(make sure you read chapter zero before this!)

SIX YEARS LATER
THE GRAND HOTEL, MANCHESTER - 23:00
"Jet lag's a fucking bastard," The familiar yet gruff voice huffed as a weight shifted in the bed, recalling his overnight flight from the States.

"And that's why I fly economy," Georgie smirked, just about able to make out his features as she lay beside him in the expansive hotel bed, "You and your fucking private jet."

"You're aware that's not how it works aren't you?" He laughed, propping himself up on his elbow, trailing his fingers over her arm.

"Well, Mr Defence Minister, we weren't all blessed with a private education at Eton like yourself," She toyed, knowing how to get under his skin better than most.

"I told you, call me Rob, and it wasn't Eton, it was Harrow," He smirked, flicking the bedside lamp on, eyeing the young woman beside him who wore his white shirt unbuttoned over her lace underwear, "Besides, didn't your father send you to St Paul's? The best girls' school in the country?"

"Details, details," She replied with a coy grin.

"Having the Justice Minister's daughter in my bed, I'd argue that's a pretty massive detail," He muttered, closing the gap between them with a heavy kiss.

"Who just so happens to be on your security detail," She hummed against his lips.

It was work, it was meant to be work, deployed within the Defence Minister's security detail for the last three months, including an official visit to Manchester for a conference to discuss crime in the local area. It wasn't a complex job, it was more of a deterrent, the hope that chancers wouldn't try and attack the Defence Minister if he was accompanied by a strong security presence.

But Georgie's presence on the detail was more than just to offer protection, she had been given a mission of her own that surpassed the importance of protecting the Defence Minister.

She wasn't meant to end up in the man's bed, she wished that she hadn't, but they were careful and it was nothing more than physical. He may have been twelve years older than her, but he made her feel more alive than she'd felt in months. It was selfish but she needed it more than she'd realised.

"If we're not going to sleep, we can at least celebrate," He suggested as he sat up, leaning against the headboard.

"You've not opened this yet," She climbed off the bed, the hem of his shirt grazing her thigh as she collected a bottle of champagne from the ice bucket.

"Suppose it'd be rude to waste a good bottle," Rob smirked as she sat back on the bed, straddling his lap, she popped the cork, letting it fly across the room.

"To Manchester," She raised the bottle with a smile before taking a swig.

"There's glasses over there," Rob laughed, admiring her spirit.

"Glasses are overrated," She replied, tipping the bottle into his mouth, letting the gold liquid hit his lips.

"You're a fucking enigma," He sighed, taking the bottle from her hand, "Reckon you'll be running MI5 by the time I'm Prime Minister."

"And when's that?" Georgie replied, intrigued by the prospect of a younger prime minister than previous years.

"We'll have to see how the party does in the next election, if it goes badly, the PM will have to resign, and then we'll vote on a replacement," Rob explained, swigging the expensive liquid from the bottle.

"So, what you're saying is, you want the opposition to win?" Georgie frowned.

"I think I have enough influence in Parliament to trigger a vote of no confidence," Rob muttered.

"Cocky posh prick," She smirked, kissing him with a grin as his hands wandered up her back, both jolting at an all too familiar sound, especially in her own line of work.

A gunshot...Followed by two more.

"Fuck," Georgie jumped off the bed, she hurried towards the hotel room door, glancing through the peep hole, but catching no sight of movement, which her training would suggest was a bad thing, "We've got to move."

"Now?"

"Yeah," She nodded as she approached the bed, slipping the shirt off her body and pulling on her black t-shirt and cargo trousers before tying her hair back out of her face. She collected her gun and MI5 pass, glancing across the room at Rob who had taken the initiative to get dressed, albeit in his clothes he'd been wearing that day, choosing to wear his government issued bullet proof vest under his shirt.

"What exactly is the plan here?" Rob asked as he watched her slip her boots on.

"I'll be honest, I haven't thought that far ahead," Georgie muttered, retrieving her radio before slipping her own bulletproof vest on.

"You don't have a plan?"

"Well, my plan is to get you out of here alive, but beyond that...we'll have to wait and see," Georgie told him, loading her gun with a round of ammunition before heading back towards the door, "You ready?"

"I suppose," He nodded hesitantly, a shadow of his usual assertive demeanour that Georgie had seen dozens of times at all those events she attended with her father.

"I do this shit for a living, you're in safe hands," She assured him, and even though she hadn't ever been in a similar situation beyond training, she was well equipped to deal with the unknown. She clicked the talk button on her radio, hoping that her colleagues who had been keeping watch were safe, "Taylor, do you read?"

She was met with nothing but the sound of static silence, which was never a good sign. The hotel was compromised, and her objective was to extract the Defence Minister...alive.

"I'm going to reach out to comms, I'll get them to intercept the CCTV channels," Georgie told him, pulling out her service phone and hitting the number for the direct line to Second Desk.

"Knightly, received," Taverner's familiar voice answered.

"The Grand's been compromised, shots fired in the hallway," Georgie told her, startled again by the sound of two gunshots in quick succession, "How long until we can get extracted?"

"Is the primary secure?" Taverner asked, being the usual question that any agent would ask in such a high stakes situation.

Georgie glanced over her shoulder at Rob, "Bluebell, secure."

"Bluebell?" Rob scoffed, unimpressed by the choice of code name.

"There are no active units in the surrounding area, it'll be at least forty minutes until we can secure an evacuation," Taverner explained, maintaining her ever calm voice as she spoke, "The best thing you can do is wait out."

"You want us to wait out and risk compromising the Defence Minister's safety?" Georgie scoffed in disbelief, "I'm not in the business of taking chances, I'm in the business of national security."

"Stay put, Knightly, that's an order," Taverner replied firmly.

Without hesitation Georgie ended the call, pulling the back off of it and removing the sim card, promptly replacing it with a new one. She returned the phone to her pocket before snapping the old sim card in half and tossing it into the toilet with a flush.

"What are you doing?" Rob hissed.

"Getting you out alive," Georgie answered, "We don't know who's wandering these corridors, but they certainly aren't friendly, we have no clue of what they know, they might have my sim copied."

"Right."

"But for the record, if anyone asks, my signal dropped out, okay?" Georgie insisted, glancing out of the window, looking down at various parked cars on the empty street.

"What now?"

"We're getting out of here, I'm getting you somewhere safe," Georgie muttered, "Ready to move?"

"Why the fuck not?"

"Okay, let's move," She whispered, resting her hand on the door handle, unlocking the door and opening it slowly.

She slowly peered around both sides of the door frame, met with the sight of an empty corridor, empty except for two bodies dressed in black, the bodies of her two colleagues.

"Shit," She hissed, approaching the two bodies that remained sprawled across the floor as she crouched beside them both, checking for pulses, "They're dead, we have to move right now."

"The lifts are just round that corner," Rob muttered.

"We can't take the lift," Georgie whispered, forever bemused by how oblivious those protected by MI5 could be, "They'd be waiting for us on the ground floor with the red carpet rolled out, we're taking the fire escape."

"And you just want me to follow you?"

"Stay as close as possible," Georgie told him as they slowly paced towards the fire exit, knowing that there were six floors below them and the armed intruders could be anywhere, "And when this is all over, I want a mention on the King's New Years Honours list, alright?"

"I'm quite sure I don't have any say in who-"

"I know your family's got connections, you can pull some strings," Georgie smirked, hoping that making light of the situation might provide him with some comfort, pressing her palm to the fire exit door, "We don't have long, they might be tailing us on CCTV."

They headed down the concrete spiral staircase, Rob keeping as close as physically possible to Georgie as they tiptoed down the steps. She knew it wouldn't be over until she had the Defence Minister secured at a safe house, until then she needed to keep him as close as she could.

"Will MI5 alert The Met?" Rob whispered as they continued their descent.

"I doubt it," She sighed, gripping her gun between her hands, keeping it pointed at the steps ahead of her, "If the blue lights start flashing then the press will flock to us like moths to a fucking flame, the country will plummet if it gets out that your safety was at risk."

"They've got MI5 running through you like a stick of fucking rock, haven't they?" Rob laughed under his breath, "The whole putting the country first thing."

"You're the Defence Minister, it's literally in your job description," She scoffed as they reached the ground floor.

Before Georgie could consider her next move, the door swung open, and stood before her was a man dressed in a black tracksuit and balaclava, gun in his hands.

"MI5, on your knees!" Georgie ordered the armed man, "Back up are on their way."

"You're bluffing," The man scoffed.

"You wanna bet on that?" Georgie remarked, her gun pointed at the armed assailant, hoping he would believe her.

"You lot are all about the element of surprise, you wouldn't tell me if your little workmates were closing in on us," He laughed, pointing his gun at Georgie, his finger on the trigger.

Before the assailant could shoot, Rob shoved Georgie to the side, heading into fight or flight mode as her abdomen collided with the bannister. But the armed man, being an inexperienced liability after a bit of real life 'Call Of Duty' was startled by the sudden movement, catching the trigger and firing a bullet, the same bullet striking Rob in the arm.

Disregarding everything MI5 told her not to do, Georgie struck the armed man in the chin with an uppercut, winding him and knocking the gun to the floor. She swung a kick at the back of his knees, watching him fall to the floor before pulling a cable tie from her pocket, grabbing his wrists and tying them together.

"How many of you are there?" Georgie hissed, pressing the barrel of her gun to his chin, kicking his gun out of his reach, "Don't fucking test my patience."

"None of your fucking business," The man violently spat at her.

"You're lucky this building's covered in cameras, because I'm one smart remark away from putting a bullet through your kneecap, alright?" She warned, "And don't think I fucking wouldn't."

"MI5 broke the fucking mould when they made you, huh?" The man laughed to himself as she glanced over her shoulder at Rob as he clung to his bicep.

"We need to get you out of here, right now," She told him firmly, focused on the blood dripping from a gunshot wound to his arm, "You feel okay?"

"Until the shock wears off, yeah," Rob nodded, pressing his hand to the wound, hoping to stem the bleeding.

"I need your belt," She told him.

"My belt?"

"Tourniquet," She replied, "To stem the bleeding."

"Take it," He gestured to his waistband, watching as she worldlessly unbuckled the leather belt, freeing it from his belt loops before tightening it around his bicep

"Let's run," She told him, pushing the fire escape door open and leading him along the street lined with parked cars.

With every step she chanced each car door, hoping that someone on that street might have carelessly left their car unlocked. She didn't have the keys to the MI5 issued vehicle, besides, she needed a vehicle that wouldn't appear on The Park's system, not yet at least.

"Gotcha," She grinned as the door to an old Toyota opened before she glanced up at Rob, "How about we get you to a hospital?"

"In a stolen car?"

"I prefer the term borrowed," Georgie quipped.

"I'm the Defence Minister, I can't travel in a stolen car."

"If I'd been shot in the arm I reckon I'd be a bit less picky about modes of transport, but hey, maybe that's just me," Georgie quipped as she crouched down beside the open driver's door, pulling back the fittings behind the steering wheel, connecting the two wires required to hotwire a vehicle, knowing that it wasn't the sort of thing the daughter of the Minister of Justice should know.

"Where did you learn that?" He scoffed.

"It's probably best you don't know," Georgie sighed, wandering around the car and opening the passenger door, "Your carriage awaits, sir."

"To the safe house?"

"Hospital first, safe house later," Georgie told him as he slipped into the passenger seat, "I need to be sure that you're not going to bleed to death."

"Clearly you missed the bedside manner module of MI5 training," Rob sighed.

"You've never had any complaints about my bedside manner before," She smirked.

"They're there!" A voice echoed through the empty space as Georgie looked up to see the man she had previously tied up accompanied by two other associates as she jumped into the driver's seat.

"Fuck," Georgie slammed the car door shut, flicking the gear stick and slamming her foot down against the accelerator pedal.

"You're driving like a maniac," Rob winced, clinging to his arm as she sped through the desolate streets of Manchester.

"I need to lose them before we get to the hospital," Georgie told him, "How's your arm feeling?"

"Like a mad man just shot at me," Rob answered, feeling completely out of depth in the city he knew little about.

"It won't be long," Georgie insisted, glancing in the rear view mirror, hoping that the Call of Duty wannabes hadn't mastered the art of hotwiring cars.

Hospitals were bleak places, the sort of bleak places that Georgie hated to spend her time, well no one exactly enjoyed spending time in hospital, she just knew there was an extensive list of places she would prefer to be.

She'd been sitting on the same plastic chair outside of the side room where Rob was being treated for almost five hours, accompanied by two armed police officers in case the chancers tried anything else.

The armed officers had told her that his wife and children would be arriving in the morning, she had always known about the wife and the children, she'd met them twice, and she supposed that made her a cruel person. She had reached the conclusion that men didn't think of her as someone they would make their wife, just something to distract from the lonely nights.

It was inevitable that her dad would be livid if he knew about the affair, and she debated whether it would make it less painful if she was the one to tell him. But it wasn't her father's opinion that she cared about, nor her mother's really, it was her older brother's. Alex who was minding her child while she worked, while she'd been shot at, while she'd shared a bed with a married man.

Georgie was sure that she'd lose her mind if she sat in that one seat much longer, "I'm going to stretch my legs," She told the armed officer as the orange embers of sunrise seeped through the large windows into the corridor.

"Don't be too long, they'll want to talk to you soon," The officer told her, and she wasn't convinced he knew what he was talking about, rather that he assumed it was something that he was meant to say.

She strolled away, fiddling with the ring that sat on her index finger on her left hand, the ring she wasn't sure she was supposed to wear anymore. She hadn't been in a hospital since the day she'd given birth, and being there filled her with nothing but guilt, because four and a half years ago she'd returned to field work less than a year after giving birth.

She just wasn't convinced that she would've survived herself if she'd stayed trapped within those four walls much longer.

"Knightly," Duffy, one of the Park's dogs appeared before her as she turned a corner, which wasn't good, it meant that there were other MI5 officers in the building, "What a delightful surprise."

"Surprise?"

"Surprise is a strong word," Duffy told her before grabbing at her arm, "The boss wants a word."

"I'd let go if I were you," Georgie struggled to wriggle free from his grasp, "My dad will-"

"What?" Duffy shoved her against the nearest wall of yet another abandoned corridor, "What's your dad going to do, princess?"

"I always thought you'd suit pen pushing, just never thought we'd see it become a reality," She smirked, and as much as she hated to use her father's status as leverage in work based situations she wasn't sure she had much choice.

"You better watch your mouth," He huffed, keeping her pressed against the wall.

"Or what?"

"Duffy," The pair looked down the corridor to see Diana Taverner, head of second desk, her arms folded across her chest as her gaze flicked between them both, "Let the girl go."

"But she-"

"I could hazard a guess at what card she played, but she's in my charge so you'll let her go," Taverner insisted as Duffy shrugged her off, "Duffy, go and check in with the officers guarding Bluebell."

"Yes, Ma'am," Duffy nodded, heading back down the corridor towards Robert's private room.

"This way, Knightly," Taverner gestured to another private side room, leading the way as Georgie followed reluctantly, "You must be tired."

"You could say that," Georgie exhaled as Taverner led her into what looked like a consultation room, except the examination table had been pushed against the far wall and in the middle of the room sat an old wooden table, with nothing but a laptop and a cardboard folder on it.

"Take a seat," Taverner told her as she closed the door, keeping the two women safe from prying eyes and ears, "You look as though you could do with a rest."

"Still running on adrenaline, Ma'am," Georgie insisted as Taverner placed an audio recording device on the table, pressing the small red button to begin the recording.

"Well, once we're done here, I'll get you on the next train to London, you'll be able to rest properly when you're home, I'm sure," Taverner assured her.

"I'm not going back to London until I know that Rob- Bluebell is stable," Georgie insisted, as though she had forgotten her place in the hierarchy of the security service.

"The defense minister got shot in your charge, you really aren't in a position to tell me what you are and aren't going to do." Taverner scoffed in disbelief.

"He would've died if we'd waited for backup, we both would've died," Georgie reminded her.

"Well, we'll never know, will we?" Taverner sighed with a slight nod.

"I did my fucking job." Georgie quipped, out of exhaustion more than anything.

"If you were doing your job, you'd have been in the same corridor as Taylor and Reiss, you might've also been dead, but I'd have known you were where you were supposed to be," Taverner told her, opening the laptop and turning it to show Georgie the timestamped videos side by side of her arriving and leaving the hotel room with Robert, seven hours apart, "I'm intrigued to see how you talk yourself out of this one, Knightly."

"You wanted intel," Georgie muttered, her nail beds aching as she absentmindedly picked at them, "I was doing my job."

"You did more than just your fucking job, you fucked the fucking primary...we said get close enough to get information, what you did was crossing a line of professionalism." Taverner snapped, aware of how Georgie's personal involvement could compromise the entire undercover operation to covertly extract information from Robert.

"I got the intel," Georgie reminded her of their conversation just a week before, "You have it in a encrypted file, a file that wouldn't exist if I hadn't-"

"I wish I could say that this is the worst of it, Georgie," Taverner replied, and Georgie knew that it was bad, because there had only been one other day on which Taverner had called her anything except Knightly, "But this is just the tip of the iceberg."

"What are you talking about?" Georgie frowned in confusion as Taverner opened the folder on the desk, pulling out a series of printed images and placing them on the table in front of her, images she didn't think would ever see the light of day.

"Do you know when these were taken?" Taverner asked.

"Two nights ago," Georgie whispered as her heart thumped against the wall of her chest.

"For the benefit of the tape, the photos display agent Georgina Knightly consuming cocaine in the presence of Defence Minister, Robert Brown," Taverner said, dealing a fatal blow, "Would you like to explain this, Knightly?"

"It was once, we were at a club with his old Oxford friends, they said they wanted to relive their old university days, and insisted I joined in," Georgie explained, "None of them knew that I was on his security detail, I think they assumed I was an assistant turned mistress, I did it to protect my cover."

"His people are offering up these photos to save the defense minister's image," She told her, placing another set of cropped images that displayed just Georgie, with no trace of Robert Brown in any of them, "And I suppose he thinks of you as nothing but collateral."

"What?"

"These photos will be on the front page of Saturday's Daily Mail," Taverner revealed bluntly, "Justice Minister's Daughter and Her Party Habits."

"Isn't there something you can do?" Georgie's voice wavered, aware that it wouldn't just be her family who saw that, it would be the parents at the school gates, it would be her best friend who was a recovering addict, and worst of all it would be him.

"You'll be removed from his security detail with immediate effect, and you're also suspended pending an investigation," Taverner dealt yet another brutal blow.

"Investigation?"

"I need to be certain you've not leaked sensitive information," Taverner answered honestly, "You're not a bad agent, Knightly, I'm just afraid you might be a liability."

"What's the worst case scenario?"

"Best case, you get fired from the service and go back to being no more than Mark Knightly's daughter, worst case, you end up spending a once promising career working at Slough House."