14: A Lovely Couple

"Donna, I really don't need this kind of hassle right now."

"You should've thought of that before you kissed Sam," she smirked.

"I didn't kiss him!" he objected loudly. She grinned.

"Did you know your voice goes kinda high when you're being defensive?"

"I'm not being defensive!" Josh tried to drop the pitch on that one and didn't quite succeed. "Donna, c'mon," he tried more evenly. "You know me. You know Sam. I'm not sleeping with Sam."

"So the two of you keep repeating. Repeatedly. So much so that it's totally suspicious."

He was too flustered even to call her on the 'repeating repeatedly' line. "Donna, if I was sleeping with anyone round here-"

Okay, that's a sentence I don't know how to get out of.

"-It wouldn't be Sam," he finished lamely.

For a second they exchanged a look that he couldn't quite put a name to. Then Donna said, more softly "Josh, relax. CJ's given you a cover story. It's in hand."

"But people are still talking!"

"They're joking, Josh. They know neither of you actually have a life. You're not having an affair - you wouldn't have time. Unless you actually did it here. Which would be-"

"Twisted?" he suggested, with a pained expression.

"-Impractical. I mean, Sam's office has too many windows. And you couldn't do it here. Not with me and CJ this close. We'd hear... noises. These are just some of the many, many reasons why nobody would buy the idea of you two having an affair. Would you like me to continue?"

"I'd much rather you stopped."

"Josh, they're just joking. It's a bit of fun. They don't mean any harm by it."

"That's easy for them to say," Josh said, a little bitterly. "All they've got to do is make some little joke outside CJ's office when Danny Concannon's sniffing around-"

"Josh, contrary to what you may think, people other than you have brains. Some lowly assistants do, even. They also have this thing called 'discretion', which I guess we can forgive you for being unfamiliar with."

"Okay, so all of a sudden I've gone from stressed-out boss who needs to be reassurred to advantage-taking despot who needs to be brutally slapped down?"

"You're funny like that," Donna agreed. "I think it's multiple personality disorder."

"Oh, great, another personality disorder to add to my ever-expanding list." Josh regretted that slightly bitter line as soon as Donna's wounded expression registered. He shook his head in about as close as he normally got to apology. "It's been a long day," he said, rubbing his forehead.

"Yeah, well; Sam's has been longer. You should go talk to him."

"I really shouldn't."

"Come on, Josh. Going out of your way to avoid a guy you normally spent about eighteen hours a day with is hardly gonna help your case."

"Neither is the fact that Sam currently can't even look at me without going luminous pink."

Donna snickered. "Okay, Josh, what did you say?"

"What did I say?"

"Come on, Josh, I know the way you like to put your foot in your mouth. I bet you said something you shouldn't."

"It was Sam, actually," he defended hurriedly.

Damn. I'm fairly sure I shouldn't have admitted that.

Donna's grin widened. "Okay, what did Sam say?"

"Nothing. Well, nothing important." He squirmed under her expectant gaze. "He just... you know how Sam loves to babble when he's stressed. First he's making his feelings very clear, and then he's worried that he's offended me, and all of a sudden it's just... too much information."

"What did he say?" she demanded gleefully.

Dammit, now he was beginning to blush, too. "He just wanted to assure me that I'm a very attractive man. Which, hey, we all knew already, right?" When in doubt, go for egomania.

Donna, sadly, refused to be lured onto an oh-that-Josh-and-his-monster-ego riff. "Sam thinks you're a very attractive man?"

"Don-na," he objected, squirming.

"You should ask him out."

"Donna!" She giggled delightedly at his outraged response. "Donna, why are you doing this to me?" he pleaded pathetically.

She grinned. "You're totally cute when you're really embarrassed."

He couldn't help it; he started to smile in return. Leaving himself nice and neatly open to being perfectly shot down.

"So's Sam. You make a lovely couple." She gave a last triumphant smirk and glided away.