Part 2
BA pulled the van outside of the entrance to Amy's apartment. Face opened the side door and Amy jumped out of the van. She refused to admit that she was any more than slightly tipsy from the amount of champagne she'd managed to drink. The guys could see different.
"Thanks guys. Was really lovely dinner," she said, but thought to herself 'except for one certain person turning up'.
"Hey? Amy, wait a minute. Does that creep know where you live?"
"Yeah, why? I bought the apartment just before we split up."
"Face, give Amy some company tonight. Just in case our friend decides to show up."
"Hannibal, it's not necessary. Why would Greg want to come by this time of the evening?" Amy protested and started walking towards the building entrance to her apartment.
"Hannibal, she doesn't need a babysitter." Face whined. "You sure this guy is gonna turn up?" He grabbed a bag that carried his essentials that was behind his seat and jumped out of the van.
"I don't know, I just got a hunch," Hannibal replied. And out of earshot of Amy, he said to Face "If he turns up, give him something interesting to see." Hannibal raised his eyebrows and smiled at Face.
"What? Why?" Face was now confused too.
"I just gotta a feeling he wants something and well if we give him some blackmail material on jealous old Johnny, we might see his true colours".
"Oh I get ya" Face winked.
"Don't give you permission mind. This is Amy we're talking about Lieutenant!"
"Hannibal!" Face responded sharply, fiddling with his tie as he does nervously. "You don't need to tell me! I can't believe you even had to say something!"
"Of course." Hannibal smiled. "We'll be round bright and early, see you two kids tomorrow morning. Oh give us the keys to the vette, we'll pick it up tomorrow morning. We may need the extra vehicle."
"Right," Face gave one of his more unconvincing smiles at Hannibal and threw him the keys to his car, slung the bag over his shoulder and then turned towards Amy, "Wait up kid!" and ran after her towards the entrance of her apartment. She looked liked she needed a bit of hand, as she was starting to wobble slightly. From the van the rest of the guys, could hear Amy protesting slightly that she really didn't need Face's assistance.
"Colonel, do you really think that guy will show up? What's his face, Greg?" Murdock asked in the back of the van. "Do you really think an old flame of Amy's could be up to something?"
"I hope not. But I just could smell a rat. That guy he was with…mmm…it'll come to me," Hannibal reached for his top left hand pocket where he stored his cigars and took one out and lit it. "OK BA, lets find somewhere to crash for the night."
XXXXXXXX
"Aaaghghhh" Amy growled in frustration, "what was he doing there Face, of all places, on my birthday?" She fiddled with the key to her apartment door but was getting more and more frustrated with it. Amy was taking out her frustration on the door and it wasn't having any of it. Face assisted Amy in the opening of her apartment door.
"It's OK, I'm really not that drunk" she insisted. "Tired, yes!" as she stumbled into the apartment.
"OK, well I'll get some coffee on all the same huh?" Face put his bag down out of the way, and threw his jacket over the arm of one of the couches, shaking his head and then walked into the kitchen area of the spacious open planned apartment to prepare the coffee.
"Face, you really don't need to be here, you can go if you like. Hannibal needn't know." Amy slumped into her couch and then took off her boots, and put her feet up on the coffee table in front of her. "Greg isn't going to show up."
"Well, just in case huh!" Face smiled over. "I don't mind taking the couch!"
"I've got a spare room, you don't need to sleep on the couch!" Amy sat up worriedly from her slouched position in the couch. "God! I hope he doesn't show up!"
It wasn't long before Face sat beside her on the couch and handed her a hot mug of coffee.
"He's really got to you hasn't he?" Face asked in a concerned tone. "Look you can open up to me kid, we're good" he winked at her. He was right. Amy and Face did have some kind of bond. They'd become good friends, amazingly Amy had thought considering Face's reputation. But he did know when to be the perfect gent at times. For Face, Amy was the only woman he could actually be himself about. He didn't have to have this pretence of "Templeton Peck" the charmer, chaser, conman, when he was around her. He could be himself and so he usually did open up to her when he knew he couldn't talk to the rest of the guys about something, and he liked the idea that if she ever needed to talk to someone, the feeling would be mutual.
"I know, but you'll just think I'm crazy or something Face. I'm being a pathetic woman!"
"Crazier than Murdock? I don't think so kid". He smiled back at her to reassure her he'd listen to whatever she had to say. "And definitely far from pathetic."
"OK. I'll spill the beans." Amy sipped at her coffee. "But don't laugh OK, this guy broke my heart!" And she pulled her legs underneath her onto the couch, so she was sitting comfortably in the corner of the couch, turning her body towards Face, who was sitting comfortably at the other end of the couch.
"Amy, come on, you know me better than that?"
"Ok, well, just before we broke up, he'd started talking about going to New York, I'd just landed the job at the LA Courier, I'd practically been there only a couple of months and things were looking up. I just didn't want to go. I couldn't even understand why he'd looked at a job in New York in the first place".
"What does he do?"
"Oh, he's a corporate lawyer. Works for companies, suing one another for stealing designs, you know, that sort of thing."
"So he could have found a job easily enough in New York then?"
"Yeah! Anyway, this went on for a couple of weeks, him badgering me about New York and then I just found him in bed with my best friend! I just really didn't see that coming! My whole life shattered around me. I don't even know to this day, how long they'd been at it behind my back!"
Face wasn't quite sure what to say; he could see Amy had got a little upset reliving her story, more with anger than anything.
"I just turned my back on him, refused his calls, everything. To me it was over. And eventually he must have moved to New York".
"And your best friend?"
"Oh I didn't want to see her either, as far as I cared, she could go to New York with him. I never bumped into her, so maybe she did."
"You sound like you had a really rough time of it, kid."
"Luckily, Al Massey took me under his wing at the paper; otherwise I don't know what I would have done. I just became a workaholic, but he looked after me. Then Al disappeared, I found the A Team and the rest is history." Amy looked at Face. She'd been looking away from him rather into his eyes, trying to hide her emotion. "You guys saved my life. Al Massey saved my life really". Amy paused, and there was silence between them.
"Hannibal and his jazz saved me!" Amy laughed to herself, as if it could be a title to her next story and trying to change her mood. But then she went back to her more serious tone. "I know that sounds a bit dramatic, Face, but I was really down when Greg left. I mean really down. I'd cry myself to sleep every night, night after night. He was supposed to be everything to me. I was suppose to marry him, have kids…you know, the whole package! Every girls bloody dream!" Amy stood up, walked around her apartment agitated. "I've closed this chapter in my life, Face, I don't want him re-opening it!"
"Wow kid," Face got up and put his arms around her, giving her a hug. "We're not going to let him, OK." Face paused and pulled away to look into her eyes and then joked "You currently have a bit of a love triangle going on in your life at the moment! Greg won't know what's hit him!"
"What?"
"Oh don't ask, Hannibal is on the jazz again!" Face finished his coffee and took Amy's empty mug off of her and took them to the kitchen area. "I did always wonder why you were so persistent to save that old guy, though. When we first met you, I think the team thought the way you were harking on back then about Al Massey, he was gonna be a boyfriend or something, until we saw him of course!" Face laughed, and Amy chuckled to herself too. "Now I know why he was so important to you though."
"Yeah he was really important to me back then. He was a very good friend." Amy smiled and laughed to herself. "He still is of course, the old fool!"
Amy sat back down on the couch and then looked at her watch. Face followed her to the couch and sat beside her.
"It's getting late, I think I'm ready for bed". The champagne had definitely made her tired. Amy got up to walk towards her bedroom. "I gotta go to work in the morning. They haven't seen me in the office for days".
"I think so, kid" Face looked at his watch, it was coming up for 11pm.
"Look, take the bed in the spare room, Face, and if you want a shower or something in the morning, take a fresh towel. OK?"
"Yeah, OK!" He walked in the direction of the bathroom. "Do you mind if I go in here first?"
"No, no you go ahead" and Amy strolled into her bedroom and closed the door. She decided to put a pair of cotton pyjamas on that weren't too revealing, but nice enough to be seen in, she could imagine the rest of the team banging on her door at the early hours of the morning. As she got into her pyjamas there was a knock at her front door. She looked at her watch. It was now gone 11o'clock. She walked out of her bedroom, Face had appeared from the bathroom and both of them exchanged a look of who could that be at this hour. Face had a dreaded idea that it could be Greg, and that he'd have to perform to Hannibal's wishes.
"Who is it?" Amy asked.
"Amy, its Greg. I'm sorry it's late but can I come in?"
Amy looked back at Face. He gestured that she did so, and slipped into Amy's room, where he frantically got undressed, taking off his socks, shirt and undoing his pants and strewn his and Amy's clothes, that he'd noticed were in a neat pile on a chair, everywhere. He puffed at the bed to make it look slept in.
Amy reluctantly opened the door to Greg. She was still buttoning her blouse to her pyjamas as she did so.
"Greg, what could you possibly need to see me about at this time of night?"
"I just had to see you." Greg walked into the apartment. At the same time Face came wandering out of Amy's bedroom in character. He left the door slightly open so that Greg could assume he'd interrupted a night of passion. As he wandered out of the room, he hopped a little pulling up his pants frantically, to look as if he was just making himself look decent. But the top half of his body was bare.
"Sweet heart, what is it? We were just getting to the fun bit!" Face whined as he pulled at his flies of his pants.
Face could see that Amy's expression was of similar shock to Greg's but she hid it well from Greg.
"Err honey, this is Greg, you know, you met him today at the restaurant."
"Oh Greg, right!" Face walked towards him with his hand out, his jeans now firmly on, but the top button of his flies undone, still showing a little of his underwear. Like in the restaurant, Greg refused to shake his hand. So Face withdrew it sensing the awkwardness and put his arm around Amy instead, who had by now positioned herself at Face's side.
"I just wanted to talk to Amy, is that OK pal? Can we have a bit of privacy?" He looked at the pair of them together, gesturing for Face to leave and then quickly glanced around the room.
Face was about to protest; however he didn't have to.
"Erm. No Greg, it is late. I wasn't really expecting visitors". Amy smiled awkwardly. "Can't we do this another day?"
"Err, yeah maybe you are right Amy. I can see this isn't the right time" Greg replied reluctantly. "Maybe I should come back another day?"
"Please," Amy insisted and gestured towards her front door.
"I thought you were with that guy, err, Johnny, wasn't it?" Greg quietly asked Amy as he went towards the door, but making sure Face could hear him.
"Oh god, don't tell Johnny, he'll kill me!" Face whined and continued to play his game "We just couldn't stop ourselves. Amy's gonna tell Johnny soon, aren't ya honey? You're gonna end it soon".
"Oh Greg. Yes, Johnny's a great guy, but I'm in love with Templeton here. I'm gonna end it with Johnny soon. I just haven't found the right moment yet. He's been so good to me, but we are just not right for one another. He's so smothering for me." Amy added realising that she too needed to get into character; she tried not to smile as she said it. Face hugged her a bit tighter. "But Johnny can't find out, he'll kill us both, he's so jealous".
As he left the apartment, Greg turned and looked in the direction of Face and gave a smirk without Amy seeing. But Face saw it. The apartment door closed and both Amy and Face relaxed!
"Face! You could have warned me you were going to pull this stunt!"
"It was late, I didn't think I'd have to! Anyway, you cottoned on pretty quickly" Face winked.
"I think 'love triangle' gave it away earlier!" Amy smiled. "But why the old Johnny's gonna kill me?"
"It was Hannibal's idea OK. Not mine. Just in case Greg is sniffing around for something."
"What do you think he wants? Other than to see me?" Amy was a little puzzled by Face's suggestion.
"Never mind." Face shook his head. Maybe Amy was better out of the loop on this one he thought to himself. "Look, it swiftly got rid of Greg, didn't it?" Face smiled.
"Yeah…how dare he show up this time of night?" Amy said more to herself angrily. "Now lets go to bed, I'm beat, separate beds that is!" she quickly added.
"Amy, you're as bad as Hannibal!"
