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Chapter Eleven
They spent the rest of Valentine’s Day relaxing. When Amanda woke from her nap, James insisted on drawing her a bath, then bundled her up in the blue cashmere robe again. They settled on the sectional under a thick blanket and watched comedies until dinner arrived. Then they opened a bottle of wine and ate straight out of the takeout cartons, watching more movies and laughing.
For once, James was grateful that Amanda needed some time to decompress before talking through a scene. It had taken him a long while to get used to her need to reflect and process before talking it out, and even after all the years they’d been playing together , he often had to remind himself to curb his impatience with her process.
But this time, he was grateful for the delay, because he had no idea what to say to her.
When she fell asleep duringGalaxy Quest, James carried her up and tucked her into bed. He went back downstairs and cleaned up, washing the wine glasses and silverware and throwing away the takeout containers. He double checked the locks, turned out the lights, then went back upstairs and got ready for bed.
When he slid in beside Amanda, she turned toward him, curling up against his side the way she always did. “Love you,” she mumbled, still mostly asleep.
“Love you, too,” he whispered back, and lay there staring at the ceiling while she slept.
* * * *
The next day was a full one at work, and he hoped the client meetings he had scheduled would be enough of a distraction, but any time he had more than five minutes to himself, his mind inevitably wandered back to last night, and his gut would roil.
By the time his last meeting ended, he was a wreck. He was struggling his way through a set of changes to his last client’s blueprints when his phone rang.
He glanced at it warily, relieved when he saw Jack’s name on the screen instead of Amanda’s. Guilt made him wince, and he answered the call on speaker. “Jack.”
“James,” came the wry response. “Busy?”
James looked at the blueprints, and the changes that were only half done. “Not really. What’s up?”
“I just thought you’d like to know, we got a new shipment in today, with some cases of that wine you liked.”
James pursed his lips. “The French white?”
“That’s the one. Want me to set some aside for you?”
“Yeah, thanks.” James sat back as a thought occurred to him. “What are you doing right now, Jack?”
“Slogging through paperwork,” Jack replied drily. “The glamour never ends.”
“Would you be able to meet me for a drink?”
“Sure. You can swing by here, if you want. No shortage of drinks.”
That was certainly true. “Is now all right?”
“I’ll tell the receptionist to let you in and dig out the good scotch.”
“Thanks, Jack.”
“No problem. See you soon.”
James disconnected the call and rose from his chair, rolling the blueprints and shoving them into a tube to take with him. He could work on them at home. Right now, he had other priorities.
* * * *
Half an hour later, James sat on the leather sofa in Jack’s office with a glass of thirty-year-old scotch in his hand and spilled his guts.
“I thought everything was fine until the scene was over,” he admitted. “I’d gotten her out of the restraints, we were cuddling under the blanket, and I was starting to go over it in my head, lining up my thoughts.”
Jack nodded. “Y’all like to talk it out right away?”
“No. If it was up to me, we would, but Amanda needs time to process and think things through. Unless things go seriously sideways or she uses her safeword, we usually wait.”
