SEEING RIGHT THROUGH IT

"Now don't forget," Amanda said on Wednesday, over a crackling phone line, "Mother has an ophthalmologist appointment tomorrow and she'll need a ride. She won't be able to drive after."

"She told me." Lee leaned back in his desk chair and doodled a star on his calendar, where he'd blocked off Thursday morning when Amanda had planned out the week with almost military precision. "I won't forget. I'm on it."

Amanda was away on assignment — a rare thing for someone in Analysis but she'd been seconded to help liaise on a case in London and she'd gone because it was London, and she was going to take a couple of extra days to sight-see and visit with Emily Farnsworth. Lee had to admit he was jealous about that, since he loved Emily like family, but at the same time he was happy to stay put. He'd had plans to box up some of the things in his apartment and the boys were coming to stay with him that weekend so Dotty could have a break.

The appointment was early — eight — and in the morning insanity Lee missed even having a coffee. They'd all been on a collective hunt for Jamie's library book about robotics, because the librarian — "Conan," Phillip called her, and Lee and Dotty had exchanged amused glances — had said she'd send home an invoice if he didn't bring it in that day. He'd borrowed it in April and forgotten to bring it back before the end of the year, then stuffed the late notices into the garbage in June without a second thought. It turned out to have fallen behind the headboard of his bed, where it had languished for much longer than it normally would have because no one in the house had made vacuuming behind headboards a priority since February.

So after Dotty's appointment, on the way back to the house, Lee and Dotty stopped at the Pie Plate. It was ten by then and he'd read the paper twice and had a cup of high-octane coffee, the type only produced via vending machine in a medical facility hallway. His stomach was growling and burning, and when he saw the red vinyl booths and smelled that special mixture of sweet and savory in the air he missed Amanda, suddenly and more keenly than he had all week.

Dotty must have, too, because as they settled in the booth she said, "Amanda said she's having tea with Emily Farnsworth this weekend." She shook her head. "What a funny thing, that friendship."

"Yeah," he said, "they really hit it off." The two had exchanged sporadic letters — whenever Emily's assignments allowed — and Dotty never failed to comment when a note from Lady Farnsworth arrived in the mail. Her letters had been much more frequent when Amanda was at home that spring, and a definite highlight in what Lee knew had been long days full of discomfort and frustration. He knew Emily would be thrilled to see how well Amanda had recovered. He wondered what the two would talk about, then almost immediately decided he didn't want to know.

Dotty opened her menu, squinted at it, and shut it again. "I can't read a single thing in here. Those drops are going to do my head in. What does Amanda always get?"

"The poached eggs and fruit," Lee said. "With toast. But it depends on whether you want to save room for pie."

"Well, that's a given. I think I deserve pie after sitting in front of that doctor and his whistling nose for an hour." She shifted in her seat, looking curiously around the diner. "Thanks for driving me. I know you had to take the morning off."

"Oh, it was no problem." Lee waved a hand, dismissively. "We don't work regular hours anyway."

"No. You don't." She studied him for a minute, thoughtful, and Lee had the sudden, strange sensation he'd walked into a trap of some kind. Their waitress approached, coffee pot at the ready, and she took their orders as she filled their cups.

It was a funny thing, the bond he and Dotty seemed to have developed. They'd spent long hours together in California, waiting to hear if the person they both loved the most would live or die, and when he hadn't been chasing down gold smugglers he'd found himself drawn into conversation with her about all kinds of things: music, what Amanda's father had been like, whether Phillip would ever buckle down and show everyone how smart he was. She'd continued a line of questioning that had begun at Christmas the year before, about his family — one he generally hated but didn't mind coming from her for some reason. By the time he'd brought Amanda home Dotty had begun treating him as the permanent fixture he secretly was, drawing him into the family almost before he'd noticed. Just like Amanda, she'd worked her way under his skin without him realizing it.

So by now he knew when she was gearing up to ask a big question. He could see it in the way her eyes, warm and brown like Amanda's, narrowed slightly, the way she leaned forward in her seat.

"I know the two of you think I don't see things," she went on. "But whatever it is you do at this… film company… isn't like any other film company I've ever heard of."

He cleared his throat but didn't offer up any answers. "It really is just a film company, Dotty," he insisted. But even to him it didn't sound convincing. Not really. It occurred to him that may have been because he was tired of trying to make it sound convincing.

"Look, Lee, this is Washington D.C.. I know things go on here. I know there are regular people with regular jobs but there are just as many other people here with irregular jobs, and I've suspected for…" She looked up at the ceiling, counting backwards. "Three years or so… that Amanda has been involved in something beyond making films about water buffalo or tractors."

"Like what?" He was genuinely curious now.

Dotty levelled him with a shrewd look. "My theory is it's something top secret, like national security." She stirred her coffee. "You can sit there and flash that dimple at me and act like I'm crazy but I know I'm right. You're charming but you aren't that charming."

He felt his eyebrows shoot up toward his hairline. He immediately tried to wipe the incredulous smile off his face, and the dimple along with it. She had him, and she knew it. He wasn't sure what to say next, but the look she was giving him was so intent it made him want to squirm in his seat.

Lee made a decision in that moment. He was going to come clean, and the thought made him as queasy as any of the high-risk operations he'd taken on during his career. This, he thought, was perhaps the most dangerous solo mission he'd ever undertaken, and he wished more than ever that his backup was not in London, having tea at Harrods.

They had always planned on telling Dotty about the Agency — inviting Billy to the wedding had made it a necessity, but Amanda had also been clear that she couldn't keep their jobs a secret forever. So they'd talked about telling her later that week, but it looked like Dotty had made the first move and as terrible as he felt about doing it without Amanda, he felt even worse about asking Dotty to wait for answers.

"Four," he said, finally. He cleared his throat again.

"What?"

"Amanda's been involved in it for four years, give or take."

"A-ha." Dotty nodded. "And you?"

"Uh… fourteen, I guess."

"And it's dangerous, this job you and Amanda do, am I right?"

"It can be, yeah." He drew in a deep breath. "But Amanda isn't out in the field anymore. She hasn't been since — since California." He couldn't say it out loud. None of them ever did. California was a euphemism they all fell back on, family code for a terrible time none of them wanted to think about but was still there in the room with them sometimes, like an unwelcome visitor.

"Was that connected to your work somehow?" Dotty's features had hardened a little, and Lee realized he'd seen the same look on Amanda's face when someone had done or said something to hurt the boys.

"No. That really was random." Dotty's brows rose, her skepticism clear on her face, and he leaned forward in his chair, that familiar desperation rising in his throat the same way it did whenever he thought about California. "It really was a coincidence. A terrible coincidence. We were just there on — on vacation."

"What about that terrible thing last year, when you both went into hiding? Amanda hasn't told me a thing about it except it was a mistake."

"That —" Lee nodded. "That was connected to work, yes. To a case. It wasn't a mistake so much as a — a setup." That felt like an inadequate explanation of the entire Stemwinder fiasco but at the same time he knew he couldn't possibly begin to do it any justice.

"Were you…" She hesitated, clearly searching for the right words. "Involved… then?"

"Yes."

Dotty nodded, mulling this over. "I thought you must have been. She wouldn't have run off with someone she didn't care about." She lifted her coffee cup and took a thoughtful sip. "You work with that Mr Melrose, don't you?"

Lee let out a slow breath, then nodded.

"He's a federal agent," she said, slowly. "Is that what you are? Is that what Amanda is?"

Lee nodded again, thinking how ironic it was that he'd spent years being trained to avoid spilling the beans to enemy agents, and here was his mother-in-law laying everything out for him. He made a mental note to ask Harry why there was no Thornton's Repression for these situations.

"Were you there when —" She paused then, and shook her head. "That business with Andrei Zernov. Mr Melrose told me I had to keep it a secret but you were there, weren't you? You must have been, because Amanda was." When Lee nodded she put a hand to her head, as if trying to keep all this new information from falling out. "It all makes sense now. I can see it so clearly. And Joe, you were probably involved in that whole thing, too, weren't you? Amanda kept running off to work but work was really you and you were looking for him and she was helping."

"Yeah."

Dotty pressed her mouth into a tight line. "You must not have enjoyed that one very much," she said, and Lee tried vainly to keep his expression neutral but knew he failed, because she nodded once and puffed out a sharp breath, all her suspicions confirmed. "You said you've been doing this for fourteen years. So right out of college?"

"Out of the army, actually. A year out of college. I was recruited by the head of the agency we work for."

"Does your uncle know?"

"My uncle?" Lee blinked. "Uh, yeah. He's known right from the start."

Dotty frowned. "Hmph," she said, and he knew she was wondering why Robert Clayton was in the loop when she wasn't. "And what about Amanda? How was she… recruited?"

Lee gave a wry smile. "Well, that was my fault."

"How so?"

He cleared his throat. "I asked for her help one day, at the train station. And she — she helped. And then she… just kept coming back."

Dotty lifted her cup, then set it down without taking a sip. "Why Amanda?"

"Why Amanda?"

"Yes. Why did you ask her, out of everyone in the train station? What made you think she'd help you?"

Lee hesitated. He'd wondered that himself over the years, at first in exasperation and then with the knowledge that it had been one of those pivotal moments he'd forever be grateful for. "I don't know for sure," he said. "She looked kind, I guess. Trustworthy." He fiddled with his cutlery, lining the handles up in a neat row. "I should let her tell you that story."

Dotty pursed her lips. "If I let her tell me I'll be waiting until I'm eighty."

Lee laughed then. He couldn't help it. "I don't know. I think she's wanted to tell you for a long time."

"She's had many opportunities. You both have."

"Yeah, we have. You're right, and I'm sorry about that." He hesitated. "At the beginning we told her she couldn't tell anyone. And then after a while, it seemed safer not to."

Dotty was silent. The waitress returned with their food, and she must have sensed the tension at the table because she slid the plates in front of them and murmured something about waving if they wanted more coffee.

"Look, I understand if you're angry," Lee began after a minute. His stomach had stopped growling by now and had started turning somersaults instead.

Dotty nodded, once. Her arms were crossed over her chest, her jaw set. "All those times Amanda came home with bumps and bruises — covered head to toe in red wine or mud or with her clothes torn. And that car. She smashed up the car far more often than was ever normal." Her brow furrowed. "I know there must have been times when things went badly. She's come home acting strangely — not like herself — and for a while last winter she wasn't the same at all. She acted like everything was fine but I could see it. Mothers can always see it."

"She's had some close calls." Lee poked at his eggs. "I don't like it. I tried to keep her out of it for a long time, but she was pretty determined to stay involved."

"So you've been looking out for her this whole time?" Dotty asked. "Keeping her out of trouble."

"As much as possible." Addi Birol nudged his way into Lee's thoughts, and Lee quickly banished him. "Until last February she was training to become a full-fledged field agent, but that's on hold for now."

"She likes it. The work."

He nodded. "And she's good at it."

Dotty put a hand over her chest. "Please don't tell me she's doing something crazy in London," she said, her eyes closed as if in prayer.

"No." To his relief, Dotty picked up her fork and began eating her fruit. "She's helping behind the scenes, with some analysis. That's mostly what she does now. She has a real gift for seeing patterns and thinking about things in a way the rest of us don't. She kind of… takes all the puzzle pieces and puts them together, and a lot of the time her insights solve cases. You should be proud of her, she's done some amazing work."

"I would have been if I'd known," Dotty said, pointedly. She softened, suddenly, setting her fork down. "I'm trying not to be angry," she said, reaching to cover his hand with hers. Her fingers were cold, in sharp contrast to the heat his own stress was generating. "I should have waited to ask her but I couldn't. You're sitting here and I feel like I know you but I don't, and I needed to fill in the blanks before — well, before you two got married, I guess."

He laughed. "I know where Amanda gets it now. She's good at questions, too."

Dotty shrugged. "Well, I don't know about that. But I do know that since she started doing this work, she's been much happier. I mean, mostly. And I don't know if that had to do with meeting you or the work she's been involved in, but even though things have been absolutely bananas for the last few years, it's been much better than when she was married. Or even right after the divorce. She was so unhappy."

"It was probably the work," he said. "I was definitely a pain in the ass when we met."

"It was probably both."

"Maybe," he allowed. "She put up with a lot from me at first but I'm sure glad she hung in there."

She reached across the table suddenly and gave his hand an affectionate pat. "You know, I'm glad she let you come out of hiding."

"Yeah, me too." He sipped his coffee, feeling the knot in his stomach finally unfurl.

"I mean, she had to, didn't she?" Dotty laughed. "Imagine if she'd tried to marry you and keep you a secret."

Lee spluttered as his coffee went down the wrong way, and for a moment he sat, eyes watering, coughing into a napkin. When he could catch his breath again he tried to laugh. "Anyway, we had to tell you before the wedding, because Billy's invited."

"Billy." Dotty's eyes went round with surprise. "Oh. Mr Melrose?"

"Uh, yeah." Lee found himself putting jam on his toast, even though he never ate it that way. Anything to keep him busy and get him through the conversation. "He's a good friend. And he's the one who saw the potential in Amanda right from the start."

Dotty was quiet for a moment, eating her eggs. "Is this wedding of yours going to be full of spies?"

Lee laughed. "No, I promise. Maybe one or two. But mostly regular people and one crusty army colonel."

Dotty smiled, briefly, then her expression turned serious again. "Amanda's out of the field, as you call it, and that's fine, but what about you?"

"I'm working on it," he said. "Billy's got some ideas."

"What does that mean?"

Lee abandoned his toast mid-piece and speared a piece of potato with his fork. "He's figuring out how to keep me there without getting so up close and personal, I guess. I want to make sure I'm around for the boys, too."

"You really care about them, don't you?" Her eyes shone as she looked at him, and he felt his throat constrict. He thought about making a joke to cover and then decided a little more honesty that morning wouldn't be a bad thing.

"Yeah, I do," he said, his voice catching a little. "All of you, actually."

Dotty sipped her coffee and smiled at him. "It's mutual. You know that."

His face prickled with heat. "That's good to hear."

Dotty ate a chunk of watermelon and sighed. "Well. This has been quite a morning. I think we've really run the gamut, don't you?"

"Yeah, you could say that." He paused. "What about you? Any revelations?"

"Me?" Dotty shook her head. "Sorry to disappoint you, but not a one."

"Oh, come on. Not a single thing?"

"Nothing I'm going to tell you about." She moved her plate aside, her knife and fork lined up neatly. Her tone sounded light but he could read her well enough now to know that she was still processing everything he'd just told her. That she probably would be for a while. He was glad the boys were coming to stay with him this weekend. She probably needed some time to think, and he needed some time not to. "Regular people have secrets too, you know. And I'm not talking about where we hide the marshmallows."