Chapter 12
669 Words
Chapter 12
Daniel sat at his desk the next morning and ignored the piles of paper that had grown significantly overnight.
He couldn’t help smiling at the memory of that moment last night in the President’s living room. For the second time in a dozen minutes, President Matthews had been required to slap Daniel’s back and remind him to breathe. Over cocktails, they divided pretty typically along gender lines, but for atypical reasons.
The men often stopped to join in on the women’s conversation. They appeared to have become instant long lost friends and the energy of it was electrifying. They were long lost friends who were both fascinated with the ebb and flow of global military tactics as they swept back and forth across the planet. Emily and Mark had amazing insights into the variations of localized conflict and the shifting tactics in the actual theater of operations.
Daniel offered country-level insights, and the President posited some fascinating cultural-level aspects in understanding some of the conflicts and their global ramifications that Daniel hadn’t previously considered.
Again, it was Dr. Alice who startled and amazed. She backed up her beauty with a very serious mind. She followed Mark and Emily into actual battlefield tactics that completely eluded Daniel even when they tried to explain them. At the same time, she was able to expand his and the President’s thinking on several subjects. When questioned, she backed up her comments with facts.
As their small party shifted and regrouped into different conversations, first in the living room and later around the dining table, he never managed to remove her from his awareness. That this breathtaking woman had been thinking about a lot more than kissing him had now rooted his thoughts there as well. He tried to imagine helping her out of that dress.
It was a thought he definitely enjoyed. But he couldn’t quite picture it. Whereas making love to her dressed only in that well-worn cardigan sweater, that he could picture just fine. As if that were the real Alice, and last night’s stunning and brilliant beauty in the perfect evening gown who had radiated as the center of the evening, she was someone he’d never deserve.
Suddenly his desk phone rang from somewhere under the latest Mexico currency crisis. The d**g cartels had hinted that they were going to wholly abandon the peso in favor of the more stable U.S. dollar. The news had crashed the peso’s valuation badly. Again.
“Daniel.”
“You aren’t opening today’s Advent calendar window are you?”
“Good morning, Dr. Thompson.” He pulled the calendar into his lap and opened to the first picture.
“Did you? No cheating or mama would know.”
“No cheating. As a matter of fact, thoughts of you so distracted me last night that I haven’t even opened December 2nd’s window and today is the third. You distract me, Dr. Thompson.”
“Bad luck.”
“Your distracting me?”
“Not opening the window. Do it now, I’ll wait.”
He pulled on the “2” ribbon, attached to a little flap door in the snow at the base of a tree. He pulled out the butterscotch drop and admired a pair of squirrels sleeping curled up inside. The sides of the little space had been painted with tiny cupboards. One open cabinet revealed a bountiful stock of acorns.
He described it to her.
“Hmm,” she hummed in his ear. “Butterscotch. I’ll bet you taste good with butterscotch.”
“I really didn’t need that image stuck in my head all day.”
“Tough,” her laugh sparkled even over the phone line.
“When can I see you again? I have to see if you taste as luscious in normal clothes as you did in that amazing dress.” Their full-body goodnight kiss had almost led him to throw her over his shoulder and drag her upstairs to his bedroom.
“Hmm,” she hummed at him again. “I’ll pick you up this time. Eight o’clock. Eat first, dress warm.”
“Hmm,” he hummed back at her. Sounded stupid when he did it. He glanced up to see Janet standing across his desk holding a couple of files.
Clearly she made a similar assessment about the inefficacy his hmm-ing ability.
“Tonight at eight.” He tried to sound business-like.
“Janet just walked in, didn’t she?” That merry giggle sounded in his ear. “Tell her I said hi.”
“Will do.” Not a chance. He hung up the phone.
- Writer
