A/N - Special shoutout to LoveyHowl, my 50th reviewer!

Six

Amanda stood in the bedroom of their hotel suite looking at her reflection in the deluxe sized mirror hanging on the wall. Her long body-hugging satiny gown was in a very deep shade of red. She had caught an echo off of Sarek's thoughts once years before through the bond pertaining to her wearing the color red and why he found it to be especially provocative to his senses. The color was an almost lustful reminder to him of marking her during lovemaking. So she wore red that night.

But as she looked in the mirror at herself, she stood there with a serious case of jitters. It had been quite some time since they had been intimate. In some ways Sarek had become a stranger to her physically.

Amanda, at that point, became a little impatient with herself. She had actually gone to the trouble of intoxicating him to get him to the state he was most likely at by now and she was starting to have second thoughts? She tried to pull herself together as she quickly glimpsed what was going on with him through their bond. Maybe she had a little time to-

Uh oh…

"Amanda," he said almost softly from the other side of the door. "If you would perhaps allow me to enter our shared sleeping space? I find that the door is locked." He was still trying to speak as normally as possible.

She smiled as she picked up her brush and tried to get her hair to look the way she wanted it to before he entered their room. "I'm not ready for you to come in yet."

"I am more than able to help you in any endeavor," he said through the door. "You are aware of that, are you not? Simply open the door. I shall…help you."

She felt gooseflesh rise all over her body and knew he most certainly could convince her given half a chance! It had just been so long since he had! She swallowed back nervousness as she said, "I'm brushing my hair, Sarek. You'll have to wait until I'm done."

"That is not at all logical, my wife, since I will most certainly cause your hair to be in a most unseemly disarray by the time we are finished this night…or perhaps by the morning hours. Yes, from what I remember, that is what you prefer most, do you not?"

She looked at the door then, shocked. She hadn't heard his 'drunken' trash talking in years. It was great! "You make promises," she goaded. "But can you deliver?"

"Open this barrier between us and you shall see," he promised.

"I don't believe you," she baited.

He paused before he spoke again. Finally he said, "If you do not open the barrier, Amanda, I shall be forced to break it down and prove my words to you."

She knew he meant it! Since she did not want to explain any damages to the hotel staff, she quickly went and pressed the release and watched him almost saunter into the room. How was it possible that someone that intoxicated could still have all of their physical faculties so well in hand? He didn't even have the decency to stagger! And to make matters worse, he betrayed an almost arrogant confidence in his bearing that he would have never shown under ordinary circumstances.

His eyes held hers as she backed away from him, small smiles on both their faces. "Where are you going, my wife?" he asked with a teasing tone.

"I don't know," she laughed as she attempted to dodge him. But even intoxicated he was more than a match for her physically. The world shifted as she was unceremoniously lifted and practically thrown onto the bed. He quickly lowered himself on top of her and stretched out languorously like some form of jungle cat that had secured a tantalizing treat. The planes of his body melded to her curves and they were both immediately feeling quite satisfied with their respective positions. It had been so long since she had been in this situation with him. The desire was truly there, in her body, in her mind, calling out to him.

He looked down into her eyes and soberness of thought overtook him. He stared down at her and into her eyes. The two were locked in a gaze that neither seemed to want to break. Finally, the silence and tension stretched too long and he admitted in the shakiest of voices, "It has been too long since we've beheld one another as such, my wife."

She swallowed back a lump of emotion. "I agree."

"Forgive," he begged as he looked down into her eyes, "forgive my oversight. Forgive my errors," he requested as his forehead rested softly atop hers. "Forgive."

Her hands reached up and wrapped fully around his frame and squeezed. To feel his solid mass like this again, so open, so full of welcome and want, she felt herself beginning to overflow with deep emotion. There was a lump in Amanda's throat and she couldn't even answer him at first. They held one another for a time, familiarized themselves with the feeling of each other once again. "Of course I forgive you, Sarek," she finally found her ability to speak again.

There was an unspoken misunderstanding here that he was beginning to realize. His Amanda was under the assumption that she was no longer wanted. Being the woman that she was, she refused to beg. But this assumption had done a large deal of damage between them.

"I neglected you," he admitted as he pulled back and looked into her eyes again. "I thought perhaps it would make me a better ambassador to distance myself from all such emotion. I assumed much. But I see now, I was in error."

"Then you have to forgive me, as well, my husband," she admitted.

"What do I have to forgive you for, Amanda?"

"In order for this state of nothingness to happen between us…it's like I've said before in all this, I had to have been complacent to allow it to happen. And I did let it happen."

"You were attempting to be a proper Vulcan's wife, to follow my form of logic. I cannot fault you for that."

"It was my pride that made me not ask about your motivations. I was afraid of the answer I might get if I did ask. But that's no excuse for my not asking. I should have asked. This state could have ended long ago if I had."

"You are more than forgiven for the illogical state of pride that led you to not ask, then, ashayam."

"Then can you forgive my next confession?" she asked nervously. She knew she was taking a mighty big chance, but she knew she had to tell this anyway since she would be unable to keep it from him completely during the afterglow of exhaustive lovemaking.

"And that is?" he asked, intrigued by this conversation. He noticed that she had tensed beneath him and wondered what it was she needed to tell him.

She swallowed and took a deep breath and just went ahead and said it on a quick exhale. "I thought about cheating on you when it got to be too much." And that quickly, things changed.

"Explain!" he snapped as his eyes changed from warmth to…she couldn't tell what that look was in his eyes.

She knew she was on dangerous ground. But it was time to tell the complete truth and let things out between the two of them. "I'm going to tell you everything right now. No more lies, no more shielding you from things. So bear with me. I contemplated having an affair. I was seriously thinking about taking my needs elsewhere since you weren't taking care of them."

"With whom?" he demanded as he looked down into her eyes.

"Well first," she said as she dug the hypothetical knife in deeper, "I realized that a human man wouldn't do. I mean, after you've had a Vulcan, you can't exactly go back. I knew I would need something a little more…vigorous," she admitted with a nervous forced laugh. There was a dangerous look forming in his eyes as she jumped headlong into her full confession. "So I looked at other Vulcans," she tried to shrug casually.

Sarek's eyes widened and then squinted calculatingly. "And whom did you consider?"

"Oh, a few males, but none of them did a thing for me when I thought about them. So I thought of the next best thing. The Klingon ambassador's attaché was really attractive! I mean, like whoa! Remember that guy? And I've heard rumors about how fierce they are in lovemaking so-"

She was making fun of him! With this realization, there was a growl coming from his throat as he quickly flipped her so that her back faced his front. He was then biting into the back of her neck like a male lion trying to get his mate to fall in line.

"OUCH!" she exclaimed with a large smile on her face. "But I haven't finished my confession!" she said, no longer able to keep in her laughter. She was having too much fun with this.

"There is more?" he asked incredulously as anger filled him. But for some reason, he wished for her words to continue.

"Of course! I couldn't settle on a Klingon because well, where's the telepathic connection? I'd miss that!"

"So then you wisely deduced that perhaps your husband was your only alternative."

"Yeah…well, no," she admitted as she gazed back at him. "I wouldn't want to lie to you, now would I?"

He turned her back around sharply then. "Is there more you wish to add on this subject?"

"I started thinking about Deltans then. And the sexual and telepathic possibilities became—well they just became endless at that thought." It was too much.

In the back of his logical mind he knew his wife was now baiting him. But he also knew she was speaking the absolute truth about the things that had crossed her mind. She had thought of all of these alternatives while he had not been attending to her needs. It was unforgivable to him that he had left the door of infidelity ajar. Amanda, because of who she was, had not walked through it.

Many Vulcan women would most certainly have gone elsewhere and then informed their husband they had found a mate who had attended to their needs either by requesting to immediately have their bond stripped or waiting for the Pon Farr and engaging in a Kal-i-Fee ritual.

But for Sarek, words had been spoken by his wife and they had to be addressed. He ripped her nightgown right off of her and then pulled her now bare form to his. One arm held her captive to his frame, pulled close, while the other hand remained free. The fingers of that free hand first tenderly traced the features of her face and then pressed to her psi-points as his eyes held hers. He waited but a split second as thought and intention suspended and time nearly stood still for them both. "Am I still what you wish to have?" he asked so as to be certain. Nothing would ever be assumed by him again concerning her.

"More than anything," she admitted breathlessly as she shivered with anticipation, her fingers questing beneath his shirt to feel the skin of his back.

He was there then, fully converging on her mind, as his mouth affixed itself to hers.

###

Amanda thought she had been exhausted before. She could now no longer even see straight. So she didn't bother. She closed her eyes.

"My wife?" he whispered as he lay next to her. "You are well?"

"Damn, Sarek," she could barely get the words out as she began to display a tiny smile. There was aches and pains only now beginning to manifest themselves to her. She was most certainly going to be sporting and array of bruises and bite marks later! "You made your point. I will never ever think of anyone else," she said with half a grin.

"As is proper," he said. Most of the chocolate was out of his system. She had baited him well. He wanted to allow her to rest, but he found himself admitting, "My wife, I was troubled at your confessions."

She found herself thinking, then you would have been scandalized at my thoughts about half the Romulan men in that delegation from last year… She could hear another dangerously low growl coming from her husband and she quickly excused herself, "I'm sorry, was I broadcasting again?" She knew only her sheer exhaustion was keeping him at bay. She opened one eye and only just registered the sun beginning to rise and found herself laughing tiredly as she closed her eye again. He had most certainly made good on his word. "You don't have to worry about a thing," she assured him. "You're most certainly enough for me."

He pulled her close to his bare skin and settled her close to him as he stroked her back reassuringly. "Sleep, my wife."

"Oh, I will," were her last words as she dropped into a deep slumber.

###

She didn't awaken until the afternoon. After a relaxing shower, Amanda went to their replicator unit and was about to order something when Sarek said, "I took the liberty of ordering something from the kitchen, my wife. It shall be here soon enough."

"Thank you." She began looking for something suitable to wear from her suitcase.

"I think perhaps it is time we discussed the situation that is left between us. I wish to reiterate that I shall not interfere with your communicating with our son."

She gave him an honestly shocked expression. "I know, Sarek. You don't need to tell me again," she said as she put on her most comfortable clothing along with a pair of cushioned socks. She began looking for a comfortable sweater, then.

"No, you are not truly aware. I said I would make certain to not ask or tell you anything having to do with you communicating with our son, but in the spirit of our honesty I must specify that I contemplated intercepting any communications he made toward you."

"And how long did you consider doing such a thing?" she asked as she located the sweater she had been looking for.

"Five point five seconds."

"What stopped you?" she asked as she pulled it on and began to button it.

"It was not a logical action. It would have been an action borne of desperation and control. And that is not the way I wish to be, most especially where you are concerned."

She took a deep breath in and out as she sat down on their now made-up bed. "I appreciate that," she nodded. She sighed. "There's something else I haven't told you."

He grew still. "My wife?" he asked cautiously. He did not think he could take one more confession of his wife's mental wanderings on the subject of other males.

"Yes. I was offered a job at the University of Maine two days ago."

"That is an excellent institution," he remarked. "In what department were you offered tenure?"

"A new Vulcan Studies department is being structured from the ground up. They want me to oversee its compilation and the hiring of staff. They also want me to teach one of the new classes on Vulcan history. That class doesn't start for another year, though. I didn't know what was going to happen with your duties and…" she shrugged. "I didn't know what to do. They said they'd wait a week for my answer."

Sarek found himself staring at his wife with awe. He knew she was a remarkable woman and this more than confirmed that. It occurred to him how many years his wife had put her career on hold while she followed him about the galaxy to this conference and that. "My wife, do you wish to take the position?"

"It would only be temporary," she said as the light of hope shone in her eyes. "I told them I could only do it for two years at the most. That's enough time to get the department properly structured, form the syllabus for the classes, find teachers and staff, advertise the classes and get funding. It's supposed to be a small department and it would only take ten students per year in most of the classes. The history class is the only one that will be a large typical university class with sixty to eighty students attending at a time. But I was adamant, there could be no Vulcan studies department without a class having to do with the teachings of Surakian philosophy. That's a class I wanted to have by itself, standing alone. I set the standard for it that only a Vulcan Master can teach it…and he or she picks the students he wants."

He said nothing at first as he watched his wife. Her body language betrayed she wanted this position very much. "That will be a difficult class to pass with such a firm taskmaster."

"I know," she shook her head with the ghost of a tiny smile.

"It will change a sincere student's entire life."

She shook her head again. "I know."

His head cocked to the side as he realized, "My wife, despite some of the negatives that you have encountered among my people, you have become their greatest ambassador, not I."

Her face flamed up at the compliment and Amanda found herself suppressing a flattered wide grin and shook her head. "I learned from the best."

He felt a deep well of satisfaction stirring within at her words. "T'Pau would be most interested in these classes and the department's funding."

She was turning red again as she said, "Yeah…um…I already spoke to her about funding. I figured even if I couldn't head the department, I could do that for them. T'Pau's already agreed to financially sponsor the first five years."

He was more than in awe with his wife at that time. But since he was aware that his people had, at times, been not so generous to her or their son he had to ask, "For what reason did you wish to undertake this endeavor?"

She didn't know if he would find her reasons frivolous or logical. But she knew he would understand. "My son is alone," she shrugged. "After all this time, how are we the only couple of our kind? How is he still the only human/Vulcan hybrid in this galaxy? I thought that maybe if our people could understand one another better, we would be more likely to expect the best and not the worst of one another, because right now, that's where we are. When a human sees a Vulcan walking by, they instantly give them this wide berth. They would rather not speak with or deal with them. There's this arrogance of emotion we seem to have that I can't even explain. Remember those terrible news articles after we got married wondering what it was I saw in you? As if by looking at us on the surface, they already know everything there is to know about us?

"And Vulcans? They think we're all weak simply because we show our emotions. The average Vulcan doesn't truly realize that most humans not only can control their emotions to a greater degree, but so many of us already do." She smiled at him. "When you married me, you showed that a Vulcan could more than just coexist with a human. And this department, I want it to be a sign to Vulcan that humans are ready to understand their brothers from across the sky and more than coexist with them. Your people took the first step when they made first contact with us and now it's our turn. We're not going to change overnight, none of us on either side. We might not change at all, but we need to learn that we're both okay the way that we are and there is nothing wrong with either of us. And we need to stop expecting the worst from one another. It's time to start respecting one another just the way we are. Vulcans need to stop expecting humans to cut their emotions off and humans need to stop expecting Vulcans to start smiling and wearing their emotions on their sleeves."

He shook his head as he regarded her as if through new eyes. After a time, he decided, "We shall remain here on Earth for the time being, my wife."

Her eyes widened. "What? But your schedule!"

"You are more than correct in your reasoning. It is time for our people to understand one another better. I can think of no better person to facilitate that understanding. I truly believe that anyone else hired in this capacity would be wholly inferior. For the sake of better relations between our people, it is vital that you be the one to head this new department."

She threw her arms around Sarek and pressed her lips to his, more than simply happy in that moment. Her euphoria transmitted quickly through the bond and he found himself overwhelmed in floating heavy happiness.

Your joy brings me completion, Amanda, more than any professional accomplishment I have ever attained.

She felt tears sting the backs of her eyes as she sunk into the solidness of his frame and let his arms envelop her, pulling her into his warmth as closely as possible.

A/N - I'd like to thank everyone who has reviewed this story. You've been very generous and I always say, and truly mean it, but every review is cherished by me.

Special thanks to VickyFromGreece. She has convinced me to continue the saga of my Sarek/Amanda regular universe stories, so I'm going to write you folks another tale of this couple hopefully in the near future.