Never Let Me Down Again

by Shadowfox and Dr Ruthless

Disclaimer: Alliance didn't want them; so we broke into the corporate offices and sprung them. Since coming to live with us, they have been given the very best of care; not to mention the primo spot on the bed when we go to sleep. What more could you possibly ask for?

Pairing: V/M,

Rated: A--and please take that warning seriously. To read it without expecting to see male/male sex will only offend you. If you don't want to see such things, go away.

Summary: Despite our best efforts, a plot seems to have hatched under our very noses. Victor gets something he desperately wants, but may lose the most important thing of all in the bargain.

Series: Third in series, 1: Walking in my Shoes, 2: It's No Good, 3: Never Let Me Down Again, 4: Barrel of a Gun, 5: Waiting for the Night, 6: Nothing

★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

I'm taking a ride
With my best friend
I hope he never lets me down again
He knows where he's taking me
Taking me where I want to be
I'm taking a ride
with my best friend

We're flying high
We're watching the world pass us by
Never want to come down
Never want to put my feet back down
On the ground.
--Depeche Mode

Victor:

My heart is thumping wildly in my chest, keeping time with the driving bassline of the music. I havent gone clubbing like this since my time in Vice, when I was a baby-faced undercover detective trying to prove myself to my squad. I grin at the memory of those long-ago days and the wild child I used to be, pulling all kinds of crazy stunts to make a collar and getting myself chewed out by my captain on a regular basis.

Mansfield, youre a good cop, Dave Parker would say with a huge sigh after I would tell him just exactly why I'd had to kill yet another expensive unmarked unit, but you take too many fucking risks. How am I supposed to keep you alive if you insist on throwing yourself into the thick of it every goddamn time? You dont even look, for Chrissakes. You just go with it, tripping blithely along, and expect us to pull you out no matter what. Its gonna get you killed one of these days, Victor; and if that happens, I swear Im gonna kick your ass. I dont want to have to be giving your family a flag. You got me?

And then the big man would sigh some more, pinch the bridge of his nose and wave me out of his office, with an Im getting way too old for this shit, and the popping of huge quantities of antacid tablets. Until the next time I pulled some bone-headed trick. Looking back, I'm amazed I managed to make it in Vice as long as I did. I definitely had some kind of unconscious death wish back then.

Of course, Narc hadnt been too much better; taking full advantage of my blue-flame eagerness by burning me up and stringing me out, then throwing me to the wolves to save their own asses instead of taking what theyd had coming. The worst part about it was that I'd been arrested by a guy that was as dirty as they came, and it had chafed badly to see the smug superiority on the faces of my fellow squad members as I was being hauled away.

But Stans betrayal hurt the worst. Stan had been my partner, my friend; hell, hed practically been an older brother to me as I struggled to find my own place in the squad, and I practically worshipped him. Stan was the reason, the only reason, I didnt go to IA with what I knew when I found out that the rest of the squad was on the take.

And when Dave Parker-- the only one whod believed my protestations of innocence, the only one whod stood up for me at my trial-- had come to see me and said, Damn, kid; you really got yourself into some shit this time. Didnt I always tell you to watch out for yourself first and foremost? Id known it was over. Known that even if a miracle had made Stan and the others come clean, I could never go back to being a cop. My faith had been shattered beyond repair.

The man the Director had recruited out of prison had been hard, angry, and bitter. Cautious and aloof, Id done what had been expected of me; nothing more, nothing less, until a beautiful thief came into my life and gave me something to care about again- namely her ex-lover. Now my lover; and I thank God every day for him. I was resigned to never finding the soulmate my hearts been searching for all these years.

LiAnn is still my friend and still my partner, but I understand now more than ever that we never would have been able to make it work together and for her strength, I am grateful. Whatever her reasons, she freed me to find what I really wanted out of my life; although at the time I hadnt seen it that way. But now--now I can truly see what a blessing her letting go was, because it's brought me full circle to Malcolm Ramsey, and for the first time in a very long time I can say I'm truly happy.

I can't help but wonder what our ex-lover thinks of the situation between me and Mac. She busted in on us at Mac's two days ago, while my partner had been finding out just how good it could be to have his dick trapped against me as he ecstatically writhed on my blood-heavy shaft embedded deep in his luscious ass. The little perverted monster that ruled me during my Vice days had risen up at the sight of her and I shot hard into that beautiful body, in turn setting my baby off and causing him to spurt thick liquid heat all over my chest and stomach and howl loud enough to wake the neighbors for a block and a half.

Then I couldn't help it, I just had to kiss him. He was absolutely gorgeous in his shock; and if anything, he'd fucked me harder and faster as she stood over us with her mouth hanging open. When we finally came up for air, she was gone.

Still, the look on her face had been unmistakable--shock, along with a healthy dose of fascinated horror. But whether it was because she'd walked in on us unannounced, was surprised at just how well we were getting along, or was disgusted and repulsed by what she'd discovered about both her ex's is hard to say. We haven't tried talking about it with her, and she hasn't yet brought the subject up herself. On Mac's advisement, we've resolved to let it lie until after this particular assignment.

This assignment being to find a vicious sexual predator running the club circuit who likes to mutilate and torture his victims before leaving their broken bodies where they were originally picked up. The victims are mostly prostitutes--young, desperate, drug-addicted men and women who can find no other way to obtain the ever-increasing amount of cash required to satisfy their needs-and their tricks.

It was the kind of case I would have worked in Vice, and that - along with the fact that one of the latest victims had been the son of a Council member - had insured the Agency's involvement. After all, how can the Director let all this talent go to waste in the midst of an international crisis?

So tonight, just call me Victim Mansfield, served up on a platter in tight, gleaming black leather and looking a lot like I used to back in the heady days of my Vice career. Joy.

When I'd asked them to meet me at The Underground tonight because I needed to do some prep work beforehand, I'd gotten a quizzical pout from my lover, a nonchalant ''kay' from Jackie, and an enigmatic look from LiAnn. It became even more blank when Mac walked over, gave me a kiss hot enough to blister paint before murmuring 'love you, baby', and sending me on my way. I had grown to know that look well in the beginning of our partnership, as it was usually the face she wore when she was hurting but trying to put on a brave front; the look she'd worn when she was missing Mac--whom we'd both assumed was long dead--and didn't want me to know about it.

The last thing I want is to hurt the woman I once loved enough to marry, but it seems inevitable at this point. Everything Mac and I say and do is another slap in the face for her, and we've agreed there's no way in hell that either of us is going to spend all our time around her walking on eggshells, pretending that what is isn't. LiAnn made her choice long ago, and if she doesn't like the consequences, that's something she's just going to have to deal with.

I suspect a huge part of her problem is that neither of us had acted with her the way we do with each other. I know that Mac had never been as open with his emotions with LiAnn-- the same is true of me. It wasn't deliberate; she's just so cool and self-contained that it seems a natural response when dealing with her. Even her passions seem to be orderly, as if she's afraid to let them truly run wild for fear of losing complete control.

Control is, has always been, a serious issue for LiAnn.

Whatever's bothering her, a great deal of it probably revolves around the fact that she's no longer the sole center of our focus. In that, I can't bring myself to feel especially sorry for her. What the hell did she expect-for us to wait on her whim forever? Probably - she always was rather self-centered that way.

Even so, she had to know it was an unrealistic idea. I tried talking to her a little bit ago, when Mac was in the john. She's not talking to either one of us right now; and while it hurts me that she'd be so petty, it's killing Mac. Jesus, she's gonna have to realize sooner or later that this isn't about her; we didn't do this to spite her. It just happened, and I can't bring myself to regret a single second.

As my Nona once told me, God made it so that you love who you love; regardless of what anybody else wants-if they don't like it, it's their problem to deal with--and I do love Malcolm Ramsey, with everything I have, everything I am, and everything I will ever be. It's scary just how much he's come to mean to me. I mean, in the span of a few short weeks, he's become my whole life-and that is just not like good old solid, straight arrow Vic Mansfield. Not that I'm complaining the slightest bit, you understand. As a matter of fact, I'm dancing on the old Vic's grave right now.

Sometimes I wonder if my old-fashioned Nona would have approved of my sweet, sexy, felonious baby. I like to think so. After all, when she sat me down and explained the nature of love to me, it was because she'd caught Corey Nielson and me kissing out back one balmy summer evening-two weeks before I was due to start a college term studying criminal justice. When I told her about the mixed-up feelings I had, wanting to be with both boys and girls and not knowing why--why I was so, as my father always put it, 'screwed up'--she'd hugged me, told me that was the way God made me and that I was just fine the way I was.

Then she'd kissed me on the forehead, sent me off to find my best friend and reminded me not to stay out too late; never breathing a word of what she'd discovered to my uptight, need-to-keep-up-appearances parents. She was a very cool old lady; and if it hadn't been for her, Alice and I would have turned out just like our parents. Hell, I know I almost did in spite of her love.

I'm watching Mac watch me as I dance with Jackie right now, and I feel my semi-hard cock stir even more within the confines of the leather that clings to me like a second skin. I'm reveling in the heat of those dark chocolate eyes, almost as black as my outfit with jealous lust at the moment. Damn, he's gorgeous. I thought he was going to jump me when he walked in and saw me sitting at the bar; and I was greatly disappointed when he didn't try, because I know I look hot tonight--if I do say so myself.

But he did something even better; walking over to insinuate himself between me and the hands of the people on either side of me by the simple expedience of planting himself firmly between my casually outstretched legs and then kissing me until I saw stars. When one of the interlopers would have dared to touch us, he turned to her, snarled 'Mine!!', and glared at the poor thing until she hastily snatched her hand back and hightailed it to parts unknown.

It was exactly what I'd wanted. I love it when Mac goes butch on me; and as much as I love seeing him bend to my will, he's been bending far too much of late. But when tonight's work is done, I plan on that changing very dramatically. I want Mac to understand that this isn't your 'typical' male/male relationship (if there is such a thing); we're equals and he has as much right to dominate me if it pleases him as I have him these past few weeks.

Despite all that Mac's seen and done in his short life, he's incredibly nave about the way a guy-on-guy is supposed to work. Waitscratch that. He thinks he knows how it's supposed to work, but the info is all wrong. Same-sex relationships work pretty much like het ones: one person steers, one navigates, and who does what at what time depends mostly on the situation at hand. At least that's the way I think it should be.

I guess it's my own fault; I pushed him when he probably wasn't ready to be taken and now he thinks this is the way it's supposed to be. LiAnn used to accuse me of being too stubborn and strong-willed sometimes for my own good and, much as I hate to admit it, I know she's right. Truth be told, I can see now how much I pushed her toward marriagetripping blithely along, as Dave used to say, and not noticing how ambivalent she was about the concept until she'd walked away from me. It's a mistake I don't want to make with Mac.

The song's ended and I practically run Jackie over in my haste to return to the bar and my lover. I'm sure she's glaring holes in my back, but I don't really care. I'm not the slightest bit interested in her, even though she's pretty enough and has the kind of body that would give God an instant hard-on if she flaunted it at him the way she has Mac and me tonight.

I'm not stupid; I know she'd like a run at both of us, separately or together--although I think she'd rather take us both on if she had her way-and there was a time when I might have entertained the notion if I'd thought it was the only way I could have Mac. But now I do have Mac; and I got him all by myself, thank you very much--or he got me is the more accurate assessment-so I guess the little princess is just SOL. Better luck next time, baby girl.

Mac kisses me soundly when I reach him, much to the chagrin of our partners sitting across the dancefloor, and gives me a fresh drink. He's looking at me in that way he has, when he wants to talk about something very important to him but isn't sure he'll be taken seriously. I watch him struggle with it for a bit and try to radiate love and acceptance in his direction. It's important to me that he knows I respect his opinions. Finally, he decides to just spit it

"Vic..."

He's nervous, I can tell. I keep sending him positive vibes. "Yeah, baby?"

Hesitant"I wish you'd do something about LiAnn. She's so... closed off."

Hmm. This wasn't what I expected him to say. "What can I do? You're the one that said to let it go until later," and I did, too-with a slight exception. For all the good it did either of us.

He's getting frustrated. "I don't know. Did you talk to her?" He catches my guilty look. "You did, didn't you?" he accuses.

"A little, maybe," I admit sheepishly. I hate when he's mad at me.

He blows a harsh breath"*What* did you say to her? She won't even look at me."

Her coldness is really starting to get to Mac, to both of us. "Not much," which is the truth. There's only so much a guy can say when the conversation is one-sided, "I did ask her how she felt about us."

He looks stricken. "Jesus, baby! Whaddya mean, not much? What did she say?"

"She didn't say anything," also the truth, but it's amazing how much nothing can mean in certain situations, "just said that we were entitled to live our own lives...and went blank again."

"So why the hell won't she look at me?"

He sounds so lost, and I know exactly how he feels. "I don't know, baby," I sigh in defeat, "she won't look at me either. I think she thought we were supposed to wait forever for her or something." That observation earns me a hard look. "She was a lot like this when we were first partnered, before you came into the picture."

His eyes glint in the low lighting, and it makes me want to sink to my knees in front of him. "Well, we have to do something," he says with conviction, "we can't let this go on."

I hate to be the one to burst his bubble. "Tell me what and I'll do it; but, baby, I don't think it's anything we can fix."

He looks at me like I just kicked his brand new kitten. "Jesus, Vic; don't you care? It's not just your life that's going out the window here. How can we trust her, depend on her in a tight corner, if she hates us?"

Now that isn't fair. "Of course I care, Mac; she's my partner too! But how can I do anything if she won't talk to either of us?" It's about time he remembers we're both in the same boat here!

"We have to do something. We can't just leave it," he's pleading now, even though we both know it's useless. "Make her see...," he trails off when he sees I'm not willing to do a repeat performance. "I guess I'll talk to her," he sighs in resignation.

I feel compelled to point out just what he's up against, "Don't get your hopes up, baby. She was pretty abrupt with me earlier." Thats an understatement. She damn near froze my balls off with her attitude.

"You don't think that she'll listen to me?" The insinuation is pretty obvious: that because they grew up together, he stands a better chance of getting LiAnn to see reason.

I only wish it were that simple. "I think she's hurting and I can understand that; but it's keeping her closed off right now."

He looks over at their table and our partner as she stares off into space, deep in thought, and then he sags in defeat. "I guess so. He doesnt like it, doesnt have to, but we both know how stubborn she can be like this.

He turns his full attention back to me and the temperature seems to jump about 150 degrees. God, Vic, I wish we could dance together," he rumbles as his eyes narrow at me. "You look so... Hot."

Score one for Mansfield. "Yeah?" I can't help but preen a little bit for my baby; rubbing my hand up my leather-clad thigh suggestively as I decide that maybe one short dance can't hurt. "Well, it's not as if anybody's gonna care, Mac. Take a look around...it's a pretty open club."

But there's no need for either of us to do sothe Underground's well known as a safe haven for the sexually adventurous. The mass of humanity around us is writhing in about as many combinations as one could imagine; all secure in the knowledge that whatever fantasy they want, it can be found here in the form of another consenting adult, maybe even two or three-or more.

Mac moves in to press up against me and my cock is suddenly at painful attention. "Oh, baby," he murmurs as his hands stroke the leather possessively. A wicked, wanton vision, he's licking his lips as he slowly humps my leg and I know I need to get free of these tight, hot leather pants immediately, if not sooner. "Think that we could dance once?"

If he wasn't a man I'd swear he was cooing at me! Still, common sense tries to remind me of why were here. I suck in a sharp breath as his hard thigh rubs against me teasingly. "Baby..."

"What?" He sounds distracted as he speeds up just a fraction.

I know what he's doing; he'll either get me to do as he asks, or he'll make me come in front of God and everybody right here and nowand I'll still do what he wants after he licks me clean in front of the same. Might as well give in gracefully; we both know I wanted to anyway. I nibble those soft, full lips gently. "One dance, Mac...we're supposed to be working,"

I feel him smile against my mouth and knew that didn't come off as sternly as I'd intended. He leans in against me to nuzzle my neck; warm, slick mouth roaming up beneath my chin before he whispers hotly in my ear. "I need them to know that you're mine. They keep on touching you. I don't like it," the possession in his voice sends a thrill through me, making my nipples stand proud in arousal.

I'm still surprised by it though. "Baby, I'm going home with you, and they all know it," I grin at the memory of the stir Mac caused when he walked in tonight. "Did you see the looks you got when you walked in?"

"They may know it, but I want them to really feel it," he whispers again and then pulls back to look at me when he realizes what I said. "Me? No," he sounds incredulous, which is rather funny to me because I know how image-conscious he is and that he's very much aware of his effect on the fairer sex, not to mention me. "What looks would those be?"

He's milking it, but I have no problem with that. I'm happy to oblige. "All the women creamed their jeans when you came through that door, baby, and probably most of the men," I whisper depravedly, knowing it for fact. I smile wickedly and work my way up to his ear to nibble on it. "You look so damn fine tonight, lover." He does, too; a walking, talking wet dream is Mac, and all of it belongs to me. Freaking amazing.

He hisses as I stroke the bare patch of skin under my fingers, which just happens to be where the back of his thigh starts curving up into his ass, my favorite place on his whole body. He's wearing these worn, snug jeans full of rips, shreds and holes; and they leave nothing to the imagination. I can almost smell his arousal, and it's making me so wild. My mind runs rampant as different scenarios flit through it, and I'd love to try them all. Later.

"Except for LiAnn and Jackie, huh?" He sounds a bit winded. Good. "You've got me confused with you, Vic. You're the one who's turning heads."

"Maybe even them...Jackie's coveting your ass, you know," I watch our supposedly ditzy partner as she watches us and feel the monster rise up again. I start giving Mac little biting kisses, stringing the resulting red marks along the base of his throat. I know there's a name for this somewhere-- either in the Kama Sutra or Ananga Ranga, possibly even in the Perfumed Garden-but it escapes me at the moment, a very minor annoyance in the whole scheme of things.

He hisses again, grabs my biceps painfully tight. I know Ill have marks. This is also good. Victor, I..., hes floundering, once more trying to convey something important to him.

What, baby? Talk to me

But he cant seem to get the words out. The only thing I hear is a harsh moan before he kisses me hard enough to leave my mouth slightly sore and swollen; which is a very good thing. I bare my throat to him as he moves lower, feeling sharp teeth scrape my jugular. Normally I'm not this submissive, but tonight I have a need to be. Because Mac needs me to be. I can feel it in the way he's mouthing my Adam's apple, the way he's crushing me against his body-so hard that I can barely breathe. You wouldn't know it to look at him, but Mac is very strong and heavy. I look forward to feeling that strength and weight later tonight.

He's vibrating with the need to possess me. "I'm scared all the time. I don't know how to do this, baby," his voice is trembling in my ear.

Confused, I stroke his back. "Of what, baby? You don't know how to do what?"

His voice shakes even more. "How to keep you."

I pull back and look my sweet thief in the eyes. The pain I see there hurts me more than the bruising strength of his arms around me. "Baby, you've got me for the rest of my life. I told you there was no one else for me ever again. How can I make you believe? What can I do to show you what you mean to me?"

"I don't know. It's just how I feel," he looks ashamed, something I can't bear to see.

"Oh, baby..." I crush Mac against me, trying to hold him as tight and as safe as he is me, "I love you, Mac...you know that, right?"

"I want to lose myself in you. I don't want to feel afraid all the time."

Ah. This I understand. He wants to take me, but he doesn't know how. That's okay; I can teach him that too, and I will as soon as we can get the hell out of this place. "I don't know what to tell you. I'm not good with words--all I know how to do is love you," and I do love you, Mac. You have to know that I doyou have to feel how much I love you. Please feel it.

He nuzzles up to my ear again. "Just dance with me, Vic. I need to feel you close to me."

How can I deny my baby what he needs? It's like denying myself. "Okay...anything you want, Mac," and I immediately feel better when he flashes a bright smile at me.

"Just so you knowit wasn't MY ass that Jackie was cootching up to a few minutes ago."

He's teasing, but I hear the jealous notes in his voice anyway and can't help laughing as I lead him to the dancefloor. "Yeah, well...I'd rather it had been you. She's...nice, but not exactly what I'm looking for, you know?"

He looks over at the table and our brooding partner. "What about LiAnn? She was, wasn't she? She was exactly what you were looking for."

Ouch. My Mac certainly doesn't pull any punches and I know I have to be honest. "At the time...and then the times changed." Not necessarily how I wanted to put it, but it's the truth.

Mac watches me steadily. "Are you sure?" Then his face takes on that haunted look that I hate; the one where he's questioning himself and his choices and I want to shake him until his teeth rattle. "Jeez. I just don't know. I feel so fucking out of control all the time."

He's being honest, and I can give him no less. "Mac, you know I'm bi, I've never made a secret of that. I like women alright...but I *love* you. I've spent my whole life waiting for you. That's why it never worked before."

Apparently, it was the right thing to say, because Mac's closed his eyes and melted against me. The music is fast right now, but we're moving to a beat that's only in our minds; a slow, sensuous beat that throbs in sync with our hearts. "Is it working now?" my lover whispers in my ear, sending a thrill of lust rocketing down my spine to settle in my groin.

"Oh, hell yeah. It's working just fine."

He smiles as I stutter a bit, then turns serious again. I swear, one of these days I'm gonna wipe that look off his face permanently. I never knew how much I missed his trademark smirk until I stopped seeing it on a regular basis. "Look at us. I'm a wreck, and everyone laughs at us. Our partner doesn't even want to look at us, and I don't know what to do."

Well, this is interesting. "Who's laughing at us?" Not that I care if they do, but they're making my baby uncomfortable and that I won't tolerate.

He's pouting just a bit, and it makes me lightheaded. "Jackie and the Director... Fucking Dobrinsky. I'd like to rip his head off and feed it to him," Mac's a man after my own heart, especially after that stunt with Dobie's sewer pipe; but I don't give a rat's ass about any of them, with the exception of LiAnn, and neither should Mac.

I look over at one of the parties in question. "In case you haven't noticed, that's not laughter, that's lust. I've wanted to kill her for the way she's been eyeing you tonight, but I really can't fault her taste"

Mac rolls his eyes at me. "Oh, come on. Even I know that it was you she was wriggling her assets at," he quips disgustedly.

"Yeah, but she likes to see you get mad," I shoot back placidly. Again, I can't blame her; Mac's fucking gorgeous when he's steamed. "As for the Dragon," he shakes with suppressed laughter, "I have it on very good authority that she *did* keep that tape."

His eyebrows go up questioningly at that, but I'm not ready to tell him about it yet. Let it suffice to say that it's amazing just how far out on a limb Nathan Muckle will go to please a Prince of the Illuminati. All I had to do was take him out to lunch and spin a little bullshit. And yes, I did feel bad about it afterwards. A little.

I get back on the topic at hand. "And Dobie? Fuck him if he can't take a joke. He *wishes* he could have someone as hot as you," he does too. I've caught him staring more than once. Tough shit, bulldog, you had your chance. My turn now, and I'm not giving it up ever. You're lucky you get to look.

Mac stands stock still in the middle of the dance floor. "Fuck him? Oh, Vic, baby, I'd so much rather fuck you." He grabs hold of me and kisses me again and I'm not about to complain now. He moans against my mouth and the sound goes straight to my cock. "God, I need you. How come I need you so much?" his voice is strained and wondering.

"I don't know, but it's probably the same reason I need you," I feel a shudder run the length of me. "God, baby...," I don't know how to say what's in my heart, to tell this amazing man how he makes me feel. The words to describe it don't exist.

"I want you," he growls. "I really, really want you," and in the middle of the dancefloor, he slides down my body to his knees to lay his cheek against my leather-clad groin.

I can't help it, my head goes back and I moan loud enough to be heard over the music. The dancers in our immediate vicinity spread out to give us room in anticipation of a show, but I don't think either of us cares.

Mac turns huge, pleading eyes to me. "Please, Vic. Give it to me."

His insistence is the beginning of my undoing. Still, I know this is a very, very bad idea. "Baby, we gotta *work*...we *can't*....Oh, baby..."

I'm whimpering with hunger as Mac's arms circle my hips to hold me still, while he buries his face in my crotch and inhales deeply. I know he can feel the swell under the leather, and he knows exactly where to press to drive me insane. He grins up at me maniacally. "I want you. I really, really need you, baby," he pouts sexily before gently rubbing his face against the rock-hard bulge in front of him like a cat and purring.

Jesus Christ, I'm gonna shoot my wad right fucking here all over himhow can he know about this little kink in my psyche!? "baby, please...gotta behave...gotta stop...gonna make me come...make me come...can't...please...," I know I'm begging and I know I'm babbling; and I can't do a thing about either one. I've got no shame left to spare for pride. You're so good, little Grasshopper

The music is a little harder, the beat more driving, and Mac is caught in it as he stands up; moving back just enough to take my hand and press it up against his own hard on. "Feel that?" he asks as hips gyrate to the rhythm and bring to mind a fantasy of feeling him buried deep in my ass, driving to the same cadence.

"Yes," I moan wantonly as my body starts to over-ride my brain. Looks like later has just become now. "Oh, shit," I rub it lovingly, trying to imagine the feel of it in my ass...plundering, taking... "I want it, Mac... want it now," I feel like such a slut at the moment, and that can only be a good thing. At this moment, I think I'd do almost anything Mac asks of me-and he knows it. He knows he owns me. That's probably the best thing of all.

Mac pulls in close again and lays his forehead against mine to look directly into my eyes. "I need you now. Not later. Not tomorrow. I need you, Vic."

His intensity is eating me alive. His eyes are electric, hypnoticand we fucking can*not* do this right now. I groan harshly. "Jesus, baby...how can you do this to me? I can't think, I can't see... It's so hot in here, and you smell so fucking good..."

"Where can we go, Vic. There must be somewhere?" His voice is soft and cajoling, gently leading me down the path he wants me to go.

But I can't completely forget duty. "I want you inside me and we *can't*we just *cant*" I'm desperate. Either he takes me now or he doesn't-his choice-but if he truly means to do this here, it's the only thing I'll accept. I want to die knowing how it feels to be possessed by Mac Ramsey.

And he starts to back away again. "Me? You mean...? Oh, boy" I watch the bob of his Adam's apple as he gulps in apprehension.

Oh, no, lover; you did this to me. You don't get to back out so easily. "There's rooms upstairs," I whisper evilly, "party rooms...if you promise you'll take me tonight, right now..." I leave the rest hanging and wait for him to catch on.

Less than half a second. I knew my baby was sharp. "Oh..." the pitiful whimper almost makes me feel sorry for him. Almost. "You want me to fuck you?" he sounds scared. I don't blame him. It's always easier to be taken than to take someone, especially if you're a novice.

I won't let that stop either of us. "Oh, yeah, baby...I want to feel you inside me. I want to know what it's like to be totally yours."

I nuzzle up to his neck and lick it slowly from the base to just behind his ear. This gains me another pained-sounding whimper. "How long? I mean...How can we? Can you set it up?"

He sounds much like I did a few short eons ago and I can't help being a bit smug. I tamp it down quickly. "Yeah, Jason will do it for me if I ask; all you have to do is say the word."

Luckily, he doesn't ask how I know the bartender's name or why he'd be so magnanimous, not that it's a big secret or anything. Jase Biondy was one of only two male lovers I had before Mac; the other being Corey Nielson, and someday Mac will thank him from the bottom of his heart. It was Jase who taught me everything I know about making love to another man, and Mac has been the grateful beneficiary of all that tutelage. Small, sweet and blond, Jase reminds me of a kewpie doll with his big blue eyes, heart-shaped face, luscious lips and compact 5'9" frame.

The relationship was doomed from the start, because Jase also liked to share the wealth--whereas I, being the twisted, selfish bastard I am, prefer total monogamy. Now, he's a good friend and nothing more. And he's hot for Mac; he practically fell over dead in disbelief when I pointed my baby out earlier. "Sweet Jesus in heaven; you do not deserve that," he gushed, and I agreed whole-heartedly. "You are one damn lucky sonofabitch, Victor," an observation I also agreed with as he offered to reserve use of his best party room for me tonight and wouldn't take no for an answer. I never expected to be taking him up on it.

Mac is trembling violently now, and he breathes harshly into my ear. "Oh, fuck, yeah. Just...hurry."

I signal Jase and get a nod in return. "Done and done. Let's go baby."

Perversely, Mac hangs back for a moment. "Do we...do we need to tell them that we'll be coming back?" He gestures over at Jackie and LiAnn.

I'm hesitant. Jackie could definitely use this against us; of that I have no doubt. "I don't know...do you think we should?"

"They might get mad."

True, but it's their word against ours. We could always say we were trying to draw the perp out. "Hmm." I decide to err on the side of caution. "Make it quick, and make the story good, Mac. I don't want the Director on our asses any more than necessary."

Mac shudders. "God, No..." He goes over to the table and tells themwhatever, then comes back to me. "Quick enough?" At my nod, he grabs my hand and makes for the back. "Where do we go, babe?"

"There's a set of stairs on the left," which he immediately heads for; but once there, I make sure and go up first to give my lover a good view of my ass. Mac is right behind me, and I hear him groan loudly before he gently cups my swaying backside in his palms.

At the top, we head straight for the room at the end of the hallway. It's the deluxe, with all kinds of accoutrements for people who are into that sort of thing; but all I need right now is Mac.

Once over the threshold, Mac kisses me gently; then whispers, "Nobody else has ever done this to me, Vic. I can take them or leave them. But you...Oh, God."

The declaration makes me tremble. I want to hear more. My voice is only a whisper as I ask over the muted beat of the music, "What, baby? What do I do to you??"

He steps over to the bed, then turns to look at me. "GodCome here, and I'll show you." His voice is husky and velvet; and it rubs against me, setting my blood on fire.

I can do nothing else but obey, and step over to him, arms spread crucifixion style as I await his pleasure. "All yours." He drags down on the zipper of my jacket and a shudder wracks me as cool air hits my skin. My nipples are painfully tight now; as Mac keeps on going, unzips the jacket and then kneels again, to unzip my pants. He's fumbling to push them down enough and his mouth is searching; I can feel the moisture of his tongue seeping through the front my boxer briefs. I whimper helplessly. "Baby?"

Mac continues to torture me mercilessly, licking and sucking at me through the cotton. "Mmmm?" he sounds distracted right now.

"I want your mouth...you're so good...need to feel your mouth on me," I'm way past the point where I give a shit whether or not I'm begging. I'm just giving it all up to Mac and just coming along for the ride, because I know he's gonna take me exactly where I want to go tonight.

Mac finds my pleas funny for some reason, and gives a gentle snort of laughter. "Like you could escape it." He pulls the front of my skivs down and allows my seriously aching cock to spring free.

As I watch, he captures it with one hand and looks up at me for just a second, making a great show out of licking his lips before he sucks me right in. Hard. I practically scream. "Ahhh!! Like I really want to! Jesus, baby...oh, yeah...suck me...."

I dissolve into inarticulate groaning as my baby goes to work, sucking as though it's nourishment to him; and I have to fight to keep my hands from fisting in his hair and brutally fucking his mouth. I remind myself that he's in control tonight, and we will get to where we're going when Mac is damn good and ready to take us there. But I'm praying with every ounce of my lost faith that we get there soon, or I'm going to be a babbling lunatic for the rest of my life.

Mac's hands are scrabbling to push the leather pants down to my knees, and once that is accomplished, I feel his finger gently rubbing the pucker of my ass as he sucks. The thought of it brings me so close to the edgeI cry out sharply; unable to keep the sound in.

Suddenly, that warm, wonderful mouth and gently questing finger are gone and I desperately want them back. "Oh, God, Vic, did I hurt you?"

I'm panting, and my vision is hazy around the edges. It's so hard to form a coherent thought. "What? Oh, Jesus, no baby... I'm on fire," light me up, baby; make me burn.

I want you to see only me, his voice is harsh and commanding, can't stand it when you see those other women.

What other women? my throat is dry from panting and it makes my voice rusty. You're all I've been able to see since the night you first kissed me.

Jackie, he accuses, before sucking on the head of my cock like a popsicle. She doesn't get you. You're mine. Only mine, his tone is warning me to take him very seriously at this moment.

As if can do anything but. Yes, I wail loudly, only yours--and you are only mine. Touch me again, baby; light me up, I need to feel that electricity again, and hes the only one who can give it to me.

Mac looks up at me for a long moment before coming to some kind of decision. Turn around, Vic, his voice is gentle, but its a command all the same and I feel it race like a drug through my veins.

He is still kneeling, and I cant help but think of what Id like for him to do to me while hes down there. Okay....

His teeth sink gently into the padded muscle of my left glute, making me jump and whine in frustration. Hes never gone farther than this yet and I dont expect him to this time, either; but then he shocks me when he spreads my cheeks wide, exposing the tight, sensitive ring of muscle between them to the unmistakable heat and moisture of his breath.

Mac, what are you...? I dont get to finish the question, because he leans in and starts to lick me. Little delicate lashes of his tongue as he steals small tastes of this formerly forbidden area of my flesh. I thank God profusely for my unwavering attention to detail during my prep time earlier. Still, knowing of his ambivalence, I have to give him an out. "Oh, baby," the words come out on a shuddering groan, a testament to the power he has over me at this moment, "...you don't...you don't have to... Oh, Fuck...you don't have to do this..."

I feel my beloved shiver, hear a sweet moan of lust before he forces his slick, searing tongue to breach me and stroke into my body over and over again. Overwhelmed by his loving, I cry out and practically fall into the wall in my haste to bend over and expose myself more fully to his pleasure.

My legs are trembling now, and I am whining with need. "Oh my God...Jesus, Mac...so fucking good...you're so hot...so amazing."

Mac is making all these helpless little noises, the kind he makes when he's really into what I'm doing to him. Unable to stand it, I reach down to fist my own cock before I go insane, only to have my hand brutally slapped away and replaced with his. He strokes me gently, when I want it rough and hard and I can't do anything about it. I'm trapped between his hand and his mouth and all I can do is hold on for the ride and try to keep breathing.

Mac finally leans back to draw a breath. I feel him pant into my ear. "I need... I really need you," he whispers shakily.

"Yeah" Again, how can I deny him-and why would I want to? I quickly strip the rest of my clothing off, then turn and start doing the same to him. Mac is wild eyed and panting, hanging by a thread as I start to touch him.

I lean in to taste him gently, not sure if he'll be disgusted by my actions; but I did do a very thorough prep, and one of my kinks is an admittedly rather perverse tendency to taste and smell my sexual partner's skin during and after lovemaking-which usually includes the sweat and semen I happen to put there myself.

I can't explain it; but there is something very erotic about kissing Mac after he goes down on me and knowing that the bitter essence I taste on his lips is a part of me that he willingly chooses to carry inside himself. My criminal psych professor called it territorial marking behavior and it was something that LiAnn wouldn't tolerate and never indulged me in when we were together.

Mac, however, is a different story. He pulls me closer and crushes my tender mouth under his own and I'm with him all the way, hungry for the rough contact. "Need you, Vic; need you now," he pants afterward, all intense and electric again as he stares deep into my eyes and down into my soul.

I love him. I'd willingly give up my life for him if he needed me to. "What do I always tell you, baby?" My fingers play with his rock-hard nipples as I gently worry his lush lower lip with my teeth.

"I don't...," he's panting again, "dunno," he's returning my attentions; and his denim-encased cock bucks against mine, sending sparks racing through me.

I grab him by the head and stare back into his gaze just as deeply. I don't want him to misunderstand my meaning this time. "Take what's yours...take me."

He looks a bit worried now. "You mean? You want me to...?" I can't help thinking how hot he looks at this moment. It's okay, baby. I know you can do this; and once you get the taste, it's gonna change your life forever.

I hit my knees, determined to submit to my lover tonight. After carefully stripping the worn, threadbare jeans and the rest of his clothing; I play with Mac's cock, keeping the tension between us high and hoping the tide will carry him along. "Yeah. I want this, Mac. I want you so deep inside me it's gonna take a fucking crowbar to get us apart again. I want to limp and eat standing up for a week because of you; but most of all, I want you to know how it feels when you first realize that I'm carrying a piece of you around inside me. There's nothing else like it in the world, baby. Nothing."

"Oh, God, Vic," Mac is shaking his head, trying to clear it, get some sense backbut I won't let him. I keep teasing him, leaving him so on edge that he finally has to reach down and disengage my busy hands from his body.

"Please, Mac? Please? I need you so bad." I'm pulling out all the stops for this. He absolutely has to take me tonight. I'll die if he doesn't.

"I don't want to hurt you," but he's spitting on his hand as he speaks.

Yes, baby, that's it "You can't." My ass is in the air now, my cock dripping as I get ready to take the ride of my life. And Mac is gonna take me there, gonna take me all the way home; I can feel it.

"What if...what if I can't...?"

He's committed, but still insecure. My poor sweet sexy baby. "What, baby?"

He moves behind me and kneels and I feel myself opening for him. "What if I come? I'm gonna come, I know it."

I shudder as he feels for my sweet spot by stroking his fingers over me. "Even if you do it's okay, baby." And it really, truly is, because I know exactly how he feels. "But you won't." I hesitate a moment, considering. "But if you'd rather have help..." I trail off, helplessly aware of just how much is going to be revealed about me after this moment, and praying that Mac can handle what he's going to learn.

I feel him shiver again as Mac lets his cock find the spot for him. Then he hesitates. "Help?"

I close my eyes, take a deep breath and spit it. "If you put on a cockring, you won't come until it you take it off," god, I hope you appreciate what it's costing me to admit this to you, Mac. "Then you don't have to worry," I hear the sure notes of personal experience in my voice and cringe inwardly.

Sure enough, Mac leaves his place behind me and I start to die inside. He lifts me up with two fingers under my chin and strokes my cheek. "You...you have one?" his voice is a bare whisper; and I nod miserably, cursing the wicked impulse that made me grab it as I was walking out the door. "Do it, baby. Please."

My eyes pop open in surprise. "Baby? Are you sure?" I have to know; I don't want him to do this just to please me.

His eyes are huge in the dim light. I know he's nervous, but his gaze is clear and steady. "Please...I want to make it good. Hurry," he whispers as I get up and go for my jacket.

"It will be good, no matter what," I pull it out and hold it up for him to look at. It's a simple leather strap studded with snap closures, real easy and non-threatening. I'm not into big, flashy stuff anyway; never have been. As a matter of fact, this is the first one I've owned since Vice and even that one was just for show most of the time.

Mac hisses apprehensively at the little bit of leather and chrome in my hand. "Shit! Will that thing make my balls drop off?"

I smile in spite of myself. "No, baby; it'll just keep you together for a while. Watch. It's a simple strap, you put it on like thisand when you're ready, all you have to do is unsnap it, like this," I demonstrate the mechanics of it on my own cock. "Okay?"

"Y-yeah. I got it."

He takes it from me as if it's going to bite him, and I can see how badly he's shaking. I step behind him and put my hands over his to steady them. "You want some help with this, Malcolm?" I whisper gently, kissing his shoulder reassuringly.

"Oh, love. Please... " He sags against me as I put the ring on, adjust it so that it's uncomfortable but not painful, and stroke on a little lube. I only need a scant amount; he's dripping precome as it is and I'm so ready for him I almost feel like a woman.

Mac kneels again and tilts his head back to look at me. "Come here, lover," he whispers hotly, "I need you bad."

In a haze, I come and kneel in front of Mac; head bowed, ass in the air in true sub fashion. I want and need to submit to Mac right now; but I'm also ready to lead if Mac needs me to, because in this, as in all things, we are partners and it is my job to back him up. He positions himself, trying to do this by instinct, without too much thinking. "That's good, baby," I whisper as he strokes my spine, giving him all the love and encouragement I know how to at this moment.

When I feel his cock hot against my body, I can't stand it anymore. I push back hard, feeling him slide into me as he cries out in amazement and then his hands are on my hips, pulling me back to meet him as he drives himself into my body as hard and deep as he can get, then holding very still.

It's glorious. I'd forgotten how good this actually was, being stretched and filled like this. My ass is on fire as it tries to decide whether or not to split in two and I'm panting hard through my mouth. I sound like I'm dying, but I've never felt more alive. I love the feeling of Mac inside me, it's just as perfect as I had imagined it would be. It's where he belongs--whenever he's not underneath me, that is.

"My God, Vic, you're so hot." I could never get tired of that reverent, wondering note in his voice. He's as deep inside of me as he can get, and I feel him rigid against me as he strains to gain just a fraction more. "I want... I want to climb inside you for the rest of my life."

I know exactly how he feels. I feel the same way whenever we make love to each other; whether hard, fast and raunchy; or slow, tender and languid-or any combination in between. I whimper helplessly when I feel him lick the sweat from my skin. It seems we may have something in common in the kink department. "Yes, baby...so good...take me..." I moan loudly and push back hard, wanting to feel him move. "Mac...Mac...," I'm not even sure what I'm begging for now.

"Fuck, Victor... I love you so much. So goddam much."

His voice is harsh and shaky and I feel him swell within me. "Love...love you...too...want to be yours...rest of my life... take me, baby...please...fuck me."

Mac suddenly starts to move; gasping, groaning and screwing me so hard I really might not be able to sit for a week. "Yes! Yes! Deeper, harder...I need it... need you...faster...don't stop!"

Mac slides an arm across my chest, grabs my opposite shoulder and starts plunging into me really hard. His free hand grabs my cock and strokes it savagely; so hard that I know I'll be tender for at least a day after this. "Come on, Vic, give it to me," he growls harshly, "I need it."

I cry out at that. Mac is well and truly possessing me, and I can feel my climax building inside me because of it. I can deny my baby nothing, and the truth of that is in the tears leaking from the corners of my eyes. I'm crying out with every stroke Mac lays inside me, and I can honestly say that I have never in my life been taken as thoroughly and lovingly as I am being taken by this man.

"Come for me, Vic. I love you."

Mac is licking at my face, tasting the salt tears I'm offering up to him and suddenly, I can feel it coming... "Mac, take it off...take it off now!" I cry, hoping he will understand what I'm trying to tell him. My climax slams into me like a freight train and I cry out one last time; a long keening wail from the bottom of my soul as I feel my man fall into the abyss with me with a gut-wrenching primal scream. I collapse to the floor, Mac still in and around me like a heavy, comforting blanket and I sob uncontrollably as he whispers my name over and over.

"Don't... Don't cry, lover. What? Did I hurt you?"

He sounds so worried and I try to dredge up a smile for him. "No, baby. I told you that you couldn't." And he didn't, not really. I know I'll wake in the morning feeling wonderfully achy and well and truly fucked. In other words, totally loved.

He traces the path of a tear down my face. "Please tell me what's wrong," he's pleading now, sure he did something wrong.

"It's never been like that...ever. I've never felt the way you make me feel," I'm shaking uncontrollably and this time, the wonder is mine. I could never have imagined it being like this.

Mac is licking my tears away, and he kisses me again. "Nobody else but you, Vic. Only you."

The emotion is going to tear me in two. "Hold me...hold me tight, Mac... I'm gonna fall apart if you don't," keep me together, baby. Please. "Love you, baby, so much. I knew that night in the truck. It scares me to want you this much...to *need* you this much," he crushes me in against his body, burying his face in my neck as I try to find the words to tell him how good he makes me feel and the depth of my love for him.

"I love you too, he whispers solemnly, "I know how you feel. It's like we were torn apart from the same person, and we'll never get back the way we were."

That's it exactly. I think back to that night in the back of the truck and how I'd told him that I was nobody's bitch-and then threw a challenge at him. Well, it didnt happen in the time, place or way that I expected; but it happened, and I just learned something new about myself. Something very, very good. I chuckle quietly over my new-found discovery. "Guess what?"

Mac smiles against my shoulder as he feels my humor. "What? You laugh? But you, my fine sir will laugh no more. Not when I put you in my cage," he nips the skin under his mouth before giving an evil, over the top stage laugh. My baby is back.

I rub my cheek against his silken hair and chuckle again. "Maybe not; but you will when you hear this."

Mac turns me to look at him, interested now. "What?"

I look him straight in the eyes, grin and whisper, "I'm your bitch."

His eyes go huge for a moment, then his laughter shakes both of us uncontrollably. "Oh... fuck!"

He can't stop; and every time he looks at me, it sets both of us off again. "Bastard! Thirty-seven years and you come along and do this to me," I'm gasping again, trying to break free of his embrace so I can pin him underneath me and remind him of just who's boss in this relationship. Or not.

Mac holds me tighter, grinning against my cheek. "Oh, yeah, baby, but I'm your bastard; just try and get rid of me now!" He kisses me soundly before adding, "God, Vic, I thought that you were at least 65," with that smirk that I've come to know and love so very well.

I struggle half-heartedly against my imprisonment. "Fucking brat, you know it?" but I'm grinning as I say it, and I think my face is starting to hurt because of it.

Mac slips gently out and shifts us so that he leans back against the bed as I lean against him. "I know that I love you," he whispers against my skin.

I know you love me too. After this, I know it in my soul. But before I can say anything, he gently whaps me upside the head and starts in"And that you are a sleazy pervert. What makes you carry this thing around with you just on spec?"

He doesn't sound upset, just curious; so I decide to roll with it. "Hey, I am *not* sleazy, thank you very much; and what have I been telling you all this time?"

"Uh... what?"

I roll my eyes. "That I have..."

He chimes in and we finish the sentence together. "hidden depths. I think I just hit the bottom of them." It's not meant judgmentally, just a statement, and I will take it as such.

But I know I still need to explain. "And I don't usually carry one..."

Mac's response of 'Oh yeah?' is somewhat disbelieving. Can't blame him. After all, I've gone from being totally straight to not only being bi-sexual, but something of a perv as well in a few short weeks. I carry on as if he hasn't spoken. "But you... you do things to me," a statement woefully inadequate for just how completely he's changed my life in such a short time. "I don't even know what made me grab it. I haven't been like this since Vice."

He snorts derisively in my ear. "Oh yeah, right, blame me...blame poor innocent Mac." He thinks about it. "I do?" He sounds uncertain now and I try to reassure him.

"Don't be sorry, baby; it's a good thing. I didn't know how much I missed that person until you showed me he was gone," I stroke the back of his hand gently, lost in memory.

Mac's questions bring me back. "Vice? Is this what you used to get up to in Vice?" He sounds shocked, and again, I can't blame him. I played testosterone jockey to the hilt with him for a long time, keeping my true nature buried to deny my attraction to him. "I thought that you were as straight as a die."

Someday I'll tell him about Corey, and Jaseand my Nona. "No, this is not what I used to get up to in Vice; but I was wild. I loved life back then, and I was very good at my job," so good that Dave Parker had me transferred out before I slipped so deep into my undercover persona that I couldn't come back out and got myself killed. But that's another story.

"Gotta know it before you can trap it, baby?"

"Something like that."

He kisses my temple and gives me a brief squeeze before checking his watch. "Oh, good grief. Do you suppose we need to go back downstairs?"

I settle into him more and squeeze his arm. I'm not ready to leave here just yet. This is our safe space, and I need for him to understand a few things before we let the outside world in again. "Mac, you need to know...I was never stupid..."

"But you used to carry a cockring in your pocket just in case."

I feel the heat rise to my face, but I knew what I was getting into when I revealed this to him and he needs to know the truth. "I never got involved that way..."

He takes my face between his hands and holds it steady, looking deep into my eyes and telling me with his gaze that it's done and over; that the past doesnt matter to him. "Maybe. Maybe not. I don't care. But now, you are mine, and you aren't ever, ever gonna look at anyone else the way that you look at me. Hear me?"

The past may not matter to him, but it does to me, and I need for him to know. I want there to be no misunderstandings between us. "I knew myself, what I was capable of...but I never slept around with a lot of people, and I was *always* safe."

The stunned look on his face says it all. We've never used protection with each other. Not that it mattered. The Agency gave us both extremely thorough physicals when we came in (and has every 18 months since) and we both tested clean. "Fuck, baby, that's something that didn't even occur to me."

I grin and kiss the tip of his nose. "My thoughts exactly."

"I wanted you so badly."

"I know," I stroke Mac's face, trying to convey love and comfort to this man that I adore.

He's showering me with little kisses on whatever part of me he can reach, and I know that I've done the right thing. "I know it may seem like I'm really wild, but you're the first person I've ever been this uninhibited with," I confess with a blush.

"Just as long as you never stop," he whispers sensuously, stoking the embers inside me.

Even so, it's still too early to do anything about it; but I can promise him this easily. "Never, baby."

He kisses me deeply, sweetly, filling me up with his love until I think I'm going to burst. "Think that maybe we should go back to work?" Mac's reluctance is clear, and I know exactly how he feels.

"Yeah, I think we need to," I sigh heavily, slipping from the shelter of his arms to start gathering my clothing up.

He struggles to his feet, knees cracking loudly in the relative silence of the room. "Grief, I'm getting so old," he mutters with a rueful grin.

I grin back as I try to find one of my socks. "Jackie and LiAnn are probably...," my voice trails off as I look toward the doorway, and I feel a sick horror bloom inside me.

Mac, distracted by his search for one of his boots, turns to look at me quizzically. "What? Probably what?"

I can't speak. I can only point, and Mac turns his head slowly to look at the door. His eyes open wide, and his jaw drops onto his chest. "Oh, Fuck," he whispers quietly.

Our partners, who we abandoned without a second thought downstairs a short while ago, are standing in the open doorway; and judging by the looks on their faces, they've seen and heard everything that went on in here tonight.

We are dead. We are so dead that they're going to have to bury us at least twice. "Yeah, that just about sums it up," I sigh quietly.

Jackie is looking stunned; and when she speaks, it's with a bizarre kind of reverence. "You guys are so.... like, so..."

"Go on, say it," Mac snarls impatiently.

"*totally* hot," Jackie finishes in a daze.

I ignore her. I could care less what Jackie thinks. My attention is riveted to the slim, dark-haired woman gazing back at me with shock and betrayal in her beautiful almond eyes. I'm suddenly afraid, as it occurs to me just why she's looking at me that way. "LiAnn?"

LiAnn just stands there. Says nothing. My fear, both of her and for her, grows.

Mac steps toward her and she steps back. "LiAnn?"

"LiAnn, please," I stay still, but try to reach her with my gaze. Look at me, please, LiAnn. I'm sorry you had to find out like this.

"Come on, girl," Mac says slowly, "let's talk about this. We need to-you know we do," the fear I feel is reflected in his face, and a tremor races through me at the sight.

LiAnn shakes her head. "You two are fine without me," her voice, her face, her eyes are all flat and dead and it rocks me to the core to think that we hurt her this much with our relationship. All I can say in our defense is that we truly never tried to flauntit in front of her.

She turns to go, and I panic. "No! Wait!" I take a harsh breath as I realize that I can't chase after her naked, and quickly grab my underwear.

LiAnn turns back as I'm struggling to pull them on and I freeze. "What?" she asks evenly, as if I'm beneath even her contempt. Her walls are going back up, stronger and higher than ever before and I don't want that to happen. We need her, as a partner and a friend.

I finish pulling my skivs back on as she waits patiently. "LiAnn... this..." the words won't come and I look over at Mac--her brother, her ex, my lover--in frustration.

LiAnn tries to smile a little and fails miserably. "Victor, you don't need me. You and Mac... You're fine," she chokes a bit on the last word, and her eyes are overly bright; but she refuses to shed a single tear.

"LiAnn, this has nothing to do with us not caring about you," I need for her to understand that Mac and I aren't playing games here.

Her brow creases a little with her frown. "Victor, did I say that it did?"

She's cool once more; as calm and placid as a sheet of ice, but I can still see the tears shining in her eyes. "You just...you made your choice a long time ago, I think."

One delicate eyebrow arches in puzzlement. "Oh? And just what do you think my choice was?"

"To be independent; not to be tied down to one man," she winces slightly, and I know I've hit the mark with her.

Mac jumps into the fray. "He's right, LiAnn. And you know what? I've made mine too. I want to be tied down--to him." He walks over and kisses me on the shoulder, then grabs his jeans and slips them on before pulling on his shirt.

"Neither one of us was what you needed, LiAnn," I will her to see the truth of that statement, "but that doesn't mean that we don't still love you, just not the way we used to." I won't pull punches with her here. She needs to know exactly where she stands with us.

LiAnn looks at us for a long moment, then shakes her head with a sigh. "I don't know. I just feel alone. Everyone has someone...except for me."

Some of the fear I feel eases with her honesty. "Sweetheart, I don't know what to tell you. I do know we need you to be our friend...and our partner. That hasn't changed. We still need you, LiAnn. It's important that you stay in our lives."

She nods, and then turns to go down the stairs.

Jackie calls after her. "Hey, LiAnn? Wait up..."

Mac calls her back too. "LiAnn? I need you on our side. Okay?" He's appealing to her not as her lover, but as her brother--as Family--and she hesitates on the landing, head down, arms wrapped around herself in her misery as she tries to think of an answer.

Jackie turns back to look at him. "Well of course she's on your side. I mean, like what do you expect? Like you think she's gonna be wearing black or something?" Then the two women go down the stairs together, leaving us to stare at each other in amazement.

I break the silence first. "What the hell was that?"

"I think that was a demonstration of feminist solidarity," Mac quips with a sigh. "It's a jungle out there, Vic."

I sigh as well, and wriggle back into my pants. "Tell me about it."

Mac grins and waggles his eyebrows at me. "Wanna play Tarzan?"

I can't help but chuckle. Looks like we've just weathered our first major crisis as a couple. "As long as I get to wear the loincloth...later. Right now, we really need to get back to work or our asses are both grass."

He frowns at the mention of work. "Damn. I guess you're right. Come on then. You still have to have that dance with me," he holds up my missing sock and hands it to me, along with my boots.

"What!?" I sputter in mock outrage. "I already did dance with you...that's how all this started."

But I'm grinning as I say it, and Mac suddenly grabs me and pulls me into a soul kiss. I melt instantly and go with it, only pulling out when the minor matter of breathing makes me do so. "But I think I could be persuaded," I gasp as my lover carefully zips up my jacket and lovingly caresses it with his fingertips.

"To dance?" he whispers, with a devilish twinkle in his eye.

I love that look, and I feel myself start to stir again. "Yeah, and *so* many other things," I confirm, "*later.* Behave now. Well. Understood?"

He sighs loftily and pouts. "If you weren't such an affront to public decency, I'd be able to keep my hands off you for a few minutes," he accuses, batting his eyes at me.

Oh, this is too much. "Me!? What the hell do you expect, when you show up looking like *that?*" I caress his chest through the silver lame hologram t-shirt he's wearing, which happens to be a size too small. Every last muscle in his torso is clearly defined by the fabric and he knows it. I break away to put my boots back on before we get ourselves in even more trouble.

"I can see every line of your body like that," he shoots back before he lets me go, but nuzzles his way up my neck as I finish pulling on my gear. "And I love leather," he whispers hotly, nipping my ear before leading the way out of the room and down the stairs. I'm floating, and I know that nothing can bring me down tonight.

Until we get down to the bottom of the stairs where Jackie is waiting. "It's about freaking time!" She sounds slightly hysterical. "Where's LiAnn?"

"I don't know; she came down with you," Mac yells over the music. "Why? What happened??"

"We came down, she said she had to use the bathroom and I haven't seen her since! I got worried when she didn't come outshe's not in there!"

I've got a very cold feeling in my gut now. "How long?" I ask, hoping against hope that it's only been a minute or two and that they've just missed each other.

"Ten minutes!"

Oh, god. I suddenly remember why we're here. A dangerous predator; one that has no gender preference when it comes to his victims. "Check the bathrooms again! Mac, check the table; then start asking around, okay??"

They take off in opposite directions as I head for the bar. "Jase? JASON!!!"

"Hey, Vic!" He grins evilly as he takes in my slightly disheveled appearance. "Jesus, man, what are you trying to do; give all the women heart attacks?" his grin fades when he sees my expression. "What's wrong, man?"

I pull a picture of LiAnn, Mac and me out of my wallet and show it to him. "You didn't happen to see where she went, did you?"

He frowns for a minute in concentration. "I think I saw her come out of the bathroom," he says slowly, "but she didn't go back to her table. She could have headed for the back door. Why? She a friend of yours?"

"She's my ex-Mac's too. Are you sure she went out back? It's important."

He looks startled, but wisely keeps his mouth shut about my lovelife. "Hell, no. But it looked like she was headed that way."

"Thanks, man," I jog back to where Mac and Jackie are waiting for me. "Anything?"

They shake their heads no. "Jason says she may have gone out back," I head out and they fall into step with me.

"Jason?" Mac asks quietly. "Friend of yours?"

So he did notice after all. "Yeah. And I'll tell you later, okay? We gotta find LiAnn first."

He nods and falls silent as we get to the back door of the club. I take a deep breath, then push it openonto nothing. The alley is empty and quiet, and that fear I felt when I first saw LiAnn in the doorway is back full force; choking me with it's intensity.

"LIAAANNNNNNNE!!!!!! LIAAANNNNNNNNNNNNNNNE!" I expected nothing, and that's exactly what I got. Shit. No. Please, dear God, no. Don't do this to me. Not now.

"Victor" Mac is pale and shaking as he holds something shiny up for me to see. LiAnn's jade bracelet, the one she's had since the age of twelve--when it was given to her by Mac as a birthday present. The one she never, ever took off. She once told me that it was her luck.

Now, it's an omen, and not a good one. I feel the apprehension rocket up my spine.

Looking at it, I can see the clasp is broken; twisted as if it was stepped on. "Where was it?"

"Hanging from a broken hinge on the dumpster," Jackie is surprisingly quiet, paleand articulate. Her valley girl voice is gone. "And it looks like there might be some blood, too."

I think we are in serious, serious trouble I turn to Mac, and my heart twists at the sight of his ashen face. He is shaking so hard I think he might be going into shock and I automatically step toward him, intent on comforting him.

"No." The nearly silent whisper is deafening in the unnatural calm of the alleyway and I feel my heart stop along with my momentum.

"Don't touch me." No

"I don't want you near me." Please, Macdon't

"It was better when I didn't love anyone because then I couldn't feel like this." Please don'tI love youI need you

"If I hadn't wanted you, LiAnn would still be next to me now." Oh, Jesusplease don't do this

"Don't ever touch me again." Please? I'll do whatever you wantjust don't send me awayI can't live without you, Macyou are my life. I'll die without you.

"I can't do this." Nonononononononono

And then he's gone, turning away from me to go back inside without so much as a glance backward.

Just like that, the perfect happiness of the past few weeks is gone; snuffed out like the flame of a candle. My soul, my life has been ripped from me; and it hurts.

It hurtsithurtsithurtsithurtsithurtsithurtsithurtsithurts

WHACK!!!!! A lightening flash of pain rockets through my cheekbone to stab into my eye and I welcome it. "Victor! Snap out of it! We don't have time for this!"

I know that voice. A vague memory floats across the wreck of my mind as I try to put a name to the face before me. Sweet, round, female, blonde

"Jackie?" God, is that my voice? I sound like I swallowed a rat-tailed rasp. My vocal cords are destroyed, but I don't know why that should be. And why am I kneeling in a dirty alley, dressed like a bad Elvis impersonator?

"Yes. Get up. We gotta get Mac and find LiAnn. We gotta hurry," her eyes are wide in the dim light. She looks scared.

Faces float to the surface of my brain, connected to the names mentioned. Delicate, exotic, AsianLiAnn. Boyish, sweet, sexybeautiful smile, beautiful eyeswhispering 'I love you' with a rapturous gaze; suddenly palethe beautiful eyes dead and cold, the beautiful smile gone forever- -because of me. Because I couldn't control the beast inside me, and lost something precious to both of us on account of it. The emptiness inside me screams.

"Jeez, Vic, don't zone out on me again--there's no way I can pick you up. Come on, cut me a break here," she strokes my cheek gently, looking sad now. Why is she sad? It's not like her to be that way. "Sweetie, you know Mac didn't mean it; he's just upset right now."

Macoh, god; he's all by himself

I focus on the woman beside me. "Go to him. Don't leave him alone," she starts to protest and I cut her off. "Please, Jackie. I need you to go to him now," she's gearing up to protest again. How can I make her understand that I dont matter anymore? As of this moment, I'm a dead man walking; my body just has to catch up with the fact.

But I promise you, my love, I will find her and bring her back to you before I let my body die. I swear it, Mac. I won't let you down again. Never again.

I get up from the hard pavement and head towards the parking lot. "Victor, where are you going? What about Mac?"

I ignore Jackie's questions because I can't answer her.

And I can't answer her because I don't know the answers anymore. To anything.

★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Mac:

I'm happy. That's an understatement. I'm ecstatic. I don't think I've ever felt this way before in my life. Here I am, surrounded by a dark throng of people, all moving to the pounding beat, and my companion is there are simply not words to describe the feelings that I get when I look at Victor tonight.

I lean back against the bar, sipping at my margarita and stretching lazily as I survey the devastating form of Vic Mansfield, my partner - my lover.

The man's glowing. He's wearing supple black leather that clings to his body as though it's been glued on, and I think it's fair to say that I'm entranced. He's gorgeous. A fucking wet dream. Long, long legs, slim hips that flare out into broad shoulders and a deep chest, and a face that's so beautiful I feel as though I should wear sunglasses when I look at him. Victor - my Victor is stunning. He's radiating a wild energy tonight that seems to be infecting everyone around him, drawing them until they end up circling around him like satellites.

I can sit back and enjoy the view, relishing the way Victor looks, because I know that the incredible man in the leather is all mine. At least, it seemed as though he was all mine, until this moment.

He's dancing with Jackie, and although the woman is incredibly irritating, I have to allow that she's also stunningly well built. Healthy is the way Vic usually describes her, shivering with a kind of horrified lust. I have to agree. Her body is perfectly toned, and her clothing is so damned tight that there's no possible way that she can be wearing underwear. We've amused ourselves many times imagining her in catfights with assorted opponents. Jackie nearly always wins.

So, here I am, lounging casually against the bar, watching her perform for Victor, writhing and undulating in her attempt to attract his interest, and presenting a very pleasant spectacle as she does so. Vic, glancing over her head to catch my eye, tips me a wink, grins, and runs his tongue over his lips. All of a sudden, I find breathing almost impossible.

Life was dull. I'd been searching for a long time for something meaningful. I'd groped blindly for something - someone to belong to, and all of a sudden, here it is. It was under my nose all along. Now that Vic and I are lovers it seems impossible to believe that I ever disliked him.

Reaching for my drink again, I study the effects that tight black leather has on Victor's ass, and I can feel myself rise in salute to my sexy lover. Damn! I wish that the two of us could dance together, but we're supposed to be working, and I know all too well what'll happen if I get up close to Vic. No, far better stay here and admire the view.

I've come a long way from my roots. Looking back on my life I'm constantly astonished at how far I've traveled. As a child I was a bit like an unwanted package, trailed around and then left to fend for myself when it no longer suited my father to take care of me. I was fiercely determined after my father had left me that I would never again depend on anyone. I would be entirely self-sufficient forever more. I didn't think that I needed anyone. Fat lot I knew, arrogant little prick that I was!

I hit the streets and learned to survive the hard way. I guess that I became a kind of artful dodger, fast and amoral as a cat. I really didn't care for anyone. I saw them all as marks to be taken and used. Fuck them all. They owed me.

When I lifted the wallet of the head of the Tang family, the two heavies that seized me and dragged me kicking and screeching to face the man I'd robbed had scared me shitless. Still, I can guarantee that more than their fare share of skin was missing by the time I was flung at Mr. Tang's feet. I was a defiant brat, but something in me seemed to appeal to Mr. Tang, because, far from having me killed or sold into slavery, Mr. Tang took me home, showed me kindness, and actually brought a half-wild youngster into his family.

I'd never had a family before. It was wonderful, even though I didn't trust - didn't dare. There I met LiAnn and Michael, and the three of us seemed to become friends, carrying out the most daring robberies before Michael and I grew to adulthood and sex reared its ugly head. It seems inevitable now that we should have fallen out over LiAnn. He wanted her, and I I had her.

I suppose that I did love LiAnn; although I never actually said the words. We'd planned to get away from Michael--to leave the Tangs, and Hong Kong. We wanted to find safety, but everything went wrong. We planned one last job to fund our escape; after that we agreed we would quit, leave everything behind and find happiness together under friendlier skies.

LiAnn escaped, but I was taken to prison when my nine lives suddenly ran out. There I stayed for a year and a half. It gave me ample time to plan for my future. Too bad that none of my plans ever came to fruition. When at last I was sprung from jail by that redheaded Messalina who calls herself the Director, I was transported to Canada to work in a shadowy government agency that had no name.

Imagine my shock when LiAnn was the first face I saw there. She was working for the agency. I saw her in the corridor as he was on my way to my induction. She didn't see me, but I became determined that she was going to be mine again. I did love her, I swear I did.

Why I thought I could just reappear into her life and take up where we left off, I have no idea. When I finally found LiAnn, I also found Victor.

Let me tell you about Victor, my beautiful Vic. He's strong and sturdy, straight as a die, with huge eyes and a short temper, and it's an understatement to say that he resented my attempts to worm my way back into LiAnn's life. He was going to marry LiAnn at that time and somehow he succeeded in pissing me off merely by existing. He hated me. I, of course, pissed him off at every opportunity.

Hey, no excuses. It was fun!

We circled each other warily, each of us bristling with irritation until eventually we learned to trust one another. We must have seemed to outsiders like two dogs, snapping and snarling over territory. It's funny how things work out, because now the circle is complete. Vic's more than just my partner; Vic's a part of me. Vic, of all people, is the one who thawed out my heart and taught me that caring isn't just an option, but a necessity. Vic Mansfield, ex-cop, is the one who finally taught me about love. Vic is the one to whom I finally said 'I love you,' and I'm hopelessly, completely, head-over-heels in love with him.

I like it, sure I do; but it scares me rigid that my happiness should depend on someone else's wellbeing. I need Vic - need him the way that I need oxygen to breathe, and that's a terrifying sensation. See, I swore long ago that I wouldn't ever care about anyone but myself, and now here I am, trapped by love. So far it hasn't been arduous. Vic's very tender towards me. He treats me as though I'm a fragile and precious thing rather than an adult version of the little guttersnipe that robbed and cheated and whored throughout Hong Kong.

I don't want to feel, thank you very much! If it's all the same to you, I don't want to care; and least of all do I want to love this self-sufficient, prickly man, however beautiful he might be. I just want to return to the safety of my flippant insouciance. I want my barriers in place once more. Things are so much easier to bear when you don't give a flying fuck.

LiAnn's sitting across the room from me right now, nursing a cocktail of her own, and frowning abstractedly at nothing in particular. That makes me grin ruefully. She's got a lot to think about. She was so sure that Victor and I would hang on for love of her until she made her decision as to which of us she'd take. She relished our jealous skirmishes. She loved them. She was always subtly stoking the fires of jealousy that festered between us even as she rejected our advances. Well LiAnn, my baby, as the Director tells us, there is always a third door. You'll never guess where I found it. It was the night that Vic and I shared a stakeout and first discovered that we wanted each other. Opening that third door has shown me a vista that I never dreamed about. I wouldn't go back through it again if I could.

Victor possessed me completely. Making love with Vic has taught me that my body needs him. I've never felt anything like the pleasures that Vic gives me, and now I'm an addict, a Victor junkie- -always craving my next fix and never, ever getting enough of him.

It must have been a shock to LiAnn two days ago, when she strolled into my apartment unannounced to find us fucking on the rug in the living room. I was on my back, and Vic was stuck so far into my ass that I could see stars. My legs were scrunched up alongside my ears while Vic pumped into me and talked me up towards orgasm with that honeyed, gritty whisper of his.

Vic groaned and lost it as soon as he saw her. Truth to tell I think it turned him on. He certainly went wild, and it only took a couple of seconds before he was spurting into me with locked muscles and a look of terrified bliss. I came in response to Vic's final lunge, howling because the torrent pouring out through my dick felt so fucking wonderful as it spurted between the two of us. It left me panting, totally unable to do anything except groan. Then Vic's mouth crushed down onto mine, sucking all conscious thought out of my brain and leaving me filled only with thoughts of love and of need for him, my gorgeous lover.

When Vic finally pulled away from me, LiAnn had already left the room and gone. We didn't see her again that day. When we did finally catch up with her she maintained a stony, uncomfortable silence that makes me wonder whether she disapproves of Vic and I on general principals, or whether she's just plain jealous that we've found each other and left her out in the cold. I don't think that she's a homophobe. She never seemed to be until now. Like the Director says, there are many more flavors than just white bread. LiAnn always agrees with her, so what's the problem? I guess that I should have a try at finding out just where her problem with us lies.

Sighing, I knock back the remains of my drink. It's going to be an uncomfortable conversation, and one that I'd avoid if only I could though I know that it's not possible to do that. I stand, flexing my spine, wanting Vic to see me, and feel for me the way that I do for him. I'm taller than he is, and much more slender, without the power of chest and shoulder that he has. He's built like a boxer, while I'm built for speed. I'm a martial artist, while he's a down and dirty street fighter. Both styles work. When we're together they work just fine. I'm dressed 'for tomcatting', as Vic would say, clad in tight, faded old jeans that fit me like a second skin. Portions of them are ripped while parts have merely worn away, but they are so comfortable that I'll never throw them out. They may disintegrate some day soon but 'til then, I love 'em. I'm wearing them with a silver lame T-shirt, and my suede jacket hangs over the back of my chair. I don't look bad, though I'm not in Victor's class. Just looking at him makes my dick stand on end.

Tearing my eyes away from my lover, I make my way across the bar to come to a standstill beside LiAnn.

The wretched woman continues to sip at her drink--ignoring my looming presence at her shoulder-- and I sigh, dropping to my knees to bring myself onto a level with her.

"LiAnn?" I drape an arm over her shoulders in a casually possessive action, and she stiffens. After a minute, I withdraw it, and try again. "LiAnn. Please talk to me."

LiAnn doesn't turn to look at me, merely saying, "Later, please. We're working."

With a sinking heart, I search her beautiful face, looking for any softness, any sign that she might be weakening towards us, but it seems not. Reluctantly, I turn away to go back to the bar, and then pause while I try one last time.

"I need you to be my friend, LiAnn. We both need you." I wait. She doesn't look at me, just toys with the straw of her drink. Then, just as I'm about to give up hope and move away her voice drifts up to me.

"I am your friend. Later, Mac." It's a start, but I'm dispirited.

I head off, aiming for my seat by the bar. My eyes are drawn to Victor all over again, sleek and feral in his skin of leather, and that makes me change my mind. I order us a couple of drinks, and hold his up to him until he makes a beeline for me. He sips, and then flashes me a smile, those white teeth of his gleaming almost blue in the UV lighting of the dancefloor. That's when I kiss him. I have to. He's gotten to me to the degree that all I can think of is his lips on mine. When I cup his face and raise my lips to lay them on his it's all I can do to keep from pressing him up against the bar. His mouth opens wide for me, and he tastes of rum and coke, of salt sweat, and desire.

Still, there are things that we have to talk about, and I don't know how he's going to take them. I eye him speculatively, wanting to lap up the sweat that shines on his forehead, wanting - oh, longing to wrap my arms around him and stop him from ever being with anyone else again.

Forget the world, and just love me, Victor Mansfield.

I know that it isn't possible. He'd kill me or I'd kill him after a week or two if we only had each other's company. We irritate the heck out of each other, but he's mine, dammit. He's mine and nobody gets to touch him. Nobody else gets that smile. Only me.

"Vic."

I know that he's not really paying attention to me. He's watching that cow, Jackie.

"Yeah, baby?"

"I wish you'd do something about LiAnn. She's so... closed off." I'm trying to bring him around to notice me, make him see me, not her. I know, I'm shallow and manipulative, but I can't stand that he's looking at her.

He swings to meet my eyes, looking a little confused, as well he might.

"What can I do? You're the one that said to let it go until later." Shoot! So I was. Well, damn. Things change. When I said that, I didn't think that you'd be drooling over 'little miss valley girl' did I? What the fuck is wrong with me?

"I don't know," I say, wanting him to put his arms around me and tell me it's time to go home and make love instead of just standing there radiating glamour in waves until everyone in this place wants a piece of him.

I can't say that though, can I? That sounds so needy. I don't want to make him claustrophobic. He needs his space or I'll lose him. It makes the tone of my voice harsher than I want it to sound. "Did you talk to her?" I catch something in his gaze. "You did, didn't you?"

He looks sheepish. I think he believes that I'm mad at him.

"A little, maybe." He responds, smiling a small, placatory smile that makes me itch to crush him to me. I don't act on it, but my hands reach to stroke him, to touch the softness of his leather, and I feel the skin stretched taut over his thigh with a gasp of delight that I can hardly disguise.

"What did you say to her? She won't even look at me." Might as well heap on the guilt.

"Not much. I did ask her how she felt about us." That makes me wince. Poor Vic! He's getting it from both of us now. I don't want to rub salt in his wounds, but I don't want him feeling too good, know what I mean?

"Jesus, baby! Whaddya mean, not much? What did she say?" I want to know. He's a braver man than I am. He always has been. LiAnn can be a real bitch when she's not happy. One thing I'm certain enough to bet the farm on is that LiAnn is not a happy camper today.

"She didn't say anything." His beautiful eyes are flat, all the light that normally dances within lies somewhere behind them in a place that I can't see. "Just said that we were entitled to live our own lives, and went blank again."

"So why the hell won't she look at me?" I sound needy, desperate even. I don't want to heap the guilt onto him any more. I just want it all to end. I want us all to be happy. Okay, I might as well believe in fairies, in gold at the end of the rainbow, and the Wizard of Oz, but tell me this, why shouldn't we have happy ever after? What chance did we have before now? Don't we deserve a break? My life has been no bed of roses until now, and I know that he has been through hell.

Victor sighs heavily, and I feel like such a heel.

"I don't know, baby. She won't look at me either." He hangs his head, and I kick myself for successfully bringing him down when he was having such a good time. Then, he surprises me when he observes, "I think she thought we were supposed to wait forever for her or something." He's right, so rightbut I never thought that I'd hear him say it. I'm looking at him as though I want to devour him whole. I should have known that he'd see through her. He's good at cutting through the bullshit. "She was a lot like this when we were first partnered, before you came into the picture, " he adds, and I understand his insight. I nod, and smile at him, tracing his jaw with my finger.

"Well, we have to do something. We can't let this go on." How can I make him feel better? My practical Victor will respond to a call to arms. I know it.

He doesn't let me down. He lifts his head and his eyes meet mine. The lights aren't exactly dancing, but they are back again. He doesn't have that terrible flatness to his expression any more. "Tell me what and I'll do it," he whispers, promising me everything that he has yet again. "But, baby, I don't think it's anything we can fix."

"Don't you care?" The stupid words are out of my mouth before I can call them back. When I see his head droop again, I wish them unsaid with all of my heart. "It's not just your life that's going out the window here. How can we trust her, depend on her in a tight corner, if she hates us?"

"Of course I care, Mac." He sounds defeated. Way to go, Ramsey. For my next trick why don't I just set fire to him, or punch him in the face? I might as well. " She's my partner too, but how can I do anything if she won't talk to either of us?" I hear what he's telling me. It's my battle as well as his. I know it, Vic. I really do.

"We have to do something. We can't just leave it." He's pleading now, even though we both know it's useless. "Make her see," He lifts his head again at my words, and this time that chin of his goes up. I know that gesture. I love it. He's digging in his heels, refusing to rise to my baiting of him. "I guess I'll talk to her." But I know he's thinking of solutions. He's sexy when he's thinking. There's a little crease that runs across the top of his nose that deepens, and his lips purse.

"Don't get your hopes up, baby," he murmurs mildly in that sexy, sand and gasoline voice that brings me out in goosebumps. "She was pretty abrupt with me earlier." Did I tell you about his voice? It's a sandblasted growl that strokes over skin as though it were fur, and makes me shiver when he uses it to describe to me the things that he's going to do to make me come.

"You don't think that she'll listen to me?" I grew up with her. There must be something that I can say, or that I can do to make her unbend and go back to the way we were. I just don't have a clue what that might be. I take refuge in arrogance, knowing that he can see clear through me.

"I think she's hurting and I can understand that; but it's keeping her closed off right now." Did I ever tell you how kind my lover is? He's got every right to be pissed at LiAnn - at me too, actually, but he's showing us both understanding even though we don't deserve it. I feel a surge of love for him that threatens to make me burst if I can't touch him, hold him or something.

"I guess so." Enough already! If I can't take him to bed and make love to him, then there must be a way I can hold him without making too many waves. A lightbulb blazes brightly above my head. I feel it as it manifests. "God, Vic, I wish we could dance together. You look so... hot."

"Yeah?" The bastard runs his hands suggestively over tightly leather-clad thighs and just about blows all my circuits. If I can't get my hands on him in the next five minutes, I'm going to explode. "Well," he continues. "It's not as if anybody's gonna care, Mac. Take a look around. It's a pretty open club." True, there are guys dancing together, and in one corner, I can see a couple of women locked together in an embrace that is what I'd call decisive. I move in, pressing myself the length of his fine, hard body, and groan.

"Oh, baby." My hands stroke the leather. It feels buttery and warm to my touch, and I press in even closer, rubbing myself against him. I know that he can feel my dick hard against his thigh. I just can't think of anything but him. I want to touch him. I put on my best, wounded puppy-dog expression. "Think that we could dance once?"

I hear his sharp intake of breath as I wriggle my hips, and manage to apply a little pressure to his basket. "Baby..."

"What?" I try to sound distracted. If he doesn't know that it's premeditated, he won't get mad at me, will he? Looking at him proves to be a mistake. He knows damned fine what I'm doing, and he's grinning. He fights fire with fire, pulling me in to kiss me, nipping my lips as he samples my mouth.

"One dance, Mac." My heart thumps. "We're supposed to be working." Yes Dad! You have to make sure that us young, flighty types know our place, I know that but we're gonna have that dance, so see if I care!

I lean in to him and nuzzle into his neck, grinning foolishly. I poke out my tongue to taste his sweat-slick chin as my hands stroke him through his skin of leather. I whisper in his ear the thing that's been burning me all night, hoping and praying that he doesn't think that I'm an idiot. "I need them to know that you're mine. They keep on touching you. I don't like it."

He looks so surprised. "Baby, I'm going home with you, and they all know it." He's smiling, but not laughing. He looks as though I've paid him a compliment, not revealed myself as a pathetic, obsessed stalker. Then he grins impishly. "Did you see the looks you got when you walked in?"

"They may know it, but I want them to really feel it." I'm trying to diffuse the impact of what I've said, just in case, but then what he just said sinks into my thick head. I shake my head and frown. "Me? No. What looks would those be?" I mean, I know that I don't look bad, but really! Line the two of us up and get the women to file past. I guarantee that they'll all go for Victor, just from the way he's radiating heat. One look at him and you just know that he'll treat you right.

"All the women creamed their jeans when you came through that door, baby; and probably most of the men." He's nibbling my ear as that soulful whisper stabs straight through to my gonads. He should use this technique on criminals to get them to confess. God knows that I would tell him anything just to get him to keep on doing what he's doing. "You look so damn fine tonight, lover." His hands have been cupping my butt, and somehow his fingers find their way though the tear in one leg, and begin stroking my thigh, and then delving between my ass cheeks to feel for my soft center. When the gentle probing slips between the cheeks of my ass, I think that I'm going to die. Oh, baby!

"Except for LiAnn and Jackie, huh?" I gasp, as I feel thrills from the pressure of his fingers. "You've got me confused with you, Vic. You're the one who's turning heads." He's planting kisses along my jaw line, down my neck. I'm hard as rock and so close to coming I'm in a daze. He turns me to lean up against the bar so that his wandering hand isn't blindingly obvious, and all of a sudden I realize that I'm gonna make a mess of these jeans if this carries on any longer.

"Maybe even them. Jackie's coveting your ass, you know." He's giving me hickeys, the bastard. He's making me into some demented art form. Mac Ramsey as a blank canvas on which he's painting blood red roses. He knows that I prefer white. Strike that. I want whatever it is that he chooses to give me. What I want right now, more than anything, is to lie right down here on the floor and spread myself open for him, or maybe to turn and bend myself over the barstool while he fucks me.

"Victor, I" How can I say this?

"What, baby?" He's not paying attention. I grab hold of his arms, stopping him short. He groans and lifts up his face, and I claim his lips. I get the shivers as our tongues collide, and the softness of his mouth, the sensations that run through me as I explore it, all make me crazy with lust. He bares his throat as I slide my own mouth over his skin, nipping at his Adam's apple. I'm holding him to me, squeezing the breath from him, and I'm shakingshaking.

"I'm scared all the time." There! I said it, and now he's going to think that I'm some kind of a weakling. "I don't know how to do this, baby." God! I sound like such a wimp.

"Of what baby?" He's confused, as well he might be. I'm a little bit perplexed myself. "You don't know how to do what?"

"How to keep you." I'm mumbling, miserably aware of what a fool I'm making of myself.

He pulls back to look me in the eyes. He's smiling, and the lights are back dancing in his eyes again, for me - for me! His smile is sweeter than anything I ever saw, and he reaches up to cup my face in his hands, gentle even though I'm hurting him with my grip on the flesh of his arms because somehow I can't quite seem to be able to let him go.

"Baby, you've got me for the rest of my life," he husks at me. "I told you there was no one else for me ever again... How can I make you believe? What can I do to show you what you mean to me?"

"I don't know." I hang my head, and I can feel the heat that means I'm blushing. The sheer humiliation of the conversation makes me want to hide myself somewhere where he can't see me: can't laugh at me. "It's just how I feel."

"Oh, baby." He says it like it's a good thing. Like he doesn't want to run a mile from me, as needy and insecure as I am. He hugs me tightly. "I love you. You know that, right?"

"I want to lose myself in you. I don't want to feel afraid all the time." I sound so stupid to myself. He's hanging in there, and he hasn't laughed at me yet. I love him for that as well.

"I don't know what to tell you," He whispers. "I'm not good with words. All I know how to do is love you."

"Just dance with me, Vic. I need to feel you close to me." I'm holding him against me, and we're on the edge of the dance floor. We can do this and maybe I'll feel better. Maybe I'll get over my jitters. I don't know why I can't just accept that he loves me and move on. Am I stupid?

"Okay," he growls, sultry and sensual. "Anything you want, baby." He nudges his hard-on against me suggestively, and my own leaps in answer. Fuck! He grins, a face so damned sexy that I can't breathe. I gaze at him appreciatively, and then out of the corner of my eye, I see Jackie doing the same. Let her look, but she'd better keep her hands off him.

"Just so you knowit wasn't MY ass that Jackie was cootching up to a few minutes ago," I say, tartly. I'm jealous. So bite me. He's mine.

Victor leads me onto the dancefloor, and turns his head to laugh as he hears me griping. "Yeah, well, I'd rather it had been you. She's...nice, but not exactly what I'm looking for, you know?" He looks me up and down lewdly, and his hands move to insert themselves into that tear in my jeans again. I shiver, but we're talking, and while the mood lasts I have to know it all.

"What about LiAnn? She was, wasn't she?" I see him wince. "She was exactly what you were looking for."

"Yeah, at the time," he says, and his eyes are boring into mine. Those little lights inside them are flinty at the moment. "And then the times changed."

"Are you sure?" Of course he's sure, idiot! Way to make him run a mile. I shake my head at myself. God, I'm pathetic. "Jeez. I just don't know. I feel so fucking out of control all the time."

Victor doesn't run screaming from me, he pulls me closer, and his face is as open and honest as I've ever seen it. He takes my face in his hands again, willing me to listen to him, as if I could do anything else when he's possessed my soul so completely.

"Mac, you know I'm bi, I've never made a secret of that. I like women all right...but I *love* you. I've spent my whole life waiting for you. That's why it never worked before." He's willing me to believe him, and I do.

I close my eyes, sighing as my heart pounds. I melt against him as we sway to the music. It's a driving technobeat, the kind that I get off on, but we're not dancing hard, somehow we're existing within this little bubble that encloses us, and the music doesn't make us crazy at all. The steady pulse of Vic's life thumps under my hands and that's the music I hear. That's the beat that drives me. That's the beat that drives both of us. It's the only thing that's real in this whole world and nothing else matters. I move my lips to his ear, and feel a frisson run through him.

"Is it working now?"

He laughs. "Oh, hell yeah. It's working just fine."

I catch Jackie's eye again, and she's sniggering about something. It's too much. "Look at us. I'm a wreck, and everyone laughs at us. Our partner doesn't even want to look at us, and I don't know what to do."

"Who's laughing at us?" he mumbles, and I wonder if he really doesn't know.

"Jackie and the Director... Fucking Dobrinsky. I'd like to rip his head off and feed it to him." I hear Vic chuckle, and wonder if he's taking me seriously. He's looking over at Jackie. Then he grips me tight, making a big play out of squeezing my ass as we sway together.

"In case you haven't noticed, that's not laughter...that's lust... I've wanted to kill her for the way she's been eyeing you, but I really can't fault her taste." He dusts my chin with kisses, and I protest the words, whilst accepting the caresses.

"Oh, come on. Even I know that it was you she was wriggling her assets at." He snickers, a little hiccup of laughter that catches at my balls as it flickers over my flesh.

"Yeah," he rejoins. "But she likes to see you get mad. She's coveting your ass, baby. You know it." He grins, inviting me to share the joke, and he's so goddamned beautiful I can't stay irritated. "As for the Dragon, I have it on very good authority that she did keep that tape."

He means the one that showed us at Vic's ill-fated dinner party. That would be a damned fine tape. I'd love to have a copy of it myself, and one of these days I'll ask the Director for one. That was really the first time that Vic and I made love to each other, and his furniture didn't survive it. I wonder who would have told him this little piece of information about her viewing habits. Not the Director, that's for damned sure. I'm wondering how I can get the information out of Victor, but he carries on and the moment passes. His voice takes on the characteristic dislike that mention of Mr. Dobrinsky always earns from him --not just from him either. "And Dobie? Fuck him if he can't take a joke. He just wishes he could have someone as hot as you."

I stand stock still in the middle of the dance floor, pulling him with me. I start to speak twice, but my tongue is thick in my mouth. The passion is sending prickles of lust through me. I gaze into those eyes of his, and try again.

"Fuck him? Oh, Vic, baby, I'd so much rather fuck you." Sliding my arms around him, I lower my mouth to his, slowly, savoring the show as his pupils dilate, and his lips part ready to let me in. By the time I actually kiss him, I'm moaning. Kissing Vic is likely to shorten my life by ten years. I can feel him straining against me, sending splinters of delight through my cock. My knees are wobbly, and someone removed my belly with an ice-cream scoop, then filled the space with small fluttery things. When finally I let go his mouth, I don't pull back, I stay, lips resting against his, forehead leaning on his, waiting for my breath to steady itself.

"God, I need you. How come I need you so much?" I whisper against his mouth.

Victor's panting too, and he's smiling against my lips as he considers his answer.

"I don't know, but it's probably the same reason I need you." I feel a tremor run through his body, and he turns his head a little to lay his cheek against my lips. "God, baby." He shakes his head.

"I want you." He laughs. I think he believes I mean that I want him in general, but I don't. I want - no, make that need - him now. "I really, really want you," I say again, and slide down to my knees, circle those slim hips of his, and lay my cheek against the leather that covers his cock. It gets to him. Victor throws his head back and moans, loudly enough that people start taking an interest in us and move to circle us. Do I care? Not so that you would notice! I look up at him, plaintively. "Please, Vic. Give it to me."

"Baby, we gotta work. We can't." He's still being sensible, damn it. I can smell the waves of lust coming off him. I can practically taste the flavor of his cock on my tongue. He can't refuse me. I lick the leather that stretches tight across his balls and get a whimper in response. "Oh, baby..."

My arms are circling his hips, and I've got my face buried in his groin. Nuzzling into him, I trace the outline of his dick rising up behind the zipper. One way or another, you're coming with me tonight, Victor Mansfield. I know exactly where to press to get you off. I smile, then pout outrageously, knowing that I'm acting like a queen, and not caring if it gets me Vic as my concubine for the evening. "I want you. I really, really need you, baby." I nuzzle him again.

Victor's eyes are dark, and he's bucking a little. Oops! Better back off a bit or it will be too late. Don't want that. He starts babbling, and I know that I have him. "Baby, please...gotta behave...gotta stop...gonna make me come...make me come...can't...please."

I stand up, moving back a little, pumping my own hips to the beat, and putting on a show for him. An idea strikes me. I take Vic's hand and bring it to press up against my own swollen dick. "Feel that?" I murmur.

"Yes." Like the whole of fucking North America can't feel it. With this mighty weapon I will win the pole vault for Canada in the Olympics. Just watch me. "Oh, shit," he says, rubbing it lovingly. Strike the Olympics. I won't have it for long enough to compete. "I want it, Mac. Want it now."

I have him. He's mine. This is a good thing. Now to make it happen. I pull in close again, my forehead against his, our eyes striking sparks each with the other.

"I need you now. Not later. Not tomorrow. I need you, Vic."

Vic groans. He's looking for a way out, but there's no chance. I can scent it on him, he's going to give in.

"Jesus, baby, how can you do this to me? I can't think; I can't see. It's so hot in here, and you smell so fucking good." It's your own fault, my lover. You shouldn't be so fucking gorgeous. How can I help myself when you will insist on looking and being such a blinding flash that you burn my eyes? You make me do it.

"Where can we go, Vic. There must be somewhere?" I'm gonna get laid. Here, or elsewhere. It doesnt matter as long as it's soon. I almost miss what he says, but then he ups the ante.

"I want you inside me and we can't" Oh, fuck! He wants me to screw him. I don't know. My knees are doing their uncertain, loose-jointed thing again. Vic's all glowing, shiny with desire. He's like a plump nectarine, sun-warmed and rosy, waiting for me to pick it. It will be firm and smooth, and when I bite into it the juice will run down my chin

"Me? You mean...?" He wants me to fuck him, and I don't know how to do that. I never have, not with a man, and I'll hurt him, or disgrace myself by shooting too soon, or he just won't enjoy it, and then he'll leave me. I gulp. "Oh, boy."

"There's rooms upstairs," he whispers into my ear, and the sound of his voice is so sexy that I almost come at the thought. He sees the effect that he's having on me too. He gives me an amused look, and adds, "Party rooms - if you promise you'll take me tonight, right now."

"Oh." I must sound so insecure and pathetic. My voice is a mere squeak. "You want me to fuck you?"

"Oh, yeah, baby." He sounds so certain, and I know that it's going to be such a fucking mess. "I want to feel you inside me. I want to know what it's like to be totally yours."

"How long?" He's running his tongue around my ear, and it's hard to concentrate on anything except the ache between my legs. He's such a bastard. He'll push me, and drive me crazy until I can't stand it any more. I know that I'll try to give him what he wants, but why he has to have this I don't know. The other is so fucking good. "I mean how can we? Can you set it up?"

Victor's seducing me with words, growling softly in my ear and raising the hairs on my neck with his sweet breath, and I'm a basket case. I'm wondering if we're gonna be able to get a room, or if I'll have to drag him outside into the back of his truck again when he smiles. "Yeah," he says sunnily. "Jason will do it for me if I ask. All you have to do is say the word."

There should be alarm bells going off in all directions. I mean, who the hell is Jason? But I'm trembling now, and all I can think of is Vic in my arms, moaning for me as I drive him crazy. I lean down to breathe assent into his ear. "Oh, fuck, yeah. Just...hurry."

I see him make some kind of signal to the bartender, getting a nod back like this is a set up of some kind. What the hell have I stepped into here?

"Done, and done, lover," says my gorgeous, sinful darling. The bartender incidentally is a babe himself. He's got the sweetest baby-face I've ever seen, and he makes a face at me over Vic's head, lascivious as all get out. He runs his tongue around his lips, and then thrusts it in and out of his mouth obscenely as Vic turns away. I lift my middle finger and flip him the bird as he snickers. I'll get him later. Vic's voice trails back to me. "Let's go."

A thought occurs to me. Shit! LiAnn and Jackie! "Do we... do we need to tell them that we'll be coming back?" What am I saying? Of course we do. They'll have a cow if they think we bailed on them for good. I'll amend that. They'll have a cow if they think that we've slipped away for a quick fuck as well. No scenario I can picture involves them smiling happily as Victor and I disappear for anything other than business.

Victor considers. "I don't know. Do you think we should?"

"They might get mad." On the other hand, they're certain to get mad if we tell them that we're just nipping off to get laid. What to do? What to do?

Victor settles it for me. "Make it quick...and make the story good, Mac." Yes, B'wana! "I don't want the Director on our asses any more than necessary." Like I do? Come on! Still, I do know what he means. That woman scares me to death.

"God, no!" I head over to where the two of them are sitting, and tell them that we're just going out for a minute or two.

"We have a couple of points that we need to tidy up. We'll be back in ten, okay?" LiAnn nods, absently, and Jackie gives me her widest grin.

"Okay, Mac. Like, take your time. Those points can sometimes take a whole lot of polishing to get the shine on them. This place is like so totally jumping. We're having so much fun." She's just like Garfield's doggy companion, Odie, I swear to God.

I return to Vic who's waiting for me with a really predatory expression on his face. I feel my arousal hike a couple of notches when I look at the way he's eating me up with those eyes of his - half lidded and considering, lights dancing mischief in the gleam of them. He's so hot he's incandescent.

"Quick enough for you?" I grab hold of his hand and together we make for the back. "Where do we go, babe?"

"There's a set of stairs on the left." He points them out and I'm away, heading for them with the single-mindedness of purpose that I consider to be one of my better traits. LiAnn would tell you that I'm a stubborn bastard, but I say that I'm focused.

Somehow Vic overtakes me, and I get the best view of his fine, leather clad ass as I follow him up the stairs. I can't keep my hands off him, and I reach up with a groan to stroke the moving muscles in their coating of black as he ascends the staircase. My dick is aching now and all I can think of is Victor.

The room at the end of the hallway is larger and nicer than I had thought, but there are some worrying things lying around - things that I really don't like the look of at all. I'll beat anyone in a fair fight, but why would I want to tie someone down and whip him, especially someone like my Victor? I don't want to think about that.

He turns to wait for me and I walk straight into his arms, my mouth seeking his in something that feels pleasantly like desperation, and then as his tongue slides into my mouth, disconcertingly like the destruction of Mount St. Helens. I'm all over him. My hands slide the length of his torso as I suck on his tongue, and then draw back to whisper into his mouth.

"Nobody else has ever done this to me, Vic, made me feel this way. I can take them or leave them. But you...Oh, God."

The music is muted here, but it's still that insistent, driving beat that I love. It pounds through the soles of my feet, and up my legs to make me jerk. Then his voice in my ears drives me crazy as he whispers, "What, baby? What do I do to you?"

"God. Come here, and I'll show you." There's a bed. I move over to stand beside it and wait for him. He steps up beside me, his arms spread wide, granting me access to all of him.

"All yours," he tells me with a gleam in his eye. I look him up and down, practically drooling, and begin to unwrap my gift, dragging down on the zipper of his jacket to expose his deep chest, smooth-shiny and silken to my hand. I leave the jacket and drop onto my knees again. I seem to spend a lot of time kneeling to worship Victor. This time, I attack the fastenings and zipper of the tight leather pants. My hands slip as I try to push them down and off his hips, and he takes pity on me, slipping his thumbs into the waistband to shove them down with a sinuous wriggle that makes me gasp. I pull him to me, searching with my mouth. He's got soft cotton boxer briefs on, and I taste him through the delicate fabric, damp cockhead oozing fluid for me, because he wants me.

He wants me! I hear his whimpered 'baby' as I lick and suck at him through the material and merely grunt at him as I torment him with my mouth.

"I want your mouth," he tells me. "You're so good. Need to feel your mouth on me." That makes me crack out laughing.

"Like you could escape it!" I pull down the front of his undies, allowing Vic's cock to spring free. Then, I capture it with one hand and looks up at Vic for just a second, making a great show out of licking my lips. I think he's going to scream in frustration, and I can't have that. People would think I was using those whips and things. I suck him right in, deep and hard, the way he likes it. He's nectar on my tongue, the taste of him as sweet and firm and juicy as that nectarine, but mine, and living, and loving me.

"Ahhh!" Hey, he likes it. What can I say? "Like I really want to! Jesus, baby...oh, yeah...suck me." He's losing it, becoming incoherent as he starts to feel me really go to work on him. Soon even those little disjointed cries are too much for him and all I hear are groans as he tries to keep himself together while I suck, and lick, and worship.

My hands are scrabbling to push the leather pants down to his knees, and when I finally get them there, I feel for the little starfish crinkle of his ass, gently stroking it, and then pressing my finger home inside him. He cries out, and I'm suddenly scared. I pull away.

"Oh, God, Vic, did I hurt you?" He's panting, his eyes are glazed over, the little lights in his eyes diffuse and hazy.

"What?" He tries to collect himself. "Oh, Jesus, no, baby. I'm on fire."

"I want you to see only me. Can't stand it when you see those other women." I'm leaning into him, still kneeling, and I watch as his brow furrows in his effort to work out what I'm talking about. Well, I never said that I was logical, did I?

"What other women?" His voice sounds hoarse. He's rolling his head from side to side. "You're all I've been able to see since the night you first kissed me."

"Jackie." I say tersely, sucking the head of his cock in the kind of way that I figure will have him trembling on the brink, but not quite able to come. "She doesn't get you. You're mine. Only mine."

"Yes." He's frightfully quick to agree. Anyone would think he was in a hurry or something. I wait, grinning around the delicious brown-pink of his cocksicle. "Only yours," he gasps. "And you are only mine. Touch me again baby. Light me up."

I'm watching him, my heart fluttering as though it's a bird trapped inside me. I know what he wants, and I have to try. This is another first, and I wouldn't have believed I'd ever do it, but right now, I want to. I need to, for him. "Turn around, Vic."

"Okay." He turns at my bidding, unsure where I'm coming from, and then he tenses and whimpers as I gently bite an asscheek. He's still not sure what I'm doing, but then I spread his cheeks apart and I think that he gets the picture.

"Mac, what are you...?" Just wait a minute, baby. I'll have you incoherent. I breathe on his asshole, and then lean to lick, delicately, sampling the taste of him. He's delectable, like that nectarine, making me want to lick and suck, and bite. "Oh, baby." He gives a shuddering groan. "You don't...you don't have to... Oh, fuck...you don't have to do this."

Of course I don't, but I want to. I don't answer. I'm groaning myself now, and I push in with my tongue to taste him, stabbing it into him over and over. I'm shivering with lust at the sound of his sharp, high-pitched gasp. He cries out "Oh my God." And then pitches forward to brace himself against the wall. I can feel the trembling n his legs. "Jesus, Mac...so fucking good."

Funny, I would have wrinkled my nose up at the idea of this, but it's really turning me on to listen to him moan, and feel how worked up he is. Little gasps and whimpers of my own rise up and I sense him move to stroke his cock. No, dammit! That's mine too. I knock his hand away and take hold of it myself, stroking it gently. I know that I'm driving him crazy, and I just want to drag it out until he begs.

He's trapped between my hand and my mouth, panting hard as he tells me how amazing I am. I can never hear enough of that. When I finally lean back to draw breath, I'm panting too.

"I need" I don't know what I'm trying to say. "I really need you."

Fortunately, he does. "Yeah." He undresses quickly and then turns around and starts to take off my clothes. I'm wild eyed, gasping for breath. I'm hanging by a thread as Vic tentatively leans in to kiss me. Maybe he thinks that I'm gonna be disgusted or something. I'm totally gone. Nothing that happens is going to disgust me. Men are pigs. Just ask LiAnn. At this moment I can only think of one thing, and it isn't gonna be gentle. I grab Vic most ungently, and crush his tender mouth under my own, feeling almost vicious in my need to own him.

"Need you, Vic. Need you now."

Victor kisses me back fiercely, hungry for the rough contact. He's doing things to my nipples that's sending fire down into my groin, and he's smiling again.

"What do I always tell you, baby? "

"I don't..." I gasp. "Dunno..."

He grabs my hair and forces me to look at him. "Take what's yours." I'm numb again as I have second thoughts. I'm gonna fuck it up, and he'll hate me. "Take me," he says again, and his voice is soft sparkles of lust as he pleads.

Fuck! How can I? "You mean?" I'm scared. "You want me to?"

He sinks down to his knees, presenting himself to me. "Yeah," he growls. Then he turns around and starts to undress me.

"Oh, God, Vic." He's getting his own back. He's tormenting me as he gets the rest of my clothes off. I shake my head, trying to clear it, get some sense back. That's no easy task while he's playing with my cock after stripping off the tacky old jeans I've been wearing.

"I want this, Mac. I want you so deep inside me it's gonna take a fucking crowbar to get us apart again. I want to limp and eat standing up for a week because of you; but most of all I want you to know how it feels when you first realize that I'm carrying a piece of you around inside me. There's nothing else like it in the world, baby, nothing." His words fire neurons inside me and I'm there, right on the edge. He can always talk me up with that voice of his, but tonight is something else completely.

I'm almost there. Don't think that I have any reserves at all. I gently disengage Vic's hands from my cock.

"Please, Mac? Please? I need you so bad." How could I say no? He's all I've ever wanted, but still I'm afraid.

"I don't want to hurt you." I'm spitting on my hand as I speak; intent on trying to moisten the way so that I don't tear him or something.

"You can't," he says. Rash baby! Of course I could. That's one of the things that scares me. There's one that scares me more though

"What if..." My voice cracks. I try again. "What if I can't..."

"What, baby?" Go on. Make me say it. Bastard! I move behind Vic to kneel next to him, and then I just blurt it out, the thing that worries me most.

"What if I come. I'm gonna come, I know it." I'm willing him not to laugh at me. If he laughs, I'll just die. I know it.

Vic shudders as he feels me groping his ass, trying to find his entrance, and failing miserably because my hands are shaking so hard. "It's okay, baby, but you won't." Then he gives me a speculative look from beneath those lashes of his. I hold my breath, wondering what's coming next. "If you'd rather have help," he says, a little tentatively, and I wonder what he means.

I'm shivering again as I try to find the spot with my cock instead of my hands. "Help?" I ask.

He seems a little hesitant, but suddenly makes his suggestion. "If you put on a cock-ring, you won't come until you take it off. Then you don't have to worry." He says it fast, as though it embarrasses him. I think for a minute. Do you suppose?

"You... you have one?" I ask, and he nods, solemnly. "Do it, baby. Please."

"Baby? Are you sure?" I nod, trying to get the voice to start again. Funny how it fades out when I need it most. I clear my throat.

"Please." It's a little hoarse, but it's intelligible, thank goodness. "I want to make it good for you. Hurry." I watch him reach for his jacket, and I'm fascinated. He brought this with him. He must have known. He must be psychic. Or maybe he never leaves home without it. Either way, I'm impressed.

"It will be good, no matter what," he says as he pulls it out of his pocket and holds it up for me to look at. It doesn't look much. It could be a hair tie. Maybe it is a hair tie. I look at Vic's short, well-behaved do, and shake my head. Oh, well. He carries a cockring in his pocket. What of it?

Still, I'm a little dubious. Is this thing gonna cut off my circulation? What happens I can't get it off again?

"Shit!" I say, looking at it. "Will that make my balls drop off?"

That makes him chuckle, but how the hell would I know? I never worked for Vice, did I? He ruffles my hair and shows me again. "No, baby. It'll just keep you together for a while. Watch. It's a simple strap. You put it on like this, and then, when you're ready, all you have to do is unsnap it, like this." His hands are suiting the action to the word, and he puts it onto himself, and then removes it just as I'm tempted to go down on him. His cock looked really fine all scrunched up like that, waiting for me. "Okay?" He tenders it to me.

"Y-yeah. I got it." I take the thing between finger and thumb and kneel there, looking helpless. He moves behind me and nuzzles into my neck, kissing me a little as he puts me out of my misery.

"You want some help with this, Malcolm?" He helps me get it onto my dick, and then lubes me up. It feels so shivery wonderful I almost die.

"Oh, love, please." I'm ready. I'm more than ready. I could drill holes in the wall if I tried. "Come here, lover. I need you bad." I nearly die when he comes and kneels in front of me with his head bowed and his ass in the air. He's submitting to me. Oh, baby! I position myself. I'm running on instinct here. If I think too much I'll blow it. I don't want to blow it. I pull him back against me, hot flesh to hot flesh, and hear him gasp.

"Oh, that's good, baby," he whispers at me as I find the place and press my cock into him. He's so open. I slide into him, deeper than I intended as he pushes back against me. It makes me scream. Suddenly I find myself buried inside him, up to the hilt. It's like oiled velvet that pulses against my dick, flickering rivulets of sensation licking at me as I try to hold it all in. I don't know if this cockring will work. I take deep breaths and try to get myself together, pressing on Victor's shoulder to make him stay still.

"My God, Vic, you're so hot." I'm holding onto him so tightly that I think he may get bruises, but I can't stop. I can't let go and relax. I'm pushing in, in trying to get deeper. "I want... I want to climb inside you for the rest of my life."

Victor moans loudly, pushing back hard against me, and suddenly I can do this. I have to do it. I can't stop. I hear his voice, rusted and soulful, crying my name, "Mac...Mac..."

"Fuck, Victor... I love you so much. So goddam much."

"Love...love you...too...want to be yours...rest of my life... take me, baby...please," and when I hear that, I have to fuck him. I can't stay still. I have to move, pull myself out and thrust home, and again, and again, feeling the build up of tension. "Fuck me," he moans, and I do. I fuck him until his teeth rattle. He's heat, and love, and sweet, silken pleasure running along my spine, bursting through my cock and making my head swim.

He's moaning now, half in pleasure and half in pain. "Yes...yes... deeper, harder...I need it... need you." His cries blow me away. I grip him tightly, one arm around his chest, and reach down to fist his cock as I fuck him. I'm pulling it, stroking it harder and harder. "Faster...don't stop."

I'm hurting him, I must be, but I can't stop.

"Come on, Vic, give it to me. I need it." I yank on his cock, stroking it savagely. I hear him cry out, and know that it's coming. He's strung tight as a bow, and his face, oh, God, his face! I love him. I have to tell him how much I love him.

"Come for me, Vic. I love you." There are trickles of moisture running from the corners of his eyes. I lick tentatively, and know that they are tears. I'm hurting him. I must be hurting him. I kiss him, mashing my mouth against his and then feel the pulse and know that he's coming, right now, for me.

Victor suddenly yells, "Mac, take it off...take it off now!" and for a second I'm not sure what he means., then it filters through my sluggish, lust-dazed brain exactly what Vic is talking about. I reach down between us to fumble with the cockring, slipping it free and almost instantly feel the tide rushing up into my balls, along my thighs, prickling, tingling through my cock. His own is erupting, spurt after spurt of slick, viscous white that coats my hand and sprays the floor alongside the bed. He screams. I echo it with a scream of my own.

All I can do is say Vic's name over and over, delicious agony as I let go and pour myself into him at last, feeling the sucking heat of him as he takes all I have to give him. Slowly we subside, slipping down to the floor to lie, still joined, and him still inside the circle of my arms, there to lie gasping out nonsense as we recover.

I hear him then. He's sobbing, and I want to die. I've hurt him. What if it's a permanent injury? I love him so much I can't bear for him to be in pain. I stroke his side in an attempt to calm him, soothe him, but he continues, great, wracking sobs that don't seem to lessen as I murmur his name repeatedly.

At last I find words to say. "Don't... Don't cry, lover. What? Did I hurt you?"

Victor smiles shakily. "No, baby. I told you that you couldn't" I'm baffled. I'm truly afraid. Maybe he's reconsidered. Maybe he doesnt want me any more and this is it. I'm scared to ask, but in the end I summon up the courage.

"Please tell me what's wrong." I trace a tear down his face, lapping it from the end of my finger as it reaches his chin.

"It's never been like that...ever. I've never felt the way you make me feel." I feel him shaking, and hold him tightly as he huddles into me. I know how to answer this. It's the way I've been feeling. I know the fear. I know the love and the uncertainty. The only thing that baffles me is that it's Victor Mansfield, and that he's the one shedding tears for me. I don't deserve him. I kiss him, and then bury my face in his neck.

"Nobody else but you, Vic. Only you"

Victor turns to me, and we lose intimate contact at last as my dick reverts to its lax and floppy self once more. "Hold me." Oh, yeah, Victor, like I was in danger of letting you go! "Hold me tight, Mac... I'm gonna fall apart if you don't."

We can't have that, can we? In the interests of keeping Vic from falling apart I crush him against me, and listen while the words spill out of him.

"Love you, baby, so much. I knew that night in the truck." I squeeze him to me, and he gasps, wheezing a little at the pressure of my arms around him. "It scares me to want you this much... to need you this much." My face is buried in between his neck and his shoulder, and I feel like shedding a few tears myself, but being the stalwart type that I am, I preserve my cool exterior, and merely sniff a couple of times as he holds me equally tight.

"I love you too. I know how you feel. It's like we were torn apart from the same person, and we'll never get back the way we were." I don't know if he'll understand me, but that's the only way I can put it. When he starts to shake with laughter I guess that he doesn't. I'm a little disappointed at that, but we're not really two people with one brain. Stupid of me to think that he'd understand.

"Guess what?"

I try to make a joke out of it, not let him see that I'm hurt. "What? You laugh? But you, my fine sir will laugh no more... Not when I put you in my cage." I swoop in to bite him on the chin and give a low, evil hokey laugh.

He stills me, one hand to my cheek, and gazes into my eyes again, love in his, and something more. "Maybe not, but you will when you hear this."

I look at him, interested now as I wonder what he's thinking. "What?"

"I'm your bitch." My stomach does a flip-flop. My heart beats a sharp tattoo, and I have no words to say in answer. It's official, Mac Ramsey, struck dumb by Victor Mansfield. I'm totally frozen for a minute or two, and then I start to laugh.

"Oh... fuck!"

"Bastard!" he gets out between paroxysms of mirth. "Thirty-seven years and you come along and do this to me." I clutch him to me and laugh, and laugh.

"Oh, yeah, baby, but I'm your bastard. Just try and get rid of me now." His lips find mine, and for a minute I can't say anything. My mouth is full. As soon as he lets me go I have to say it as I look at his luscious, kiss-swollen lips. "God, Vic, I thought that you were at least 65." I know, once a smart-ass, always a smart-ass. He tries half-heartedly to fight me off. Not a chance!

"Fucking brat, you know it?" Harsh words, but he's grinning, and I'm grinning too as we hold each other tightly. I turn him in my arms, and sit so that we can both lean back against the end of the bed the bed that we didn't use. I settle him against my shoulder and whisper into the sleek cap of chestnut hair.

"I know that I love you." I see him open his mouth to speak, and add, "And that you're a sleazy pervert. What makes you carry this thing around with you just on spec?" I grope for his cockring and dangle it in front of him after giving him a gentle tap across the back of the head.

"Hey, I am *not* sleazy, thank you very much, and what have I been telling you all this time?"

"Uh... what?" I'm not with him.

"That I have" and then I know. I say it with him as he chants, "Hidden depths."

"I think I just hit the bottom of them." I say, fervently. God, Vic, I never felt anything quite so amazing as you, wrapped around my dick, squeezing the last ounce of pleasure out of me.

"And I don't usually carry one," he says.

"Oh yeah?" It just so happened that you were going out to work so you popped it into your pocket? Pull the other one, my gorgeous reprobate. You're sick, and I love you.

"But you." He seems to choke up for a second or two, then he smiles again. "You do things to me. I don't even know what made me grab it. I haven't been like this since I worked Vice." I smile down at him. Victor, it doesn't matter, just don't ever leave me.

"Oh yeah, right, blame me." I whine. "Blame poor innocent Mac." I do things to him. That's nice. "I do?" I wonder what things they would be. If they are anything like the things he does to me he's so fucking lucky!

"Don't be sorry, baby." And now his voice is soulful. I can hear a thousand regrets lurking there behind his words. "I didn't know how much I missed that person until you showed me he was gone."

I do believe that I'm shocked all over again. "Vice? Is this what you used to get up to in Vice? Who is this man, and what has he done with my straight-down-the-middle, by-the-book partner? "I thought that you were as straight as a die."

"No, this is not what I used to get up to in Vice, but I was wild. I loved life back then, and I was very good at my job." He's re-living a time that meant a lot to him. I hold him to me and kiss his hair. I want so much for him to be at peace.

"Gotta know it before you can trap it, baby?" I ask him, but I don't mean to be snarky. I love him too much. I just don't know how to let him know.

"Something like that." He's still somewhere else, in another space and time. I kiss his face, then I notice the time.

"Oh, good grief. Do you suppose we need to go back downstairs?" I don't want to. I want to stay here forever, holding him. I know that real life will intervene as soon as I go out that door. He takes my face in his hands and turns me to look at him. I know that he's serious now, and I wait.

"Mac, you need to know. I was never stupid." I know, baby. I know it because you wouldn't be my Victor if you were. Still, I need to wind him up a little. It's in my job description.

"But you used to carry a cockring in your pocket just in case."

Well, fuck me! He blushed. Just like that, he turned the color of beets. "I never got involved that way," he protests. I take his face between my two hands and hold it steady, while I search his eyes. "Maybe. Maybe not. I don't care, but now, you are mine, and you aren't ever, ever gonna look at anyone else the way that you look at me. Hear me?"

"I knew myself, what I was capable of, but I never slept around with a lot of people, and I was always safe."

Oh, Lord. That's what he's worried about. He thinks that I have some kind of VD, or worse. I never thought he'd lay that kind of thing on me. I tense up, and say very carefully, "Fuck, baby, that's something that didn't even occur to me." He grins, and kisses the tip of my nose, and I think that perhaps I misread him. Maybe he didn't mean that at all. Maybe he was trying to tell me that he was clean. I relax, and he rubs my shoulder.

"My thoughts exactly."

"I wanted you so badly." I still do. Will it ever end?

"I know." He strokes my face, and I lean over him, dusting his skin with butterfly kisses, little kisses that pepper his face, his neck, his hair. "I know it may seem like I'm really wild, but you're the first person I've been this uninhibited with." I see that blush of his rise up once more to stain his cheeks. I love it.

"Just as long as you never stop," I say, and there's the voice again, tickling the inside of my ears with its sexy rumble.

"Never, baby."

I kiss him again then, deep, luscious kisses that curl my toes and make me gasp and tingle all over. I won't ever get tired of him.

"Think that maybe we should go back to work?" I say, hoping he'll say 'no, stay,' but of course he doesn't. He slips out of my arms at last to reach for his clothing.

"Yeah, I think we need to," he sighs.

I struggle to my feet myself, hearing my knees crack loudly. "Grief, I'm getting so old," I say in an attempt to make a joke. We grin at each other.

"Jackie and LiAnn are probably..." He stops, and his voice is suddenly still. It's weird. Not like him. I look up at him.

"What? Probably what?" I'm not really paying much attention to him to be sure. I was utterly convinced that I was wearing two boots when I came in here, and now there's only one of the bloody things. What the hell has happened to the other? I'm still grumbling when he points towards the doorway. I turn to look, following his finger.

My eyes open wide, and my jaw hits my chest. "Oh, fuck."

"That just about sums it up." He's white. There in the doorway, round-eyed and glassy are the two women we believed to be downstairs, grooving to the beat and all of that sort of stuff. They aren't downstairs at all, they're right here with us, and they look as though they've been with us throughout all of our recent exertions. Jackie looks like she was just given a math term-paper to write. She's dazed and confused in the way that only she knows how. Of course she speaks. When did she ever stay silent?

"You guys are so.... like, so"

I'm fucking furious. I don't have time to waste on her. She's seen it before. No doubt she'll find a way to see it again. I snarl at her. "Go on, say it."

"*Totally* hot," she blathers, happily. Well, whoop-tee-do! I'm sure I'll sleep better tonight knowing that Jackie Janczyk, queen of the mob, finds me totally hot when I'm fucking my lover.

Victor's looking worriedly at her companion. She's not about to gush, and part of me wants to slap her for causing my Vic such pain. He shifts uneasily. "LiAnn?"

LiAnn just stands there and says nothing.

I try. I take a step forward, willing the connection. "LiAnn?"

Victor's pinking up. He's hurting. I know that look. "LiAnn please."

"Come on, girl," I say, half an eye for her, and half for my lover who's having a bad time of it. "Let's talk about this. We need to, you know we do."

LiAnn shakes her head. "You two are fine without me." Well fuck her! That's not what this is about. This is about keeping the team together. This is about not breaking Vic's heart. Will you just unbend for once in your spoiled life, LiAnn? The bitch that she is, she turns to go, and I see Vic move as if to start after her, and then, realizing that he's naked, subside, grit his teeth and reach for his underwear.

"No! Wait," he calls, hoarsely, struggling into his clothing.

LiAnn turns back to face him, ignoring me. "What?" she asks, as if expecting to tell a stranger the time of day or something. I want to take her by the shoulders and shake her out of her sullen fit. She's compromising the team. She shouldn't be acting like this, damn her.

"LiAnn... this..." he doesn't finish. I get the feeling that he's giving up. He looks at me in frustration. I open my mouth to say something. I don't know what, but when did that ever stop me in the past? I stop short because she's speaking to me, to us.

"Vic, you don't need me. You and Mac... You're fine." Her eyes are shiny wet but she won't weaken. She'll hug her anger to her and begin a vendetta. I know her.

"LiAnn," Vic is still trying. "This has nothing to do with us not caring about you." She flares up at that, coloring, and snapping at him.

"Victor, did I say that it did?" Bitch! Double-dyed , first class, queen of bitches. You've been taking lessons from the boss woman, haven't you?

"You just...you made your choice a long time ago, I think." Vic is trying to reach her, and I love him for it, but he won't do it. I know her, and she's made up her mind to sulk. We need to give it a week, and ask the Director not to send her out with us until she comes around.

"Oh? And just what do you think my choice was?" Come on, woman, give! The last time you made a choice, you saved Vic's life for him. Choose equally well now.

"To be independent." He's earnest, brow furrowed in thought as he makes a connection with her. "Not to be tied down to one man." I see her nod at that, and I want to cheer. I can't stop myself from pitching in and adding my own two cents worth.

"He's right, LiAnn. And you know what? I've made mine too. I want to be tied down to him." I walk over to kiss my man, a little peck on the shoulder that stands for all the love I want to give him. Grabbing hold of my jeans and my T-shirt, I finish getting dressed.

"Neither one of us was what you needed, LiAnn." Vic is back on the air, and he's so full of distress and confusion that I want to hold him, soothe him. He's always been hurt by her behavior. "But that doesn't mean that we don't still love you, just not the way we used to."

She stands still, looking at us, hugging herself as she does. "I don't know. I just feel alone. Everyone has someone... Except for me."

That makes him pause, and a look of compassion crosses Victor's face. I want to warn him about that. If she thinks that he pities her, she'll hate him. "Sweetheart, I don't know what to tell you. I do know we need you to be our friend... and our partner. That hasn't changed."

She nods, which makes me feel a little better and then turns to go down the stairs.

Jackie calls after her, "Hey, LiAnn? Wait up."

I call her back too. "LiAnn. I need you on our side. Okay?" Jackie turns back towards me then.

"Well of course she's on your side. I mean, like what do you expect? Like you think she's gonna be wearing black or something?" She gives LiAnn a smile and pats her on the shoulder in a gesture that I don't usually see from her. LiAnn is a little shocked too. Leastways, she doesn't take Jackie's hand off at the wrist.

Then the two women go down the stairs together. We just stand still, gaping after them. Then we turn to each other and gape a little more. Soon, we have the whole routine down to perfection. If you need anyone to gape for you, look no further, we're both good at it.

Victor finally puts it into words. "What the hell was that?"

"I think that was a demonstration of feminist solidarity." I sigh, theatrically at him. "It's a jungle out there, Vic."

He sighs right back at me. "Tell me about it." I watch him wriggle into his pants. It's an inspiring sight and I purse my lips as I eye him lewdly, then I waggle my eyebrows at him suggestively.

"Wanna play Tarzan?"

He chuckles and I'm so glad. I made him laugh. I cheered him up. Maybe things will work out for us. If they don't, it won't be though lack of effort on my part. Vic Mansfield, making you happy is my special care.

"As long as I get to wear the loincloth...later," he grins. "Right now, we really need to get back to work or our asses are both grass." I wish you hadn't said that, lover, but seeing as you did, I suppose that we should go do some work.

"Damn," I frown. "I guess you're right. Come on then. You still have to have that dance with me." Here's a sock I extend it to him, and he takes it from my fingers, stooping to put it on before the penny drops and he practically explodes.

"What?" He does a wonderful line in pseudo-outrage. "I already did dance with you. That's how all this started." He attempts to look severe, but his mask slips and within a matter of mere seconds he's grinning at me, pink tongue sweeping his lips in a movement that's unconsciously seductive. I think that its unconscious anyway. Whatever! I can't keep my hands off him when he's like this. I grab him and pull him in for a kiss that rocks me.

I need this man. He's like an addiction. When he's with me, I feel amazing, astonishing, complete, and when he's not there I crave him. When I finally have to let him go I hold him steady so that I can look into those eyes of his again and see the lights dance for me. "But I think," he adds, "That I could be persuaded."

"To dance?" I murmur, reluctantly pulling closed the zipper of his jacket, and running my fingers over the supple skin of it. I prefer the supple skin that lies beneath it, but we really will be in the shit if we don't get downstairs in the next few minutes.

"Yeah," he says, smiling wickedly from under thick, black lashes that are just plain sinful. "And so many other things."

We have to go back to work. So why am I standing here, running my hands over him all over again, working up a severe case of desperate lust. Stop being so fucking seductive. On second thoughts, don't. I just have to learn to handle it, don't I? I look him up and down again. Long, sleek legs, slim hips, sturdy, solid chest and shoulders, face of a fallen angel. Oh, yeah, I can resist that any time. Any time.

"If you weren't such an affront to public decency, I'd be able to keep my hands off you for a few minutes," I say in exasperation.

That gets to him. The eyes flash green fire as he looks me up and down. "Me? What the hell do you expect, when you show up looking like that?" He strokes the fabric of my top, and I think he likes it. There's a certain look on his face that indicates to me that he gets off on me looking like rough trade. Got news for you, sweetheart, I like you any way I can get you, but the leather look is the sexiest thing I've ever seen. I may never let you wear anything else ever again.

"I can see every line of your body like that." But it's not a problem, okay? I step back while he puts on his boots, and then when he stands up again, I lean forward one last time to nip at his ear lobe and run my tongue the length of his jaw. "And I love leather." I whisper, hotly.

At last we leave the room behind. I don't want to. I've got this awful feeling of impending doom that won't let me shake it, but I'm first down the stairs anyway, and fuck me if it isn't Jackie the flake waiting to grip hold of my arm in a manner that will leave dents. I try to pull away, but then look at her face. I mean I really look at it, and she's worried, I can see that. Shit! Now what?

I'm not prepared for what she says to me.

"It's about freaking time. Where's LiAnn?"

I look around the room as though I think I'm going to spot her. She's not there of course. Oh, well, I tried. "I don't know," I say - yell actually, the music is very loud. "She came down with you. Why? What happened?"

She leans up on her tiptoes to yell in my ear, and I find myself being assaulted by the Janczyk frontage. It's firm and soft and feels really pleasant, but it's not what I'm looking for. I lean down, partly so that I can hear her, and partly to escape the attack of the mutant cleavage. "We came down. She said she had to use the bathroom, and I haven't seen her since." I look at Vic. He's looking grim, and so is Jackie. "I got worried when she didn't come out. She's not in there."

"How long," I hear Vic say.

"Ten minutes," replies Jackie. My heart stops and I feel cold inside. She's done something totally stupid. That's my department, goddammit. We've got a predator on the loose, and she's done something to get herself separated from the herd. Fuck!

Victor takes control when I can only gasp and look scared. He sends us scattering, Jackie to check all the stalls in the bathroom to make sure she didn't just get sick or something, me to ask the people around by where she was sitting, and he to go do something. I watch, and he heads off towards that cute barman I noticed earlier. They seem to be deep in conversation. I'm just starting to ask people if they've seen her, when Jackie joins me. One woman thinks that she saw LiAnn go outside and guessed that it was for fresh air, but otherwise nothing.

Vic comes back to us. "Jason says that she might have gone out back." He turns without saying more, and we follow. What else can we do?

"Jason? Friend of yours?" I ask Victor, as though it really matters. He sighs and looks at me with a peculiar, lost, haunted expression on his face, and it makes me wonder just what kind of friends my lover had before he and I hooked up together. They didn't always make him happy, that's for goddam sure.

"Yeah, and I'll tell you later, Okay?" He looks somehow incomplete, as though he's waiting for me to hit him, although why, I can't imagine. "We gotta find LiAnn first."

That's true. That's truer than true, but I want to know who hurt my Victor, and I won't forget this. We arrive at the door and Vic gives it a shove. We all spill out into the quiet, empty alleyway that is the back of the Underground. There's nothing here. Nobody but the three of us is in sight. I feel as though I'm going to choke, and Vic looks devastated. Even Jackie looks concerned.

He takes a deep breath, and screams LiAnn's name once, and then a second time, louder than the first. We wait, but not even an echo replies. It was a long shot. Didn't expect her to come jogging around the corner saying that she'd just nipped out to buy herself a Sno-cone or something. If it had been Jackie, yeah, maybe, but LiAnn? No chance of that happening. The woman never craves anything. I think that she's the most self-contained person I ever met.

I'm kicking around the place, heading towards the Dumpster to check inside it - not that I expect to see her lifeless remains in there, you understand, but I have to check it anyway. My eye is caught by something shiny that dangles from a broken hinge, and all of a sudden I want to scream. It's the bracelet that I gave her when she was 12. She's never taken that off. Never since I gave it to her. She told me once that it was her luck - her luck that I'm standing here holding in my hand.

LiAnn's luck ran out. God help me.

"Victor." I show him. He won't have a clue what I mean, but I show him anyway. How could I have been upstairs, fucking around when my friend - my sister, dammit - needed me. I'll never do it again. I promise. I'll never sleep with Vic again if that's what it takes to get her back. I promise. I'll be so good. Please, please.

Vic's speaking, asking where we found it, and his words sound like so much sand running through the timer.

Jackie answers him quietly, telling him where we found it. I don't listen. I'm in a fog. Her last words suddenly stab me like knives.

"And it looks like there might be some blood, too."

I stand still. I might as well be alone. I feel remote, cushioned from anything but the dreadful, tearing pain of my missing sister. Blood. The word reverberates inside me. LiAnn's blood. This is all my fault. I'm the one that insisted on fucking about with Vic when I should have been working, keeping an eye on my LiAnn. Vic reaches out for me and I step back.

No. Don't touch me. I don't want you near me. It was better when I didn't love anyone because then I couldn't feel like this. If I hadn't wanted you, LiAnn would still be next to me now. Don't ever touch me again. I can't do this. I watch as the lights in his eyes go out.

Turning wordlessly, I head back into the club, knowing that I just confirmed for myself that it is not Mac Ramsey's destiny to be happy.

★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

to part 4: Barrel of a Gun

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