not. I can rattle off all kinds of facts and figures and quotations I teach my team that the evidence never lies and that there's always a clue."

"What are you trying to say?"

"That when it comes down to understanding human relationships in a very down to earth, basic way, it's me who doesn't have a clue. That's where Catherine comes in. Alec, you're good for Ed. You help him cut through the facade of perfection, and force him to look at the way things actually are. You do that by merely breathing. You're the salt of the earth, you don't pull your punches, you don't spout any bullshit. You simply care. Oh, you hide your warmth under that veneer of being sexual on the same level as a sixteen year old boy. You try and think of yourself as a ladies man. You have worth beyond that. You're a simple, loyal friend to Ed. You always will be. I have no desire or inclination to ever replace you in Ed's esteem. So, as they say nowadays, chill out." Gil chuckled.

"I had you pegged wrong." smiled Alec.

"It happens."

The two men exchanged a warm handshake.

"Look, can this stay between us? I don't want to seem like an idiot to Ed. I don't want my insecurities to interfere with my being a support to him."

"Ed's a brilliant guy, Alec. He can see what's going on. Don't you think he knows?"

"Yeah, yeah I suppose so. Look, Grissom, you know I had all but given him up for dead. When I think of what happened to him, I want to throw my guts up. That abyss you keep talking about, do you ever think he'll climb out of it?"

"That depends on him. He's having to confront emotions that you and I can only guess at. Rage. Fear. Sorrow. Shock. Hatred. That outburst we saw was the tip of the iceberg."

"That's what scares the shit out of me. For years I've wanted him to just be Ed Straker, like anyone else. Not be on his guard for the rest of his life. But that raw emotion I saw in there, the way he looked at Frances, it scared me. For a moment I thought Ed had gone mad."

Gil looked thoughtful for a moment. "Men have called me mad, but the question is not yet settled, whether madness is or is not the loftiest intelligence , whether much that is glorious, whether all that is profound , does not spring from disease of thought from moods of mind exaulted at the expense of general intellect." Gil recited. "Edgar Allen Poe."

"Poe went insane."

"Poe didn't have the tremendous will to live that Ed possesses, Alec. In this situation, before Ed can walk back into the light of sanity he has to crawl in the depths of the abyss. We have to be there, waiting for him. As frightening as that scene was, Alec, Ed made a choice. He could have killed her. You know as well as I do that Ed certainly can be Hemiptera Reduviidae, the assassin bug. One example of that species can kill other insecta up to 400 times it's own body weight in 30 seconds. How you see Ed Straker depends on your point of view. Frankly, Alec, I see him more as gromphadorhina portentosa, the giant hissing cockroach. I race them at the entomology conferences. Intimidating looking species, speedy, but pretty much harmless, all it can do is hiss." Gil grinned.

"That sounds like him all right! Does Ed know you think he's like a bug that just tries to intimidate people by hissing at them?"

"I may not understand humans as well as I do bugs, Alec, but even I have common sense! I don't particularly want to be close enough to him to hear him hiss."

Alec laughed.

* * *

"God damn it Frances, how can I make you understand what I went through?"

"You said some vile, awful things to me, Edward, and I don't want to see or speak to you!" Frances said, throwing down the ball of yarn and her knitting needles.

"When are you going to see that not all people fit into your narrow little world in which everybody acts like a Christian? When are you going to see that when people find fault in others, they very often overlook the fault in them? You profess to believe in God, Frances. Jesus would have been the first one to tell you that he forgave the sins of Mary Magdeline, forgave the sins of the very people who nailed the spikes through his hands. He was human before he was divine, Frances."

"How dare you try and tell me, a reverend's wife, about the Good Lord? How dare you even come up here and invade the privacy of my home? Why, I don't know you anymore, I can't believe you'd behave like this. You were always a gentleman. What's wrong with you?"

Ed grabbed Frances by the shoulders, shook her and she screamed. Downstairs, Angel shut his eyes at the sound and began fervently praying.

"I'll tell you what's wrong with me, Frances! Day after day after day I laid in my own offal and had to wait until those monsters brought me a bucket I could relieve myself in. Day after day I had their self-righteous rubbish jammed into my ears against my will. Day after day I was in severe pain when they'd decide I needed to be punished, and they'd strap my leg down and the pain just made me scream, and puke my guts out, and pray to pass out, and when I would they'd throw water on me, or force me to drink whiskey until the whole world was obliterated. Then one by one they'd march strangers in, and I watched them all have their heads yanked back by the hair, and watch the knife slice open their throats and watch the blood spurt out!"

"Stop it stop stop it stop it!"

"No Frances. No. I won't stop. Why should I? Nobody stopped it for me. Nobody stopped that filthy, disgusting, smelly woman from pressing up to me with her breasts, forcing me to suck them and using me as a tool to satisfy herself when the whole time she was pretending to be holy. No one was there to stop her from raping me. When I refused, she'd move my injured leg until I screamed, Frances! I screamed for help, and it went on day after day. They thought I was God. If belief in God means you get judged by people who don't know, who never will know, the hell I went through, people like you that think that because a mother like Catherine danced for a living, she's going to hell, then what's accomplished by believing in a God? What do you now think of me? Are you saying I deserve hell too? Do you? DO YOU?"

"Edward, please--"

" Frances, damn you, can't you understand? I never asked for this! I never asked for this! Oh God, God, God! Can't you see I need you more than ever now? Can't you see I need to be told that it's all right, that Claire and Alec and everyone else are not going to turn their back on me? I need to know that I haven't turned into a monster. Those people all died! I couldn't do anything! God help me, I couldn't do anything! I swore an oath to defend my country, I spent my entire life fighting a war that nobody even knows is raging. But I couldn't stop them from dying. I prided myself on my ability to keep myself together, to never allow anyone, not even myself, know I had flaws. Frances, I saw those people die day after day after day. Some bravely, like that woman's husband, who told me to be brave. Some screaming. Some young, some old. Some who didn't understand what was happening. The floor of the room was spattered with blood, Frances. The images are all locked in my brain. I watched them die. But they never let me have the peace that death would bring me. "

"Edward, please, no more, no more."

"Dear God, Frances. Sometimes I look around and I wonder why I survived. And how I survived. I screamed for help, I screamed for Alec because I didn't want Claire to see me like that, covered in my own filth, helpless, half a man. And I had hallucinations of him coming, and promising me that everything would be all right. That help would come. It never did come for those innocent people," Ed sobbed. "It never did come for me!"

Ed let go of her feebly and dropped to his knees, covering his face with his palms, weeping heartbrokenly. Covering her mouth with one hand, she started to move toward him, to caress him. Then he looked up at her, a terrible stillness on his face.

"I didn't die, Frances. I have sin on my soul. I don't deserve to live." he said, with the composure of a fugue state. He picked up one of her knitting needles and turned the tip toward himself. She screamed and grabbed it, and they struggled. She screamed Angel's name and the cleric hurled himself up the stairs and took in the terrible situation in a glance, and he managed to get the knitting needle out of Ed's hand.

Ed collapsed into an unconscious heap.

"Oh Stanley what have I done to him?"

Angel sighed. "An unforgivable thing, Frances my dearest, but you know the difference between you and Q-tip is that he'll forgive you any sin. Real or imaginary. Now go and fetch Alec and that American bug fellow. Hurry, woman!" Angel said, struggling to get Ed onto the bed. Ed moaned faintly, but obediently lie back against the pillow.

* * *

In the Vauxhall, Claire was getting increasingly nervous.

"My husband is in trouble, I feel it."

"You know he has to do this alone, honey," Catherine said, in a attempt to comfort her. "Look at them out there. Standing in the rain. Men."

Claire looked at Catherine. "You don't understand Edward. He doesn't have to do this alone. He's in trouble because he was trying to do this alone. Screw this. I'm going inside!"

Claire jumped out, slammed the car door, ran up to the door of the house past a startled Gil and Alec, started to pound on it.

"Shit," Alec said.

"What?" Gil said.

"She knows something. Come on, we have to get that door open!"

Just as the two men flanked the petite brunette, the door flew open and Frances was there.

"Edward's passed out, please co-"

Claire pushed Frances aside so hard that the woman nearly lost her footing, ran in past her, looked around frantically and then ran up the carpeted stairs to the Brisby bedroom. Angel was bent over Ed, wiping his forehead with a flannel dipped in cold water. Claire pushed him aside, and he dropped the pitcher he'd been holding. Claire took Ed's hands, weeping. Ed slowly turned his head on the pillow, opened his eyes and looked at her. Relief spread over his face.

"EDWARD! Oh Edward, don't you dare leave me alone again. Don't you dare."

"Will you quit shouting? I haven't gone deaf yet. Hold me." He reached out his arms to her, and she pulled him into a sitting position.

"EDWARD. EDWARD..," she murmured, caressing his face with both her hands and looking at him. He smiled back up at her.

"Hush. Tell me you love me."

"I love you more than anything else in this world. I'd do anything for you."

"I bet you tell that to the guy under the bed too," he said, content to be in her arms.

"You're the only man I love."

"That's because you have a seven million dollar cheque in your handbag."

"Oh shut up Straker. Shut up and let me take care of you."

"This one time, you win. Walk with me to the car. You drive."

"Ed, you okay?" came a anxious Aussie voice.

"You look exhausted, Ed," Gil observed.

"I wondered when the dynamic duo would show up. I don't know, Alec. I sort of-"

"Sort of tried to stab yourself with a knitting needle?" Frances said quietly. Ed looked sheepish. Alec turned white. Gil looked alarmed and Claire gasped.

"I was just trying to pick up the row that-"

"No jokes. Don't censor yourself Ed." Gil said calmly.

"Listen to him, Ed." Alec growled.

"Yes. Yes. Okay? Yes. I keep hearing their voices. I keep thinking of sin."

"If there's anyone on this planet that never sinned in their life, Edward Straker, it's you. I won't let you go. Claire won't let you go. None of us will let you go." Frances said. "Can you ever forgive a very stupid, narrow minded woman?"

A bright but weary smile played upon Ed's classical features.

"It depends." he said qu,etly.

"Don't tell me, let me guess, Q-tip. Lemon drizzle cake?" Angel asked.

Ed nodded, but then he looked at Frances a little pensively, and she approached him and kissed him on the cheek.

"All you want, Edward dear." she said tearfully. Angel grinned.

"Well, why is everyone staring at me? We have a shopping excursion to go to." Ed announced, and leaning against and holding Claire tightly, he got up from the bed. The rest of them began to come into the bedroom and stare at him.

"Honestly, Sir, we should be moving on. There's a storm starting." Graham said, taking in how red Ed's eyes were.

"No," Ed said softly, "It's over. It's over for now."

* * *

"I said no mushrooms!" Claire complained, as Ed fed her a slice of pizza.

"So give me your mushrooms. I like them."

"You did that on purpose, ordering them. That's the way you get everybody's mushrooms, you con artist. I don't know how you can eat those foul things, Edward." Claire poured some more ginger ale in Ed's glass, then hers. The entire gang was at one of Ed's favourite Italian restaurants, in a area away from prying eyes, sitting around a table covered with the traditional red and white tablecloth.

Alec popped open more bottles of beer and passed them over to Gil and Angel.

"Share spaghetti?" Catherine inquired of Gil, after a sip of the red Barolo wine she'd ordered to accompany her spaghetti and meat balls. Gil raised an eyebrow.

"You never watched Disney movies? Lady and The Tramp. I watched that movie until my VCR died and ate the tape up." sighed Yvonne. Ed grinned.

"Lindsey watched it, when she was five." Catherine said meaningfully. "She's seven now, she doesn't watch it as often."

"You don't plan on growing up?" Graham said, pouring another glass of wine for himself and Yvonne.

"Did you ever have a childhood at all, Graham? Or were you always a sourpuss?" Yvonne moaned. Graham gave her a imperial look.

"I had two toy airplanes, Graham," Ed reminded him, amused.

"And a plushie dog with no ears," Claire added.

"In all respect, Sir, I also found your affection for your toys a bit difficult to swallow."

"Catherine?" Frances said tentatively.

"Yes?" Catherine said guardedly.

"I'm sorry for the things I said, I'm sorry that I caused so many problems. I didn't realise what I was doing. I was simply so worried about our Edward, you understand."

"No problem. I don't hold a grudge, it solves nothing." Catherine smiled. "I was pretty rude to you too. We can start over again as friends."

"Everyone stares into the abyss sooner or later," Gil told them quietly.

"It isn't something I recommend, Gil," Ed replied solemnly.

"Anyway, subject over. What's this game you were talking to us about, Ed?" Catherine asked.

"I'll tell you over espresso and dessert." Ed announced, picking up the dessert menu and studying it. Claire rolled her eyes at him.

"For a skinny fellow, you certainly put away a lot of food, Edward. How are you going to make room for dessert?" she scolded in a good natured way, secretly glad Ed's appetite was back.

"What? You ate five slices of my pizza." Ed complained back, well aware of what she was thinking.

"Your pizza? We were supposed to be sharing it, remember? You ate the rest of it." Claire reminded him.

"Talking about excessive consumption, how many beers have you consumed, Alec?" Gil asked.

"Don't worry about it, I don't plan to drive. Besides, I'm just getting started."

"I bet you CSI types would like to weigh his liver. Cutting open people. It isn't natural," Angel said.

"What liver?" Ed wanted to know. Alec grinned at Ed.

"Ed, quit beating around the bush and tell us about the game you're going to have us play."

"Wait until the slices of Black Forest cake and the espresso arrives." Ed scolded.

"I can make anything on this dessert menu, and make it better, Edward," Frances said, displeased. "These prices are ridiculous."

"Claire and myself come here for the ambience and excellent service, too," Ed reminded her, amused.

"Cupcake, don't you think you've done enough damage for one day?" groaned Angel.

"Stanley Mitchell Brisby, don't you dare talk like that to me, unless you want to walk home."

"You can really feel the love at this table," Catherine said. Gil grinned slightly at her.

"No more arguments. I kill the next person that starts to argue and upsets Edward's dinner," Claire put in.

"Were you really a doctor once? You're starting to scare me with your violent tendencies," Ed teased, signalling the waitress and putting in his order for an entire Black Forest cake.

* * *

"How are we going to do this?" Claire asked,distributing money to everyone after depositing the cheques.

"Pairs and trios. Yvonne and Graham, me and Alec, Catherine and Claire, Angel, Frances and Gil." Ed suggested.

"Sorry Sir but I insist on accompanying you." Graham proclaimed.

"Fine fine fine. Male and female teams. You, me and Alec. , Gil and Angel, Catherine, Yvonne, Claire and Frances. We keep in touch by mobile. We'll hit Hamleys last."

"This should prove to be interesting." Gil pointed out.

"I'm beating your ass, Gris." Catherine told him.

"We'll see, won't we?"

"Edward, I wanted to be with you." Claire said as the groups slowly moved off. "I'm so worried about you."

"You have a bigger job, keeping Frances from killing Catherine or vice versa."

"Will you be all right, sweetheart?"

"I'll be with Alec here." Ed smiled.

"Alec. Don't let anything happen to him, please." she said urgently.

"Count on it."

* * *

"Okay so we're in this together, right? We can't let the men beat us." Catherine said decisively.

"Tell me again what our objective is? I was so upset about Edward eating that stale Black Forest cake that I confess I wasn't listening." Frances said, wandering with the women around Harrods.

"We're supposed to compete as teams and individually to find a gift that Edward needs and would like the most." Claire said glumly, missing Ed.

"Frances that cake was perfectly delicious and you know it. Anyway, Ed said the winner gets his or her choice of car. Claire, honey, he'll be okay. Come on, I need your advice on something I have in mind as a gift." Catherine said with a look of mischief.

* * *

Alec guffawed loudly in appreciation. Ed grinned at him. Graham just walked along with them, holding an umbrella over their heads, a sour expression on his face.

"If you ask me, it was a tasteless gesture, what Miss Constantine sent to Ed."

"Graham don't be such a snob. Anyway, Ed, you have to get back at her."

"How, Alec? I thought of having a T-shirt made for her, but I wasn't quite sure what to have put on it."

"She broke her leg when she went out to Austria with that current pretty boy of hers, right? Caroline doesn't seem to realise she's forty-seven not fourteen." quipped Alec. Graham gave him a look that suggested he was the pot calling the kettle black.

"Ski bunny." Ed said thoughtfully, narrowing his eyes.`"I broke my leg because I thought I still was a ski bunny-"

"when the truth is I don't even fill out this T-shirt." Alec suggested. Ed started laughing.

"Done."

"Ed, tell me something. You didn't want me to go in there with you when you went to see Frances."

"It was something I had to do for myself."

"You didn't take Grissom with you, for a while there I was afraid you were going to take Grissom with you."

"Leaving you behind? Alec, I think you better lay off the hard stuff. It's beginning to interfere with your brain."

"I just thought-"

"Yeah, I know what you thought. So what are you going to buy for me?" Ed put a hand on Alec's shoulder for a moment, his eyes shining. Alec smiled at him warmly and did the same. Graham tried to ignore them.

"Ed, what you really need is a ball and chain for your ankle so you won't get into trouble . What were you playing at with that knitting needle?"

"I went a little nuts. It was foolish of me, I'd somehow convinced myself that I was a sinner as much as Frances believed Catherine was. I was afraid that was what Frances was really saying."

"The way I see it Sir, is that you were a victim, nothing more." Graham said.

"Thank you Graham I appreciate it."

"Ed, you need us, you yell. No more of this alone in the abyss stuff."

"Alec, you're beginning to sound like Grissom." chuckled Ed.

"When he isn't talking about stuff with eight legs, he's a decent guy. Come on, I want to go to a bookshop for my gift to you."

"Alec, I already have a copy of the Kama Sutra. At least I did before Silk Wood Manor nearly burnt down."

"Shut up, Ed."

* * *

"Let me see if I'm getting this straight. You're getting Ed a Bible? Do you honestly think that's an appropriate gift for him after what he endured?" inquired Gil.

"I'm no good at buying people presents, just ask Cupcake, I'm naff when it comes to anniversaries and birthdays, really." shrugged Angel.

"So what are you going to get him, Mister superior bug man?" he wanted to know.

"I shouldn't be telling you, it will be an unfair advantage. However, Ed admires good glass and I thought I'd get him a Caithness paperweight. I bought one in a antique shop back there. It had an appropriate name."

"Abyss?" Angel said.

"Abyss," Gil confirmed.

* * *

"Oh my heavens, I don't know if I should even be in here." Frances said, looking at the lacy lingerie that surrounded her.

"You said Janet Reger is the best, didn't you? Now be quiet, I need to pick out something special. Hmm, this blue teddy is scrumptious."

"Oh my. "

"Oui, let me help, Catherine, believe me, I am expert at French lingerie."

"I thought you were a security expert." Claire teased Yvonne.

"I know about all matters undercover." she snickered, causing Claire and Catherine to laugh.

"Oh my," repeated Frances.

* * *

"Shit. Shit. Shit." Alec said, seeing something on the counter as he paid for his book for Ed. He picked up the book he spotted and flipped through it. His eyes fell on a passage. "Son of a bitch! That filthy son of a bitch!"

"Sir, please, either pay for that book or leave," the shop assistant said. "I won't have that language in this establishment."

Alec slammed the book on the counter and counted out more pounds. Hearing familiar voices, he turned around in panic, seeing Ed and Graham browsing a short distance away.

"Give me more of those books." Alec ordered her quickly.

"Which, Sir? Are you referring to this book, Sir. It hasn't been selling that well. Printed cheaply if you ask me."

"Yes, give me more. No wait, give me all of them, and whatever's in your stock room too. Hurry it up. Here, send them all to my address, I'll pay cash and make it worth your while."

The woman raised her eyebrows practically up to her hairline. "I'm afraid I can't do that, Sir. There's a little over four hundred in stock, and the author is due to-" the woman stopped, looking shocked as Ed sauntered up to the check-out, his carry-all basket full of books, his tone boyish.

"You almost finished, Alec? Look, I bought books for everyone. I found a couple of new medical thrillers for Claire. She likes them. Plus I got some storybooks for Catherine's little girl, a advanced book of crosswords for Gil and what is it, Alec?"

"Sir," Graham said urgently, "I think we better go, I think we better go now. You go out to the car, I'll take care of your and Alec's purchases." Graham threw down some bills on the counter.

"What the blazes is going on? I demand to-" Ed's voice trailed away as he finally saw the sign behind the astounded clerk, who was staring unabashed at him.

AUTHOR SIGNING Mary Rutland author of The shocking truth about Straker will be here to autograph your book between seven and eight o clock.

"You're Ed Straker! Oh my goodness! You were on the news! You're Ed Straker!" the clerk exclaimed loudly. A few individuals started to turn their heads in her direction. Some of them started to approach, curious.

"Ring up the purchases, and shut up you loathsome woman." Graham snapped, and she finally started to do so, looking at Ed nervously.

Ed quickly turned his back on her, bent his head down, handed his basket to Graham, slipped his aviator sunglasses on, and whispered urgently to Alec. "Get me out of here, Alec, get me home." Ed said in desperation.

"It'll be okay Ed. It'll be okay," Alec promised, as he rapidly led Ed across to the entrance of the bookstore, with many customers staring. Just as they approached the door, with Graham catching up to them, and brandishing his umbrella in a threatening manner in the event anyone approached, the door opened, and a short, stocky man appeared. He smelled of too much cheap musk cologne, and he wore a suit that didn't fit well. He spotted Ed immediately and looked like a trapped animal.

Behind him was Mary Rutland.

Ed stopped in his tracks.

"Sir, we have to go. We have to go now." Graham urged.

"Why, Mary? Why? Just tell me why." Ed said sadly.

"Ed, come on, for God's sake, Ed." Alec said worriedly.

"I need an answer." Ed repeated. "Just tell me why."

* * *

At that moment, Claire Straker frowned.

"What's the matter, dearest?" Frances said, as the three women walked to Claire's Vauxhall.

"Something bad, Frances. Dear God, something bad is happening to Edward." Claire took out her mobile and quickly rang up Alec.

* * *

Alec's mobile rang and he ignored it, stepping slightly in front of a pale Ed.

"Ed. Come on. Ed. Please."

"Why did you come here? Are you having me followed?" she said shrilly. She looked like a cat caught with a mouth full of canary feathers.

"The way you had me followed? Why, Mary? Why do you want to humiliate me like this? Hurt me like this? Why?"

"Get out of my way Ed, I'm a author now, I have books to sign."

"Damn you not until I get an answer. That book is a bunch of lies, and you know it's a bunch of lies. What are you doing this for?"

Mary's oily looking companion spoke up. "You're interfering with my client's proper business. If you have something to say, say it through a solicitor."

"Oh believe me, I will. I just want to hear from the mother of my dead son why she thinks it's a good thing to publicly condemn his father." Ed snapped.

"Straker, get the hell out of the way before you get my fist in your-"

"Don't you raise your voice to me, you little punk. " warned Ed.

"I suggest you listen to him, before I turn your face into a bloody pulp," Alec snarled, stepping forward.Graham stepped between Alec and the man, released a catch on his Swaine and Adeley umbrella and a blade snapped out of the ferrule. He put it inches away from the man's nose. A little gasp went up from the onlookers.

"You as much touch a button on Sir's jacket and you'll regret it." Graham said.

"You see that?" the man said loudly to the onlookers. "He threatened me. Wait until the local Chief Superintendent hears about this. I intend to post a formal complaint." he whined in a show of bravado.

"You do that, whomever you are. See how far it gets you. The chief superintendent of this district happens to have served with me in the Army. I suggest you get the hell out of here, you ignorant little boor." Graham growled. He lunged slightly forward with the brolley and a thin vertical line of scarlet formed on the bridge of the man's nose. The man wailed loudly and disappeared out the door. Mary's mouth fell open.

She turned to go out but felt Ed's hand grab her gently but firmly by the arm until she had no choice but to face him. Ed's sharp blue eyes fixed and cut through her like a industrial laser through steel.

"Mary. Listen to me and listen to me carefully. After the year of torture I endured, I promised myself nobody will ever get away with turning me into a victim again. Enjoy this sudden fame while you can, because if you continue to try to ruin me, believe me, you'll go down so quickly you'll forget what up was like. You can count on it. I've had enough of you. I won't allow myself to be hurt by you anymore. I suddenly realise you're nothing more than part of the abyss. When monsters are confronted, they lose their power over a person. It's been easy for you to think of me as the monster all these years, hasn't it, Mary? I suggest you look closer at who the monster really was. You." Ed let her arm drop, and walked, accompanied by Graham and Alec, out the door.

* * *

The cars containing the houseguests pulled up about half a block from the bookstore so they wouldn't be spotted. Ed stayed in Graham's Jaguar.

"Damn you, Alec, why didn't you answer your phone?" Claire said, as Alec came up to everyone. Alec quickly explained to one and all what had occurred without leaving any detail out and Claire hurried up to the Jaguar. She banged on the tinted windows and Graham, still guarding Ed, made a sour face, but he touched the switch that unlocked the door. Ed Straker sat in the back seat, looking like a wax mannequin. A little life came into his eyes when she slid in beside him and hugged him. He kissed her.

"Oh Edward, what a horrible thing, I'm so sorry."

"I'm getting better at recognising monsters in the abyss. Claire, it's all right, I'm okay. I imagine that little scene will end up in the tabloids, but at this point I don't care. At some point in everyone's life, a moment of perfect clarity happens. I think I just had mine. Come on, we have Hamleys to visit. We can't disappoint Lindsey. Besides, the game is still on."

Claire caressed Ed's cheek for a moment, as if assuring herself her husband was really there. He seemed more composed. She looked thoughtful for a moment. "What bookshop was it, Edward? It's a terrible coincidence that she should be there. Was it one of your favourites?"

" Afraid so. It's the way my luck is running. It was Tanner's. Look. Alec and Graham practically bought the stock out. It doesn't matter, I managed to get some gifts for everyone. Maybe I should be autographing the Straker books too, after all I'm the anti-hero in them." He held up the bags full of books with a chuckle, and she looked at him with a faint, strange smile. She drew out a copy of Mary's book and looked at it.

"Edward, will you have them all wait for me? I just realized I left my purse in a shop." Claire asked quickly.

"Certainly. Want me to-"

Claire had left, and Ed frowned, shrugged. He signalled Graham to get Alec.

"You all right?"

"Alec, would you find and go with Claire? She left her purse in some shop."

"You must be kidding Ed, she is carrying thousands of pounds. I saw her give her purse to Frances for safekeeping before she came up to your car. She cashed the cheques-what is it?"

"Oh my God. I told her it was Tanners!"

"Sir, where are you going?" Graham said in alarm as Ed burst out of the car.

"How could I be so foolish, Alec! She's going to the bookstore. To confront Mary! Come on!"

* * *

Claire Straker ran, the way she had dashed through the corridors of San Francisco General Hospital when code blue came over the p.a. system. She knew she didn't have long before Ed would realise she'd lied, and he'd come after her. However, Tanners wasn't all that far away, and she got there, and entered, and looked around. She spotted a short queue, and pushed past it, getting a chorus of how rude and honestly and a lot of indignant looks. When she was nearly at the beginning of the queue, she saw the woman signing books at the table, and she hesitated. What Alec had paraphrased from what he'd skimmed in the book came back to her.

...when I think of all the times my husband would leave our home to be with Alec, I couldn't help but wonder what his true motivation was. Our sex life was nearly nil, and the few times we shared a passionate night, I was left unsatisfied, since as I have said, Ed proved from our wedding night to be a poor lover. So the disgusting thought that he and Alec were sharing a bed all this time came to my mind. At that time, homosexuality was not a matter you discussed, and certainly not a matter you were proud of. My husband was young and handsome then, and in my estimation could easily have been gay, with Alec as his lover. It explained so much. Alec remained his close friend to Ed's disappearance and probable death, which took place during a secretive fire at the manor Ed was rumoured to have inherited.

Claire pushed her way to the front, and slammed down the book in front of Mary on the table. Mary looked up at her, startled. Some people watching recognised her and gasped, but there was no recognition from Mary. Mary's companion scowled at her, and looked around for the security guard. Mary managed a practiced smile.

"Who shall I make this out to?"

"Claire. Claire Straker. Familiar with that name, Mary? Straker? Ed Straker? As in the man who was tortured for a year? Know what happened to him? He came back, he survived a terrible kidnapping, came back wanting a safe place, some comfort. Instead he finds himself a victim of lies. Lies you're telling. You're the most disgusting person I ever met. "

"Now see here, you have no right to speak to my client like that. Where is that idiot of a security guard? Well, I'll just have to remove you myself." the man announced smugly and reached for Claire. Claire grabbed his arm, twisted it, then twisted it in the opposite direction, placed a decisive kick right for his testicles, and then when he screamed like a stuck pig and bent over in pain, she delivered a karate strike to his neck. He went down like a dropped anvil. Mary screamed.

"Oh shut up. So you're trying to make my husband look bad, huh? You say he's not a good father, you say he abandoned you, you say this, you say that, you make up sick, deprived crap about the close friendship he and Alec have had all these years. You liar! Did you put in the book how you didn't allow Ed to see his son's little boat? Did you include how you didn't even bother to stop Johnny from running into the path of the car? Did you put in there how you let your mother and then Rutland use you for a doormat? Then you try and condemn Edward for money. Well maybe you aren't the best judge of my husband's character. Ask the friends and families of the victims of Jerusha and Hiram March what kind of man my Edward is. Ask Mayland Hospital staff. Ask the mothers and fathers of children that are still alive because Edward paid with his own money for their care. Ask all the sick children he sometimes played with and brought toys to after he formed his Foundation. Ask the people at Edward's studio who have worked loyally for him for years what they think of my husband."

"How dare you! " Mary managed weakly to reply, but she was pale.

"How dare YOU, you disgusting worm of a person! Edward is going to sue you and then Alec is going to sue you and by God you won't have a penny left!"

Claire twirled toward the crowd and balled her fingers into fists. "Why do you people want to read the lies this woman is telling? Do you really want to make her wealthy from my husband's misery? My husband was tortured, he's still suffering and still all he could think of was people like Edith Bedford. You all make me sick! Do you hear me? You all make me sick!" Claire started to weep. There was a uncomfortable silence. A few people tossed their copies of the book aside in self-conscious distaste. Finally the middle-aged but tall and muscular security guard Mary had hired appeared out of nowhere, drinking from his paper cup of tea. He looked without expression at the unconscious man on the floor, as people whispered to one another.

"Get her out of here!" Mary insisted.

"I missed tea time. I'm on my break, Ma'am," he said indifferently.

"You utter fool!" Mary yelled. She turned on Claire. "It's just like Edward to send someone else to do his dirty work. Coward! He wouldn't dare show up and say these things to my face!"

The crowd of people watching parted like the Red Sea as a figure that had been standing by the entrance unseen, silently watching the drama unfold, finally moved through them solemnly. His sonorous, distinctive male voice cut through the din in the bookstore. Yet it was deceivingly calm, tranquil. "I seem to recall that you didn't try and release this book until you thought I was dead, Mary. So I put it to you all, who is the real coward here? Come on, Claire. Let's go."

"Oh Edward." Claire said. He smiled at her. Alec was at his side, and Graham behind them.

"Be sure to look in your post box soon, Rutland. You'll be getting notice of my lawsuit against you for slandering me in that list of lies you loosely call a book." Alec said, clearly praying for a excuse to use her as a soccer ball, judging by his expression.

"Alec." Ed spoke meaningfully, putting an protective arm around Claire.

"I know, I know." Alec muttered. Graham grinned at him.

"What's the matter with you?" Mary said shrilly to the uniformed security guard. He didn't seem to even know she was there.

"Mr. Straker? I made sure I was given this particular job because I hoped we'd run into each other before matters were settled," he said quietly. "I missed the earlier opportunity to meet you." The man extended a hand.

Ed looked at him, puzzled. Graham started to frown and moved to step in between them but Ed gestured for him to move away, which he reluctantly did. The unconscious man was groaning, rubbing the back of his head. Ed ignored him, but Graham and Alec kept an eye on him as he sat up. When he spotted Ed, his face drained with blood. Graham noticed with glee that his nose was in plaster, although earlier Ed had lightly scolded him for injuring the man when it wasn't necessary.

"You look so familiar to me." Ed removed his aviator sunglasses and studied the man, trying to place him.

"I'm Susanna McVale's father." the man said, his eyes suddenly gleaming with unshed tears.

"My God." Ed uttered softly. " I remember now. You resemble each other so much. She was one of the people the Hirams killed." Ed took the man's hand in one of his and placed his other hand on top of it in a comforting gesture for a minute.

"I wanted to thank you. My Susan got a decent burial and fancy wake and all her classmates attended, thanks to your Foundation's funding. I'll always remember your kindness. When it is my time to join her, I'll be laid in the plot which your Foundation paid for, right next to her and my wife."

"It was the least I could do, Mr. Vale. I have to go now." Ed was obviously fighting to keep his composure. Claire took him by the arm, concerned.

"Goodbye." the man said, looking at Ed as if he was trying to memorise all his features. Ed, Claire, Alec and Graham left the bookstore, and for a moment nobody made a sound.

"My husband Ed planned this, didn't he!" Mary shouted, near hysterics. The crowd looked at her as though she'd smeared herself with feces. More of the books they'd held to purchase were tossed aside.

"Husband? He isn't your husband Ed anymore. Thank God for that. And the answer is no, and I'll take any lie detector test you want to give and still swear to it. All of you are my witnesses. As for me being in your employ, forget it. Find yourself someone else that wants to be an accomplice in the misery you've created for a pure and decent man like Mr. Straker." Vale turned his back on her and left the store.

The bookstore slowly emptied of customers as time progressed. Mary looked desperate. Her books were strewn everywhere. Nobody was left in queue, they'd long scattered in shame. Suddenly she noticed that the man that had accompanied her, serving as her agent, had summed up the situation as a losing one and was sneaking out. She yelled at him, but he disappeared out the door.

"Go with him. You're costing us customers." the manager of the bookstore said.

"You owe me money!" Mary reminded her, rapidly losing what poise she still possessed.

The manager rang up the register and handed her a fat roll of pound notes at random without counting them. "There. Now get out. Don't bother to come back tomorrow. I've decided not to sell your books so we'll be sending them back to the publisher. I'm a good judge of people and I know Straker was telling the truth about you. Get out. I'm closing shop, it's late."

* * *

Earlier, Graham and Yvonne had been confronting two paparazzi who apparently had shown up to get pictures of Mary and had hit pay dirt when they saw Ed. They merely managed to get some blurred shots of a scowling Alec, who was shielding Ed as he got into the Jaguar with Claire.

They eventually dashed off and Yvonne returned to the Vauxhall, with Graham taking his place at the wheel of the Jaguar.

"Left your purse behind, huh?" Ed asked Claire.

"It worked didn't it? Edward, I just couldn't, well, I just, someone had to tell her off."

"Maybe now for once they'll tell your side of the story. Maybe for once they'll listen to men like Susanna McVale's father and Edith Bedford and everyone else instead."

"Maybe." Ed answered solemnly.

"That's all I wanted, my precious Edward. I'm sorry."

"Don't be, sweetheart, don't be. I heard everything. I could have stopped you at any time, or had Alec stop you. I chose not to. For the same reason."

She smiled and kissed him, and their lips intensely pressed together for a considerable time.

"Come on, Ed, you can make out later. Let's go to Hamley's." Alec suggested with a grin. Ed reluctantly broke off with Claire and smiled.

"You heard him, Graham. Hamleys. And if you get us there before closing time, I'll buy you anything in there you want." Ed teased. Claire giggled at him, and hugged Ed.

Graham groaned and started up the Jaguar.

At the exact time Ed Straker and his companions wandered around Hamleys, particularly to the delight of the manager since Ed was a long time repeat customer, Mary Rutland dejectedly turned her key in the lock of the flat she was renting, resolving to throttle her filthy coward of a lover, who had entreated her to get into the morass in the first place.

Write a tell-all book, he'd said, Straker's rotting somewhere and his widow is too diminished by the fire to care what you write. Make more money than you ever dreamed of, pay off all your debts he'd said. Curse him! He was no better than Rutland, or any of the men she'd dated and gone to bed with. Even now, after so many years had passed, Straker was a carbuncle in her life. The thing that really bothered her was how he hadn't seemed to age. If anything, he seemed more handsome than when they'd been married. Well, she thought, with all that money he'd inherited he can well afford to have botox injections and plastic surgery. It just didn't seem like something he'd do. It didn't make sense. And now with what had gone on, nobody would buy the book when he was coming off so favourably. Why couldn't those two maniacs have killed him along with everybody else? He had his nerve, suggesting that she was responsible for Johnny. And then that mousey little whore he'd married had the nerve to tell her off.

Damn, the damn key is sticking! What was the matter with the porch light anyway? If it hadn't been for her keychain flashlight she wouldn't see the door at all.

"God damn you to hell Ed!"

"Having a spot of trouble?"

Mary whirled around, startled. "How dare you follow me home! "

"I was just doing my job, Ma'am. Taking care of you, remember? That's what you hired me for. Having trouble with the key, are you? Before I started taking guard jobs to make ends meet for myself and my daughter, I had a burglar alarm shop. Sold and repaired and designed any kind of alarm one might want. Times got bad, and we went out of business, so I took any job so that my Susanna could stay in school and get her A levels. My Susanna was a beautiful girl, she was going to go into politics. And those bastards killed her. And someone has to pay, Ma'am. No use trying to open the door Ma'am. I filled the lock with putty, and snapped the wires to your alarm system. Cheap alarm system it was."

Mary opened her mouth to scream, but he grabbed her and covered her mouth, and dragged her around the back of her flat as she struggled.

"My Susanna is dead. While people like you, filth of Britain, write a lot ugly things and live. Well someone has to pay, and it might as well be you. Mr. Straker is an honourable man who doesn't deserve what you tried to do to him and his friends. He said helping me was the least he could do for me. This is the least I can do for him."

He withdrew a ice pick from his pocket with one hand.

It was the last thing Mary Rutland saw.

* * *

Unseen, Ed Straker made his way through the thick foliage, brandishing his weapon. The only sound was a whoosh as a bird was startled, and flew off a branch. Ed's boot hit a twig, and he froze, his eyes brilliant behind the camouflage and Perspex mask he wore. He waited, heart pounding. He continued through the foliage, and came to a clearing. His feet hit gravel, he spotted the base camp sign taped to a wall and he sighed with relief.

"Straker!" a voice cried triumphantly. Ed whirled around, and fired in the direction the voice had come from. He was too late, and the projectile hit him, and his chest exploded with scarlet. He dropped, first to his knees, then onto his side, and lay still. The assassin came up, prodded his body with the tip of a shoe, then satisfied he was out of commission, placed her weapon back in her holster. Claire Straker came up, saw her husband collapsed on the gravel, and knelt next to him.

"Edward, Frances is making cookies, any particular kind you want?"

One eye opened.

"I'm supposed to be a corpse, sweetheart," he said, and closed the eye.

"What kind of cookies do corpses like?"

"Those oatmeal and raisin ones with the chocolate icing?" Ed opened his eyes, sat up, and took his mask off and let it hang down from his neck.

"Catherine, did you shoot my husband?" Claire said calmly.

"She not only shot me, she brought down, Angel and Alec." Ed sighed.

"I beat them all, and just in time, too. I was running out of paintball capsules." Catherine confessed. There was a sudden pop, and she felt something hit her back. Turning, she saw Gil remove his mask.

"I believe that makes me the ultimate victor." he said.

"You shot me in the back!" Catherine accused.

"Quite accurate, Catherine. I put together the facts at hand, and came to the conclusion that my only chance for a win was to cheat."

"Huzzah! The men's team win," Ed said, jumping to his feet. Claire grinned at him and stood up to shake hands with a smug Gil. Suddenly there was a shrill scream. They all looked at each other for a instant, then ran in the direction of the scream. Frances was standing on a chair in the kitchen, holding a freshly baked batch of iced oatmeal cookies on a tray. Angel was on his hands and knees under the table with a copy of Lancet, looking for something.

"What exactly is the nature of the emergency, Frances?" Ed wanted to know. Angel lifted his head without thinking, hit it on the table top and swore, meriting a scowl from Frances. Gil spotted something in the corner, looked around, picked up a rubber glove from the sink, and put it on. Then he approached the object, holding it by the tip.

"All right, who broke my ant farm?" he inquired in irritation. There was a loud thunk, and Gil winced. "You know, Reverend, that if you intend to commit the perfect crime, you shouldn't perform the homicide in front of me."

"Serial anticide killing." Ed put forth. Angel got up and smiled happily, displaying the magazine cover, which was covered with smeared black messes. He tossed it into the rubbish. "That was the last of them, Cupcake. Sorry, Gil, I wanted to tease her with it, but she screamed and I dropped it, and all thirty of your critters made a run for it."

"Ugh, how perfectly disgusting. Must you constantly deal with bugs?" Frances said, getting down from the chair.

"Um he is a entomologist," Catherine pointed out, as amused as Ed and Claire. "Frances, those were quite harmless Lasius nigers, the common black ant. I decided not to also purchase Myrmica ruginodis, which are red ants that sting in the interest of keeping the peace. I see I failed."

"Sure none of those ants got into the cookie dough?" Claire asked innocently. "They look like raisins."

Ed made a sour face. Graham abruptly made an entrance into the kitchen. "Mr. Straker, I wish to make a formal complaint as part of your staff." he said in a lofty tone. Ed examined a cookie off the tray for ant body parts and then bit into it, munching contently. Claire took another tray of cookies out of the oven to cool off, and then started pouring coffee.

"Go on," he answered, with a mouth full of cookie. Claire shook her head at him and handed him a cloth napkin and a cup of coffee the way he liked it.

"Now you understand that I have never interfered with whatever-" he stopped short as a miniature tank rolled over his highly polished brogues, causing Ed and the others to break into laughter, except for Gil, who was still mournfully holding up his cracked ant farm, looking for survivors. Alec entered, his turtleneck smeared with multiple paintball colours, and he carefully made an adjustment on his remote control.

"That the Australian Sentinel tank series?" Ed asked.

"Cruiser Mark Three, and to scale, a beaut if you ask me. Nothing stops it." Graham bent over and picked up the tank, and dropped it in the rubbish, then he left the kitchen. Alec gawked.

"Nothing except Graham, Alec." Ed said through another mouthful of cookie.

"Bloody nerve of that man." Alec complained.

"At least you still have a toy, Alec. Angel here utterly ruined mine," Gil pointed out.

"Cheer up, Gil, Claire purchased several remote control airplanes, and you can have first choice," Ed assured him.

"Awww, did someone break your little ant farm?" Catherine cooed.

Gil gave her a long suffering look and dropped the remains of the farm in the rubbish, and handed the tank back to Alec. Alec gleefully set it down and guided it back into the hall. Ed swallowed the last of the cookie and headed toward the sitting room with Claire, where Yvonne and were setting up train track and Graham was ignoring everyone. Track seemed to be everywhere Ed looked. He gingerly picked up a caboose, appropriately a bright red colour, and examined it.

"Pretty impressive. Hornby Dublo. I used to have a small Lionel set I was nuts about, don't know what my mother did with it."

"It's going to be very nice when we get it all set up. Want to help us set up track? Hey, careful with that tank, Alec!" Angel complained.

"Sorry, can I do anything?"

"Alec, chere, get the remaining curved track out of the box, we're starting to need it," Yvonne said.

"Here, Alec, I'll put your tank in your room, go ahead and help them," Claire said.

"Where are the little trees?" Ed inquired, after a sip of his coffee.

"Do you think we need more of them?" Angel asked.

"A couple more over here." Ed got down on the carpet with them. Claire and Frances arrived again, hands full of cookie trays and then time Gil entered, and assisted Alec in opening the plastic packets that held the circular track. Claire set down her tray of iced gingerbread bars, and handed out coffees while Frances distributed peanut butter cookies. When she was finished, she turned on the new CD player and light jazz softly played in the background. Angel got up and started to take photos with his digital camera. Catherine, Claire and Frances grinned at the would be engineers as they placed track down tenderly, pausing only to munch on the cookies.

"We need something like this in the lab, Gris, good for releasing stress," Catherine decided, picking up a figurine of a man, and laying it across the track.

"I never guessed you had homicidal tendencies, Catherine. That anyone I'm familiar with?"

"Eddie, my ex." she admitted.

"I guessed correctly," Gil nodded, fitting track together.

"Ed, when are you going to tell us who won the game?" Catherine asked.

"After all the cookies are gone and we have a premiere run of the train." Ed closed the little door again. "We still have to fly the airplanes, too."

"Any passengers for the passenger car?" Angel asked, watching him.

"Naturellement, Angel, Claire's little nurse doll," Yvonne assured him.

"Oh, does my poor nurse doll have to be a part of this?" Claire moaned, picking a female figure in white out of a Hamley's logo bag on the table.

"You have to sacrifice to achieve reality," Gil told her. "We could have taken your ants for a ride." Ed opined.

"Lasius nigers prefer roller coasters to ride," Gil informed them, glancing over at Catherine, who nearly was choking on a iced gingerbread cookie bar at that statement.

"The ants told you that?" Catherine wanted to know. "That they like roller coasters as much as you do?"

"I speak fluent ant." he nodded gravely. "It was the last conversation we had together before Angel sent them to insect paradise."

Claire chuckled at him. Graham looked up from the copy of Country Life he'd been reading, and stared at Gil, clearly thinking everyone around him had escaped from an asylum.

"Were they Anglican ants?" Angel wondered. "Maybe we could have a more proper send off for them in the garden. Wonder if the Book of Common Prayer has any deceased ant prayers?"

"I don't think ants have souls, Stanley." Frances said, giving him a napkin, and fearing his sense of reality was ebbing away, judging by her look.

Ed grinned at her. "Buddhists believe quite the opposite, Frances." Ed told her, fitting two freight cars together as he sat on a settee next to Claire, who was using a comb to groom the diminutive doll's hair.

"Quite accurate, Ed. That reminds me, are you enjoying the book of Tao?"

"I haven't gotten through it all, Gil but it's quite thought provoking." Ed told him. Alec took the doll from Claire and looked up its dress, earning a slap on the arm from Claire before she saved it and a chuckle from Ed. Catherine looked heavenward.

"Aren't the Buddhists the ones that take those poor children that are supposed to be reincar-" The phone rang and Claire set down her doll. "Hello. No this is his wife Cla-what? Yes. Yes. Go on. Yes. Yes I will. Yes. Immediately, yes. Edward, oh God. It's for you. Mary's been stabbed, she's at Mayland Hospital in the critical care unit. Mark Vale was taken into custody and confessed to stabbing her."

* * *

Late the next afternoon, having kept a vigil at Mayland overnight, sleeping only in catnaps, Ed slumped wearily in the hospital lobby next to Alec, until he saw a familiar figure arrive. He stood up. Alec didn't, but gave the man a curt nod.

"Ed. You look the same. Remarkable. It's been a long time. I wouldn't blame you if you didn't want to speak to me after that horrid book she insisted on publishing. I tried to get her not to do it, but she's got a mind of her own, like her late mother."

"Not at all, Mr. Nightingale. Yes, it's been a long time," he told the bent over, elderly gentleman with a few white wisps of hair that was Mary's father. The mass of lines that was his face seemed pained.

"Have you been in to see her, Sir?" Ed moved his Burberry trench so that the man could sit on his other side, and sat back down himself, raking his fingers through his silver hair. He suppressed a yawn, but Mary's father didn't seem to notice.

"Came briefly last night, gave a statement to the police. They say she'll be all right, thank heaven for that, apparently someone saw that Vane drag her round the back of her flat, and summoned the police. Saved my daughter's life."

"Hours ago, I was touching him, talking to him, it seems a nightmare repeating itself. The police informed me he is suspected of killing three other people, but he's only finally confessed so far to attacking Mary. Can I pour you some coffee, my wife Claire brought some in a thermos along with some paper cups."

"The woman on the telly. Yes thanks. Where is she?"

Ed passed him a cup. "Cream, no sugar, unless you've changed how you take it."

"No, I haven't changed, Ed. Thanks. Where is your wife?"

"Claire? She's speaking to the surgeon that did the operation on Mary. There was internal bleeding, but they've stopped it, wound wasn't serious as they thought. My wife is going to see if they'll allow Mary visitors. I've been waiting a long time. Mr. Nightingale, I don't want to say anything that will make the situation worse, but do you have any idea what Mary's motivation was for the book? I'm afraid I have no choice but to continue to go after her as soon as she recovers, try and get it off the shelves. I can't allow the lies to stand."

"Ed, I had a falling out with her years ago. She recently got involved with some bloke that she claimed to be in love with, paid his gambling debts, and as a result fell into heavy debt herself, had to sell the house you gave her in the divorce settlement. I had him investigated. He seemed very interested in you being something of a celebrity, and he talked her into writing that book. He said it would put paid to what you'd done to her, and make her a fortune. They didn't count on you ever coming back. Especially under the circumstances that you did. I don't know how you survived."

Alec stood up and stood in front of the man. "You sound concerned. If you were really concerned-"

"Alec don't."

"No, Ed. I've had it. I'm speaking my peace. If you were really concerned you should have stopped her somehow. Her book not only states that Ed was a bad father, it hints at a homosexual relationship between Ed and myself. It's a piece of filth she should be ashamed of. It's notable for what it doesn't say, like the fact a few years ago, Mary deliberately put Ed in danger when her husband disappeared, hoping Ed would kill him and get him out of the way. Ed didn't have to come, but he's been here since after the police questioned him. Is that the act of someone that didn't care about a woman he once married? Go talk to that daughter of yours, and straighten her out. I won't accept anything less than a complete statement to the press saying the book is a bunch of lies that should be put into a rubbish bin. Ed had to go through hell for a year, and he doesn't deserve to have to have his reputation tarnished like this, nor do I. All this has happened and you've done nothing. If anyone is a bad father, it's you, Sir. It's you."

"Alec!" Ed snapped. Mary's father shook his head, set down the untouched coffee cup and stood up wearily as if hampered by something far more heavy than age.

"No. He's right, Ed. He's right. I never said anything to my wife when she interfered with your marriage all those years ago. I never told my daughter that I thought she was being a fool, not trusting you. Mr. Freeman, if my daughter will consent to seeing me, I'll tell her all that and more."

"Sir, I'm so sorry." Ed said.

"No Ed. I am. Goodbye."

Ed watched the old man shuffle off toward Mary's ward.

Claire turned the corner in a lab coat with a stethoscope draping her neck, and came toward him, kissed him on the cheek. She looked as tired as he did.

"She's fine, Edward. She wants to see you alone, after she sees her father. The doctor said visitors are fine."

"Not a chance." Alec said.

"Alec."

"I said, not a chance. We all go in or we don't go. I didn't have to be growing up around those damn sheep as a kid in Australia to know that woman has a talent for pulling the wool over your eyes."

Ed sighed. Claire chuckled at Alec. "Alec is right, Edward."

"I confess I'm too tired to argue with you two."

"Good, come on, breakfast is on me." Claire said. sliding her arm around Ed's waist. "And everyone's waiting for you in the cafeteria and they're hungry. Besides, and Gil want to talk to you."

"I love you." Ed whispered to her.

"I know, Edward. If it were me in there, well, I know."

* * *

"I asked to see you alone." Mary said, her arm still connected with an IV.

"Edward, I'll be back, I'm going to go stop in on some wards, say hi to the few friends I still have here." Claire smiled.

"All right. Don't be long."

"She's not even that pretty, Ed. Is she prettier than I was, all those years ago? Why can't we speak alone? I asked to speak to you alone."

"We don't always succeed in getting what we want," Ed said. "How are you feeling? I had you moved to a private room where you'd be more comfortable." Ed hung his Burberry sleepily on a hook. It dropped, and Alec picked it up, draped it carefully over a chair.

"Ed, stay with me, I'm so frightened."

"Give it a rest, Rutland." Alec growled.

"Mary, your father told me why you did what you did."

"I never stopped loving you, you know."

"Christ, I think I may vomit," Alec said.

"Alec, go get me a cup of coffee."

"Ed, I told you-"

"And I'm telling you. Go bring me a cup of coffee."

Alec groaned, slipped out the door.

"Oh darling, we could have been so good for one another, you still care, I know you do. I am the mother of your son. Ed, please hold my hand."

"You know, I hired a solicitor from America, to stop that book you wrote. Or I should say co-wrote. You'd like him, Mary. He says exactly what's on his mind. I told him I was going to go to Mayland to make sure you were all right. I told him I had a certain obligation to make sure you were all right. He said I was full of shit. He said I should put a lid on it. I started to listen to him, and I took his advice. I'm telling you that now, Mary, put a lid on it."

"I don't understand."

"Oh you understand all right. You understand perfectly. You pushed the book through. You saw that I was alive, and you still pushed the book through. Your father told me all I needed to know. You know, Mary, I didn't realise it before but monsters in the abyss come in all sizes shapes and colours. You knew exactly what I was doing. Now that you see you've lost in this little game you've been playing, I and the property and portfolio I inherited are beginning to look pretty good to you."

"How can you say that to me? Ed, I'm all alone in the world now."

"As soon as you're well enough, I want the book stopped. I want you to make a court statement saying exactly why you made up those lies. I want a cheque donated to the Straker Foundation for the amount that the publisher gave to you for the book. The police managed to find your little agent friend, you know. He's wanted for larceny and bad cheques."

"Damn you, why did you even bother to show up? So you could get more good publicity?"

"Gosh that doesn't sound like someone who says she still loves me."

"My father spoke to you, what does he know? Oh get out of here. Go back to your little sanctimonious whore in the lab coat. Who did she think she was, telling me what I had done was wrong? When has she ever gone without anything, living in that manor of yours?"

"When are you going to be honest with yourself? Why don't you admit what you did? You didn't want to show the world what I was really like. You just wanted to make a fast couple of thousands of pounds with your Lothario. Why don't you admit it, Mary? Do I have to supoena your father to speak in my behalf, tell the court what he told you, tell the court what he found out about your lover?"

"He's got one foot in the grave, you'd never do that to him. Besides who would believe the doddering old fool anyway? What was I supposed to do? Wait for him to drop dead so I could get his lousy house and all his money? All right, you bastard, yes, all right? I lied in the book. It was the only way I could live decently, and Mario said I should make it juicy, a lot more pleasing, if I threw in a few suggestions that you and your damn Australian were romping between the bed sheets, the amount we'd get for the book would be enough to live on for years. The British public would lap it up like a kitten laps milk. How else was I supposed to look after myself? My mother told me to marry well, and I thought I had, but you cared more about that obscene job of yours than me."

"I'm going to get every penny you and Mario made, Mary. Then Alec and myself are going to get a press release stating exactly what you just said."

"Over my dead body!"

"Yes, yes. It almost was, wasn't it, Mary? Mr. Vale wanted it to be that way. They said he claimed he did it to help me. That he wanted to stop the injustices that modern day monsters like you do, that he wanted to shine light on the abyss. All he succeeded in doing is proving he was part of the abyss himself. Rest well, Mary. I'll see you in court."

"Bastard!"

Ed Straker carefully picked up his Burberry, and went past the guard he'd had assigned to her door.

* * *

"She admitted everything?" Claire asked, using her fork to cut into a considerably sized piece of apple pie topped with whipped cream Frances had made for Ed and the others. They were sitting around the Silk Wood Manor dining room table.

"She didn't dot every I and cross every T, but basically, yes," Ed answered, sipping his coffee.

"How are you going to make her admit it in court?" Graham wanted to know.

"Oh, her canary is singing like a dream. Seems he was promised a reduced sentence if he testified against her. Besides, even if we didn't have her Prince Charming, there are other ways we could get what Ed needs," Angel said, licking cream off his fork.

"I told Ed it wasn't wise to go in there alone." Alec grumbled. "And what does he do? He throws me out."

"She wouldn't have said anything with you there, Alec, you know that."

"Well, I knew you get stupid around that woman, so I had Yvonne get me a little something, a electronic bug." Alec grinned. "Planted it on your coat when you dropped it. We picked up every word she said. Oh we probably can't use it in court, but we certainly could have the right people at the right time overhear the recording, and maybe distribute a few transcripts to a couple of eager beaver tabloid reporters who want a scoop."

"You had me bugged? What did you think would happen in there?" Ed said in irritation.

"My guess is he thought you'd slip into the abyss again, Ed," Gil said quietly.

"And maybe forget the fact she was out to ruin her ex," Catherine added.

"So basically you didn't trust me after all these years to do what I knew was right," Ed said, looking at Alec, mildly amused.

"You didn't stop needing a babysitter when you first started to shave, Ed, so don't give me those big baby blues," Alec reminded him.

Angel chuckled.

"All right, all right, suppose I give you something else, Alec."

"Yes, Ed, why don't you give him something else?" Angel asked.

Ed reached in his pocket for a mini-tape recorder, and Alec gawked. Ed snapped it on.

".......that pretty, Ed. Is she prettier than I was, all those years ago? Why can't we speak alone? I asked to speak to.."

He snapped it off.

"Little bitch." Claire muttered to herself. Catherine high-fived her.

"You said it, girlfriend." Catherine grinned.

"You had that thing in there all that time?" Alec grumbled to Ed.

"Not exactly, but Angel wired me for sound before I went to see Mary. He was afraid the police would implicate me in some way, even though we all had airtight alibis. He thought it was going to be pretty difficult to get money and vindication out of a corpse, even if we managed to get Mario in our hip pocket. And if she made it, and tried what she tried, we'd have it all on magnetic tape."

"So that's where you were all this time. With the cops. Smart boy," Catherine said admiringly.

"I was at the police station with earphones," Angel admitted. "But it wasn't only yours truly that should get the kudos."

"Who then?" Catherine asked, after a sip of her coffee.

"It wasn't me," Frances said, and turned slowly to look at Gil, who had a mouthful of apple pie.

"Let's just say something about Mary Nightingale Straker Rutland bugged me," Gil said calmly after washing it down with coffee. "No pun intended. So I managed to borrow that wire from a acquaintance in forensics at Scotland yard for to use, and we talked Ed into using it, taped him up at the john."

"No wonder he was in there a long time after breakfast. And here I thought it was all my coffee he drank." Frances chuckled.

"Between all of us, we helped Edward win," Yvonne said triumphantly.

"Speaking of winning, who gets the car?"

"That will have to wait for later tonight, Catherine. We have a lot to put in motion," Ed told her.

"It won't be you. You know, I've wanted a SUV for a long time now. Not great on mileage, but just the thing to take on the streets of Las Vegas." Gil said thoughtfully.

"Dream on, bug boy. I'm wrapping a bow around a nice new red Cadillac convertible," Catherine told Gil.

"Forget it, Stanley and I will have a nice new Range Rover," Frances said, patting Angel's hand.

"There's a BMW I wouldn't mind having," Alec admitted.

"And I thought Mary was greedy," Ed said with a sigh. Claire laughed and kissed him. "And what is it you want if you win?" he said as she wrapped her arms around his neck.

"Oh nothing much, Edward just a gorgeous highly tuned piece of British and American machinery that goes from zero to 200 mph in five seconds. Sleek, polished. Maybe in a nice silver. With big blue headlights. Parked next to me."

"What make of car?" he said suspiciously.

"One of a kind in its class. Called an Edward Straker."

Ed blushed while the others laughed.

* * *

A few days later, Ed sat next on the wicker settee in the sunroom as Claire served breakfast, and picked up several British tabloids and some respected newspapers. EX-WIFE OF STRAKER ADMITS LIBEL was one headline. STRAKER VINDICATED read another. RUTLAND REVEALS MONEY MAKING SCHEME. STRAKER TELL-ALL REMOVED FROM SHELVES STRAKER'S PARTNER SUES HIS EX-WIFE, WINS SETTLEMENT PUBLISHER OF BOOK MAKES HEFTY DONATION TO FOUNDATION. NEWS OF THE WORLD MAKES APOLOGY TO STRAKER

"Well, the unpleasantness is over, Alec and I got what we wanted, and the Foundation profited, which is the only good thing that came out of this." Ed pointed out, flipping through some pages.

"What will happen to her now?" Frances asked.

"Oh she managed to collapse in tears on her father's shoulder at the press conference, and she said something about embracing Christianity and seeing the light. I just hope it's a train coming straight at her," Alec told her. "But your concern for her is misplaced, believe me, she'll dream of some new plot to get at Ed. Amazing how so many crooks who can't get a plea bargain suddenly find God."

"We do get a great many new converts from the criminal element," Angel grinned. Frances was pouring morning tea for the houseguests and she shot a glance at him. Ed was staring out at the murky weather, watching the rain, which was beginning to pick up. In another part of the house, he could hear a train whistle blowing. , Catherine and Gil were running the toy train. So much for peace and quiet at seven on a English morning. Morning? Morning usually involved the sun coming up.

"What good is a sunroom with no sun?" he wondered aloud. It was so dreary outside, he was sure not even Sherlock Holmes could have found Watson in that fog. So much for the British summer. He picked up an newspaper again and his eyes fell on a column of type he hadn't seen before. He shuddered and pushed the newspaper away from him like it might poison him.

"How are you handling all this, Edward?" Claire asked softly, misinterpreting his action as relief that it was all over.

"It's making me hungry, and those scrambled eggs look good," Ed lied and picked up his fork without appetite.

"I made them myself for a change."

"You put too much milk in them, dear," Frances said.

"Be quiet Frances." Claire said, a little more sharply than she intended.

Frances fell into silence.

"I'll never be the cook you are, but then- oh. Excuse me, would you?" she let the teaspoon clatter to the serving tray and ran out with a muffled sob.

"Claire?" Ed was baffled, and he threw down his fork, gave Frances a cold look and went after his wife. He managed to locate her after several minutes without success in the garden, and instantly the error of being in pyjamas and robe in a cold climate became apparent. How he'd managed to find her in this fog he didn't know. "Sweetheart?"

"Edward, I don't know what to do with myself anymore. At first, when Mary was injured, I just was relieved, I wanted that chapter of your life to be over."

"I can understand that. Mary keeps showing up in my life. It's like a bad novel," Ed said with a soft chuckle.

"Then I was back in Mayland again, and everything I'd lost-oh God, Edward, what am I supposed to do, I got pushed into choosing medicine and now I'm not even good enough for taking temperatures. I can't cook. I can't sew a hem. I can't set a damn table. I'm no good as a wife. So much for the lady of Silk Wood Manor."

"The Lord of Silk Wood Manor couldn't care less, he loves her. The lord of Silk Wood Manor is also freezing his title off out here."

Claire turned and chuckled, took his hand between hers and kissed it.

"It would be just like you to catch pneumonia. You survive just about everything life throws at you and you'd catch a cold and die."

"I'm not planning on dying anytime soon, although I'm getting numb standing out here. Claire, did it ever occur to you you're feeling useless, useless because of your hand?"

"I hadn't thought about it since the accident. Edward, I miss Nathaniel. I miss our old life."

Ed nodded. "We're both feeling useless, fishes out of water. I should just forget

this psychological rubbish and go back to Shado where I belong, and take you with me. Shado medical centre can always use you, if you want to leave the Foundation."

"I don't think your people would be any more comfortable with the Commander's wife than they are with the Commander."

"Ouch."

"I didn't mean it that way, Edward." she chuckled and put her arms around his waist.

"Sure you did. I thought the whole purpose of my being away from Shado was to heal my shattered psyche. Now I'm beginning to think you're a lot worst than the abyss." he grinned at her.

"Oh how wonderful, first Frances criticises my eggs-"

"Eggs." Ed repeated meaningfully. "That reminds me, wives are supposed to feed husbands."

"And then my husband compares me to a abyss."

"I changed my mind, I am dying soon. Death by frostbite. Can we go-"

Suddenly the garden lighting went out. Claire gave a startled cry, and Ed pulled her down to the ground for a few moments.

"What in blazes? Christ, I'm out here with no weapon, where in the hell are the high tech security systems I pay so much for. Come on, I think the door is this way. Near the lavender."

Claire didn't quite understand the sheer fright in his tone. Slowly they got up and began to move through the garden. But it wasn't like what he'd remembered of the old Silk Wood garden, and he soon grew confused.

"Oh no, I think we're lost." she said when they crashed into a wall of foliage. "These are the rose bushes!"

"You think? Ow. OW. Yeow! Damn it. Why is it that when I need him, Lancaster is never-AUGH! Get that flashlight beam out of my eyes, would you, Graham?"

"Sir, you're bleeding." Graham said urgently.

"That's what I pay you for, that indisputable sense of the obvious. What the blazes is going on here- UGH!" Ed said as the ear-splitting grounds alarm finally went on then off.. Ed decided that numbness had been preferable, since now he could feel the thorn which was stuck in his palm. He winced as Claire spotted it and pulled it out.

His silk robe was spattered with blood drops, and his face was smeared with dirt.

"Reverend Brisby, the bloody idiot accidentally dropped his coffee on the transformer of the train set. Blew the power. Shorted out the alarm systems. Don't worry, Yvonne is going to rely on back up power. Come on, Sir I want you inside."

"Better get me in before I bleed to death. I want a report on the status of the security around here. From now on, I don't want it -" Ed was interrupted by Graham's mobile going off.

"Yes. I know. Yes, we found him, Yvonne. He's okay. Have you been able to - all right. Yes, way ahead of you, as usual, carry on." Graham shoved his mobile in his pocket. He practically was pushing them ahead of him now. Claire saw for the first time that he was armed.

"What's going on?" Claire said, frightened.

"I'll tell you once we get you inside, Ma'am."

"You'll tell us now." Ed ordered. In response, he got his Glock shoved into his hand. It was like he'd just swallowed a double expresso.

"Don't tell me, let me guess. Security breach? UFO headed for us? English Heritage wants a new coat of paint on the damn Grade 2 gates?"

"Infra-red scanners picked up someone who shouldn't be on the property. Probably managed to get in when the security system went down."

"You know I read Jerusha March escaped this morning, escaped when they were moving her to another ward of hospital. I want Claire in the safe room."

"NO! No way in hell am I ever going in there again. The last time I did, I lost you." she pressed herself to him.

"This is no time to argue." Ed said desperately, but his arms closed around her.

"That's right, so stop arguing. I'm staying with you. Stop treating me like a child. I work for you, just as much as Graham does. So just keep moving."

"When are you going to under-" Ed started to say. Then the world was obliterated by a gunshot, and Claire fell forward soundlessly, no longer protesting. Ed screamed, and it was muffled by Graham pushing him to the ground, and several shots in succession deafening him. The Englishman suddenly gasped, clawed at his back and fell on top of Ed. Ed grasped around in the mud for his dropped Glock, touched metal but all he'd managed to find was the flashlight Graham had been using. He swung it around, over the motionless bodies of the two people (Claire! Dear God! Claire!)and up into a face he knew all too well.

Between her hands, she was holding a gun at him, and she squinted into the beam of light.

"You told lies about me Neal," she squealed. "I found you. Took me a long time to find out. Now is the judgement, Neal. Now is the time of the Second Coming. STOP! Don't move."

"Please. I'm not going anywhere. My friends are hurt. You can have me. I'll go with you. Just let me call for help for my frien-"

Suddenly high intensity beams illuminated the garden, and Ed dropped the flashlight, trembling. Her gun was closer to his head now. He felt dizzy, weak, nauseous. The abyss beckoned.

"Glory! GLORY and praise Almighty God, hallejujah, in His infinite mercy and wisdom he has chosen you to be his disciple!"

Where was Yvonne? Gil? Alec? Christ, they must be able to make out that something was wrong. He couldn't rush at her to try and get the gun out of her hands, she was too close to him, at this close she'd blow his head clean off. That must be why nobody was risking a shot. It was hard to think. He didn't want to think. The peace of the abyss called to him. After all, his friends lie dead. Dead like all the innocent people he'd witnessed being slaughtered. It was because of him they had gone to the splendour of God. It was for his sake. It was right that his time had come. He was the sacrifice-

"NO!" he yelled. "No, you murderer no, I won't let you into my head anymore. No more deaths! No more dying! Go ahead! Kill me. The moment you do, they'll open fire on you and you'll follow me into hell. Not paradise. I'm NOT your God. Do you understand? You're nothing but a piece of filth!"

"Know thy Maker! Hallejulah!" she screamed, raising the gun.

Goodbye my darling Claire. I wish I'd had the time to tell you just what you brought to my life. Just how much I cared for you. How I finally felt loved, finally began to feel human again. But not even alien bacteria can restore an human skull ripped apart by a slug. There's a limit to even the miracles you believed in, darling. Goodbye Alec, how could I ever thank you for your friendship, and yes, for your loyalty and love. Live for little Ayomide.

Ed squeezed his eyes shut.

It was then that he heard it. A loud buzzing. Didn't they say that at the point of death, there was buzzing, and light, and a tunnel? Ever the scientist, he opened his eyes. Jerusha was there, the gun still uncomfortably pointed at his temple, warm against his flesh, the smell of cordite in his nostrils. The buzzing got louder. The idiotic thought that Gil had somehow come up with a super bug came to his head. But it was no insect. And it was coming right for him.

Shiny. Bright. Coming right for him. And he'd never been that glad to see anything in his life. A model airplane. A Sopwith Camel. It zipped by her ear, turned for another dive. His heart leapt.

Only two people could fly anything with wings, even a toy, in that precise a manner. One was him. The other was Alec Freeman.

She turned, and it was the moment he'd needed, and he grabbed the gun, wrestled with her, holding on to it desperately. Weakened, his grip started to go, and he leaned forward, collected saliva in his mouth and spit it in her face, and now blinded, screeching at him, sounding like nails drawn across a chalkboard, she dropped the gun, and her head exploded as a gunshot rang out, and he felt himself collapse in shock against the damp earth in exhaustion.

He didn't hear as Alec yelled out orders to get Claire Straker and Graham Lancaster to hospital, nor watch as the chopper took flight, headed for the Mayland Hospital helipad. Nor did he feel Alec Freeman pick him up gently, so gently in his arms, and call him a idiot with the utmost of affection as Alec carried him to the waiting medi-chopper and put him on a stretcher. Gil climbed in with Alec, put a hand on his shoulder for a moment. Alec didn't take his eyes away from Ed.

"Was he hit?" Gil said to the medic that was carefully tearing Ed's shirt open and jamming IVs into his arms.

"I don't think so. Non-responsive. Shock. Minor scratches from the thorns and greenery. No entry wounds. No sign of internal bleeding. But don't worry, Sir, I'm not having Commander Straker die on my watc-"

"Shit." Alec said. He gave a curt shake of the head.

Gil furrowed his brow.

"I thought-" the medic began, looking at a puzzled Gil.

"You thought wrong. Stabilise Ed and then signal the other chopper ahead of us for a report on Spencer and Lancaster, minute Ed wakes up he'll want to know how his wife is. I'm not worried about Graham, the old goat would survive a nuclear blast let alone a gunshot wound. But Ed's wife-"

"Yes Sir."

"We'll get out of your way." Alec added.

"Right, Sir."

The two men moved to the rear of the chopper as it lifted off.

"Care to tell me why that medic called him Commander Straker?"

"No idea." Alec responded.

"Care to tell me why you're lying to me?"

"No idea." Alec repeated.

"Ed will be all right, Alec. Largely due to you. I remember Ed mentioning to me at the toy store that you were a combat pilot during the war, but I didn't take it seriously. Then I saw the way you flew that thing, and it suddenly wasn't a toy. You saved his life."

"Ed may still be alive, but that isn't going to mean much if we lose Claire. I don't even know how bad she's hurt. Gil, all my life I've been getting that blond idiot out of messes, and no matter how many times I do it it never gets easier."

"You and Ed met during the war?"

"Yeah. No! I mean, no."

"Interesting. I've interrogated a number of criminals in my professional capacity, and none lie as badly as you do, Alec. So whatever secrets you're trying to keep are safe with me."

"Secrets. What good will they be if he dies?"

"I don't think its anything worse than exhaustion and shock, possibly psychological trauma Alec. Ed will be fine. I'm more worried about you at the moment."

"You don't know him as well as you like to think you do. If Claire dies, he will. Between the two of us we kept him going after that year. If she dies, he won't bother to go on. And since he's the closest thing I have to a ruddy brother, no use for me to stick around either."

"It'll be all right," Gil said, aware of how trite that sounded.

"Can't you move this thing faster? And where the hell is the report I asked for? I want to know what Mrs. Straker's condition is. Get on the damn radio!" Alec shouted.

"Alec, he'll be okay."

"Right. Everybody tells me that. You don't mind if I reach that conclusion on my own? Oh damn, I was supposed to call Yetunde. She's going to want my Australian hide. I was supposed to pick up Mide. Some father-some fat-"

Ed moaned faintly. The sound of it was muffled by the oxygen mask they'd placed over his face. Alec buried his head in his hands and wept with relief.

Gil gently laid a hand on his back. For some conditions of the human spirit, science wasn't much help, Gil thought to himself. How odd. He was weeping. Him. Gil Grissom. There was a scientific explanation for everything.

Must be allergy season in England.

Must be.

He was suddenly grateful that Cat wasn't there to point out with glee that he wasn't allergic to anything.

What did women know anyway?

Just about everything. Ginger Rogers had done everything Fred Astaire had, and backwards.

"Everything will be all right," he repeated, knowing that Catherine would say that to Alec, and wondering why he wished she was there to say it. But two words stayed on his mind. Four really. And it would be easy to get Straker's prints. They had to be everywhere around the manor. He'd do a little quiet digging. Hadn't Willows told him she had the instinct about Straker that there was more to him than met the eye?

Catherine was never wrong.

Commander. Straker. Thailand. Vietnam.

How he loved an new crossword puzzle. Four blanks were already filled in.

* * *

Alec Freeman walked into Shado headquarters on a dismal British afternoon, and toward the familiar office. Caroline Constantine was already there, hobbling on crutches.

"Hello Gorgeous." he told her.

Caroline waited for the door to close shut with a pneumatic hiss.

She had on a burgundy trouser suit with a white lace blouse, pearl necklace and earrings and wore one strappy sandal. On the other she had her cast signed and adorned with different sayings. Most of them were rather risque, Alec knew. He'd written at least two of them.

"Don't be a prat, Freeman, I happen to know you're about 87% responsible for that T-shirt I got in the post. And don't ask me if I talked him out of leaving yet. You know Ed is like a barnacle on a ship's underbelly when it comes to something he decides to do. He isn't thinking of the long term consequences, he's just thinking of his wife. He's feeling vulnerable. That run in with that witch didn't help. But at least it provides him with closure. A lot of people who experience that kind of torture never get their sanity back, but our Ed is resilient. He just isn't the superman he thinks we think he is."

"Did you get him to at least think things out before he does something stupid like resigns from Shado?"

"He threatens to once a year now. He handed in his resignation letter to me, said he was unfit on account of mental illness. I told him he was a idiot. Claire did too, she knows how important Shado is to Ed. Lucky girl that Claire, landing Eddie. The snogging alone could raise the dead. I'm stuck with you I suppose, it's you in bed I really want."

"Your place or mine?"

"Mine, your bedroom looks like a laundry heap. How is Claire? I heard where Graham got shot. Right in the buttock. Serves the beggar right. It so is appropriate for him. I never saw anyone as full of himself as Lancaster besides Foster, and Foster's buried in a nice English churchyard somewhere. And to think I never got to find out if the legends about Paul's sex life were true."

Alec grinned at her. "I came by to see how things were, Ford assures me things are quiet with our liquid breathing friends and Gay's due in a few minutes to mind the store. Then I'm off to see Ed and Claire. She's doing well I hear, her surgery went wonderfully, thank heaven. She gets released today from Mayland. Can't convince Ed she isn't dropping dead soon, though. He's been staying with her at Mayland, sleeping on a cot. They finally fixed a private room for him again. Hope he doesn't need it soon. How is Ed's stability?"

"Saw him for a session last night. Took me fifty-five minutes to get through the bull shit and actually have him tell me he still has nightmares, and flashbacks to the killings. I tried to get him on a new psychotropic recommended by Mela, but you know Ed. No pills. It's good him having company at that manor of his, met them last night. You know, that Grissom fellow isn't half bad looking. Anyway, I have a session with Ford coming up, so I need a drink." Caroline took a glass from Ed's shelf above his dispenser and filled it with a little brandy.

"Keith sees you?" Alec grinned.

"Yes, he was seeing Rose Mela, but then Rosey started in on his absence of a sex life, and he bolted like a racehorse at the hiss of a rattler. I swear that man has a ego thin as onion paper. Mind you, I know Ed picks on him, and enjoys it too, but then I know why and will never tell. See you later, Freeman, you darling male you."

"Oh you know you fancy Ed Straker more." Alec replied, shrugging.

"Yes, but I didn't want to be rude." she chuckled after a sip. He sighed dramatically.

"Thank God I have Ayomide, least she loves me. Yetunde took her for the week, so I have no females to adore me. Guess I'll go pester Claire and Ed now."

Alec picked up Caroline's hand and kissed it. She just rolled her eyes and took the resignation letter bearing Ed's signature out of her handbag and stuffed it into the vapouriser.

* * *

At the remodelled special hospital suite for Ed at Mayland, Claire Straker was impatiently sitting in a leather chair near the window, wearing her husband's brown Nehru jacket over a green wool sweater and plaid skirt. Between peering nervously at the clock and flipping through Vanity Fair, she jumped, startled, when the door swung open and a impossibly huge bouquet of pink and white carnations, white roses, white orchids and various greenery all done up with a gold ribbon walked in her hospital room on two legs. Two legs she knew well. She bounded up, threw down the magazine.

"Finally you get here, Edward! You're late! I want to go home!"

A familiar face peeked through the flowers, looking glum. "I had some things to pick up in London, took me longer than I expected. You don't like the flowers I got you?"

"Beautiful, Edward, just lovely, where's the soda you promised to get me?"

"I spent thirty pounds on this thing and all you care about is the-my God! What did you do to your hair?" Ed dropped the bouquet on a nearby table and came over to his wife, who had her usually below shoulder dark hair cut in a new bob just barely sweeping her shoulders.

"Had the salon do it last night after you left. I wanted a new look. I know you prefer it long, Commander, so I didn't go too crazy."

"You cut my hair!" Ed wailed.

"Your hair?" she asked in great amusement, snuggling against him. She suspected he had something behind his back, since he didn't snuggle, but kissed her, inspecting her hair tentatively.

"You know what I mean. What are you doing with my jacket on? I seem to have left it behind here."

"It reminds me of you, makes me feel like you're here, I know you sneaked to Shado a few days these past weeks. I talked to Caroline."

"And?"

"And she said she was planning to stick your resignation letter in your shredder the first chance she got."

"It's a vapouriser. Damn. First people are insisting I start a normal life, take more time off, then I try to retire permanently and they all stop me."

"Where's my American grape soda you promised me, Straker?"

"Huh?" Ed asked playfully, pulling out a bottle of grape soda hidden in the flower clay. It had a logo that said STEWARTS. Claire clapped her hands and reached for it, and he pulled it away. "I'm giving it to some other wife who appreciates the lavish flowers I give her."

"Meanie. Come on, take me home, I can't wait to get out of this place. And the flowers are just beautiful, Edward."

"Red roses from Alec?" Ed said, bending and smelling a bouquet of red roses. "Good old Alec. Not much imagination though. Why are you in such a hurry to go home? You were complaining about how much you missed hospital life." Ed leaned forward and kissed her. He noticed she had much more colour, and showed no signs of the pain from her gunshot wound. He eventually decided he liked her shorter hair, and he put his fingers through it. She smiled at him warmly, caressed his cheek, noticing he looked tired.

"Shut up, Straker, it's different when you're a patient and they're waking you up to give you a sleeping pill, and the surgeon comes along and inspects your stumps without your permission and says damn fine microsurgery, and you have to threaten the nurses that chase your husband out of his cot when he's been up all night."

Ed smiled. "I was in the way. I kept driving them crazy, asking them how you were really doing. Besides, gave me a reason to go out to Shado, see if I was needed. Naturally I wasn't. So last night Caroline drops over at Silk Wood, she takes me back to Shado and tries to crack open my injured psyche." Ed bent, got two glasses out of a cabinet and added ice, poured the soda after a deft pop of the cap with a church key he'd brought along.

"I've seen the way she looks at you, it isn't your psyche she's interested in.|" Claire said playfully, watching his lithe muscles ripple under the form fitting brown jumpsuit and white turtleneck. He wriggled his pale fine brows lecherously, handed her a soda.

"I'm so glad today will be your homecoming, Mrs. Straker, I missed you. I missed you more than I can say." He tinkled his glass against hers, and she sipped until it was all gone, licking her lips.

"Edward, you were here practically all the time I was." she reminded him, pointing to the cot.

"This isn't home. I can't stand it at home anymore without you, Frances is driving me crazy. I'm chasing her out tonight. It'll just be us. Come on, let's pack up all your flowers and get you out of here. Hmm, maybe we can get you a hair transplant." he said after drinking his soda down, and placing his and her glasses aside. For that he got a sharp slap on the arm and he chuckled.

* * *

In her green Vauxhall, she tried to curl up against him as they drove, but he shooed her away, humming. He'd brought her a Barbour jacket, had gotten into his own. It had surprised her he hadn't brought a bodyguard, but she decided not to upset him and ask him about it. One day of freedom for the both of them seemed so wonderful. The car smelled of flowers and his light citrus cologne, and she didn't mind that the weather was absolutely ghastly, all that mattered was that her husband was next to her.

After a while, she slipped into a light nap. She had no idea how long she'd been asleep when the car pulled to a stop, awakening her, but she soon recognised that they were in Tetbury.

"God, I really must have been exhausted. Why have we stopped here, Edward."

"I wondered when you'd wake up. Get out of the car. I want to show you something."

"But I want to go home." she wailed like a child. It did no good, he had already come over to her side of the car and opened the door for her, waiting until she reluctantly got out. He locked the car as she popped on her prosthesis fingers from her purse. He took her arm, holding his umbrella for the two of them. looking mysterious, and paused occasionally to nod to people as they walked by. Finally they stopped in front of a small building surrounded by trees.

"Edward, I just want to go home, I'm not in the mood for a walk, and I'm freezing."

"Nice building this, don't you think. That's an interesting door."

"Oh God, what have you bought now?" she chuckled.

"Grape soda manufacturing company maybe," he teased.

"Good! There isn't a decent grape soda in all of Engla-"

Claire gasped. She had spotted a brass plaque beside the bell push. It was shiny, seemed new. There was something on it.

Claire Straker Doctor of Medicine General Practice, Paediatrics

"Edward, what have you done?" she wept.

"Nothing, bought the building, had the plaque made. Whether or not you start a private practice someday is up to you. But its time you did what you love, and you can do regular medicine without full use of your fingers. Hire a nurse. They may have pushed it on you darling, but its what you do best."

She didn't say anything for the longest time, and he frowned, thinking he'd hurt her, when all he wanted to do was make her happy, see her smile again. Finally she spoke. "Edward, no. I don't want this. I woke up in that hospital, thinking you were dead, thinking I would die. I never wanted to see suffering again. I had time to think about what I wanted. I want you, and our home and to be your wife, and to help you run your company. What I do best is run the Foundation that is so important to you. Interact with the people you help, especially the children. We can do so much more, too, you know. Have a section that assists Shado. Try to help victims with their loss and shock when the aliens kill their loved ones and friends."

"You're sure about this?" he said quietly.

"Edward, the year I spent waiting for you to come home, I didn't have any choice but to just try and keep the Foundation running. As long as it stayed alive, then so would you. At least that's what I told myself, I tried to be so brave, but I grieved for your loss as much as poor Alec did. I was afraid I'd never see you again. Edward, hold me, oh please hold me."

"It's all right, I'm here now. I'm here."

"They said you went into some kind of fainting spell after I got shot. Almost a fugue state."

"Yes, yes. Briefly. Just shock, exhaustion. I was convinced she'd killed you. Alec. Alec and his damn flying toy. And to think Frances kept bitching about how it wasn't proper for a grown man to have a toy. People see him and dismiss him as the happy-go-lucky lady killer. They don't realise he was a combat pilot. Do you know what I did with the plane he used to save our lives? I had it repaired, it had a crack in it when it finally hit the ground, and I had it sealed inside a perspex case, and it's in our bedroom. We owe our lives to his quick thinking. Claire-"

"Yes." she said, clinging to him underneath the umbrella.

"You haven't heard what I was going to say yet," he laughed.

"Whatever it is you want, yes, I know all the ways you sound, husband. When you think you've done something wrong, and you're wanting forgiveness, when you're aroused, when you're in pain, when you're being the Commander, when you want something, and that was your I want something voice."

He grinned, handed her the umbrella. He took out a pen from his pocket, unscrewed the tiny screws that held the plaque in place, and shoved the plaque in a pocket.

"I'll keep this just in case you change your mind, and I can use this building as the local branch of the Foundation. Right now though, we're both still on holiday, even in this awful deluge. I may have to buy an ark. Come on, I'll tell you what's on my mind when we get home. Let's go home Mrs. Straker. Oh-forgot something."

"Now what?"

"I stopped by Garrards."

She fingered her beloved locket.

"Edward, I know you're trying to replace the jewelry I lost-"

"Who says I got you anything, greedy? I picked up something for Alec." He opened a velvet lined case, and she laughed at the object in it.

"You planning on awarding him with that tonight?"

"Yes, going to have a special dinner for him tonight. Oh and, okay, greedy, this is for you."

He handed her another, smaller box from Garrards, and within it was a simple gold disc edged by tiny emeralds and seed pearls. It was engraved in tiny old English letters, and it said: I'm the woman Ed Straker loves so return me to Ed , because he is forever lost without me at his side.

She dropped the umbrella and moved close to him.

"It's how I feel, you know." he whispered, holding her, his eyes burning into her, gleaming blue hungry depths. Suddenly she forgot that it was a dismal grey day with rain dampening both of them.

"Oh Edward. It's so perfect. I'll never take it off. I'll never be lost to you again."

"You can wear it as a pendant with your locket and as a pin." Ed pressed his lips together in the old, familiar way, trying to stop the emotions that were unleashed inside him. The fear. The pain. The longing. The love.

"Sweetheart, I won't ever go away. I won't leave you." she said, watching his eyes fill with unshed tears. She pinned it on, and touched it like it was a living thing. Then she touched his face gently. "I love you, Edward."

"I couldn't stand it, you know." he said quietly. "I watched you fall, and I could do nothing. I was with Jerusha, for that year of hell, and she'd touch me, tell me how attractive I was and I longed for you to touch me instead. I fought falling in love with you for so long, and now I can't conceive of a world in which you don't exist." he whispered huskily.

"Edward, I know. My precious, my sweet Edward, I know. We've taken each other for granted sometimes. We've had so much taken away from us, but we've been given so much. We have each other. I love you so much. So much."

" I have a lot to do tonight before our guests leave, award the prizes for the game, convince a old Australian to do something he may be reluctant to, and make love to my beautiful wife. Let's go home. Come on. We can't stand here like this. We'll catch pneumonia. And no doctor around for miles."

It earned him another affectionate slap on the arm, and he laughed and picked up the umbrella.

* * *

"Come on, Gris. Military conspiracies? This is too far-out, even for you." Catherine rolled her eyes. The two of them were in a car Gil had rented on the premise of getting souvenirs, driving back to Silk Wood Manor.

"Catherine, I tried digging up something on Ed's military background using Commander, Thailand, Vietnam, Straker. I got as far as acknowledgement that he had served in the Vietnam conflict, was a P.O.W. , and retired from the Air Force a long time ago to take his job as studio executive. Nothing else. Every time I tried to pry further I got an Aegus security clearance block, even when I used my own authority as a law officer. Catherine, Aegus is normally reserved for governmental establishments such as the Pentagon. What's Ed Straker doing with that kind of top security blackout of information? I'm not even started. You remember some years ago, I told you I passed out when Claire Straker, who was showing all clinical criteria of being dead, suddenly sat up and screamed?"

"You said she'd died of a bug bite, anaphylactic shock, that she's been allergic, carries epinephrine with her. That she couldn't actually have been dead."

"After I got back from Mayland hospital, I requested to help out on the crime scene in Ed's yard. They allowed me to watch, they didn't allow me to go anywhere near the scene. Even though I was a criminalist. Moreover they didn't even look like criminalists from the Metropolitan Police. I particularly remembered speaking to one fellow who claimed to be from New Scotland Yard. When I called New Scotland Yard to discuss it with my contact there, he said nobody of that name worked for them. So late that night, I returned to Ed's garden, obviously something wasn't kosher. Sure enough, I found samples of both Ed's and Claire's blood they overlooked. I used my authority to take the samples to a lab in London, saying I was working on a case. Catherine, their leukocyte count was astronomical. As you probably remember, normal WBC is 4,500 to 10,000 cells per microliter. Ed's in particular was 30,000 mcl. Hers was considerably higher."

"That's not possible."

"It gets better. I found a pathogen in their blood, nothing I'd ever seen in the laboratory. Dormant in his, active in hers. I made a standard culture of it in a petri dish. It multiplied exponentially in gelatin, and then every last bacterium died and within seconds there was no indication it ever had been there in the first place. Never witnessed anything like that in my life. My conclusion is that the Strakers somehow have taken part in some sort of military bacterial experimentation."

"Let's say you aren't hallucinating. What are we supposed to do about it?"

"Catherine, we don't even know if whatever it is that was done to them was voluntarily or not. They might not even know. And some pieces of the puzzle are still missing."

"Gil, whatever it is, do you know how much trouble you could get into? I'm into getting at the truth in conspiracy theories as much as the next person, but I want to see Lindsey when I get back to Las Vegas, and I like my job."

"You don't have to get involved."

She sighed. "You should have stuck to pupae. Okay, so what do we do next, 007?"

"The only thing we can do. Go straight to Ed with what I discovered. The shortest distance is a straight line."

"We tell him tonight?"

Gil nodded. "Something is rotten in the state of Denmark," he recited.

"Let's just hope we don't end up like the majority of the characters in that play"

* * *

"Claire won the game?" Alec said, sneering. "If that isn't nepotism I don't know what is." He and the rest of Ed's guests, were gathered in the library, having coffee and drinks after dinner. Frances and Angel had gone home, because they had an early morning church meeting.

Gil was contemplative, looking at the numerous leather bound and hardback and paperback books that were stacked from floor to ceiling, while was moody and somber, but the others were relaxed. Alec was proudly wearing the diamond and ruby medal that Ed had gifted him with after a sumptious dinner of beef Wellington. It was engraved Alec Freeman, Flying Ace

"I won?" Claire said, genuinely surprised, after a sip of coffee.

Ed had accepted the steaming hot cup of java she'd poured for him from the silver coffee service, and he used the tongs and creamer to add two cubes of sugar and a dash of cream. He stretched his legs out as he sat beside Claire on the green leather settee. He examined the tray of pastries and chose a chocolate filled croissant, breaking it in half as was his practice, and handing Claire the other half. Ed listened contentedly to the crackling of the fireplace for a few seconds before he responded.

"Yeah. I asked everyone to buy me something that they thought I either needed or that I would like. Alec bought me a book titled How to Have a More Exciting Life, in what I'm interpreting as a tongue in cheek gesture. Yvonne bought me a new silencer for my Glock. Graham bought me a book on hunting. Frances bought me a cookbook and Angel bought me a pocket Bible. Gil bought me a paperweight called Abyss, beautiful piece by the way, Gil and Catherine bought me a black lace teddy, wipe that grin off your face, Alec, the teddy is for Claire, she said the best thing for me was for Claire and I to, well, draw your own conclusions," Ed said suggestively.

Claire chuckled, and winked at Catherine. Gil mildly raised his eyebrows at his colleague, then went back to digesting the book titles, sometimes taking a book off the shelf and eyeing a page or two through his spectacles.

"So what did you give him to win, Claire?"

"I told him the only thing I could give him that he needed was my love," she said seriously. "Love is something you genuinely can't buy."

Ed smiled a crescent of a smile, but didn't respond.

Alec cleared his throat.

"I'm trying to decide whether that's more sugary than the strawberry bars and just as full as empty calories, or if that's the most touching thing I've ever heard in my life." Catherine quipped. Claire chuckled at her.

"She's making a true statement, Catherine." Gil said, examining a custard bar. He took a bite of it. "Ed, Catherine and I would like to have a word in private with you before we retire for the night."

"Go ahead and talk to them, Ed, I'm heading back home, these old Aussie bones of mine are tired." Alec said.

"You are home, Alec." Ed smiled. "You and my goddaughter Ayomide."

"What are you talking about?"

"You recall that building across from here that housed me while I was "Neal", living along with the other homeless men working on the reconstruction of Silk Wood Manor? Now that they're long gone, I've ordered it refurbished and repainted. I also paid your last month's rent on your flat , emptied it, hired a moving lorry to transfer all your belongings and furniture and everything else to our storage area, and once the building is finished, you'll live here, across from us. For now, you'll be on the second floor in what used to be Claire's room. Just across the hall from where we sleep."

"You what? That's damn cheeky of you! Shouldn't I be able to decide where I live?"

"You heard me. You're a single father raising a daughter, with us you won't need to pay rent, and in your situation every last penny matters. You saved my life, Alec. I want you near us. This is a non disputable matter." Ed told him quietly.

"Ed, I--"

"Is he always this way?" Catherine asked Claire, amused.

"Always. And they've argued like this for more than thirty years. Usually Edward gets what he wants. And more than generally, he cheats to get it." Claire grinned.

"My loving supportive wife." Ed teased.

"Always? Since they met in Thailand, perhaps?" Gil shut Profiles in Courage, and slid it back into its place.

"Thailand?" Ed echoed innocently. Gil pegged him as a much better liar than Freeman and wondered what more was to come. Catherine folded her arms, watching.

"I happened to mention I met you in Thailand." Alec shrugged.

Ed looked disturbed. "Graham, would you give Alec a tour of his future house and then show him to his bedroom suite?"

"Yes, Sir."

"Graham."

"Sir?"

"How's the buttock?"

Graham flushed to the roots of his brilliantined hair. "Mr. Freeman, if you'd accompany me."

"Shot in the arse, huh?" Alec guffawed. The Australia got up, patted Ed on the shoulder and kissed Claire on the cheek. They could hear Graham muttering to himself as the pair went out, closing the door after them. Claire poured more coffee for Ed and brushed crumbs off her long leather skirt. She picked up the dessert tray again, chose a apricot cookie, gave Ed a lemon bar and passed the tray around.

"So what's on your mind, bug guy?"

Gil laid out what he'd done, and his conclusions.

"You investigate me? Like I'm a common criminal?"

"I simpl-"

"Don't give me any sanctimonious bullshit, Gil. I'm not one of your bugs to observe and dissect. I didn't object to you showing up on my doorstep because I liked you, and I genuinely thought you wanted to help. I don't even mind rehashing something that is difficult for me to think about if there's the possibility of you gaining further understanding into what makes Jerusha tick. But this goes too far. I was in intelligence, didn't it ever occur to you that its standard practice to put a block on my service record?"

"How do you explain the irregularities in your and Claire's blood, Ed?"

"I told you, I'm not consenting to any interrogation and I take offense to being treated like a criminal. You just had to stick your nose into my business, didn't you?"

"Ed, I admit my intellectual curiosity was my first motivation. But that team that appeared on your property lied to me-"

"The police are not obligated to allow you to help process evidence of a crime. As for the fellow who said he was with New Scotland Yard, he may have had his own reasons for not wanting to give his real name."

"I'm sure he did. But the factor everything comes down to is what's in your blood and how did it get there?"

"Why are you so sure the blood with the bacterium was Claire's and mine?"

"Your and Claire's DNA was on the strands of hair and in the blood samples that the criminologist team neglected to find and collect, and that I did. DNA matched."

"This isn't your business, Gil. Do you think Ed and I am committing a crime?" pleaded Claire.

"I'm trying to establish what the situation is. If I find out you are committing a crime, I'll take this to the authorities."

Alec came into the room.

"Nice little place you set up for me, Ed. Oh oh. What's happened?"

"They found out about our blood," sighed Claire.

"Shit." Alec replied.

"God damn you, Gil, you aren't going to let this go, are you?" asked Ed.

"No."

"I thought we were friends."

"Ed, if Catherine, whom I've known for a long time, and whom I consider a friend and colleague, committed a criminal act, I'd do the same. I'm doing my duty."

Ed got up and stood mere inches away from Gil, staring at him.

"You have no conception of what duty is, or what is given in achieving it. " he said quietly.

Catherine looked at Claire. Tears were falling down her cheeks. Claire slowly got up and came and took Ed's hand. Catherine decided that whatever it was, it wasn't criminal.

"What exactly do you base that conclusion on?" Gil demanded.

"Gil, we may be out of line here somehow."

"Why?"

"My gut tells me whatever they're covering up isn't criminal."

"We have to rely on the evidence."

"Damn it Gil, they're our friends."

"Business before sentiment. You know that."

"I'm a woman, and I know when another woman is pulling the wool over my eyes. "

"We can't afford to rely on your feminine intuition."

"Nor can we afford to rely on your ineffectual way with other human beings Grissom. You're way off your mark."

"Catherine, it's all right, I don't want this making enemies of all of us. Edward." Claire said.

Ed turned slowly, the weight of the world on his shoulders.

"He isn't going to let it go any more than you would were you in his place, darling. Tell them what's at stake. Tell them what you told me. Give them the opportunity you gave me, Edward. Alec, close the door."

"All right, we'll take your car."

"We don't have to go to Shado right away. Part of Shado is here with us."

"Shado?" Gil echoed, puzzled. Ed looked just as puzzled.

"What are you talking about, Claire."

She chuckled a little. Alec, who had shut and locked the door, grinned outright.

"I knew you'd want to work even as you recovered, and I also knew that Mela and Constantine haven't cleared you yet. So I asked Louis and his team, and Graham and Alec if I could make some adjustments to our safe room."

"Meaning?"

Claire picked up a intricately carved wooden Japanese puzzle box from the fireplace mantel and brought it over to Edward. She pushed a hidden panel on it and a drawer sprang out with a musical tone. She presented it to Ed.

"Claire, I don't have any time for puzzles."

"Voice identification positive. Commander Straker," a computer created voice emanated from a hidden speaker in the room. Gil and Catherine heard a definite hiss.

"All right. I can guess what's next. Where is it?"

"You're holding it. Close the drawer and push the panel back in."

Ed did and one bookcase swung open, revealing a steel door, which slid aside.

"This is your show, Mrs. Straker."

"Not mine. Yours." she smiled at Ed.

"Gil, Catherine? Come with me."

* * *

Ed and the others came home several hours later, and settled in the snug. Claire handed out freshly made coffee, but no one seemed that interested in it. Catherine was clearly shaken, the child had been about seven, Lindsey's age. Gil was quiet. Yvonne and Graham had been filled in, and stood by, guarding Gil and Catherine, essentially placing them under house arrest.

"I know you'd like to see the actual body of the child from which the organs were taken, but that's not possible. What was left of her, was returned to her grieving family. However, you saw the corpse of the alien who had the child's heart and lungs. My organisation could use your forensic skills, and you wouldn't necessarily have to quit your job. You could serve as consultant to Shado. Usually people like you, who stumble on the truth of what I do, are given the amnesia drug we told you about. It's vital that no one find out what's going on. The criminology team that came to get the body and collect evidence from the garden are from a sector of New Scotland Yard and the Metropolitan Police that work for me.

"Believe me, they're going to be disciplined for leaving anything behind." Ed added, clearly displeased.

"Beings from outer space taking organs. Ripping up children like that," Catherine muttered. Gil frowned.

"If I didn't clearly accept that the bacterium in your blood wasn't lab created as some sort of bactereological weapon for the military, but originated from a interstellar source, and saw that alien body, I never would buy the premise and need for Shado. I'm still not sure I do. But more of the puzzle pieces are falling in place. How many Shado people are infected with that alien bacterium?"

"Myself, Claire and Alec. I purposely injected it into Alec to try and preserve his life. Claire's symptoms and ultimate death and reanimination weren't from any allergy to insects, they were from our having sexual intercourse, the infected sperm from my body passed into her. Up to then, we thought the only way of transferring the bacteria was through direct injection. The bacteria has mutated since then. Although it saved Alec, it hasn't restored any youthfulness as it did in Claire and me. Why, we don't know."

"It didn't help Ed much through his year of capture." Claire sighed.

"We don't know why it corrects physical damage but not psychological damage, at least Dr. Constantine's theory is that it can't. We also know that large amounts of it kills. A colleague became ill and used high amounts of the cultured bacteria without our knowledge or permission. It killed him, horribly."

"What will you do now?" Claire asked.

"I don't know yet. We may just opt for the amnesia drug you described."

"You can't leave here without it." Alec pointed out firmly.

"Alec, the rest of you, it's late, I'm tired. Claire and I are going on up to bed. Yvonne, Graham, will you see to the security arrangements? Good. I'm suddenly tired. Good night."

"Edward, everything will be all right." Claire said, holding Ed's arm as they moved into the hall.

"I know. Oh wait. One final detail." Ed coaxed Claire out the kitchen door, and around the path to the servant's quarters above the storage area and garage. She stifled a yawn. He went into the garage with her. He pointed out one shape that was covered up. A quick pull, and the tarp floated to the ground, revealing a bright green Volvo topped with a huge ribbon. Claire shrieked.

"My car!"

"You did win, you know. I could have gotten you something snazzier, but somehow," he dug in his trousers for the keys and gave them to her as he spoke, "I figured you'd-"

Claire silenced him with a kiss that led to a more passionate one.

"I was tired.."

"And now?"

"I'm still tired."

She slapped him playfully on the chest.

"You had making love to your beautiful wife on your schedule, remember?"

"Yeah, and I have so many, I forget which one-hey! Come back here!" he shouted as she stomped off in a pretend fit. He chased after her, and caught her and they laughingly went upstairs to their master bedroom. He lifted her up and carried her in and never looked back.

The End

until the next story, Sins of the Fathers

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