Diplomacy

persuade me.” Jack tried to stay calm and pretend he didn’t hear her take a stab at Lucas.
    “I won’t ask what he’s got that I haven’t since that’s bloody obvious, but Christ, Jack - why now? Why him?” She was mellowing again, her tone less angry. Right now, he hated how well they knew each other. He hated the fact that he could read her like a thermometer and he knew that she could do the same with him.

    D i p l o m a c y | 129

    “I wish I knew, Maire. I wish I knew why. It would make it easier to explain why I’ve kept those feelings at bay for so long, but now I can’t anymore.”
    “No, you wouldn’t know, would you?” Maria spat out, furious at hearing Jack use her nickname during an argument. “If you did, that would mean you were thinking for yourself instead of letting your fucking dick do it for you! YOU SCREW UP OUR LIVES, make me a laughing stock, AND YOU DON’T KNOW?” Maria launched herself at Jack and he grabbed her hands, preventing her from hitting him.
    Jack closed his eyes, blindly fending her off, trying to keep himself from lashing out as she had done. He didn’t want to lose control of himself.
    “Maria, it’s... I love him.” There it was. Jack hadn’t said Lucas’s name, but he knew that she knew who he meant. He couldn’t deny his love for Lucas, not to her. She deserved the truth from him.
    Maria backed off, breathing hard, her hair unraveling from her always neatly tied up bun.
    “Love? Don’t talk to me about love. You just used me, and this is all the thanks I get?”
    Jack inhaled deeply, trying to catch his breath as well. “I used you no more than you used me. My position got you exactly where you wanted to be, Maria.”
    “So what? In time, you’ll find out that your little tramp is just using you too!”
    Time to defend Lucas, since Lucas wasn’t here to do it himself.
    “Why would he use me, eh? It’s not like he can benefit from this getting out. It’s not as if my contacts will help his career, not like they’ve helped yours, anyway.”
    “Don’t be naïve, Jack. He probably collects Ambassadors like trophies, then moves on to another country, another prime piece of forbidden ass,” she said with this superior, mocking look on her face that Jack had always loathed.
    “He’s not like that, Maire. You don’t know him.”
    “Oh and you do, after a few weeks of letting your dick do the talking? Tell me another one...” She was seething.

    130 | Z a h r a O w e n s

    Jack realized that if he didn’t keep his cool now, they would both end up in the newspapers.
    But Maria wasn’t backing down yet. “I can’t believe you would be this selfish! What has he done to you? If you’d thought of me even once, you wouldn’t have done it at all. You’re a fool, Jack.” Jack swallowed. “I did think of you. I wanted you to be able to walk away from this with your head held high.” Maria snorted. “Walk away? You can forget that! This stops here and now!”
    “Says who?”
    “Says me, as usual.”
    “You can no longer dictate my life the way you’ve been doing for the past fifteen years, Maria.”
    Maria threw him a disgusted look. “What?”
    “You know what I mean.” Jack wasn’t about to back down now.
    “You mean you’re not going to stop this foolery? Oh, for god’s sake, Jack, wake up!”
    “I can’t do it anymore. I can’t keep up this charade any longer.”
    “My point exactly. Get rid of him.”
    “And what? Return to this lie of a marriage?”
    “Jack, it’s not a lie; we make a good team, everyone says so…” Maria was turning on the charm again and he so didn’t want this.
    “We’ve been more friends than lovers for years, Maire.” She shook her head. “And what’s wrong with that? That’s more than many couples have.”
    “I want more. I need more. Maria... I love him; I can’t push that away.”
    “It’s an affair, Jack, a stupid affair. It can only ruin us if we let it.”
    “I’ve felt more alive with him than I have in the past twenty years.” She laughed. “Oh for Christ’s sake, listen to yourself. You sound like a cheap novel.”
    “Maria, you can move on from this. I’m sure you can have your own career. You have an excellent reputation in the foreign service.” D i p l o m a c y | 131

    “FUCK OFF, JACK! I don’t want to move on, I want what I have here and now. Don’t you think for one second I’m going to make this easy for you and your little tramp.” She clenched her