Amanda pulled up to Lee's apartment building a brief time later and parked behind his Corvette. She shut off the engine and leaned her head against the steering wheel before letting out a deep sigh. What was she going to say to him? How could she explain it so he would understand? Would he be able to forgive her?

She jumped at the sound of light tapping on her driver's side window a few moments later. She glanced up to see a very confused Lee Stetson smiling down on her.

"Amanda?"

She hesitantly opened her door and he grasped her elbow to help her out. He moved her away from the door before slamming it shut and pulling her face toward him with both hands for a searing kiss.

"I thought we were meeting at Spencer's at 12:00?" He scanned his watch. "It's not even 11:30 yet." Before she could answer he took her hand and asked, "What's wrong?"

Amanda leaned against the car, thinking about her answer. She hated to see the worried frown he now wore, but she knew it was only going to get worse once he knew the truth. "Can we go upstairs?" She whispered.

He simply nodded, but never let go of her hand as he guided them back up to his apartment. Lee must have sensed her unease because he didn't say a word during their entire trek upstairs; he just watched her intently. Her eyes darted around the small elevator, anywhere but in his eyes. She was certain if she looked him in the eye, she'd lose what little self-control she had left. Without relinquishing her hand, he fished out his keys with his right hand and allowed her to go in ahead of him. Amanda dropped her purse near the end of the couch and sat down hesitantly.

SMKSMKSMKSMKSMKSMKSMKSMKSMK

Lee had seen her fight off a Russian goon with her fingers shaped in the form of a gun, gotten grown men to drop their guns by shooting an AK-47 wildly into the sky, and even brokered a cease fire between top Russian and American agents on Christmas Eve with nothing more than a broom and a towel. But he had never seen her look so scared or so lost before. "Amanda, please tell me what's wrong. We can get through whatever it is together." He startled when she jumped up from the couch and began pacing in front of the fireplace.

She held up her hand when he stood to go to her. "No, please. I can't do this if you're touching me."

"Wha—"

"Please, Lee," she interrupted. I need to t-tell you some things. Things you probably . . . " She shook her head and bit her lip. "Things you won't like." She turned away from him and he watched her head fall back toward the ceiling before she let out a slow, deep breath.

He sat back down and strained to hear her shaky voice.

"I'm not . . . who you think I am."

"A-man-da!" Why was she being so melodramatic? Maybe he shouldn't have rushed her into a physical relationship. Could he go back to cold showers knowing how amazing they were together? He was startled from his thoughts when she cleared her throat.

"I mean, I am . . . but I'm not. You don't know everything." She turned around and he noticed her biting her fingernails like she often did when she was nervous. "When I was in college, before I even met Joe, I was recruited . . . by the FBI." She trailed off as she watched his reaction before quickly looking away.

His eyes never left hers, his jaw tensing at her last statement. This didn't make any sense. He ran a thorough background check on her just after he'd handed her that package over three years ago. He would have known if she were an agent.

Before he could interrupt, she continued. "It was in my freshman year at Virginia Tech-."

"Wait a minute, you went to UVA!"

"Actually, I started out at VT and then transferred to UVA, but I'm getting ahead of myself. So, I was taking a psychology class at Virginia Tech and the professor had us take this really in-depth personality/IQ test." She shrugged. "I guess I must have done well because the next thing I knew, I was being interviewed by a man from the FBI. He was in his mid-forties, and he didn't say much aside from peppering me with question after question. Shortly after that, I was sent to Quantico for intense training."

Lee leaned back into the couch and shook his head at the absurdity of it all. Amanda King an FBI agent? None of this made any sense. She hated the idea of using a gun, hell any type of weapon. Did he know her at all? He was brought out of his musings as she continued.

"The first year or so, they just had me helping out with pretty harmless civil disobedience groups. It was the late sixties, so they were popping up all over campus. I could slip right in and no one questioned my being there since I was a student. Mostly, I just informed the 'real' agents which groups were harmless and which were more than they seemed. That is until my junior year when I got involved with the wrong group." She took in a deep breath.

9:08 a.m. Thursday, October 10, 1970

"Mandy, come on! We're going to miss the bus to the Capitol," The young woman rushed toward the door ahead of her.

"I'm coming, April! I'm coming, geez!"

"You know Tony will have a fit if we're late," the strawberry-blonde called over her shoulder.

"I know." Amanda grabbed her jacket and poked the petite blonde in her side. "Okay, let's go!" She giggled as they ran out the door and down the street.

Moments later Amanda was grabbed around the waist and pulled off the bus just as she placed her foot on the first step of the bus. "Whoa!" She screamed.

"Hey there, Gorgeous! I thought you changed your mind and blew me off." He turned her around and nuzzled her neck. Tony was only a couple of inches taller than her and a good three years older. He had done his undergrad at the University of Michigan and was now in his second year of his masters at VT. His black wavy hair and piercing blue eyes were only part of his charms. He was extremely smart and funny Amanda thought; that was of course when he wasn't planning the destruction of the United States government.

"I told you I would be here," Amanda smiled over his shoulder as she secretly eyed the agents that had recently been assigned to keep an eye on her. Tom, the tall, thin man that she had guessed was in his early-thirties, was sitting on the bench across the street 'reading' a paper. Marco, the much shorter of the two men, and who appeared to be a few years younger than Tom, was 'window-shopping' nearby.

"Yeah, you did. But it was getting late. I'm glad you're here." He held her face in his hands and kissed her deeply before nudging her onto the bus. "Come on, Babe. We're going to be late."

Prior to this case, there had been only one agent on her, and a rookie at that; 'just in case', they had said. But once she was assigned to the 'Weather Underground Organization' seven weeks earlier, they had placed Tom and Marco on her. They were full-blown agents. If that fact hadn't made her nervous, the plans she had overheard when Tony was on the phone with the organization's base certainly had her on edge. At first, she thought she'd misheard him, but when he repeated himself, she knew for certain. They were planning to blow up the Capitol. She continued to pretend to be asleep until he finished his conversation.

"Wait a minute, you're telling me you were part of the team that brought down Tony Caputo and the Weather Underground?" Lee didn't want to interrupt her, but this was getting crazier by the minute. His Amanda was the girlfriend of Tony Caputo, one of the Weathermen founders?

She simply shrugged. "Well, we only brought down the VT branch. I'm sure you remember they originated in Ann Arbor at the University of Michigan?" At his nod, she continued. "The 'Weatherman' wanted to create a clandestine revolutionary party to overthrow the U.S. Government. The whole Capitol bombing was planned in protest to the U.S. invasion of Laos."

"If my memory serves me correctly, the VT branch did a lot of damage in the late 60's to early 70's and they had even bigger plans that they weren't able to make good on. How on Earth did you do it?"

"Because I was Tony's 'girlfriend,' I was privy to a lot of private conversations. And I just happened to be wearing a wire. One night, Tony almost discovered it." At Lee's furrowed brow she explained. "He had hands like an octopus." She smirked, trying to lighten the mood as she sat down in the chair across from him.

Lee frowned. The knot in the pit of his stomach was tightening.

"The next day of the protest was when they had planned to plant the bomb. I had to be there so that it wouldn't look suspicious. When they arrested Tony and most of the rest of the group, they brought me in as well, so that my cover wasn't blown."

"What do you mean 'most of the rest of the group'?"

"Tony was tight-lipped about who developed the bombs they were planning to use, so whomever it was, is still out there."

Lee nodded in understanding.

"And April was never charged." She shrugged. "Not enough evidence to prove she knew the extent of what was going on." Amanda sighed wistfully, "She was a good kid but she needed a lot of assurances and looked for it in all the wrong places."

"Several of the other members pleaded out or turned State's evidence against Tony and his lieutenants. I moved onto other less-dangerous groups. A few months later, a sorority sister and I went to a party in Georgetown and that's where I met Joe. Joe and I started dating and things were going great. That is until I unlocked my car one morning before class. It blew to kingdom come. Lucky for me, I just happened to open the trunk first to put in some laundry, so I walked away with only minor injuries."

He gasped at the idea of what could have happened. "The Weathermen," he guessed.

"Uh huh," she nodded. "It seemed they put two and two together and figured out that I was the mole. The FBI wiped out any indication that 'Mandy West' had worked for them, transferred me to UVA my senior year, and kept me under watch until they finally closed down the entire operation the following year." She ran her thumb along the seam of his couch cushion as if she was remembering that moment in time and then shivered.

"Guess we know now why you dislike being called 'Mandy' so much, huh?" he laughed lamely and she nodded.

"How much did Joe know about your secret life?" He saw her cringe at his question and he already knew the answer before she had formed the words.

"I had to tell him generalities, Lee. We were getting married . . ."

Lee swallowed hard before nodding. The fact that Joe knew something this big about her and he didn't was the hardest part. "But Amanda I don't get it. Why all the secrecy? Why would you keep it a secret from the Agency . . . from me? How did you keep it a secret for that matter? I ran a very-thorough background check on you myself. None of what you just told me was anywhere in your background."

"Lee . . . it was need –"

"Don't you dare finish that sentence, Amanda King!" He jabbed his finger into the air as he sat up. "Need to know my ass! We're partners!"

"You don't understand, Lee-"

"Enlighten me then." His deep voice boomed as he glared at her from across the room.

His contempt for her nearly choked her and she took in a deep breath and leaned her head against the back of the chair as if searching for answers. "Once Joe and I married and I found out I was pregnant with Phillip, I left the FBI. I wanted to be a housewife and mother first and foremost. My handler, Mr. Klein wasn't happy and tried to talk me out of leaving. He even offered me part-time status, but I had made up my mind."

"That still doesn't explain why –"

She continued, never looking away from the ceiling. "Life went on, we had Phillip and then Jamie, Joe began traveling to Africa, and my time with the FBI seemed to be from another lifetime. That was until 1983." Amanda glanced over to him and he could almost detect a look of pity from her.

Before he could say anything, she returned to her story. "It was early June of '83 when I received a call from Mr. Klein. He initiated one of our old drop sequences. I was shocked. I hadn't thought of that part of my life in ten years."

She pulled up to the abandoned warehouse and put the car into park, but left the engine running. Sure, it sounded like Mr. Klein and he knew the code sequence . . . well, what she could remember of it. It had been an awfully long time, she thought as she made her way to the empty building.

Hesitantly, she slid the large rusty door open, cringing at the loud screeching of metal on metal. 'So much for the element of surprise.'

"Agent West."

"Um, it's just Mrs. King now, Sir." How was it that the man hadn't aged? It had been ten years and he looked exactly the same as he had on her last assignment. "I'm no longer with the FBI. I'm a mother now. I have two small boys at home. I don't know why you've called me here, but –"

"Agent King, please." He held up his hand to stop any further rambling. "I brought you here to discuss a mission that requires your particular skills—"

"Sir—"

"Please, hear me out. I have a colleague at another organization. Have you ever heard of the Agency, Agent King?" At her nod, he continued. "This colleague of mine, he has an agent that requires . . . special handling."

"Whoa! Whoa! Wait a minute! Are you telling me that our meeting at the train station was . . . that you were some kind of . . . of plant?" The panic was evident in his strangled voice.

"No! Lee, I swear to you when we met it was . . . it was –"

"An accident?" He scoffed.

"Fate," she offered.

Snorting in disgust, Lee swiped his hand across his forehead. "I don't believe this." He grumbled to himself as he jumped out of his seat and began to pace behind the couch.

Amanda stood quickly too as if to stop him from bolting. "I turned him down, Lee. I told him I wasn't interested!" She rushed. "I swear to you, when you picked me out of the crowd at that station, it was just by chance." The worry on her face was evident. But he couldn't focus on how she was feeling right now. His entire world was spinning out of control. Everything he knew, everything he felt was somehow thrown into a blender and pureed to within an inch of its life.

"So, you turned this Klein down then, but obviously he got you to agree," his jaw tensed.

"I hadn't seen or heard from Mr. Klein since that day at the warehouse when I turned him down. Then that morning at the train station, when you grabbed me, I was so caught off guard. I didn't have time to think, just react. Then we started working together . . . on occasion." She smiled but he didn't return it in kind. She sighed before continuing. "Yes, you're right. I did agree to . . . to –"

"Lie to me? Betray me?" He pinned her with a look of disgust. "You can't even say it!"

"No, Lee. You've got it all wrong. I never betrayed you! I would never . . . I could never . . ." she shook her head vehemently. "Everything I've ever told you is the honest to God truth! I never lied to you!"

"No? You sure omitted a hell of a lot! You didn't think all of this was important for me to know?"

"You know I couldn't say anything. I swore an oath, Lee. Just like you!"

"When?" At her perplexed look, he clarified. "At what point in our relationship did you agree to throw in with this Klein character? When exactly did I become the butt of the joke, Amanda?"

"You were nev—"

He held up his hand to cut her off. "Save it. When, Amanda?"

She bit her lip before answering. "It was spring of last year when he came to see me. I hadn't heard from him in over a year and a half, so I thought he had given up."

"Who set up the introduction, Agent King," Klein asked curiously.

"Sir?"

"Your initial meeting of Agent Stetson in October of last year. Last we spoke, you were quite adamant you were not interested in coming back to the intelligence game." He ignored the shaking of her head and look of confusion and continued, "Imagine my surprise, when I returned from South America only to find you had not only returned to the business, but had become the partner of the man you refused to partner up with nearly two years ago."

"What," she asked after the air returned to her lungs. Memories of their conversation flooded her consciousness. ". . . an agent that requires . . . special handling," she mumbled. "No, no, no. It can't be . . .," she moved to the window and looked up at the moon and stars wishing she would wake up from this nightmare. " . . . recently lost his last partner," she sighed resignedly. "The man was taking unnecessary risks, you said," she turned and stared back at her former handler. "I don't believe this!"

"You're telling me it was a coincidence that you met and partnered up with the one man I attempted to pull you out of retirement for?"

She shrugged. "I had no idea who you were talking about back then and I guess I never put it together."

"Unbelievable. Only you, Agent King."

"Sir?"

"This could only happen to you," he chuckled.

If she hadn't been so offended by his comment, she might have laughed along with him.

"I immediately resigned from the Agency to work for Jordan Security. The timing of his job offer was perfect. But, when Agent Klein found out, he threatened to expose me to the Weatherman, and I knew he meant business," she rubbed her temple and continued, "then Byron was killed and you and Mr. Melrose offered me my old job back. Maybe Klein pulled strings to make that happen . . . I don't know anymore."

Lee was transfixed on the woman before him. This woman, this stranger . . . the one person he thought he knew better than anyone in his life, including himself. He felt as if he had fallen down the rabbit hole. Was he going to wake up and find that this had only been a bad dream?

Amanda hated the turmoil she saw in his eyes but knew she owed him the whole truth. "I lived in the fear that any day he would decide to transfer me . . . break up our partnership for not following his orders, that you would learn my secret. I told him I couldn't betray you like that. But then he said if I didn't work with him that something might happen to you." She stood straighter and lifted her chin up as if to steel her resolve. "At that moment, I knew I would do anything to keep you safe, so I finally agreed to meet with him on occasion to ensure you were safe," she took in a deep breath and let it out, feeling exhausted but strangely relieved that Lee knew everything now.

"Get out." He whispered almost to himself, but the way she jumped was a clear indicator that she had heard him. Yet, she didn't move; as if she couldn't believe what he'd said. He stared coldly at her before repeating himself. "I said, 'get out,' Amanda," his calm, cool demeanor made her flinch. With a guttural groan, her shoulders sagged and she quietly let herself out of his apartment. It felt as if she had taken the air out of the room with her and he struggled to catch his breath.