Chapter 65-A Couple of Normal People

"Dead Men Leave No Trails"

After watching Sallee elude him by hopping on the bus, Lee hurried back to the parks department building where he'd left Amanda for her safety. He let out a frustrated sigh as he saw her peering cautiously around the corner of the building. He shook his head as he approached her and through gritted teeth, ground out, "Amanda, what was the last thing I told you when you phoned me half an hour ago?"

"Not to follow Sallee," she confirmed with a nod, knowing that he was irked with her for not following orders. "But, Lee, he was right there-"

Lee interrupted her tersely, "He'd take you out as quick as he'd swat a fly." Didn't she realize how much danger she'd put herself in or how...lost he would be without her?

Amanda swallowed hard at the deathly serious look on Lee's face and nodded in contrition. There was more to his annoyance than just her disregarding his orders. The look on his face said it all. He was concerned for her safety. "I'm really very sorry. It's just that when you took me home last night, I couldn't get Millicent off my mind. After I read her diary, she...she wasn't a stranger anymore. She was just a kind, sensitive, lonely lady. And I kept thinking, suppose I hadn't found Sallee yesterday? What if I'd left it alone? Then she'd be alive right now, playing her violin and ironing Allen's work shirts and..." She trailed off and stared at the ground.

Lee moved to comfort her; these were feelings he understood. He took her hands in his, but she still stared forlornly at the ground.

"Hey. Look at me," he cajoled, squeezing her hands lightly. When she gazed up at him with sorrowful, guilt-ridden eyes, he continued, "You are not responsible for Millicent McDonald's death. I don't know what Sallee's game is, but I do know he was using Millicent and believe me, when he finished with her, he wouldn't have just walked away. If you hadn't pushed this thing, we wouldn't know Sallee's alive and planning something." He hugged her for reassurance.

Amanda leaned into his comforting embrace, clinging to him for dear life as she let the tears she'd been holding back silently fall. Lee closed his eyes as he held her trembling body against his, softly stroking her hair, trying to comfort her the best way he could in a disconcerting situation. Boy, did he know what it was like; to feel responsible for someone else's life. He felt that every day; more so since she'd charged into his world with both feet. If anything happened to her because of her involvement with him...

Amanda lifted her head from his chest and yanked on his lapels to pull him closer. He raised his hands from where they'd rested at her waist to wipe the tears from her face. "Amanda..." he began, but she silenced him with a finger to his lips before sliding her arms up to wrap them around his neck and urge his head downward toward hers. "Lee, please, I just...I-I-I need..." she sputtered.

"Shh." He lightly brushed his lips against hers, but took it no further than that.

Amanda whimpered in protest at the brevity of his kiss and tugged on the back of his neck again, needing more from him. Instead of moving closer, though, he pulled away from her. "We should get back to the office," Lee stated firmly, trying his best not to be swayed by the unspoken plea in her eyes. He wanted so much more than that with her.

"Not yet," she argued. "I-I can't."

"Amanda..." he responded in a scolding tone as she moved closer to him and pressed her mouth against his again, but he knew that it was futile. He could never say no to her, nor did he want to. He returned her kiss briefly, then took her hand and led her to the locked entrance of the recreation building, knowing that it was only open on the weekends. Wordlessly, he quickly picked the lock, pulled her inside with him and closed the door behind them.

Once inside and alone, Amanda wrapped her arms around him again and they began to kiss in earnest as he backed her up further into the main room to where he knew there was a door off to the left, leading to a smaller room used for self-defense classes. Upon reaching his destination, he reached one hand behind her to turn the doorknob, but the force of their combined weight caused them both to topple into the room, landing on the mats just a couple of feet inside the doorway.

"Oof," Amanda involuntarily groaned as she landed on her back with Lee's full weight on top of her. Not that this had been the first time. How many times now had he thrown her to the ground for cover and shielded her body with his own? Each time he had, she'd felt safe...protected and she needed that more than ever now. When he moved to relieve her of some of his weight, she locked her arms around him and shook her head as she ran one leg down his and urged his head down to meet hers again.

"Amanda, are you sure?" he questioned her. When she nodded, he finally gave in and kissed her soundly as he moved one hand to caress her stocking-clad leg until he reached the bare thigh above it, pressing her into the mat. As he felt her squeezing one hand between them to work at his belt, he let out a low groan as she brushed against his swelling member, bringing to mind another time they'd been in a harrowing situation after her repeated demand of "take off your belt." That had been an accident, but this...this was very deliberate. He trailed soft kisses across her face, her eyes, her cheeks, tasting the saltiness left behind by her tears of guilt, wishing he could kiss away her pain.

"Lee," she sighed as he lowered his lips to the pulse point at her neck while he began to work the buttons of her blouse loose one by one, pressing his lips tenderly to each new patch of skin he revealed. She let out a cry of protest when he stopped for a moment.

He lightly stroked her face, placed a quieting finger to her lips and crooned, "Patience, My Love." He continued what he'd started by hooking his fingers into the sides of her panties to drag them down her long legs, casting them aside and then bunching up her skirt at her slender waist before dipping his head down to the apex of her thighs, flicking his tongue out to taste her.

"Lee," she gasped at the contact, her hands flying to his head and sliding through his fine, silky hair.

Lee knew this was something that she needed, a release that only he could give her. Or, at least, that she'd made clear in her recent actions that she only wanted from him. He slipped his middle finger into her, finding that sweet spot inside while he pressed the flat part of his tongue against her intimately, loving her with his mouth. He was rewarded by hearing her sighs turn into breathy moans as she neared her climax, stroking her inside with his finger and outside with his tongue until he felt her coming apart beneath him, her body trembling now, not in sorrow, but with pleasure.

Moving back up her body, he finished the job she'd begun on his pants and slid into her welcoming warmth. Feeling her tightening around him, still in the throes of her climax, he knew he couldn't hold on for long, but this wasn't about him. It was about her. Moving in and out of her, he braced himself above her with one hand, while he stroked her with the other until her felt her falling over the edge again, watching with delight as she tossed her head from side to side with the force of her second orgasm, screaming his name and he soon tumbled over with her, emptying himself into her as he hoped he was emptying her of her guilt even as he filled her. "Amanda," he let out a deep groan as he collapsed on top of her.

Amanda held tightly to him, kissing his face and clinging to him in the aftermath, grateful that he'd given in to her demands, soothing her the way she needed to be soothed. "I-I-" she broke off as he raised his head to gaze into her eyes.

"You...?" He inquired.

"Th-thank you," she stammered.

He chuckled as he rolled to his side to take his bulk from her and pulled her with him. "Thank you?" he questioned, his eyes dancing in amusement.

"You know what I mean." She slapped playfully at him.

"Yes. Yes, I do," he replied. 'Thank you" had long ago become their code for "I love you," since they were both too chicken to be the first one to actually say the words. He held her to him and at the look of deep longing in her eyes, couldn't help himself asking, "Are we ever gonna' be like a couple of normal people?" Almost instantly, he regretted it at seeing the startled look on her face. "What?"

"Nothing. I just...I think that sounds nice, but I thought you didn't want normal."

"Well, with our jobs, we'll never have completely normal," he pointed out, "but isn't that all the more reason to have it on our off time?"

"You might be onto something there."

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Lee couldn't believe it. His comment about "normal" has actually struck a chord with Amanda, or at least he thought so. She'd invited him to her house for dinner, a real dinner date, not a cover, not him hiding out, no pretenses, just the two of them and he had been pleasantly surprised by how much he'd enjoyed it. But as luck would have, it wasn't to last because her family had come home early just as they were sitting down with their dessert and were "this close" to an entirely different definition of the word.

He didn't let himself be disappointed for long though. After all, he wasn't some hormone-crazed teenager. He'd been perfectly content with the one tiny kiss on her back patio, the look on her face setting his heart alight with happiness at the idea that they were one step closer to their happily ever after.

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Amanda waltzed back into her house dreamily after Lee's departure. Her first thought when Lee had grabbed her and pulled her into his arms the way that he had was that he was in the mood for another backyard romp. Instead, he'd simply gazed longingly into her eyes before giving her a sweet kiss, a feather-light brushing of his lips against hers. The look he'd given her spoke volumes about his feelings for her and then without a word, he was gone. This time, though, she didn't feel the sinking feeling that she usually did when he'd leave like that; this time she was elated, so much so that she didn't hear her mother talking to her.

"Amanda, have you heard a word that I've said?" Dotty questioned impatiently from the kitchen. "I swear, you've got your head in the clouds so much these days." Dotty stared at her daughter, trying to gauge her mood. "Saying goodnight to your Mr. Steadman or whatever his name is? You know, it's funny because I could have sworn a while back, his name was Simpson, but then when he called last week, I think he said it was Steadman..."

At the mention of Lee's "names" Amanda snapped to attention. "Oh, Mother, really. Just because I'm in a good mood, it has to be about a man?"

"No, it doesn't have to be, but I'm just looking at the facts. There are two sets of dessert dishes here, one that was already in the sink and one that I just picked up from the den." She gestured to the sink. "Plus, dinner dishes washed for two including a pair of wine glasses." She nodded to the drainer on the counter. "That silver sports car was parked outside and as soon as I asked you about it, you disappeared out the back door again and I'm betting if I were to look outside, the car would be gone now." She noticed that Amanda had also dodged her comment about her would-be boyfriend's last name. Was she intentionally trying to hide him from her family? Or was he doing so in providing different names? Whose decision was it to hide who he really was, his or hers?

'Hmm..." was Amanda's only reply as she began to clean up from her thwarted dessert with Lee.

Dotty smiled. "Does this mean that the two of you are finally on your way to behaving like a couple of normal people in love?" Seeing the wistful look on her daughter's face, she knew that could be the only logical reason for it...Amanda was in love. "No, never mind. You don't have to tell me, not that you'd volunteer any information anyway. You're like one of the spies in those novels I read. You'll never crack no matter how much pressure I put on you."

"Hmm..." came Amanda's reply again as she worked to clean up the remnants of the dessert she and Lee didn't get to have, still lost in her own thoughts. She only wished that she had had the courage to tell Lee how she really felt about him after their jaunt at the park. She'd had every intention of doing so tonight, and it seemed that in the way he'd taken her hands when they'd been sitting on the sofa together and the way he'd said her name, that he had something he wanted to say too. She'd stopped his train of thought because she'd longed to kiss him, but even that hadn't happened. Why did they have to come home early? She'd thought the two of them would have the whole night and she'd even changed out of her work clothes to be more relaxed around him, fully prepared to invite him to spend the night for the first time. She'd even hinted at it when she'd invited him over, reminding him that her family wouldn't be home for another day. Still though, the night hadn't ended on a bad note, even it is wasn't in the way she'd hoped.

"I'll just go check on the boys' progress with their unpacking, but I do hope this is a good sign of things to come."

After her mother had left the room, Amanda's smile never faded as she reflected back on Lee's words at her dinner invitation about being like a couple of normal people and replied softly. "I do too."

"And Amanda..." Dotty called from the stairs having heard her daughter's last comment.

"Yes, Mother?" She turned the direction of her mother's voice to see her still on the landing.

"If it does turn out to really be something, you know you could always invite him over for dinner some time when we're all home instead of waiting until we're out of town." She grinned at her daughter then trotted up the stairs.