Story Notes:
Timeline: early S3
Disclaimers: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.
Feedback: Please. Here or at amanda_rex AT yahoo DOT com
Thanks: Thank you to Jenn and Carrie for service above and beyond.
Disclaimers: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.
Feedback: Please. Here or at amanda_rex AT yahoo DOT com
Thanks: Thank you to Jenn and Carrie for service above and beyond.
"Man cannot discover new oceans unless he has the courage to lose sight of the shore."
Andre Gide
"Denial ain't just a river in Egypt."
Mark Twain
Lee tapped the steering wheel to the beat of the song playing through his car stereo only to realize he was whistling. He wondered just when his mood had lightened so much. Just a few hours ago, word came through about Beamon's cover getting blown, scrubbing their planned bust the next morning. That would send them back to the drawing board, which meant many more frustrating hours behind a desk, jockeying paper to get another angle on the case. He would have started tonight, but Billy caught him taking out a little frustration on the bullpen coffee maker and all but ordered him to get out of there and get a little rest.
Once Lee decided to take him up on that, things began to get worse. His keys had slipped out of his hand in the parking lot, sending him to his hands and knees on the pavement to fish them out from under his car. As far as Lee could see, here really was nothing to whistle about, except maybe that he could sleep in a little in the morning. He really needed the rest. He had been sleeping poorly for some reason lately.
Unfortunately, sleep would have to wait. Everyone involved in the operation knew it had been cancelled except for Amanda. Her phone had been busy all evening, a little detail that bothered him more than he was comfortable thinking about. He briefly pictured Amanda on the phone with someone she had yet to tell him about. If that was true, they had been talking for hours. He gripped the steering wheel harder. He told himself that Phillip was probably monopolizing the phone with his new girlfriend, but he kept thinking about how Amanda had been acting strangely recently, taking lots of unexplained time off.
This was not jealousy, he thought to himself. It was concern. She just failed to understand what an easy target she was. She was so naturally trusting, and a magnet for men with bad intentions. Whoever this guy was, he might even be their link to whatever had gone wrong with Beamon's big case. If not, the jerk probably wasn't good enough for her anyway.
Lee thought it over some more, wondering how Amanda could be so perceptive about people most of the time, yet still be taken in by the kind of men who used her as their window into Agency operations. Of course, between their work and her family responsibilities, she had little time to meet anyone else. Though there was that one guy, Chad, from Cryptology, who had been sniffing around her for the last week or so. He needed to take a closer look at Chad, make sure his background checks were up to date. Now that he was thinking about it, he had always gotten a funny feeling about that guy.
Maybe it would be safer for everyone if he made sure she got out a couple of times a week. Nothing too serious, just dinner or a movie when there wasn't an ongoing investigation they were busy with. Spending some time with Amanda might be the best thing he could do for operational security. That would keep her far away from the jackals and opportunists and give him less to worry about in the long run.
He pulled the Corvette into her subdivision, parking two streets over under the streetlight that was burnt out so he could take advantage of the dark as cover. He knew Amanda had shuffled and juggled everything around to make the early meeting time for Beamon's sting and she would appreciate someone letting her know it was all called off. It was out of his way, but that was all right. He might have swung by to check on her anyway, doing his usual mid-week sweep of her neighborhood and security survey around her house.
He snaked his way through several yards to get to her house, reaching over the top of her gate once he reached it and opening the latch. He pulled it closed, careful not to let the hinges creak as they sometimes did, and crept his way toward the windows that would let him peek into her kitchen.
He frowned as he looked into nothing but darkness along the back of her house. A check of his watch showed him it was just past ten o'clock and he began to worry. This was late enough that the boys were certainly in bed, but Amanda and her mother were routinely up and around this late.
No one was visible inside the house so he quickly checked the windows and door, finding them all securely locked. He looked over the familiar trappings of Amanda's life, photos and schoolwork covering the front of her fridge, a note on the chalkboard reminding her of an upcoming school bake sale, and Phillip and Jamie's backpacks sitting on the table next to an arrangement of fresh-cut flowers from the garden. Everything looked normal, no signs of a struggle or anything else out of the ordinary.
He finally spied the phone, sitting out of its usual place. When he looked at it carefully, he could just barely see the receiver wasn't seated properly into the base. One side was cocked upwards, that one little oversight causing the hours of busy signals Lee had encountered back at the Agency. He sighed and ran a hand through his hair, wondering what he should do next.
He could just head home, but unless Amanda noticed the downstairs phone was off-kilter as she was rushing around to make their now-defunct early meeting time, no one would be able to contact her to let her know it was off. There was one more thing he could try.
Lee circled the house, quickly finding Amanda's bedroom window among the rest on the second story of the house. He could see that her light was on by the slight glow coloring the sheer curtains. He looked at the ivy-covered trellis and sighed, hoping it would hold his weight. The last time he used it, he had been sure it was about to come loose and throw him to the ground.
He tested the trellis by pulling back on it, surprised to find it holding strong and fast to the side of the house. He remembered Amanda had mentioned asking the boys to repair it, as they were usually the ones responsible for weakening it. It was a good repair job functionally, though their work left a little to be desired cosmetically. Some of the nails weren't driven in all the way, or had bent and been nailed down anyway in a messy tangle.
Despite their somewhat shoddy workmanship, Lee sent a mental thank you to the boys as he began his climb upwards; their work seemed to be good enough to keep him from a two story fall. As he grew closer to her window, he saw she had cracked it open by a few inches. He wished that had been visible from the ground. He might just have called out to her to see if he could avoid the trellis entirely.
Five more feet and he was there, able to look inside and see her, tucked nicely under the covers with her head cushioned against the two pillows fluffed up behind her. He was about to tap on the window and hiss out her name, hoping he could wake her without alerting the rest of the neighborhood, when he heard some kind of noise coming from her. He smiled a little despite the odd circumstances. He knew Amanda had a tendency to talk in her sleep and he found it oddly endearing.
Then a longer, deep, throaty noise escaped her as her head pushed further into the pillows, and he stopped finding it endearing. She sounded...what did that noise mean? Was she sick? In pain? He gripped the trellis harder, leaning in so he could hear more clearly.
"Oh, my," she whispered, the soft sound barely loud enough to make it to him. He fixed his eyes on her, watching her carefully. She had been scarce at work lately. Maybe she was sick.
He examined her face, or at least what he could see of it from this angle. If she had been asleep, her features would have been relaxed. Instead, he saw tension there, her eyes clenched tightly shut. Her breathing was growing erratic, her mouth opening for an occasional gasp. It was just like Amanda to be sick and not mention it, even to plan to get up early for Beamon's bust despite being ill.
His eyes began to adjust to the dim light inside her room and he looked her over carefully to figure out what might be wrong. He ducked reflexively when he sensed movement, peeking back up a moment later to see what had changed.
She was in a different position, her knees up and her feet braced on the mattress under the covers. Her soft, raspy moaning had resumed. He was beginning to think she was really ill.
Her legs flattened to the mattress, this time, spread a little wider. He could see the covers moving, one of her hands doing something somewhere between her hips, the other appearing to rub something closer to her shoulder. Well, no, a little lower than that. Her breaths were open-mouthed gasps, as though she couldn't get enough air. He was really concerned now. He had never seen her react this way to pain before.
"Oh, that's so good," she whispered, confusing him completely. If she was in pain, there was no way she would say that. Her hands began to move faster, her gasps turning back into low, quiet moans. He pictured the way her long, lean body was laid out, trying to figure out where her hands were.
His body figured it out before his mind would let him believe it. He felt his own breathing quicken, his pants tightening across his groin. Both hands went numb and shaky and he felt light-headed, like he could just fall backward any minute and there would be little his distracted body could do to stop it.
The moment he fully understood what was going on, he ducked his head down in a panic, afraid of being caught watching her like a two-bit Peeping Tom. He felt frozen in place, but he needed to move. Slinking away now was his best option, getting out without her ever discovering he had been here.
He moved his left foot down, finding a good hold. His right hand followed, getting a good grip of the slats around one of the diamond-shaped openings in the trellis. Next came his left hand, but it wouldn't budge when he tried to move it. Closing his eyes in frustration, he realized he was caught on something.
Carefully, he climbed up to get a better look at whatever was trapping him there. He saw a particularly nasty grouping of gnarled and bent nails near where he'd braced his left hand through the ivy and wood. When he looked more closely, he saw that they had worked their way through and around his sleeve, with enough fabric trapped between the nails and the trellis that he couldn't easily pull himself away.
"Dammit," he whispered, trying to move his head out of the way so the dim light from Amanda's room would fall onto his arm. He needed to get free without making any noise, and for that, he had to be able to see what he was doing. With both arms now beginning to tremble under the strain of holding his body up this long, it wasn't easy to pull his right hand away from the trellis to work on the nails holding him in place.
He tightened his jaw in frustration when the burning sensation in his muscles meant he had to rest, mostly because he'd made almost no headway on getting himself free. Every time he made any progress at all, the fabric started to rip and he was afraid she would hear him. He tried to imagine what she would do if she discovered him here, his panic rising as he realized none of her possible reactions were good.
Thinking about her made him glance over at her before he could stop himself and he had to swallow a frustrated groan as he watched her again. He forgot about the nails and his sleeve and being stuck.
She was beautiful, he found himself thinking before he could stop himself. Her body language was wilder than he had ever seen before, unrestrained and sensual. It almost reminded him of the few times he had seen her angry about something, when her brown eyes would go nearly black and the color in her cheeks would deepen. She was rarely shy of disagreeing with him when they didn't see eye to eye, but in those few times when she had been truly angry, he realized now what he had witnessed. That look in her eyes, the tilt of her head, the way her breath had quickened, that had been his glimpse into the depth of her passion.
Despite himself and his best intentions, he stared directly at her, drinking in each movement, memorizing every sound. His cock was painfully hard and straining against his pants. Even after he forced himself to squeeze his eyes shut, he found that just hearing her was enough to drive him absolutely crazy. That slightly rough, scratchy edge to her voice had always been uniquely Amanda, but this was different. It was more raw and intense. It was the difference between having your favorite brandy softened over ice and downing it straight, so you could taste every nuance of its flavor.
She hissed out another long breath tinged with almost-pain and he opened his eyes again. She had thrown her covers off to the side except for one sheet. It was the only thing shielding her body from him, though it was thin enough to leave very little to his imagination. Her face was angled away from him, so he gave in and indulged in watching her. Her hips and her hand were working together, their movements clearly outlined as the light and shadows played over her. She threw her other arm over her eyes, giving him even more cover and emboldening him to lean in closer and watch more intently.
He wrapped his left hand securely through the trellis, then he let his right hand fall away to brush over his now-painful erection. He had to bite his tongue hard to avoid making any noise. He tasted blood, and his traitorous mind immediately supplied an image of Amanda biting his tongue in passion as he drove into her. He imagined how his name would sound through the filter of her arousal. Hearing just that one word would be enough to trigger his mind-blowing climax. He felt himself slipping and got his hand braced just in time to keep him in place.
As he watched her, he wondered what fantasy was driving her. How long had it been for her before she gave in to the need for this release before she could sleep? Knowing her the way he did, he doubted there had ever been anyone to share her bed after she and her husband had split up. Was this routine, or had something led to this?
Was there a man over her in her mind's eye, pressing her body into her mattress, running his hands over her, listening to her as she reacted to every touch? Her hand moved faster now, harder, and he could make out each circle of her fingers as her legs pulled the sheet taut over her body. He watched as her hand flew to her mouth, biting down on her finger as she fought to keep the slightest evidence of her desire, of her need, from escaping the confines of her bedroom. He was transfixed as her body tensed, every muscle coiled tightly as her orgasm shook through her.
Several minutes ticked by as he watched her begin to relax, her slight motions languid and sleepy. She stretched, arching her back and throwing both arms over her head, a tired and satisfied smile on her face.
He ducked down as much as he could and held his breath to make sure he made no sound to attract her attention. He willed his body to revert to equilibrium as hers had, but he could still feel his heart pounding in his chest, sending all the blood in his body directly to his groin. Images of what he had just watched dominated his mind, though he knew he should be working to get free.
He closed his eyes, desperate to control his rapid breathing and runaway thoughts. One of Amanda's passion-filled moans replayed itself in his mind, causing him to involuntarily thrust his hips forward. He ground his teeth painfully together as he indulged in the sensation of pressure against his erection. He relished this minor release as it passed through his body, though it was so much less than what he needed right now.
One single, lucid thought broke through the fog in his mind and he knew he needed to take a chance, rip himself free of the nails trapping him there, and get away. He was never going to be able to relieve this pressure while he was stuck here and it certainly wasn't going to go away on its own. The longer he stayed here, the more certain it was that he would get caught. Facing Amanda was unimaginable if she ever found out that he had watched her in such a private, personal moment.
He ripped himself free, wincing at the impossibly loud sound of fabric tearing, and climbed down as quickly as he could. He took cover in the shadows closest to her house and then began his trip back to the car, his head still spinning at what had happened and the effect it had on him.
He took a different route this time, knowing he was in no shape to scale fences. As he crept along, he tried to concentrate on the guilt that had begun to set in. It was easier than thinking about how turned on he was, how much he had wanted to climb through her open window and earn those moans for himself.
He shook his head, wondering what he was thinking. This was Amanda he was picturing. It's-just-business Amanda. Forbidden territory. Obviously, it had been too long since his last meaningless affair. Simply letting his body find its release with a willing partner with no messy emotional strings attached was what he needed. Things had been busy recently, both with work and with a few social engagements he had invited Amanda to attend with him in the absence of anyone else he wanted to take. Maybe they were spending too much time together and that was why he was starting to get curious about her in ways that were just too dangerous. His rock hard erection was the inconvenient proof of that.
He finally reached the car, unlocking the door with shaking hands and folding his painfully aroused body into the driver's seat. He sat for a moment or two, not sure how long he could wait before he got the hell out of there. He needed his mind to clear, to push away the disturbing thoughts of how much he still longed to hear her moan his name, of how sated and beautiful she looked after her climax had rocked through her.
He swore, turning the keys and savagely throwing the Corvette into gear. It was going to be a long trip home.
He drove home in a haze, thankful he had made this trip enough times that he could do it on automatic pilot. There was only one available spot in front of his building, a very short one that taxed his parallel parking skills. He tested several new combinations of swear words every time he felt his tires bump the curb, wincing when he heard fiberglass scraping against cement.
He finally wedged his car into the space and went inside, getting all the way to the elevator before he realized he didn't have his keys with him and that his car wasn't locked. Ignoring the curious look from the doorman, he went back out, retrieved his keys, and locked the car. He tried out several more profanities under his breath.
He stomped to his apartment, finally allowing his mood to blossom into pure blackness. He went straight to the bar once inside, getting himself some brandy with no ice. He downed in one gulp what he had poured, shuddering a little when the taste hit the back of his throat. Two more just like that followed the first, and he hoped it was enough to lull him to sleep without rendering him useless the next day.
Inside his bedroom, he carelessly shed his clothes, letting them stay wherever they fell, until he was down to his boxers. He paused long enough to rip back the covers, then climbed into bed and hoped sleep would come quickly.
Images of Amanda's hand working furiously under her covers played inside his mind and he clamped his hands over his face as though he could somehow scrub it all away. He thought back over the evening, wondering how things had gone so wrong. He had started out with good intentions, just wanting to save her a lot of time and trouble. Instead, he had ended up in his bed with his erection re-awakening, yet feeling too guilty to do anything about it. And through it all, she still would never get word about the scrubbed mission in time.
He sighed, sitting up and turning on his bedside light as he realized there was one way he could still get word to her. He picked up his alarm clock, glaring at it a little as he fumbled with the dial and set it for an ungodly early time. If he got over to Amanda's before she headed in, he could give her the news in time for her to go about her normal morning routine. It was the least he could do for her, given what he had just done.
He switched the light off and hoped his plan would lighten his conscience enough so he could sleep. He settled carefully on his side, dug his head into the pillow, and waited for sleep to come.
His body, of course, had other ideas. His memory supplied image after image of Amanda and his imagination wove them into a pure fiction of the two of them together. His hands itched to stroke away this misery and turn it into pure release. It just seemed so wrong to play the part of her voyeur earlier, then twist what he had seen into his own gratification.
He rolled to his back, his hand slipping inside his boxers and closing around his erection. His loud groan filled the room the moment his palm applied pressure and he immediately remembered how Amanda had to try so hard to muffle her voice. He pictured her here, in his bed, where the sounds of her passion could be unrestrained as he brought her to the brink over and over. He wondered if she could trust him enough to completely let go.
He abruptly halted his movements the moment he realized what he was doing. His situation had nothing to do with Amanda specifically, it was just the natural reaction of a young, healthy man witnessing a woman—any woman—in the throes of passion. Amanda had no place in relieving this pressure that was building up inside him. They were friends, work associates, and he would not allow there to be any complications.
He threw off the covers and headed straight for his shower. With a twist of the dial, he turned on the water and adjusted the temperature to just north of arctic levels. He needed to clear his head and his body wasn't responding to anything subtle.
His boxers hit the floor and he stepped in, suppressing a pained yelp the moment the freezing water hit his overheated skin. It sobered him right away, he noted with satisfaction. If there was one thing he prided himself on, it was his iron control over his sexual appetite. He never allowed himself to get too close to any one woman. Not after Eva and Dorothy. Needing one woman in particular to star in his fantasies or share his bed was an indulgence he would not allow himself.
Satisfied the problem had been taken care of, he reached out and turned the dials, letting the water warm up. If he was going to take an impromptu shower at eleven-thirty, he may as well enjoy it. He leaned his neck to the side and let the water stream over his weary muscles, groaning a little as his hand massaged the kinks there.
He thought back to the previous week, when he and Amanda had been stuck inside his new Q Bureau, organizing stack after stack of misplaced and disorganized files. He had hefted boxes all afternoon, and by the end of the day, the strain of the work had settled firmly on his neck and shoulders.
Amanda had come quietly around behind him while he was leaned back, his eyes closed, as he tried to release the tension in one particular knot that had formed where his neck met his shoulder. Her hands deftly replaced his, applying pressure to the exact spot that needed it. He had taken a surprised breath and she pulled away immediately, replacing her hands only after he found enough voice to ask her to continue.
Lee blinked and came back to the present, looking down to see that he was right back where he had started. His body was responding to the memory of her hands on him, but now he was aching to overlay that experience onto the images of her from an hour ago. The pieces fit together quickly in his mind.
She would finish the massage and he would stand up, turning to look into her eyes as he asked her if there was anything he could do for her in return. She would blush for a moment, perhaps looking like there was something she wanted to ask him, but she would turn away at the last second. He would pursue her, pulling her back into his chest. She would lean back, tilting her head so that he could press his face into her neck, whispering to her that she could ask him anything.
She would remain silent, but he would hear her heart beating, proof that she was as affected by him as he was by her.
"We're partners, Amanda. I would do anything for you, the way you would do anything for me. Tell me what you need."
She would remain quiet, but he would feel her reluctance wavering. She needed one last push, a few more words from him to convince her to take the leap of faith.
"Anything you need, Amanda. Just tell me and I'll give it to you."
He blinked his eyes open, the fantasy dropping away, and he was suddenly aware of his hand as it applied firm pressure to his reawakened erection in long, slow strokes. He desperately tried to remember why this was wrong, why this was forbidden territory, but he returned to his Q Bureau fantasy instead.
"I need you," she would whisper. "It's been so long and I just need to feel you inside me." He could hear her saying it, hear her voice breaking, and hear the depth of her need as she struggled to breathe.
He watched his own hand for a minute, imagining it was hers instead. She would take her time at first, but speed up as soon as she sensed his impatience. Staring up, she would wrap her fingers around his cock and give him the pressure he needed.
Their eyes locked inside his fantasy world and he suddenly understood something, a thing so fundamental that it seemed like it had always been there. He knew it the way he knew his own name. He needed her, all of her, in every way.
He stopped everything, panic mixing in with the current of need flowing through him and sobering him enough to bring him back to reality. This had gone far beyond a mere bad idea, well past wrong, and he had ended up squarely on the grounds of insanity. He could not, would not have these thoughts about Amanda. It was just too dangerous to let himself feel this way about her.
He cleared his mind, desperately trying to think of a woman to replace her. What he needed was Amanda's polar opposite. Red hair, he decided. That was easy enough to imagine. Icy blue eyes. And she was short, no taller than his shoulder. She was wearing an outfit that should have gotten her arrested, a dangerously short skirt and a see-through, low-cut blouse. They found each other in a bar, dancing around the niceties for as long as they had to before he could get her to come home with him. They would not exchange names, and neither of them cared.
He waited for the image to be clear, then began to stroke himself. He pictured his fantasy woman going down to her knees and taking him into her mouth, grabbing his hands and urging him to hold her head in place as he thrust into her. He tried to imagine the feel of her hair tangling in his fingers, the warmth of her mouth, anything he could picture to make the fantasy more real.
He stopped as the image in his head faltered. He was getting more distracted the harder he tried to concentrate, and worse, he could feel how little his imagined scene was doing for his libido.
Out of nowhere, he pictured himself back in the Q Bureau, lifting Amanda up to sit on the edge of his desk. Their mouths would meet in a fiery kiss, their first real kiss, as she would pull him toward her. Her hands would undo his pants, then shove them down with his boxers. He would respond by roughly pulling up her skirt and tearing her panties from her body.
He would be inside her before he could remember deciding to do it, swallowing her cries with a kiss to avoid being overheard. She would rest her head on his shoulder so she could whisper to him, tell him how incredible he felt inside her, let him hear her moaning his name as he drove her over the edge.
He would maintain his control as long as he could, his determination to give her everything she needed overriding any more selfish concerns. He would hold back until he heard her voice again, urging him to show her how much he had wanted this too. Those would be the words that would break him, and he would finally allow the white-hot waves of pleasure to wash over him as he came hard, thrusting deep inside her.
In reality, when he came, Lee was nearly doubled-over inside his shower. Most of his weight was braced precariously on his right palm, which was flattened against the misty, slickened tiles. The feeling lasted an impossibly long time, tightening his stomach and flowing throughout the rest of his body as his erratic breathing kept him from shouting her name. He felt the water pelting over him as he slowly relaxed, coming back to normal.
He tried very hard not to think at all as he turned off the water and reached for his towel, quickly drying himself off so he could return to bed. He managed to keep his mind blank all the way back to his bedroom, where he climbed back under the covers, turned to his stomach, and buried his face into his pillow. He began to use every anti-interrogation technique he knew to block his mind from thinking about what he had just done, knowing this was his only chance to get a moment's rest.
Somewhere around procedure number forty-seven, he finally fell into a fitful, unsatisfying sleep.
It was a quarter after six when he pulled up around the corner from Amanda's. As he got out of the car, he went over each of the hazards he might run into as he skirted around a few houses to get to hers. Coming this way, there were two dogs to avoid, one particularly difficult hedge to duck through, and three fences to hop. He got around those obstacles easily and reached Amanda's house, listening closely to see if anyone was in the backyard. Dotty was sometimes outside early in the morning, doing a little gardening or having a morning cup of tea.
He heard nothing but silence, so he moved soundlessly through the gate and crouched, keeping himself out of the line of sight from the kitchen windows. This would be the hardest part, trying to figure out who might be in the kitchen. Amanda's house was usually pretty noisy, revealing everything he needed to know. Dotty gave her presence away easily with her tendency to put the television or radio on if she was there, and Phillip just seemed to create noise everywhere he went. Jamie, however, had been spending a lot of time quietly reading at the kitchen table or in the family room and Lee had narrowly avoided being caught by him several times before.
Staying back to scope things out, he took a careful peek through the window near the sink. He saw Amanda right away, sipping from a mug and holding the newspaper open in front of her in her other hand. He stepped closer, tapping twice on the window when he got there, then he dropped down just in case Amanda wasn't alone.
He heard the back door open and shut and then Amanda appeared, whispering, "Lee?"
"Yeah." He moved away from the window and stood up, watching a brilliant smile break over her face when she saw him.
"Good morning. What brings you here?"
"Your telephone." He looked at her, trying to act nonchalant. It was more difficult to see her, to be around her than he had thought it would be. She looked confused, so he explained further. "Your phone's been off the hook since yesterday afternoon and we couldn't get in touch with you. The operation this morning has been scrubbed."
"Oh, I've been after Phillip to be more careful when he hangs up, he keeps banging the receiver down...wait, did you say the mission's been called off? What happened?"
"Beamon's cover wasn't as bulletproof as he thought. He got out with no trouble, but we have to go back to the drawing board on this one."
"Oh, thank goodness." Amanda sighed, dropping her shoulders forward in obvious relief. "I mean, I know the mission was important, but the boys need a ride to school and mother would have had to reschedule her dentist's appointment. Did you know our dentist charges you if you cancel with less than a day's notice? I understand that it's difficult for them to manage their schedule, but sometimes things come up at the last minute, you know?"
He blinked at her, only half-registering what she was saying. Her drawn out sigh of relief sounded so similar to a noise he heard from her the previous night and he was suddenly having trouble concentrating. He cocked his head to the side, letting her verbally rearrange her morning plans as he tried to block the fantasy he had indulged in the night before from his mind.
"Lee? Did you hear me?"
"What?" He thought back, trying to remember the last thing he heard her say. "I'm sorry, this blown operation has me a little distracted. What did you ask me?"
"Oh, I understand. I asked if you still needed me today."
"Yeah!" His answer came a little too quickly and with too much enthusiasm. He cringed internally at his lack of composure. He needed to pull himself together. "We'll have a lot of work to do, going through the background information to find another angle on this one. We can certainly use another pair of eyes and hands."
He looked down at her hands when he said the word, picturing them as they had moved under her covers the night before. Her hands really were nice, her fingers long and delicate. Her skin was soft, too. That much he knew from his sometimes-habit of taking her hand as he led her somewhere.
"Lee?" He looked up, wondering how much of the conversation he had missed. "Are you sure you're all right?" She looked worryingly like she was about to do something like put her hand on his forehead to gauge his temperature. If there was one thing he knew, it was extremely important that he avoid the feeling of her skin on his. At least for today.
"Sure, I'm all right. Sorry I'm so distracted. I was up pretty late and I didn't get much sleep. " He braced his fingers on his forehead and temple as though he was rubbing away his fatigue, half to sell his 'I'm so tired' story and half to guard against her touching him.
"Oh, Lee. You're only up this early because you couldn't contact me, is that right?" When he nodded, she started to bite her lip with worry. He imagined her doing it to choke back her cries of passion instead and almost groaned out loud.
"Don't worry about it. I should get in there anyway. Sleep's not gonna help us get this guy."
Amanda went to the door and stuck her head through. Apparently satisfied that no one else was up yet, she motioned to him to follow and she went inside. She went straight to one of her upper kitchen cabinets, rooting through it and pulling out a travel mug. She set it on the counter and filled it almost to the top from her coffee pot.
"Just a little cream, right? No sugar?"
"Amanda, you don't have to—"
"Don't be silly, it's just a little coffee. I'll get the mug back from you later. So, cream?"
"Yeah, that's right." He knew better than to argue any further once her mind was made up.
She added the cream to the cup with a graceful flourish he found distracting. He was suddenly assaulted with an image of Amanda slowly pouring the cream over her naked body, then offering herself to him so he could lap it up with his tongue.
"I know how you like cream, I'm glad I have some this morning."
He felt the first stirrings of his body responding to the images tromping through his head and he knew he had to escape.
"I should go." Amanda frowned at him a little and he explained his abruptness. "Your family. They could be down here any minute."
"Oh, right." She sounded like she was agreeing with him, but the frown hadn't cleared her face.
She snapped on the lid and handed the coffee to him, not releasing it right away when he grabbed it. Their fingers brushed together and Lee nearly dropped the cup.
"Lee, are you absolutely sure—"
"I'm fine." He heard the tension in his own voice, something he knew she would interpret as anger. "I'm fine," he repeated, this time making sure he would sound something like normal.
"I'll see you in a few hours." She looked really suspicious of him. He needed to get out of there.
"Right. Thanks for the coffee." He didn't wait for a response, just disappeared through the door and headed for his car.
Lee paced around the bullpen, holding the inch-thick printout of that morning's news as he reread the first item for the sixth time. He threw back the last gulp of his latest cup of coffee and forced himself to concentrate, finally allowing the words to come together and make sense in his head. He read through some terrorist cell movement rumors and then flipped forward to the section detailing upcoming travel plans of prominent Americans to see if there were any correlations. He was just getting into a good working rhythm when Billy leaned out of his office and called over to him.
"Scarecrow, I need to see you in here."
Lee folded the printout together and crossed over to Billy's office, shutting the door behind him and flopping down into the chair across from his desk.
"What do you need, Billy?"
"I need to know what's going on with you. That's what I need."
Lee shrugged. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"You've been stalking around here for at least a week, barking at anyone who gets in your way. Now, I understand you might be feeling a little restless. I gave you a little rope on that one because you haven't been in the field very much lately and I know how you feel about spending time behind a desk."
"Yeah, that's gotta be it." Lee knew he had been a little short with a few people recently, but he really thought Billy was blowing things out of proportion.
"I realize you haven't had as much help as you're used to. Amanda needed that time off, and with the light work load, I couldn't think of any reason not to give it to her."
Lee waited a beat, trying to seem nonchalant. The few times he had seen her, Amanda had never volunteered any reason for her sudden need to be out of the office. No one he had casually brought it up to around the Agency seemed to know, either. The one person he had neglected to shake down was now sitting across from him and this was the best opening he had been given.
"So, what's going on there?"
"You mean, what's so important that it has you doing your own paperwork and dealing with your own files?"
"Yeah, something like that." He examined his fingernails, trying very hard not to appear interested at all.
"If she wanted you to know, I'm sure she would have told you herself."
Lee swore internally and gave a slight shrug as his only response to Billy's non-answer.
"Whatever it is, it isn't tying her up today. I talked to her this morning to let her know about the scrubbed mission, but she'll still be in later. Anything you want us to focus on?"
"Funny you would ask. That's the other reason I called you in here. With Beamon's cover gone, we need to find another way to get on the inside, and fast. I want the two of you to dig into every piece of information we've got and not come out until you can give me another way in."
Lee winced. "Yeah, I was afraid you were gonna say that."
"Most of what you need is already in the vault. I asked Mark from Research to pull the rest of it and get it up to the Q Bureau ASAP."
Lee narrowed his eyes, trying to remember who Mark was. "Is he that tall guy who spends his lunch breaks lifting weights? The one with the fan club in Steno? He really works in Research?"
"He's fully qualified for the job unless there's something you know that I don't."
"No, no. Listen, I'm going to get up there and get started." He left Billy in his office to head upstairs. He wanted to be there to receive the files and send Mark on his way. There was no reason for this guy to hang around any longer than necessary, certainly not long enough for him to run into Amanda, who could easily get sidetracked in a friendly conversation. She was too nice to just tell the guy to get lost so they could work.
"Morning, Mrs. Marsden," he said, once he reached the Georgetown lobby. "Hey, when Amanda comes in, can you have her come straight up to the Q Bureau?"
"Assuming she remembers the code word." Mrs. Marsden smirked a little, just a hint of amusement playing behind her usual inscrutable exterior.
"Oh, come on. It's been a long time since she had trouble...please tell me it's been a long time."
"No, you're right. She hasn't had a problem there for a while. I'll direct her when she arrives."
He thanked her and started up the stairs, taking them two at a time while he fished his keys out of his pocket. Once inside, he started up the coffeemaker. He dropped in an extra half-scoop of grounds, just the way Amanda usually made it. He didn't have a chance to do anything else before there was a knock at the door.
"Yeah, come in," he called, loudly enough to be heard through the door. He turned to find a human brick wall coming through the doorway, balancing a large file storage box on one meaty palm.
"Bringing the files Mr. Melrose asked me to get to you. Where can I put them?"
"Desk's fine. Thanks." Lee gestured to the only clean corner of his desk. Mark set the box down as though it weighed nothing, then turned and rubbed his hands together.
"Anything else I can do to help? I'd be happy to stick around and help you pull files out of the vault."
"No, that's fine. I'm sure they can use you back downstairs." Far away, he added, internally. He still didn't know who or what was distracting Amanda and he thought it was best to keep all the possibilities away when they needed to get down to business. He was going to have enough trouble being around her after what he saw last night, he didn't need to be worried about what was going on in her head on top of that.
"Let me know if you change your mind, I'd really like to help."
"I'll keep that in mind." Lee walked back to the door, holding it open in a not-so-subtle gesture that it was time for Mark to go. Just as Mark squeezed his bodybuilder's frame around Lee and through the door, Lee heard Amanda's voice coming from downstairs.
A ridiculous panic set in before he could counteract it and he dove back inside the Q Bureau and shut the door. He immediately felt idiotic, especially as he had already faced her this morning and felt he was well on his way to putting last night's misadventures behind him. He was ready to be composed and professional, and more importantly, to ban himself from thinking about what he had witnessed.
He started to open the door and then thought better of it. He should not stand there, looking like he had nothing better to do than wait for her to arrive. He lunged toward his desk when he heard Amanda's footsteps in the hallway, but went back to listen at the door when the sound suddenly stopped.
"Good morning, Mrs. King." It was Mark's voice. How was it that even his voice sounded like it lifted weights?
"It's Mark, isn't it? Good morning. And please call me Amanda."
Lee felt his jaw tighten with annoyance. This was exactly what he had been trying to avoid, why he had tried to usher Mark out as quickly as he could. Mark would pull her into a conversation and she would be too polite to break away. Instead, Amanda's footsteps resumed and Lee sighed, realizing it could have been much worse.
"Hey, do you mind if I tell you something?" Mark added, and Lee swore under his breath. "I've read about everything you've done in the field, or as much as I have access to, anyway. You're just...well, you're an inspiration to a lot of us who work here who would love to move into field work. I just wanted you to know that."
"Well, I—"
That was all Amanda was able to get out before Mark began talking again, his words coming out in a rush of what sounded to Lee like nervousness.
"I was just wondering, if you ever had any time, could I sit down with you and ask you a few questions? See if there's anything you can tell me about how I might be able to get into Field Section? I know something like this would be on your own time, so I'd be happy to buy you lunch in return. Or dinner, if you want."
Lee's fists squeezed shut. He knew it. He just knew there was a reason to have a bad feeling about this Mark guy. He mentally added him to his list of people he had to check into, bumping him above Chad from Cryptology.
"I don't know that I could give very good advice. I didn't come to the Agency in a particularly normal way. I might not be very helpful to you."
Before Lee realized what he was doing, he had the door to the Q Bureau open and he stuck his head out the door. He saw Mark looming over Amanda and suddenly realized he needed to come up with a reason why he was leaning out of his office. He blurted out the first thing he could think of.
"Hey, did you remember to include the Anderson files?" Mark turned around and Lee studied the other man's features carefully for any sign that he was maybe a little too annoyed to have been interrupted.
"If that was the Black Lightning operation, then yes, they should be in there." Mark looked perfectly normal, no signs of stress. Lee still had his doubts, but he pushed those to the side for the moment.
"Ah, Amanda. Good, you're here. We really need to get started." Lee tried to sound nothing other than businesslike and detached.
"We'll talk more another time," Amanda said to Mark, patting his hand as she squeezed by him.
"I'll hold you to that." Mark turned to leave, but not before he watched Amanda walking away for just a little longer than Lee felt he should have.
"Oh, you started the coffee. It smells delicious." She took in a deep breath as she entered the room and then let it out in another distracting sigh. He countered by opening the file box and taking out the first one he could grab, thumbing through it until he stopped hearing that sigh play over and over in his head.
She moved around him to get behind his desk to the coffeemaker, brushing against him a little as she passed. Once she had her coffee, she turned and began to frown at the cluttered surface of his desk.
"Where are we going to work? Should we clear some of this away? I can pull up a chair to the side and we should be able to work that way."
He blinked down at the desk for a minute, trying to focus on what she was saying, but seeing little flickers of his fantasy instead. The file box sat right where he had imagined putting Amanda before they tore out of their clothes and he was finally buried inside her. Now she wanted to work there, right next to him, as they were trapped together in this room for the entire day. His mouth went dry as he realized how impossible this was going to be.
"That won't be very comfortable for you." It was the only thing he could think of. He had to do something to keep her from occupying that corner of his desk until he got his head back on straight.
"I'll be fine, it's not like we haven't done it before."
"No, I have a better idea." He picked up the phone and punched in a few numbers. "Yeah, Facilities? This is Scarecrow, up in the Q Bureau. I'm going to need another desk up here as soon as you can bring it. This is priority one, you got that?"
He hung up the phone with a feeling of satisfaction, sure that they would get something up here to help him with his problem before very long.
"You didn't have to do that. I would have been fine over here."
"We'll need the extra space to spread out all these files anyway. Why don't you take this list and start pulling things from the vault. I'll start clearing off my desk. Hopefully they'll have the other desk here before we're done with that and we can just dive in."
She took the list from him, her eyes bulging when she saw how long it was.
"I'd better get started." She crossed the room and then pulled back on the heavy vault door, her skirt swirling around her legs as she walked. It reminded him of the way her legs had tangled in her sheet the night before. Amanda pulled her first file as he continued to watch her and he wondered idly if the sheet had frustrated her or if she had been too far gone to notice or care.
"Are you all right? You aren't doing anything." Her voice echoed around the metallic walls of the vault.
"Sorry, just thinking. This is so much information. I was just trying to figure out where we should start."
"I agree. It's pretty overwhelming. Maybe we just need to skim through as much as we can as soon as I get everything pulled and something will jump out at us."
"Yeah, you're right." Lee flopped into his chair, his mood brightening a little as he realized he was starting to feel more normal around her. Amanda was still Amanda, and they were still a good team. He was perfectly capable of forgetting what he had seen and heard and going right back to the way things should be between them.
After all, what she had done was completely natural. She was a healthy woman with a busy, complicated life. It was unrealistic to think she didn't have physical needs. Now that he had witnessed exactly how deep her desire ran, he wondered how long this kind of life would be enough for her. She could find a job that left her more free time, gave her more of a chance at normality. He was still considering this when two people from Facilities arrived, delivering the second desk.
"Don't know that I've ever heard of a desk being given priority one status, Stetson." The Facilities Manager continued to grumble under his breath as they maneuvered it through the door. His tone seemed to insinuate that Lee had been too abrupt with him on the phone earlier.
"Hello, Mr. Henckel!" Amanda emerged from the vault with a stack of files balanced in her arms. "I really appreciate you getting this up here so fast. It's really going to help us."
"It's no real trouble, Mrs. King." Talking to her, Henckel was suddenly singing a much different tune. "I'm glad someone can use this old thing. It's a little battered but it was all I could scare up."
"Well, it's a big, flat surface, and you can see how useful that will be with all the files we're dealing with." Amanda gave him one of her warmest smiles and Henckel returned it. That was probably the first time Lee had ever seen the old man smile.
"Need anything else, you let us know, all right?" Henckel gestured to his subordinate and they were out the door, leaving Lee and Amanda alone again.
"This really was a good idea. I don't know how we could ever keep all this straight just using your desk." Amanda began arranging the files she pulled from the vault on the new desk, flipping a few of them open to check something before sorting them into piles.
"Did you find something already?" He was used to the way Amanda worked, and when she started making piles, it usually meant she was seeing the beginning of a connection.
"I'm not sure yet. I need to read a little more before I figure it out."
"Let me know as soon as you think you've found something. Billy was pretty clear this morning. We have to find another way in."
"You got it." She slid into the chair behind the new desk, never taking her eyes off the case file open in front of her.
They worked that way for a few hours, and Lee was relieved at how easily he was concentrating as he went from file to file. Amanda interrupted a few times, asking several seemingly unrelated questions that had him wondering what kind of track she was on, but he let her go on her own until she decided to share it with him.
"Oh, where is it?" Amanda opened file after file, groaning with impatience each time she didn't find what she was looking for.
Lee had to resettle himself in his chair as he listened to the sounds she was making. They reminded him of her frustrated moans the night before, before she really seemed to settle into the rhythm her body needed. He could almost feel the ivy and wood of the trellis in his hands and see her body writhing under the sheet.
"I'm sorry if I'm distracting you. I just can't find the file that had the section with the..." She trailed off, reading part of one of the three files she was trying to hold open at the same time. "I know it's here somewhere. I'm just so frustrated."
He tried very hard to say something, or at least make some sort of noise to acknowledge her. He managed a low hum as he actively blocked himself from thinking about exactly how frustrated he knew Amanda was and how very much his body wanted to fix that for her. Right now.
"I'll be quieter." She looked upset and uncomfortable, her shoulders slumping a little as she rifled through the files. She must have interpreted his hum as annoyance.
"You're fine. I know it helps you to think out loud. I'm frustrated too, if it helps."
"Well, it shouldn't, because I'd like us to find something to take to Mr. Melrose, but it does. Thank you."
"Hey, maybe what we need is a little break. How about I go out and bring back something for lunch?" He wasn't really hungry, but he did need some time outside this room to get his head back on straight and his body under control.
"That would be great." She looked up at him briefly, using her finger to mark the place where she had stopped reading.
"How about the deli?" That was an eight block round trip, more than enough time for him to pull himself together.
"Sure, get me anything but chicken salad."
He laughed. "Yeah, I don't think we're ever getting you chicken salad again." He remembered chasing Amanda around for a day while she was under the effects of the hallucinogen that had been meant for him, one of the many times she had been in danger because of him.
"Yeah, I think I'm done with those, especially since none of you ever filled me in on what I did while I was drugged."
"Amanda, I need to ask you something." He also needed to stall for a minute before he got up from his chair for the effects of her frustrated moans to wear off.
"Okay." She looked a little nervous, which made him worry she really was hiding something.
"Are you thinking about leaving the Agency?"
Her immediate reaction gave him a better answer than he would get from anything she said. Her mouth fell open in shock and she dropped the folder in her hands, staring over at him in confusion. "Do you think I should leave the Agency?"
"No!" He winced. He had not expected her to turn the question around on him and his answer came out a little too easily. "Not unless you feel you have to."
"Then why are you bringing it up?"
He cleared his throat uncomfortably. At some point, it had become just a little dangerous for him to be completely straightforward with her.
"You haven't been around much lately, I thought you might be..." He trailed off, rejecting several different ways to finish his sentence. They all made him sound too invested in her answer.
She studied him carefully and he tried very hard not to show any reaction at all, mostly because she had side-stepped his question so far and he was more likely to get a completely honest answer from her if he gave her nothing to read in his body language. That was straight out of every textbook ever written on soft interrogation strategy, to give your subject nothing but a huge silence you knew they would want to fill.
"There's a big fundraiser every year at Phillip and Jamie's school. I declined a place on the committee last year, and the year before that, too. I didn't want to miss it again, not in Phillip's last year at this school. It takes up a lot of time, but Mr. Melrose assured me I could take these days off and he would let me know if there was something really urgent."
"Why didn't you mention it?" He clamped his mouth shut, annoyed at himself for asking. The question sounded either accusatory or needy, and neither of those was good.
She looked away from him to answer, like she was a little uncomfortable with what she was going to say. "Well, I didn't get the feeling you were all that interested in what was going on at Phillip and Jamie's school, so I didn't bother you with it. I knew Mr. Melrose would let me know if you needed me for something. It just seemed unnecessary." She looked back at him, giving him that look she had that always made him think she could see straight through him. "Are you upset with me about something?"
"No, I was just curious about the time off, that's all."
"It's more than that. You seem pretty jumpy. Are you sure I didn't do anything to—"
"I'm sure. I think I'm just relying on too much coffee and too little sleep."
"Maybe I should go out to get the sandwiches and you should stay here."
"No, I think I could use the walk. The fresh air will wake me up." He got up, walking to the door as quickly as he reasonably could while still looking nonchalant. "I'm taking my keys, so go ahead and lock the door behind me."
He went through the door and waited on the other side until he heard her flip the lock into place, then took off for the deli. Once he got outside, he decided to use the walk to talk some sense into himself. He needed to be completely honest, so he could get all these thoughts out of his system and move on.
He decided to handle it like a case, and start with what he knew. He and Amanda had spent several years working closely together. She was one of the few women he had ever allowed into his life this way and the only one who had never betrayed him or left him alone. It was only natural for him to feel a connection to her.
Now that he'd been stuck on that trellis and witnessed some things he never should have, he had to figure out how to isolate those experiences from his personal relationship with her. He had to compartmentalize, as any good agent would when he had to. He needed to visualize it.
In one area, he put his partnership with Amanda. He acknowledged the depth of their friendship, even allowed himself to admit to some of the complicated and conflicted feelings he had for her. He layered onto that his resolve to keep their association completely platonic, clearly labeling her as hands off territory. Her job was to work with him and help him when she could, and his job was to make sure she stayed safe. A clear head was the only way to ensure he would be effective.
He gritted his teeth, knowing the next thoughts would be more challenging. He created a separate area in his mind, very distinct from the first. He allowed himself to remember everything he had seen the night before, every sound and every movement she made. He admitted to being aroused, that he had been intrigued by this part of her he had never witnessed before. He looked at the situation objectively, rationalizing that he was a healthy adult male and that, from a purely clinical standpoint, he would have been affected by any woman under similar circumstances. His reaction was heightened due to his close association with Amanda. It was natural to be curious about her given how much time they spent together.
He pondered his decision to fantasize about her after he got home and to construct a scenario in his mind so compelling that he could almost feel the heat of her body around him. That had been a mistake. It would never have happened if he had properly separated his relationship with her from his reaction to watching her in an intimate, highly sexual moment.
He accepted that mistake, filing it away with his understanding of his physical reaction. He had been tired, and in his weakened state, he had blurred a line that needed to stay solid and unwavering. If he wanted to avoid distractions or another unfortunate mistake, he had to keep these two areas inside his mind as separate as he could.
With that handled, he took care of lunch and then forced his mind back to the case, using the walk back to test his memory on the details he had read so far. He might be the person going undercover soon, depending on what angles he and Amanda were able to find going through the files today.
By the time he was done, he knew where the gaps in his memory were and he had begun to make some mental notes about what he needed to go over to fill them in. He was feeling more confident, more like his usual self.
He took his badge from Mrs. Marsden, settling easily into this new, better mood. He had his keys in his hand by the time he got upstairs, but he froze in place when he heard voices coming from behind the door. One was Amanda's, but he couldn't hear enough of the other one to place it.
He began to quietly turn the doorknob, his breath catching when he found it unlocked. He put his other hand inside his jacket, letting it rest on the grip of his holstered gun so he would be ready to react if Amanda was in trouble.
He pushed open the door and saw Amanda working quietly, right where he had left her. Everything seemed fine, but he stayed on his guard as he went inside, just in case.
"You're back, great. I'm starving." Amanda smiled up at him without a hint of stress or anxiety, so he slid his hand out of his jacket casually, as though he had never been concerned at all.
He reached into the bag and pulled out her lunch, setting it on the desk in front of her. "Is there someone in here with you?"
"Oh, yeah. Mark came up again, asking if he could help pull the rest of the files." She leaned forward, whispering so that Lee could barely hear her. "He's just so eager, I felt bad sending him away. I gave him a list of a few things I was about to get up and look for."
"We talked about leaving this door unlocked when you're here alone." He channeled a little of the annoyance he felt about Mark's return into scolding her about the door.
"I'm not alone."
"He's not an agent, Amanda. What's he going to do if someone bursts in here?"
"He'd probably scare them half to death. Have you seen the size of his arms?" Amanda made a comically large circle with her hand around her arm, miming an enormous bicep.
"Security is too light up here. When you're here and I'm not, the door stays locked. End of discussion." She looked a little hurt, but he wasn't willing to give on this one. He was starting to enjoy taking over the Q Bureau, but they were much more exposed here and he didn't want to take any chances.
"I've got these pulled for you, Mrs. King." Mark reappeared, pushing the heavy vault door open easily with one hand. "Would you like me to stay and go through them, see if I can find any cross-references?"
Lee turned away and picked up a file from his own desk, though he watched Amanda carefully out of the corner of his eye.
"No, I think I need to read through them myself. I'm not quite sure what I'm looking for yet."
"I wish I knew how you did it. I would have missed that connection you showed me in those other witness accounts, that's for sure."
Lee desperately wanted to break into the conversation and send Mark on his way, but waited to see how Amanda would handle it.
"I still don't know if that means anything. Might be a dead end."
"Even so, it was pretty amazing. I can see now why they pulled you into the field." Mark grinned at Amanda, looking like a complete idiot by Lee's estimation.
"It didn't exactly happen like that." Amanda looked over at Lee and they shared a look for a little longer than he thought was a good idea. "As far as how it did happen, that's need to know." Lee continued to stare at her, then cleared his throat and forced himself to look away.
"Well, I'll let you get to your lunch." Mark hovered for a moment despite his stated intention to leave and then seemed to give up. He set the new stack of files on Amanda's desk and left, his shoulders a little slumped as he pulled the door closed behind him.
Lee sat behind his desk and laid out his sandwich, feeling oddly satisfied about the way Amanda had handled Mark. He took a bite and then nearly choked once Amanda did the same. She must not have been kidding about being hungry, because she let out a long, satisfied moan at her first taste of her sandwich.
It took great effort to swallow, as his mouth was suddenly dry. Against every instinct for self-preservation that he had, he shut his eyes and let a perfect image of her body straining toward climax replay itself in his mind. This was the sound she had held back, the one he had heard a shadow of even through her attempt to muffle it.
"What do I owe you?" Her voice cut through the haze of his daydream and he blinked as he tried to make sense of it.
"What do you..." He stammered through the words, trying to buy time. His ever-helpful imagination had conjured an impossible scenario of him looking up at her naked, sated body from between her legs before hearing her utter those same words. Then she would flip him onto his back, wrapping her mouth around his cock to repay him for his hard work.
"For the sandwich?"
"Don't worry about it." He blanked out his mind as he stared at her, willing himself to remember the talk he had given himself on the walk over to the deli. "It's a working lunch, I'll expense it."
"You should give me the receipt before you forget about it." She smirked at him, and something about the normalcy of that brought him back down to earth.
"I'll take care of it. You just get back to what you were working on."
"Yes, sir." She leaned over the desk, pulling one open file over another and lining something up between the two.
He took another bite of his sandwich, relieved to feel his body returning to normal. He rummaged through the file box on the corner of his desk, reading the labels on the folders to see if one sparked something for him. He picked out two, thumbing through the first as he settled in to read.
He found something in one file that seemed familiar, so he flipped through the others he had worked with that morning looking for something to match up. He was beginning to give up hope when he heard Amanda hum thoughtfully to herself, as though something had just clicked for her.
"What have you got?"
"I don't know, but this is really strange. Look at these columns of numbers on this page Beamon was able to sneak out." She held one paper out, toward him, and he got up to look at it.
"What am I looking for?"
"I think a part of each one is a bank account number, but they're stuck in the middle of a bunch of other numbers. I also found this list of their accounts buried in all of the up-front surveillance done before Beamon went in." She handed another sheet to him and he looked between the two, trying to find the matches Amanda was talking about. After looking for several minutes, he finally found his first one.
"How in the world did you notice this?" He couldn't imagine how she could have put this together.
"See this account number, with the five ones in a row? I noticed the same pattern on Beamon's page. I decided to see if more of the numbers matched up, and they do."
"Any idea what the other numbers are?"
"Not yet, but they've got to be something important, don't you think? Maybe it's code. Do you think I should take a copy of this down to Cryptology?"
"Yeah, that sounds...wait." Lee pictured Chad's face lighting up as soon as Amanda appeared in his department. He just managed to get rid of Mark, the last thing they needed was another guy contriving reasons to distract Amanda from their work. "Did I hear something about you finding a connection in some witness statements?"
"Well, yes, but I don't think that lead is as solid as this one is."
"It's okay, we can take care of both at the same time. Why don't you go back to the witness statements, see if you can make anything more out of them. I'll take these other pages down to Crypto while you do that."
Reluctantly, she handed the papers over to him. "Give them copies. I want those back. I just have a funny feeling what we're looking for is in there."
"I'll be right back. I know just the person to take them to."
When he reached the department, he saw his quarry right away. Ethyl was the grande dame of Crypto, starting her career there thirty years ago and working her way up until she ran the place. If there was a code to be broken here, she would find it. Best of all, she wasn't Chad. No unwanted distractions for Amanda.
He turned on the charm and talked to Ethyl, trying to intrigue her with the case by making her pull the details out of him one by one. He kept taking the papers back from her, feigning a need to consult them as they talked, but it was just a ploy to make her want to hold them. That would make her more interested in taking on the codebreaking task personally.
"Scarecrow, for the last time, let me get a look at that. I can't tell you anything if you won't even let me see it."
He could see how interested she was behind the annoyance and he knew he had her. She would work on this one herself.
"I can't let you keep them. I'll need you to make copies. Amanda and I want to keep working this too, see if we can find anything ourselves."
Ethyl stared at him for a minute, pure fire in her eyes. "Do you honestly think you'll find something there before we do?"
"I'm that desperate to find a break in this case."
She walked the papers to the copier and back, handing the originals back to Lee. "I'll call you as soon as I find something. Don't get too comfortable in that office of yours because I'm going to find that break for you."
Lee waited until he was well away from Crypto to let the smile break out over his face. He played that exactly right. They had the best codebreaker the Agency had to offer working on this for them, someone he could trust. Someone not named Chad.
Once he was back upstairs, he tried the door, but found it locked. He used his key and went inside, starting to talk before he even saw her.
"Crypto's on it. We should hear something before—" He stopped abruptly once he looked over at her. She was stretching out her back, her arms pulled over her head, straining toward the ceiling. "Are you all right?" He flashed back again to the night before, vividly remembering her satisfied stretch after her orgasm.
"I think I've been in one position too long, and I started the day with my neck and shoulders a little tight. I need to move around for a minute."
She took the papers back from him as he stood there, helplessly mute. He pictured her with her back arched, body tense as her fingers worked toward her release. Yes, he could see how she might have strained a muscle or two.
"I could see what I can do." He was unsure exactly what he was offering her for a moment, imagining so many different ways he could help her relieve tension.
"You don't have to do that. We should get back to work."
"I don't mind." He circled around behind her, letting his hands fall on her shoulders. He ran his fingers over her, looking for all the places her tension had settled. He got a whiff of the subtle perfume she used as he started slow circles against one particular place on her neck that seemed to need his attention and he found himself fighting an insane urge to press his lips there.
"Oh, that's so good." Amanda leaned into him and he could feel the heat from her body on his. He concentrated on finding new knots to work out on her neck and shoulders, feeling her relax under his hands. "This is just what I needed."
He let his mind wander, wanting to concentrate on anything other than the feel of her skin against his and the sound of her response to his touch. He wondered, not for the first time, how exactly he had gotten here. He had fought against this, against her, as hard as he could. Yet, here he was, no longer caring how scared he was that he could lose her someday and wondering if he could ever be everything she needed.
"Is that better?" He whispered the words directly into her ear, noticing her shiver when his breath played over her skin.
"Yes, thank you." Her voice was deeper and breathy. The unwiseness of their situation seemed to hit both of them at once. He felt a wave of it come over him just as Amanda's shoulders straightened under his hands, her body pushing away from his. "I should get back to these comparisons, but thank you, I feel a lot better now."
He stepped back as she pulled out the chair, sitting down and burying her nose into the papers he had returned to her. He walked slowly back to his desk, feeling strangely like there was something he needed to do. And yes, part of him wanted to lay her over that new desk and learn every inch of her body, but there was something beneath that, something separate.
"We're going to be here for a while, aren't we?" Amanda looked right at him, her expression impossible to read.
"Looks like this is going to take some time. Can you stay?"
She smiled at him, then gave him the answer he desperately needed to hear. "I can stay as long as you need me."