Angelo and Amanda; Angelo and Nathan, Thursday afternoon

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True to her word, Amanda comes to find Angelo for what turns out to be a productive talk.



Sometimes, Amanda thought as she stomped down the path to the boathouse, Clarice had the right idea, swearing off men. If it wasn't Manuel getting his pride hurt when she acted to take care of things, as asked, it was Angelo going all passive and jealous on her. Either way, she was tired of it and now the question of Valentia's relationship with Manuel was settled (although she was going to have to get onto that whole 'tracking down the kid's real origins' thing once this was done) she was buggered if she was going to leave things with Angelo they were.

"Right," she said to the office as she banged open the door. "This has gone on long enough."

Angelo was alone in the room, this time, sitting at his desk with his nose in a file. He glanced up at her coolly as she slammed in. "Guess so. You've been in the mansion a whole day, an' all."

"I was busy!" she retorted, coming over and plucking the file from his hands and slapping it down on the desk. "Manuel's got no fucking idea how to look after a kid, let alone an empathic one, and she trusts me. So sorry if I didn't come racing down here the minute I got back." A small petulant part of her made her add: "It's not like you've taken any bloody interest in anything I've been doing since November any way."

"You", he retorted, sparing the file a bare pointed glance before looking back at her, "were on business since November. I learned not to ask about that stuff, 'cause you hardly ever tell me anyway."

"Because you never ask!" Oh, that wasn't childish at all. "Anything difficult, you just curl up and go all silent on me, is it any wonder I don't tell you anything any more? Pete was fucking well dead, I blacked out a chunk of a city in Spain and who is it emailing me to ask if I'm all right? Not my bloody boyfriend, that's for sure!" In frustration she balled up her fist and slammed it down on the desk. "If it was Nate I bet you would have been on the next plane out to make sure nothing had happened!"

"You took off to Spain without even tellin' me face to face, after all of half a day together after Africa, but oh, it was okay, 'cause Remy said so!" Angelo snapped back, going automatically on the defensive at the mention of Nathan. "Anyway, you made it pretty clear the no secrets thing doesn't stretch to Snow Valley stuff, so there's no point askin' about what you're doin', is there? Power cuts happen, an' then when I knew it was you, it was from a post to the journals so I knew you were well enough for that."

"What do you want to know? That I was part of a fucking assassination in India? Or that I killed a couple of hippies the other week who hadn't done anything except be in the wrong place when Apocalypse decided to set up camp?" She flung it at him like a weapon. "Do you want to know you're sharing your bed with a killer who doesn't spend days agonising over what she did because it's part of her fucking job?"

"I used to share my bed with Sarah", he reminded her, eyes and voice flat as they almost never were. "An' I've always known who she is. It's only gonna be different with you if you try an' pretend to be someone else with me. I know what Apocalypse did to people, so deserve it or not, I'd bet they didn't give you much choice."

"The woman in India gave me plenty of choice. We went in there to kill and that's what we did. It wasn't about revenge or personal issues or even self-defence. I used what Selene taught me, sucked the life almost completely out of her." Was she trying to drive him away? she wondered. Or was she just trying to get a rise out of him, see what it would take? Seeing him this angry was a relief, almost.

"Snow Valley actively wanted her dead, I don't believe for a second she was some innocent bystander. Just 'cause you guys're killers, doesn't mean you're murderers - an' trust me, I know the difference." There was weariness under it all, now. "I can deal with what you do, 'Manda, but it seems like you've been busy for a long time." Not that he hadn't, of course, but not out of the country, not for that long.

She sagged a little. Fuck, now she felt guilty. "I... had to be, Ange," she said at last. "Losing Pete, nearly losing Wanda... I couldn't deal. There was fuck all I could actually do to change anything and the only thing I could do was work. Work or turn into a useless heap, like I was after London." She looked down at the desk, not wanting to meet his eyes. "Even going off to Spain with Manuel, that was work. Do you really think I'd go off with him on Hellfire business for fun, after everything that's happened with us and them?"

"Not for fun." He stared down at the abandoned file, not focusing on it. "But you went off with him on Hellfire business - an' since when are you involved with Hellfire past workin' for Emma, anyway? An' you told me at the last minute." He'd been stressed already, with Nathan going away and coming back broken, or he might not have taken it quite as hard.

"I'm not. I was gathering info for Remy on what the Courts are up to. He's worried about Emma recruiting half the fucking office for her own thing." Suddenly very weary, Amanda dragged a chair over to sit on, flopping down on it opposite Angelo, the desk between them. "As for why I didn't say anything... I don't know. I s'pose I didn't know how to tell you without you getting pissed off at me, considering we hadn't exactly been talking. Maybe I thought you wouldn't care." She started chewing on her thumbnail, a sure sign of emotional turmoil. "You've been so distant lately... maybe underneath I wanted to see if I could get a rise out of you, see if there's any passion under there, like there used to be."

"Three an' a half months an' I've seen you how many times?" he asked, looking up at her fleetingly. "Or not even seen, you weren't here so that's not so much fair, but how many times did we talk when you were in Africa?" He'd tried to make that as unaccusing as possible, but he couldn't keep a little edge out of it. "I'd have answered the phone to you any time of night, but I never knew when'd be a good time to call you."

"You ever tried to get phone service in Ghana?" she replied, but with a fleeting smile rather than counter-accusation. Then she dropped her chin in her hands, resting her elbows on the desk. "You're right. I haven't been around, not really. Not since London, in a way," she admitted with a sigh. "Sometimes it just seems... I dunno. Like we're just trying to fit each other in between everything else. Our jobs, Nate, the Trenchcoats, my powers shite, your teaching and the leather brigade. And sometimes it feels like we're together just because we think we should be, rather than feeling it. Like we're a habit or something we're trying to prove or something."

"Maybe we are", he was forced to admit. "It's easy t'get into a rut, just a comfortable... thing. An' when we've got all this stuff eatin' up our time an' comin' ahead of us... but it's not stuff we can give up. That's the trouble."

"So what do we do?" she asked softly. "We can't go on like this, Ange. It's killing both of us."

"I don't know." That was more helpless than he would have liked. "Maybe, I don't know... make sure we make time for us, set it aside properly?"

"We could try that..." She bit her lip. "Ange, you do want this, don't you? I know I haven't been the best girlfriend in the world, but if you're not happy..." She let it trail off, not sure she wanted to finish.

"I haven't been", Angelo confessed. "But it's been a lot of stuff. You bein' gone so long was only part of it... an' like you said, I wasn't exactly the perfect boyfriend after you came back."

"I wonder sometimes, if you still love me," she confessed, looking down at the desk again and fiddling with a corner of a file. "You're so quiet most of the time. Yelling at me just now is the most emotion I've seen out of you for ages. And I know I'm one to talk with the whole 'business as usual' thing, but I do love you, Ange, even if I've been too angry and upset at everything to show it."

"I do", was the instant response. "'s just... it's been a hell of a few months, an' now Nate's... I don't even know what's up with Nate, he won't tell me, but somethin' happened two weeks ago, an'... maybe we both just need to get out of here for awhile."

"I might have to go back to Spain to dig up Valentia's papers and talk to the people who had her - you could come with me, if you want?" she suggested hesitantly. "Just for a few days, so you wouldn't be away from Nate too long."

"Spain sounds nice", he said with a faint grin. "Think you're on to somethin' there." And he leaned forward, arms out towards her in an offer of a hug.

There was the faintest look of surprise on her face and then she rose out of her chair, twisting to half-sit on the desk and let him wrap his arms around her. It was like coming home, in a way, despite the slightly awkward position. "I'm sorry," she murmured, almost too quietly to hear.

"Me too", he answered, leaning into her shoulder.

Later, after Amanda leaves, Nathan puts in an appearance. Some things are talked about, others talked around.



Angelo was still sitting at his desk, hours after Amanda left, but his mind wasn't especially on his work. He wasn't worried about asking Nathan for the time off to go to Spain, he was just worried about taking it.

The man in question drifted through the door and interrupted Angelo's concerned brooding. "Sorry," Nathan said. There was a thick stack of files tucked beneath his arm. "Got caught up in the translating." As well as the other members of the office were doing in their language learning, he was still the only one around here fluent in Punjabi.

"I was wonderin' where you'd gone", Angelo said easily. "Anythin' interestin' in there?"

"Nothing we didn't already know," Nathan said, setting the files down and moving towards the coffeemaker. He was moving more easily than he had even a few days before, but there was a stiffness to his posture that didn't really have anything to do with his injuries.

Angelo was watching him, not even pretending to read the file in his hands, noting both parts of that. "Least we know now, I guess. How's the leg?"

"I'm fine," Nathan said, almost absently. "Busy afternoon?"

"Not really. Just catchin' up on some of the readin' I've got behind on... an' Amanda came by earlier."

"Oh?" A very odd little smile that Angelo almost didn't see, with Nathan half-turned away from him.

Almost, but he did see it. "Yeah, there was some stuff we had to talk about... what's that look for?"

"Talking. You and she. I may be a nosy old bastard but I'd gotten the sense there hadn't been a whole lot of that lately."

That got him eyed suspiciously. "You are a nosy old bastard. But you're kind of right. She was away a long time."

"Too easy to let these things slip by." Until they burst out with defensiveness on the journals where everyone can see them, Nathan thought, but didn't say. Just because he hadn't felt like communicating much with the mansion at large didn't mean he hadn't been reading. "Was it a fruitful talk?"

"Yeah, I think it was." He hesitated, then, "She might be goin' back to Spain, try an' find out more on this kid Valentia. Asked if I wanted to go too."

"You should go," Nathan said, looking around with a smile that was strained, but sincere. He felt a strange kind of relief, and not just because the two of them were clearly attending to their relationship rather than their jobs.

"I thought you'd say that." He was looking carefully at Nathan's face, and the strain in his smile. "An' it'd be the same answer if I promised to stop askin' what happened to you."

Nathan took a deep breath and let it out on a sigh. "I clearly haven't had enough coffee today, because I didn't follow that. But you should go. We're not overly busy right now, and we can handle things without you for a little while. And hey, I took some time off already this month... your turn." Although in your case it had better be actual time off.

"It'll only be a few days", Angelo said, ostensibly to inform Nathan rather than remind himself. "But your time off doesn't count, it was hardly a holiday."

"This isn't really about me, is it? Go. Have as much fun as possible while digging up dirt on the de la Rochas."

Angelo snorted. "Yeah, findin' dirt on Alphonso sounds like a real fun time. But we'll do our best. You gonna be okay? No more messin' around with wine an' antibiotics?"

Nathan raised a hand with a flippant smile. "I do solemnly swear to behave. You can count on me."

"Yeah, I've heard that one before."