After All This Time
Chapter 5: Memories
Disclaimer: We own nothing but our imaginations.
Duke unsaddled and cared for the horses, taking his time with the task. It soothed him, settling his temper and his rattled nerves. He had a choice to make, he could either walk back in there and continue to isolate her, thereby making them both miserable and inevitably living out the rest of his days alone, he had long ago decided there was no one else like her, or, he could go back in there and attempt to break down some of the walls she had erected. He could get back to the core of things; find out what the hell had gone so wrong with them. And maybe.just maybe.he could dare to hope that he could find, somewhere inside of her, a glimmer of feeling for him, a tiny glimmer that could be nurtured into a spark, and from a spark back into a flame. He was still in love with her, he had lived with that fact every moment since they had parted ways, accepted that he would always love her. It would be a hell of a lot better if he could love her and live with her at the same time, and for that to happen, she'd have to learn to love him back. "Damn, what a circle we're caught in. Can't be happy together, can't be happy apart." He put the saddles, brushes, and things back in their proper places and went back inside to start dinner.and to start mending the broken pieces of their relationship.
She heard him come back in. He was in the mudroom, she supposed taking off his boots and washing his hands. His footsteps came down the hall. Her breath caught in her throat as they paused outside her door. He knocked softly. She stayed where she was, face down on the bed. She shut her eyes tight and scrunched up her pillow, still damp from her tears. What could he possibly want now?
He knocked again, a little louder this time, "Shauna?" he called softly through the door.
'Hell!' She thought, he wasn't going to go away. She dried her eyes and went to open the door a crack, hoping the lighting was dim enough that he wouldn't see the tear tracks on her face. She just looked at him, not trusting her voice to speak.
"I'm going to take a shower and then start dinner. I thought you might like to decide dinner tonight."
He was asking her what she wanted for dinner. 'Imagine that, he's trying to be nice to me again!' She supposed it was because they were going to be stuck here together for a while. Ball was in her court; she had to decide if it was worth the risk to be nice to him. She could either live with him and be nasty mean about it and keep her heart safe, or she could be nice to him and risk having her heart hurt again. It was already damaged; there wasn't a whole lot he could do to make it worse. "Do you have chicken?"
He thought for a second, "Yes. I'll take it out of the freezer before I get in the shower. Could you start chopping vegetables to go with the chicken?"
"Sure. Just give me a minute."
"I'll leave them out on the counter."
She waited until she heard the bathroom door shut down the hall before she made her way to the kitchen. As promised, vegetables, a knife, and a small bowl had been left out on the counter. The mindless activity of chopping vegetables gave her thoughts time to wander. Her thoughts turned once again to the time she had spent at Bill's ranch in Texas:
It had been a long, rough mission but their goals had been accomplished. The cobra base they had infiltrated had been destroyed but not before they were able to retrieve the information they had come to get. Hawk had been overjoyed that finally something was going right. Duke convinced him to grant the small team five day's leave before heading back to base. They had all slept on the chopper ride to Bill's place, flying late into the night to arrive at the ranch close to sunrise. Bill had woken her up so she could watch the sun rise over the valley and meet the land, the sun's warm kiss turning everything red and gold. Bill landed and got everyone settled. She had been the last one to wake up that afternoon, joining the boys for an intense card game before she and Duke had gone off for a walk. It had been so nice, she remembered, being able to spend time with him away from the military. Bill had made his famous Texas hot links. Everyone had eaten outside and they had laughed all night. Duke had walked her up to her room, given her a stirring good night kiss, and then went down the hall to his own room. She spent that night dreaming of what it would be like when she and Duke found that perfect moment to be together.
The next morning she had woken up to the smell of roses, she opened her eyes and discovered Duke had left a rose in her hand sometime during the night. She had lain there in bliss for some time; he loved her.just as much as she loved him. It was so new, feeling like this. She had thought herself to be in love before, but not like this. This time it felt like forever, like nothing or no one could tear them apart.
It had turned out to be the best birthday she had ever had. The boys pulled out all the stops, a full southern breakfast, jokes, laughs; Bill had even pulled out his harmonica and made her dance with Gung Ho after he shoved a guitar in Duke's hands. Country-dance music wasn't exactly Duke's area of expertise but he did okay.
And then later.Duke had apparently cornered Bill sometime that morning about wanting some time alone with her. He took her on a trail ride to the perfect secluded picnic spot. They finished their picnic and just sat, enjoying each other's company. He took her hand, "Happy Birthday, Shauna. I'm sorry I don't have anything more than a picnic lunch to give you."
She puts her finger to his mouth. "Sshs. You've already given me something more precious than gold, you're heart. I love you Conrad, with all of mine."
He pulled her close and whispered in her ear, "You have no idea how long I've waited for you to say that."
She pulls back to look at him, "Just waiting for the perfect moment." She popped the buttons on his shirt open and wrapped her arms around his neck, "Now, about that Birthday gift you think you owe me, I know exactly what I want." She teased him as she leaned back to lie on the blanket, bringing him with her. She ran her hands over his now bare muscular chest.
"Do you now?" he mumbled as he captured her lips with his.
Duke stood in the doorway of the kitchen watching her. She had the most peaceful look on her face, her mouth turned up in a slight smile. She was remembering something. What? He wondered. Well, whatever it was the memory was a good one. He had decided something while he was in the shower, his life had been fairly miserable without her, incomplete, and off center. He was still in love with her and he wanted her back. He had absolutely no idea of how to go about doing that. She hated him! She blamed him for ruining their relationship. She would have lived the rest of her life perfectly happy without him had she had a choice. He couldn't remember much about their breakup. He could remember the day she called the whole thing off, the exact moment and phrasing she used when she hurled his engagement ring at his head, the last item in a volley of breakables. He actually had a tiny scar on the side of his cheek from a glass she had hurled at his head shortly before she had left his quarters. Other than that he didn't really give a damn, he knew what he wanted and he would use everything in his arsenal to get her back. He won her once by God, he could do it again!
He followed instinct and approached her silently, "Penny for your thoughts?" he whispered in her ear.
She gasped, startled that he had taken her by surprise, and unsettled because he was so close. She could smell his soap; feel the heat from his body. Any closer and he would be brushing against her. She stopped cutting vegetables and just stood there, breath caught in her throat, half hoping he would put his arms around her like before, half wishing he would just back up and give her some space.
He could feel her shiver, 'At least now I know she's not indifferent to me, that's something.' "You were remembering something. What?"
She swallowed, "Nothing.it was nothing." She started chopping vegetables again.
"It must have been something, you were smiling."
"How long until the chicken is ready to cook?"
He backed up, if he pushed too much too soon then he would loose the fragile bond of peace they seemed to have agreed upon. "It's only been out of the freezer for twenty minutes. It needs a while longer before I put it in the sauté pan. Finish the veggies, I'll get cooking supplies out."
She concentrated on cutting the vegetables, not wanting to encourage conversation, but she watched him out of the corner of her eye. And she was aware of him, aware of where he was at all times. He brought more vegetables for her to cut up and threw them in with the chicken when it was time to start cooking.
She had just finished setting the table and pouring each of them a glass of water, the only beverage she could find in the kitchen, when he brought the pan over to the table and carefully placed chicken and vegetables on their plates. He put the pan in the sink and sat down across from her.
"Try it, you should like it."
She took a small bite and closed her eyes, "You learned how to cook!"
He laughed, "Yeah, I did. I suppose that means you like it?"
"I'm eating it aren't I?"
They were silent for a moment. She really hadn't meant for that last comment to come across so harshly. "So, who taught you to cook?"
He didn't answer for a long moment, "Roadblock."
Her water glass paused halfway to her mouth, "Oh." She figured she already knew the answer to the question she was about to ask but she needed to ask it out loud, "Why Roadblock?"
He looked up, "He was the only one on base at the time who really knew how to cook. I asked and he agreed to teach me."
"Get tired of eating base food?"
"No. I just thought that if you and I were getting married, one of us should learn how to cook. Cooking was never you're favorite thing so I asked Roadblock to teach me as a favor.'"
"You never told me." She looked at him, wondering why he had never shared this with her.
"It was going to be a surprise. Our first morning as a married couple I was going to make you breakfast and bring it to you in bed." He pushed his plate away.
She didn't know what to say. "Conrad, I'm .I'm sorry things didn't work out between the two of us. I had thought they would, that we'd get past anything so long as we worked together. But we didn't." She looked away.
He reached across the table and took her hand, "We never talked about what really happened. We should have." He ran his thumb across her knuckles.
She pushed her plate aside and stood up. "I'm tired, Conrad. And I don't want to get into this now." She started to walk away but his hand pulled her back.
"Shauna, we owe to ourselves to talk about this, we're never going to make it here together if we don't make amends. After all this time we should at least be able to sit down and talk about it. "
She paused, turning towards him, and saw the sincerity in his eyes. If she managed to get out of talking about it now, then he'd find a way to make them talk about it later. "Conrad, you know just as well as I do what happened. I don't think there is any point in bringing it up again."
"No, Shauna, I don't know what happened. Things started happening so quickly, we got caught up in a whirlwind of change and I lost you."
"Yeah, things started changing. The Joes were disbanded, we were being sent back out into the real military. We had been offered different positions in different places. And the best offer I had, the one offer I was really interested in would mean I would get a promotion and outrank you! And you couldn't handle the fact that your "woman" would outrank you!"
"Shauna, that's not fair. It was never that."
"Oh, really? Then what the hell was the problem? You sure were acting like you weren't too happy with the idea of my promotion. But at the same time you were the one that was pushing me to stay in the military. You were at the top of your career, I was on my way, and the position that could have taken me there was the one position that you had a problem with!"
"Your right, I didn't want you to take that position. I didn't want you to outrank me, but dammit that was not the only thing that broke us up! I was willing to sit down and talk about it but you refused. You refused to even entertain the idea of a compromise!"
"Conrad, explain to me what the hell a compromise is?! We were in the military, we don't compromise. We're trained to take orders and follow them without question. At least that's the way I was trained."
"Fighting with you was not what I wanted. Can we just sit and talk without fighting?" "You're the one who wanted to know, but if you can't handle it..."
He took her by the shoulders and gave her a hard shake, "Shauna, look, yes I admit I was jealous, I didn't want you to outrank me, but I didn't want to lose you! I would have walked through hell and back for you! I did on more than one occasion so don't you dare say that jealousy was the one thing that tore us apart. You're just as much to blame as I am."
"What did I ever do?"
"It's not what you did, its what you didn't do. You were never willing to stay and talk things out. If things were important enough for us to argue about then we argued until I gave up and let you have your way. But that's not going to happen this time! I'm not letting you run away from this!"
"The hell with you, the hell with this! You wanted to know what happened, this is what happened. If you can't handle the fact that this is what really tore us up, that's your problem. Now, I'm tired and I'm going to bed. Now." She broke loose from his grasp and stormed down the hall to her room and slammed the door. He could hear the lock click in the door.
She slammed the door to her room for the second time that day and slumped against in tears she could no longer hold back. She had to get away. He was right, she knew he was right but it didn't change a thing, not a damn thing. They were still miles apart and she was certain that nothing and no one could bring them together again.
Duke cleaned up the dishes and went to the library. He closed the door quietly. If he let go of his control now he'd go storming down the hall and break her door down. So instead, he went to the cabinet by his desk and took out the bottle of Scotch. He poured himself a generous portion of brown amber liquid and put the bottle back. He set his drink down on the desk and reached down to the very bottom of the cabinet and took a small square box. He carried the box and his drink over to the couch and set down. He leaned back on the couch and took a deep swallow of his drink. Fighting with her always took it out of him. He looked the box in his hands but couldn't bring himself to open it. He placed it gently on the coffee table. He finished his drink in one swallow and placed the empty glass next the box. He leaned his head against the top of the couch and let his thoughts drift him into sleep.
He woke up the next morning when the bright sunlight came streaming in the library window. He stood up and stretched. He had things he needed to do and they wouldn't wait. He walked out of the library, did a quick perimeter check, and then went to take care of the ranch chores.
Scarlett woke up at the sound of a door closing. She was starving. They hadn't even really gotten into their meal when they started arguing. She got out of bed and dressed, stopping briefly in the kitchen to see if Duke had started breakfast. He was no where to be seen. She grabbed a piece of fruit and started looking for him. He wasn't in his room, the bed didn't even look like he'd slept in it. That left the library and outside. She checked the library first. Duke wasn't there but he hadn't been gone long. An empty glass was sitting on the table in front of the couch. She picked it up and sniffed it, the familiar sent of Scotch sent memories rolling over her. Not just any brand of Scotch, her brand. The only kind she would drink. The kind she'd gotten him hooked on shortly after their relationship had started. She put the glass back on the table and picked up the box. And feeling a little too much like Pandora, she opened the box.
Chapter 5: Memories
Disclaimer: We own nothing but our imaginations.
Duke unsaddled and cared for the horses, taking his time with the task. It soothed him, settling his temper and his rattled nerves. He had a choice to make, he could either walk back in there and continue to isolate her, thereby making them both miserable and inevitably living out the rest of his days alone, he had long ago decided there was no one else like her, or, he could go back in there and attempt to break down some of the walls she had erected. He could get back to the core of things; find out what the hell had gone so wrong with them. And maybe.just maybe.he could dare to hope that he could find, somewhere inside of her, a glimmer of feeling for him, a tiny glimmer that could be nurtured into a spark, and from a spark back into a flame. He was still in love with her, he had lived with that fact every moment since they had parted ways, accepted that he would always love her. It would be a hell of a lot better if he could love her and live with her at the same time, and for that to happen, she'd have to learn to love him back. "Damn, what a circle we're caught in. Can't be happy together, can't be happy apart." He put the saddles, brushes, and things back in their proper places and went back inside to start dinner.and to start mending the broken pieces of their relationship.
She heard him come back in. He was in the mudroom, she supposed taking off his boots and washing his hands. His footsteps came down the hall. Her breath caught in her throat as they paused outside her door. He knocked softly. She stayed where she was, face down on the bed. She shut her eyes tight and scrunched up her pillow, still damp from her tears. What could he possibly want now?
He knocked again, a little louder this time, "Shauna?" he called softly through the door.
'Hell!' She thought, he wasn't going to go away. She dried her eyes and went to open the door a crack, hoping the lighting was dim enough that he wouldn't see the tear tracks on her face. She just looked at him, not trusting her voice to speak.
"I'm going to take a shower and then start dinner. I thought you might like to decide dinner tonight."
He was asking her what she wanted for dinner. 'Imagine that, he's trying to be nice to me again!' She supposed it was because they were going to be stuck here together for a while. Ball was in her court; she had to decide if it was worth the risk to be nice to him. She could either live with him and be nasty mean about it and keep her heart safe, or she could be nice to him and risk having her heart hurt again. It was already damaged; there wasn't a whole lot he could do to make it worse. "Do you have chicken?"
He thought for a second, "Yes. I'll take it out of the freezer before I get in the shower. Could you start chopping vegetables to go with the chicken?"
"Sure. Just give me a minute."
"I'll leave them out on the counter."
She waited until she heard the bathroom door shut down the hall before she made her way to the kitchen. As promised, vegetables, a knife, and a small bowl had been left out on the counter. The mindless activity of chopping vegetables gave her thoughts time to wander. Her thoughts turned once again to the time she had spent at Bill's ranch in Texas:
It had been a long, rough mission but their goals had been accomplished. The cobra base they had infiltrated had been destroyed but not before they were able to retrieve the information they had come to get. Hawk had been overjoyed that finally something was going right. Duke convinced him to grant the small team five day's leave before heading back to base. They had all slept on the chopper ride to Bill's place, flying late into the night to arrive at the ranch close to sunrise. Bill had woken her up so she could watch the sun rise over the valley and meet the land, the sun's warm kiss turning everything red and gold. Bill landed and got everyone settled. She had been the last one to wake up that afternoon, joining the boys for an intense card game before she and Duke had gone off for a walk. It had been so nice, she remembered, being able to spend time with him away from the military. Bill had made his famous Texas hot links. Everyone had eaten outside and they had laughed all night. Duke had walked her up to her room, given her a stirring good night kiss, and then went down the hall to his own room. She spent that night dreaming of what it would be like when she and Duke found that perfect moment to be together.
The next morning she had woken up to the smell of roses, she opened her eyes and discovered Duke had left a rose in her hand sometime during the night. She had lain there in bliss for some time; he loved her.just as much as she loved him. It was so new, feeling like this. She had thought herself to be in love before, but not like this. This time it felt like forever, like nothing or no one could tear them apart.
It had turned out to be the best birthday she had ever had. The boys pulled out all the stops, a full southern breakfast, jokes, laughs; Bill had even pulled out his harmonica and made her dance with Gung Ho after he shoved a guitar in Duke's hands. Country-dance music wasn't exactly Duke's area of expertise but he did okay.
And then later.Duke had apparently cornered Bill sometime that morning about wanting some time alone with her. He took her on a trail ride to the perfect secluded picnic spot. They finished their picnic and just sat, enjoying each other's company. He took her hand, "Happy Birthday, Shauna. I'm sorry I don't have anything more than a picnic lunch to give you."
She puts her finger to his mouth. "Sshs. You've already given me something more precious than gold, you're heart. I love you Conrad, with all of mine."
He pulled her close and whispered in her ear, "You have no idea how long I've waited for you to say that."
She pulls back to look at him, "Just waiting for the perfect moment." She popped the buttons on his shirt open and wrapped her arms around his neck, "Now, about that Birthday gift you think you owe me, I know exactly what I want." She teased him as she leaned back to lie on the blanket, bringing him with her. She ran her hands over his now bare muscular chest.
"Do you now?" he mumbled as he captured her lips with his.
Duke stood in the doorway of the kitchen watching her. She had the most peaceful look on her face, her mouth turned up in a slight smile. She was remembering something. What? He wondered. Well, whatever it was the memory was a good one. He had decided something while he was in the shower, his life had been fairly miserable without her, incomplete, and off center. He was still in love with her and he wanted her back. He had absolutely no idea of how to go about doing that. She hated him! She blamed him for ruining their relationship. She would have lived the rest of her life perfectly happy without him had she had a choice. He couldn't remember much about their breakup. He could remember the day she called the whole thing off, the exact moment and phrasing she used when she hurled his engagement ring at his head, the last item in a volley of breakables. He actually had a tiny scar on the side of his cheek from a glass she had hurled at his head shortly before she had left his quarters. Other than that he didn't really give a damn, he knew what he wanted and he would use everything in his arsenal to get her back. He won her once by God, he could do it again!
He followed instinct and approached her silently, "Penny for your thoughts?" he whispered in her ear.
She gasped, startled that he had taken her by surprise, and unsettled because he was so close. She could smell his soap; feel the heat from his body. Any closer and he would be brushing against her. She stopped cutting vegetables and just stood there, breath caught in her throat, half hoping he would put his arms around her like before, half wishing he would just back up and give her some space.
He could feel her shiver, 'At least now I know she's not indifferent to me, that's something.' "You were remembering something. What?"
She swallowed, "Nothing.it was nothing." She started chopping vegetables again.
"It must have been something, you were smiling."
"How long until the chicken is ready to cook?"
He backed up, if he pushed too much too soon then he would loose the fragile bond of peace they seemed to have agreed upon. "It's only been out of the freezer for twenty minutes. It needs a while longer before I put it in the sauté pan. Finish the veggies, I'll get cooking supplies out."
She concentrated on cutting the vegetables, not wanting to encourage conversation, but she watched him out of the corner of her eye. And she was aware of him, aware of where he was at all times. He brought more vegetables for her to cut up and threw them in with the chicken when it was time to start cooking.
She had just finished setting the table and pouring each of them a glass of water, the only beverage she could find in the kitchen, when he brought the pan over to the table and carefully placed chicken and vegetables on their plates. He put the pan in the sink and sat down across from her.
"Try it, you should like it."
She took a small bite and closed her eyes, "You learned how to cook!"
He laughed, "Yeah, I did. I suppose that means you like it?"
"I'm eating it aren't I?"
They were silent for a moment. She really hadn't meant for that last comment to come across so harshly. "So, who taught you to cook?"
He didn't answer for a long moment, "Roadblock."
Her water glass paused halfway to her mouth, "Oh." She figured she already knew the answer to the question she was about to ask but she needed to ask it out loud, "Why Roadblock?"
He looked up, "He was the only one on base at the time who really knew how to cook. I asked and he agreed to teach me."
"Get tired of eating base food?"
"No. I just thought that if you and I were getting married, one of us should learn how to cook. Cooking was never you're favorite thing so I asked Roadblock to teach me as a favor.'"
"You never told me." She looked at him, wondering why he had never shared this with her.
"It was going to be a surprise. Our first morning as a married couple I was going to make you breakfast and bring it to you in bed." He pushed his plate away.
She didn't know what to say. "Conrad, I'm .I'm sorry things didn't work out between the two of us. I had thought they would, that we'd get past anything so long as we worked together. But we didn't." She looked away.
He reached across the table and took her hand, "We never talked about what really happened. We should have." He ran his thumb across her knuckles.
She pushed her plate aside and stood up. "I'm tired, Conrad. And I don't want to get into this now." She started to walk away but his hand pulled her back.
"Shauna, we owe to ourselves to talk about this, we're never going to make it here together if we don't make amends. After all this time we should at least be able to sit down and talk about it. "
She paused, turning towards him, and saw the sincerity in his eyes. If she managed to get out of talking about it now, then he'd find a way to make them talk about it later. "Conrad, you know just as well as I do what happened. I don't think there is any point in bringing it up again."
"No, Shauna, I don't know what happened. Things started happening so quickly, we got caught up in a whirlwind of change and I lost you."
"Yeah, things started changing. The Joes were disbanded, we were being sent back out into the real military. We had been offered different positions in different places. And the best offer I had, the one offer I was really interested in would mean I would get a promotion and outrank you! And you couldn't handle the fact that your "woman" would outrank you!"
"Shauna, that's not fair. It was never that."
"Oh, really? Then what the hell was the problem? You sure were acting like you weren't too happy with the idea of my promotion. But at the same time you were the one that was pushing me to stay in the military. You were at the top of your career, I was on my way, and the position that could have taken me there was the one position that you had a problem with!"
"Your right, I didn't want you to take that position. I didn't want you to outrank me, but dammit that was not the only thing that broke us up! I was willing to sit down and talk about it but you refused. You refused to even entertain the idea of a compromise!"
"Conrad, explain to me what the hell a compromise is?! We were in the military, we don't compromise. We're trained to take orders and follow them without question. At least that's the way I was trained."
"Fighting with you was not what I wanted. Can we just sit and talk without fighting?" "You're the one who wanted to know, but if you can't handle it..."
He took her by the shoulders and gave her a hard shake, "Shauna, look, yes I admit I was jealous, I didn't want you to outrank me, but I didn't want to lose you! I would have walked through hell and back for you! I did on more than one occasion so don't you dare say that jealousy was the one thing that tore us apart. You're just as much to blame as I am."
"What did I ever do?"
"It's not what you did, its what you didn't do. You were never willing to stay and talk things out. If things were important enough for us to argue about then we argued until I gave up and let you have your way. But that's not going to happen this time! I'm not letting you run away from this!"
"The hell with you, the hell with this! You wanted to know what happened, this is what happened. If you can't handle the fact that this is what really tore us up, that's your problem. Now, I'm tired and I'm going to bed. Now." She broke loose from his grasp and stormed down the hall to her room and slammed the door. He could hear the lock click in the door.
She slammed the door to her room for the second time that day and slumped against in tears she could no longer hold back. She had to get away. He was right, she knew he was right but it didn't change a thing, not a damn thing. They were still miles apart and she was certain that nothing and no one could bring them together again.
Duke cleaned up the dishes and went to the library. He closed the door quietly. If he let go of his control now he'd go storming down the hall and break her door down. So instead, he went to the cabinet by his desk and took out the bottle of Scotch. He poured himself a generous portion of brown amber liquid and put the bottle back. He set his drink down on the desk and reached down to the very bottom of the cabinet and took a small square box. He carried the box and his drink over to the couch and set down. He leaned back on the couch and took a deep swallow of his drink. Fighting with her always took it out of him. He looked the box in his hands but couldn't bring himself to open it. He placed it gently on the coffee table. He finished his drink in one swallow and placed the empty glass next the box. He leaned his head against the top of the couch and let his thoughts drift him into sleep.
He woke up the next morning when the bright sunlight came streaming in the library window. He stood up and stretched. He had things he needed to do and they wouldn't wait. He walked out of the library, did a quick perimeter check, and then went to take care of the ranch chores.
Scarlett woke up at the sound of a door closing. She was starving. They hadn't even really gotten into their meal when they started arguing. She got out of bed and dressed, stopping briefly in the kitchen to see if Duke had started breakfast. He was no where to be seen. She grabbed a piece of fruit and started looking for him. He wasn't in his room, the bed didn't even look like he'd slept in it. That left the library and outside. She checked the library first. Duke wasn't there but he hadn't been gone long. An empty glass was sitting on the table in front of the couch. She picked it up and sniffed it, the familiar sent of Scotch sent memories rolling over her. Not just any brand of Scotch, her brand. The only kind she would drink. The kind she'd gotten him hooked on shortly after their relationship had started. She put the glass back on the table and picked up the box. And feeling a little too much like Pandora, she opened the box.