Chapter Text
The order had been as clear as it was unpleasant.
“Trevelyan must be brought in alive,” M had said. “No matter how much he resists or what you have to do to prevent his escape. Take him to the safe house and wait for further instructions.”
Bond had raised an eyebrow.
“Alive and in one piece?”
“As long as he’s breathing, that will be sufficient.”
Now, as freezing rain turned the docks of St. Petersburg into a slippery maze, James began to suspect that M did not fully understand the magnitude of what she had asked him to do.
Alec Trevelyan did not want to be captured.
Nor did he intend to arrive anywhere alive if he could drag Bond down with him.
The former Double-O agent emerged from between two shipping containers and fired. The bullet struck the metal beside James’s face, sending up a shower of sparks. Bond ducked and rolled behind a stack of crates.
“Your manners haven’t improved!” he called out.
“And you still talk too much!”
Another shot tore through the wood.
James counted to three, rose, and returned fire. He was not trying to hit Alec—only to force him back toward the narrow passage between the containers. Alec recognized the maneuver one second too late. He cursed and ran toward the only available opening.
Exactly where Bond had left the trap.
The steel cable snapped tight around Alec’s ankles. He fell forward, managing to twist before his head struck the ground. His pistol flew from his hand and skidded several yards across the wet pavement.
James abandoned his cover and lunged at him.
Alec greeted him with a kick to the chest.
Bond lost his balance but managed to seize Alec by his coat. They rolled through the puddles, striking each other with the fury accumulated over years of betrayals, pursuit, and all the words they had never dared to say.
Alec fought as he always had: fast, dirty, and without wasting a single movement. He drove an elbow into James’s ribs, cut his cheek with the edge of his ring, and reached for a knife concealed inside his boot.
Bond caught his wrist.
“How many weapons are you carrying?”
“Enough to kill you.”
“That doesn’t answer my question.”
Alec head-butted him.
White light exploded across James’s vision. Blood filled his mouth, but he did not release Alec’s wrist. He twisted, used Alec’s own momentum against him, and forced him facedown onto the ground, one knee pressing into his back.
Alec growled and continued struggling.
“It’s over.”
“You’ll have to kill me.”
“I’m not allowed.”
“Then you have a problem.”
Alec managed to bend one leg and nearly threw him off. Bond increased the pressure and pulled a pair of handcuffs from inside his jacket. Securing the first wrist was relatively easy. Reaching the second cost him one blow to the jaw and another to the abdomen.
The click of the cuffs was swallowed by the rain.
Alec was breathing hard beneath him. Even then, he tried to get up.
“Stay down.”
“Go to hell.”
James searched him. He found the knife in his boot, another beneath his belt, a small pistol at the base of his spine, two magazines, a length of wire hidden in his sleeve, and a lock pick sewn into the lining of his coat.
“Is that everything?”
Alec turned his face toward him. His dark, rain-soaked hair clung to his forehead. His green eyes burned with a hatred too intense to be mere hatred.
“Come closer and find out.”
Bond saw the movement almost before it happened. Alec had managed to slip his tongue beneath a dental cover. Something small and metallic dropped into his mouth.
James seized his jaw.
“Spit it out.”
Alec smiled.
It was a mocking, defiant, and dangerously familiar smile.
Bond pressed his fingers into Alec’s cheeks.
“I said spit it out.”
Alec tried to bite him.
James extracted the tiny capsule from between his teeth before he could break it. He examined it beneath the dim light of the docks.
“Poison,” he said. “How dramatic.”
“Prepared.”
“I need you alive.”
“You’ve always needed far too many things from me, James.”
The words struck him harder than the head-butt.
Alec took advantage of his hesitation and twisted. His legs swept Bond’s out from under him, and they both fell sideways. Alec began to shout, perhaps hoping to alert whatever men might still be searching for him around the docks.
James could not allow that.
He pulled a black handkerchief from his pocket.
“Don’t make me.”
“Make you do what? Silence an inconvenient truth?”
“Gag you.”
Alec’s smile widened.
“You wouldn’t dare.”
Five minutes later, Alec sat in the back seat of a stolen car, his hands cuffed behind his back, his ankles secured with a cable tie, and Bond’s handkerchief stuffed between his teeth. A strip of cloth torn from the lining of his own coat held the improvised gag firmly in place.
His expression promised James a slow and extremely painful death.
James adjusted the rearview mirror.
“I warned you.”
“Mmmph!”
“No, I’m not taking it off. You tried to swallow poison, shouted for help, and bit me.”
Alec released a stream of furious sounds.
“That counted as an attempted bite.”
“Mmmf!”
“I’m not going to argue semantics with you.”
Alec kicked the back of his seat.
“If you do that again, you’ll travel in the boot.”
The prisoner stopped struggling. He remained completely still for several seconds.
Then he kicked the seat twice.
James smiled despite himself.
“You always have to have the last word.”
The safe house was nearly three hours away, isolated among forests and mountains. A storm had closed the main roads, forcing Bond to drive along secondary routes covered in snow.
At first, Alec did not stop moving.
He tested the cuffs. He strained against the tie around his ankles. He rubbed his cheek against his shoulder, trying to loosen the knot holding the gag in place. When none of that worked, he leaned sideways and began searching for something beneath the seat.
James braked sharply.
Alec was thrown forward, restrained only by his seat belt.
“If you were looking for the emergency pistol,” Bond said, “I already removed it.”
Alec glared at him.
James returned his attention to the road.
“I know you.”
The silence that followed felt strange.
James had expected more resistance. Alec never accepted defeat, not even a temporary one. He should have continued fighting until he injured his wrists or dislocated a shoulder. Instead, he leaned against the door and remained far too still.
Bond watched him in the mirror.
“Alec?”
The prisoner’s eyelids opened.
“Are you still with me?”
An offended glare was his only answer.
“Good.”
James continued driving, although unease had begun to coil beneath his ribs.
Twenty minutes later, he heard a thud.
Alec had slipped sideways across the seat. His forehead rested against the window, and his eyes were closed.
“Trevelyan.”
There was no response.
James pulled over and set the brake. He climbed out, opened the rear door, and caught Alec before he fell into the snow.
“Wake up.”
The green eyes opened without focusing.
Alec tried to straighten, but his body hardly responded. A violent shudder passed through him from head to toe.
James touched his forehead.
He was burning.
“What the hell…?”
Alec turned his head away and muttered something behind the gag.
“I’m going to take this off. If you try to bite me again, I’ll make you wear it all the way to Scotland.”
He untied the cloth and pulled out the sodden handkerchief. Alec gasped, worked his jaw, and drew several deep breaths.
“Bastard,” he whispered.
“I’m pleased to see the fever hasn’t improved your disposition.”
Alec tried to spit at him, but he lacked the strength. He closed his eyes and let his head fall back against the seat.
“Where are you hurt?”
“I’m not.”
“You have a fever.”
“Perhaps I’m allergic to your company.”
James began searching his clothing. Alec reacted when his fingers brushed his left side. It was only a slight contraction, but Bond noticed.
“Here.”
“No.”
“Let me see.”
“Take your hands off me.”
James opened his coat. The black shirt concealed the blood well, but when Bond placed his palm against Alec’s side, he felt the warm, sticky fabric.
“You’ve been shot.”
“It only grazed me.”
“When?”
“What difference does it make?”
“Enough of one that you’re about to lose consciousness.”
James lifted the shirt. The bullet had opened a deep furrow beneath Alec’s ribs. It did not seem to have penetrated, but the wound was inflamed and still bleeding. Alec had placed a hurried dressing over it beneath his clothes, and the material was already soaked through.
“This needs attention.”
“How perceptive.”
“You should have told me.”
“You were rather busy handcuffing me and stuffing a handkerchief into my mouth.”
“And you were busy trying to kill me.”
Alec opened his eyes. For the first time since his capture, the anger was gone. In its place were exhaustion and something resembling shame.
“You would have followed your orders anyway.”
“Yes.”
Alec’s expression hardened.
“Exactly.”
James understood then what that single word had meant to him. Not confirmation, but another betrayal. Further proof that if Bond had to choose between Alec and his duty, he would always choose his duty.
Even when Alec was wounded.
Even when he might die.
“I would have followed the order to take you somewhere safe,” James clarified. “Not an order to ignore the fact that you were bleeding to death.”
“There is no difference.”
“There is to me.”
Alec released a dry laugh that ended in a grimace of pain.
“That’s what you always say.”
His head fell to one side.
“Alec.”
James patted his cheek. There was no reaction.
Cursing, he cut the restraints around Alec’s ankles and stretched him out across the back seat. Then he hesitated over the handcuffs. Alec was still dangerous, even unconscious. Leaving his arms twisted behind him, however, would only worsen his condition.
Bond unlocked one cuff and fastened it around Alec’s left wrist, securing the other end to the interior door handle. That way, Alec could rest on his side without being completely free.
“Don’t make me regret this,” he murmured.
Alec did not hear him.
The safe house was a small stone building hidden among pine trees. James carried Alec inside from the car. The former 006 regained consciousness as they crossed the threshold.
“Put me down.”
“You can stand when we reach the sofa.”
“I can stand now.”
James released him.
Alec’s legs immediately buckled.
Bond caught him around the waist before he struck the floor.
“An impressive demonstration.”
“Shut up.”
“Would you like the handkerchief back?”
“Try it and I’ll make you swallow it.”
The threat sounded weak, but James chose to interpret it as an improvement.
He carried Alec into the bedroom and sat him on the bed. Then he searched the house. He found a medical kit, antibiotics, bottled water, blankets, clean clothes, and several tins of food. The shortwave radio was not working, and the storm had brought down the telephone line.
They were alone.
Alec looked at the medical kit and then at the cuff still fastened around one of his wrists.
“Are you going to chain me to the bed?”
“I was considering it.”
“You’ve probably fantasized about this.”
James went still.
Despite the fever, the provocative glint had returned to Alec’s eyes.
“Don’t flatter yourself,” Bond said.
“I’m not. I remember perfectly well how you looked at me in Istanbul.”
“We were under enemy fire.”
“That never stopped you from flirting.”
“You were covered in blood.”
“That didn’t stop you either.”
James opened the medical kit with more force than necessary.
“Take off your shirt.”
Alec smiled.
“There it is.”
“I need to clean the wound.”
“Of course you do.”
“Would you prefer me to cut the fabric?”
“I’d prefer you to release me.”
“That isn’t going to happen.”
“Then you’ll have to do it yourself.”
James found the key to the cuffs, freed Alec’s right wrist, and fastened the empty cuff around one of the bars of the headboard. Alec could move, but he could not leave the bed.
“A very generous concession,” he muttered.
“Lift your arm.”
Removing the shirt proved more difficult than James had anticipated. The fabric was stuck to the wound, and Alec could not suppress a groan when James pulled it free. His face turned pale beneath the scars.
“It doesn’t look like a simple graze.”
“I’ve had worse.”
“That doesn’t make this one any less serious.”
James cleaned away the dried blood. The bullet had torn through the flesh at an angle without striking any vital organs, but the wound was filthy. Its edges were red and hot.
Alec breathed through clenched teeth, his back rigid.
“You can insult me if it helps,” James said.
“I wouldn’t know where to begin.”
“Choose something traditional.”
“Arrogant Englishman.”
“You’re English too.”
“Domesticated government agent.”
“So were you.”
“Incompetent seducer.”
James looked up.
“You never complained.”
Silence fell between them.
For one second, the bedroom, the snow, and the years of hostility vanished. They were young agents again, sitting too close together in a hotel room while they waited for instructions that were late in arriving. They were sharing a cheap bottle of alcohol, a marked deck of cards, and glances that always lasted longer than they should.
Alec was the first to look away.
“That was before.”
“I know.”
James applied the antiseptic.
Alec cursed and tried to pull back. The chain of the cuffs rattled against the headboard.
“Stay still.”
“Easy for you to say.”
Bond placed a hand against his abdomen to keep him in place. The contact made them both tense.
Alec’s skin was far too hot.
James finished dressing the wound and slowly withdrew his hand.
“You need antibiotics.”
“I’m not taking anything you give me.”
“I could force you.”
Alec looked at the black handkerchief abandoned on a chair.
“I see you’ve grown fond of that.”
“Don’t make me demonstrate how many methods of persuasion I know.”
“I remember some of them.”
Alec’s voice had grown lower. It no longer sounded mocking, but almost intimate.
James felt his throat tighten.
He took out two tablets and left them on the bedside table with a glass of water.
“Take them willingly, or I’ll help you.”
“Is that a threat?”
“A promise.”
Alec held his gaze. Then he picked up the tablets and swallowed them.
“Good boy.”
“Call me that again and we’ll find out whether I can strangle you with one hand.”
James offered him the glass. Alec drank too quickly, and water spilled down his chin. Bond wiped it away with his thumb before thinking about what he was doing.
Alec stopped breathing.
James could not move either.
His finger remained beside the corner of lips he knew only from dreams he had spent years refusing to remember.
“You shouldn’t do that,” Alec whispered.
“Why?”
“Because I might think I still matter to you.”
James withdrew his hand.
“Get some rest.”
Alec’s expression closed immediately.
“Naturally.”
Bond stood and left the bedroom before he made a mistake for which there was no training.
The fever worsened during the night.
Alec woke several times, disoriented and violent. He pulled at the cuff until he injured his wrist. He called James by his surname, by his number, and eventually by his given name with a desperation that chilled Bond’s blood.
James remained at his side.
He changed the dressings. He forced Alec to drink. He placed cold cloths across his forehead and added wood to the fire whenever shivers racked his body.
Near midnight, Alec opened his eyes and did not seem to recognize him.
“James…”
“I’m here.”
“Don’t let them take me.”
Bond took his free hand.
“No one is going to take you.”
“You’re lying.”
“Not this time.”
Alec turned his face toward him. The fever softened his features, stripping away the arrogance and cruelty he wore as armor.
“You always choose the mission.”
James tightened his fingers around Alec’s.
“Not tonight.”
“When they come…”
“They won’t come until the storm passes.”
“They’ll turn me over.”
James did not answer.
Alec released a broken laugh.
“I knew it.”
He tried to pull his hand away, but Bond did not allow it.
“I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to.”
“Alec, listen to me.”
“I’m tired of listening to you.”
“Then, for once, stop talking.”
Alec regarded him with a shadow of his old defiance.
“Make me.”
The answer summoned an immediate memory: the docks, the rain, and the black handkerchief between Alec’s teeth. There was no humor in it now.
James leaned over him.
“I am not handing you over to be executed.”
Alec blinked.
“M ordered you—”
“M ordered me to bring you in alive. She didn’t explain what would happen afterward.”
“You know perfectly well what will happen.”
Bond knew. Interrogation, a secret trial, and a death that would never appear in any newspaper. If Alec was fortunate, he would spend the rest of his life in a cell until he ceased to be useful. If he was not, there would be a carefully arranged accident.
“I won’t let it happen.”
“Why?”
James searched for an answer that would not betray him.
He could not find one.
“Because I already lost you once.”
Alec’s lips parted.
“You abandoned me.”
“I thought you were dead.”
“And when you learned I wasn’t…”
“You tried to destroy London.”
“I needed you to feel one small part of what I had felt.”
“You could have come to me.”
“For what? So you could hand me over to your superiors?”
“So you could give me the chance to choose.”
Alec watched him in silence.
James lowered his gaze to their joined hands.
“You never gave me that chance.”
“You would have wasted it.”
“Perhaps. But the choice should have been mine.”
Alec’s eyes shone. Perhaps it was the fever.
Perhaps it was not.
“You would never have chosen me.”
James lifted Alec’s hand and pressed his lips to his bruised knuckles.
“I’m choosing you now.”
Alec closed his eyes.
He did not withdraw his hand.
Hours later, when the fever began to break, James fell asleep in the chair. He woke when something tugged on his jacket.
Alec was watching him from the bed.
“I need the lavatory.”
His voice was rough, but he was lucid.
James sat upright.
“Can you walk?”
“If I can’t, you’ll have to carry me again, and I’ll never allow you to forget it.”
Bond unlocked the cuff.
Alec raised his reddened wrist and examined it.
“Does that mean you trust me?”
“It means I’m not accompanying you to the lavatory in handcuffs.”
Alec planted his feet on the floor and stood. He managed two steps before swaying. James slipped an arm around his waist.
“Not a word,” Alec warned.
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You were thinking it.”
“You can’t shoot me for my thoughts.”
“Not yet.”
After helping him back to bed, Bond did not put the handcuffs on him again.
Alec noticed.
“This is a mistake.”
“Probably.”
“I could escape.”
“There’s a storm, you’re unarmed, and you can barely remain upright.”
“I’ve escaped from worse situations.”
“I know.”
“I could also kill you while you sleep.”
James picked up his pistol and placed it on the bedside table, within Alec’s reach.
“Then do it.”
Alec stared at the weapon.
“What are you doing?”
“Giving you a choice.”
“I could shoot you.”
“Yes.”
“I could take the car.”
“The keys are in my pocket.”
“I could take them after I kill you.”
“That would be efficient.”
Alec glared at him.
“Don’t mock me.”
“I’m not.”
James sat on the edge of the bed.
“You can shoot me, attempt to escape, and freeze to death before you reach the main road. Or you can stay, recover, and allow me to find a way out for both of us.”
“There is no way out for us.”
“There is always a way out.”
“You used to say that before every suicidal mission.”
“And we survived almost all of them.”
“We didn’t survive the last one.”
James lowered his voice.
“We might survive this one.”
Alec picked up the pistol.
Bond did not move.
The weapon remained between them. Alec held it for several seconds, his finger resting outside the trigger guard. Then he removed the magazine, emptied the chamber, and placed the separate pieces on the table.
“I don’t trust you,” he said.
“I didn’t expect you to.”
“I’m still furious.”
“I expected that.”
“And if you ever gag me again…”
“I’ll try to use something more comfortable.”
Alec looked at him in disbelief.
James smiled.
An unexpected laugh escaped Alec’s throat. It was weak and aggravated the pain in his side, but it was genuine. Bond could not remember how long it had been since he had last heard him laugh like that.
Suddenly, Alec looked embarrassed.
“Don’t make me regret this.”
“I could say the same to you.”
James prepared soup in the small kitchen. Alec managed to get up on his own and appeared in the doorway wrapped in a blanket.
“You should be in bed.”
“And you should stop giving me orders.”
“You’re in my custody.”
“I’m no longer wearing handcuffs.”
“Administrative details.”
Alec sat at the table. His hair was disheveled, a bandage encircled his ribs, and the blanket was gathered beneath his chin. He looked less like an international terrorist and more like an angry cat rescued from the rain.
James placed a bowl in front of him.
“Eat.”
“That smells appalling.”
“It’s soup.”
“That’s what the tin claims.”
“Your alternatives are this or cold beans.”
Alec picked up the spoon.
“I preferred it when you were trying to kill me.”
“I’ve never tried to kill you.”
“You dropped me from an antenna.”
“You let go of my hand.”
The spoon stopped moving.
James regretted the words as soon as he spoke them.
Alec stared into the soup.
“I thought you wanted me to.”
“What?”
“To let go.”
James remembered the metal beneath his fingers, the rain, and Alec’s face suspended over the abyss. He remembered the anger, the betrayal, and the terrible instant in which their hands had begun to separate.
“I was trying to hold on to you.”
“After chasing me halfway around the world.”
“I was still trying to hold on.”
Alec raised his eyes.
“Why?”
Bond moved closer. He knelt beside the chair so Alec would not have to twist his injured torso.
“Because it was you.”
“That isn’t enough.”
“It’s all I have.”
James placed one hand against his scarred cheek.
Alec shivered but did not pull away.
“Tell me to stop,” Bond whispered.
“Would you?”
“Yes.”
“That was always our problem.”
“That I respected your decisions?”
“That you needed me to ask for what you already wanted.”
James brushed his thumb across the scar.
“Then tell me now.”
Alec closed his eyes and leaned into the touch.
“Kiss me, James.”
Bond obeyed.
The first brush was careful, barely a touch. Alec exhaled against his lips and grasped the lapel of his jacket. James kissed him again, more firmly, containing years of longing behind a tenderness he rarely allowed himself to show.
Alec was the one who deepened the kiss.
His hand slid up to James’s nape and drew him closer. For a moment, MI6, their orders, and every betrayal ceased to exist. There was only the warmth of Alec’s mouth, the breath they shared, and a tremor neither man was willing to acknowledge.
Alec pulled away with a grimace and pressed a hand to his side.
“Careful,” James said.
“I don’t remember you being so cautious.”
“I don’t remember you having been shot the last time.”
“I had been shot the last time too.”
Bond stared at him.
Alec smiled.
“I didn’t want to ruin the moment.”
James laughed and rested his forehead against Alec’s.
“You’re impossible.”
“And you’re in love with me.”
The silence returned, but it was no longer hostile.
James could have denied it. He had denied more obvious truths under far worse interrogations. But he was tired of wasting chances.
“Yes.”
The smile vanished from Alec’s face.
“Don’t say that because of the fever.”
“The fever is yours.”
“You know what I mean.”
“I’m in love with you,” James repeated. “I was before you disappeared. I probably have been since Istanbul. I was too much of a coward to tell you then.”
“You’re not a coward.”
“With you, I am.”
Alec kissed him again. This time it was slow, almost reverent.
When they parted, his eyes were bright.
“I loved you too,” he confessed. “That was why it hurt so much to believe you had never come looking for me.”
“I would have burned the world to find you.”
“I almost burned it to punish you.”
“A slight overreaction.”
“You never did know how to accept a compliment.”
They remained together until exhaustion overcame Alec. James took him back to the bedroom and sat beside him.
“Sleep.”
Alec caught him by the wrist.
“Stay.”
Bond settled beside him, careful not to touch the wound. Alec rested his head against James’s shoulder.
“When MI6 arrives,” he murmured, “this will end.”
“No.”
“James…”
“The car has false number plates. There are emergency funds and documents in the compartment beneath the floor. The border is four hours away if we take the secondary roads.”
Alec lifted his head.
“You’ve thought about it.”
“Since M insisted a little too forcefully that you arrive alive.”
“Are you going to defect?”
“Let’s say I’m taking an extended holiday.”
“They’ll hunt you.”
“They can try.”
“You could lose everything.”
James stroked his hair.
“I already lost you once. I won’t do it again.”
Alec studied him, searching for doubt or deception.
He found none.
“Where will we go?”
“Somewhere warm.”
“I hate the beach.”
“Liar.”
“I hate sand.”
“That’s a lie too.”
“I hate your beach shirts.”
“That’s understandable.”
Alec rested his head against James’s chest once more.
“What if I try to escape?”
“I’ll chase you.”
“What if I try to kill you again?”
“I’ll disarm you.”
“What if I shout?”
James glanced meaningfully at the black handkerchief still lying on the chair.
Alec raised an eyebrow.
“Don’t even think about it.”
“Then behave yourself.”
“Never.”
Bond switched off the lamp.
Outside, the storm began to weaken. Inside the safe house, Alec remained awake until the steady heartbeat beneath his ear convinced him that James was not going to disappear.
At dawn, the radio came back to life.
M’s voice emerged through the static.
“007, report your situation.”
James looked toward the bed. Alec was asleep on his side, his expression peaceful and one hand outstretched across the space Bond had just vacated.
“Target secured,” he replied.
“The extraction team will arrive in two hours.”
Bond looked at the dismantled pistol, the abandoned handcuffs, and two false passports lying on the table.
“Negative. The storm has blocked access.”
“Our reports indicate that the road is now passable.”
Alec opened his eyes.
James held his gaze as he spoke.
“Then your reports are incorrect.”
He switched off the radio.
For a moment, neither man said anything.
“You just lied to M,” Alec murmured.
“It won’t be the last time.”
“James Bond, international fugitive.”
“It has a certain charm.”
“And what will become of your reputation?”
“It’ll survive.”
Alec pushed back the blankets and carefully rose.
“I still need clothes.”
James pointed toward the wardrobe.
“There’s a prepared suitcase.”
“Passports?”
“On the table.”
“Weapons?”
“In the car.”
“The handkerchief?”
Bond picked it up from the chair and approached him.
Alec backed away until his legs touched the bed.
“James…”
Bond placed the handkerchief around Alec’s neck and tied the ends gently, like a cravat.
“A souvenir.”
Alec touched the black fabric. His cheeks flushed slightly.
“You’re a bastard.”
“But I’m your bastard.”
“That remains to be seen.”
James kissed him before he could continue.
Alec protested for less than a second. Then he wrapped his arms around James’s neck and returned the kiss with a tenderness that contradicted every one of his threats.
Two hours later, the extraction team found the safe house empty.
A pair of open handcuffs, a disabled radio, and a note written in Bond’s elegant handwriting lay on the table.
“Mission accomplished. The prisoner is still alive.”
By then, James and Alec had already crossed the border.
Alec sat in the passenger seat, no longer in handcuffs, the black handkerchief tied around his neck. He was still wounded, still furious, and would probably spend the rest of his life discovering new ways to defy James.
But when he fell asleep, his hand remained entwined with Bond’s over the gear stick.
James drove south without letting go.
This time, when forced to choose between the mission and Alec Trevelyan, 007 did not hesitate.