For a New Year's Eve wedding, it was okay, I guess.  Amanda had invited everyone she cared about and I must confess I was a little surprised to be included in the gathering. 

Hmm.  An unfortunate choice of term, I suppose, although there were far too many Immortals there for my peace of mind.   Not surprisingly, the groom was tall, dark, athletic and an inveterate good guy.  Sound familiar?  But no, it wasn’t Our Celtic Hero, it was one of the American variety.  And a youngster, at that.  The fellow seemed a little rough around the edges for Amanda’s refined tastes, but there’s no accounting for True Love.  My best guess is that she knew she’d never have MacLeod, so she found someone cut out of the same cloth that she could actually dominate.  Cynical, I know, but hey, it’s what I do.  And it’s true, isn’t it?

Holidays are an amusing, ever-fascinating socio-cultural exercise no matter what era you were in, and when combined with something like a wedding, there is a nearly overwhelming outpouring of ceremony and sentimentality that is either grotesque and bizarre, or amusing – depending on how you chose to look at it.   I chose to be amused.

Nick Wolfe, the groom, was understandably perturbed when MacLeod – his fiancé’s former lover and an Immortal of legendary skill, strength and experience at all kinds of activities, both on the battlefield and in the bedroom – finally arrived at the last minute before the New Year’s Eve ceremony, only to have his bride flutter over the Scot like *he* was the favored object of her attention.  But MacLeod seemed to catch onto that situation immediately, peeling Amanda away like clinging plastic wrap and solicitously handing her back to her spouse-to-be. 

Mac and I exchanged brief pleasantries after making rather intense eye contact at a distance, and I wondered what was going through his mind.  He’s gotten better in the last couple of years about not telegraphing his feelings.  Was he happy to see me?  Wary?  Distrustful?  Damn it, I worry far too much about what the man thinks, which is probably that I’m some kind of weird historical artifact, or just a pain in the ass he has to deal with because… because why?  Because I keep popping up in his life like a very old, corroded penny you keep running across and don’t know what to do with?

During the actual ceremony, Mac’s eyes were suspiciously bright as he walked his friend of some 350 years down the aisle and gave her away.  He loves Amanda, even if he wouldn’t dream of marrying her, and this was so… permanent.  An Immortal marrying another Immortal.  Gave me the willies.  It’s nuts, in my opinion.  Who does that?  Well, there was Gina and Robert, but they were both more than a little bonkers, anyway.

Thankfully, the actual wedding ceremony was brief, but I have to admit that having it on New Year’s Eve with everyone dressed in their most festive attire, all gathered in a gothic church wreathed in pine boughs and alight with hundreds of candles, was a sight to behold.  Amanda was breathtaking as she paced sedately down the aisle on Mac’s arm to the lush accompaniment of a string quartet.  All pretense of virginity had vanished a thousand or so years ago, but she had defiantly dressed in a clinging ivory gown that trailed behind her with a quiet swish of silk, her shoulders left bare to provide a display for the single strand of pearls that supported a diamond pendant of at least ten karats that had me wondering what sultan or prince it had belonged to before her sticky fingers ‘acquired’ it.

The reception-cum-New-Year’s-Eve party quickly transformed the solemn occasion into a rather wild, noisy celebration, interrupted only briefly when the happy couple arrived.  I caught a glimpse of MacLeod when he made a toast that wished Nick and Amanda many lifetimes of happiness together, but the remaining toasts were predictable, sentimental and boring.

I wandered over to the buffet table and sampled several glasses of champagne, studiously avoiding the numerous Immortals attending, including the deValicourts and some Irish dandy named O’Brady, and waited for a propitious moment to leave.  Having lots of Immortals around made me nervous, but I hadn’t had much of a chance at all to talk to MacLeod.  A few more minutes wouldn't do any real harm, I decided, joining Joe Dawson and Lucy Becker, Amanda’s mortal majordomo, at their table. 

The full-sized swing band started to play a slow, romantic ballad, prompting Nick and Amanda to take their obligatory first turn on the dance floor.  As the dance concluded and the bride and groom kissed and everyone applauded, Mac appeared and made a courtly show of asking Wolfe’s permission to dance with Amanda.  Permission was granted, but Wolfe’s acquiescence seemed grudging, especially when the dance turned out to be a jazzy number that allowed Mac and Amanda to cut loose in an eyebrow-raising display borne of long centuries of partnership.  But when the dance was done and bows were taken to the crowd’s appreciative applause, Mac bent to kiss Amanda’s gloved hand, then led her over to Nick, handing her over and murmuring something to both of them that diffused the tension and had the bride and groom smiling adoringly at each other. 

“Classy,” Joe murmured, as he watched the scene play out. 

Lucy sighed wistfully.  “Isn’t it romantic?” she asked, then turned to Joe.  “It’s like a fairytale.  Two handsome, dashing men who love the same woman, and one stepping aside so she can be free to find true happiness.”

“Is that what Amanda told you?” Joe asked with an amused glance at me

“Well, of course!” Lucy answered.  “I mean, just look at them!  Duncan and Amanda look so wonderful together, and it’s clear that he loves her.  But he willingly gave her up out of true love,” she sighed again.

“Yeah, well.  Sort of,” Joe acknowledged, reluctantly.  “But he’d no more have married her than…, hey!” Joe exclaimed as I kicked him under the table, even though it only thumped against his prosthetic leg.

“Yup.  It’s just like a fairytale,” I affirmed enthusiastically, throwing a warning look at Dawson.  There was no point to spoiling Lucy’s romantic fantasy with the truth – that Amanda had gotten Mac into more near-fatal catastrophes than any person he had ever known – except perhaps Fitzcairn.  Hmmm.  Now that I thought about it, MacLeod seemed to allow himself to be led astray on a fairly regular basis.

“Speaking of MacLeod, where did he run off to?” I asked.  After handing Amanda off to Nick, he seemed to have disappeared.

“Probably went to the can,” Joe advised.  “Don’t worry, he’ll be back. He loves weddings.  As I recall, when Gina and Robert got married again, he danced with every woman in the room at least twice and got rather sloppily drunk and sentimental over the whole notion of a marriage that might last forever.”

“Yeah, but only after he practically cost me my head,” I grumbled, still irritated about that incident, although it was proof that MacLeod wasn’t the only one who occasionally allowed himself to be led astray.

But MacLeod didn’t reappear, and after a half an hour I went looking for him, unsuccessfully, finally ending up back at Joe’s table.  It took a moment to wrest the Watcher’s attention away from Lucy’s scintillating conversation, or perhaps it was the substantial cleavage sitting in the neckline of her low cut evening gown.  “Do you have somebody on MacLeod tonight?” I asked Joe quietly.

“Why?” Joe asked in annoyance.

“He seems to have left the party.”

Joe frowned, then reached for his cell phone and made a call.

~~~~~~~

MacLeod was sitting on the stairs leading down to the Quay, staring out at the water where the Notre Dame Cathedral was bathed in light that reflected back off the river in undulating ripples.  He looked up when I stopped at the top of the stairs, then turned back, his arms loose around his knees, one hand clasping his other wrist.

I moved slowly down the steps and settled next to him and the two of us just sat in companionable silence for minute, our breaths fogging regularly in the damp, chill air of a mid-winter’s night.

“You didn’t say goodbye,” I finally observed.

Mac glanced over at me with a small smile.  “Connor always refused to say goodbye, insisting that we’d always see each other again.”

“But sometimes we don’t.”

Mac nodded slowly.  “Sometimes we don’t.”

A dinner boat slowly rumbled past with an echoing beat of loud dance music trailing in its wake, causing the water to lap up over the edge of the Quay in quiet splashes.  After it had gone by, I tried again.  “Feeling nostalgic tonight?” I asked, and when Mac looked at me questioningly, I motioned my chin towards the Seine, where Mac’s old barge had been moored for a number of years – years of tragedy and upheaval.

Mac looked down for a minute, then resumed his observance of the river traffic, such as it was.  “I guess that’s part of it.”

“Ah.”

A couple of beats of silence passed.  “Ah, what?”

“Just Ah.”

Mac shook his head, then pushed himself to his feet, strolling towards the water.  I followed, then waited as MacLeod paused at the water’s edge

“I’m really happy that she found real love.  You can see it on her face, read it in her eyes, and with one of us.  Who’d have ever thought?”

“I know,” I agreed.  “Kind of leaves you in the lurch, though.”

Mac shook his head.  “No.  Amanda and I… we never had that kind of relationship.  Oh, there were a few times, a few moments…” he shrugged.  “But it wasn’t like what she has with Nick.” He sighed.  “You know, Amanda tried to talk me into setting up house a few times, but the timing never seemed right, and I knew we would drive each other crazy after awhile.”  He chuckled softly.  “After a very short while, probably.”  He paused for a few heartbeats of silence.  “But I’m going to miss her.” 

He turned and headed downriver.  I walked alongside, examining Mac as closely as Mac had examined me earlier.  Yes, he looked his usual self, well dressed and groomed in his classic tuxedo, his hair long enough now to curl slightly – but there was a distance about him that was troubling.  Tonight, the legendary Immortal social butterfly had walked away from Amanda’s wedding when the old MacLeod would have wallowed in the unbridled sentimentality of the event. 

“So, what is Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod doing these days?” I finally asked.  During the previous, hectic twenty-four hours we had not had any real time to talk, and even though the conversational gambit was a bit hackneyed, at least it was safe.

“Same old, same old,” Mac shrugged, his hands tucked away in the pockets of his dark overcoat.  “Antique authentication and valuation mostly.  Connor left so much stuff behind, warehouses full all over the world, it’ll take a lifetime to deal with all of it.”

“What, no home remodeling, no dojo management, no saving the world?”

Mac glanced at me sideways with a small smile.  “Sorry, Methos.  I’m out of the world-saving business.  Retired.  I know that’s a disappointment, since you like nothing better than to lecture me on how ridiculous it is to try to change things.”

“It’s not ridiculous.  Just futile.  The only person we can change is ourselves, and that’s hard enough without trying to take on all the evils of the world.”

Mac shook his head, looking up into the cloud-shrouded night sky, his lips pressed tightly together.  “Who we know and what we do changes us, Methos.  I’m a different person for knowing you, for knowing Connor, for knowing Darius, and Tessa and Joe and Amanda, and so many others, I….” He stopped and I ended up several steps away before I stopped and turned.

“What are you trying to tell me?” I asked.

Mac shook his head.  “I don’t know.  Probably nothing,” he smiled, but the expression didn’t reach his eyes.

I moved close and gently nudged Mac with my elbow to get him walking again, and in a few steps we were under the same bridge where I had once offered MacLeod my head in a moment of what I now considered temporary insanity. 

I still occasionally have dreams about that night – disturbing dreams that have me on my knees, looking up into Mac’s dark, troubled eyes, the katana glinting in the low light, the blade moving slowly but inexorably towards my neck.  Sometimes the dream felt peaceful, inevitable, full of longing and desire, and I lean my head back, thinking of an endless fall into the warmth of MacLeod’s sweet, strong essence – an essence that had washed over me like stepping from the chill of a winter’s night into the warmth of a summer sun the moment the man had first walked into my life and called me by name.

In other versions of the dream, MacLeod’s face would be closed and hard, his dark eyes revealing nothing except my own reflection.  The katana’s blade was a sibilant whistle as it cut through the air and I felt the sting of its edge even as I jerked, trying to move away.

Either way, I always woke up with my heart pounding, sometimes in terror, sometimes intensely aroused.  Sometimes it was hard to tell the difference.

“You okay?” Mac asked, and I realized this time I was the one who had stopped.

I looked over, and felt goose flesh crawl across my skin.  It was the same place, the same light, the same man as in my dreams.  I shuddered and hugged myself.  “Just a little cold.  Some of us weren’t born in the far frozen north.”

Mac smiled.  “Do you even know where you were born?” he asked.  “Never mind.  You don’t need to answer that.  I suppose if you were a woman, I’d offer you my coat.”

“But because I’m a man, you’ll just let me freeze?” I asked in annoyance.  “There’s chivalry for you.”

“Somehow I don’t think you’re in immediate danger of pneumonia,” Mac replied, “and I thought you considered chivalry not only outdated, but self-destructive.”  But – wonder of wonders – he did slip his coat off and lay it over my shoulders.  As the residual heat from MacLeod’s body enveloped me, I could feel the carefully balanced, but still perceptible weight of the katana on the left side.

“Idiot,” I murmured, clutching the coat around myself a little tighter.

“Excuse me?”

“You are an idiot, giving another Immortal your coat and your sword.”

Mac threw his head back and laughed out loud, the sound echoing against the stones arching overhead.  “This from a man who begged me to take his head in this very spot.”

I felt my lips clamp together.  So Mac remembered that night, too.  I wondered if he also had dreams – or nightmares – about it.  “I was young and foolish then,” I replied, and made my lips form a smile.

“You haven’t been young in several thousand years, although I can’t speak to the foolishness part,” Mac responded, his eyes bright with teasing mischief, and something else.  I felt suddenly, unaccountably warm, and it wasn’t just Mac’s coat.

Maybe not nightmares, then.  Maybe just dreams.  Another wave of heat rippled through my body, and I felt my face flush.  I tucked my chin down, infuriated at my pale skin that so easily showed a color change.

“Something’s really bothering you.”  MacLeod sounded surprised.

“No, I came down here because I figured something’s really bothering you,” I patiently pointed out, willing my skin to cool, and opened the coat a little to help it along.

Mac’s open expression instantly shut down, his eyes slid away to view the water and his hands went into his pockets.   “I just didn’t want to deal with Amanda’s sentimental goodbyes or feed Nick’s paranoia, so I thought getting away quietly would make everyone a little more comfortable.  Besides, there’s someplace I needed to be.”

“Ah, and we certainly wouldn’t want to make anyone uncomfortable, now would we,” I couldn’t resist saying.

Mac gave him a long sideways look, then said firmly, “No, we wouldn’t,” as though that put an end to the issue for all time.  Then, he turned and headed for the stone steps leading up to the street.  It was just after 9 pm, which was the shank of the evening for Parisians, especially on New Year’s Eve.  The sidewalk cafes were brightly lit with Christmas décor, and filled with patrons bundled against the cold, sipping their hot chocolates or their coffee outdoors, despite the winter chill.  I caught snatches of conversations as we walked by.  Politics, romance, gossip.  We shared a smile as we passed two gray-haired Frenchmen arguing vehemently about the relative merits of a couple of rival local football teams.  In one iteration or another, they were the same things people had been talking about for as long as I had been alive.   It was a sweet moment, I realized, this shared sense of the long stretch of time and circumstance that only another Immortal could truly experience.

Then we both slowed simultaneously as we neared a quiet cross street and felt the encroaching presence of another of our kind.  I had checked Watcher records prior to Amanda’s wedding just to make sure the sudden influx of Immortals wasn’t going to trigger something nasty, and had only come across the usual Immortal denizens of Paris, all of whom were known quantities and benign, unless deliberately challenged.

But while the figure that stepped out of the shadow of a doorway was not anyone I knew, I saw MacLeod square his shoulders and broaden his stance.  “David,” Mac nodded in grim acknowledgment.

“I told you I’d come for you,” the man answered, his blade swinging out from under his coat into view.

Mac turned his head marginally towards me and reached out a hand for his katana.  “Go,” he instructed quietly.

I just looked at him for a moment, then slipped Mac’s coat off my shoulders, reached for the sword inside and handed it to him.  I folded the coat over my arm and stepped back to give the men room.  “This isn’t your fight,” Mac added, softening his earlier brusque order.  “I’ll take care of this.”

“No doubt,” I replied, eying Mac’s opponent.  He was of a good height, and reasonably well built, but the eyes that watched MacLeod with such intense determination were those of a man who had never reconciled himself to Immortality.  I had seen it all too many times.  Some people just couldn’t handle it – the losses, the combat, the disconnection from the mainstream mortal existence they thought they had been born into.  I moved further to the side, sliding into a shadowed doorway. 

Mac held the katana with deceptive looseness, lowering its deadly tip towards the cobblestones.  “I’d hoped that, with time, you’d understand.  Jill died because of her fear, not because of anything I did.”

“Oh, I understand,” the man replied grimly, gripping his broadsword so tightly his knuckles shone white in the dim light reflected from a distant street lamp.  “You couldn’t stand to see me with those women, so you were always getting between us.  So superior, so smooth, you wanted them all, didn’t you, couldn’t stand that I might have a love of my very own.  I was never good enough for them, you made sure of that!”  David punctuated his accusations with an attack that MacLeod easily fended off.  I felt the tight knot between my shoulder blades loosen a fraction.  Unless Mac did something really stupid, this fight wasn’t a real contest.  The evidence was all pointing to another unwanted battle, some former friend or student who had broken under the weight of the years.  In this case, it looked like it hadn’t taken very long or required much in the way of loss.  What a waste.

Mac moved in, ducking smoothly under David’s overhead slash and kicked out with a leg sweep that pulled his opponent’s feet out from under him, landing him on his back with a grunt of expelled air.  The katana whistled ominously as he swung downward, the blade’s edge ending a fraction of an inch from David’s throat.  “Stop this!” Mac hissed.  He wasn’t even out of breath, but his jaw was squared in that hard line that always made me cringe.  It usually meant that he had made up his mind and nothing would deter him.  In this case, it probably meant that Mac was bound and determined not to kill an asshole who seemed bound and determined to kill or be killed. 

“Damn you, MacLeod!” the man gasped. “You don’t even fight like a real man!” he snarled.

“We were friends, once, David, and could be again,” Mac said, softening his tone a little, but then pressed the katana a little closer to David’s flesh.  “But not if you’re dead.”

“You were never my friend!  You never wanted me to be happy, and you know what?  You won!  You succeeded.  No woman will ever love me.  I’m alone, and I’ll always be alone.  Go ahead, do it, MacLeod!”  David’s whole body vibrated in grief and anger as he stretched his neck back tauntingly.  “Because if you don’t I’ll haunt you until one of us is dead!”

The two men were frozen in a deadly tableau, Mac with a clenched jaw, his lips drawn back in a grimace, his opponent defiant and unrepentant.  Finally, Mac stepped back, flipping his blade up behind his shoulder.  “I won’t serve as your executioner.  Whether or not either of us is happy today, or tomorrow, as long as there is life, there is hope for the future and I refuse to take that away from you.”

“It’s too late, you bastard!” David cried and rolled to his knees.  “You already have!” and he folded in on himself in despair.

“No, you managed that all by yourself,” Mac said evenly.  “Until you accept that you can’t control what other people feel, you’ll never find a relationship that will satisfy you or anyone else.”  Mac backed off and I instinctively slipped a hand into the pocket of my coat, closing my palm around the handle of the .09-millimeter Glock I always kept handy. 

Sure enough, Mac turned to walk away, leaving his back totally vulnerable.  “Idiot,” I muttered, and pulled the Glock out of my pocket, stepping out of the shadows to have a clear shot.

“Don’t!” Mac said softly as he brushed by.  “Let him be.  He won’t hurt me.”

“You’re a fool to walk away.”

“We’d already established that I’m a fool,” MacLeod replied with a small smile. “But I won’t kill another friend.”

David pushed himself to his feet.  “Pick it up,” I called out, nodding towards David’s sword.  The man looked up at me, straightening in alarm as I stepped into a pool of moonlight.

“Don’t do this!” Mac hissed, grabbing my arm, but I shook off the hold, my broadsword slipping into my hand with the ease of long practice.

“So,” I said, “It’s the holidays and you’re lonely and depressed and you decided it’s MacLeod’s fault.  Well, MacLeod isn’t your enemy.  But if you come after him, I will find you.” I took a step forward and added softly, “and then you really will have good reason to wish you were dead.”

For a moment the man looked struck dumb, then as he stared, his expression moved from stunned to puzzled, his gaze moving back and forth between MacLeod and the strange Immortal who must have seemed to appear out of thin air.

“Who the hell are you?”

I just smiled, but it wasn’t intended as a particularly friendly expression.  “Santa Claus,” I answered.  “Now run along.”  I made a small shooing motion with my sword, and David jerked gracelessly backward.  He bent carefully to pick up his sword, keeping a watchful eye on me, then slowly backed up, eventually disappearing into the alley’s dark shadows.  Once the extra Immortal presence had faded away completely, I felt the tension leave my body in a rush and belatedly realized just how eager I had been for a fight. 

Interesting.  I normally had better control of my more aggressive instincts but that was one asshole I would have fought without hesitation, and I didn’t even know the guy.  I slipped my sword and gun back into their proper places, and turned to find MacLeod staring at me with an expression I couldn’t quite decipher.  I had expected mulish anger … some moral high dudgeon expressing great ire that someone actually cared enough about his sorry hide to try to help.  But no, there was only a furrow to the heavy brow, a puzzled, somewhat suspicious look that had little in it of moral outrage.  Mac held out his hand and I belatedly realized I still had Mac’s coat draped over my arm.  I was feeling flushed and warm, and no longer needed the extra wrap, so I handed the garment to its owner.

Mac wordlessly slipped it on, then tucked the katana safely away.  “I think I need a drink,” Mac commented, looking at me with a raised eyebrow.  “What about you?”

“My apartment or your hotel?” Then I belatedly realized Mac might have just wanted to stop off at a pub somewhere.

“How well stocked is your bar?” Mac asked with a smile.

“Well enough.”  Another decision reached without thought as to why, and I found myself smiling as I turned to lead the way.  Perhaps I had had a little too much champagne at the wedding, or perhaps all the emotional outpourings attendant on such ceremonies had stirred my more sentimental nature – not that I had much sentiment left after so many centuries of watching cultures, landmarks and religions fade from everyone’s memory but my own.

We moved companionably out of the alley and to the street, and I quickly flagged down a cab where the two of us sat shoulder to shoulder on the ride to my apartment.  I could feel Mac’s eyes on me and it made me uncomfortable.  “What?” I finally asked.  “Do I have dirt on my face or something?”

“No.  I’m just trying to figure out what the hell is going on with you tonight.”  Mac was looking at me with that same bemused, puzzled expression he had worn earlier. 

“No big mystery.  I just figured your friend needed a little extra motivation to find some other way to express his personal sense of ennui, rather than to burden you with it.”

“A little overly dramatic, don’t you think?  ‘I am Santa Claus,’” Mac intoned in a deep, oily voice.

“I didn’t sound like that,” I insisted in mild indignation, but Mac just chuckled, turning away to watch out the window as the taxi wended its way towards a quiet neighborhood just west of the Eiffel Tower.

I led the way up the stairs to my third floor flat.  I had changed residences twice in the last five years, even though I had kept my current name.  It was a conundrum, all this identity stuff.  I needed to keep Adam Pierson going for a while in order to build educational and professional credentials.  Otherwise I would be stuck living off my investments and I had always found that peculiarly stultifying, both emotionally and intellectually.

Knowing that money would just automatically pour into my accounts took the edge off of my survival instincts, made me lazy and dangerously sloppy, so I tended to try to get by on whatever my current persona actually earned. Yes, I cheated from time to time, and always kept a substantial stash of cash within easy access, but I was careful to live exactly as Adam Pierson might – except that the art on the walls was original, and I owned the apartment building, of course, but no one needed to know that.

Mac stepped into the living room, examining the eclectic mix of furniture and objects d’art with a discerning eye.  The 15’ ceilings accommodated several long Chinese scrolls as well as the tall bookshelves that housed my more recent acquisitions.  “Nice place,” Mac observed with a too-knowing smile.  “This building has some wonderful old apartments in it.  I tried to buy it a few decades ago, but learned it had been held by the same family-owned company for a very long time, and they weren’t interested in selling, at any price.”  Mac slipped his coat off and hung it on a hook by the front door, trailing his hand over the assortment of decorative canes and umbrellas collected nearby in a large urn.  “Nice canes,” he noted.  He pulled one out, twisted the top and extracted the long, thin blade stored inside.  The astute observations and efficient motions recalled that spine-tingling moment when MacLeod had instantly intuited my identity and called me by a name no one had used in centuries, reminding me that this was a very smart, very dangerous man – but the chill that skittered across my shoulders was not from fear.

I shrugged out of my own coat, tossing it over the back of the couch, and went to a low bookcase in a corner whose surface also served as a bar.  “I have some Jamesons,” I said, taking a quick inventory.  “Will that do?”

“Sounds fine,” Mac said absently as he perused my book collection, taking an occasional volume down, inspecting it briefly, then putting it back.  I poured each of us a double shot into what containers I had available, which were water glasses of dubious sanitation.

“L’Chaim!” I intoned, handing Mac his glass and raising my own in salute.

Mac raised his glass, a distant look in his eye.  “Slàinte maith, h-uile latha, na chi 'snach fhaic!” he answered softly. [Good health, every day, whether I see you or not!]

I paused, my glass halfway to my lips.  “I take it you’re planning on disappearing again?”

Mac looked at him with a raised eyebrow.  “It’s just an old Scottish toast, Methos, not some dire prophecy.  And it seems to me you are more prone to disappearing than I am.”

“Yeah, but people tend to actually notice when you take a powder.”

Mac’s face crinkled up into a grin.  “Aw.  Is the wee lad feeling unloved?”  He joked in a broad burr, and reached out and tried to ruffle my hair.

“Hey!” I protested, ducking and swatting away the large hand.  “I’m not the one who lost my best fuck buddy tonight.”

“Now, now, let’s not be crude,” Mac admonished.  “Amanda was more than a lover, she was….”

“A thief, a ne’re-do-well, a trouble-maker….”

“A good friend,” Mac inserted firmly.

I sagged into the couch, looking up at my friend.  “And now that she is permanently attached you’ll miss her… friendship,” I observed with a knowing leer.

“You are incorrigible,” Mac sighed, sitting beside him.

“I try.”

“You try my patience,” Mac commented wryly, then shifted his weight a little so he could look at me more easily.  “And are you going to tell me why you tracked me down tonight?  I’m sure you didn’t just happened to wander by the Quay de la Tournelle by coincidence.”

“Why not?” I obfuscated.  I had been avoiding thinking about that same question ever since I had asked Joe to find out where MacLeod had disappeared to.  “It’s a pretty spot, lots of lights, lots of history, more for me than you, I dare say.”

“That could be said of just about anywhere on the planet.”

I sipped my drink, searching for a safe change of subject while Mac just looked at me expectantly.  “Speaking of weddings and holidays, you know, it’s interesting how humans need to create rituals.  I think it is because they are trying to create a sense of permanence about something that is inherently transitory.  Birth, marriage, death, religious commitments.  It’s been the same as long as I can remember.  The forms change, the nature of what is being celebrated certainly change, but not the need for ritual.  I think ritual is where music and dramatic art was born, actually.”

There was a silent pause and Mac frowned at me, studying me for a moment before he spoke.  “It’s their own version of immortality, I think.  It’s also a way to feel control in the world, of creating expectations and fulfilling them in a predictable, comforting way.”

“But why would Amanda and Nick feel it is necessary to go through all that folderol?” I asked with a wave of my hand.  “And the deValicourts, officially remarrying every century.  Unnecessary.  Our memories don’t work like that.  If we want to recall something, we can, in agonizing detail.  Frankly, I think it’s because we want to emulate them.  To pretend that we are mortal, just for a little while,” I concluded wistfully.

“It’s not just ceremonial folderol,” MacLeod said.  “It’s a celebration, a marking of a passage of one way of living into a new and different one, of publicly acknowledging a commitment to another person.  It was Amanda staking a public and private claim on Nick and vice versa.”  Mac sipped at his drink and smiled.  “And I like all that folderol, always have.  Connor loved to celebrate Christmas, and I remember many a happy dance around the Maypole, and tippling a little too much ‘water of life’ at a wedding. Why, it was at the wedding of Angus Harris and Kira NicGregor that I lost my virginity,” he added, a small lilt of remembered Scottish burr coloring his words.  “I was barely fifteen at the time, and there was this lovely lass from…”

“Nantucket?” I interjected, and got cuffed on the shoulder.  “Spare me tales of your sexual misadventures, MacLeod.  Even we don’t have enough time to listen to them all, at least if your Chronicles are any guide.”

Mac’s smile was sly and teasing.  “Possibly, but unless those damned Watchers were behind every tree and bush for the last 400 years, there are probably at least one or two encounters they missed.”

“The occasional boffing of sheep is not something I would think you would want recorded for all time,” I responded, ready to duck another attempt to cuff me for my impudence.

But Mac just looked at me, eyes wide with an innocence that I didn’t believe for a second.  “I don’t know.  Have you ever seen a sheep with a really satisfied smile on her face?” he asked, lips twitching and eyes crinkling playfully.

“You are a sick bastard, MacLeod.”

“You ought to know.”

I kept sneaking looks at MacLeod’s expression, trying to read his face, with its dark laughing eyes and mobile seducer’s mouth. If my expectations were right, Mac was on the cusp of abandoning his current life, prepared to distance himself from his friends – allegedly for their own protection.

Been there.  Done that. I considered.  It works for a while, but eventually even the most hardened heart has to reach out or it just becomes an empty shell.  Ultimately, it wouldn’t strengthen his armor; it would weaken it, corrode it, crack it open and make him far more vulnerable than if Mac simply did that which he did best – care.

And if I had to hazard a guess, that’s what MacLeod was doing even now, as I felt the weight of an assessing gaze once again.

“I wish you wouldn’t do that,” I finally complained.

“Do what?”

Make me feel… … just make me feel.  The words formed in my head, but I managed to keep my thoughts to myself.  “So,” I equivocated, “Are you going to tell me why you really left the wedding?”

“I told you, I had something I needed to do and didn’t want to create a fuss when I left.  Are you going to tell me why you followed me?” Mac demanded.

I got up to refill his drink, muttering.  “Annoying, stubborn boy scout.”

“I heard that.  You mutter a lot, Methos.  Do you suppose that’s a sign of senility?” 

I turned to make a caustic comment, but found MacLeod had risen and was standing right behind me, his glass held out for a refill.

“No, it’s a sign of insanity,” I grumbled as I poured more scotch into each glass.   “If you must know, I figured you were going to pull an Indra on me… on us.”

“Indra?” Mac looked puzzled for a second, then smiled and nodded.  “Ah, yes, the Hindu god who, when confronted with the reality of his own insignificance in the universe, wanted to go off into the wilderness and become a yogi.”

“But,” I continued the story, “His wife, not terribly thrilled at the notion of being left behind, convinced the local priest to talk to him, who instructed him that the true hero stays and looks after those he has committed to care for, even in the face of his own inadequacies.”

For a long moment MacLeod just looked at me, then he broke the stare and looked into the depths of his glass as though there might be some secret message there.  “I’m no one’s guardian, Methos, and have no intention of becoming a yogi.  And please,” he added softly and raised a hand.  “Just do me a favor and don’t talk about heroes.”

I waited a minute until MacLeod looked up, then nodded in understanding.  Until the upheavals of the last few years, Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod had seemed rigidly mired in the role assigned to him at birth, his personal sense of worth totally bound up in whether or not he was a “good man”, whether he made a difference – whatever that meant.  He had, consciously or otherwise, always thought of himself as a hero, and so had everyone else – until he had come face to face with his own faults and failures.  Now, at 400-plus years old, Duncan MacLeod, no longer of the Clan MacLeod, no longer the hero, was probably having an identity crisis of monumental proportions.

Somehow that thought crystallized the moment and a decision was made – or not made, actually, it just… became.

I settled in next to MacLeod, close enough to feel the smooth fabric of his designer tuxedo jacket, “Do you remember what the priest advised instead of going off into the desert to live off spiders and snakes?”

Mac turned his body, laying an arm over the back of the couch.  “No, but I’m sure you’re going to tell me.”

I took in a long, slow breath and let it out, willing all my tensions and doubts and anxieties to flow out of my body.  I leaned slightly forward, as though I were about to convey a great secret and MacLeod subconsciously mimicked my movement and met my eyes expectantly.  “The story goes that the priest told him:  “You are in the position of the king of the gods. You are a manifestation of the mystery of Brahma in the field of time. This is a high privilege. Appreciate it, honor it, and deal with life as though you were what you really are. And besides, now I am going to write you a book on the art of love so that you and your wife will know that in the wonderful mystery of the two that are one, Brahma is radiantly present also."

MacLeod’s brows gathered together in a look of confusion.  “Uh, okay.  That’s… fascinating, Methos.  And this is relevant because?”

“Because I… because we – Joe and Amanda and Robert and Gina and the rest of the absurd number of Immortals and mortals whom you have managed to befriend in the past 400 years – prefer that visiting you not require traveling three days by camel and living in a yurt.  And,” I lowered my voice and my chin, and looked up, feeling a touch of warmth in my face, “there are, as the priest implied, certain rewards to sticking around.”

The furrowed eyebrows crawled upwards about as far as they could go.  “You’re planning on writing me a book about the mystery of sex?” he asked dubiously.  “As I recall, just a minute ago you were saying I had too much sex in my life.  Make up your mind, Methos.”

“There’s quantity and then there’s quality,” I reminded him, wondering if I was going to have to spell this out in terms far more specific than either of us was probably comfortable with.

“Hmm,” MacLeod’s eyes were now glinting with a hint of humor and mischief.  “Amanda certainly never complained.  And what’s with the sudden preoccupation with my sex life, anyway?”

I swallowed and looked into my lap.  Now or never.  “Well, actually,” then I had to clear my throat. “I was more interested in the quality of my own sex life,” I replied, my voice unexpectedly breathy, then I raised his eyes to MacLeod’s face.

MacLeod blinked once, then twice, then cocked his head to the side.  He opened his mouth to say something, then shut it, swallowed and cleared his throat, staring intently at his lap.

“Cat got your tongue?” I asked innocently.

“No,” MacLeod finally said, his voice husky, and he raised his eyes.  My heart thumped hard once, twice, three times before it settled back down to an admittedly accelerated pace.  Mac’s pupils were visibly dilating, darkening, widening, and a flush of bronze had stained the ridge of his hard cheekbones.  “It’s just… unexpected.”

“Is it?” I asked, leaning in a little.  “Then either I must be losing my touch, or you have been deliberately obtuse.”

“Perhaps I have.  Do you blame me?” Mac asked, his expression hardening a little before he looked away.  “Our relationship hasn’t been exactly… easy.  And relationships in general lately, at least for me, have been nothing short of disasters for everyone involved.  As a matter of fact,” Mac put down his glass and stood. “I think I’d better go.  Thanks for the drink, Methos.”

By the time MacLeod was reaching for his coat, I was leaning casually against the door, my arms crossed.  “I told you I wasn’t as much interested in your sex life, as mine,” I said, then lifted my chin provocatively, acutely aware that my face was flaming with color.  “Are you telling me you’re not interested?”

“Methos,” Mac growled, “Stop this.  I’m not stupid, you know.  Amanda put you up to this, didn’t she?  Poor Duncan, left all alone. Well, I’m nobody’s pity fuck, so you and Amanda should just mind your own business!”

I pushed away from the door, forcing MacLeod back a step.  “You are being particularly dense tonight.  Now I’ll ask again.  Are you saying you aren’t interested?”

“I… I,” Mac stammered, his face alternating between ghastly pale and deep reddish-bronze, then he took a long breath.  “I don’t know what game you’re playing, Methos, but this isn’t a good time.  I have to go.”

I smiled, and noted with satisfaction that the expression was making MacLeod even more nervous than he already was.  “There’s never a good time, Duncan.  There’s only today.”  Perhaps it was the unusual use of MacLeod’s given name that finally made the man truly stop and look at me instead of trying his damnedest to obfuscate and escape.

“What do you want from me, Methos?  What do you expect me to do?” he asked a little breathlessly, his brows furrowed together in consternation.  “I’m not good at this anymore, not with people I care about.”

“Oh, so you’d prefer someone you didn’t care about?” I asked, moving close again, and having Mac respond with another backward step.

“That’s not what I mean!” Mac said in exasperation.  “I mean… It’s… you know what I mean!”

“I think you mean that you don’t know what your role is anymore.  Not the protector, not the hero, not the caretaker,” I shrugged.  “So what’s a retired superhero supposed to be, how’s he supposed to act?”  I moved close again, and Mac moved away again, but this time he was backed up against the arm of the couch and had no place left to go.

“I’m no superhero!  Never have been!  Christ, would you just leave it alone?” He shoved me back and moved past me, again headed towards the door.

“MacLeod!” I called as Mac had his hand on the doorknob, and thankfully something in my tone made him pause.  “You never answered my question.  I want an answer.”

Mac’s head turned, but he was still looking at the floor.  “What do you think?” he finally replied in a barely audible whisper.

I resisted the temptation to once again close the distance between us. “What I think is that you are afraid of disappointing me, of disappointing yourself.  But disappointment is all about expectations, MacLeod.  The trick is to have no expectations.”  I moved slightly closer, but managed to refrain from touching.  For the moment, just that near proximity to flushed, slightly sweaty skin, to wide brown eyes, to flaring nostrils, was plenty of stimulation, and I felt a surprising rush of realization of just how much I had wanted this.

“We are defined by our expectations, Methos,” Mac argued stubbornly, his voice low and intense, matching my own tone.  “Not just of others, but of ourselves.”

I couldn’t contain a low chuckle, and was pleased to see gooseflesh rise on MacLeod’s neck.  “That is where you are mistaken, MacLeod,” I replied.  “It’s a lesson rarely learned at all, and then only after many, many lifetimes.  You’ve been burdened with being Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod too long, my friend.  But the past is irrelevant, the future is unknown and you are whatever you want to be – right now.  Today.  You can choose who or what you want to be, what role you want to play.” I found my hand reaching up and I laid my palm flat on Mac’s chest where I could feel the  thrum of a quick heartbeat under solid, warm flesh, and the  rapid rise and fall of a chest of solid muscle.

“But…”

“No buts.  Who do you want to be, right now?”  It came out as a whisper, but by then our faces were so close, I could have merely breathed the words and they would have been understood.  “Do you want to wrestle me to the floor and have your way with me?” I read a negative from the tightening around MacLeod’s mouth.  “No?  Had enough of being the strong guy, have we?” I smiled gently.  “Then how about this?”  I pushed lightly and only once, which was all it took to move Mac back.  I laid the length of my body along the luxurious fabric of his tuxedo, moved a knee between two hard thighs and dipped my head to press my lips along the warm, slightly damp line of flesh just above the starched white collar of Mac’s shirt.  When Mac lifted his chin and tilted his neck, sagging against the door, I hummed with satisfaction. The man always did speak more with his body than with his voice.

“Methos,” the name was breathed softly, breathlessly.  “I don’t know how to do what you want.”  But broad hands had found my waist and were gripping it hard, pulling us closer rather than pushing us apart.

“You don’t have to,” I answered, taking a small break from nipping and sucking at MacLeod’s neck.  I went back to my task, but my fingers were now busy working at the tiresome silver studs on the front of Mac’s tuxedo shirt, and I was distracted by broad, warm hands sliding inside my own jacket, moving down, grasping my arse and pulling us close, almost too close to deal with the annoying but necessary task of removing the clothing barriers between us.

I was almost expecting it when, with a low growl of frustration, Mac pushed away from the door, instinctively falling back on his usual role of aggressor, so I shoved back hard, making the door thud in its frame.  “No!  Not tonight,” I whispered urgently, looking straight into Mac’s dark, somewhat confused, slightly dazed, dilated eyes.  “Tonight you are not Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod.  Tonight you are a stranger, a friend,… a lover?” I asked with a smile, but Mac just looked at me like I had just sprouted green antennae.

“What…” Mac swallowed hard.  “What the hell are you talking about?”

“Okay, I’ll choose.  Tonight you are a guy I just picked up in a bar.  I don’t even know your name, but when I asked if you wanted to go to my place and fuck, you didn’t say anything, you just stood up, told me to pay for the drinks, and headed for the door.”

“But I wouldn’t…”

“Of course Duncan MacLeod wouldn’t, but that’s not who you are tonight.  No roles, no preconceptions, no expectations.  Just two guys who each want something from the other.”  I couldn’t resist a smile, and I suspected it looked as predatory as I felt.  “And I know what I want from you.”

Our breaths were rapid, our skin slightly sweaty with tension and arousal, and the moment stretched out as Mac stared at me, blinking slowly.  My knees went watery when at last Mac nodded, ever so slightly, but I knew the acquiescence was tenuous at best.  “So,” I breathed softly.  “What’s your name?”

MacLeod swallowed once more, hesitating.  “No names,” he whispered. 

I studied his face for a minute, then nodded.  “No names, then.  Come with me,” I instructed, marveling at the pregnancy of every word we seemed to utter. 

~~~~~

Tremors chased up and down my skin as Methos’ long fingers enclosed my wrist and tugged, leading me into the bedroom where the bed was only nominally made from the night before.  He threw back the already-rumpled bedclothes and sat so that I was standing in front of him, then he reached out slowly, his fingers deftly removing the tuxedo studs that I had spent so much time on earlier in the evening.  Each stud dropped with a small metallic click as he carefully placed them on the nightstand next to a thick book.  I felt strangely distanced from myself, still not sure what this man expected or wanted, or even what I expected or wanted.  But the notion of being someone else, someone who didn’t have any history with this lean, wiry figure who was so intent on removing my tuxedo, was oddly appealing.   

I closed my eyes for a minute, letting the idea soak into my skin a little.  Yes, I could do that.  I could just be, just let go of pretense and knowledge and the burden of all the years, all the people.  Maybe that was why I couldn’t choose a name.  There had been too many names that meant too much to me.  Everything had a history.  Letting it all go would be a blessing and I felt a surge of anticipation.  Oh, yes, I could do this.  I wanted to do this.

I found myself picking up the book on the side table as he continued his valet duties, all the while wondering what some stranger might do or say – what *I* could do or say without sounding false or stupid.  At that moment I truly felt like a stranger, to myself, to him. 

“Plutarch, eh?” I heard myself asking, and felt a smile curve the corners of my mouth.  “You some kinda intellectual?”  The last stud came free and my shirt opened, exposing my chest to a sudden draft of air that felt good against overheated skin.  My hand reached out to gently stroke soft dark hair. “I’m just a working stiff, myself.”  Yes, that felt right, both the words and the gesture.

His eyes fluttered at the touch of my blunt, workman’s fingers cradling his head, then he let a hand trail along the bulge in my trousers, and the touch felt electric, sending a jolt of pure lust spiking straight to my crotch, and my cock jumped under his hand.

“A working stiff, eh?” he asked with a sly grin. “I can see that.”  He unbuttoned my trousers and slowly slid the zipper down, letting the fabric fall to the floor with a gentle swish.  More exposure to air sent another shiver across my skin, and I rested a hand on his shoulder for balance as I toed off one shoe, then the other, and kicked away the trousers.

“What now?” I asked softly.  The notion of anonymity, of letting go, of letting someone else take charge, was getting more appealing by the moment.

He stood and pushed my dress shirt open, stroking down my chest as he did.  He moved with a marvelous, unselfconscious grace, making me feel bulky and almost awkward in comparison, but as his eyes traveled upwards to meet mine, I found it was his face that held the most fascination.  The pupils, ringed with multi-colored irises, were dilated with what I assume was lust, but there was also a mischievousness there that probably should have made me nervous, but it only made me want to grab him and hold him down, spread his legs and fuck him until he came so hard….

“No,” he whispered, pausing with both hands on my chest.

Damn.  I know my face is too easy to read, at least for him.

He reached high to push my shirt off my shoulders, so I took the hint and pulled it off, wondering if I could make him want me as much as I wanted him, so I took my time, stretching biceps and shoulders as I did.  When I finally looked down again I was rewarded with an eager, open mouth, so I leaned in and met soft lips, following with a questing, exploring tongue. 

There was a residual sweet/dry flavor of scotch, and the texture was both hard, smooth teeth and soft, wet tongue moving against my own.  Lips met and parted and met again, tongues quested and tasted, breaths mingled, hands groped and clung and the heat and humidity between us grew until I could have sworn the room temperature had gone up by at least ten degrees.  He pulled back a little, letting us catch our breaths, studying my face with an expression I wasn’t sure how to interpret, except that I knew he wanted me. 

Really wanted me.

A sudden wave of doubt made me swallow hard.  Damn. I had lost so many, disappointed so many, failed so many times.  This was harder than I had expected.  Could I really do this – let go?  Not care about consequences?

“What a brave boy you are,” he whispered, running his thumbs along the pulse points at my temples.  “Lie down, and I’ll make you glad you decided to stay, show you things, teach you things.”

How did he know exactly what to say?  “I’m not exactly inexperienced,” I felt compelled to remind him – and myself.  In for a penny, in for a pound, I told myself.  I will do this.  I want this.  I sat on the bed, lying back on my elbows in a deliberately provocative pose, one knee up to display everything I had to offer. “Perhaps I can teach you a few things,” I added, raising an eyebrow.

He studied me for a minute with a lascivious smile and raised eyebrow.  “That,” he said with a widening grin, “will have to wait for another night.”  Then he slowly pulled his bow tie loose but kept it in his hand, never letting his eyes leave mine.  He peeled off his shirt and took his time sliding the zipper down on his trousers, closing his eyes with pleasure as it vibrated against his cock.

God, the man was going to drive me crazy.  I ended up spreading my legs a little further, just to see how far I could push him and was rewarded with a pause in his striptease act as his gaze focused momentarily on my crotch.  He swallowed, his face flushed and shining with sweat.  I liked that, and my cock got even harder.

Finally, his focus traveled a little further north, and our eyes met.  “Trust me?” he asked quietly, letting our two ties dangle together in his hand.  The meaning was potent and obvious and my insides churned.  Part of me screamed that this was the stupidest thing I had done since that debacle a couple of hundred years ago, when I arrogantly assumed that my physical strength and sexual charms were enough protection in a game of sexual bondage with a pretty and supposedly harmless Immortal.  It had almost cost me my head.  But then, what was I doing here if I wasn’t prepared to risk it all? 

“I…I don’t know,” I barely managed to whisper past lips dry with either anticipation or fear – or maybe both.

He smiled.  Remarkably, he seemed both all-powerful, and utterly harmless at the same time.   “If you really want this, roll over and lie flat in the middle of the bed, face down.” 

Push has now come to shove.  The thought felt like one of those conversation balloons you see in the cartoons.  I froze, unable to move at all, my mind automatically plotting the quickest exit path, but those damnable perceptive eyes caught me at it.  I felt my face flush, revealed as the coward that I am.  Do it, I screamed at myself, but that internal voice was only slightly louder than the other voices in my head telling me that this was not only humiliating and humbling, but stupidly dangerous.

Oh, shut up, I finally told them all, and stubbornly gave him what was undoubtedly an insecure, jerky, nervous nod, and then I was on my stomach, my legs spread wide, my whole body dripping with nervous sweat and hot with either fear or embarrassment or… I didn’t even know any more.  I just knew I wanted this.  I needed it.  Some dark, dumb part of me craved being helpless.  Not a good survival technique, Methos’ voice whispered inside my head. 

There was a long pause, long enough for my doubts to bubble up even more, but then the bed dipped with his weight and in only a few moves he deftly knotted a tie on my right wrist then stretched my arm out so he could tie the other end to the bedpost.  I was afraid the ties weren’t long enough to make it to both sides, but with a little moving in the other direction, in only a moment both arms were secure, if stretched a little uncomfortably tight.  I wondered what it looked like to him to have me stretched out like that, how it made him feel.  But maybe that was just my own mind distracting me from how it made me feel – helpless.  Except that if I really pulled using all my strength, I could probably get free even if it broke the furniture in the process.  I couldn’t resist testing, generating an ominous creaking noise but I stopped when I heard a low chuckle behind me and felt a hand stroking my back.

“Beautiful,” he whispered, and my tension began to ease a little, or perhaps I was just distracted by lips pressed in the middle of my back, and hands trailing down my backside to the inside of my thighs.  “So beautiful,” he murmured again and I felt him lick his way down my spine, leaving small spots of coolness behind.  “Have you ever been a bottom before?” he asked in a low-pitched voice I had to strain to hear. 

“I… not like this.”

“Ah, of course.  You like to be in control, don’t you?”

“It’s not that,” I insisted, “it’s just…,” but I paused when he chuckled and pinched me hard on the ass. 

“It’s just that you like to be in control.”  He leaned forward, letting his breath wash over my shoulder before he kissed it.  “But that’s not what I want.  Right now I want a beautiful boy who needs me, who wants to be touched and owned and fucked until he can’t stand it anymore.  I don’t want someone strong or defiant, I don’t want someone to look out for my needs.  I want someone pliant and accepting of whatever I want to do.”

No one had called me a boy in centuries and I suppose I should have been offended, but instead it made me feel strangely exhilarated and I shivered hard, then gradually, incrementally, forced my body to be still. 

“I want you to tell me this is okay,” he whispered.  His warm palm on my ass cheek somehow grounded me and I took a long breath.  This was it – what I had wanted, this release from the person I had always hoped I would be but never really was – the one who kept things under control, kept everybody safe, protected, whole.   Instead, here was someone who could take all that control away, and yet still watch out for me.  Keep me safe. 

Safe?  Part of me almost laughed at the thought.  I should be fighting this, but instead I found myself murmuring an assent.

“What?  I didn’t hear you?”

“It’s okay,” I said again, but the words barely escaped my throat.

He leaned closer, the warmth of his breath washing over my shoulder.  “But do you need it?” he asked quietly.  “Do you need this?”  He let his hand trail further down, his fingers brushing the cleft between my legs.  My cock jumped and my hips surged into the bed, seeking friction.  “Say it,” he insisted.  “You need to say it out loud.”

“Yes,” the answer came, soft and slightly hoarse, but I felt compelled to continue, and added, “Oh, yes,” deliberately echoing a bitter conversation about forbidden wants and unsavory desires.  In the momentary silence that followed, I feared I had broken the mood, if not the rules about anonymity, so I slid my legs open a little wider as a distraction, only to receive a sharp slap on my ass.

“No impudence allowed,” he ordered harshly, but I could hear the smile in his voice.  I was glad he couldn’t see my face, because I was smiling like a fool, both deeply relieved and inordinately pleased that we could now banter about something that had once almost destroyed any vestige of trust between us.  Somewhere between his propensity for convenient lies and my tendency to cling to long-held beliefs well after they had lost their sheen of faith, trust had been badly tarnished – but never lost completely, which was a minor miracle. 

“Stay right there,” he ordered, and stood.

“Like I have a choice,” I murmured, but that got me another, sharper slap on the ass.

“I said no impudence,” he repeated more sternly  “You are to be silent, except when I give you permission to speak.”

“Sorry,” I replied, even though I didn’t feel particularly repentant.  “I’ll be good,” I added, knowing I risked another blow.

“I’m sure you will,” he murmured as he retreated briefly to the bathroom.  

I felt positively giddy, sweaty and nervous as hell, so I closed my eyes and attempted a few slow, deep, meditative breaths, the rhythm of which was lost when the bed sank with his weight.  He laid a soothing hand on my back.  “It’s okay. Tonight your only role is to please me.”

Then two large hands were smoothing lotion over my ass cheeks, kneading them, coaxing me to relax a little, and I realized that I had been holding my whole body way too tight, every muscle taut with nervous tension.  I breathed deep, consciously letting my ass relax.  His fingers moved into the crack and paused.  I suppose he expected resistance, but instead I opened myself up to him and his fingers slid along that whole seam.  It felt good against my heated, sweaty skin, and I heard him murmur, “Nice,” almost to himself.  That made me smile.

After that, everything kind of blended together, all the touches and kisses, the gentle breach of my body with his fingers that felt so natural and easy.  He said things, but I don’t remember what they were, only that they made me feel safe and cared for. 

The man at my back demanded and I obeyed.  That was all there was to it, really, even when he positioned me awkwardly on my knees, with my arms spread wide, holding on to the headboard.  By that time, I desperately wanted him inside me, wanted the feeling of being taken, of having him so excited by touching me that he couldn’t help himself, so that when he finally pushed his cock in, it was a relief that made me groan with pleasure.

But then he only moved in tiny increments, barely in and out.  It felt so very good, but it was damned frustrating.  My arms were starting to ache with the strain, and I tried to pull away and push back harder, but he was in absolute control, finally laying a broad, warm hand in the middle of my back and admonishing me to let him do it his way.  Except that his way was to take his own sweet time, to draw out his pleasure by slowly pulling out and pushing back in again – each time with a sigh and a murmured expression of enjoyment. 

Damn him! How could he keep going so slowly?  Didn’t he want to come?  All my body knew was a desperate need to push hard and push fast.  But the hands now firmly at my waist held me tight, and the harder I shook with need the slower he went, until I was vibrating with the need to come, the desire to push back.  And still he slowly pulled out, and slowly pushed back in again.

“Please!” I finally gasped.  I hadn’t wanted to beg, but I was breathless, dripping with sweat, and my arms were shaking from holding my weight in such an awkward position.  Finally, at that small, pathetic plea, suddenly the cock that so wonderfully filled my ass was pulled away, then slammed back in once, but at a slightly changed angle.  A jolt of undiluted ecstasy flashed through my whole body and I shouted… something, but in only a second it was gone, and it wasn’t enough, damn it!  I was so close, so desperate to come, but he pulled way out again and slammed in, hard.  Then he did it again, and again, and I’m sure I was sobbing something, begging him to finish it.  My arms were going to give out, my body was going to spontaneously combust, the heat and pressure in my cock was unbearable, but the man was a machine, pistoning in and out with exquisite, torturous timing, just enough to keep me on the absolute verge of coming, but not enough to take me over the edge.

“Enough!” I finally roared, and reared up as far as I could.  The whole bed frame creaked and groaned with the strain, and suddenly there was a fist in my hair, pulling my head back until I could hardly breathe.

“It’s enough when I say it’s enough!” he gasped into my ear, but then he jammed into me and pulled out again, speeding up.  Then faster and faster.  Oh, yes!  I felt exultant even though I couldn’t breathe, even though my eyes were tearing from the pain of having him yank my hair so hard.  None of that mattered. Now we were both gasping and sobbing with the effort, and then he reached around and grabbed my painfully distended, long-neglected cock, and squeezed.

The world went white.

And I came.

And came.

And came.

~~~~~~~ 

I collapsed onto MacLeod’s warm, slick, sweaty back, gasping for air, and let warm, buoyant euphoria just wash over me and permeate my old bones.  I knew Mac’s arms must be aching from holding so much weight, but at the moment, I couldn’t care a whole lot, and Mac hardly seemed aware of anything anyway.

At last I managed to lever myself upright, reluctantly pulling away and out of Mac’s body.  I couldn’t resist one final sweep of my hands over the smooth, rippling muscles of a broad back and fine, fine ass cheeks, my thumbs lingering over the hot, wet hole I had just left behind.  I managed to untie one of Mac’s arms, and it dropped like a dead weight, the other one following soon after, and the two of us folded up onto the sticky, rumpled covers, still breathing deep and hard.

I relaxed, my chest snugged up against Mac’s back, one hand gently kneading the knotted muscles of Mac’s strained shoulders.  My body was sated, my emotions… a little jumbled.  But I felt good.  I had done it, after all.  I had finally done it.  Not only had I fucked Duncan MacLeod, but I had made him beg for it, had managed to get the stubborn git to finally let go of that blasted need to be in charge of everyone else’s welfare.  It was a major triumph, even if I did say so myself.

Mac sighed and turned in my arms, looking at me with a flushed, sloe-eyed, sleepy expression that made me smile.  The dark eyes blinked a few times and the expression changed, hardening a little.

“You are looking very smug,” Mac observed.

“And you are looking very… debauched.”

“Oh, I’m feeling very debauched,” he responded with a smirk.  “Are you feeling very smug?”

“Maybe,” I answered teasingly.  “Seems to me I have good reason.”  

Mac blinked at me owlishly for a moment, then turned his attention to his wrists where the ties had cut into his skin, absently rubbing the creases. “Well, I’m glad to have provided you with some amusement,” he said softly, then turned his head again, looking me in the eye.  “But whatever your agenda was, I still enjoyed it.”

“My agenda?” I asked.  “What makes you think I had an agenda other than having a good time?”

Mac chuckled dryly.  “When don’t you have an agenda?  But it was a hell of a fantasy, regardless.”  He sat up and reached for his clothes.

“Don’t flatter yourself,” I couldn’t resist saying.  “I don’t spend my days and nights fantasizing about fucking Duncan MacLeod.”  Damn it!  This was hardly the way I had wanted our post-coital conversation to go, not that I’d really given it any thought.  But then again thought hadn’t seemed to be high on my ‘to do’ list the entire evening.

Mac paused, then cast a look back over his shoulder, that slightly twisted, ironic smile still firmly in place.  “Don’t worry.  I won’t tell,” he said, then reached for his tie, still knotted loosely around the bedpost.  “Although my tie will probably never be the same.”

I reached out and caught the ends of the tie in my hand, drawing Mac’s attention.  “Is that what you think?  God, you are full of yourself, aren’t you?”  I sighed, shaking his head.  “But I guess I shouldn’t be terribly surprised since that’s what I told you it was about,” I ended up muttering.

“Sorry, Methos, you lost me.”  Mac relinquished the tie, then stood, headed to the bathroom.  I followed, watching as Mac wet a washcloth and unselfconsciously wiped off the evidence of our vigorous and rather messy sexual encounter.

“You’re right, I had an agenda,” I admitted leaning against the doorframe, accepting Mac’s self-congratulatory smirk as my due.  “But it’s not what you’re thinking.  I sure as hell didn’t do it to act out a fantasy.”  Well, it wasn’t a *complete* lie.

“What then? Did you do it on a bet?  I can see it now, you and Amanda, toasting to her future wedded bliss, and she bends your ear, certain I will be pining away without someone to keep me company.”

Shit.  This isn’t going well.  “No, I didn’t do it out of sympathy or Amanda’s urging.  I did it because… because you needed it, and I wanted to be the one to provide it.”

Mac turned at last, threw the washcloth into the sink with an irritated slap and gave me a narrow-eyed look.  “Exactly what “it” did I need, Methos?  To be properly humbled?  Shown my proper place?  Brought down a peg or three?”  Mac stalked a little closer, his eyes glittering dangerously.  “Well, too damned bad.”  He moved closer still, so close I could smell the sex and sweat still clinging to his skin.  “I liked it,” he said in a low, sultry voice.  “So if you expected me to go all weak-kneed and embarrassed about it, go find yourself another anonymous lover to play with.”

I couldn’t help the smirk, then the snort of laughter that escaped, then I threw my head back and guffawed. Mac’s dark, heavy brows lowered and he just glared at me for a moment, then shook his head in disgust and stalked back into the bedroom.  But I didn’t let him get far.  As Mac leaned down to pick up his clothes, I tackled him from behind and we both landed on the bed with a bouncing thump.  In about two heartbeats our positions were reversed and I ended up on the bottom with MacLeod sitting on me, looking properly outraged, which only made me chuckle even more.

“What the hell is with you, Methos?  Did I piss you off about something and you wanted revenge?”  Mac sat harder, shoving the air out of my lungs with a painful whoosh.  “Out with it.  What the hell is going on?”

“Hey!” I barely managed to gasp.  “Uncle!  I just thought it was funny.  Only you would get self-righteous about being thoroughly fucked, and enjoying it.”  I was more than a little relieved to finally see MacLeod’s lips twitch into a reluctant smile, and the heavy weight on my chest eased a little.  I got in a large breath, and continued.  “And, in my humble opinion,” I ignored the snort of derision at that remark, but I did soften my tone.  “You desperately needed it.”

“Needed what, exactly?” Mac asked suspiciously, crossing his arms and not budging another millimeter.

“To let go,” I announced.  “Of responsibility, of expectations.  You spend so much time worrying about being a good guy, you never just… live… experience… exist.  That was my agenda, if you want to call it that,” I assured him, folding my arms behind my head.  “And yeah, I felt pretty damned smug about it.  You’re not that easy to seduce, you know, despite your reputation as a world class round heel.”

The glower returned, but I could tell it was more show than substance since there was a twinkle of mischief in MacLeod’s eyes.  . 

“Round heel?” he parroted, cocking his head.  His hands darted out, capturing my forearms and pinning them to the bed.  “I’ll show you round heels.”  He leaned in slowly, closing the space between them inch by inch, his eyes daring me to break our locked stare.  Then, with our eyes still open, watching, our mouths met.  It was wet and hot and I wasn’t sure whether it was the taste and feel that was so utterly engrossing, as though my whole existence had narrowed down to warm, wet sucking sounds and sensations; or perhaps it was the intensity of doing it with our eyes open, as though each was challenging the other to stop – or to continue, I wasn’t sure which.  Then Mac moved further down, nipping lightly at my jaw, then my neck, moving down even more and spending an eternity on each nipple until I was squirming.

“Mac,” I said, then paused, looking down at the top of a dark, tousled head.  “or are we back to no names?”

The head raised and those wide eyes looked up, and I swore my heart actually stuttered in my chest.  Foolish organ, my heart.  It had betrayed me far too many times. 

“Duncan,” was the answer, in a husky whisper.  “Call me Duncan.”

“Duncan,” I breathed softly.  I ran a hand through the soft, damp, silky hair, pushing an errant curl away from Duncan’s forehead.  Oh, yes.  Foolish, foolish heart. 

Large hands mapped my flesh inch by inch in a masterful display of the lover’s art, and I allowed myself the luxury of immersing myself in the enveloping cocoon of delicious sensation.  How sublimely rare, how breathtakingly precious this was, to let go, to trust utterly.  At some point I realized my own hypocrisy at deciding that this was what Duncan needed, when in fact it was a deep need of my own.  But I couldn’t bring myself to really care about that when Duncan’s fingers broached my body, finally pushing perfectly against that sweet spot that made me gasp for more.

“You like that?” Duncan whispered teasingly.

I murmured something affirmative, but I wasn’t certain it was in English, or even in any language at all as my hips were lifted onto hard thighs and I was invaded, filled, enflamed.  My head went back, my eyes closed so I could just feel.  We let the climax build slowly as heat danced between us in a gradually accelerating rhythm.  Adding to that thrum was the underlying, ever-present beat of our quickenings, layering on a whole different dimension of sensation that no mortal could ever begin to grasp.  It was an edge of tension, excitement, fear and curiosity, overlaid with a sense of an unbreakable bond at some primal level that drove us towards each other, a force echoed in the rhythm of Duncan’s thrust into my body, again and again.  I was remotely aware that I was crying out with each push and had a death grip on Duncan’s forearms, willing him to go faster, thrust deeper in a drive to share the same space, the same breath, the same life, so that when we both came it had the physical power of an orgasm plus the emotional power of a Quickening, and I heard Duncan’s cry of triumph join my own.

~~~~~~

I edged slowly towards wakefulness, reluctant to emerge from a cocoon of deep, relaxed comfort.  Unfortunately, small sounds intruded on my effort at unconsciousness, and I finally ordered one eye to open, which it did, albeit reluctantly.  MacLeod was moving quietly around the room, fully dressed except for his tie.

“It’s the middle of the night,” I murmured into my pillow.  “What the hell are you doing?”

“It’s not quite midnight, and I’m picking up your tuxedo,” came the answer in the semi-dark.  “It ended up on the floor.”

“So?” I managed to get an elbow underneath myself, rise up a little and pry the other eye open to match the first.  “Were you afraid it was going to run away to and find some snooty French waiter who would give it a better home?”

MacLeod sat next to me and I rolled over on my back as a large, callused warrior’s hand gently caressed the side of my face.  I’d seen Mac do that with others and thought it sloppily sentimental at the time.  Now it felt like the perfect way to express a deep need to make physical contact – or to say goodbye.  “Where are you headed?  The States?  Katmandu?  Another monastery?” I asked, carefully keeping my tone light but closing my eyes in anticipation of the answer.

“Isn’t that what you expect me to do?” Mac asked.

I opened my eyes once again to catch an odd, anticipatory look on Mac’s face.  He was waiting… for what, exactly, I wasn’t at all sure and that made me wary.  “Now who is the one playing games?” I quipped.

Mac sighed and dropped his gaze, shaking his head a little.  “You were the one who started all this blather about letting go of expectations, you know.  And here you are, all armored up, waiting for me to do something in accordance with your preconceptions and prejudices.”

I pulled away a little, lacing my fingers behind my head in a display of casual indifference.  “There’s a difference between preconceptions and prejudices, and an astute understanding of human nature.  You figure that your friends are doing just fine without your protective and honorable influence, so you rationalize that you are not needed or particularly wanted around.  Ergo, you exit stage left before anything untoward can happen since, after all, everything bad that happens in the world is your fault, you being so influential and important in the great tide of history, and all.” 

Somewhat to my surprise, rather than get defensive or offended, Mac just shook his head with a laugh and looked at me with an annoying, sardonic smile.  “Ah, Methos the Wise has spoken.  So it is written, so it shall be.  Etcetera, etcetera, etcetera,” Mac announced in a poor imitation of Yul Brenner’s portrayal of the King of Siam, complete with a rolling wave of his hand.

“Yeah, well, have a nice life,” I grumbled, pulling the covers up to my shoulders and rolling away to my side.  “Send me a postcard from Tibet, and stay away from the yak butter.”

“I actually like yak butter tea, as I recall,” MacLeod responded, “but I admit it’s an acquired taste,” and I felt the bed shift as Mac stood.  I heard steps moving towards the door, then they stopped.  “You know, Methos,” Mac said softly, his voice sounding unusually resonant in the quiet darkness, “I think you are the one who has always had trouble seeing me for who and what I really am, not what you expect me to be, or want me to be.”  There was a long pause, but I refused to respond, fearful that my damnable sharp tongue might betray me once again.  Finally, Mac broke the tense silence.  “I told you I had someplace I needed to be tonight.  Something I needed to do.”

“Then go.  I’m not stopping you.”

“Nor I, you,” Mac whispered.  His footsteps faded and I heard the front door open and close, then there was only the echoing silence of an empty apartment.

I threw off the covers in frustration, shuddering at the chill in the air.  I grabbed a pair of sweats from the floor and pulled on a sweater before I padded into the living room to pour myself a scotch.  How had such a promising evening gone so sour so quickly?  Perhaps it was just our male, Immortal natures clashing, inevitably, irrevocably, fatally.  I gulped the drink down, staring out the window, catching a final glimpse of MacLeod as he climbed into a taxi and disappeared.  It had started to snow and I was reminded that this was, after all, New Year’s Eve, a night of great and usually utterly unrealistic expectations.  Most Parisians would be delighted to have even a light dusting of flakes come morning, giving the momentary illusion of a world made clean for the new year – ignoring the fact that the snow only covered up the ugliness for a few hours and brought with it miserable cold, dirty slush, terrible traffic, and slick sidewalks.  The capacity for humans to delude themselves was a source of constant amazement.

Ceremonies.  Traditions.  Expectations. They weighed us down, covered us with armor and obligations until that’s all you were, a conglomeration of disappointments and weighty obligations.  I’d lived that way myself for thousands of years until gradually, incrementally, I…  my thoughts slowed, turning in on themselves.

What obligation would MacLeod have that took him out into the night on New Year’s Eve?  From the start Mac had assumed I had some kind of hidden agenda, some unknown and unknowable ulterior motive, while I had been so ready to accuse, so full of grim expectation that Mac was leaving all his friends in the lurch, that other possibilities had never entered my mind.  I took a large swallow of my drink, almost finishing it, then studied the remaining liquid like it held some deep secret. 

~~~~~~

The streets had managed to accumulate just enough snow to be treacherous and I stepped carefully out of the taxi, only to have my next step slide right out from under me, almost landing me on my bum in the middle of the street.  Fortunately, superior reflexes saved my dignity, and I paid off the driver, who left me standing outside a big white mausoleum of a church.  I stepped onto the grounds and the combination of the soothing feel of holy ground plus the shivery sensation of Immortal presence swirled through me like the odd currents that carried the delicate flakes of snow up and around my body like a small whirlwind.

A tall, dark figure stepped out of a shadowed doorway and despite being on holy ground, I instinctively reached for my sword.  But it was just MacLeod.

“You came.”

“I was curious.”

“How’d you find me?”.

“I called the cab company and browbeat them into telling me where they had left you off.  You come here to do some kind of penance for Connor, or Richie or some other dark moment in your life?”

Then I heard the church bell begin its slow, midnight chime, signaling the end of one year and the beginning of a new one.

Mac just looked at me, then held out something he had been holding in his hand.  I took it.  It was heavy and wrapped in golden paper and tied with a beautiful bow.  The tolling bell sounded another great clang above us, filling the air with melancholy vibrations.

“What’s this?”

Finally, Mac smiled.  “It’s a gift.”

“For me?”

“No.  You need to take it into the church’s parish hall, and present it there.”  The bell tolled once again.

“What the hell do I do that for?”

“Just do it, Methos.”

“Why should I?”

“Because I’m asking you to.”  Again, the deep bell sounded.

I studied him suspiciously.  I didn’t like not knowing what I was getting into.  “And what if I say no?”

“What if you don’t?”  Mac moved a little closer.  “Live in the moment, Methos.  Take a chance.  Let go of your… expectations,” and another toll punctuated his last word.

“My expectations have kept me alive for quite a while.” 

But Mac just cocked his head, and held out the present.  “Trust me,” he urged softly, and something in his tone made gooseflesh crawl up my spine just as another chime vibrated the air.

“Oh, all right!” I snatched the package irritably.  “Where do I go?”

At the sound of another bell, MacLeod turned and led the way into the sanctuary, walking all the way to the back.  Our steps echoed off of the marble walls and our passage stirred the candle flames that dotted several naves with tiny spots of illumination.  The bell was slightly muted in here, thankfully, as it rang thrice more.

Mac led me through an arched doorway in the back and down a cold stone hallway to a set of ancient wooden double doors.  There was a sense of anticipation in the air, like a balloon expanded as far as it would go before it exploded, and as we neared the doors and heard yet another toll, I felt the chill of new Immortal presence.

“MacLeod!” I whispered loudly over another peel of the midnight bell.  “What’s the big mystery?  Who else is here?”

“They’re expecting you,” Mac said softly, and pushed open the doors as the final peel sounded and slowly died away.

At least two hundred pairs of young eyes were fastened on me, and one pair that was much older, looking somewhat taken aback as he and I gazed at each other in mutual surprise.

“Uh, and here he is!” Father Liam O’Reilly stammered, obviously not expecting to see me standing there, present in hand.  “A tall, dark, handsome stranger to bring luck to us all for the coming year!”

“Dammit, MacLeod, what’ve you gotten me into?” I whispered over my shoulder.

“You know what to do,” Mac said, amusement coloring his tone.

“So, what gifts do you bring us, stranger?” O’Reilly called.

I cast an irritated, slightly panicked glance back, but Mac just winked at me.  Bastard.  Well, all I could do was hope I remembered all the right traditions.  I stepped carefully over the threshold, standing just inside the door.  The interesting part would be to speak French with a Scots accent.  “I bring ye gifts for Oidhche na Challuinne – a  lump of coal to bring ye warmth on a cold night, and a black bun cake, so that we might crown a king and queen for the evening, and,” I raised the present high, and shouted out, “A guid new year to one an a'!”

The room erupted in wild cheers and squeals as the children exploded party favors, confetti and streamers filled the air and balloons drifted down from the ceiling in quantities so vast that the floor was quickly hidden from view. 

MacLeod took the gift from me, passing it off to a black-garbed sister waiting nearby.  “Now everyone must kiss the stranger, for luck!” Mac shouted to the crowd and suddenly all the children were there, yanking at me, pulling me down until I was on my knees so they could give me sloppy, wet kisses on both cheeks, on my hands, on my head, each with a giggle or a shy glance before they immediately ran away to kick balloons and squeal some more.  It was disgusting and deafening… and oddly exhilarating.

But I was going to kill MacLeod, I decided once I ended up seated in a child-sized chair with dozens of children around me, including a tow-headed boy on my lap named Marcel, who told me in no uncertain terms that he knew all about Hogmanay and launched into an enthusiastic, but utterly incomprehensible lecture on the topic, complete with hand gestures and sound effects.  Then, amidst more squeals and loud bangs of exploding party favors, I ceremoniously crowned a painfully shy, large-eyed mixed-race youngster as “king”, and a blonde-haired cutie with braids and a face sticky with sweets as the “queen”, who were the ones who found the requisite pea and the bean hidden in their pieces of cake.  Their diadems were made of hand-cut cardboard decorated with glitter-dusted shapes, but the look on their faces was one of transported joy as they marched around the room, being lustily and loudly cheered by their “subjects.”

Fortunately, that seemed to be the last of my official duties as Hogmanay “first footer”, but It was almost 2 o’clock in the morning before O’Reilly and the other attending adults started rounding up the children to have a prayer of thanksgiving before hustling them off to bed, and by that time I was sticky with having been touched and grabbed by innumerable childish fruit-punch and black-bun-cake-smeared hands.

I thankfully retreated to the back of the room and found MacLeod there leaning against the wall; watching the proceedings with unabashed amusement.  “Not quite what you expected?” he asked with a grin.

“Was I supposed to expect to be “first footer” at a Scots Hogmanay celebration in a Catholic church in Paris?” I grumbled.  “Is there a loo nearby?  Gods, what a mess,” I complained, starting to wipe my hands off on my coat, but deciding against it.

“The traditions have French origins, as well, and the lay people in the parish wanted a New Years celebration for the children in the orphanages.  It seems that the period right after Christmas is a particularly depressing time around here.  Hogmanay seemed pretty harmless and one they could adapt to their needs.  Liam asked me earlier tonight at the wedding to be their official “first footer”, but when you showed up,” he shrugged and grinned sheepishly.  “It was an impulse I couldn’t resist.  You should’ve seen the look on your face.” 

I descriptively suggested where MacLeod could put his impulses. “Oh, get over it,” Mac responded, “You enjoyed it, I could tell.  You’re very good with children, you know, but then I suppose you’ve had lots of experience at it.”  He frowned and pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket, wetting it with his spit.  “Here, you’ve got cake on your face.”

“Not in this lifetime!” I snarled, leaning out of MacLeod’s reach, but Mac’s lips were twisting into a grin and he kept coming, quickly backing me up against the wall.  I caught Mac’s wrist before the spit-laden cloth could be rubbed on my cheek, and for a second we were frozen, eye-to-eye, chest-to-chest.  The sounds and sights of the room faded from my awareness and narrowed just to MacLeod’s looming presence, the intensity of his stare, the strength of his hands, the lingering scent of our recent sex. 

“Mac!  Adam!  Please, this is Holy Ground!” Father O’Reilly interjected anxiously, rushing up and looking around to see if anyone was watching.   “And ‘tis New Year’s Eve, you know?  Auld Lang Syne and all that?  I know he’s irritating, MacLeod, but surely you can set aside the Game just for tonight?  For Amanda? For the children? For…”

“I’m irritating?!” I began in protest.

“Relax, Liam,” Mac interrupted, but didn’t break his eye contact with me.  “I’m not going to take his head, although with all that goo on it, it’d probably stick there no matter what weapon I used.  Here,” with a smile, he gently surrendered his damp handkerchief to me.  I looked at it dubiously before I found an un-spat-upon corner to wipe cake residue off of my face.

~~~~~

The temperature had dropped at least ten degrees by the time we stepped outside.  Several inches of snow had accumulated and It looked like the City of Lights had been draped in festive white lace that reflected back all the illumination from stores and street lamps until it seemed almost as bright as day.

The blanket of white also muffled the rumble of passing cars and the usual city noises to an eerie silence which somehow made the world seem smaller, more private, more… intimate, I decided as I convulsively shivered, gathering my coat around me more tightly.  But then, ever since that strange moment when Mac had pushed me against the wall it had seemed like we were the only two people that existed in the universe and I couldn’t even remember how we had managed to extricate ourselves from the Hogmanay party.

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” Mac said softly, turning his face up into the soft, fat flakes drifting down onto his shoulders and into his hair.  His coat was open and his face was flushed, as though he was impervious to the cold.  Or perhaps it was because he produced his own heat, I mused privately.  Mac eyed me up and down appraisingly.  “You’re going to complain about the cold again, aren’t you?” he asked with an indulgent smile.

“Well, gosh, let me see,” I responded with an irritated twist of my mouth because I knew Mac expected it.  “It’s below freezing and we’re in the middle of a blizzard at 2 o’clock in the morning, when I ought to be at home in bed, and the probability of us finding a taxi at this hour in a snow storm is pretty close to zero, so yes, I’m bloody well freezing my arse off!”

“Well, we certainly wouldn’t want that,” Mac responded, moving closer.  “Would you like me to be chivalrous and give you my coat again?”

“Then you’d freeze your arse off,” I replied softly.  “And we certainly wouldn’t want that.”

Mac just looked at me for a long moment.  “What do we want, Methos?” Mac asked at last, his breath enveloping us in a warm, white mist.  “You need to tell me, because I don’t think I’m at all clear on that.  Was it just sex?  That’s all you seemed to be interested in earlier tonight.  And yet,” Mac shook his head slightly, sighed and stepped away, walking slowly down the snowy sidewalk.

I followed, making an effort to saunter casually, although sauntering was difficult in the slippery snow, and I hadn’t felt casual all evening, actually, and that in itself was disturbing.  “And yet, what?” I asked – casually, I hoped.

Mac stopped unexpectedly so that when he turned, our chests were practically touching.  “And yet, you got so pissy when I left, like…” Mac pressed his lips together as though he didn’t want to say the words that formed in his mouth.  Our silent mutual stare was broken only by the swish of a passing car.

“Like I didn’t want you to go?” I finally asked.

“Yeah,” Mac answered almost in a whisper.  “Like you didn’t want me to go,” and he reached up and gently brushed a flake of snow from my cheek with his thumb.

My skin tingled where Mac had touched me.  My whole body felt so… so… aware – of the damp curls pasted to Mac’s forehead, of the snowflake caught on an eyelash, of the touch of color on hard cheekbones slightly darkened with a day’s growth of beard, and of the fact that Mac seemed to be holding his breath, waiting for a response.  But my mind was blank.  Too many words, and not enough, were crowding in my brain and none of them seemed right.  So I just leaned in.  Mac’s lips were a little cold, but then he opened his mouth and I found warmth waiting for me. 

For a long moment we touched only with our lips, our tongues, our shared breath.  Kissing men was almost always an exercise in dominance, in heat, in lust.  This one was unexpectedly gentle and left me breathless and even more wordless than I had been before. 

Now what? A bewildered voice inside my head asked, and I didn’t have an answer.

Mac chuckled, and I realized I had spoken aloud.  Mac stepped to the curb and held his hand up for a cab, which seemed a useless gesture given the time, the weather and the virtually empty streets, except that a black sedan rolled to a smooth stop at the curb.

“You arranged for a car?” I frowned.  “Then why have we been slogging around in the snow for the past ten minutes?”

Mac just smiled at me, opened the car door and gestured for me to enter.

“Now we find a warm, dry place, talk about my plans for opening an antique valuation business here in Paris, and drink a toast to the ever lovely, ever interfering Amanda.” 

“You still think she put me up to finding you tonight?”

“It’s what I would expect from her – and from you.”

I reached out and grasped Mac’s forearm and he looked at me in surprise.  “Wait,” I ordered.  “We’ve been beating each other up all night with our expectations, avoiding them, defying them, defining them.  But…”

“But what, Methos?” Mac asked softly.

I tried to think of something wise or pithy to say, but absolutely nothing came to mind. The possibilities and potential outcomes were too vast, too complicated, too far reaching, too... just too. “I don’t know,” I answered honestly.

“Good.”

“Good?”

“Yes.  Good.  Because that means you have no expectations.  That you don’t know what’s going to happen next.  Neither do I.”  Mac’s gentle smile broadened into the mischievous grin of a naughty boy.  He gestured grandly for me to enter the car.

A shiver of anticipation began at the top of my head and traveled like an electric current throughout my body, all the way to my toes.  I had to swallow first, then I stepped back, making my own grand gesture.  “Oh, no,” I replied, my voice low and rough.  “You first… Duncan,” and had the pleasure of meeting Duncan’s dark, dilated eyes before watching MacLeod gracefully move into the back seat.  I licked suddenly dry lips that had already managed to curve into an anticipatory smile, and climbed in after.

~~~ finis ~~~