She gave Sam a very rueful, sad smile and patted his neck. "Oh yes. Very easy indeed. It's an endless gamble, and while I could claim I did it because I thought it might ... keep him under control, I—well. I'm afraid I'm just a little too addicted to the taste of adrenaline. And that's the simple explanation." The full one, she reflected, would take a lifetime.

"You take so much time to wonder about defences and don't seem to be considering the possibility that I might just snap—" a click of the fingers to illustrate "—one day."

"So that's what you saw, then," she said aloud; then added for clarity: "You saw him ... snap."