Una didn't move the bottle toward him. She wouldn't stop him if he picked it up, but her plan wasn't to get him excessively drunk—and if he did, the effects of the sedative darts in the needle gun might be less predictable. And as angry as she was, she didn't want to kill him. That would have been far, far beside the point and would have defeated her purposes altogether.

She sipped from her own glass, trying to keep the contempt off her face.

"What sort of difficult situation? It must have been very dire to have to resort to such desperate measures." Her tone was so neutral as to be almost kind.