Notes: This story is mostly from Lee's POV, but there's a good amount of Amanda POV too. For the purposes of this story "Our Man in Tegernsee" takes place before "Brunettes Are In." Assumes knowledge of the basic plots of those episodes. I've taken some lines of dialogue from "Brunettes" and modified them a bit. And I used a few lines from "Who's The Boss?" as well.
Chapter One
Lee
Lee was fuming. He hadn't wanted Amanda to take this courier assignment in the first place but Billy wouldn't listen, and then Amanda wouldn't listen. Now her safety was in jeopardy, not to mention the lives of the Agency's three agents in Leningrad. He was mad at Billy, he was mad at Amanda. Mostly he was mad at himself. 'I never should've kissed her when we were in Munich,' Lee thought.
He pulled into the parking lot near the laundromat just in time to see Amanda being attacked. Some thug was grabbing her purse. Lee slammed on the brakes and ditched his Corvette in the middle of a lane. He still didn't get there fast enough.
The purse snatcher was off and running while two onlookers roughly helped Amanda to her feet before leaving the scene. Thankfully, she seemed unharmed. As was the basket of laundry.
"Well at least he didn't get the microdot." Lee gestured to the basket of clothes.
Amanda's initial relief after the attack was abruptly reversed. "Oh, my gosh! He got the sock!"
"What!?" Lee looked at her and shouted. His head started to pound with adrenaline and confusion.
"The man inside said it wasn't safe, so I thought I should put the sock somewhere other than with the laundry. Who would search for a sock in my purse? How could I have known I'd be attacked by a purse snatcher?!" Amanda defended her actions as best she could in the face of Lee's ire. Unfortunately, nothing was going to derail him.
"That sock happens to represent the lives of three people, it's a vital code that we have to have, or in 48 hours three of our agents will be caught and killed!"
"Lee, I'm sorry!"
"Sorry?! I'm the one who's sorry!"
Lee shoved the now useless basket of laundry into Amanda's hands, grabbed her arm, and started them toward his car. Amanda shrugged out of his grip and declared, "I've got my own car," as she wheeled around to walk the other way. Not a second later, she spun back to follow Lee, admitting that the thief had gotten her car keys.
Later, back at the Agency, in a bid to salvage the mess of a day, Lee agreed to Amanda's last-ditch suggestion to search the laundry for the microdot. As they walked out of the bullpen and into the hallway, he explained to Amanda that his gut - his very experienced, highly trained gut - was telling him it would be futile. Or at least he tried. And then tried again.
Amanda stopped walking and faced him straight on. "What are you saying to me?"
Glad she was finally admitting her need for clarification, Lee spelled things out. "Amanda, you should've never taken that courier assignment."
"Mr Melrose asked me to do it."
Lee sighed and tried to be patient, but his patronizing undercurrent could hardly be missed. "Yes, but if you were listening closely, I was asking you not to."
"You were?" Amanda was baffled.
"Ah-ha! Yes! See?! That is the difference between a pro and non-pro. Being able to pick up on the subtle nuances."
Lee stepped to the elevator and punched the 'up' button with a triumphant poke.
Even though Lee felt he'd won the point with Amanda about his experience and picking up on nuances, there they were... in her den, looking through the laundry. Lee snorted in frustration, threw a balled up pair of socks across the room, and wondered why he was doing the searching when it'd been her idea. Tension radiated off of Amanda, who was sitting stoically in a chair next to the bookcase, hands folded in her lap. There was nothing about this that was going well.
It was the 'Hot Mama' t-shirt that put him well and truly over the edge. It was a stupid shirt and so unlike Amanda. That it was a gift from Phillip and Jamie gave it some context. But the mention of her boys snapped something inside him. Lee did not understand how, as a mother, she could've agreed to take this assignment that she so clearly wasn't ready for, and that he'd tried to tell her not to take. Now the lives of three agents were at risk too.
Lee leapt to his feet and voiced his frustrations about the case, about the laundry, about Amanda - loudly. When she stayed very still and very quiet, he realized the level of his anger had gotten out of hand. He took a deep breath and paced. "Uh… I'm very sorry, Amanda. I lost my temper again. I seem to be always saying things that, uh... "
"Well, sometimes that's when people are the most honest." Amanda's voice was flat, defeated.
Raking a hand through his hair, not really knowing what to say, Lee admitted, "Yeah, and the dumbest, so…"
"Lee, I think we should stop."
His shoulders relaxed a bit. "Yeah, there's no microdot in this laundry... "
"No, I don't mean that. I think we should stop working together. I don't think we should be partners anymore," Amanda said with a low steady voice.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa. We have never been partners. I don't work with partners, Amanda, and you know it." 'Is she pushing my buttons on purpose?' Lee wondered as he pointed an accusatory finger at her.
"You're losing your temper again."
"I am not losing my temper!" he shouted, proving her point.
"I know you think that I'm not right for the Agency," Amanda jumped in, still speaking in that infuriatingly calm voice. "I just want you to remember that I didn't ask to join. I mean, you got me into it in the first place."
Lee couldn't believe she was throwing that in his face. "Well, I'm not holding you there, am I?!"
"No."
Exasperation fizzled through his body as he held his hands out in a plea. "Amanda, what are we talking about here?"
"My resignation." She paused as the word hung between them. "I think I should probably give it to Mr. Melrose."
Lee reeled in confusion for a moment. He wasn't about to tell her to stay - or to go, for that matter. The way things were between them right now, no matter what he said she'd turn it on him in no time. "Well, you do what you think is best for you."
"Well… I will then, I guess I'll turn in my resignation," Amanda nodded.
"Well, fine."
Lee walked out Amanda's back door, got in his car, and took off.
Within ten minutes, Rollo was knocked out, the den was a mess, and Amanda and Lee stood on opposite sides of the couch, both holding onto a lamp.
"Why did you come back?" Amanda asked.
It sounded like a peace offering, so Lee assumed her near-kidnapping had done the trick to snap them out of whatever had gone so wrong earlier.
"I, uh… I didn't like the way our little disagreement ended. I drove by and saw the van in the driveway and the door was open..."
He could see her hackles go right back up. So much for peace.
"It wasn't just a 'little disagreement.' You said that I should resign."
"No, you said you were going to resign," Lee said, taking one hand off the lamp and pointing a finger at her.
"You agreed with me. You meant it, didn't you?"
"No, I didn't totally mean it." This felt like deja vu all over again.
"But you mean it a little," Amanda pressed.
"Maybe a little." He still thought it would be safer if she resigned.
"Ah ha! You said it again." She jerked the lamp from his grasp and held it as if in victory.
"Said what? I don't even know what I said anymore." Lee thought he was absolutely going to lose his mind. This was madness. If these were the kinds of conversations they were going to keep having, he definitely meant it.
Amanda
Amanda lay in bed replaying the day in her mind. It'd been a disaster almost from the start. She felt terrible about losing the microdot, especially now knowing it contained information that was the only chance for three agents to get home safely.
As if that weight on her shoulders weren't enough, there was Lee piling on. She hadn't seen him this agitated and quick to anger in a long time. Or at least not this edgy for this long, maybe ever.
The final straw - one of them at least - had been Lee's absurd circular logic. How could he say she was too inexperienced and couldn't discern nuance well enough to have taken the assignment and then turn around and chastise her for not picking up on his hints that he wanted her to turn it down? That'd been when the idea of resigning began to seem like the only option.
Their 'little disagreement' - Amanda snorted to herself at Lee's descriptor - reminded her of the tense discussions between she and Joe shortly before their divorce. The ones that went around and around, and in retrospect, foretold the breakup. She would never understand why people who cared about each other could - and would - hurt and confuse one another so badly.
With a cooler head and this quiet time to contemplate, Amanda admitted that she'd succumbed to that very pitfall. She had manipulated her conversation with Lee. Hurt and confused by his anger, she'd wanted to force him to be the one to say she should resign. 'I never should've kissed him when we were in Munich,' Amanda thought.
End Chapter One
