Second Chances

Chapter 17

Thao sat back in his chair, sighed, and folded his hands in his lap. "Maybe this joint venture of ours is not meant to be, my friend."

Carter murmured some choice expletives under his breath, tossing a piece of paper aside and rooting through files for something. "I’ve been dreaming of this opportunity for too long, Thao. I’m not about to let some bloody bureaucrat with his head up his @ss spoil it for me!"

Carter continued to push papers around on the small table, swearing again occasionally. Finally, Thao leaned forward and placed his hand over Carter’s. "Perhaps we should attempt to fulfill our dream some other time -- when your personal life is not such a distraction, eh?"

Carter slammed the paper in his hand down and yanked his other hand away from Thao. "Me? Distracted? What makes you think that my personal life is distracting me?" Carter shuffled the papers again but then sat back in his chair as he stared down at his lap with a guilty expression that he tried his best to hide.

"Carter.....you’ve lost your place in that particular file three times already this morning." Thao tried to gentle his voice as Carter lifted ocean-blue eyes that were streaked with red to meet his. "Your eyes look like roadmaps because you can’t sleep ....." Carter opened his mouth to object but Thao held up a hand to stop him. "I heard you pacing in the hall last night. You swim each morning alone and almost bit my head off when I suggested accompanying you....." Thao sat back again and shook his head. "I’ve known you for a long time, Carter, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen you like this before. At least, not since....." Thao leaned forward towards Carter and lowered his voice.

"....Surely.....you’re not falling in love with Casey again, are you?"

Carter sighed loudly. "I just don’t know, Thao. She’s just so.....different. If I just knew for sure that she would stay this way...." He sat up and leaned closer to Thao. "She insisted that I kiss her goodbye before I left." He folded his hands on the patio table. "Thao -- I think there was probably more passion in that kiss than there was in the entire first two years of our marriage." He sat back and shook his head. "I just can’t seem to get it out of my mind.....the way she looked at me......and tasted....."

Thao propped his elbows on the chair and put his fingers to the bridge of his nose. He was about to make a comment about Casey that would earn him a punch in the nose, but then Miranda appeared at the edge of the lanai. She carried a silver tray that held three tall, frosty glasses. With a not-too-subtle sway of her hips, she walked to the table and set the tray down next to Carter. "Maybe you’d both be able to get a lot more accomplished if you took a little break from all this work."

Carter raised an eyebrow at her, never even hinting at a smile. "Miranda -- we’re only 100 feet from the ocean, we slept until 10 this morning....." He gestured at his swim trunks and terrycloth beach jacket. "......and to quote Dilbert, I believe we’ve taken the term "casual Friday" about as far as it can go." He shook his head. "I seriously doubt that either Thao or myself is suffering from working too hard."

Miranda presented him with a glass from the tray. "Well, I still think a quick break might relieve some of the stress." She leaned closer to Carter, offering him an excellent vantage point for appreciating her décolletage. But Carter disappointed her when he simply took the glass from the tray, closed his eyes, and took a long drink,. "That Thomas character mumbled some words I didn’t understand again when I asked him for the iced tea." She sat down next to Carter, pouted, and stirred her tea with a spoon. "I think he put some kind of Aborigine voodoo hex on me."

Carter finally smiled. "Thomas would do no such thing, Miranda. He’s just a little......eccentric.....at times. You have to learn not to take him so seriously." Carter sipped his tea and then leaned back in the chair. "I remember the time that Thomas accused me of being too soft to keep up with him anymore." Relaxation seemed to flow over his body as the memories came back to him. He chuckled, more to himself than to the others. "He actually *dared* me to go walkabout with him one more time -- for old times’ sake." He shook his head. "I didn’t get any sleep that first night because he kept me up all night telling jokes."