Page 49 of Hold On

“Code breaker? Now I’m intrigued. I wonder how many archaeologists actuallyarespies?”

“Not many these days and not Will. He can’t lie without blushing.”But I can.

“So what sort of data did you analyse?”

“The sort that if I told you, I’d have to kill you.” Ren shot him a smile. “Government stuff. I really can’t say. But it had to do with AI, connected devices and data-driven decision making.” Vague enough, though it was mostly a lie.

“Why don’t you want to do it anymore?”

“You believe me now?”

Dominichmmed. He sat up and helped himself to a cheese scone. Ren took one too. With his mouth full, he had time to think before he said anything else. If he told Dominic the truth, he’d never be able to go back to that work.But did he want to? It had almost got him killed.

“It got too much,” Ren said, thinking of the truth, not the lie. “It was all I did. Eat, sleep and breathed it. Except I didn’t sleep, didn’t eat well and I almost choked.”

Ren rubbed his chest, and when he realised what he was doing, grabbed a Sprite.Change the subject.“How did you cope being locked up all that time?”

“What choice did I have? What choice does anyone have in that situation? You adjust, find your own way of coping. I found it in education. I read thousands of books. I even tried philosophy too. I think I was looking for the answer to—why me?”

“Did you find it?”

“Only in so much as a realisation that fate has the biggest hand in determining someone’s life. Was my mother awful before she met my father? The other way round? What made them do it? If they’d not been together, would either of them have been as bad? I have no idea and I never will.” He gave a quiet chuckle. “And that’s my fault because I didn’t give them the chance to tell their story.”

“You don’t know that they’d have ever opened their mouths. Rosemary West has never confessed what she did.”

“That’s true.” Dominic looked round at the view. “This really is beautiful. I used to think that once I was released, if I was ever trapped in a small solitary place for a long period of time, then at least I’d know I could cope. Like those boys in that cave in Thailand. A strange thought that prison had been useful for something. I don’t think that anymore. I can’t lose this freedom now I have it. It would be unbearable.”

“And yet roughly one in four reoffend.”

“Which means roughly three in four don’t. Those that do, don’t come out of prison planning to commit a crime. Well, most don’t, I imagine. I wonder how many of those who reoffend feel they have no choice? Put back in the environment they came out of, lacking education and skills, meeting up with their old friends, no prospects? I can see why they fail. But I won’t.”

Ren wanted to hug him, but the way Dominic was holding himself told him to wait.

“One thing prison teaches you is how to be patient. Well, it taught me that. You follow rules or you come unstuck. You accept what you can’t change and make the most of every opportunity offered.”

“I think you’re probably a poster boy for second chances.”

“It’s early days.” Dominic bit into an apple. “Where’d you live usually? Cambridge or elsewhere?”

“London.” That was probably where he’d end up. All his stuff was at Will’s or stored at their parents’. Not that he had a lot of stuff. “I moved in with my brother after I resigned.” He felt a pang of regret that he was twisting the truth when Dominic had been so open with him, but he had no choice. This was about Dominic’s security as much as his. Different, maybe, if they were in a long-term relationship. “Have you told your brother that you don’t want to renovate houses with him?”

“Not yet. If I had the money, I might try doing it on my own, just to give me a place to live that was all mine, but I’ve looked online and even uninhabitable hovels, places where I’d have to live in a tent while I worked on them, are beyond my budget.” Dominic took another bite of apple.

“Getting a job isn’t going to be easy. Huh. Sorry for stating the blindingly obvious. Do they give you advice in prison? Talk to you about job opportunities?”

Dominic gave a choked laugh. “They tell you how to sign on, explain to you what you’re obliged to tell employers. Some prisons have workshops sponsored by companies that train you to do things like mend bikes and occasionally jobs are offered afterwards. I was hoping for…”

“What?”

“Hoping for something better than mending bikes for a living, which makes me a fool.”

“You’re not a fool to hope for more.”

“Yes, I am. On the other hand, maybe hoping for more was what kept me going. I did those degrees because they were subjects that interested me, and didn’t require facilities I didn’t have, like a laboratory. I read all the time. Fiction, non-fiction. I did courses in accountancy, business studies, first aid, plumbing, hairdressing—not going to be taking that up, bricklaying. I still hoped for something more when I got out.”

“Governor of the Bank of England? Prime Minister?”

“Right.” Dominic put the apple core back in the bag.

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