Nick Mariano is not a small man. Sam has only met him a couple times at White House events Amy strong-armed him into attending, and the deputy chief of staff remembers him being cheerful, tall, and not nearly as smart as the other people in attendance at the party. He definitely wasn't a bad guy, and even if he were, the building is crawling with Secret Service. Amy is safe. She has to be.
Even so, when he passes through the lobby, he stops to check the entry log. Sure enough, Nick Mariano signed in to the building just fifteen minutes ago. No sign out recorded.
He continues through to the policy bullpen, checking their office for any sign of the recently split couple. When he turns around, he sees Rachel coming toward him from the other end of the bullpen, her face buried in a folder. "Where'd she go?" He asks.
She jumps slightly, not having expected him. "I don't know," she replies.
"Look, Rachel, I know you don't want to betray her trust, but I know Nick is here and I know that he's not supposed to be, and all I'm trying to do is make sure she's alright, so I need you to tell me where they went."
The blonde eyes him for a moment before nodding. "They were headed toward the Mural Room – " Before she can say anything else, he's bolting back through the lobby.
The Mural Room is empty when he arrives, and he strides through into the outer office to the Oval. To his left is the door to the Rose Garden, and then he sees them. They're standing out in front of the rows of chairs where she'd been sitting only hours before. He dwarfs her in size, but she looks completely in control of the situation.
That doesn't stop him from feeling relieved when he sees an agent standing just outside the door.
He refocuses on the pair in the garden, particularly on the brunette woman who has barely moved an inch since he arrived. There's a reason Amy Gardner is often sought for debate prep. She is a master. While Nick is moving around erratically, looking agitated, Amy stands stoically, hands folded in front of her as she mostly listens, only interjecting now and then and never letting her emotions get the best of her. Sam cracks the door quietly so he can hear some of the conversation, but he only manages to catch words and short phrases here and there. In fact he really only catches some of Nick's raised voice, while Amy's much calmer speech doesn't carry toward him. The only way he can tell she is the least bit upset is from the way her jaw clenches every now and then.
From what he manages to gather, Nick doesn't like the answers he's getting from his ex. The more frantic he gets, the more aggressive he looks, and that causes the knot in Sam's stomach to tighten. It tightens further when Nick grabs Amy by the shoulders and kisses her.
It's a hard, desperate kiss from the woodworker, and from this angle, Sam can't tell if Amy is reciprocating or not. But then she stumbles backward, and it looks as though she pushed him away. She then delicately wipes at the corners of her mouth with her fingers, shaking her head, and Sam is certain she's going to start shouting. But she doesn't. She just shakes her head and says something that once again Sam can't hear, so he finally decides to step outside.
He recognizes the agent as Agent Walker, and Sam nods as he closes the portico door quietly behind him and steps outside, moving a few yards away from the Oval Office and hiding behind a pillar. Now that there's no door between them and she's starting to ramp up her argument, Amy's voice finally finds his ears. " – and you don't come here, to a place you know you are no longer welcome – a place crawling with the best-trained guards on the planet – and demand answers. You call or email or send a damn messenger and trust that if I want to talk, I will come to you."
Her hands find her hips and she speaks quietly, Sam can't hear her this time, but he thinks he can see the word 'sorry' pass her lips. Nick seems to consider her words before finally turning to go, looking dejected as he heads toward Agent Walker, who escorts him inside.
Once the two men have gone, Sam looks toward Amy, who's facing away from him, and he walks in her direction, making his way down the aisle slowly so as not to startle her. When he reaches her, she just continues to stare ahead, toward the chuppah under which their friends were married just a couple of hours ago. If he hadn't seen the argument that had just occurred, he wouldn't think for a moment that she was upset. "You okay?" He asks quietly.
She nods slowly without shifting her gaze at all. "He thought it would be a romantic gesture – showing up here in a tux with flowers, declaring his love for me and whisking me off to Virginia to get married on a moment's notice." She takes a deep breath and rolls her eyes. "Turned out to be more of a security risk than a romantic gesture."
It's chilly outside, the setting sun cooling the evening air, so he slips off his jacket and drapes it over her bare shoulders. Amy seems surprised but not at all offended as she twists to slip her arms into the sleeves with a quiet "thanks" as she quirks her lips. "Actually I think it's a good thing he showed up today," she adds after a long moment. "Proved I made the right decision by saying no."
"Yeah, showing up at the most highly protected building in the United States wasn't the brightest idea in the world, was it?"
"No, it was not… but on the up side, it gave me a chance to apologize to him. I did care about him, and it made me sick to hurt him, but I'm pretty sure that if you're supposed to marry someone, you don't hesitate; you just know," she reasons. Finally, she turns her head to look at him. "Does that make me sound like a total sap?" She chuckles.
"A little, but I like it," he replies, meeting her gaze.
She seems to consider her next words for a moment as though she isn't quite sure how Sam will react. "He said that I'm like this because I feel like I have to be."
"Like what?" Sam asks.
Amy nods again. "Tough. Severe…"
"Indomitable?"
"His vocabulary isn't quite that extensive, but sure." She allows a minor smile at that. "He thought he could tame me or something. If we got married, I mean. Like if I had a big, strong man waiting for me at home…" She trails off then, shrugging and looking down at the ground beneath them. "Maybe he could fix me."
"Well then he's an idiot."
Her head snaps up to look at him. "He's an idiot," Sam repeats, turning to face her fully. "You are resilient. You don't take shit from anyone. You're passionate about your work and you want to change the world, which sometimes means you have to be at work until two in the morning because your job is important. If he doesn't understand that – if he doesn't love those things about you, then he's an idiot who didn't deserve you in the first place."
Sometime during his little speech, she turned toward him, and he can't quite read her in that moment. "So," she breathes, her voice gravelly. She clears her throat and swallows thickly, her voice stronger after. "What you're saying is that I need a man who understands that I'm an extremely intense workaholic who won't take his crap?"
A wide smile spreads across Sam's face. "You're Amy Gardner. You don't need a man," he counters.
"Damn straight," she laughs.
He laughs along with her. "But if you decide you want one," he adds with a shrug of his shoulders.
In her heels, she's just about the same height as he is, so all it takes is a tilt of her head for their lips to meet. This time he doesn't stop her.