Chapter 78-Impossible to Get in the Mood

"Santa's Got a Brand New Bag"

AN: For this installment, I decided to take a bit of a liberty with this episode and extend the scene in the Q Bureau since a little romantic interlude fit pretty well with the existing dialogue.

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Amanda couldn't help laughing a bit at poor Francine and the way she kept fighting with Beaman over his sprig of mistletoe across the room. Every Christmas party was always the same with her having to continually dodge Beaman and his unwanted, alcohol-fueled, overzealous attentions. A part of her couldn't help thinking that Francine secretly liked the attention. After all, Beaman was the only man to hit on her who wasn't being a complete animal about it. He was...sweet...to her, anyway. Not only that, but if any other man had pulled some of the drunken moves that he had, Francine would have knocked them out. Amanda only wished she could understand what grudge he had against her personally. She was acing all her classes, out-doing everyone in them and she had worked hard to prove herself. So why did it seem like he had it out for her?

Her thoughts were interrupted by Billy's voice. "Has anyone seen Lee?"

"Yes, Sir," Amanda promptly answered. "He's upstairs in the Q Bureau working on the Brandenburg file."

"No, he's not," Francine interjected, having finally escaped Beaman. "I closed that last night."

Amanda's brow furrowed in confusion. Why would he have lied to her? "Well, he's up there working on something."

Billy glanced at the duty roster board and exclaimed, "Look at who's put himself back on the duty roster again."

Amanda's heart sank as she questioned, "How did he do that?"

"Beats me," Billy responded with a shrug. "We all work too hard not to take some time off for Christmas, including Lee. Get up to the Q Bureau and get some Christmas spirit in the guy. That's a Christmas order."

"Yes, Sir." Amanda smiled and walked away.

"Did I give you one of these?" Billy indicated his wife's homemade fruitcakes.

"Yes," Francine replied absently still reflecting on Billy's "Christmas order." She laughed once she thought Amanda was out of earshot and in a warning tone, said, "You know that you just gave her license to-" She shuddered at the thought.

"To what, Francine?" Billy grinned.

"Come on, Billy. How long are you going to deny that the two of them are...well...involved, shall we say?"

"Who says I'm denying it?" His smile became broader as he saw Beaman approaching again with his sprig of mistletoe. "Maybe you oughtta try it."

"Fra-cine," Beaman drawled as he draped an arm across her shoulder.

"I'll get you for this," she warned Billy while he only burst out laughing.

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Amanda stood nervously outside the Q Bureau, unsure of what she was going to say to Lee now that she'd just learned that he was doing everything he possibly could to avoid joining in on the holiday celebrations, including with her. It stung a bit. She'd thought now that they were engaged and had grown so much closer, that things would be different. As she'd said to him just a week ago, she couldn't understand why one minute he was grousing about not being a bigger part of her life and the next he was grumbling about how out of place he'd feel when presented with just such an opportunity.

She took a deep breath to calm herself and before she could lose her nerve, pasted on a smile, entered the room and greeted him with a cheery, "Hi."

When her fiance' barely acknowledged her reminder about the party going on downstairs, she took the opportunity to slip his present under their office tree and in a cheery voice, chirped, "Well, would you look at that? I think Santa Claus has been here!" She hoped it would get him out of his funk and into the holiday spirit. She was disappointed again when he made a crack about Jeanie's fruitcakes instead and she tried to explain to him that it was just part of her holiday routine, desperately wanting to follow Billy's order, not only because he'd suggested it, but for herself as well. It was their first Christmas together as a real couple and she wanted them both to enjoy it.

"I am not hard to get in the mood," Lee argued at Amanda's accusation.

"You are impossible to get in the mood," she countered as she rose from her desk and approached his.

"Amand-"

She kept going, ignoring his attempts to protest. "We oughtta' grab an eggnog downstairs, then I can take you to the nearest shopping mall and I'll help you do your shopping."

"I-"

"What can I do to get you in the mood?" she teased in a low voice as she edged closer until she was finally leaning over him. She reached on either side of him to push his chair back as far as it would go and planted herself in his lap astride him.

"Well, you know I'm not hard to get in that mood," he responded and let out a sigh as he felt her lips trailing down his neck while her hands tugged at his belt. He ran his hands up her thighs under her festive skirt.

"Speaking of hard..." she crooned as she opened his pants, slipped one hand into his boxers and began to stroke him.

Lee let out a low groan at her ministrations while his own hand wandered inside her panties.

"Lee," she gasped when he touched her intimately. He always knew just where and how to touch her to set her on fire. She only wished she knew how to touch his heart to change his Scrooge-like tendencies at Christmastime. She extracted herself from his lap just long enough to drop her panties. She resumed her position and tugged on his boxers to free him from them needing desperately to connect with him again. She kissed him softly as he lifted up to meet her. She guided him into her and then leaned her head against his, gazed longingly into his eyes and whispered, "I love you."

"I love you," he responded as he shifted to grasp her hips and pushed himself deeper into her.

They began a slow, rocking motion, both mindful that the door wasn't locked and that the chair made noise when it moved. Amanda rested her hands on his shoulders and kept her eyes locked with his as they moved together, the slow burn fueled by what they were both feeling; her frustration with him for pooh-poohing all things Christmas and his with her for trying to force him out of his comfort zone. It only served to escalate the fears each of them had about getting married, but underneath it all, they both knew one thing for certain, they loved each other completely and wanted to spend their lives together. The trouble was meshing those two separate lives into one as easily as they melded their bodies in the throes of passion.

Their breathing became more and more labored as they both neared their culmination. "Amanda," Lee croaked as he felt her tensing around him and found himself tumbling over the edge with her.

They shared long, languorous kisses as they came down from their mutual high, their heavy breathing the only sounds in the room, neither daring to speak for fear of what might be blurted out in the heat of the moment. There was still too much unresolved.

Lee broke the silence by repeating, "I love you," as he wrapped his arms around her. However, he couldn't help feeling that the words just weren't enough. While he had now met Amanda's family, it was still an issue that they didn't really know him yet and the fact that he'd been invited for Christmas made him feel uncomfortable with that fact. Not to mention that they'd been engaged for nearly two months now and they were no closer to making any solid plans for their future, not even setting a wedding date.

"I love you too," she replied and snuggled against him, laying her head on his shoulder. She let out a deep sigh as she thought of the mood he'd been in lately and she knew a lot of it was because of the season since he hadn't had a lot of happy Christmases in his life. She was hoping that by embracing him with love and family this year that might change, but the more she tried to engage him in the holiday festivities, the more he seemed to withdraw from her. "So, how about that party?"

"Oh, is that what this was about? A bribe?" he teased.

"No, not at all," she answered as she lifted her head and looked into his eyes again. "I just thought you could use a little pick-me-up and I know I needed one."

"You feeling the holiday blues too?" he questioned skeptically. "That's not like you."

"Only because you are," she answered honestly. "It's like I told you before, when people I care about hurt, I hurt too. Did you honestly think I couldn't see you hurting?"

"Amanda, I'm not-"

"Don't even try to deny it," she cut him off before he could make lame excuses as she rose from her perch. "Right now, you're doing exactly the kinds of things you did when we first met...throwing yourself into work...and even making up work to do to avoid thinking or feeling, hoping it will bury the pain."

"Don't you think you're being a little melodramatic?" he scoffed.

"Don't you think we should talk about what's bothering you?"

"Amanda, I-" There conversation was cut short by the telephone ringing. Amanda slapped her hand down on the receiver to keep him from answering it and avoiding the subject yet again, but seeing his perturbed look, she relented and hand it to him. She picked up her discarded underwear and shook her head in disbelief as she heard Lee's side of the conversation. She knew that tone all too well. He was about to add more work to his plate to continue not dealing with his feelings.

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"I got my present already," Lee beamed as he slipped one arm around Amanda.

"Merry Christmas," she replied with a warm smile.

"Yeah." He kissed her softly. "Thank you for insisting that I be here."

"Did you honestly think I'd let you get out of it? I'm the stubborn one, remember?"

"That's no lie," Joe teased as he and the boys re-entered the room with armloads of firewood and walked straight through the den toward the living room fireplace.

Lee and Amanda quickly broke apart and Lee cleared his throat loudly as he focused his attention on his plate. "Well, would you look at this? It looks amazing! It's been a long time since I've had a home-cooked meal for Christmas."

In a lower tone, just for his ears, Amanda responded, "Well, you're never going to have that problem again. I'll make sure of it."

He gave her a half-smile, but inwardly he wondered just how all of this was going to work. While Joe had been teasing Amanda, it did get him thinking. He knew just how stubborn Amanda could be so how was that going to work with their future? Would she always be pushing him to do things he wasn't ready for instead of letting him do things in his own time?

He thought again though about how they hadn't yet even discussed setting a wedding date and the more he thought about it, the more surprised he was that she hadn't brought it up. That was another thing Joe's comment had gotten him thinking about. He remembered reading about their divorce and Joe's statement that Amanda was "resistant to change" and he wondered if it were truer than he'd wanted to believe. As he'd just mentioned himself, Amanda had insisted on him joining her family for Christmas, but hadn't considered that he might want to do something different.

His thoughts were interrupted by Amanda's cheery tone, "Hey, listen... since you were such a good sport about coming here even though you were nervous about it, I had a thought. Joe's taking the boys to his parents' house tomorrow, so why don't you and I have a little private Christmas celebration? We can exchange our gifts properly and maybe you can share your Christmas traditions with me like I shared mine with you."

"What about your mother and your aunt?"

Amanda chuckled. "Oh, don't worry about them. They'll be too busy arguing about tomorrow night's dinner to even notice I'm gone. Besides, I think Mother would be thrilled to know I was spending the day with you."

"Yeah, that sounds nice. I'd like that." He gave her a genuine smile this time, feeling quite foolish for his earlier thoughts. "Merry Christmas, Amanda."