Alex had stopped off at a store on their walk, picking up some groceries and a few cold beers for them. While her apartment wasn’t the biggest, it was tidy and organised. It took Sam back to their time together in Naples, where Alex had tended to him, nursing him back from the brink of death.

‘I know, right?’ Alex said through her chewing as she polished off the pizza she’d ordered for them. ‘Pretty fucked up.’

‘You need to walk away from this.’ Sam turned to her, his beer hanging loosely through his fingers.

‘Excuse me?’

‘Alex, these people are dangerous. Look at what they did to me just for walking into their bar?’

‘No, Sam. They did that to you because you decided to go all Liam Neeson on their boys back home.’ Alex shook her head in despair and sat back in her chair. She pulled out her cigarettes and put one to her lips. ‘And also, you don’t have a fucking right to tell me what to do. You abandoned me. In Italy. Alone.’

‘I had to go back…’

‘Well, like you said, you got the job done. You set things right.’ Alex lit her cigarette and exhaled an irritated cloud of smoke. Sam shook his head and looked out over the street. Alex’s apartment was a few streets away from The Pit and was situated above a deli. Beneath them, Sam could hear the hustle and bustle of the afternoon footfall.

Alex’s words cut him deep.

As she walked Sam through Dillon, she’d explained to him it was safe. The Riders weren’t exactly early birds, and the message they’d sent him would be enough in their eyes. Sam winced, his fractured wrist humming in pain.

He’d explained to her how he’d got home, how he’d found Etheridge, the man he’d pinned their hopes on, and how he’d been beaten, tortured, and left for dead in the hunt for Sam.

Another reiteration of how dangerous it was to be an unfortunate touch point of Sam’s fight.

Sam explained to Alex how they’d lured Wallace into the open, only for the General to kidnap Amara Singh. Alex could tell from Sam’s struggles that he’d cared for Singh, and she felt every ounce of anger as he explained to her how Wallace had died. That should have been it.

Sam would have been straight on the plane back to the States to help her.

But he had to stay. Singh would have gone to prison.

As Sam had explained his and Etheridge’s plan that saw him infiltrate a maximum-security prison, Alex felt bad for being so mad at him.

Sam had made her a promise, one that she’d clung to every night as she’d slept on the sofa of that crummy apartment in Naples.