The hood filtered the light from a dim bulb that shone constantly in the centre of the ceiling. If there was a porthole in the room it was covered, but it seemed likely, considering the high temperature and close proximity of the engines, that the room was at or below the waterline.

Hank had explored with his legs in all directions and found what felt like a piece of heavy rope, a plastic bucket, a chunk of wood and a solid metal support welded to the floor, which was probably holding up a shelf somewhere above. He estimated he had been on board a day or so but it was hard to tell without a change in light. He had dozed off several times but for how long he wasn’t sure. He had kept an accurate count of the number of days for the first seven, until his only source of timing, daylight, was taken from him. The old garage filled with junk they had first kept him in had a hole in the roof. ‘They’ being the French people: Henri and the two apes who kidnapped him. Then after a drive inside a box for an hour or so he found himself in a dank room, which he presumed was a basement without any light other than the one that was switched on whenever someone came into the room. He estimated he had been in that place for three days but if he had been told six he would not have been surprised. A few years back he had taken part in an interrogation exercise in Fort Bragg, North Carolina, and was kept in a dark cell for two days with just food and water. Light and darkness were alternated, anything from minutes to hours between them, and when the exercise was over he thought he had spent three days more in the cell than he actually had.

Figuring out his surroundings was his only pastime. The thought of escape was always on his mind of course, but the opportunity had not yet presented itself. Not that he had a life-threatening, burning desire to escape. He would if he could, if it didn’t endanger him. His captors were very thorough and attentive though. The bonds they tied his hands and feet with were strong and whenever he was visited they were checked and if loose, retied. They had not removed his hood since he regained consciousness on day one, even when feeding him, which was a handful of bread, cheese or meat shoved under it and into his mouth, followed by a squirt of water from a plastic bottle. No one had spoken to him. Not a word. He’d heard voices on occasion but they were in another part of the building and muffled. When he was in the basement there were Irish and French voices. There was a woman’s voice once. English she sounded, but she could’ve been Irish. He thought she had fed him a couple of times. She wasn’t as rough as the others and her hands were soft. If he guessed correctly she was the one who had given him a piece of chocolate.

After the basement came the long drive in the back of a grimy van to his present location. They had carried him in a box from the van and rolled him out into the metal room and secured him to the pole.Those were all Irishmen, or at least the only ones who said anything were.

Hank felt low in energy, kept deliberately so by his captors no doubt. He was constantly hungry but his stomach had shrunk enough so that just a small amount of food would satisfy him for a while. The only plus side to not eating was that he didn’t need to take a shit, which he hadn’t done the last three days.

Oddly enough, being held captive had been one of Hank’s daydreams; however, he always saw himself in a cell and able to exercise every day and maintain his fitness. But being constantly tied up and hooded was not as bad as he would have imagined. There was something about Hank’s generally easy-going temperament and his ability to live within himself that helped him through the endless hours sitting in silence with only his thoughts for company. He had covered just about every aspect of his situation and the endless combination of outcomes. Kathryn had figured greatly in his thoughts, of course. He expected Helen and Janet had been told he was away on a long exercise. It was Kathryn he was most worried about.

A door opened and what sounded like several people stepped into the room. Hank wondered if it was feeding time, or better still, a trip to the toilet perhaps. The only positive thing about the shit in his pants was that it offered some insulation against the cold floor, once it had dried out a bit, even though most of it had worked its way up his back and over his thighs. A shower would have been unbelievable. He might have forgiven them for everything had they let him clean up and put on fresh clothes. It sounded like they were carrying something heavy as they shuffled across the floor.They dumped it unceremoniously a few feet from Hank. He could not make out the rest of the sounds accurately, but someone was doing something energetically enough to make them a little out of breath. Then the group made its way back through the door and it was closed.

No food, Hank decided. No toilet. And definitely no bath. He became annoyed. Fear had initially dominated all of his emotions, but as the days went by it melted into the background, for the most part, and he began to feel anger and impatience. It was not so much at being captured but the way he was being kept. In a strange way he had accepted being a prisoner almost immediately. He was a soldier and incarceration by the enemy was always a potential hazard of that occupation. He was annoyed at the way they treated him like an animal and decided the next time they came in he was going to voice his complaints. If the IRA considered itself to be a contemporary army, and indeed if it expected its enemies to think of it as such, it should act in as many ways as it could like one. That included the proper treatment of prisoners. What they were doing to him was torturous and uncivilised. Hank would try and make them see things that way the next chance he got. Then he heard something, close by, across the room. He wondered if it was a rat. Then he heard a sigh. It was a person.

Hank’s senses stretched to maximum sensitivity as he scanned for the slightest sound or movement. He moved his head, trying to get a glimpse of any change in the light. Another sigh, or was it a moan? Something scraped across the floor, like the heel of a foot, a leg straightening out, as if the person were sitting on the floor like Hank. It then went silent.

Hank waited an age for whomever it was to make another move. It seemed as if the person was asleep. The breathing had become rhythmic, quite loud, but it also sounded congested.

Some time later, as Hank was beginning to doze off, he heard the person start to cough and hack, trying to clear their throat.

‘Ah, Jesus,’ a voice moaned. It was a man.

Hank listened quietly, wondering when the man would acknowledge him.

‘Ah, God,’ the man said again. ‘Bejesus . . . Focken bastards,’ he cried out weakly.

It was obvious that the man was in pain. Hank wondered if he was a prisoner like himself. The man would surely be able to see Hank, unless he also had a hood over his head.

Hank deliberately scraped his foot across the floor. The man went silent. He’d heard him. Hank did it again. When the man spoke it was with a croaking sound, as if he had painful chest problems. ‘Why don’t you get the focken thing over with, yer bastards.’

He was Irish, Hank could tell that much, and he obviously thought Hank was one of them. That confirmed the man could not see him. Hank was about to say something but was suddenly suspicious. What if it was one of them? What if they were trying to trick him into talking? The first rule of imprisonment for a soldier is to say nothing other than name, rank and serial number.

‘Say something, you bastard,’ the man said. ‘Focken beat me up again if it makes yer feel any better.’

It seemed an extreme length to go to just to interrogate him. There was nothing he could think of that would be of any use to the IRA anyhow. Hank decided talking would be okay as long as he asked the questions.

‘Who are you?’ Hank said.

‘What do mean, who am I, you eedjit? You know who I am or I wouldn’t be here.’

‘I’m sitting on the floor with my hands tied to a pole and a hood over my head,’ Hank said.

The man was silent for a moment. When he spoke again the aggression had gone from his voice, although suspicion remained.

‘You a prisoner?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Is that an American accent?’

‘Yeah.’

‘And you’re toid op with a hood over your head?’

‘Yeah, I’m tied up.’

There was a long silence again, both men trying to figure out the other.

‘What’s an American doing a prisoner with these people?’ he asked.

‘Case of mistaken identity,’ Hank said.

‘That right?’ the Irishman said sardonically.‘Let me guess,’ he said. ‘You must be FBI or DEA. You were doin’ one of yer arms deal stings and the boyos caught yer.’

‘Nope,’ Hank said.

‘Then it’s CIA, or maybe you’re INS?’

‘Nope.’

‘Ah, it don’t make a dick of a focken difference what you tell me, fellah. I’m for the focken tip anyway.’

‘Tip?’

‘You’re talkin’ to a focken dead man,’ he said. ‘They’re gonna focken clip me, so they are.’

The comment filled the small space and the air took a while to clear.

‘What are they gonna do with you?’ the man asked.

‘Don’t know.’

‘I shouldn’t think it would be the smartest thing in the world for the IRA to clip a Yanky fed. Last thing they’ll want to do is make it personal with your people.’

‘I’m not a fed.’

‘Oi give op then. What are yer?’

‘I’m not law enforcement,’ Hank said tiredly.

‘Then what the fuck are yer doin’ here?’

‘I told you. Case of mistaken identity.’

‘Bollocks . . . Look, if you don’t want to tell me that’s fine. Like oi give a focken shite. Got me own focken problems anyhow. Just makin’ conversation . . . You’re probably the last focker I’ll talk to, that’s all.’

Hank wanted to talk to the man, find out about him, but a lifetime in Special Forces was urging him to be cautious.

‘Why’re you here?’ Hank asked eventually.

The Irishman didn’t answer.

‘Hey, you were the one who said it didn’t matter and wanted to talk,’ Hank said.

‘I’m a tout,’ he said.

Hank knew the term. ‘You IRA?’

‘Well, now that’s an interesting question . . . Since I’m a tout I s’pose I’m focken technically not IRA.’

‘You work for the British?’ Hank asked.

‘Brits? Fock off. I work for meself.’ He cleared his throat and nose, hacking loudly, then groaning with pain immediately after. He took a moment to recover, undoubtedly in a bad way.

‘Focken bastards gave me a good pasting last night. I thought that was it. Kicked me focken stupid they did.What I’d give for a focken aspirin. Me head is focken splittin’.’ He cleared blood and mucus from his nose and throat again and held his breath to ease the stab of pain the effort caused him. ‘Focken bastards,’ he said softly as he exhaled. ‘So what the fock you doin’ here then if you ain’t nothin’ to do with law enforcement?’

Hank kept silent.

‘Oh, roight. I forgot. Mistaken identity. Excuse me focken brain but it’s a bit loike mashed potato at the moment . . . So who is it they mistook you for then? Prince focken Charles, was it?’

Hank expected his captors knew who he was. In two weeks or whatever, no one had asked him. If they weren’t curious that suggested they knew. If they never gave a damn, why were they keeping him? They would’ve searched him when he was unconscious and found his US Navy ID card. That would’ve surprised them, especially if they thought they had a Brit spy in the bag. In two weeks he would’ve expected the IRA to be able to find out who he was. Perhaps he was already in the newspapers as a missing American serviceman.

His thoughts went to Kathryn again and how she no doubt went ballistic when she found out. He wondered if they had told her it was the IRA holding him. That would confuse her already confused politics. He was going to get an earful when he got home no matter what. Hank fully expected to be repatriated once the Brits and Americans had sorted the mess out between them. It would be an embarrassment for all concerned, and the IRA had no use for him surely. What the hell, he decided. He wasn’t giving anything away they didn’t already know.‘I’m US Navy,’ Hank said.

‘US Navy? Navy intelligence?’

‘No.’

‘Oh, for fock sake. You’re doin’ my head in, man. What the fock would the IRA want with an American focken sailor?’

‘I was working with the Brit military . . . observing. Something went wrong and I got snatched by these guys who thought I was a Brit.’

‘Is that right? What were you observing?’

‘It doesn’t matter.’

The Irishman started laughing gently and then winced with the pain it caused him for his troubles. ‘The American sailor got picked up watching the Brits watching the IRA. That’s focken sweet, that is.You tell a grand tale, so you do, Yank.’

‘How’d you end up here?’ Hank asked.

‘I got shopped . . . The snitch got snitched on. It was the Brits, I know that much. Focken IRA didn’t have a clue about me. They’re nothin’ but a buncha focken eedjits. It had t’av been the Brits. I was too bloody careful.’The man took a moment to get through a stitch of pain. ‘I know why they did it though,’ he continued after a moment. ‘It was me own fault.You went a wee bit too far this time, Seamus, so you did,’ he said. ‘Too bloody tempting though it was.’

‘What was?’

‘I shoulda got out a year ago,’ he said, ignoring Hank’s question. ‘Got a wife and a kid, yer see.That makes yer push it, you know. When yer single you push it for the crack. When yev a family you push it for the money . . . I sold guns to the IRA and I sometimes sold the people I sold them to to the Brits, when I knew I could get away with it. And a good living, so it was.’

The Irishman went silent, then there was a sniffling sound, softly with each intake of breath. He was crying.

Hank let him to himself and they sat in silence for a long time.The man seemed genuine enough and he wasn’t unusually interested in Hank.

‘Where do you think we are?’ Hank asked, breaking the long silence.

The Irishman cleared his throat, bringing something up, blood or mucus, and spitting it into his hood. ‘Fock. I can’t cough any more. The pain is murderous. I must have at least half-a-dozen broken focken ribs,’ he said, adjusting his position carefully. ‘Either the Med or the Atlantic. If we’re on a river we’re not far inland. I heard seagulls as they brought me aboard. They picked me up in Munich and we must’ve drove ten hours at least but not much more. It was loit when they picked me op and loit when I got here and I didn’t sleep on the journey. That’s the best I can make of it for yer. Not that it makes a flying fock of a difference.’

‘What were you doing in Munich?’

‘About to get focken paid,’ he said.

‘Paid for passing information?’

‘No. Running weapons. At first I thought the fockers were stitching me op, trying to take me goods without paying.When they started beating on me they explained the real reason and that me time was op . . . Bastards.’

‘You really think they’ll kill you?’

‘Oi’ll be the first focken tout in four hundred years to walk free if they don’t. Oi’ve a sneakin’ feelin’ oi’m not going to be that locky,’ he said. ‘Anyhow, I recognized one of the voices when I came on board. A murdering bastard called Brennan. The Executioner is one of his nicknames. Bastard gets a kick out of it. Likes to take his time too. Taunting bastard, so he is. Brennan’ll have some fun with me before he does the business.’

Hank believed him. The man certainly sounded like it was going to happen. It suddenly felt strange, being in a room with a man about to die.

‘What did you mean earlier, when you said you went too far?’

‘What?’

‘You said you went too far.You think that’s why the Brits shopped you. You were greedy.’

‘Oh, yes,’ the man said, then took a while to answer again, and this time not just because of his discomfort. Hank could almost hear him thinking. ‘Do the Aral Sea labs mean anything to you?’ he asked.

‘No.’

‘It should. The Aral Sea is in Kazakhstan. It’s a big lake really, mostly dried op. The other soide of it is Uzbekistan. In the middle of it is an island, and on that island are the labs that used to churn out some of the deadliest biological weapons the world has ever heard of. That was back in the Cold War days . . . If yer know the right people, for the right price yer can buy a pint a pure death . . . Did yer know eight kilos of a chemical that oi don’t even know the name of could kill two and a half million people in a city as big as London?’

‘You saying you tried to buy some of that stuff?’ Hank asked.

‘Not troid. Oi’m sayin’ oi bought some . . . “Virus U” they call it. About two cupfuls for a hundred grand. The so-called experts talk about how much damage some a these biological weapons can do, but for the most part they don’t have a focken clue. A Pepsi can full could wipe out a small town and then spread and wipe out several cities. Oi don’t know what two cupfuls of Virus U’ll do, but oi wouldn’t want to be within a thousand miles of it when it’s released.’

‘Who did you buy this stuff for?’

‘Who do yer bloody think?’

‘The IRA?’

‘They’re me only client.’

‘And they have it?’

‘A course they have it.’

‘Would that be the IRA or the Real IRA?’

‘What’s in a bloody name?’

Hank was suddenly stunned as the implications of what he had just heard sunk in. ‘Are you out of your friggin’ mind?’

The Irishman didn’t answer. Hank wondered how out of touch he was with the IRA situation. He never would have believed they would be into biological terrorism.

‘Have the IRA ever bought anything like this before?’ Hank asked.

‘Not as far as oi know. This was a special request. It took me a year to set it op.’

‘What do they want it for?’

‘They don’t exactly include me in their top-level mission briefings.Tell you the truth, oi wasn’t going to let it happen. Oi’m tellin’ the truth. Dead men don’t tell lies . . . I was going to shop them to the Brits soon as oi got paid the money. It would’ve been me last job sure enough. Oi’d’ve got a few sheckles for that kinda information. The joke is the Brits’ve shot themselves in the foot by shopping me. You can’t expect me to feel sorry for ’em. They’ve focken killed me and that’s that.’

‘The Brits don’t know?’

‘Sure they know. I’d made me contact and said as much as the boyos have a bottle of bio . . . I think it was a case of the left hand not knowin’ what the right was doin’, I mean in British intelligence. Obviously they would’ve wanted to know where that stuff was. They were gonna give me a fortune for the information. Some eedjit shopped me before I could complete the transaction. Maybe it was that focken IRA mole they’re always talkin’ about. Now that oi think of it, that would make more sense than anything else.’

It was this last comment that flicked a switch in Hank and made him realise he was very much a part of all of this and not just an observer. It was the RIRA mole they were after in Paris. ‘Where is this stuff now?’

‘Don’t know. But they’ve got it. And some of the mad bastards I know in the Real IRA’ll use it too. They’re just as fanatical as the focken Muslims.They won’t lose any sleep over killing a few hundred thousand Brits, I can tell yer that much.’

Hank could only think of one thing. He had to escape and tell someone.

Suddenly the engines revved hard and the entire boat shook. There was a jolt, as if the boat had been pulled by a tug, and then a sense of floating movement.

‘We’re off,’ the Irishman said. ‘Soon as we’re out to sea that’s me for the chop.’

Hank no longer cared about the man’s future. He had committed an ungodly act by providing a handful of terrorists with the means to kill hundreds of thousands of people. Hank twisted his hands inside his bindings. They were firm and impossible to wriggle out of. He was going to have to do something more than just wait for an opportunity to escape. He was going to have to create one.

Kathryn felt an urge to genuflect as she moved across the centre aisle, even though she had not done so since her mother used to practically drag her here most Sunday mornings all those years ago. She chose not to and walked slowly behind the back benches and to the side wall, subconsciously hiding in a corner.

The church had not changed much as far as she could remember. The altar was clean and bare and the wooden tabernacle unimpressive.The candleholders looked cheap and plastic flowers in their plastic baskets adorned a nativity scene set up on one side of the altar. Anything of value that had not been stolen over the years was locked away.The church continued to be a target for thieves until it was well known there was nothing of value left in it. The police told Father Kinsella they thought it was the act of drug addicts. Kathryn remembered how shocked she was then. It didn’t seem so shocking any more. The evil was a part of life now.

The confessional box opened and a young boy stepped out and went towards the woman waiting in the pew close by. Kathryn watched as Father Kinsella, dressed in a black cassock, stepped out the other side of the box to have a chat with the pair of them. He smiled and patted the boy on the shoulder, shook the woman’s hand warmly before she and the boy turned and walked away. Father Kinsella followed them with his eyes until his gaze fell upon Kathryn watching him.

His smile remained and he headed towards her.

Kathryn watched the boy as he passed by, memories of her younger days and her visits to Father Kinsella’s confessional flooding back. She wondered if he was still recruiting young warriors for the cause.

‘Kathryn, Kathryn, Kathryn,’ he said quietly as he approached. ‘Good of you to come and see me so quickly.’

The boy paused in the entrance and waved back at the priest before leaving. Kinsella returned the wave.

‘Good lad that,’ he said, after the boy had left. ‘He wants to join the British SAS. I’ve got me work cut out for me there, so I have.’ He faced Kathryn, still smiling. ‘Did you manage to avoid the press when you left the house?’ he asked.

‘Yes. There were a few reporters hanging around out front, but the shortcuts through the back gardens haven’t changed.’ She smiled at the memory of finding those childhood escape routes almost exactly as she remembered them, but the nostalgia was quickly swept away by the growing dread of the media interviews the priest had spent the previous evening preparing her for. She had lost track of the number of newspaper and television journalists that had called at the house, only to be turned away by her mother with the promise Kathryn would speak to them soon. And it wasn’t just the media hounding her. She’d had calls from various military personnel in Washington DC, and also from the SEALs in Norfolk,Virginia; the commander of Team 2, Hank’s former boss, and another officer whose title escaped her, all offering moral support and assurances that everything was being done to get Hank back home. And then there was the guy from the State Department who was coming by in the week for a chat on national security and modern terrorism, and the welfare union was sending a psychiatrist over to evaluate her and the children for post-traumatic stress disorder.

Father Kinsella had said she would be ready for the press by this afternoon, after one last coaching session, but Kathryn had had more than she could take already. On receiving the priest’s message that he wanted to see her, she decided to tell him she was going back to Norfolk that evening, before meeting any of the press, and then prepared herself for the inevitable verbal onslaught on how important her work was and how she had to stick with it and ‘feed the press’ as he put it. But she was determined to stand up to him this time, although, she had to admit, to her surprise, he had been unusually kind and understanding since he first came to the house to see her. He spent many patient hours schooling her on what to say to the news media, and how to act, rehearsing her for specific questions, and even how to ignore or circumvent subjects in order to push prepared statements. She had lost count of the number of times she had quoted: ‘I don’t blame the IRA for holding my husband captive. They’re only fighting for what they believe in. I know they’ll set Hank free once the British Government admits its guilt in abusing my husband the way they did . . .’ Instead of bolstering Kathryn’s confidence the preparations only fuelled a feeling it was all some kind of ridiculous pantomime. It was clearly a propaganda campaign for the IRA and she was nothing more than another tool.

‘The truth is I can’t do the press interviews, Father,’ she admitted, cringing in preparation for the eruption. ‘I can’t stay here any more. I’ll go mad if I have to talk to all those people. I don’t care what you say. I won’t be able to do it.’

‘I know, I know,’ Father Kinsella said with great sympathy as he took her arm and walked her towards the church entrance. ‘It’s okay,’ he said.

She was suddenly wary.This was not the reaction she had expected from him. Suspicion immediately set in. He was up to something. He could never be this understanding. As they walked outside the sun shone brightly in a cloudless sky and they headed along the stone path that went down the side of the church towards the car park. She wondered if he was guiding her somewhere private where he could shout his head off at her, but he seemed calm.

‘I agree that you should get away, Kathryn,’ he said sincerely.

Kathryn glanced at him. There was no sign of anger. ‘I thought you were going to be mad at me.’

‘No. I want you to go away, Kathryn … I want you to go back to England.’

She stopped in her tracks and stared at him in disbelief. ‘England?’

‘Well, there’s no point in going to Norfolk. The press would soon find you there.’

He was wearing the look of a dealer who knew the cards he was laying even though they were face down. A trip to England certainly wasn’t intended for her benefit. She could kick herself for even presuming for one second that the man had as much as an ounce of concern for her, or anyone for that matter.

‘But England?’

‘You’ll need to be leaving tonight.’

‘I don’t understand … Why?’

‘You’re going to meet someone who can help you.’

‘Who?’

‘I can’t tell you who right now. But it’s very important. He’ll be able to help you. You’ll be well looked after.’

‘I don’t want to go back to England.’

‘Kathryn. Trust me. Now would I be sending you all the way over to England if it was a waste of time?’

‘Can’t they come here?’

‘Not this person, darling,’ the priest said. ‘He’s very high up, if you know what I mean.’

Kathryn was only just beginning to understand. ‘IRA?’ ‘Ay . . . It’ll take but a day or so. That’s all. You’ll do just fine if there are any interviews.’

‘I have to meet the press?’

‘You’ll find out everything when you get there. Depending on how you get on might decide Hank’s future. He called me this morning and asked if you would go.That’s a great privilege, Kathryn. Now, is that a good enough reason to go or not?’ he said, beaming as if he’d solved the mystery of life.

Everything in Kathryn’s soul wanted to cry out, NO! But she could not find the strength to say it. She had to do whatever it took to get Hank free. Even go back to England and meet the IRA itself. When she’d left England she’d vowed never to return, and now here she was, only a few weeks later, on her way back.

‘What about Janet and Helen?’ she asked.

‘They’ll be fine here with your mother.’

Kathryn gave him a look that must’ve conveyed some sign of trepidation.

‘Don’t you worry about them,’ he said.‘A couple days aren’t going to do them any harm. And I’ll be here to look out for them . . .Then, when you get back, you can take them off to Virginia with you.’

She closed her eyes and sighed.

‘I’ve got your air tickets organised. And guess what? Business class no less. It’s not all for bullets and bombs, you know. And I’ve got you booked into a nice hotel in London with all expenses paid.’

Kathryn nodded, none too happy, but resigned. ‘Will this be the last of it?’ she asked.

‘I’ve a feeling this will all soon be over.You please them in England, it’ll all work out in our favour. Just keep telling yourself Hank will soon be home. That’s all you need to think about,’ he said. ‘I haven’t let you down yet, have I?’

They arrived at her mother’s car. ‘Look,’ he went on. ‘I know you find me a hard taskmaster, Kathryn, but I get the job done. Now, off you go. Pack some warm clothes, enough for three days. Keep it simple looking. No bright colours. No need to look too cheerful. I’ll be around tomorrow morning at ten o’clock to pick you up and take you to the airport and tell you everything else you need to know. Okay? Oh, and one more very important thing. You tell nobody where you’re going. I don’t care who it is. No one. Not your mother, children, friends, nobody. I’ve told your mother you’re away and that’s that. She knows enough not to ask you anything. Do you understand me, Kathryn?’

‘Yes,’ she said.

‘Good, because this trip is most serious. Most serious. If they think anyone is following you, for instance, the meeting will be off, and it’ll not go well for Hank. I can’t emphasise that enough. Now off you go.’

Kathryn climbed into the car and started the engine. She looked at Father Kinsella before pulling away. He smiled at her with one of his more saintly looks. Something about this trip was already troubling her. The past few days she had begun to think better of him than she ever had in the past, and wondered if perhaps she had misjudged him. Now, the old feeling that there was something very dark and dangerous about him, was back and stronger than ever.