"Francine, I can't wear this!" Amanda exclaimed in a horrified voice.
"You're not going to a PTA meeting, Amanda. You're easy and you're going out to watch submarine races with a hot date and a bucket of beer." Francine retorted.
Amanda tugged down ineffectually on the hems of the very short denim shorts that Francine had insisted she borrow. She tucked the hem of her sleeveless white cotton blouse into the waistband neatly.
Francine stood back and pursed her lips, giving Amanda a once-over look. "Uh-uh. That won't do. Come here!" She reached forward and unbuttoned two buttons at Amanda's neckline and the bottom three of the shirt. Taking the shirt-tails, she tied them in a quick knot under Amanda's breasts, baring her midriff.
"What the Sam Hill do you think you are doing, Francine?" Amanda asked in a shocked voice.
"What does it look like I'm doing? I'm completing your transformation from a frumpy housewife to a backwoods sexpot." Francine sniped.
"I am not a frumpy housewife!" Amanda said between clenched teeth.
"Not tonight, anyway." Francine replied slyly .
"What do you mean " Not tonight?" Amanda demanded.
"Exactly that. You look like Miguel's date should look."
Amanda just snorted. To tell the truth, she didn't want to be Miguel's date. She wanted to be Lee's. "Francine, I'm too old to be anybody's sexpot."
Francine gripped Amanda's shoulders and looked her square in the eye. "Ha! Amanda, it's just a question of attitude!….Come on, I haven't done your jewelry or make-up." Dragging a reluctant Amanda by the hand, she pulled her into the closet-sized bathroom.
Amanda moaned quietly, but Francine was undeterred. She didn't allow Amanda to face the mirror until her work was complete. Amanda turned to face the mirror and gasped. The effect was dramatic from the overstated make-up to the dangling earrings that all but reached her shoulders. "I look like a hussy!"
Francine smiled a little too broadly. "Good! Just the effect I was working for!" She brushed her hands on her thighs and said, "Now that you're done, I better start in on myself." She headed for the small bedroom to complete her own transformation.
Amanda called out over her shoulder, "I didn't know you were going out too!" She began to daub off some of the make-up. Only so much excess was really called for.
Francine's voice floated down the length of the hallway that separated them. "I'm not going out, but since our friend Jose Rosado will find out that you won't be here, I'll be very surprised if I don't have a visitor this evening. Make sure you don't get back before mid-night…." Her voice was muffled as she pulled a skintight shirt over her head. "I'm going to have to convince him that he had the night of his life."
"Francine, you wouldn't!" Amanda exclaimed.
Francine re-entered the bathroom and began applying her make-up with a trowel. "Well, I would if I had to, but thanks to my good friend Mickey Finn here," she tapped a medicine bottle resting by the sink, "I shouldn't need to. If I have to, I have a stun gun under the mattress. A girl has to be prepared for any contingency."
Amanda wondered if she would ever have the confidence and the willpower that Francine exhibited. She felt wholly inadequate to the job when she was called on to perform this kind of subterfuge. She looked in the mirror and bit her lip.
Francine looked at her face in the mirror. "Amanda, you can do this. It's just Lee, it's not like he would ever try to pull anything."
Amanda let out a short forced breath. Little did Francine know where things stood between Lee and her, actually to come to the point, she wasn't sure where they stood either. But she was right, when push came to shove, there was no-one Amanda could trust more than Lee.
They heard a knock on the door. Francine glanced at the clock; "Showtime, Amanda."
Amanda gave a sharp nod and headed to the door. Francine called from behind her. "Don't be afraid to swing your hips a little more. Didn't you bring any higher heels?"
"No, I didn't Francine!" Amanda replied through gritted teeth. She had had enough and the evening hadn't even started. In her irritation, she pulled the door open forcefully to face Lee.
Lee's eyes opened wide and he lost his breath. It was like someone had punched him right in the solar plexus. Her irritation had brought color to her cheeks and a flash of fire to her eyes. Those legs….damn, her legs stretched to eternity. He began to stutter…."Am..Amanda, uh, um… you look…uh…"
"Like Daisy Mae in warpaint!" Amanda retorted.
"Well, uh, it looks good on you!" Lee replied, beginning to be able to find words again. He knew that he would never be able to look at Amanda quite the same way again. Remembering Amanda dressed in short shorts and strappy, heeled sandals would keep him up late at night. She looked like any red-blooded teenage boy's dream tonight. He found that not all of his tastes had quite grown up, after all. "So did Francine help you, uh, with your new….look?"
"I'm not sure I would say she helped me. Let me get my purse and we'll go." Amanda gave an aggrieved sigh.
"Goodnight Amanda, remember don't come home before midnight!" Francine called down the hallway.
"Kind of a reverse curfew, huh?" Lee asked with a quick grin.
"Please…let's just go!" Amanda replied.
"Your wish is my command, my lady!" Lee swept out his hand to invite her into the cab of the black pick-up truck.
He closed his eyes momentarily as she climbed up into the cab, flashing a long expanse of uncovered leg. There was only so much temptation a man could take. Lee climbed into the drivers seat and an awkward silence reigned. He gazed at the road, the rearview mirror, the speedometer….anywhere but his companion in the cab that suddenly seemed much too small. Finally he forced himself to make conversation. "So, are you and Francine getting along?"
"Until the last half hour when she decided to become the beautician from my worst nightmare, I'd say we were getting along just fine. Actually, she's been pretty….nice." Amanda's voice faltered. She realized in surprise to herself that she had actually been becoming closer to the supercilious blonde agent.
"Francine's not bad, really." Lee contributed. "She's just had such a tough battle making it in a guy's profession that she doesn't realize that she doesn't always need to fight."
Amanda thought quietly to herself that he had provided a pretty astute observation. She hadn't realized he thought so much about his colleagues.
"Mmm….maybe you're right. So where are we going?" Amanda asked.
"Not much out here, is there?" Lee countered as they made their way through miles of dark roadway. "There's a hill with a good outlook over Rosada's camp near here. I thought we could chat and look at the stars while we wait and see if there are any deliveries this evening. Rosada doesn't really trust me, yet. He seemed really anxious to have me out of the way this evening and was real happy that I had a date with you……I think he was the only happy one in the camp."
"What?!" Amanda asked.
"Well, let's just say you left a lot of broken hearts out there by going with me this evening." Lee laughed and glanced over at her.
She looked shocked. Amanda really had no idea how attractive she really was. If any of them had gotten a look at her tonight, he would have had to fight them off with a stick. The combination of her underlying innocence and her sultry appearance was a lethal draw. He pulled in an unsteady breath and pulled his eyes back to the road.
"I don't think it's their hearts they were thinking about." Amanda retorted dryly.
Lee coughed in surprise. Maybe she wasn't as innocent as she seemed. "So, what do you think of working at a Taco stand with Francine?" He switched to a more neutral subject.
"As Francine said, I don't think I want to eat, see or smell another taco for the rest of my life," she laughed.
"I remember this fantastic Taco stand down near a surf shop I used to go to in Florida. The colonel just hated my going surfing," he recollected. "Man, I could have lived there forever and never wanted to eat anything else." Lee laughed.
"You surf?….Of course you surf, you're an adrenaline junkie." Amanda laughed softly to herself.
"What's so funny about my surfing?" he asked, mildly affronted.
"I can't see you as a carefree surfer dude, but I guess I can see you trying to kill yourself in yet another sport….." Amanda ruefully shook her head. "We are so different, Lee."
"What!?…Surfing isn't that hard, Amanda. I could teach you in an afternoon." Lee said in an afterthought.
Amanda laughed outright. "When would we ever be in a position for you to teach me how to surf? Besides, I can't see myself waxing down the bottom of my surfboard and hitting the waves." She chuckled at the image.
"You don't wax the bottom, you wax the top so you can get enough grip to stand on it. You could do it, Amanda. You sure have the figure for it." Lee felt the color rise in his cheeks as he realized that he hadn't edited his thoughts.
Amanda blushed lightly. "That isn't the point I was making, Lee. I'm just pointing out how different we are, I mean, we really don't have anything in common."
"What?!" Lee replied indignantly. When had Amanda written him off so completely?
"I mean it, Lee. Really….name me one thing we have in common." She challenged him.
Lee was startled by the question. He felt so comfortable with Amanda and felt they were growing closer than ever before. Clearly she didn't feel the same way. His thoughts scattered as he tried to quickly point out to her how very much they actually had in common…..but his thoughts just wouldn't come fast enough.
"See my point? Surfing!" Amanda snorted lightly.
He pulled the truck into a clearing. It was a high hill with a steep cliff that overlooked the valley below. He parked the truck so that they could sit in the back to face the view below.
"Here?" she asked.
"I guess this is the happening spot in Grief Hollow." Lee responded.
"Where on earth did they come up with that name?" Amanda wondered.
"I guess the valley wasn't settled by optimists," Lee quipped.
They walked to the back of the truck and Lee spread out a worn cotton blanket across the truckbed. Amanda clambered in and sat with her arms wrapped tightly around her drawn-up knees, tilting her head to look at the stars.
Lee leapt lightly into the back of the truck with her. "We do too have things in common." He couldn't let the topic go.
Amanda quirked a closed mouthed smile at him that he could just make out in the twilight. "Okay, Scarecrow, name one."
Lee frantically thought back to all he knew about Amanda. Again, he was slow to respond, "Pot roast!" he pulled out.
"Ha! I like pot roast. You like Enoki mushrooms." she replied. She was perversely beginning to enjoy herself. She didn't know why she was driven to point out their differences when all she wanted was to be closer to him. Francine's ministrations had put her in an uncharacteristically peevish mood this evening.
"Old movies, restaurants, ….we both like sunsets." He countered.
"Uh-uh, Lee, most people like those things!" she rejoined.
"You know what, Amanda King? You are a fraud!" Lee said with growing confidence.
"Me, a fraud?" she asked.
"Yes…," he leaned in closer to her resting his weight on one hand. "You are an adrenaline junkie, too."
"What?!" she sputtered. She was the most cautious person she knew!
"Uh-huh. This job….you keep nearly getting yourself killed and you still come back for more. You crave it….mystery, danger…intrigue." His voice had deepened and their faces were mere inches apart.
She pulled back slightly and coughed, taken aback. She had never thought of herself that way. She realized in surprised pleasure that her partner did. "Maybe you're right." She allowed.
"Maybe?!" he countered with a lift of his brow.
"OK - so you may well be right." she agreed half-heartedly, with a shrug and small smile.
Lee laughed softly to himself, happy to have turned the tables on her. He reached into a red cooler on his right and pulled out two cold bottles of beer, quickly prying off the tops with a church key. He passed one to her and tilted his head up to gaze at the stars above.
Amanda took a sip and pulled a face, before placing the bottle back down by her feet. Lee glanced over at her. "What's wrong?"
"Sorry…I hate beer. It tastes like soap."
"I thought you loved getting beer…..didn't you and Joe always get pizza and beer at that place Doobie's?" he asked.
"Dooley's," she corrected him absently. "Pizza was all we could afford when Joe was in law school. Beer was Joe's favorite, not mine."
"Well, personally, I'd rather be sharing a nice bottle of Cabarnet with you right now, but that doesn't go with my image back at camp," Lee rejoined. "Aha! One more thing we have in common! Red wine - see, I told you! When this is all over we can split a bottle of wine and never drink beer again!"
"I'd like that," Amanda replied softly with a gentle smile.
"So Joe has the boys this weekend?" Lee asked rhetorically. He couldn't resist asking her about her ex, though he didn't know what made him do it. It was like needing to probe a sore tooth. You touched it and realized, yeah, it still hurt, again and again.
"Mmm. He was late, I was afraid he was going to stand them up again, but he came." Amanda sighed and then took a long sip of the detested beer. While having Joe back in the country was good for the boys, in many ways her life had been easier when he lived out of the country.
"Don't you ever get angry at him, Amanda?" Lee asked softly. While Joe King wasn't altogether a bad guy, he couldn't reconcile and forgive the way he had left Amanda to shoulder the burden of raising her sons alone. He didn't understand, wholly, how Amanda could. Yet, she wasn't bitter like most of the divorcees he had known.
"I'm not a saint, Lee. Of course I get angry!" Amanda smiled wryly. "It's just that having divorced parents is hard enough for the boys. I don't have to make it harder by having them know I'm angry with their dad. Every kid deserves to think both of his parents are perfect." She shrugged with resignation and took another long pull of beer.
Lee shook his head silently, then took a long pull on his own beer bottle. "You're a better person than I would be, Amanda."
Her beer bottle was mostly empty and Lee provided her with another one. She had become re-accustomed to the taste, and having finished one bottle she felt a little more carefree and comfortable with herself in her scanty attire. She tipped her head back and felt the cool night air on her face. Her tongue loosened and she offered, "You know, we actually tried counseling before it all fell apart."
"You did?" Lee replied skeptically; he had little use for counselors and shrinks.
"After six months of counseling, you know what she told me? That Joe loved me as much as he was capable of loving anyone." She laughed quietly and bitterly.
"Yeah?" his voice encouraged her to continue as he gazed at her profile.
Amanda shook her head at the memory. "Darn it all, Lee. What more could I do? He loved me as much as he could love anyone….but he should have loved me more." She whispered it with a ferocity he had never seen in her. "That's when I decided to get a divorce." Her lips tightened in the effort to suppress remembered tears.
"Amanda….," Lee threaded his fingers through hers and coaxed her into looking at him, "Amanda…he was a fool. A damn fool." His other hand cupped her cheek as his thumb brushed over her lower lip. "He had everything any man could ever hope for and he didn't know it…..You were right. You deserve more." Both of their barriers had dropped and his heart was in his voice. It was more imperative to him at that moment that Amanda be comforted than he protect his own heart.
"Thanks, Lee" Amanda responded, her voice cracking. Unconsciously, they both leant in for a kiss, their eyes drifting shut. The moment couldn't be denied. This time, she knew they would actually do so and she trembled lightly.
"What the hell?!" Lee's eyes snapped open as he heard engine noise approaching their secluded spot. Amanda all but groaned in frustration. Not again.
"Damn, I might have known they'd follow us!" Lee snarled, ripping his shirt open as buttons flew everywhere. "Quick, Amanda, undress a little," he waved a hand generally towards her upper half, "you need to look a little ravished, undo some buttons or take off your bra."
"What?! Lee, are you crazy? I will do no such thing!" Amanda said sharply.
"Amanda - they think we came up here to fool around! If we don't look like it, they'll figure out why we're really here. Either you undress some or I'll help you do it." Lee replied fiercely.
"If I undress any more, Lee, I'll be buck naked! Francine didn't leave me with many clothes!" Fiery sparks flew from her eyes as her cheeks flamed.
"Use your imagination!" Lee shot back.
She turned her back to him and quickly unsnapped her bra, pulling it off underneath the cover of her sleeveless shirt. She draped it over the side of the truck, then unfastened and refastened the few buttons of her blouse so they were misaligned. She reached up to muss up her hair, and whipped around to face him. "Satisfied?!"
Not nearly, Lee thought; his mouth ran dry. She was a siren and she didn't even know it. He nodded sharply, not trusting himself to speak. He wanted nothing so much as to plunder that mouth and lose himself in the rush of desire that threatened to consume him. He didn't need to know that she wore lacy peach lingerie. It was much easier to imagine her in white serviceable cotton. His fingers itched; he wanted to complete the job she had begun….so damn much.
The engine noise was getting louder and closer. "I'm sorry, Amanda….just play along, OK?" He wrapped one arm around her in a vise of steel and bent her back to the bed of the truck. Her eyes widened and he could feel her heart pound in what he presumed was fear. "Don't worry, Amanda, I'll keep you safe." He reassured her.
From everything but her attraction to him, Amanda thought wildly. She should be afraid, she should be scared spitless. But all she could think of was his scent and the slide of her hands along his back under his loosened shirt. He felt so good. Then, as his lips scorched her neck, all her thoughts fled.
Lee bit back a groan as he felt Amanda's hands slide up his back and he went up in flames. There was no way to hide his reaction to her and she was sure to know now as his body was crushing hers in the bed of the truck. His hand fisted in her curls as he bent to kiss her neck. He had the oddest sense of déjà vu, though for the life of him he didn't know why. He couldn't remember when he had ever wanted a woman this much, and it was his partner, damn it. He felt Amanda arch against him and her leg slid over his hip and he moaned incoherently. Did she have any idea how much she affected him?
Amanda was lost in sensation and insensible to the fact that another truck had swept into the clearing, it paused with its headlights washing over the embracing couple. Satisfied that they were otherwise fully engaged, the truck peeled off leaving a light cloud of dust behind.
Lee waited until he heard the truck's engine noise die away. He reluctantly pulled back from Amanda, resting his weight on his left forearm and gazing down into her fathomless dark eyes. He was pleased to note they were as unfocused as his own. She wasn't immune to the attraction between them either, even if she thought they had nothing in common. He all but snorted; they sure had this in common.
"I think they're gone." He found his voice was husky and cleared his throat. He felt his right hand almost unconsciously slide down her smooth left leg as he pulled himself away, and he couldn't suppress a shudder as he fought to bring his body back under his own control. He lay on his back and covered his face in his hands, drinking in great draughts of the nighttime air. Think of a cold ocean swim, he told himself,….the lineup of the Orioles….the multiplication table….'Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, Delta'….
Amanda lay beside him, quivers still wracking her body. She should be embarrassed. She couldn't believe the wanton response that Lee could so easily wring from her, when most men couldn't even interest her enough for a goodnight kiss. "You sure they're gone?" her voice cracked.
"Yeah." He couldn't trust his voice to say more. He couldn't trust himself to return to the kiss they were about to share before they were interrupted. In his current state there was no way he would be able to limit himself to just a kiss. He couldn't countenance making love to Amanda for the first time in the bed of a pickup truck either.
"Good." She didn't know what else to say. She pulled herself up into a sitting position and wrapped her arms tightly around her knees. She couldn't face Lee just yet. She was simply shaken to the core by his effect on her. She tilted her head to look up at the stars, anything but focus on the bare-chested man next to her. "What time is it? Francine said I can't go back before midnight."
Lee glanced at his watch. "It's just 10:15 right now," he answered roughly. He cursed to himself; Amanda recovered a lot faster than he did. "Now that they've checked on us, I'm betting they'll be making a shipment out. We should be able to see something from here."
"But it's nighttime! What on earth can we see from here?" Amanda questioned.
"Infrared…latest technology courtesy of the Pentagon." He passed a weighty set of goggles to Amanda.
"Oh my gosh!" Amanda replied looking through them and seeing more than she ever expected. It was disorienting and she pulled them off quickly.
"I have the old-fashioned kind here," he held up a pair of black binoculars "These are good for seeing the stars until they get down to business down there."
"I thought you'd need a telescope for that." She recalled he had a telescope in his apartment but she hadn't realized he was such an astronomy buff.
"Nah….binoculars are better for some things." He pointed to the west. "See that bright star there?" Seeing her nod he continued, "That's actually Venus…now, look just above there and see if you can see a group of stars."
Amanda squinted, but she didn't know what she was looking for. Lee gave her the binoculars and sat behind her, gently guiding her to look for the Seven Sisters in the night sky. He heard her gasp in amazement. "Those are the Pleiades - the Seven Sisters. You can see them better through binoculars than a telescope." Without thinking about it, she leaned back against him, lost in the beauty before her. Lee tilted his face to breathe in her perfume in the curls behind her ears. He just couldn't get enough of her. Struggling, he tried to focus. "Indian tribes used to use them as a vision test….you had excellent vision if you could point out all of the seven stars."
Surprisingly, Amanda began to feel herself relax in his presence again as Lee pointed out each of the constellations and explained their legends to her. He was such good company, she realized. Her eyes smarted as she came to terms of how much she wanted this man, body and soul; and how unlikely it was that he would ever be hers.
"Why the frown?" Lee asked, sensitive to her changing mood.
"No reason." She shook her head lightly. "Thanks for the astronomy lesson! Jaime and Philip will be very impressed next time I take them camping! It gets harder to impress them as they get older, you know," she laughed.
He looked uncharacteristically relaxed, leaning back against the side of the truck with his head tilted up to the stars. A gentle wind ruffled his hair and she could smell the fresh pines all around them. She could get used to being with him like this.
Truck lights turned a corner in the valley far below them, and Scarecrow immediately leapt out of the truck bed and slid on the goggles; tense alertness in every line of his body. Amanda sighed and followed suit. "Four…no, six trucks. Damn, it's a bigger operation than we thought." He said.
She took out a small pen light and notebook and began writing down everything that Scarecrow observed. The delivery and unloading took the better part of an hour before all activity below ceased.
"Did we get what we came for?" she asked as she stowed the notebook away.
"Well….as much as we're going to get." Lee responded with frustration. "I hope Francine is able to get something out of Rosado tonight, I'm not getting enough in the time I've been with them."
"Do you think she's all right?" Amanda responded with a worried frown.
"Don't worry, Amanda, Francine's a tough cookie and she knows what she's doing." Lee consoled her.
"That's why I worry. One of these days Francine is going to bite off more than she can chew and there won't be some tall Scotsman to take the bullets for her." Amanda responded tartly.
"OK then, why don't we just get back and check on her." Lee responded sharply. He didn't like being reminded of her connection with the Scottish agent Ian Fraser, even if he did like the man. "It's past twelve, so she should have no gripe with us."
"Thanks, Lee." She responded softly. " I just worry."
Lee couldn't help but smile, "Yeah, I know." His hand drifted to the small of her back as he escorted her to the cab of the truck. While he might have rewritten the script for part of the evening, he couldn't recall when he had spent a night as memorable as this one was. He shook his head, as he headed back to the driver's side. One hell of an evening indeed.