Highlander 1. Prologue and Chapter 1

_**Rating: **Some profanity and violence**  
Synopsis: **In 2007, Elena Duran visits Edinburgh and brings the Game home to Connor MacLeod's family.  
__This story arc continues in "Elena's Journey"_

* * *

**The Only Game in Town**

by Vi Moreau and Parda  
November 2001

* * *

**Prologue: A Raw Deal  
**

_**New Year's Day, 2007**_  
_**Rome, Italy**_

The Honorable Mr. Peter Bryce Shaw had been well into his second century when he discovered his passion for music: the graceful fluidity of Mozart, the magnificent grandeur of Beethoven, the precise power of Paganini. However, after countless lessons on a variety of instruments during the next hundred years, Shaw finally admitted to himself that he had no real musical talent. Oh, he could manage the technical aspects of a piece—reproduce the notes, follow the tempo and the dynamics—but his playing lacked élan. It had no feeling, no soul. He was doomed to listen, never to create.

There was, however, one type of music in which Peter Shaw excelled, and this afternoon he had the chance to play. Shaw examined his chosen instrument one last time: blond, handsome, well-muscled, perhaps twenty-five … and lying helpless at his feet, properly gagged and restrained. Shaw much preferred the challenge of an unfettered—or, even better, an actively resisting—opponent, but: "Nothing obvious or permanent," Shaw's employer had requested, and Shaw always took pride, and care, in performing well. A moving target left too much room for error.

So, immediately after entering the ostentatious Italian villa, he had disposed of the two servants and the lone bodyguard with tranquilizer darts, and then trussed up the playboy who had joined in a man's game and then so foolishly refused to honor his debts. But first, one last detail: Shaw bent over and extracted the gag, receiving a vehement, spittle-filled curse and a furious glare in return. Excellent. Shaw smiled, adjusted the fit of his black kid gloves, and commenced to play.

The subdued percussion of hard fists on soft flesh … the soft staccato of boots to the ribs, to the knees, to the small of the back, the kidneys so vulnerable there … it was a rhythm easily sustained, punctuated by harsh gasps and enhanced by the crescendo of moans, building so deliciously to the fortissimo of a scream, a descant of pain above the cracking of bones.

Shaw stopped himself after the fourth broken rib. A pity he couldn't continue to the final resolution, but "A warning, only," his employer had requested, and Shaw was certain that this Lorenzo Ponti had gotten the message "loud and clear," as those Americans liked to say. Shaw untied him and then, when Ponti attempted to get up, to actually strike at him—oh, how delightfully pugnacious of the boy!—Shaw allowed him his feeble attempt. Then he delivered a final stunning blow, leaving Ponti bruised and broken, but unbloodied, on the floor.

On his way out, Shaw stepped over the body of the butler in the atrium then gently shut the front door of the villa. His nondescript rental car awaited. After he had fastened his seatbelt, he considered his personal selection of CDs. Mahler, he decided finally, the Bernstein recording of the fifth symphony. Shaw was in the mood for something intense and stirring on this bright and chilly New Year's Day. The trumpet sounded its solitary call as he set off down the long drive, lined on either side by cypress trees, a symbol of everlasting life.

The funeral march was just beginning when Shaw turned onto the main road and caught a tingle of a different kind of immortality—one of his own kind was near. But the traffic was constant and the sensation faded immediately, so Shaw decided not to pursue. Besides, he never mixed pleasure with business.

* * *

**Chapter 1****: Reading the Cards**

_**Friday Afternoon****, 5 January 2007**_  
_**Edinburgh, Scotland**_

* * *

"Get down!" Colin hissed, grabbing Sara by the arm and yanking her down with him as he dropped to the floor of the exercise room.

"Why?" she hissed back, pulling her arm away and punching him in the shoulder, but Colin knew she would stay down. Their dad had taught them that ages ago, back when they were little, and they were ten now (ten years and two weeks, actually), so they both knew the rules.

Colin pointed to the row of windows, just above their heads. "Somebody's coming."

"Really?" she asked. Colin nodded, and Sara grinned her most "evilly plotting mayhem and murder" grin as she rubbed her palms together, looking just like Calvin from the comic books, except with longer and darker hair. "Cool," Sara breathed. "The game can be for real." She scuttled over to the rightmost of the three windows, and Colin moved to the left. "Ready?" Sara asked, and when Colin nodded, they each cautiously peeked over their windowsill and looked down to the street three stories below.

A tall woman in a red cape down to her ankles and with a red scarfy-thing partway over her long, black hair was slamming the door shut on a taxi cab. As the cab drove away, the woman stood on the sidewalk, swinging a black backpack in her left hand and looking up at their house. Colin and Sara immediately dropped again.

"Do you think she saw us?" Sara asked, flat on her belly but with her head up off the wooden floor.

Colin considered the angles involved. "Nah. We weren't up high enough for her to see us from that far down. We're still safe. But did you see her eye patch?"

"Yeah, black, like a pirate! This is great!" Sara peeked over the windowsill again, and Colin did the same. "Beware, Grand Marshall," Sara intoned, as they watched the woman read the name "MacLeod" on the plaque attached to the porch railing and then climb the four stone steps to the front door. "The pirate-witch seeks entrance to the castle." The doorbell chimed far below, and Sara clutched at his arm. "She sounds a magic note! The door opens!"

The door had indeed opened, but the woman did not enter. She just stood there, waving her hands around. "Her powers are no match for the wards we have set to guard our home," Colin scoffed. "I remember well how you did chant the spells and draw the ancient runes, only two nights past when the moon shone full."

Sara wiggled with pride. "That was great, wasn't it?" she asked, dropping out of her role as Grand Sorceress of the Realm of Heryan. (They had ended up calling it "realm," because Sara absolutely refused to call it a kingdom, and queendom sounded just plain dumb.) "Even if Mom didn't let us stay outside very long."

"Well, it was midnight, and it was freezing cold."

"It had to be midnight," Sara countered. "And of course it was cold; it's January. And anyway, we're not in school right now, so why—"

"Shhh!" Colin interrupted, looking back down at the porch. "She's coming in!"

Sara gasped in dismay as the black-haired woman disappeared from their view. "The lady of the castle knows not of the danger! She's been ensorceled by the Scarlet Witch, to invite her into our home!"

"And the lord of the castle not here," Colin added grimly, and he and Sara exchanged a dark and portentous glance. "Quickly!" Colin commanded, leaping to his feet. "We must discover the witch's schemes before the lady of the castle is harmed!" He started for the stairs.

Sara grabbed him by the arm before he got past Dad's sword collection mounted on the wall. "Quietly!" she hissed. "And watch that fifth step from the top. It squeaks."

"I know that," Colin hissed back, shaking her hand off his arm and going for the stairs again. "I told you about it six months ago, remember?"

"Of course I remember," she said, shutting the door to the exercise room behind them as they started down the staircase. "I also remember telling you about the second step from the bottom four months before that. And about the creaky door at the farm, and about the hiding place in the stables, and about—"

"Shhh!" Colin said one more time. "We're almost to the second floor." They tiptoed down the next set of carpeted stairs in sock-feet, stepping completely over that squeaky fifth step, then gingerly seating themselves on the fourth step from the bottom and setting their feet on the third. That second step squeaked something awful.

The heavy wooden door to the parlor was open, which was good, because otherwise they wouldn't have been able to hear anything. The Scarlet Witch woman wasn't keeping her voice down, which was even better. Even so, Colin could still make out only some of the words.

"… don't want to get you involved in this, Alex. I … in Edinburgh … two days …"

Colin and Sara exchanged meaningful nods. The accent of the stranger was definitely not Scottish. Colin guessed she was Spanish or maybe Portuguese, but one thing was certain: the Scarlet Witch had traveled far, probably under a black pirate's flag, wrecking mayhem— Or wait … should it be wreaking mayhem? It couldn't be reeking mayhem, because that would be smelly. Well, anyway, the mayhem had been wrought. Colin went back to the story. The pirates had been causing mayhem and seeking blood and treasure, while the Scarlet Witch and her scurvy crew sailed the Seven Seas.

"Perhaps I should just leave him a note," the Spanish-sounding woman said next.

Sara mouthed the words "Black spot?" and Colin nodded eagerly. This was just like *Treasure Island* when the blind man had delivered the sentence of death to the old sea captain. Dad had been a sea captain, a long time ago, and he was definitely old. Really old.

Mom spoke next, her voice sounding farther away. "Not at all … I invited … Connor … be back soon …"

"… not involve Connor, either, I promise … may know someone I'm looking for, is all." That was the Witch again, on the trail of her prey.

Sara pointed to the hat stand in the corner of the front hall. The witch's scarlet cape was hanging on a hook, and her backpack lay flopped over on the seat. Sara raised a single eyebrow at Colin, putting on her haughty, mysterious "channeler of sacred powers" face. Colin wished for the thousandth time that he could move only one eyebrow, but both of his always moved together, so he settled for looking mean and lowering his eyebrows in a "black thundercloud of menace."

Sara's hands started moving in a pattern to set a magic spell, and Colin drew in a deep breath to mouth the silent words of power that would banish the evil outlander, then found to his horror that he absolutely had to sneeze. Sara waving her hands around had loosened all the dust that had stuck to her green and white sweater when she had dropped to the floor upstairs.

Colin struggled mightily. He took in great gasping breaths through his mouth. He rocked back and forth. He tried to yawn, to smile, to frown, to do _anything_ that would wiggle that dust rabbit out from the back of his nose. He finally clamped his nostrils shut with one hand, and that seemed to do the trick, but now Sara was the one trying to be quiet, as she tried desperately not to laugh. She had both hands clapped over her mouth, but snorted giggles were escaping from between her fingers, and then all of a sudden Colin was trying not to laugh, too.

"Kids?" Mom called from the parlor. She sounded suspicious, maybe even a little mad, and Colin didn't have any urge to laugh anymore. Eavesdropping was definitely against the rules.

This game was over. Colin and Sara shrugged as they stood and started down the rest of the stairs. On the last step, Colin's sneeze finally erupted in a snorting hiccupy kind of noise that made Sara start giggling again. Colin wrinkled his nose at her ferociously, so that he looked like a Ferengi, then he put a cheery smile on his face and turned the corner into the parlor. "Hi, Mom!"

"We came down for a snack," Sara added. She and Colin stopped just past the door, checking out the scene. Mom was sitting in Dad's favorite chair, the brown leather wingback one by the fireplace. The woman in red—except she was the woman in black now, all black: black boots, black jeans, black turtleneck, black hair and (coolest of all) black eyepatch—was standing between the two windows of the front wall of the house. She was slender and tall, maybe even as tall as Dad. The toe of her left foot was tapping silently on the black fringe of the Turkish rug. Colin glanced at the second hand of the clock on the mantle then started counting the taps.

"Mm-hmm," Mom said, not sounding at all convinced, just when Colin had gotten to twelve taps. He checked the clock again; fifteen seconds had elapsed. So, that meant … one and one-quarter second per tap.

Mom stood and motioned Sara and him into the room with her eyes. They took four steps and stopped by the couch. "Elena, these are my children," Mom said, sounding more exasperated than proud. "Colin Duncan and Sara Heather. Kids, this is Elena Duran-Ponti."

"Call me Elena," Elena Duran-Ponti said, with a smile so bright and cheerful that Colin found himself smiling back. No evil witch-pirate could smile like that. Then, unlike most grownups, she held out her hand. A little surprised, Colin stepped forward and got a good, solid handshake from her, none of that slimy or deadfish stuff some people did.

"She's a friend of your Uncle Duncan," Mom explained.

"And of Cassandra," Sara put in, her eyes narrowed and her shoulders hunched like she was getting ready to tackle something, the way she always got when she was cranky.

"Yes, Cassi and I have been friends for many years, since before you two were born," Elena said. "When she and I went on our Mediterranean cruise this last fall, she told me how pretty you were—and how tall." Elena beamed at them both, and even Sara thawed a little under that smile. Elena held out her hand to Sara next, and after a second of hesitation, Sara took it and shook, too.

Colin looked at Elena again, more carefully this time. She wanted to talk to Dad, she was a friend of Uncle Duncan and of Cassandra, and Elena and "Cassi" had been friends for "many years," so therefore… "You're an Immortal!" he said, pleased with his discovery. Sara huffed out air through her nose and crossed her arms, looking crankier than ever. Colin didn't care. "Do you have a sword?" he asked Elena.

Elena looked over at Mom, who was looking kind of grim. "They found out about Immortals and the Game at Duncan's wedding at the end of September," Mom said to her.

Elena nodded then answered Colin. "Yes, Colin, I have a sword. I have many swords."

Just like Dad and Uncle Dunc. Cassandra had only one, and she hardly ever carried it around. "Do you have one of them with you?" Colin asked. "Can I see—"

"No swords without your father around, Colin," Mom interrupted immediately, before Elena could even open her mouth. "You know that rule."

Of course he did. That was one of the earliest rules he could ever remember learning, right along with "Don't pull the cat's tail" and "No shoes down the toilet" and "No pizza in your sister's hair."

"I just wanted to draw it," Colin explained to Elena. Then her left eyebrow went up, the one without the eyepatch—how come everybody else could do that except him, anyway?—and Colin realized he had to explain again. "Not draw it from its scabbard, draw a picture of it."

"Ah," Elena said, smiling again. "Perhaps later, when your father is home."

"Which should be in about ten minutes," Mom said. "He'll be back from his run soon."

"Is your eye missing or just not supposed to get any light?" Sara asked straight-out and blunt, being her usual battering ram of curiosity.

"Sara!" Mom said sternly, but Elena waved her hand.

"That's all right, Alex," Elena said then turned to Sara. "My eye is gone, chiquita."

Colin bit into his lip to keep from smiling, because that made Sara sound like a banana, and she would absolutely hate for him to be thinking that. He got himself serious by looking at Elena's eyepatch and wondering how the eye had been taken out. Dad had said stuff wouldn't grow back. "Were you a pirate queen, like Grace O'Malley in Ireland?" Colin asked.

"No, I'm pretty much a landlubber, but I was a bandit for a while," she added cheerfully.

"Like Robin Hood?" Colin asked.

"Well, I didn't rob from the rich and give to the poor. I just … annoyed the Spanish conquistadores in Argentina."

"Are you from Argentina?"

"Yes, I am."

So, he'd been wrong about her being from Spain or Portugal, but at least he'd gotten the language right. He wanted to ask if the person she was looking for was an Immortal, too, if she was going to fight him and maybe chop off his head, but if he asked that, then Mom would know that Sara and he had been listening in, and that would be bad. So instead, Colin asked Elena, "Why are you here in Scotland?"

"She's visiting," Mom answered for her, which meant Mom didn't want Colin and Sara to know. Then Mom said, "Kids, didn't you say you wanted a snack?"

Colin grimaced. Sara had been one to say that, and now Mom was using it to kick them out of the room. But it wasn't all Sara's fault; Mom would have come up with something even if Sara hadn't said anything. Mom was sneaky that way. He might as well make it good. "Can we have the rest of the Christmas cookies Grandma sent?" Colin asked.

"Not all of them," Mom warned. "They're my favorite, too."

"Come on, Sara," Colin said to his twin, who was silently glowering at the fireplace, and as they went through the library into the kitchen they could hear Elena asking about the fabric on the furniture. Chit-chat talk, designed to keep "the children" from learning anything interesting, like who Elena was looking for, and where and when and how she got that eyepatch. Colin kept listening anyway, just in case, and he and Sara moved silently in the kitchen instead of bamming cabinet doors around the way they usually did.

"… house is Georgian, like all of New Town," Mom was saying from the library. "Most of the furniture is Georgian, too, except for the chairs and the sofas, and the beds upstairs. Two-hundred-year old horsehair cushions aren't exactly comfortable."

"Or sturdy enough with children around!" Elena added with a laugh, and Colin nodded as he poured glasses of milk for Sara and himself. He'd actually sat in a chair at Aunt Rachel's antique store in New York once, and it had creaked and groaned, making him jump up right away.

Sara had set the cookie jar on the kitchen table, and Colin joined her there, claiming the chair with the most sunshine. Sara was scowling in the shadows. "What's wrong?" Colin asked, dunking a reindeer cookie feet first into his milk then biting off the legs.

Sara jerked her head toward the library door, even though Mom and Elena had moved back to the parlor and their voices were too quiet to hear. "Her."

Colin swallowed his mouthful of soggy cookie. "Mom likes her. And she's a friend of Uncle Dunc and Cassandra, too." Sara just glowered some more and savagely bit the head off a Santa Claus. "Geez," Colin said in disgust. "So that's why."

"What?"

"You don't like Cassandra having Immortal friends."

"That's not true!"

"Well, you sure didn't like Cassandra going off with Amanda after Uncle Dunc's wedding."

"That's because I don't like _her_," Sara retorted. "That Miss Snarkity Queen of Slinkiness."

Colin hadn't thought Amanda was that bad. In fact, he had thought she was fun. Their big brother, John, had liked her, too. Sara gloomily dunked her Santa Claus cookie in the milk and held him there, watching as the feet melted away. Then she drank her milk. Colin shuddered and took another cookie, a holly leaf this time. "Elena doesn't seem snarky," he pointed out.

"I guess."

"She's like a newspaper."

Sara looked up, her narrowed eyes almost green instead of their more usual bluish-green-gray. "What?"

"You know," Colin said with a grin, "black and white and read all over."

Sara wrinkled her nose at his joke and objected, "But there's no white. Her skin's more like coffee with lots of milk."

"Her teeth are really white," Colin said.

"I guess," Sara said again and started eating another cookie. They munched in silence until Sara said, "Cassandra never told me Elena was Immortal."

"Well, of course not," Colin said in exasperation. "Immortals can't go blabbing other people's secrets around. Besides, Cassandra doesn't have to tell you everything."

"No worry about that," Sara said in disgust. "She keeps saying we're too young to learn the really good stuff."

Well, they were. But Colin decided that Sara didn't need to hear that right now. She wouldn't listen to him anyway. He knew. Colin reached into the cookie jar and pulled out a star one, then nibbled each of the five points down to the center. He had just popped the last bit into his mouth when Sara stood. "Where are you going?" Colin asked.

"The dining room, so we can see Dad come back," she said, and Colin hastily swallowed the last of his milk and grabbed one more cookie before he followed her from the kitchen. They had to step around boxes of half-packed Christmas ornaments to get to the windows that faced the street. More boxes sat on the long table; Mom had been working all morning on packing away the Christmas stuff. He and Sara each took a chair, kneeling on the seats to look out a window, with their arms folded on the backs of the chairs and their chins resting on their hands, like the lions on guard at the New York library, except with no tails.

The last of his last cookie was dissolving in his mouth when Sara said, "Who do you think she's here to fight?"

Colin shrugged. "I don't know. The only other Immortal we know in Scotland is Cassandra, and Elena won't fight her. How many Immortals do you think live around here?"

"I don't know, but I'm going to ask Dad when he gets back," Sara announced firmly.

"Here he comes now!" Colin said and leaned closer to the window to watch the familiar green-hatted figure in a gray sweat-suit and a loose white jacket coming down the hill at a slow jog, his cool-down phase. All of a sudden Dad's head went up, and his face twisted kind of funny for a second. Then he started running again—fast—right toward the house. "He doesn't look happy," Colin observed.

"No," Sara agreed. "He must have felt Elena being here."

"Then why is he pulling out his sword?" Colin asked, because Dad was pulling his katana out from underneath the back of his coat as he ran. The curved blade looked dull instead of shiny in the bluish shadows of the winter day.

"Because it could be a bad guy! They can't tell who!" Sara reminded him, and Colin felt incredibly dumb. "Elena must have felt him, too," Sara said. "I hear her getting ready to go outside."

"Right," Colin said, because he could hear Mom unlocking the front door. Dad was right in front of the house now, and Sara and Colin waved to him through their windows, but he only nodded at them once and kept going, only to stop suddenly at the bottom of the stairs. Mom must have opened the door. His sword went down, but he didn't hide it away, and he still didn't look happy.

Sara and Colin hopped off their chairs and yanked open the door to the hall. Elena and Mom were just stepping back from the front door, and Dad was close behind. He kicked the door shut behind him then tucked his sword back under his coat, instead of putting it away in the huge Oriental vase near the bottom of the stairs the way he usually did.

"Duran," Dad said, and the name sounded like he was grinding it between his teeth. "What do you want?"

"Hello, Connor," Elena said. "I want to ask you a question."

Colin lifted his eyebrows, both of them of course. Elena wasn't smiling, and Dad sure didn't want her here. Huh. Obviously, being a friend of Uncle Dunc and a friend of Cassandra wasn't the same as being a friend of Dad.

"Duran, you're in my home," Dad said, and this time the words sounded like the growl Colin and Sara got whenever they had seriously broken the rules. Colin automatically backed up, and Sara did, too. Their eyes met in quick agreement; Elena Duran-Ponti was in for it now.

She seemed to know it, because she swallowed once, but she didn't back up. Then Mom said, "I invited her to come in, Connor."

Dad nodded slowly, but he didn't even look at Mom. He just kept staring at Elena. "Did she tell you she was looking for someone?" Dad asked.

Now how had Dad known that? Colin wondered. But then, Dad always knew stuff that Colin couldn't figure out how he knew, like last week when he'd confiscated the flashlights that Colin and Sara both kept hidden under their mattresses so they could stay up late and read under the covers.

"Yes, but…" Mom stopped then, like she'd run out of words, and Mom hardly ever did that.

Sara and Colin exchanged glances again, suddenly realizing exactly how serious "looking for someone" was. The Game wasn't played for pretend. The Game meant swords and beheadings—for real. Elena might get her head chopped off and die. Colin swallowed hard, wishing he hadn't eaten quite so many cookies so fast. This wasn't just fun and exciting anymore.

"Business," Mom said, the word sliding out between her teeth, like a snake sliding across grass.

Elena turned and said quickly, "Alex, thank you so much," and she took one of Mom's hand in hers, not for a handshake like she had done earlier with him and Sara, but for a squeeze. "I must leave now."

"Yes," Mom agreed, not even arguing a little, but she patted Elena's hand and gave her a hug before she let go. Elena walked across the hall to get her scarlet cape. Colin always liked to make his shoes squeak when he walked there, but her rubber-soled boots made no noise at all on the marble floor. She lifted her cape off the hat stand with one hand then twirled the long cape around her shoulders, but one side of the cloth always stayed straight, and she had to tug at the other edge to get it to hang right.

Aha! Colin thought in satisfaction: her sword. No wonder she wore a cape. Dad's sword always made his coat look kind of lumpy. Elena was pulling on gloves, black of course, and then she took out her red scarf, wrapping it around her neck this time instead of over her hair. She picked up her backpack and slung it over one shoulder. Dad hadn't moved at all.

"It was good to meet you," Elena said to Colin and Sara after she was all dressed, and she smiled at them with the same bright and happy smile as before. Colin and Sara nodded gravely back, and Colin wondered if he'd ever get that chance to see her sword … or see her again.

Dad didn't take his gaze from Elena as she walked past him and out to the porch. "I'll be back soon," Dad said to Mom, and he gave her a quick kiss, the way they always did whenever they said goodbye, so that was OK. Colin relaxed a little, then Dad smiled at Sara and Colin and gave them a wink, and Colin relaxed some more. Dad wasn't going to have to fight anybody; it was Elena's turn.

"Lock the door," Dad said to Mom as he stepped outside.

"I always do," she said dryly, and she shut it behind him and slid the bolt home.

Colin and Sara always did, too. Locking doors was another of the unbreakable rules, and now that they knew about the Game, they knew why.

* * *

_**Continued in Chapter 2 - Queens High**_


	2. Chapter 2: Queens High

**Chapter 2**: **Queens High**

Connor led Duran away from his house at a brisk pace then ducked into the first alley he saw, a narrow brick-walled passageway between two stone-fronted houses. He didn't want any witnesses: not casual passersby, not the Immortal whom Duran was hunting, and certainly not his own wife and kids. Connor stopped five paces from the street entrance, then grabbed the front of Duran's cape in his fists and pulled her toward him. He deliberately avoided that tempting red scarf, once again stifling the urge he'd felt in his front hall to take her by the neck and squeeze the life out of her for being so goddamned stupid as to bring the Game into his home.

"I know you're hunting, Duran," he snarled. He'd recognized "that look" about her right away: the black clothes, the lack of makeup, the edginess … but most of all, he'd recognized it by a certain hungry sheen in her gray eye. He'd seen that same sheen in his mirror sometimes. He was seeing it now, her face only inches from his, and it infuriated him. "If you ever deliberately bring the Game into my home again—" He paused for effect.

"I would never endanger your family, Connor," she protested.

"—I'll take your head," he finished.

There was a long moment of silence while Duran seemed to digest this bit of news. Although her expression didn't change and she met his gaze steadily, her face paled, and not just from the cold. "I understand," she said calmly. "I apologize."

Connor let go of her cape.

"I'll also apologize to Alex if you want me to," Duran offered, straightening her cape so it fell smoothly around her again and putting her backpack on the ground at her feet.

Duran still didn't get it. Connor spelled it out for her. "Stay away from Alex," he ordered. "Stay away from my kids. Don't visit, don't call, don't email, don't send a letter. Don't even walk past my house. Ever."

Elena took a deep breath, her jaw clenching. "I have _never_—and I _will_ never—come to your house when I'm being hunted, if there is any chance of attracting an Immortal there. I would not endanger your family, Connor MacLeod."

"You're a lightning rod, Duran," Connor snapped back, his own righteous rage easily matching hers. "There's always a chance of you attracting an Immortal."

"That's true for any of us: Duncan, Cassandra, and you," she flared.

"Duncan's family. You're not. Cassandra's a friend. You're not. And she doesn't look for trouble. You do. And trouble goes looking for you." He stepped closer to her, too close, and growled, "Maybe the Immortal you're hunting is also hunting you. Maybe he has you under surveillance and knows you're here. Maybe he's just connected you to me. Maybe you've already endangered my family." Arrogant, obnoxious, stupid woman … Connor grabbed her, by the scarf this time, and pulled her toward him again, demanding, "What do you know about him?"

Duran gripped her scarf closer to her body, avoiding touching Connor—and using her right hand, he noted, leaving her sword hand free. "Only his name," she admitted. "Peter Shaw."

The knot in Connor's stomach loosened, just a little. He dropped the scarf and stepped back to give them both more room.

"What do _you_ know about him?" Duran asked, straightening her clothes again.

"Enough not to take him lightly."

She looked at Connor carefully. "Very well. If you think I've placed your family in danger, just say the word and I'll take Shaw's head."

"Oh, will you?" Connor said.

"Of course, I will. If I messed up, I'll fix it." Her smile was ruthless and hungry. "Do you think I won't do it? Or I can't?"

"You'd try," he agreed, for he had no doubt about her courage or her willingness to fight. "But you can't guarantee me that you'd succeed." Connor was determined to knock these stupidly blasé assumptions out of her head. "You know nothing about Shaw, yet you took a chance with my family, and you brought the Game to my children's attention." As if Sara and Colin needed any encouragement—they already played "the Game" more than Connor liked, but he knew that play-acting helped them work out ways to deal with it, and they would need that in the years to come. What they definitely did not need was to meet a flashy, dramatic Immortal, complete with eye-patch and cape for God's sake, who made the Game seem "glamorous" and "thrilling" instead of the ugly, bloody war it really was.

"And I apologized for that already," Duran said.

"I want more than your apology, Duran. I want your word: Don't ever come near my family again."

"All right," she said, nodding. "It's a small world, but you have my word that I will not deliberately come near your family. Does that satisfy you?"

"No. If you inadvertently come near my family, I want you to leave."

She shook her head but said, "Fine," then shivered as a gust of wind found its way into the alley and whipped her hair around her face. "Can we go somewhere warm now and talk for a few minutes?"

They could, but they weren't going to. He wasn't in the mood to chat with her over a nice cup of tea or a friendly pint. Besides, she wouldn't talk as much or as long if she were cold. "We can talk right here. What do you want with Shaw?"

She sighed and hugged her cape around her. "I need to find him."

Apparently, she'd given up on torturing Watchers to get what she wanted. "I'm not the Yellow Pages, Elena," Connor informed her. "Or -dot-com."

"I've already tried the usual places and done my legwork. Nothing. And I know you keep track of every Immortal in every city where you live."

So he did, but he was damned if he'd hand over an address just because Elena was lazy. She was going to have to pay, and in this business, information was gold. "Why do you want him?"

"Why? You don't really care what I do," she said perversely. "Can't you just give me an address or at least a neighborhood and let me go about my business?"

Connor shrugged. "You're right. I don't care. Find him yourself." He turned to walk back home.

"Wait, Connor," she called, hurrying after him to block his way. "Why can't you just tell me where I can find him?"

"Why?" Connor repeated.

Elena sighed, looked at the grimy concrete beneath their feet, looked up to the narrow strip of pale mackerel-clouded sky above, then finally looked back to Connor's face. "Shaw was in Rome a few days ago," she said.

A few days? Make that lazy and impatient, Connor thought. Very impatient. But that was no surprise.

"He came to my house," Elena said.

"That house-visiting virus must be contagious," Connor put in.

"Except he did more than say hello and talk about the furniture," she snapped.

"That's all you did?"

"Yes."

"You didn't speak to my children? Regale them with fascinating tales of your exploits?"

"I'm not sure what regale is exactly. I wasn't bragging to them. Sara asked me about my eye patch, and then Colin asked me if I'd been a lady pirate. I told her it was missing, and I told him I'd been a bandit. I suppose I could have told them it was none of their business, but I didn't," she said in a clipped tone.

"You could have just told Colin no," Connor said, just as clipped. Elena had always talked too much. Connor got back to business. "What else did Shaw do at your house?"

"He attacked my husband's bodyguard and … he beat my husband. Rather severely, although it doesn't show. It was … very professional."

Connor considered that last word. "So … Shaw is involved with organized crime, and he went after your husband?"

"Lorenzo …" Elena hesitated then burst out, "Damn it, Connor, why do you always have to know everything?" She stomped her feet on the ground, either in irritation or trying to keep warm, or maybe a little of both, then said suddenly, "I can't believe a man like Shaw is a friend of yours. So, what's the problem?"

"No problem, but if you want my help, tell me more about your husband and Shaw. I won't ask again."

Elena sighed once more, long and resigned, then the words came out, flat and toneless and quick. "Lorenzo did some gambling in London before Christmas. He owed a lot of money. He chose not to pay. Apparently, he was warned—verbally warned—and he chose to ignore that warning, too. It was a mistake. Two mistakes, actually."

"I'll say," Connor said sarcastically. Lorenzo whatever-his-name was an idiot.

"The man who came into my house, shot my servants and my husband's bodyguard with a tranquilizer gun, and then hurt my husband is an Immortal, Connor." Her gray eye darkened to almost black as she stated, "No Immortal comes into my house, does violence, and walks out freely."

"So this is payback," Connor summarized.

"No." She lowered her voice and put her face close to his, conspiratorially. "This is insurance. I can't let Shaw get away with this, Connor. He'll talk about it. Pretty soon, _any_ Immortal will think he can come into my house, piss on my rug, fuck my maid, and get away with it. And they'll start coming to my villa, just like they still come to my estancia in Argentina. I don't need this constant aggravation. Besides, I don't know that my being Immortal might not have been the reason Shaw himself came in the first place—to teach me a lesson, put me in my place, let me know how vulnerable I am through my loved ones."

"Sounds like it's just a gambling debt your husband tried to welsh out of. Otherwise, Shaw would have left a message—"

"My husband walking around all bent over like an old man is a message, Connor!" she exclaimed. "I can't take that chance, and I _know_ you understand what I mean. So tell me, please tell me, where I can find Shaw. Thank you."

Connor almost smiled with surprise. A please and a thank-you from the fiery Elena Duran. And an apology, too. She must really love the idiot. Although, it had been over a century since Elena had last been married, and it sounded as if she'd forgotten how to share. "My villa," she'd said. "My rug, my maid, my house." What did the indisputably foolish Lorenzo (and also undoubtedly proud, Italian, and very macho) think about his wife "protecting" him? "Does your husband know what you're doing right now?" Connor asked.

Elena sighed unhappily. "Yes."

"And he told you not to go after Shaw."

Elena nodded. "He told me not to go," she repeated.

Connor's opinion of the husband went up. His opinion of the wife went down. Not that their marriage was any of his business. Connor moved on to the Immortal aspect of the situation. "Has the debt been paid?"

"Yes, two days ago. I gave Lorenzo the money and—"

"You 'gave' him the money," Connor repeated. Apparently, it was "her" money, too.

"Yes, he didn't have it, and I did," she replied, as though explaining to a child. "He's my husband. His problems are my problems, remember? The Catholic Church still says, 'For better or for worse. For richer or for poorer.'"

Connor remembered when the Catholic Church had also said, "love, honor, and obey" but the obeying part had never worked, not with Heather, not with Brenda, and not with Alex. And obviously not with Elena. Connor shrugged mentally. Again, not his problem.

"If Shaw weren't an Immortal, I would have just shut up and let it go," Elena was explaining. "And I might still just let it go—provided Shaw was acting only as a thug and not as an Immortal thug. But I need to be sure, and Lorenzo knows that part of our lives is my business alone."

"This is about gambling, not about Immortals," Connor contradicted. "And you're sticking your nose in your husband's business."

"And you've been sticking your nose in mine. Now will you tell me where I can find Shaw, yes or no?"

"No," he replied, watching with detached amusement as her eye flashed with rage. She was so easy to tease. But he'd pushed her far enough already, and he didn't want to deal with her anger right now. In fact, he didn't want to deal with her at all, and the best way to get rid of her was to put her together with Peter Shaw. If Shaw lost his head as a result of his tête-à-tête with the Argentine … well, Connor wouldn't miss him. If Elena lost her head … well, that was the price of the Game, wasn't it? Connor knew he should be used to it by now. "I'll contact Shaw and set up a meeting," Connor said. "OK?"

"OK," she said. "And thank you." She stared at him, waiting, until Connor lifted an eyebrow in inquiry. "Aren't you going to call him?" she asked.

"Later." He wasn't going to reveal any of his methods to her.

"When is later?"

"Patience is a virtue, Elena," Connor reminded her, reflecting that Elena wasn't strong in the seven virtues. Although, to be fair, she wasn't strong in the seven vices, either … except maybe lust. Connor noted again the high cheekbones, the golden skin tones, the full lips, the soft black hair curling on her temples, the passionate and dangerous glow in her eye … make that definitely lust, both in her and in her partner.

Connor immediately headed out of the alley, welcoming the chill breeze full on his face when they reached the street again. He was about to leave when he remembered to ask, "What's your husband's last name?"

"Ponti. Lorenzo Ponti. We celebrated our first anniversary last month."

"Congratulations," Connor said, meaning it. Marriage to Elena Duran couldn't be easy.

"Thank you. You and Alex have been married how long, twelve years now, yes?"

"Yes."

"Then you've straightened out some details already. Lorenzo and I are still working … well, fighting about it. And it doesn't make it any easier that he's already seen me take a head—and a Quickening."

Definitely not good, Connor thought. No wonder mucho macho Lorenzo had gone gambling with the big boys and then refused to pay.

"The last mortal I married…" She paused then surprised him by abruptly walking away. Connor thought she was leaving, but instead she stood for a long moment, looking at the bare branches of the trees in the garden down the hill. Connor waited, because information—of all kinds—was always useful. Finally, she turned back to him. "Seventeen days after the priest said the words over us, my first husband fought another gaucho who had insulted my honor. A knife fight. It had nothing to do with Immortals, but my husband was better with horses than with a knife. He died in my arms, and I promised myself, 'No more mortals.'"

Connor had promised himself the same thing, centuries ago. He'd spent a long time alone.

"No more having to protect the people we love," Elena said. "Not just from the Game, but … from knowing about it, from seeing what we have to do…"

What we are, Connor thought.

"But he was worth it. So is Lorenzo," she said nodding firmly. Then she met his eyes. "As Alex is worth it to you."

Connor cleared his throat and nodded. Alex was worth it all. Brenda and Heather had been, too. He'd done his best to make sure he was worth it to them.

Elena took the stray ends of her scarf and tucked them inside her cape. "I was driving up to the villa when I sensed Shaw as he was driving away. I had no idea if I'd get home and find Lorenzo dead. You know what I mean, don't you, Connor?"

Oh, yeah. He knew exactly what she meant. He'd gone through it ten minutes ago, thanks to her.

"I rang the bell only because I didn't know if it was the right MacLeod," Elena protested under his withering stare. "I wasn't going to go inside. I was going to wait across the street in the park, but Alex invited me inside, said you were coming right back, insisted I come in out of the cold."

"Even if Alex didn't know better—" And she should have, damn it. Connor was going to have a talk with Alex when he got back home. "—you should have known better. And in front of my kids?"

"I never intended your children to know," Elena said quietly. "I didn't tell them I was an Immortal—or that you are an Immortal, for that matter—or that I was hunting. But your children are very … perceptive."

Connor snorted in wry agreement. They took after their mother that way.

"And curious," Elena added with a smile.

They got that from Alex, too. And from him.

"You may not believe this," Elena said, "but I would protect Alex, Sara, and Colin with my life."

"I do believe it," Connor said. "You already did, eleven years ago." Alex would probably have been killed if Elena hadn't taken her place as a hostage when Simon Andrew had arrived at the MacLeod farm in the Highlands, seeking revenge for the death of his wife. "But once is all the proof I need, or want," Connor said.

Elena returned his small smile with a larger one. "We are, as they say, in violent agreement." She leaned down and pulled a hotel card out of the front pocket of her backpack then handed it to him. "This is where I'm staying."

Connor nodded. "I'll call," he said and left Elena Duran standing on the sidewalk, with her long black hair whipped by the winter wind, and her scarlet cape wrapped tightly against the cold.

After he'd showered and changed, Connor went into the sitting room that adjoined the master bedroom and called Shaw, using the name and the cellphone Connor reserved for such business. If people bothered to trace this number—and they would—they'd come up with a company phone registered to Dayton Industries, which was a subsidiary of the Trithea Group, which was owned by the international company InterAlia Shipping & Imports, Ltd., which was in turn a subsidiary of the conglomerate TridentC, in which Connor, like millions of other people, owned stock. Connor just happened to own a lot of stock, under a lot of names.

Shaw's phone, Connor had determined, was registered to Leyton Publications, which was part of Grimwald Associates, etc. Connor had met Shaw five years ago in a rare book store in Old Town, and Shaw had initiated a business-like exchange of names (an alias, in Connor's case) and cell-phone numbers. "One never knows," Shaw had said, with a remote smile and a polite hint of a bow, and one never did. Duncan had provided details from centuries past, and Connor had set detectives to discover Shaw's home. Shaw's main residence was in London, and he also had an estate south of Edinburgh, no doubt so Shaw could enjoy lording it over "his Scottish peasants." Connor hadn't had reason to contact Shaw since that first meeting.

The phone was answered after the fourth ring. "Shaw speaking," said a light tenor voice with oh-so-impeccable BBC-approved diction.

Not bad for the adopted son of Yorkshire nobility (very minor nobility) from three centuries back, Connor thought. Shaw had learned more than warfare during his centuries as an English redcoat, though judging from Elena's account, he obviously hadn't lost his taste for brutality. "Paul Ganton here," Connor said, leaning back on the sofa. "A 'business associate' would like to meet with you in Edinburgh for a discussion."

"What's his name?"

"Her name," Connor corrected. "Elena Duran."

"Duran, Duran…," Shaw mused.

"They haven't had a hit song in years," Connor noted.

"Quite," Shaw bit out, obviously not amused. "From South America, yes?"

"Yes," Connor said.

"Then I have heard of her. What does she want?"

"To discuss the debt of Lorenzo Ponti."

Shaw sniffed. "He was late, of course—he's Italian, what can one expect?—but that debt has been paid."

"Only on one side. She thinks you owe her."

This time Shaw sighed. "So she was the Immortal I sensed as I was leaving. He's her gigolo, is he?"

"He's her husband."

"Really?" came the incredulous drawl. "A mortal." He tsked in disapproval and distaste.

Connor let it slide. He had promised Alex he wouldn't look for fights, and this whole mess was Duran's problem, not his. "Meet with Duran, Shaw."

"You didn't strike me as a matchmaker, Ganton."

"More like an insurance agent," Connor replied. "Right now I'm offering life insurance, a special one-time deal. You interested or not?"

Shaw sniffed and sighed this time, irritation followed by resignation. "A discussion, you said."

"Yes."

"On Holy Ground."

"Of course. Tomorrow."

"I had planned," Shaw informed him, "to deep-cultivate my rose beds tomorrow."

"Duran is not renowned for her patience," Connor informed him in turn. "Or her restraint."

"You know her well, I see. Is she a friend of yours?"

Connor ducked the question. "She's in Edinburgh, and she wants to leave. Soon."

"Oh, very well," Shaw said. "I can be in Edinburgh tomorrow afternoon."

"Three o'clock, St. Mary's Cathedral," Connor said and hung up before Shaw could squawk about meeting on "papist" ground. The very Catholic Elena, Connor knew, would appreciate that church, and she would also appreciate being inside. Even with all her faults, Shaw irritated Connor more than Elena did.

Connor went downstairs to retrieve Elena's card from his jacket pocket, only to be ambushed by Colin and Sara, who had been lying in wait with pillows in hand. Connor spent twenty minutes or so wrestling with Colin and Sara (and getting pummeled unmercifully). Then he went back upstairs to the sitting room and sat at the desk to call Elena.

She answered the phone before the second ring. "Hello?"

"Three o'clock tomorrow, St. Mary's Cathedral, York Place."

She let out a noise somewhere between a whistle and a whoosh. "Good! And thank you."

"You're welcome. By the way, he knows me as Paul Ganton, not Connor MacLeod."

"I'll remember it in case Shaw mentions you," she said. "And if he does, what do you want me to say?"

Connor rolled his eyes heavenward and gave a silent sigh. "Nothing."

"I understand. You want to stay out of it completely."

At least she'd finally figured that out. Connor was about to hang up when Elena said, "Now … can you tell me anything about him?"

Yet another request for information. Maybe he should start charging by the minute. But Connor knew Elena would return the favor in kind someday. Also, the more she knew, the better her chances of surviving this encounter, and even though she'd annoyed the hell out of him today—and on a few other occasions—Connor didn't want Elena dead over something as stupid as her husband's gambling debts. He stood and went over to the window, speaking as he walked. "Until lately, Shaw has spent his life as a British officer. First death at Culloden in 1746, served with distinction under Cumberland then spent the next ten years in Scotland."

"Duncan told me about Culloden, and what came after. That is not high praise for an Englishman."

"No," Connor agreed, remembering again the anguished screams of his people, the smoke from burning crofts and farms, and countless starving children with hopeless eyes. Connor looked through the window to the peaceful, prosperous street below, lined on either side with beautiful houses. No war in Scotland now, thank God, though it was always happening somewhere in the world. "Shaw's a man of his time, a typical English nobleman of years past," Connor went on. "He's a bully and a sadist, but he's not a coward, and he won't cheat. Honor is important to him. He likes his money, his books, his dogs, and his roses. He despises mortals, Jews, Catholics, women, non-whites, and foreigners, particularly the Spanish, Scots, Irish, and Welsh. And Italians, too, of course."

"Don't forget the Frenchies," she said. "Well, since I'm a half-breed Catholic woman from Argentina, I guess he won't be including me in his garden parties. Or you, for that matter."

"Probably not," Connor said with a smile.

"Bien. I am correct in assuming you don't care one way or another if I decapitate him."

"You are."

"Thanks for giving me the advantage of a Catholic church and being inside, out of that cold north wind, Connor."

"It's not cold," Connor contradicted automatically, but then acknowledged her gratitude with a gruff, "Don't mention it," even as he was a little surprised that she had. Not that she couldn't be perceptive, but she was usually blithely self-absorbed, and when she was hunting, she was totally focused on her goal. Connor understood that, all too well.

"Will you put Alex on the telephone so I can say goodbye?" she was saying.

Connor ground his teeth in exasperation. So much for Duran being perceptive. She still didn't get it. "No."

"But—" The whoosh this time was a disappointed sigh. "Fine, Connor. Have it your way."

"I intend to," he said and clicked off the phone.

"Intend to what?" Alex asked.

Connor turned from the window to see his wife standing in the doorway leading to their bedroom, wearing her usual at-home attire: faded blue jeans and a soft wool sweater, which didn't sound like much but sure looked good on her, especially with the slightly tousled hair. "Have it my way," he said with a slow smile, taking his time in appreciating the long slim legs, the gentle curve of hips and waist, the more generous curves of breasts, and the stunningly beautiful face above.

Alex gave him an equally slow smile back. "Do you?" she said and came into the room. Connor set the phone on the desk and joined her on the sofa, lying back with Alex in his arms. He combed his fingers through her hair, smoothing the wayward golden tufts. "Did you help Elena?" Alex asked.

"Mmm." He twined one of her curls around his finger then thought to ask, "Where are the kids?"

"In the basement, watching _The Count of Monte Cristo_ again." She propped her head up on her hand to look at him. "Connor, about earlier today …"

Good. He'd been waiting for Alex to bring this up. He'd decided on the wait-and-listen approach with her years ago.

"… when Elena said she wanted to see you," Alex explained, "I didn't realize at first that it was part of the Game."

"Alex …" Connor tried to keep his long-suffering sigh from going on too long. "What else could it be?"

"Books, horses, antiques?" Alex suggested. "Or maybe money or whisky or music. Not everything in your lives is about Immortals."

True, but … "Didn't you notice Elena was excited? Impatient?"

"I just thought she was always like that."

Connor laughed aloud. "You're right; she is."

"And she's a friend of Duncan, and you know her, and I've met her and I like her, and Cass likes her. I know Elena wouldn't hurt me or Colin or Sara. So I didn't see any harm in inviting Elena inside out of the cold for fifteen minutes to wait for you. After she was inside and I realized…" Alex shrugged. "It was only a few more minutes before you came home."

"No harm done today," Connor agreed. "But if the Immortal whom Elena was hunting was also hunting for her…" Connor left it there for Alex to figure out for herself. She liked that better than being told she was wrong. After Alex had nodded, Connor laid down the law. "Unless I'm there, don't ever invite an Immortal into our home."

"Connor—"

"Alex," he said, cutting her protest short. "When I came back from running, I sensed an unknown Immortal in my home, with my wife and with my children." Even seeing Colin and Sara waving to him from the window hadn't allayed his fears. Kids weren't that hard to fool. "Shall I tell you what I imagined before I got to the door?" Connor asked.

Alex's lips tightened in an unhappy smile. "Probably the same kind of things I start to imagine every time you or the kids are more than ten minutes late coming home."

Connor pulled her to him, wrapping his arms around her as he closed his eyes, wishing he could make it all go away. Sometimes he forgot they both had to live with that fear.

"Cass visits sometimes when you're not home," Alex pointed out, her head on his shoulder and her fingers toying with the top button on his shirt. "So does Duncan."

"Those two, but no others," Connor amended. "But that's only because Duncan's family, and Cassandra always calls me before she stops by."

Alex lifted her head. "I didn't know she did that."

"We've surprised each other once too often," Connor said dryly. "I also call her."

"But, unless you see the Immortal right away, when you first sense them you're not sure who it is."

"That's right," he said. "I'm never sure."

Alex sighed and laid her head back down on his shoulder then reached for his hand. "It's a lousy business, Connor."

"I've never hidden that from you."

"No, you haven't," she agreed softly. "You made sure I knew what I was getting into before I married you, and I'm glad." She brought his hand to her lips and kissed the back of each finger, one by one, and then she kissed him. Connor kissed her back and was just about to suggest moving to the bedroom, or maybe the floor, when Alex pulled away and asked, "Is Elena going to be all right?"

Connor silently cursed Elena Duran once more, then resigned himself to answering all of Alex's questions. When the time came, he wanted his wife's full attention. "She'll be all right. It's a discussion, not a challenge." At least, not so far.

"That's good. When's she leaving town?"

"Probably tomorrow night."

"So soon?"

Connor shrugged. "She's a newlywed, and her husband's waiting."

"So she's even more impatient and excited than usual," Alex said and gave him another slow smile. "I remember being a newlywed," she said next, her voice going husky and her eyes going smoky-blue, as her fingers traced a slow line from his ear to his chin. "The bedroom. The elevator. The airplane ride over here."

"And we were interrupted every single time," Connor pointed out. "As for our wedding night …"

"I certainly didn't invite Lt. John Stenn of the New York City Police Department to the reception," Alex pointed out in turn.

"Neither did I," Connor said grimly.

"Besides, he didn't interrupt us. That was my mother, then John, and then when Duncan—"

"Don't remind me," Connor said, even more grimly than before. Never mind what Connor had done at Duncan's wedding in New Zealand four months ago. Connor was going to make Duncan pay for the rest of his life.

"We only had to wait four days after the wedding, Connor."

"That, and the week before."

"But it was worth the wait. Wasn't it?"

"Oh, yeah," he agreed fervently, and they were both smiling now. Connor decided to try to recreate that honeymoon right now.

Then Alex announced, "I'm going to ask Elena if she wants to have dinner tonight. She'd probably like to get out, instead of sitting alone in a hotel room."

Connor swore in exasperation as he sat up, running his fingers through his hair. Wouldn't that woman ever get out of his life? "No."

"You don't have to come," Alex said, sitting up, too. "I know you don't enjoy her company. You can watch the kids while Elena and I go out."

"No," Connor said again, getting to his feet.

"No?" Alex repeated, looking up at him in confusion. "You mean you won't watch the kids?"

"No, I mean you aren't going out to dinner with Elena Duran."

Alex stood, too. "No?"

"No."

Alex leaned back slightly, folding her arms across her chest. "And why is that?"

"Because she's a walking target for trouble, and she's not safe to be around. I told her not to come near us."

"She's not coming near us; I'm going to her."

"No, you're not."

Alex's foot tapped slowly and silently on the floor, a sure sign of thinking in her. When her foot stopped, she asked, "This Immortal Elena is looking for, is he also hunting for her?"

"No," Connor said, because he would not lie to his wife.

"Is she any more likely than you are to get attacked at a restaurant in Edinburgh tonight?"

Connor gritted his teeth but admitted the truth again. "No."

"If an Immortal does appear, do you think she can handle it?"

Give credit where credit is due. "Yes."

Alex tilted her head and said, with her dangerously sweet voice of reason, "Then why don't you want me to have dinner with her?"

"She's hunting."

"She is not hunting; she's waiting," Alex corrected, abandoning sweet reason and going straight to full-scale logical attack. "The way all of you are always waiting. I am not going to let the Game rule my entire life, Connor. I am not going to let it keep me a prisoner—your prisoner—in my own home."

"You're not a prisoner, Alex," Connor said in exasperation. "But you are not going to have dinner with Elena Duran."

* * *

_**Continued in Chapter 3****: Turning the Table**_


	3. Chapter 3: Turning the Table

**Chapter 3****: Turning the Table**

Alex met Elena for dinner at seven that evening.

"Elena, you look wonderful!" Alex said, impulsively hugging the other woman, though she hadn't done so earlier that day when Elena had first appeared at the door. Alex had never been a "touchy-feely" kind of person, and hugging someone she'd met once and hadn't seen in over ten years had seemed a bit much. But not anymore. Elena's hug back was stronger and longer than Alex thought it would be, and when Elena finally let go, Alex stepped back to admire. "I love your dress, Elena."

"I bought it this afternoon, right after you called to invite me for dinner," Elena said, twirling around so that Alex could see. The black silk flared out just above Elena's knees, but clung tightly everywhere else, except where there wasn't any fabric at all. Her matching black eyepatch and the faint scars on her neck added to the allure of exotic mystery.

Alex was glad now she'd chosen her white pleated silk with the plunging neckline instead of her warm and sensible—but not nearly as sexy—blue cashmere sheath. Connor hadn't stayed in the bedroom to watch her get dressed, the way he usually did, but when she had finally appeared downstairs, he'd gotten up from his chair, walked over to her slowly, taken her hand and bowed, all the while looking straight into her eyes. "You're beautiful," he'd told her, as he had told her earlier that day in their bed, where he'd taken her after they'd finished discussing the Game. Alex still felt beautiful now.

"I see we both like silk," Elena said. "The lady in white and the lady in black. Dominoes."

"Yes," Alex agreed, with a sudden mental image of a tiny white dot on a large black field.

"So, tell me," Elena said, linking arms with Alex and drawing her down to sit on the plush divan in front of the fireplace in the hotel drawing room, "however did you convince Connor to change his mind?"

She'd yelled at him, told him exactly what she'd been putting up with because of him. "I'm always locking doors and closing windows," Alex had said to Connor in their sitting room. "I look behind me, around me, and in front of me for possible assassins or kidnappers everywhere I go. I check my car for bombs every time I drive. I live my life surrounded by weapons and the constant threat of death or dismemberment, both for me and my family, and I am _not_ going to let that damned Game of yours determine everything I do!"

Connor hadn't said anything to that, but he'd finally nodded, so Alex had picked up the phone from the desk, hit redial, and gotten Elena right away. Elena had said no to the dinner invitation at first, and then she'd told Alex why. "He said that, did he?" Alex had said, fixing her husband with a steady stare, and then she'd handed Connor the phone.

"Elena, you can have dinner with Alex tonight," Connor had said, all in one breath, and given the phone back to Alex immediately, as if he hadn't wanted to hear another word. But as soon as Alex had clicked off the phone, Connor had taken her hand and said, "I'm sorry, Alex," and she'd known he wasn't apologizing only for this most recent disagreement, but for the way the Game affected their entire lives.

"It's all right, Connor," she'd said immediately. The Game wasn't his fault, and she wasn't really that upset. Having dinner with Elena wasn't critically important to Alex, but Connor thinking he could order her around was. Alex always set him straight right away. She knew Connor took her more seriously when she was angry, and years ago she'd decided on the "get mad to get him to listen" approach with him. She didn't do it very often, and she never let it last very long.

"I just want you to be safe," Connor had said.

"I know."

"I love you, Alex."

"I know that, too," she'd said with a smile. "Want to show me how much?" she'd invited, and Connor had smiled back and taken her to bed, reminding her once again why she loved him and why she put up with the Game. He was worth it. He was worth it all.

Now she was having dinner with Elena Duran, and Elena, understandably enough, wanted to know how Alex had gotten Connor to change his mind. But the only person Alex ever discussed the ins and outs of her marriage with was her mom (and sometimes, inadvertently, with Cassandra). Giving Elena Duran information about how to convince Connor of anything was obviously not a good idea. "I'm his wife," Alex said simply, and Elena smiled knowingly in return. "What kind of food would you like?" Alex asked, moving the conversation to safer ground.

"I'd prefer something hot, but I'm not that hungry. You decide."

They ended up in the restaurant of the basement of the hotel. Elena didn't want to go out in "the cold" again, and she requested the table close to the fireplace in the corner of the low-ceilinged room. Elena sat with her back to the wall, of course, then evaluated the room rapidly, checking out the people in the room, each of the fifteen or so tables, the bar near the stairs, and all of the doors. One good thing about being with Immortals; they always knew where the bathroom was.

Alex and Elena ordered, then they were left alone, looking at each other across a dark wooden square of a table as they waited for Alex's Caesar salad and Elena's cream of haddock soup to arrive. The fingers of Elena's left hand were tapping out a complicated rhythm that made the water in the glasses ripple, and when Alex glanced under the table, she saw that Elena's toes were tapping, too, trembling like a race horse before the starting bell.

"I take it you don't feel unsafe being here with me," Elena said, breaking the silence, just as straightforward and blunt as she'd been eleven years ago.

Alex smiled to herself as she unfolded her napkin, its ocean-blue color a perfect match to the abstract designs of swirling waves and leaping salmon on the otherwise stark white walls. "No more unsafe than usual," Alex replied, which was both a compliment to Elena's skill and a reminder to her that Alex had lived in the shadow of the Game for thirteen years.

"Thank you for your vote of confidence, Alex."

"Not only my vote. Connor said you could handle it if an Immortal appeared," Alex told her, and Elena lifted an eyebrow but looked pleased. "I often think that Connor is overcautious," Alex said, "but he has his reasons."

"And I respect his reasons." Elena's one eye was sparkling with amusement. "I take it he told you not to come, but you came anyway. I also respect that."

"And I thank you for your vote," Alex replied. "Did your husband like you coming to Scotland?"

"No. But I came anyway," she said, and both women smiled this time. "I was hoping to see John while I was here," Elena said, unfolding her own napkin.

"You just missed him," Alex said. "He left on Wednesday to get back to graduate school in Colorado."

"!Que barbaridad! Last time I saw him he was only a little older than Colin and Sara."

"John's twenty-three now, all grown-up. Here," Alex said, pulling her wallet from her purse and flipping to the pictures.

"He's very handsome," Elena said, studying the snapshot. "I like the mustache."

Alex smiled as she put her wallet away. "So does he."

The waiter arrived with the soup and salad and the wine, and Elena nodded her approval of the burgundy. "Is Cassi back from her vacation yet?" Elena asked as the waiter poured the wine. "We had a great cruise together."

"Yes, she got back the week before Christmas and told me all about it," Alex said. "I'm afraid you just missed her, too. She was here in Edinburgh for our annual New Year's Eve party and Connor's birthday the next day, but she went back to the Highlands on Tuesday. She said she needed time to get ready to start teaching music again, she'd been away from the school for so long."

"She's very dedicated to her students and her job. And so are you, as I recall. How's your work going, Alex?" Elena said, but before Alex could answer, Elena turned suddenly to watch a middle-aged couple descend the stairs, she in soft violet, he in a kilt of red and blue. They took seats at the bar, and Elena turned back to Alex with a smile, saying, "I saw Duncan in a kilt once. He looked great. I bet Connor does, too."

"I've never seen him in a kilt," Alex said. "And in the great plaid only a few times." She picked up her glass and smiled at Elena over the rim. "But you're right; he looked good in it." And very good out of it, too, Alex thought contentedly as she lowered her eyes and sipped at her wine, remembering a certain summer day a few years ago.

"That one doesn't have the legs for a kilt," Elena said, gesturing with her head towards the couple at the bar. "I don't think he ever did."

Alex set down her glass. "Not everyone is blessed with beauty, Elena." A corner of Alex's mind whispered: Or eternal youth. Alex speared an anchovy with her fork.

"I admit I'm prejudiced," Elena said with a careless shrug of her smooth-skinned and perfectly muscled shoulders, "but I admire people who try to stay in shape."

"So do I," Alex replied, "but I don't think that gives me the right to disparage people who don't stay in shape, or make fun of those who will never have 'the legs for a kilt,' no matter what they do."

Elena's eyebrows went up in surprise. She opened her mouth to say something then closed it again. Finally, she said, "Alex, I know you've been busy with Colin and Sara for these last ten years, but I don't need a mother to teach me manners."

Immortals didn't even have mothers, and with some of them, it showed. "Thumper did."

"Thumper?"

"The rabbit in the movie 'Bambi.' His mother told him: 'If you can't say something nice, don't say nothing at all.'"

"Bambi," Elena said, shaking her head with a smile. "Alex, I say a lot of things that aren't nice, usually on purpose. But not to you, and I don't want to argue with you."

Alex wasn't here to argue, either. She'd come partly to keep Elena company, but also to satisfy her own curiosity. Alex wanted to know more about this woman whom Cassandra found entertaining and Connor found irritating. In the last ten minutes, Alex had already found Elena Duran to be both.

"Can we just drop this, please?" Elena was saying, being charming now.

"Yes," Alex agreed then added sincerely, "Please excuse me, Elena. It seems I am a little tense tonight."

"You and me both," Elena said with a smile. She waved one hand in grand dismissal of the whole affair. "So, Alex, about your work. Dug up anything good lately?"

"I went to Cyprus on a dig of a Chalcolithic cemetery last spring, but this year my publisher asked me to write another book, so I'm researching legends again." They chatted about that for a few moments, and then about Attila the Hun and a book on Rome they had both read. But Alex hadn't come here to talk about history or about herself. She leaned forward, resting her chin on her interlaced hands. "Enough of work—you have a new husband! Tell me all about him. How did you meet?"

"At a polo match the summer before last," Elena said. She took one more spoonful of soup then pushed the bowl aside, though it was still nearly two-thirds full, as were both their glasses of wine. Most of the water, however, had disappeared. "He'd just graduated from university and was playing to raise money for UNESCO," Elena said. "He's tall, blond, and handsome, and he looks very fine on a horse." She grinned happily.

Alex automatically smiled in return, even as her mental image of Lorenzo was flipping from man to boy. Lorenzo was only a year or two older than Alex's stepson, John. Which meant that Elena had married a man who was twenty years younger than Alex. But then of course, Elena looked fifteen years younger than Alex. No doubt Elena and Lorenzo made a striking couple. Alex reached for her wine.

"So, near the end of the match," Elena was saying, her hands talking, too, waving about in a ballet of motion, "he falls off his horse, limps off the field, and comes right to me where I was sitting in the second row. In front of God and the whole world, he yells out, 'Signorina, you are so incredibly beautiful that when I saw you from my horse I was stunned, lost my concentration, and fell off!'"

"He thinks on his feet, I see," Alex said, with a real smile this time, leaning back to let the waiter take her salad plate and Elena's bowl. "And then?"

"Then I laughed. And he said, 'Since you have caused me such agony—,' and Alex," Elena said, putting her hand on Alex's arm, "he was clearly not in 'agony.' But he said, '—the least you can do is have dinner with me.'"

"And so you did."

"As he said, it was the least I could do." Elena spoke more of Lorenzo—his family was rich (but definitely not Mafia), he loved old movies, he was well-educated, charming, and the eldest of five children. "We talk about everything: art, politics, horses—love. If I mention a book he doesn't know, he reads it—and I do the same. And he argues with me, Alex. From the first day—he fights back."

"You admire that," Alex said, knowing that finding a strong man for a strong woman wasn't easy.

"Oh, yes." Elena nodded, obviously remembering. "He also makes me laugh. He has all these little jokes—sometimes when I see him I start to smile in anticipation. I smile for other reasons, too." She pulled out a photo for Alex to see, saying, "You can't tell from the photo, but he has the nicest ass …"

"That is important," Alex agreed with a grin, then studied the evidence at hand. His wide shoulders nicely filled out a T-shirt which read Universita Cattolica Del Sacro Cuore. (The first two words were easy enough, and Alex used her Latin to finish it and come up with "Catholic University of the Sacred Heart.") He'd been caught in the act of putting a strawberry in his mouth, but he was smiling, brown eyes crinkled at the corners, laughing at the camera. "He has a nice smile," Alex said, handing it back. "The rest of him isn't bad, either."

"None of him is bad, Alex. Come to think of it, he'd look just fine in a kilt, too," Elena replied, raising her eyebrows playfully. As Elena was putting the photo back into her bag, she caught sight of the waiter coming their way again. Her face lit up in anticipation, and she said, "As I remember, the Scots make a good steak." The waiter set chateau briand (rare) and a baked potato in front of Elena, and then smoked duck with risotto in front of Alex, each plate garnished with carrots in a honey-fennel sauce. Elena watched the waiter disappear into the kitchen and surveyed everyone in the room again. Her fingers were tapping the entire time. "Right after Lorenzo and I met," Elena said, turning back to the dinner and slicing into her steak, "we had a tornado romance— No, that's not the phrase, is it?"

Alex smiled to herself before she looked up from cutting a piece of carrot in two, because tornado suited Elena just fine. "It's usually a 'whirlwind' romance."

"A whirlwind romance, then," Elena said, waving one hand. "We were married five months later, the day after Christmas. He's a sweet man, not at all the typical irresponsible playboy type." She put a piece of steak in her mouth and chewed thoughtfully, swallowed, then said, "At least not completely. And here's the most important thing: he loves me, and I love him."

"Yes," Alex agreed. "Love is so important." But it wasn't the only thing that mattered in a marriage. Alex started in on the duck.

"Now you tell me about Susan MacLeod," Elena said, leaning forward and giving Alex her full attention.

"Susan … she's a good person," Alex said, pausing with her knife in her hand as she thought back to Duncan's wedding in New Zealand four months ago. "She has blue eyes and curly red hair. She's tall and very slender, the way some redheads are, you know? She has two kids from her first marriage—"

"Widowed?"

"Divorced. Her ex lives on the North Island now. I don't think he sees Paula and Tommy very often. They're ten and eight," Alex added. "Susan's a librarian at the local school, and her hobbies are bee-keeping and painting and dogs. She and Duncan met at a sheep-dog trial."

"Yes, he told me. We parted on good terms, and we've kept in touch over the last ten years."

Alex nodded, wondering what it was like to share a lover over the centuries. Elena didn't seem jealous or bothered about Duncan's new wife, and Amanda hadn't, either. Or did mortal partners even matter? Did other Immortals simply dismiss them as temporary diversions, defective specimens who grew old and died and never had the legs to wear a kilt?

Alex went back to slicing her duck into pieces, deciding not to worry about such things. Connor loved her, and she loved him, and what other people thought didn't matter. Alex continued with her description of Mrs. Susan MacLeod. "She's generous, patient, got a great sense of humor, and she's good with kids. She loves to dance and she loves to ride. She and Duncan are very happy together."

"If she likes horses, I like her already." Elena tipped her fork in her potato and scooped up some of the buttered mass, nibbled at it, and set down her fork. "I'd like to meet her someday."

Alex set down her fork, too. While she didn't know how Immortals felt about such things, she did know what it was like from the other side. "Speaking as the mortal wife of an Immortal, Elena, I don't think you and Susan meeting is a good idea. I don't think Duncan and Lorenzo should meet, either. Mortal spouses and former Immortal lovers aren't a good mix."

Elena leaned back in her chair. "You and Cassi get along just fine."

"Cassandra and Connor were lovers four centuries ago, not ten years ago like you and Duncan. And besides, Cass is … well, you know her. She's no threat, to any marriage. She doesn't like men anywhere near her, and she hasn't been on a date in centuries. Whereas you, Elena …" Alex shook her head and smiled as she took in Elena's slinky black outfit again. "You're like a blaze of fireworks." Duncan was, too. Lorenzo, no matter how young and handsome he might be, was a mere squib in comparison, and he would know it.

Elena laughed merrily. "I can be low-key if I want to. Really, I can," she repeated under Alex's disbelieving stare. "But I usually don't want to. In any case, I'm glad Duncan is having a chance to raise children. I'm sure he's a patient and loving father." She looked at Alex then added, "I know Connor is, too; I can tell by how protective he is of Sara and Colin. Too bad I won't get a chance to see them again."

"I wish you could visit again, too, Elena. I'm sorry—" Alex stopped herself right there, because she wasn't sorry about it; she was annoyed. No, make that angry—and resentful. Immortality was hard enough to live with, but she hated the bloody juggernaut of a Game that made normal life impossible. But the Game wasn't her fault or under her control, and she wasn't about to apologize for it, or for what Connor felt he had to do. "I wish we could visit more," Alex said simply and left it at that.

"Me, too." They ate in silence for a few moments, though Alex noticed that Elena hadn't been eating much: just a few bites of steak, a little more of the potato, a sip or two of wine. She'd said she wasn't hungry, plus all that looking around the restaurant and toe tapping and finger drumming took time. "Look," Elena said, setting down her empty water glass, "I may tease and push Connor himself, and that's a lot of fun—but where his family is concerned, I absolutely respect his wishes."

"Wise choice," Alex said dryly. "Connor really said he'd take your head?"

Elena nodded emphatically. "Yes, and he meant it, too. When an Immortal says, 'I'll kill you,' it's not just a phrase." She picked up her wineglass but only stared into it.

"Thinking about your meeting tomorrow?" Alex asked.

"It's hard to forget. We're supposed to just talk, but the chance of dying is always there." She looked up with a brave yet sincere smile. "I'm not scared. Most Immortals don't scare me, or probably scare Connor." She drank her wine and, looking over the edge at Alex, admitted, "Your husband scares me."

"Does he?" Alex murmured, with an uncomfortable mix of revulsion and perverse pride.

Elena chuckled. "I'd rather you didn't tell him I said that, although he knows it. There's a side of him you haven't seen, Alex. I have seen it, and…" She drank a swallow of wine then pushed her plate away and wiped her mouth with her napkin.

But Alex had seen that side, only not directed at her. Connor hadn't liked Kane or Yaliti at all, and he didn't much care for Elena, either. Connor had been downright intimidating this afternoon in the front hall. Alex had no appetite left for the food remaining on her plate. "Has Lorenzo seen that side of you?"

Elena nodded, staring past Alex at something that wasn't there. "Not aimed at him, of course, but yes," Elena admitted after a moment. "A battle and a Quickening. Have you seen—"

"Yes, but from a distance." She didn't want to see one again. "How does Lorenzo feel about having a warrior for a wife?"

"What do you think? He's an Italian male. It's difficult for him, and unfortunately there are Immortals in every big city."

"Why not leave Rome? Move to a smaller town or to the country?"

"Like the Highlands?" Elena asked with a grin. "Or New Zealand?" She shook her head. "Eventually, after ten years or so, we will have to move. People will start to notice me and wonder."

"Ten years?" Alex repeated. She and Connor had already been in the Highlands for twelve.

"Oh, around that," Elena said. "I've gone twenty years in one place, but the Ponti family is in high society, which means paparazzi. Pictures can be hard to explain."

Alex nodded, glad she didn't have photographers after her, and leaving the moving problem behind … for a while.

"But we just got married," Elena said, "and Lorenzo works in Rome. His family has been there since the Renaissance or something. He doesn't want to be driven out of his home. So…" She shrugged.

"So you take the chance that the Game may come to your home, and you may have to fight to protect him."

"I'd rather see his pride hurt than bury him," she said firmly.

"Elena…" Alex decided to go ahead and say it. "There are other ways to lose him, besides the Game. If your fighting makes him feel less than a man, eventually he could decide to leave you."

Elena closed her eye and shook her head. "Yes. But I'd also rather divorce him than bury him." She took a piece of bread from the basket and buttered it, then set it down untasted. "Does it bother you when Connor fights to protect you?"

"Yes. But I'm a woman; it's different."

Elena smiled a little bitterly. "I've been a woman for several centuries, Alex. It's always been different, and often much more difficult than it is today. But what about you? Does it … terrify you when he fights?"

"It worries me," Alex corrected then admitted, "A lot. Terror comes when my children are threatened. Fear comes when it's me. For Connor, I trust him to take care of himself. But I still worry."

"I can imagine the fear cuts both ways, but I guess in some ways it's easier to act than to wait at home and worry."

"For you, perhaps." The waiter came and cleared the table, and the women were silent until he was gone. "Well, anyway," Alex said as she folded her napkin neatly and put it back on the table, "Connor's fought only three times since I've known him, and I—"

"Only three?" Elena interrupted, and Alex knew by the abruptness of the question that Elena thought three heads in twelve years wasn't a very good score. No doubt she had taken more. "Does that include the Englishman who came to your house when I was there?" Elena asked.

"No," Alex answered. "I was worried then, of course—and I was worried for you and Duncan, too—but you ended up being the one to fight Simon Andrew, not Connor. You know about the first two: Kane, when Connor and I met, and then ten years ago, when I was at the dig in Norway and Connor went to New York to visit Rachel, there was Bethel." Elena nodded once, her lips tight, and Alex deliberately did not look at Elena's eyepatch, the immortal woman's legacy from that madman.

"The third was in Cornwall, a few years back," Alex said then added with a wry smile, "Our summer holiday." Alex's gaze wandered to the leaping fish painted on the restaurant walls. There had been dolphins leaping in the Atlantic that day. She and Connor and the twins had watched them in the morning, in between building sandcastles and playing in the waves. At lunchtime, they'd gone to a restaurant to eat. Then the Immortal had arrived.

_**

* * *

Cornwall, Summer 2003**_

"His name's Yaliti," Connor said, after they had finished lunch and gone back to their rented cottage in a tiny village not far from the sea. "He's a Highlander."

"He doesn't look Scottish," Alex said, because Yaliti had dark eyes, dark skin, and dark hair tightly coiled into tiny curls.

"New Guinea Highlander," Connor explained, as he sat on the bed and tightened the laces on his boots. "He's from the Fore tribe."

"They were cannibals, right?" Alex asked from her place near the bedroom door. "Headhunters?"

Connor offered her only a lopsided grin before he took out the sharpening kit and his sword. He shrugged. "I can't hold that against him." He held up the katana to the light, the blade a gleaming deadly arc. "The Celts had quite a reputation as headhunters, too."

"And so do you," Alex observed, but Connor only shrugged again and got down to the business of sharpening his steel. Alex gritted her teeth at the too-familiar sound then marched over and stood right in front of him. "Connor."

He stopped and looked up, his eyes already gone to a flat, cold gray. Her husband, the father of her children, the man she knew and loved, had disappeared. Alex swallowed hard and tried anyway. "Why?" she asked then paused to let Connor listen to the voices of Sara and Colin coming up from the porch just outside.

Brother and sister were discussing their favorite way to eat ice cream. "Cones," Sara said, "because you can lick them and then bite the crunchy part." Her brother disagreed. "Bowls," Colin announced, "so you can add chocolate sauce and mush it all up."

"Why?" Alex asked Connor again. "Is there a vendetta between you and Yaliti? Did you shoot his brother? Did he eat your cabin boy two hundred years ago?"

"Not exactly."

"Not exactly," Alex said, repeating those two words with deliberate irony. "Then what, exactly?"

"Not my cabin boy, and not cannibalism." The sharpening stone rasped its way down the blade again. "My student, who was twenty-three years old."

"Connor—"

He looked up from his sword, and once again Alex was looking into a pair of killer-eyes. "I want his head, Alex," Connor said simply.

Alex had an equally simple reply. "His death isn't worth your life. Not to me."

Connor nodded but said, "Yours is, to me."

The room felt suddenly cold, and Alex swallowed before she asked, "What do you mean?" even though she already knew.

"If I don't kill him, he'll come after you."

So now here he sat, her very own knight errant—albeit clad in faded blue jeans, a T-shirt, and a pair of old hiking boots—sharpening his weapon and preparing to fight to the death to avenge a comrade and to protect his lady-love. Alex didn't understand how the old stories made this out to be romantic or thrilling. She didn't like it at all.

Connor could see that, of course; he knew her that well. He set aside his sword and stood then took her into his arms. Alex closed her eyes and breathed in the nearness of him, the warmth, the love. Connor placed a gentle finger under her chin to tilt her head back, and when Alex opened her eyes, she was glad to see her husband again, not the cold warrior of a moment ago. He kissed her before he said, "It's not about you, Alex. He and I have been looking for each other for centuries."

As if that helped. Any guilt that evaporated (not much) was immediately replaced by worry. This Yaliti wasn't as young and inexperienced as Alex had hoped. But she knew she couldn't stop it, and she wouldn't make it any harder for Connor than it already was. She nodded and kissed him lightly, almost casually, not desperately clinging the way she wanted to. "Would you like me to stay with you while you get ready?" she asked, making sure that her voice didn't shake. "Or would you rather be alone right now?"

The knuckles of Connor's left hand brushed the side of her cheek, and she turned her head to kiss them; then she looked into his eyes again, eyes of molten gray. "You go be with the kids," Connor said softly. "I'll be out soon."

It was only seventeen minutes, but it seemed a long time. Connor appeared on the porch with a rolled beach towel in his hand. No doubt the sword was hidden inside. "Hey, kids," Connor said, but when Sara and Colin looked up from their game of dominoes, Alex fled to the garden on the far side of the house, unable to watch Connor saying "I love you" and a coded "I may never see you again" to his daughter and son, because at six and a half years old, the kids had no idea of the existence or the necessities of the Game.

Alex couldn't say that sort of farewell to him, either, and she didn't want to hear it. When he joined her in the garden, she was glad that he was a man of few—sometimes no—words. They kissed, said "I love you," and then he set off for the beach, because Connor never said goodbye, and "I love you" said it all.

Alex waited until he disappeared from sight before she went back inside, changed into a blouse and skirt, then took Sara and Colin to the caretaker's cottage five houses down the lane, as she had arranged on the phone half an hour before. "My Betsy will be happy to watch them for you," said Mrs. Carne, speaking of her eldest girl. "She's saving up money for a computer. You'll be back in a few hours then?"

"Yes," Alex promised. She kissed her children, and then, driven by curiosity and dread, she set off to watch her husband kill a man … or possibly die. She followed the footpath out of the village, past the crumbling brick engine house of an abandoned copper mine, and up to the top of the cliff. She looked down to the small sandy beach below. They were there, stripped to the waist and fighting, pale skin and dark skin both already streaked with blood. Alex crouched low, so that she wouldn't be silhouetted against the sky, and watched the battle from above.

She'd seen Connor spar with other Immortals from time to time, occasionally seen him been cut and bleed, but those had been practice bouts with friends. This time was real. Alex watched through slitted fingers, not wanting to look, not able to look away. She didn't think, she didn't hope, she didn't dare to let herself feel, but still she winced at every clash of blades, and she bit into her lip at every sudden move. Connor was limping, and his left arm was covered with blood from the bicep down. The other Immortal had blood on his torso and left thigh. She could only dimly hear the harsh clang of the swords, and she was glad the roar of the waves drowned out any grunts of efforts or cries of pain.

The end, when it came, was silent, and so fast that Alex nearly didn't see. Connor had turned somehow, his sword up and angled, and then the blade was down, streaked with more red. The other Immortal's headless body wavered for a moment before it crumpled sideways to the sand, underneath a spraying fountain of red rain. Alex found herself almost frantically looking for the head, and she swallowed hard when she finally saw it, bobbing in the waves, a good ten feet away from where the body lay. A dark pool was already spreading near the slanted stump of the neck.

Connor dropped his sword and stumbled to the water's edge, just in time for the Quickening to strike. The lightning drove him to his knees, and the water boiled and steamed. Alex watched until it was over, until Connor had dragged himself out of the water and lain face-down and exhausted on the sand, next to the body of the man he had just killed. Then she huddled on the ground on the top of the cliff side, weeping silent tears, trembling all over, and swearing viciously in words and languages she hadn't even realized she knew.

After some time, she peeked over the cliff edge again. Connor was standing now, and the body and the head were both gone. Alex wasn't going to bother about how, and she hadn't come out here just to lie whimpering on the ground. Her husband had just fought to the death to protect her; the least she could do was give him a warm welcome home. Alex scrubbed at her face with both hands, wiped it dry with the hem of her skirt, then hurried down the path until she reached the abandoned engine house of the mine. She waited in the courtyard for Connor to come by.

He showed up about fifteen minutes later, walking slowly, head down. He carried the towel-wrapped katana in his left hand. Alex could see that he was tired, but somehow, with his hair darkened and slicked back with water, and dressed in a damp T-shirt above soaked jeans, he looked impossibly young.

Alex stepped out from the shadow of the old brick wall. "Hey, MacLeod!"

His head went up, like a wolf on the scent. Then he grinned, looking even younger than before, and he headed straight for her. Alex waited for him, her eyes locked to his, her pulse thrumming through her veins. She hadn't been with him after Bethel, but Alex remembered very well what Connor had been like—and what he had wanted—after he'd killed Kane.

Connor stopped only inches away, not touching her anywhere, yet she could feel the heat from him on her skin—and deeper inside. He smelled of ocean spray and sunshine and wind. "Are you following me?" he asked, circling her slowly, his breath stirring her hair as he spoke those familiar words, because she had followed him before.

Alex turned just as slowly to face him. "Always," she said, a fierce whispered promise, and Connor smiled, fierce and hungry, before he backed her up against the wall. The sun-warmed bricks were hot against her shoulder blades, but hotter still were Connor's hands, tangling in her hair, gripping her shoulders, sliding down her arms, following the curve of her waist, and then lower still to pull her against him hard.

"Why, Mrs. MacLeod," he said as if surprised, gathering up the fabric of her skirt in his hands. "You're not wearing underwear."

"Why, Mr. MacLeod," she answered, for her hands had been equally busy working at the buttons on his jeans. "Neither are you. Rather convenient, wouldn't you say?"

"Yes," he said, the word a growl and a hiss, and Alex answered his next swift movement with a gasped "yes" of her own. Connor took her by the wrists and pinioned her arms wide, so that she was held fast between his body and the wall. They stood there a moment, unmoving, staring into each other's eyes, until Alex called him by name. "Connor," she said, soft and low, and he answered with a devouring kiss that demanded all she had to give. So she gave it, and they had no more need of words.

* * *

The babysitter had been worth every penny they'd paid her that day.

"There is no holiday from the Game," Elena observed, and Alex came back to the present with a start.

"No," Alex agreed, already knowing she would never ask Elena how Lorenzo had dealt with her post-Quickening sexual needs. Some parts of a marriage needed to stay private. "After that time," Alex told Elena, "I asked Connor not to fight, if he could avoid it. I want my children to have a father, Elena, and I want my husband with me for the next fifty years or so. You Immortals have time. Your battles can wait."

Elena shook her head. "Not always."

"No, and I understand that. But if revenge has waited a hundred years already, can't it wait a hundred more?" Alex asked, using the same argument on Elena that she'd used on Connor four years earlier. "Connor promised me that he wouldn't hunt or fight unless the other Immortal was hunting him, or threatening us, or unless something very serious was going on." Elena was leaning forward, intent and interested, and Alex mentally kicked herself as she suddenly realized why. In trying to convince Elena not to take unnecessary chances, Alex had just told the Immortal how many heads Connor had taken recently, and when and why Connor would pick up his sword. She knew better than to share that kind of information.

But still, Alex consoled herself, it wasn't that bad. Elena and Connor weren't enemies—not now anyway. If, in the centuries to come, they did decide to fight, Alex would be long gone, and Connor's promise wouldn't make a bit of difference. She'd tell Connor what she'd said to Elena, of course, just as soon as she got home, because this was Immortal business. He wouldn't like it, but she didn't think he'd be too bothered, because, really, what could Elena do with the information?

"I bet Lorenzo would love for me to promise him that," Elena mused.

She could learn from it, Alex thought in triumph, relieved to find that at least some of Elena's interest had apparently been for herself.

Elena met Alex's gaze. "But it's not an easy promise to keep."

"Whoever said marriage was easy?" Hers certainly wasn't, not usually, and definitely not today. "I give up things to be with Connor; he gives up things to be with me."

"You must keep Connor on his toes," Elena said happily. "I think he deserves you. But as far as Lorenzo is concerned … I'm walking a tightrope here, Alex, and I know it. But he's worth the trouble. I want to be with this man; I want to spend my next half-century or longer with him, if I can."

The waiter arrived with their desserts: cheesecake and espresso for Elena, raspberry soufflé and decaf coffee for Alex. Alex waited until the waiter left before she said, "If you fight this man tomorrow, Elena, you may not have any time with Lorenzo."

"You want me to walk away." She sighed. "I can't make any promises."

Alex wasn't the one Elena should be making promises to. But Alex had said enough already, maybe too much. They ate their desserts in silence, with only an occasional "ahh" or "mmm" of appreciation. Alex ate nearly all of her soufflé, promising herself she'd run five days this next week instead of her usual three. Elena, frozen forever at the age of thirty, didn't have to worry as much about such things. She also got plenty of exercise with a sword.

When they were finished, Elena slowly moved her head from side to side, getting kinks out of her neck, like a snake weaving in the air. Then she rubbed her hands together and said suddenly, "Alex, I'm always confident before a fight, but I'm not unrealistic."

In Alex's opinion, being always confident was unrealistic, not to mention prideful and rash. But maybe it was necessary to survive. Fear fed on fear, and an Immortal who went into a duel frightened had just handed her opponent another weapon to use. Survival of the most arrogant—wouldn't Darwin have been pleased. It certainly explained a lot about the Immortals that Alex knew.

"I know Connor doesn't hate me as much as he pretends," Elena started.

"He doesn't hate you, Elena," Alex said. "I'm sure of that. But he also doesn't pretend. He's not the most patient of men, and you … annoy him. That's all."

"I know. And he irritates me. Some of that is deliberate—on both our parts."

Yet another game Immortals played. Alex controlled her sigh.

"But I want you to know that Connor is an Immortal I trust, and there are damn few of those! And in spite of my annoying ways, he still gave me information on my opponent, and helped me. I already thanked him, and now I want to thank _you_, Alex. For coming to me, for trying to help, for caring. For making sure I wasn't alone tonight. I appreciate it."

"I'm glad I came," Alex said, and she meant it. It had been an interesting evening. "I've wanted a chance to talk to you, and … well, we're not likely to see each other after this, are we?"

"Well," Elena said, obviously thinking that over, "I won't go against Connor, but I also don't want to lose sight of you completely. Europe is small, and you travel a lot in your job."

"Yes, to dusty little corners of the world, hardly your—or Lorenzo's—style. You live a jet-set life in Rome and Buenos Aires; I live in the Highlands with horses and sheep. I don't think we'll be running into each other at either the Vatican or at school recitals very often."

"True. But you can't stay in the Highlands forever."

"Just as you can't stay in Rome. But you and Connor wouldn't live in the same city, not by choice."

"No. We Immortals like our space. Too much so sometimes." Elena reached over and took Alex's hand. "I've learned a few things in my time, Alex, and one of them is this: friends are hard to come by, and I don't give them up easily." She tightened her grip, and Alex squeezed back, because Elena was right; friends were rare. "If you ever do feel the need to get in touch," Elena said, "even though it goes against your husband's wishes, we do have a friend in common."

"Yes, Cass would help," Alex agreed. Cass would be happy to help. Right before Christmas, she and Alex had discussed including Elena in their plans. Alex had been the one to suggest it, and Cass had agreed, but with some reservations. After tonight, Alex could see why. "Elena has great strength and great courage," Cass had said, "but little subtlety and very little patience." And very little tact, Alex might add, but at times a direct approach was more effective than tact or subtlety, and Elena excelled at going full steam ahead. Alex was certain she would have reason to contact Elena in the years to come.

"And who knows?" Elena said, letting go of Alex's hand to lift both hands palm up in the air, a classic Italian gesture. "We might meet each other skiing in the Alps someday."

"Yes," Alex agreed, smiling as she lifted her coffee cup in a salute, since the wine glasses had been cleared away. "We might." Elena lifted her cup in return and they sipped; then Alex raised her cup in a toast: "I wish you and Lorenzo many happy years together."

"Thank you," Elena said, "and I pray for the same for you and Connor." After Alex had set down her cup, Elena continued, "Before we go our totally separate ways, may I ask you one favor? And if you can't do it, I'll understand completely."

Alex nodded. "Ask."

"If anything happens tomorrow, it will be right after I meet Shaw. We'll go somewhere … private. I don't always get this opportunity, and I don't always have a husband to care about me. Since I can't call you at home, would you call me here at the hotel tomorrow?"

"Yes, of course."

"If there's no answer…" Elena took a business card emblazoned with "Ponti" from her wallet then wrote a phone number on the back of the card. She offered it to Alex, saying, "This is Lorenzo's private line. If I'm not at the hotel by five, will you please ask Connor to contact my husband? So I don't just disappear, and Lorenzo knows what happened to me?"

Alex took the card by the edges, watching as it bent and flexed from the simple touch of her hand. Here was the other price of the Game: Please name your next of kin. "I'll call Lorenzo, if you'd like," Alex offered. Connor wasn't known for his tact, either.

Elena shook her head. "The further you stay away from the Game, the better. Besides, I'd rather Connor called him: one man to another. If Connor will do it. Tell him it's my dying wish." Elena was smiling, but this was no joke. Alex was about to agree when Elena put her hand over Alex's and said, "I'll try not to fight. But if I do, I have no intention of losing."

There was that requisite arrogance again, brought by blood into the breed. Not one of them ever intended to lose, but one of them always did. Alex tucked the card into her wallet next to her credit card, wondering if someday, someone would call her.

"Connor won't lose either, Alex," Elena said, still sounding confident, when she had no right to be. "He has too much to live for."

Alex almost snapped at Elena to stop being so patronizing, but bit off the words when she saw the sincerity in the other woman's face. "Do you truly believe that, Elena?" Alex asked, trying to hide her disbelief. "That simply wanting to live can make it happen?"

Elena smiled. "I've fought alone, just for me, just to stay alive. I've also fought to save someone else's life, and when I knew someone loved me, when my death would cause pain to someone I cared about. There's a difference in your attitude and in your swordwork, believe me—at least for me," she amended.

Alex nodded then snapped the clasp on her purse shut and stood to leave. With one smooth motion, Elena bent to pick up her bag and stood, and they looked at each other across the dark square of the table once more. Alex stared helplessly at this beautiful and vibrant woman, this fierce warrior who sometimes loved to kill, this Immortal.

And immortality was what this was all about, wasn't it?

"Even when you have everything to live for, Elena," Alex said finally, speaking a truth she lived with every day, "that doesn't mean you can't die."

* * *

_**Continued in Chapter 4: Another Player**_


	4. Ch 4 and Ch 5

**Chapter 4****: Another Player **

_**Saturday Morning**__**  
Rome**_

Lorenzo lay perfectly awake as he had been all night, on silk sheets on his bed in his multimillion-euro villa outside Rome, alone and hurting. It was high time he got up, but he didn't have the heart. His wife, Elena, was gone. He'd paid for his mistake, but now he was paying again, and so was she—maybe with her life. He might not see her again, and he'd just let her go, just watched impotently as she walked away while he stayed home, waiting, and the whole thing was his fault, from the beginning…

* * *

**Three days earlier**

* * *

After the beating, Lorenzo had spent the next two days in a haze of painkillers and sleep. It was Wednesday before he was completely awake and aware at the same time. His parents were waiting to speak to him, of course, and he could hear the voices of his brothers and other relatives downstairs. Elena left to give him some privacy with his parents. His father gave him the good news: because the police had been discreet, the doctor had come to the villa, and no one had been that badly hurt, the so-called newspapers who usually ate up stories like this had not gotten it. "You'll just have to be careful and not be seen with that cane," his father said then exclaimed, "Paparazzi!" making it sound like a curse word.

"They'd have had you mixed up with the Mafia on page one, making love to every young woman in Italy on page three, and divorced with a bastard child on page five," his mother sniffed.

After his parents left and the maid cleared away the refreshments, Lorenzo was left with the usual inescapable thought that his mother was a mind reader of some kind, because she'd hit the truth, or near-truth, with every word. But although he'd lied to his parents, he wasn't going to lie to his wife.

"It was the Mafia," he told Elena later as he lay on the sofa in their sitting room, that damned cane the doctor insisted he use close at hand. Elena raised her eyebrows, and Lorenzo explained, "The British Mafia, although I didn't know it at the time. Before Christmas, while I was in London to negotiate the merger and you were in Argentina, I did some gambling." He'd casually mentioned that he was looking for something exciting, something challenging, and Stanton, a financial adviser for the British corporation, had taken Lorenzo to a private club, which, Stanton had said, was the "best game in town."

"You know I don't gamble, but this one time … I enjoyed it, but I lost some money," Lorenzo told his wife. "They called me here after Christmas to ask for their money. I … didn't take them seriously. I told them they'd have to wait. It was a lot of money," he admitted. Elena was unexpectedly silent, so he asked, "Don't you want to know how much money I lost?"

"How much?"

"Seventy thousand euros."

"I'll give you the money," she immediately said.

"I got into this mess; I'll get myself out," he said, waiting for her to retort with, "Look what a good job you've done so far."

But instead she said reasonably, "Your parents may find out if you make such a large withdrawal. If I give it to you, you won't be embarrassed in front of them."

Instead I'm embarrassed in front of you, he thought bitterly, with a mixture of gratitude and resentment. "Aren't you going to say how childish it was of me to gamble more than I could afford to pay? How irresponsible?"

"Do I have to say it?" she countered.

"No. It's all over your face. You think because you're four hundred years old that I'm just a little boy. And I certainly acted like it, didn't I?"

Elena didn't have to say that either, and Lorenzo didn't want to hear it. But he took her money. He gave her the name of the person to pay, and she called the bank and transferred the funds while he lay on a sofa helpless, hurt, and angry. Finally, Elena hung up the phone.

"Now it's over," Lorenzo said, hoping to just forget about it all. He had sat up while she fixed everything for him, and now he planted the cane on the floor and struggled to his feet. He hated the cane with a passion, but it was a necessary evil—he could not walk steadily without it, and he absolutely did not want to fall.

Elena sighed. "It's not over. The Englishman who came here, the 'enforcer,' Peter Shaw—he's an Immortal. I'm going to go talk to him."

Lorenzo could feel his mouth fall open. "How … how can you be sure? How do you even know his name, or where he is?"

"I arrived just as he was leaving, remember? I sensed him as he drove away. And he introduced himself to you. Giorgio told me his name, said he had an English accent. His car was a rental, so I took a chance and checked the flights to the British Isles that day, found out what city he flew to—"

"Do the airlines give out that information?" Lorenzo asked, truly curious.

"For the right price they do," she answered. He stood there swaying slightly and thinking dark thoughts about Immortals until she said, "Please sit down before you fall down."

He sat, but with added rancor at her for pointing out another one of his weaknesses. Again. Then he leaned forward on his cane, realizing the truth about this whole mess. "It's a coincidence."

"Maybe," she allowed. "But I have to be sure."

"I'm telling you that you can be sure. Everything doesn't have to be about you, Elena! If it had been Immortal … business, don't you think he would have said something to me? Left a message for you—"

"He left me a message by beating you up!" she exclaimed.

The savage anger on her face made him pull back, a little. "You can't go after this man just in case! He's dangerous; he might…" He couldn't bring himself to say it.

But she could. "Decapitate me?" Counting off on her fingers, she said, "One, I can take care of myself. Two, I may not fight him at all. If you're right, and this has nothing to do with Immortals—"

"Of course I'm right!" he stated. He was completely sure about this, just as he was sure that she would go anyway and that he couldn't stop her. "But you have to go chase him down, don't you?"

"Yes, I do," she said, facing him directly. "I can't take the chance. If I ignore it—"

"This is about me and Shaw!" Lorenzo interrupted again, because she just wasn't listening to him. Trying once more, he repeated, "It's not about you! Stay out of my affairs, Elena! I will not have my wife running all over Europe chasing this man, especially not because of me, and most especially when it has nothing to do with you!"

"You're worried about 'your wife' running all over Europe?" she asked, an edge to her voice. "What about my husband running all over Europe? How many other women have you slept with since our wedding day, mi amor?" she said sarcastically. She leaned down and put her face in his. "Are there any others besides Ana, your little hairdresser? Any other babies?"

"No! And you know why I—"

"I know," she cut in, "that we've been married exactly one year and nine days. I know that the day before our first anniversary you tell me that your mistress is pregnant, and that you want _me_ to adopt your child by the little bitch. Maybe Shaw came to beat you up because of a woman, eh?"

Spitting out a curse, he yelled, "You know that's not true!" Yelling hurt his ribs, but he didn't care. "You know I went to her only because of you! Because I saw you chop off that man's head! And now you want to do it again," Lorenzo said bitterly. "You just want to cut off Shaw's head to prove what cojones you have! Because you can't—" He stopped himself from saying it, but Elena kept right on going.

"Because I can't what?" she demanded then finished for him, yelling just as loudly as he had, "Because I can't have children? Because I'm not a real woman, so I have to prove I'm a real man? Is that what you think?"

"I didn't say that, Elena," he yelled back, a little guilty because he had been thinking something like that, and she could not help being sterile. But there were other things she could help. He was the man of this family, not her!

She had moved away from him, going to stare out the window, but he was relentless. He wished he could just stand up and walk after her, turn her around to face him, damn it! But getting to his feet and crossing the room would take too long, so he had to be satisfied with shouting at her again. "You would never have let this bastard come into the house and beat you up, no, not you! You're too tough, the tough Elena Duran. Shall I take off my pants and let you wear them? Do you want my cojones as well?" He could feel the heat on his face, darkening his light complexion, and the fury in his heart; he had never felt so humiliated in all his life.

"!Idiota!" she insulted him, banging the window shutter hard. She always reverted to Spanish in her most passionate moments. "!Imbecil! You don't understand anything!" She put her hands to her head. "Do you think I want to go?" she asked, coming to him again.

"Yes, you do! You want to fight; you love it! You want to be the hero!"

"I don't …" She shook her head. "It doesn't matter what I want or don't want. I don't have a choice," she insisted, muttering something extremely crude under her breath. "I _have_ to go!" she added, putting her hand on her chest.

That's what she'd said before, when that Immortal had come to this very house, and Lorenzo had watched her chop off his head. Then Ana, then the gambling, and now…

Elena was finished slamming and swearing—instead, she was doing something he hadn't expected. She took her wedding ring off her left hand and put it on the side table by the sofa. Lorenzo felt his heart stop, and couldn't find any words. God, no—she was leaving him?

But she said bluntly, "I can't wear it. It interferes with my swordwork." Then, more gently, "Keep it for me until I get back." She went to her closet and pulled out a long duffel bag he hadn't seen her pack, then slipped her old leather backpack over her shoulder.

God, at least she was coming back. Unless she lost her head. But… He stood as quickly as he could. She kissed him softly on the mouth, and he grabbed her hand in a fierce grip. But she deftly pulled herself free, and he couldn't possibly follow her. "I love you, Elena. Don't go," he asked her, remembering with shame when she'd asked him the same thing.

Shaking her head, she turned and left him, alone, just like he'd left her.

* * *

_**Saturday Morning**_

Lorenzo stared out the window and watched the sun rising above the hills, the start of a new day. He knew Elena still loved him, as he loved her. They were two strong volatile Latins; maybe they were fated to have these huge fights, to run away from each other occasionally, but he knew in his heart that they were also fated to be together. For all his life, anyway. He could never give Elena up, and he wanted her to come home, which meant he had to go after her and bring her back. If she didn't or couldn't come, then he'd at least be with her.

He quickly threw off the covers and sat up, then hugged himself, rocking back and forth until his ribs stopped hurting, remembering he had to move slowly. He carefully reached for the phone and called the firm of investigators his family generally used for business, then called the butler to help him shower and dress and pack, and to let his bodyguards know they were going on a trip. Before he left his bedroom suite he picked up her wedding ring, the one he'd given her, to bring with him. He ate breakfast, stared at the morning paper without reading, and waited (not very patiently) for the phone to ring. Finally, the detective firm called to say that Elena had gone to Edinburgh. When his charter jet landed in that city, he called for an update, and they gave him the name of her hotel. Hailing a taxi, he and his two bodyguards headed there directly from the airport.

Lorenzo was going to find Elena, and when he did … God knows what would happen then.

* * *

**Chapter 5****: Raising the Stakes **

**_Saturday Afternoon_  
_Edinburgh_  
**

Elena Duran was usually late—except for "business" meetings. She arrived at St. Mary's Cathedral fifteen minutes before the appointed time of three o'clock. She looked up at the grimy, soot-darkened granite of the cathedral façade then glanced at the tourist brochure, which had a plan of the building and a brief history, saying the cathedral had been built in the nineteenth century. It was not big enough, and certainly not old enough, to match some of the old cathedrals she loved, but the moment she stepped inside she felt it: the peace and safety of familiar Roman Catholic tradition and Holy Ground, both. And, thankfully, no Immortal. Not yet.

She went to the font and dipped in her fingers, making the sign of the cross and touching the cool water to her lips. Genuflecting briefly, she then veered left and walked silently and purposefully down the Lady aisle, her red cape swinging. On her left were the stained glass Stations of the Cross, beams of weak winter sunlight cutting through the colors, leaving dancing bright-hued prints on the dark wooden benches and on the several women kneeling here and there, still wearing the traditional shawls and mantillas on their heads. Elena took in a deep breath, smelling wood and polish. To her right, standing by another font, a priest was speaking softly to an attentive parishioner. She walked by the last of the confessionals, then made for the place she felt Shaw would feel most uncomfortable. Shaw disliked Catholics and women, so their meeting would take place in the Lady Altar, the small chapel to the left of the main altar.

A mother and her son, about ten years old, were sitting in the last pew of the Lady Altar. They rose to leave as Elena walked up. The boy smiled at Elena, and as she smiled back she noticed his coloring: light brown hair and blue eyes. He looked a little like Colin MacLeod. Elena knew she had impressed Colin—most males of any age automatically liked Elena Duran—but she was regretful that she wouldn't have a chance to win over his more reluctant twin, that child Cassandra was so pleased with. However, Elena knew that breaking her word to Connor was neither right nor smart, and he had the right, so she dismissed those two children from her life until or unless the very paranoid elder Highlander changed his mind. At least she might be able, through Cassandra, to pursue her friendship with Alex.

Not to mention that Elena might have Lorenzo's child by the hairdresser to worry about in May. Elena had not yet agreed to the adoption; she wasn't sure she was willing to raise this child, or any child, although Lorenzo wanted to. It would be good for the Ponti family, especially since she was unable to provide Lorenzo with an heir. But she remembered how paranoid and overprotective Connor had been just yesterday with his children, and she remembered what that was like when she had tried to raise children—how fragile they were, how much it hurt when they died. Then, while she had been thinking it over, Shaw had paid his visit, and here she was.

She put her backpack on the seat of the second pew, intending to sit in the first pew, where she'd have the most freedom of action and a good view of the approaching Immortal.

But Elena had never been able to sit for long, so she got up and wondered down to the main altar, reading the notes in her brochure and examining the statuary, admiring the bright colors of the stained glass windows, then came back and lit a candle to ask the Lady's blessing. She stuffed the collection box with euro notes then looked back toward the main portals, wondering what was keeping Shaw and thinking maybe this was part of his pre-game strategy. Finally she sat for a moment, then got back up and walked the few steps up to the simple, wood-backed altar and studied the crowned Madonna looking down seriously, almost frowning, and hugging her child, the Christ Child, who was holding up His small hand in blessing. The last time Elena had hugged her own child had been over a century ago. But that baby, Tanya, had died after just a year, leaving a gaping hole in Elena Duran's chest, larger and more painful—and more long-lasting—than any plunging swordthrust.

Then, nearly twenty-five years ago, when her friend Maria Alonso had become pregnant, Elena had thought—had _hoped_—to rear another child. She and Maria had talked for hours of the baby, making plans, discussing names. Elena had even embroidered baby clothes, and she hated to sew. Then the Hunters had come, and Elena had left Maria behind, thinking, hoping they wouldn't harm a pregnant woman. But Maria and her unborn baby had been shot to death while Elena ran and hid.

Lorenzo's baby could never fill those gaps. But this was a new century, a new millennium. Maybe it was time to try again. She knelt in front of the small altar. What shall I do? she prayed. Is it time? Can I really have one more chance? Will I be able to see this child actually grow to adulthood, maybe even have children of her—or his—own? Elena could oh-so-clearly remember holding Tanya: satin skin, silk hair, little breaths against Elena's chest, and that smell, the baby-smell, a smell unlike any other in Elena's long life. She stared into the cold plaster eyes of the Christ Child and wondered why she'd been drawn here, to the Lady Altar, to the Mother…

A tingling of the spine at the edge of her consciousness made her rise quickly from her knees. !Cabron! He was half an hour late, but Peter Shaw had finally arrived.

* * *

"I know my wife is registered at this hotel." Lorenzo Ponti tried to smile and be charming about it, but he was fast losing his patience. He hung his cane on the edge of the desk by its curved handle, then set both hands on the desk and leaned forward. "Where is she?"

"I'm sorry, Mr. Ponti," the desk clerk said. "We do not keep such close tabs on the whereabouts of our guests."

"Has anyone visited her? Has she made calls, gone somewhere, received a letter?"

"Mr. Ponti," the clerk said, obviously affronted. "We never pry into the affairs of our guests."

"She's not having an affair! She's—" But he couldn't say what she was really doing. His beloved Elena might be fighting even now, and it was all his fault! He decided on a different approach. "Look, you're a married man, too," he said in a warmer tone, looking at the clerk's wedding ring. "I'm sure you understand. I'm just trying to find my wife."

"Your wife has not yet checked out," the clerk explained patiently. "You may wait for her in the drawing room, if you wish, or downstairs in the bar. I will watch for her, and when she returns from wherever it is she went, I will most definitely tell her that you are waiting to see her."

Lorenzo was having some trouble understanding the burr, but he got the general idea, and figured this was the most he would get from this cold Scotsman. However, it wasn't enough. "Yes, but—"

"Mr. Ponti?" interrupted a woman's voice. Lorenzo turned to see a woman not in her first youth, but slim and beautiful nonetheless—hair of light gold, pixie face, sapphire earrings. He glanced quickly at his two bodyguards, who were carefully watching them but had allowed her to approach him and had therefore apparently judged her not to be a danger to him. Stylish haircut, black mohair coat, shoes that might have come from a small Paris boutique, a slim black leather briefcase in her left hand, and an old-fashioned silver ring on the fourth finger—Lorenzo didn't know any rich married women in Edinburgh, but she obviously knew him. "Lorenzo Ponti?" the woman asked.

"Si," he said immediately in surprise then switched to English. "I am Lorenzo Ponti."

"I'm Alex MacLeod." She held out her hand, and Lorenzo took it, shaking gingerly, still wondering who she was. "Elena spoke with me and my husband yesterday," Alex MacLeod said.

"You saw Elena?" he began then said, "MacLeod?" MacLeod was an Immortal; he had been Elena's lover for a few years, but this was a woman … of course! "Ah, you are Duncan's wife!"

"No, the other one," she said, smiling as if at some private joke. "My husband is Connor MacLeod."

_Connor_ MacLeod? There was another MacLeod? Was he also an Immortal? Had he also been Elena's lover? Or perhaps, Lorenzo thought with a sinking feeling, Connor MacLeod was her enemy. And this woman was his wife. But she'd said she'd seen Elena—that was the important thing. If he could just get that information! "Elena—where is she?"

"Mr. Ponti, let's go sit down." She motioned for him to follow her, and he picked up his cane from the desk. He limped after her through the lobby toward a small drawing room with a blazing fire at the far end. Salvatore quickly got ahead of the woman and went into the unoccupied room first, walking over to the windows and looking outside, searching in every direction as he always did. When he was satisfied, he nodded to Lorenzo that it was safe to proceed.

The woman stepped through the doorway, but Lorenzo didn't move. The privacy of the drawing room would be good, but before he got comfortable, he had to try to find out if this other MacLeod, this Connor MacLeod, was Elena's enemy and would be coming looking for Elena, wanting to behead her. Because if he was, then Lorenzo could not trust anything Alex MacLeod said. "Mrs. MacLeod …" She stopped and turned back to him. Lowering his voice, he asked, "Is your husband an … Immortal?"

Her gaze met his, serious and unflinching, with no surprise or confusion, so the answer was yes, but she said only, "He and Duncan have been friends for many, many years."

All right, he was dealing with the wife of an Immortal. Lorenzo nodded. Now all he could do is ask her and hope he could tell if she was lying. Even if, as she said, Duncan and Connor MacLeod were friends, which was highly likely considering the Scots and their clans, it did not necessarily follow that Elena and Connor were friendly. Lorenzo decided to look on this as just a business deal, and he had learned to read other executives, male and female alike, with some measure of success. Except the stakes here were not money and power, but his wife's life, and possibly his. This was his chance to do what he could to protect her. "Duncan MacLeod is a friend of Elena, and they trust each other. What about your husband, Connor MacLeod? How does he feel about Elena?" he asked bluntly.

This time her smile was wearily amused. "They don't exactly get along, but they respect each other."

Lorenzo wanted to trust this beautiful woman, but he was at least wise enough to know that wanting to trust beautiful women was a weakness of his. However, she seemed to know Elena; at least, her answer fit Elena's character. Elena was not easy to get along with, but she did command respect. It was in the way she carried herself, the way she walked, her self-confidence—part of what had attracted him to her the first time he saw her. Mrs. MacLeod sounded sincere, and her smile seemed genuine enough. They were still standing, still waiting to sit down, but she didn't seem impatient or insulted. Maybe he could trust her somewhat. "You've known Elena for a long time?" Lorenzo asked politely—and curiously.

"I met her eleven years ago. Yesterday was the first time I'd seen her since then, but I certainly never forgot her. She leaves a strong impression."

"Yes," he said, nodding. "Elena impresses people. One either loves her or hates her. Surely you must understand that I want to be sure your husband is not in the second group," he said seriously.

"I understand that you love your wife, Mr. Ponti, but surely you must understand that there are more than two choices. My husband does not love Elena, but neither does he hate her. Elena came to our house to ask for his help in finding someone."

"She would not have asked for his help if they were enemies," Lorenzo mused out loud.

"No?" she challenged. "Elena might well have done so, if she thought she could frighten him into talking, or if she thought she could blackmail him."

"She might," Lorenzo admitted, narrowing his eyes at this Alex MacLeod. She was not a trophy wife; she spoke her mind. Well, he wasn't a trophy husband, either. "I have no quarrel with what Elena decides she must do to survive. I have _seen_ what their fights are like. Have you?"

"Yes."

"Then perhaps we agree. And what about your husband; would he blackmail or threaten?"

"He might," Mrs. MacLeod admitted in turn. "But yesterday, there was no blackmailing or threatening. She asked; he answered, as a matter of mutual respect."

Lorenzo shook his head. He still wasn't completely sure, and Mrs. MacLeod obviously knew it, too, because suddenly she said, "Mr. Ponti, I spoke to you because I know you are worried about Elena, and I know what that worry is like. If you would rather be alone, I will leave."

"No, please," he said, waving one hand in dismissal. It should do no harm to talk to Mrs. MacLeod, and she might help him find Elena, which was still his first priority. Besides, one could never be completely sure of anything, and his instincts told him to trust her. And he realized he did not want to wait alone. "Please, let us go inside as you suggested. And call me Lorenzo," he added smiling slightly.

* * *

When Elena had sensed the Immortal entering the cathedral, she'd shaken her head to clear it and wiped everything else from her mind to concentrate on the matter at hand: Peter Shaw. Although they were supposedly just here to talk, she still had to prepare herself for the verbal sparring which took place before the real battle was fought. He walked up, clearing his throat noisily in the silence of the alcove, and she turned to face him.

She stood studying him openly while he did the same to her. He was carrying a long wool coat over his left arm, and wearing a conservative and very expensive hand-tailored gray wool suit, complete with vest and gold watch chain. He was slim and obviously very fit and appeared to be on the low side of thirty-five, with medium brown hair, thinning on top. His eyes were that pale washed-out blue color that generally made people appear weak—but she saw no weakness in Shaw's eyes.

Elena waved him to a seat on the front pew, on her left side, and they both sat down at the same time, leaving a two-person gap between them. Shaw crossed his legs, brushed some lint off the knee of his pants and leaned back expansively, putting both arms on the back of the seat, while Elena spread her cape out regally on the seat of the pew. Elena knew silence made a lot of people nervous, and she wanted to see how he would begin.

"How's your husband?" Shaw finally asked.

As he spoke she noticed his crooked teeth, which surprised her, considering the money he obviously had. The bad teeth, thin nose, and prominent chin gave him a rather ferrety look. Definitely rodent-looking, she thought, and he had begun with an attack, direct and to the point. Good. She didn't want to waste any time, either. "We're not here to talk about him," she said quietly.

"No? It was his refusal to pay that brought me into this business in the first place."

She shook her head in disgust. "Oh yes, your 'business.' After a few centuries of living you can't find anything better to do than to hurt people for fun and profit."

"I do have other interests," he said mildly. "That's merely a hobby which suits my particular talents. Not much call for that nowadays, even in the army."

"I imagine it makes you feel superior," she suggested.

"Oh, my dear," he said, with chuckles oozing out between snuffles.

The totally patronizing laugh put Elena's teeth on edge, and she wondered why every English Immortal she met insisted on calling her "my dear."

"We already are superior," Shaw said. "They're mortals."

Uncrossing his legs, he turned in his seat and leaned toward her, getting into her personal space in a move both physically threatening and intrusively sexual at the same time. He must have had a lot of practice, she thought.

"So," he said, "if you don't want to talk about your very mortal husband, why ever did you go to such lengths to find me, hmmm? Tired of him?" His avid gaze slowly eased down the length of her body, then came back up. "Looking for something—or someone—more exciting?"

It was the same age-old male attitude, designed to insult and belittle women. Or maybe he was trying to arouse her. Elena was neither insulted nor belittled, and absolutely not aroused. However, she was pissed off. "We're here to discuss why you personally came to my house."

Shaw leaned back again and sighed. "Your husband didn't see fit to respond to my employer's earlier suggestion that he pay his debts. It was decided that a personal invitation would be more convincing, and so I went 'personally' to your house."

You could have talked to him, she wanted to say. You could have just threatened him; you didn't have to beat him so badly. Seeing Lorenzo hurt had cut her deeply, but complaining to Shaw would sound too whiny, so she kept her mouth shut while he continued.

"It was only about the money," he said. "It had absolutely nothing to do with you, m'dear, nothing at all. I knew that Lorenzo Ponti was married, but I had no idea that his wife was an Immortal. Is that what you wanted to hear?"

It was what she wanted to hear, and it rang true. Fine. Good. She felt relieved—it was over. "I believe you, Shaw," she said. And she could just leave it at that. But he'd called her m'dear again, and there was something about the Englishman that cried out for… She decided it was her turn to lean forward into his personal space. Her breath blowing softly on his face, she said, "It's not only about the money, Shaw. It's about you. You—" She wanted to say more. She wanted to call him a coward who was envious of real men and an adolescent bully who had never grown up. But he really wasn't worth it, and she was eager to get back to her injured husband—thank God Lorenzo was safe and far away from this sadistic son of a bitch!—so she stood, lifting her backpack by its strap and saying, "Fine. I'm satisfied, and I'm going home."

"So soon?" Shaw drawled, uncrossing his legs and standing. "You may be satisfied, but I'm not." The hunger in his eyes was palpable—she could feel a familiar crawling sensation on her skin, as though he were touching her all over with icy fingers. They were so close she could smell his expensive but too-sweet cologne.

"I came all this way just to meet you," Shaw was saying. "You should at least make it worth my while. As you said, I hurt people for fun and profit. Hurting your husband was a job." He reached out a finger and traced the shape of her eyepatch in the air, as if measuring, then traced its mirror image on the other side.

Elena's stomach tightened. Dear God, Shaw wanted her, he really wanted to harm her, to blind her, just like Bethel had! Bethel had hurt her, tortured her for pleasure—but this was not Bethel, she reminded herself. This was Shaw, not as vicious, and certainly not as dangerous. Shaw had no power over her.

"Hurting you would be purely for pleasure," Shaw purred. He smiled, again revealing his narrow crooked teeth. "Mostly mine, I suspect, unless … ," and now his eyes took on an eager glow, "… you subscribe to the teachings of a certain French marquis?"

A certain French marquis who liked to inflict pain. Elena felt a chill in her bones, as cold as if she were standing outside. But Peter Shaw was not Claude Bethel, and she was not going to be caught like that ever again. However, like Bethel, Peter Shaw was a filthy, disgusting _sadistic_ animal who probably deserved to die, and she was the perfect person to kill him. This was it, the right moment, the time to make the challenge, to name the time and place. Suddenly, Elena found herself looking forward to the duel now, right now! She could feel her heart begin to pound in her chest, and she forced herself not to lick suddenly dry lips. She turned her head to look in the direction of the altar to hide the lurch of excitement, the jolt of adrenaline she felt coursing through her body. At times, Elena loved to kill, and certainly beheading this cabron …

But the sight of the Madonna and Child calmed her, and Elena decided she was not going to fight. She was going to go home and tell Lorenzo that he'd been right and she'd been wrong and that it hadn't been about Immortals and she was sorry. But first she had to _not_ kill Peter Shaw. She looked back at the Englishman. Breathing in deeply and surreptitiously through her nose, she smiled and shook her head gently. "Sorry—you'll have to get your jollies kicking your dog or …," she was going to mention raping his maid or sodomizing his butler, but she settled for, "… whatever you usually do. I'm not available."

As she started to turn, he reached out and grabbed her cape, fingers digging into the fabric but not actually touching her. "Praying to worthless painted plaster won't help you," he said, with a jerk of his head toward the statue of the Madonna and Child. His fingers started stroking the fabric of her cape. "But if you ask me very prettily, I might let you go … after a time. Perhaps."

The thought of Peter Shaw touching her disgusted her, but she kept silent.

"Or perhaps I'll decide to take your head," Shaw said next, attacking where he apparently thought he saw weakness and fear. "Yes," he said, the word slithering like a snake on his tongue. "You came all this way to fight me; the least I can do is oblige. I know a place, not too far from here, where we can go. I challenge you. Now."

* * *

_**Continued in Chapter 6: Staying in the Game**_  
**  
**


	5. Ch 6 and 7

**Chapter 6****: Staying in the Game**

* * *

Lorenzo and Alex MacLeod had settled themselves on the couch facing the fire in the drawing room, and drinks had been ordered: mineral water for him because of his medication, a Black Russian for her. The heat of the fire felt good to Lorenzo, especially considering the weather outside. Elena would love this room, he thought suddenly, then turned his full attention to the woman in front of him. Mrs. MacLeod had slipped off her coat, revealing black wool trousers and a sweater of blue cashmere that perfectly matched her eyes, and a firm figure that could only come from many hours at the gym. Under other circumstances, Lorenzo would have felt warm and romantic.

As it was, he was beginning to feel too warm so close to the fire, so he stood carefully, leaned his cane against the tall side of the upholstered couch, and took off his mahogany-colored leather coat, folding it before handing it to Salvatore, who had stepped up for just that purpose. "Grazie," Lorenzo said.

Salvatore nodded then took off his own coat and put both on the arm of a plaid-covered easy chair near the windows. He opened the button on his suit jacket and sat down in the chair. A waiter delivered the drinks, and once he was gone, Giorgio, who had been watching from the lobby, took up a post near the door.

"Friends of yours, I see," Mrs. MacLeod observed, as she glanced at Giorgio and Salvatore.

"They are my … how do you say … my guards …"

"Bodyguards," she supplied, reaching for her drink.

"Yes. Where is Elena, Mrs. MacLeod?"

"Call me Alex. And please, sit down."

Maybe she'd tell him if he did what she said. But after he had laboriously sat down, she said, "I don't know where Elena is right now."

Confused and frustrated, he leaned forward, gasping as he hurt his back. Why had the woman asked him in here, then? "You saw her—"

"Yesterday. But I don't know where she is now."

Words. Elena might be fighting, might be dying, and here they were, talking. Then he thought of something. "But you are here looking for her," he guessed.

"I was on my way home, and I thought I'd stop in and say goodbye before she left. She was planning on going back to Rome—going home to you—tomorrow morning. But I know she will come back here to collect her things. You and I can wait for her together."

Lorenzo sighed and leaned back, reaching for his cane and placing it between his legs. Alex wanted to wait with him, eh? She was doing him a service. Perhaps she felt sorry for him. At this particular moment he was too exhausted to care. He hadn't slept very much since that damned Englishman had come to the villa, and even less since Elena had left after the worst argument she and he had ever had. Well, almost the worst. He had refused pain killers in order to stay alert, but he was paying for it: his back ached, his left leg hurt, his broken ribs were agony with every breath, and his head was splitting—and the cold weather wasn't making it any better. At least the fire felt good. He shifted in his seat, wincing. He wanted to be home in bed doped up and lying with his wife, not chasing her all over Europe and wondering if she was still alive. "You said you and your husband both saw her. Would he know where my Elena is?" he said wearily.

Alex had just opened her mouth to speak when her cellphone beeped from inside her coat pocket. "Excuse me," she said, and Lorenzo nodded. Alex stood and walked to the corner of the room, then spoke quietly into the phone while Lorenzo stared at the flames, impatient and trying not to show it. Elena had not carried her cellphone with her wherever she'd gone—or she had turned it off. That's what had scared him so much in the first place, the fact that he hadn't been able to reach her. But she had told him she wouldn't want to be distracted by a cellphone ringing while she—

He wanted to call her from his own cellphone again, but didn't. Maybe it was not a good idea. Lorenzo interrupted those thoughts and gazed at Alex MacLeod. Who could she be talking to now, her manicurist? This was a matter of life and death! But a moment later Alex returned and said, "My husband is coming to join us."

This could be bad, Lorenzo thought, determined not to panic. Why would the Immortal want to come—to wait with him, Lorenzo? Was he also doing him a service? Did MacLeod and his wife both pity him? But surely MacLeod wouldn't try anything in a busy hotel with the bodyguards here? And he couldn't do anything to hurt Elena anyway—she wasn't here—and MacLeod might know where she was. Then it occurred to Lorenzo that MacLeod might be concerned for his wife's safety, especially if … Lorenzo's head was spinning, but he focused in on the most important question, even if he did feel like what his mother called a broken record when he said, "Does your husband know where Elena is?"

"He might. You can ask him when he gets here." Her gaze flicked to his cane then returned to his face. "Lorenzo, you are not well? Would you like some tea instead of only water?"

"You do not have to feel sorry for me, Mrs. Mac— Alex. I am fine. I am just tired and …" Lorenzo had no idea what Elena had told this Alex MacLeod, but he forged on. "I had an accident," he said, lifting his cane slightly in explanation.

"I'm sorry to hear that. Was it recently? Does Elena know?"

"You mean, did this happen since she left, or did she leave me like this?" he asked with some heat, trying to keep the bitterness and the anxiety out of his voice and failing miserably. He felt so young, so out of his league, and for some reason he wanted to weep. But he wouldn't, and at least Elena hadn't told Alex MacLeod all about him. Good. "It was a few days ago," he said, answering Alex's first question, but not the one about Elena. He wondered how much Alex knew about Immortal "business," how much Elena had told her, how much her Immortal husband told her. Well, he might as well find out what he could. "Yesterday, when you saw her … do you know why she's here? In Scotland?"

Alex nodded. "She was looking for someone. She was intent on finding him, but she wasn't hunting."

Lorenzo physically winced. Rubbing his hands together, he said, "That's a rather ugly way of putting it, but accurate, I suppose."

"It's the word they use," Alex said.

He looked at her. Now her eyes were sympathetic, no longer pitying. "Elena is very direct," he supplied.

"So is Connor," Alex said. "A trait they share."

"You mean the two of them? Or all Immortals?" Lorenzo inquired curiously.

"Most. At least of the ones I've met."

"And how many is that?"

"Thirteen," she answered immediately.

Lorenzo noted that she didn't have to stop to count. He'd met only one other Immortal, nearly six months ago, on a warm and sultry summer night.

**

* * *

**

**_Rome, Italy  
28 August 2006_**

The Immortal came right to the front door of their villa, bold as brass. Elena wiped her mouth, threw down her napkin and went to see him, while Lorenzo waited in the dining room alone, staring down at the remains of the congealing lasagna and the half-empty glasses of wine, feeling a combination of self-pity and pure astonishment.

Elena returned in three minutes. "I'm going to fight him. Now."

It was too fast. He couldn't think. He stood suddenly, pushing his chair back so hard it fell over, then went to her. "Wait! No!"

"I have no choice." She went to the sideboard, opened the bottom drawer, and pulled out a sheathed sword Lorenzo hadn't even known was there.

Lorenzo grabbed her sleeve, staying well away from the sword in her hand. "But why don't you send him away? Tell him you just won't fight?"

Bluntly she answered, "Because if I don't fight him now, he'll come back when I'm not here."

"For me?" Lorenzo asked, still upset and now frightened, and ashamed of it. "I can't let you—"

"It's not just you, mi amor."

He had had no idea it was possible to say "my love" so coldly.

"There are other lives involved. I have no choice," she repeated. Then she smiled a little. "I'll be back." She pulled away from him. Then, gripping her sword in her right hand, she went outside, through the garden, and down the hill to the grove of trees that covered the rocky hillside.

Lorenzo said a quick prayer then followed, realizing now why she had insisted on buying this estate with the old-growth grove, for privacy while she fought—or perhaps while she buried someone. He watched the duelists from the trees, knowing they were too intent on each other to know he was there. They were silhouetted in the moonlight, moving among the rocks. Lorenzo felt like an audience of one at a graceful dance recital, but once when he'd sat in the first row, just under the stage, he'd been close enough to notice what he was noticing now: the sound of their footfalls, each little grunt of effort, their chests heaving, the concentration and sweat on their faces. And in this case, their swords swinging, the clash of metal on metal, the blood dripping, the threats and gasps and cries as these two played their "game" and tried their level best to kill each other.

They'd been talking before, taunting words in a language Lorenzo didn't understand, but by now they were both bloodied, in obvious pain, and too winded to speak. Then there was a flurry of swordplay on Elena's right side, her blind side, and the Immortal cut deeply into her side—My God!—and she gasped with pain, curling around the wound and retreating back to the grass, nearer where Lorenzo was hiding. He bit his lips to keep from yelling obscenities at this son of a bitch who was hurting his woman, and stood trembling with effort to keep from rushing forward and attacking the bastard with his bare hands. In the last few minutes Lorenzo had seen just how good she was at this deadly game, and he knew distracting her could be fatal for her, and it would be his fault, so he forced himself to stillness, struggling against his own fighting instincts.

Then Elena did something, tripped the Immortal … he was down on his knees, dropping his sword. It skittered off among the rocks, and he lunged towards it, but she was so damn fast, right there on top of him, her own sword held two-handed by her right ear. The moonlight glinted off the blade—God it looked sharp!—and then she said something as she swept down.

The man's head came off easily and fell with a soft thud. A gout of blood cascaded out of his neck, its strong stench reaching Lorenzo as the Immortal's kneeling body fell straight down on top of his head. Lorenzo's stomach tightened with spasms as he fought to keep from retching. He averted his eyes and looked at Elena instead.

She had moved away slightly and stood, legs braced apart, holding her sword up in triumph, with a look of satisfaction—no, a look of pleasure—on her face. How could his wife, the woman he loved and lived with and shared his bed with, be celebrating having just decapitated—

But it wasn't over. No, not quite yet. His eyes were drawn back down to the body, which was now beginning to glow, and the air became charged with electricity. Elena's hair stood up away from her head, like the Bride of Frankenstein. Sparks flew off the corpse, then coalesced into a thick, long blue tendril of light and power which sought her out among the rocks like a snake tracking its prey.

Then it struck her, and she gasped then screamed and shuddered as wave after wave of lightning-type bolts slammed into her.

Lorenzo was pushed back by the electricity which surrounded her like a force field from a science fiction movie. He could tell by her face that she was in pain, but there was also a great deal of joy there. Sure, she was glad to be alive, but how could she be so happy about killing a man, cutting off a head. And there was so much blood …

After the light show she collapsed to her knees, her head down, gasping. Little tornadoes of blue light circled her, but that wasn't the only reason he was afraid to approach her. "What the hell was that!" he asked her, moving within a few meters of her.

Elena met his eyes. "The Quickening," she murmured.

He didn't like what he was seeing on her face. Relief, yes, that was normal, but he still didn't understand what those lights had been all about. "What? What was it?"

"A … transfer of energy, something like that. His … life force, to me," she said.

Lorenzo felt a coldness steal over him. "You mean his soul? You've taken his soul within you? Is that what you Immortals do?" he asked, crossing himself.

She shook her head, attempting to stand but collapsing back onto her knees. "No. It's not exactly … we don't really know what it is. I'm no soul eater," she finished, weakly.

All Lorenzo could think of was, "You took his life, and his soul—and you enjoyed it."

"No," she answered. "Lorenzo, please, can we talk about it later? I need to clean up this …" Using her sword as a crutch, she finally made it to her feet and looked around her.

"This murder? This killing? Soul stealing?" He shook his head, horrified. "How can you live like this? How can you do this?"

She closed her eye and opened it again. "Go home, mi amor. I'll come to you and we'll talk—"

"Come to me?" Now Lorenzo finally understood the expression he'd seen on her face. Lust. She was actually sexually aroused! He couldn't believe it! She wanted him. She expected him to make love to her after— "You're covered in blood!" he exclaimed. "How can you even think of making love at a time like this? What kind of creature are you?"

"Lorenzo!" she protested, holding a trembling hand out to him. Blood dripped from it, staining her sword, and blood was still dripping weakly from the man's trunk, but she was ready, her eye was blazing, and he was disgusted. He took a step back, away from this person he didn't know. He'd had no idea.

"I can't help …," she was saying. "I love you. I just want you to …"

But he was retreating rapidly, turning away from her into the trees. How could she possibly expect him to bed her?

"Lorenzo! Don't go like this! Don't go!" she called out after him, but any further words were lost in the wind and distance as he ran from her, back home, jumped into his car, and drove into the city. Within an hour he was in Ana Monteverde's arms again. He hadn't been with another woman since he'd met Elena, but now he wanted—he needed—a normal real woman who didn't want to use him to satiate her bloody lust.

Lorenzo realized his mistake, realized how much he loved his wife, when he woke up in Ana's bed the next morning, but it was too late. When he confessed his infidelity to Elena, she packed up and left. The day after she had gone, Lorenzo went walking alone in the rose garden of their empty villa, and he decided he didn't care that Elena was an Immortal and that she beheaded people and took their Quickenings. He decided that her wanting him to make love to her whenever was just wonderful.

She didn't return his messages or answer his letters at first, but a month later when he met her cruise ship at the dock, she smiled at him and waved. Lorenzo waved back as best he could with a bouquet of roses in his arms. A ruby necklace was in his pocket, his gift to her.

"I was wrong," Lorenzo said immediately, as soon as she'd gotten off the ship. He was happy to see her, thrilled to be touching her, holding her again. He hadn't lost her! All around them on the docks were happy reunions of returned travelers and their loved ones, but none were as happy as his. "I love you. And what I said that night … I didn't understand …"

"You had a great shock, Lorenzo."

"Yes, and I needed some time by myself. But I still should never have been unfaithful to you," he admitted. "Please forgive me."

"I forgive you, but … while I'm with you, I give you all I have, all my love, all my attention—and I don't like to share. If it's too intense for you—"

"No. I love you and I want you."

She smiled sadly. "Even now that you know what life with me can be like? Do you still want me?"

"Absolutely, dear heart."

"I won't apologize for who I am or what I did that night outside the villa," she said. "You have to take me or leave me, Lorenzo."

"I'll take you," he said and kissed her again. He fastened the clasp of the ruby necklace behind her neck, then took her hands and stepped back to admire her beauty. As always, she glowed. The red stones shone darkly against her dusky skin and matched the deep red of the roses she held. He didn't remember having seen that skimpy red dress before either—it suited her. Everything she wore looked good on her, and it always would. Since his teens, a lot of women had thrown themselves at him, but none of them could tell the stories Elena knew. She saved the stories for him alone. Although he'd had to pursue her and woo her and convince her to marry him, once he had won her she willingly shared all her vitality and her life with him. She did give him everything she had, and she made him feel like the one true love of her long life. Even his die-hard bachelor friends considered him lucky.

"I love you, Elena," he told her, and he took her home.

* * *

**_January 2007_**  
**_Edinburgh_**

He still loved her. He couldn't imagine not loving her. Lorenzo drank his water in one gulp, wishing for something stronger but knowing he shouldn't because of his pain medication. Which he hadn't taken, because he wanted a clear head when he saw Elena. If he ever saw her again. That thought made him sick, and he swallowed. He felt exhausted, and decided that what he could have was lots of sugar and caffeine to get him through the rest of this horrible unending day.

"You know, I will take some espresso," he said to Alex. "And something for your husband, too, of course. Scotch, perhaps? Glenlivet?" He noted that her drink was half-gone. "And would you like something more?"

"I'm fine, thank you. Connor does like Glenlivet, but in the winter he prefers a stronger brand. Lagavulin would be fine."

Lorenzo gave the order to Giorgio in Italian, enunciating the name of the whisky carefully. Giorgio started to go off on his errand; then Lorenzo realized he should alert his men. "Giorgio, Salvatore, the whisky is for Mrs. MacLeod's husband, who will be joining us shortly," he said in Italian, then translated for Alex's benefit. Giorgio nodded and left, leaving Salvatore extra alert.

Alex glanced at Salvatore then said quietly, "Lorenzo, Elena told me she was planning only on talking today, not fighting."

Which was more than Elena had told him. "You are very kind to say so, but we both know plans sometimes go wrong." He sighed. "She could be fighting, even now."

"She might," Alex agreed, more quietly than before.

And he didn't even know where. Lorenzo knew he was being impatient and probably rude, but nevertheless he asked, "Your husband will be arriving soon? Is he far from here?"

"Not too far," Alex replied. "He's taking the children to a friend's house and—"

"Children?" he interrupted, leaning forward again. "You have children?" Elena had told him she could never bear children, that Immortals were sterile. Maybe it was only Immortal women who were barren, and not the men. "But—"

"Artificial insemination at a sperm bank," Alex explained matter-of-factly.

Lorenzo leaned back, letting out a long whoosh of air. That would work for women, but not for him. It didn't much matter anyway. Elena didn't want his child. And he loved her too much to insist, but … Dio mio! To be a father! He had grown up in a large, loud, very affectionate family—the thought of never having children around his own home upset him greatly. They had discussed the possibility of adoption, but now that he was going to have a child of his own, a chance … He looked at the fire, watched as a log split and fell with flashing sparks. "Elena says having children is dangerous for the children of the Immortals. They're pawns."

"So is a wife—or a husband. But both Connor and I wanted children, and we decided it was worth it. We also decided to live in a small town, hidden away. We minimize the risks as best we can."

Lorenzo nodded. "In my situation we also worry about our children being kidnapped for ransom. It happens too much in Italy."

"And all over the rest of the world, too."

"Yes. Are you afraid for them? For your children?" Lorenzo suddenly asked, keeping his eyes on the flames.

"Yes."

Looking away from the fire and into Alex's eyes, he whispered, "Are you afraid for your husband?"

"All the time," Alex softly replied then broke eye contact when Giorgio returned to stand at the door, allowing a waiter with the drink order to come inside.

The tray was placed on the table before them, and Lorenzo poured the espresso and the sugar, stirred and took several slurps of the scalding black brew, then immediately refilled his demitasse from the silver pitcher. Holding the cup without drinking, he went back to staring into the safe fire again. It wasn't right for a man to admit fear, not to a woman or to another man. It was different for Alex. She was a woman; she could talk about such things without shame. But he was the man—it was his job to protect his wife, and not only wasn't he doing it, his own stupidity had gotten her off into trouble to begin with.

But now he was here, in Edinburgh, to find her, or at least to be with her when she returned. And yes, he was afraid, very much so, that he might already be too late, that Elena might be dead, and he didn't like to admit that. But the woman sitting beside him, waiting with him … Alex knew … perhaps she deserved … He drank his cooling coffee in one long swallow, set the cup down on the saucer then quietly admitted, "For me also, the fear comes every day."

"They worry about us, too, you know," Alex said. "There is only one way for them to die. There are so many things that can happen to us." She was staring into the fire now. "That will happen," she murmured, almost to herself. "Lorenzo," she said, suddenly turning to him, taking his hand in her own, "no matter how long anyone lives, they can live only one day at a time. Accept each day, love every day, and live."

"Ah, that is my philosophy exactly!" he agreed, stomping with his cane on the rug. "After all, 'carpe diem' is an Italian concept. Well, Roman, actually," he said, feeling a little better to be on a safer, and happier, topic.

"Italians are the Roman heirs," Alex said, smiling as she let go of his hand to pick up her drink. She sipped at the black concoction then said, "Elena told me you are a polo player. Do you have your own string of ponies?"

"Only since I've been married," he said, smiling broadly now, because this was a subject he loved. "We brought some ponies from Argentina to breed. You have not lived until you have nurse-maided five high-strung thoroughbred ponies on an airplane across the Atlantic," he said. "The smell alone…!" he said, rolling his eyes theatrically.

"I can imagine," Alex said, matching his smile. "We've kept racehorses on our farm." They spent the next few minutes discussing breeding strategies and bloodlines. Then suddenly Salvatore sprang to his feet, reaching for his shoulder holster, so Lorenzo turned in alarm, clenching his teeth as a spasm shot through his neck. A man in a long, beige woolen coat was at the entrance to the drawing room, eye to eye with Giorgio, who was now standing right in the middle of the doorway, blocking the way in.

Alex was already on her feet, facing the door. "That's my husband," she said to Lorenzo; then she smiled and nodded at the man in the doorway, but MacLeod didn't even glance at his wife. His attention was all for Giorgio, who wasn't getting out of the way.

Lorenzo ordered Giorgio to let Mr. MacLeod pass, then planted his cane between his feet to help him stand.

Giorgio immediately stepped aside, although he kept his attention on the new arrival. Still, Giorgio managed to exchange a glance with Salvatore, who had also stood down. As Lorenzo struggled laboriously to his feet, he caught the look between his men and noticed something: Giorgio had been _afraid._ This was so unusual for Giorgio that Lorenzo looked carefully into MacLeod's face—and saw why. Grey eyes, the color and warmth of granite, were checking him over thoroughly as MacLeod stalked silently into the room—just like one of the big cats, powerful and deadly, Lorenzo thought, remembering that Immortals used the word "hunt."

Startled by the intensity of MacLeod's eyes, Lorenzo involuntarily took in a breath, almost upsetting his precarious balance. He swore silently and leaned forward onto his cane, righting himself and preparing to meet the Immortal. As MacLeod came closer he unfastened his coat, revealing a dark-green sweater of the finest mohair and pants of a fine heather gray worsted. The shoes, though … the shoes didn't match. They were hiking boots—waterproof, good traction, ankle support—shoes for fighting a duel in. Lorenzo sent a quick prayer to Mary, Our Lady of Lujan, the patron saint of Argentina, hoping that this dangerous man was not Elena's enemy.

Lorenzo noticed that, unlike the wife's elaborate silver wedding ring, the Immortal's ring was a plain gold band. But it was on his left hand, and Connor MacLeod was probably right-handed. Elena was left-handed, and it interfered … Still, Elena's wedding ring was in Lorenzo's vest pocket. He was keeping it for her, just as she'd asked. She was his wife, and he was going to put her wedding ring back on her hand whether she was dead or alive.

* * *

**Chapter 7****: Calling the Bluff**

When Shaw had challenged her, Elena had experienced a rare moment of total clarity. She looked toward the altar once more, realizing all of a sudden why she'd come to the Lady Chapel. Elena smiled. The Baby Jesus statue's eyes were no longer cold; they were alive and looking straight into her, and the benevolence flowed from Him in waves, filling her with strength and with a new resolve. All she'd had to do was ask Him; He had answered her prayer, helped her make her decision. For a moment she held His gaze with her own; then she lowered her head, coughing once, using all the strength of will she had to keep from sobbing out loud, to keep from showing weakness in front of Shaw.

Now she really couldn't fight Shaw, not just for Lorenzo's sake, but for the baby's sake, for _their_ baby's sake. This baby was worth raising, no matter what. Connor MacLeod believed raising children was worth the trouble, and so did Duncan. So did Cassandra and even Methos—and so had Elena, at one point. She nodded to herself, agreeing with them, and with Him. The Feast of the Epiphany, the renewal—and a renewal for her. A new life. Yes, this baby would be for her and Lorenzo—that was His promise to her. All she had to do was live, survive for her husband and her child. All she had to do was not fight Shaw, not kill him, not be killed by him, just walk away. That's all.

But !carajo! Shaw had made the formal challenge. And he was partly right about why she'd come. Actually, everyone had been mostly right: Lorenzo, Connor, Alex had been right. And now Elena, who had been mostly wrong, had to get herself out of this deep hole she had so efficiently dug for herself.

"No," she simply said, looking back at Shaw. "I came to Scotland just to meet with you," she continued, lying a little and well aware of it. "You convinced me that you didn't come for me, and I won't cross swords over a … misunderstanding."

"I've challenged you," Shaw said, obviously annoyed and a little surprised. Looking down his nose at her and sniffing, he said patronizingly, "I didn't think you a coward, m'dear. Women talk a lot, but they've no stomach for the real thing, have they?"

Elena wanted to knock his crooked teeth out of his mouth, but she didn't rise to the bait. However, she wasn't afraid, she wasn't weak, and she did have the stomach for the "real thing." No matter what else, this couldn't stand. It was time to set the Englishman straight. "Shaw, you like to fight when you're sure you're going to win—don't we all? You look at me and you think: 'She's just a woman, blind in one eye.' But I'm still here, and you've heard my name before, and I came looking for you, remember? I'm not such an easy target." She glanced down at his hand where he still held her cape, then looked back to him and held his gaze. "But as I said, I'm not available now."

Shaw suddenly smiled and released his hold on her, then stepped back and bowed. "How refreshing to meet a woman who's actually faithful to her wedding vows. I will allow you to go home to your gambler husband, Mrs. Ponti," he said grandly, as if he were granting a boon to an inferior. "But I do look forward to meeting you another time."

"Tell you what," she offered, rearranging the cape around herself without once looking away, "if you ever really want me, you know where I am. In fact, if I see you in Rome in the next half-century or so, I will decapitate you."

"You can try," he said in high good humor, obviously not taking her seriously as a fighter. Elena couldn't decide whether to be irritated or relieved. "But fair's fair," Shaw added. "If you come to London, or Edinburgh, in the next fifty years, I will decapitate you."

Elena thought it over. London and Edinburgh, eh? Well, she could stay away from London if she really had to, and since she couldn't visit the MacLeods, she had no real reason to come to Edinburgh, and Cassandra was far away, in the Highlands, so … Elena nodded. "We understand each other."

Shaw nodded, and Elena stepped aside to let him leave. She wanted to stay in the chapel and thank God for this new blessing in her life. But Shaw took only a few steps before he turned and asked her, "By the way, how well do you know Paul Ganton?"

Damn, better make this good or Connor would kill her—he might even take her head. Or give it a good try, anyway. "He was a source of information, nothing more," Elena said. "Why? Is he a particular friend of yours?" she asked avidly, hoping to make Shaw think she knew less about Connor than Shaw himself did, and that she was eager to learn more.

"I don't have any friends who are Scots," he said contemptuously.

"Didn't think you would, Shaw," she murmured. Then, dismissing him, she knelt at the altar, pointedly turning her back on Shaw, praying to her beloved Madonna and beautiful Son. For a moment Shaw was silent behind her; then he sniffed once in obvious disgust. She heard his footsteps fade down the cathedral nave.

Elena smiled, thanking God for keeping her out of this fight, thinking about the fact that although sometimes she fought to protect those she loved, other times she could be just as protective if she _didn't_ fight. Shaw was a bastard who deserved killing, or at the very least being put in his place, but this time someone else would have to do it. This time she was walking away and going home, where she and her husband would love and keep this child God had blessed them with. And maybe that's why God had wanted her to live. "Gracias a Dios," she murmured and crossed herself once more.

* * *

_**Continued in Chapter 8: Cards on the Table**_  
**  
**


	6. Chapter 8: Cards on the Table & Notes

**Chapter 8: Cards on the Table**

* * *

**_Hotel in Edinburgh_**

* * *

"Connor," Alex said when Connor reached her side, "this is Lorenzo Ponti. Mr. Ponti, this is my husband, Connor MacLeod."

"Mr. MacLeod, how very good to meet you at last," Ponti said solemnly, holding out his hand.

Connor finished his inspection of Elena Duran's husband—mid-twenties, blond, tall, handsome, expensively and fashionably dressed—then took the young man's hand in his. Ponti had a firm grip, which Connor returned in full, though he didn't shake too vigorously. It was obvious the boy was already in pain. Elena had been right; Shaw had done a thoroughly professional job. "Welcome to Scotland, Mr. Ponti," Connor said as he let go.

"Grazie, thank you. Your lovely wife has been kind enough to talk with me while I am here. We got you a drink," he said, gesturing to the silver tray on the mahogany table with a quick but suddenly halted wave of his right hand.

Connor added broken ribs to the list of Ponti's injuries. That must be an added torture for an Italian—no waving hands in the air. Ponti was compensating, though. The fingers of his other hand were beating a tattoo on the handle of his cane. Nerves? Or just extra energy? Connor needed to know more about this young husband of Elena Duran's, because depending on what Elena had been up to, they could be in for a rough evening. "Thank you," Connor said, picking up the whisky and immediately catching the scent of smoke and sea—Lagavulin, just the thing for a brisk winter day. He looked up to see Alex's quiet smile; she'd ordered it for him, of course. He toasted her silently before he took the first welcome sip, letting the pale amber liquid roll on his tongue, swallowing the heat, then breathing in through his nose as the finish came roaring back in a wave.

Ponti, at least, knew enough to respect a man's first taste of whisky. But as soon as Connor had lowered his glass, Ponti leaned forward on his cane and asked, "Mr. MacLeod, do you know where Elena is now?"

It was an easy question to answer. "No."

It wasn't an easy answer for Ponti to accept. He threw a wild, almost accusing glance of despair at Alex, and his fingers tightened on the handle of his cane. But apparently he wasn't quite so stupid and reckless as Connor had thought. He didn't bluster, he didn't rage, he merely took a deep breath and said evenly, "Scusi, excuse me, Mr. MacLeod, let me rephrase. Do you know if she met with this Inglese? Do you know where? When?" He leaned forward again, desperate and earnest, his agitation betrayed by his lapses into Italian. "Do you know anything that could help me find her?"

Connor could answer these questions easily, too, but he chose his words with care, not wanting the boy to rush out the door. That wouldn't help anybody. "I arranged a meeting between her and the Englishman at three this—"

"At three?" Ponti interrupted. "But it is …"

He glanced around the room for a clock then reached into the pocket of his trousers, even as Alex was saying, "Quarter to five," and seating herself on the divan.

Ponti verified the time on a silver pocket watch then closed the watch case with an audible click and slipped it back into his pocket. "Nearly two hours?" He started pacing—limping—in front of the fire. Connor moved closer to where Alex was sitting to give him room, but didn't sit down. "It is too long," Ponti muttered to himself in dismay.

"Lorenzo," Alex said, quick to reassure, "they met—on Holy Ground—for a discussion."

Ponti knew the score. He started to whirl to face them, but grimaced in pain and ended up making it a three-point turn before he managed to turn around. "But they could have gone off Holy Ground for a battle to the death. Yes?" Neither Connor nor Alex denied it, and Ponti demanded, "What else could take so long?"

"Shopping," Connor immediately replied.

Alex looked up and favored him with a sweetly venomous smile. She said to Ponti, "Maybe one of them was late. Or maybe Elena stopped at a restaurant afterward. She said she hadn't been eating much these last few days."

"She would have called," Ponti said, shaking his head and stumping about again with his cane. "She would let me know."

"But she doesn't know you're in Scotland," Alex pointed out. "Have you checked for messages in Rome in the last two hours?"

"No, I was at the airport, then the taxi … But I have my cellphone. She would call that number, not—" He stopped and turned to the beefy black-haired bodyguard, the boxer sitting near the window, the one Connor had instantly dubbed "Luigi," companion to "Guido" in the hall. Never mind that Ponti had called that one Giorgio; he looked like a "Guido" to Connor, and Guido he would remain.

"Il telefono, per favore," Ponti requested, beckoning with one hand, and Luigi reached into a leather coat that obviously belonged to his employer and trotted over with the phone.

Ponti punched one button then swore viciously, a long and involved paragraph of invective. Connor's Italian wasn't good enough to catch each word, but the meaning was clear. "Dead!" Ponti snarled, all but crushing the small plastic phone in his hand, then winced in pain and dropped the phone on the seat of the chair nearest the fire, clutching at his back, right above his waist.

Damaged kidneys? Connor wondered. Pissing blood was no fun. And yet here was Lorenzo, traipsing across Europe to find and rescue his wife instead of resting at home where his doctor had no doubt recommended he stay. Elena had found herself a tough one this time. He would need to be, to put up with her.

"You came here, expecting to find her," Ponti said next to Alex. "Did she tell you a time?"

"She said she'd be here by five o'clock," Alex answered, as she had told Connor half-an-hour ago on the phone.

"And if she's not here by five, then …," Lorenzo said in a whisper.

Then … Alex's left hand was resting on the arm of the divan, and Connor glanced at Alex's watch: four forty-eight. The minutes were ticking by. Connor made an elaborate show of sitting down next to Alex, leaning back comfortably with his drink in his hand and saying, "I've never known Elena to be on time," even as the detached, logical part of his brain was making a list of the people who should be told that Elena Duran was dead. Connor would call Cassandra and Duncan himself, of course. Those two would spread the news from there: Amanda, Methos, Dawson and thence the Watchers, Elena's people at her ranch in Argentina … and the ripples would go on. At least Connor wouldn't have to call the husband and tell him over the phone. It was a lousy way to hear bad news.

Ponti was nodding and even smiling a little at Connor's observation, but it was a desperately hopeful smile. "Yes. It is possible she is shopping, as you say, Mr. MacLeod. Women!" He waved one hand—but only the hand, not the whole arm—in the air. "A pretty dress, and they lose all sense of time—even Elena." He turned to his beefy bodyguard once more and said something in rapid Italian about calling Rome, then jerked his chin at the cellphone on the chair. After Salvatore-Luigi had picked up the phone and disappeared, Ponti maneuvered himself slowly into the chair, then sat there, staring at the fire and bouncing the cane on the floor while his feet tapped in rhythm.

Elena was always full of nervous motion, too; Connor remembered. Between the pair of them, the Ponti home must sound like a colony of woodpeckers. Connor took a hefty swallow of his whisky and did his best to ignore the noise. Alex patted his arm soothingly then said to Ponti, "Lorenzo, it's not even five o'clock yet. Elena isn't late now, and she would never be late for something like this."

Connor silently added the obvious prerequisite: If she were still alive.

Alex was saying, "She wouldn't want us to worry."

… any more than they already had. Connor took another sip of whisky and settled into his waiting mode: expecting nothing, imagining nothing, doing nothing … for the moment.

Ponti looked up, brown eyes dark and haunted, but he managed another smile and said, "Yes. There is time. My Elena will come, if she can."

Someone certainly had. Connor set down his drink as he stood to face the door to the lobby, because an Immortal had just arrived. He didn't need to announce it, though; Guido said: "Signora Ponti!" from the lobby, and then Elena was at the door, still swathed in black and red. Luigi, either done with or abandoning his phone call to Rome, stood behind her.

Connor glanced at Alex's watch again: four fifty-one, nine minutes to spare. Elena looked tired and tense, but her clothes were immaculate and her hair neatly brushed. No Quickening then, not even a fight. Maybe she had actually learned something from her talk with Alex last night. Even the pugnacious Elena Duran was capable of talking and then walking away … good. Very good.

Elena paused at the threshold, her wariness disappearing as she identified Connor as the other Immortal, then smiling in incredulous delight at her husband. Connor grinned, because Elena suddenly looked just like Rachel had when she'd actually seen Elvis Presley, live and in-person! fifty years ago. Even the long ponytail was the same, only black instead of blonde. Alex had stood and turned to watch the show.

Ponti had managed to get to his feet and was heading for the door even as Elena swept toward him, her scarlet cape flaring out behind her. "Cara mia!" Ponti whispered passionately, his arms held open wide, the cane still in his right hand. Elena slowed just before she reached him, no doubt to ease herself gently into his embrace, but Ponti tossed his cane aside and wrapped his arms around her, a sudden move that threatened his balance and made him gasp in pain. Elena had to be supporting half his weight.

Neither of them seemed to care. "Mi amor," she said, her voice muffled against Ponti's shoulder. Connor listened carefully, because he hadn't spoken Italian in decades, and Elena was, naturally enough, now using her husband's native tongue instead of her own. "I tried calling you," she was saying.

Ponti pulled back, regained his balance, and looked her over, holding onto her arms and devouring her with his eyes. "It doesn't matter," he proclaimed, shaking his head.

"You're here! I can't believe you came looking for me!" she said, laying one hand lightly on his chest.

Ponti smiled broadly. "Do you really think there is any place in this world where I would _not_ come looking for you?"

"No," she answered, and Connor wondered when the cherubs would appear overhead to rain down rose petals on this touching romantic scene. There should at least be violins. He glanced at Guido and Luigi, but neither of them had made a move to pull out a musical instrument. Apparently serenading wasn't a requirement of bodyguards these days.

"You were right, and I was wrong," Elena was saying to her husband, in tones of such abject apology that Connor blinked and wondered where the real Elena Duran was. Alex turned to him with a bemused and amused stare, both eyebrows raised. Alex's Italian was limited to ordering food and listening to opera, but Elena's meaning and tone were clear enough. Alex tucked her arm inside his, and Connor pulled her closer and took her hand.

"This had nothing to do with me," Elena said, all in a rush. "I shouldn't have come."

Connor had told her precisely the same thing yesterday, but then Elena had always needed to figure things out for herself.

"Who cares who is wrong and who is right?" Ponti said, which was wonderfully gracious of him, but then again, Ponti had been right. He could afford to be gracious, and so could Connor. Connor had already had an apology from Elena, and hearing and seeing this second apology was reward enough.

"You are here with me," Ponti stated, "and you are safe."

Not that the first fact had anything to do with the second, Connor noted, but at least the young man had tried to take care of his wife. It wasn't his fault Elena hadn't let him.

"It is over then, isn't it?" Ponti asked, a worried tone creeping into his voice.

"The Englishman and I reached an understanding," Elena reassured him. "He won't be coming to Rome anytime soon, and I won't be coming here or to London."

Connor lifted an eyebrow. The fiery and stubborn Elena Duran had actually allowed Shaw to ban her from a city—two cities—all because of this Lorenzo Ponti? She should admit being wrong more often. Or be in love more often. She seemed a whole new woman. Connor had never seen this side of Elena before, but he realized suddenly that Duncan very probably had.

"Don't even think about Peter Shaw any more," Elena was saying to her husband. She added softly, "We have other, more important matters."

"Yes, we do." He reached into his vest pocket and pulled out a ring, which he ceremoniously placed on the third finger of her left hand.

"Querido," she whispered, switching back to Spanish again for the endearment. They stared at each other, enraptured for a moment, until they remembered there were other people in the room. Elena slipped her arm carefully around her husband's waist and supported him as they turned to face Connor and Alex.

"Alex, thank you so much for being here," Elena said, in English now, smiling her brilliant, blazing smile. "And Connor?" she asked, obviously surprised.

"I came looking for my wife," Connor said, with a smile and a comradely nod for Ponti, who smiled and nodded back.

"They were kind enough to wait with me," Ponti said, and Elena moved to the side as Luigi handed Ponti his cane. Leaning on it with his left hand, Ponti held out his right hand to Alex. "Grazie mille, Mrs. MacLeod. I hope to finish our discussion of racehorses another time."

"I've enjoyed meeting you, Lorenzo," Alex said, shaking his hand. "I hope you feel better soon."

"Thank you. And Mr. MacLeod," he said, turning to take Connor's hand, "if you and your family are ever in Rome, you must be our guests."

Connor shook hands firmly—and carefully—then responded to the invitation with only a non-committal smile. Elena was murmuring, "That's not likely to happen," and she was right. Connor didn't want his family in the same country as Elena Duran, let alone the same house. Elena hugged Alex, whispering, "Gracias, amiga."

"You're welcome," Alex said, still in a half-embrace with Elena. "I'm glad we were still in Edinburgh when you stopped by yesterday. I wouldn't have wanted to miss you completely."

Connor wouldn't have minded that a bit, but it had turned out all right. Alex stepped back to his side while Elena moved back next to Ponti, and the two couples went back to finishing this business of saying goodbye. Connor helped Alex on with her coat, then she picked up her briefcase and took Connor's arm again. "Time for us to go," Alex said.

"Us, too," Elena said. "In the last two days I've been kicked out of Edinburgh twice."

Connor returned her impishly knowing smile with the barest minimum of a nod.

"I feel like one of those cowboys from the movies," she said with a good-humored chuckle, letting him know she didn't hold his decree against him. Not too much, anyway.

"You mean like John Wayne?" Ponti asked. He shifted his weight—cautiously—so that his shoulder were back and one hip was slouched down, then he said, the Duke's slow drawl warring with his quick Italian accent, "This town ain't big enough for both of us, pil-grim."

His imitation was so good that Connor smiled and Alex laughed. "You'd be perfect, Lorenzo," she said, "except for your accent," and at the same time, Ponti joined in with, "My accent. I know."

"Before he gets a swelled head thinking he's the next Marcello Mastroianni," Elena said, linking her arm in his, "we'll say goodbye. Connor, Shaw sends his regards."

Connor nodded, not surprised that Shaw had asked Elena what she knew about "Paul Ganton." In the Game, swordwork was essential, but information was critical.

"Thanks, and I'm sure we'll see each other again," she added.

"No doubt," he agreed, and with yet one more round of nods and murmured good-byes, the two couples finally separated.

Connor and Alex went out to dinner, a romantic evening together on their last night in town. By unspoken agreement, not a word was said of the Ponti-Durans. They spoke instead of the history lecture Alex had gone to earlier that day, the holidays just past, the children, and a hundred other small, familiar things.

After dinner, Connor and Alex stopped by the Gowans' house and picked up the kids. Sara and Colin were sent to bed as soon as they all got home. "But, Mom!" Sara protested.

Alex laid down the law. "We're leaving for the farm tomorrow morning, school starts on Monday, and you two have to get back on schedule. It's almost ten o'clock." She kissed them goodnight, and Connor took over from there, following the kids into the hall to make sure they went upstairs.

"What about Elena Duran?" Sara wanted to know, swinging around one-handed on the mahogany baluster at the bottom of the stairs. "Is she still in Edinburgh? Did she fight? Is she still alive?"

"Yes, no, and yes," Connor answered. "She's with her husband at a hotel, and they're leaving for Italy tomorrow morning."

Colin had made it all the way on to the first step, but he wasn't moving. "But, if they're leaving for Italy and we're leaving for the Highlands tomorrow, then I won't have a chance to see Elena's sword so I can draw it."

"I have pictures of Elena's sword," Connor said. "I'll dig them out, and you can draw it from those."

"Great!" Colin said then narrowed his eyes in confusion. "Why do you have pictures of Elena's sword?"

"Because it used to be mine. I gave it to her, ten years ago."

"As a present?" Sara asked dubiously, stopping in mid-swing, because last night while Alex had been out to dinner, the twins had asked and Connor had answered: No, Elena Duran and I don't get along.

"As a trade," Connor corrected. "That sword for hers."

Colin jumped on that. "Do you still have her old one? Can I draw it?"

"You already have. It's the katana with the handle wrapped in dark-blue cord."

"The one with the tsuba that looks like a chrysanthemum?" Colin asked.

"Yes."

"What's her new one like, the one you gave to her?"

"It's a German broadsword." The twins' eyes were still bright with questions, but Connor said, "I'll tell you more later. Go to bed," he ordered, with a kiss goodnight for them both.

"Goodnight, Dad," they chorused and straggled their way up the stairs, bickering good-naturedly about something which Colin had apparently done wrong the day before.

"It was your fault," Colin defended himself. "You were the one who got all dusty, and you made the noise."

"Yeah, well, you were the one who was wiggling around like you had an armadillo down your underwear," Sara retorted. "What was I supposed to do?"

Connor didn't want to know. He went into the library, where Alex was picking out a book. He lifted her hair and kissed the nape of her neck. "Ready for bed?" He kissed her again, a little closer to her ear, and she shivered under his caress.

"Since you ask so nicely…" She replaced the book on the shelf and turned around with a smile. "Yes." They went up the stairs together, arms around each others' waists. Halfway up, Alex said, "Elena and Lorenzo seem very happy together."

"Mmm-hmm," Connor agreed.

"I think he's good for her."

"Mmm."

"Do you think she's good for him?"

This time Connor's "mmm" was non-committal, and Alex stopped climbing. "Elena's a real handful, even for someone her own age," Connor explained. "Ponti's very young."

"She seemed like putty in his hands tonight," Alex observed.

"That she did," Connor said cheerfully, for it had been a sight to behold.

"What did they say, exactly?" Alex asked, curious as always.

Connor snorted in amusement, smiling again. "They should have been on stage, an extravagantly romantic Italian opera. Her best line was: 'I was wrong and you were right.'"

"Verbatim?"

Connor nodded. "But he probably doesn't hear that very often, and he'll hear it less often as the years go by. The honeymoon phase doesn't last forever."

"No," Alex agreed thoughtfully as they started climbing again. "Maybe by the time it's over, Lorenzo will be ready to keep her in hand." She smiled at him sidelong. "The way I do you."

"I like it when you keep me in hand," Connor said, smiling back.

"And you're a real handful," Alex said.

"More than one," Connor corrected as they reached the top of the stairs.

Alex laughed and agreed: "You definitely require two." She kissed him then went to say goodnight to Sara and Colin one last time—and to make sure they turned off their lights and didn't stay up all night to read. At least they weren't going to be using flashlights for a while.

Connor got in the bed to warm it up for Alex, and in a few minutes she returned, burrowing under the covers and snuggling close to him, tangling their feet together in the sheets. Suddenly, she lifted her head and kissed him fiercely. "Thank you for not fighting," she said to him, her eyes suspiciously bright. "Thank you for not making me go through what Lorenzo went through today … all this last week … and will probably go through again."

"Hey," Connor said softly, taking both her hands between his own, then kissing the back of the ring finger on her left hand, just above her wedding ring. "Thank you for giving me a reason not to fight … Mrs. MacLeod."

Alex's smile broke through the threatening tears. "I love you, Connor."

"I love you, too, Alex." Alex kissed him again then laid her head on his shoulder, their legs intertwined, still holding hands, her fingers caressing his. She wasn't done talking yet, though; Connor knew the signs. Sure enough, a few moments later, she began.

"Last night at dinner," she said, not lifting her head, "Elena asked me to ask you to call Lorenzo, if she were killed. She said it was her 'dying wish.'"

Connor gave a soft "mmph" of resigned amusement. Leave it to Elena to ask for something more, even beyond the grave. Always pushing, that one. Oh, he would have done it, of course. Even without her asking, he would have done it. Comrades-in-arms took care of their own, and no matter their differences, he and Elena had fought side-by-side. "Why didn't you tell me earlier?" Connor asked.

"When I got home last night, you were asleep. Today, after I told you about my conversation with Elena, I didn't think you wanted to talk about her anymore."

"You were right."

"I know," his wife said with complete confidence. "I have you in hand, remember?" Connor swatted her on the backside, but Alex only grinned before she got serious again, almost pensive. "I didn't want to talk about it, either—that she might die. It's easier not to think about it."

"Yeah," Connor agreed, knowing exactly what she meant.

"Elena has a lot of respect for you, Connor."

"And I respect her," Connor said, because he did. "But as much as I respect the brave and fiery Elena Duran and her young and stalwart husband Lorenzo Ponti, I think we've talked enough about that pair of newlyweds for a while."

"Is that right?"

"Mmm-hmm," Connor murmured, rolling Alex over onto her back and then kissing a path along her lower jaw up to her ear. "I think you and I should revisit our own newlywed days."

"Do you?" Alex said, smiling up at him from the pillows.

"I do," Connor replied, and so they did.

* * *

**Chapter 9: Full House**

* * *

_**Late at night**, **May 2007**_  
_**Rome**_

"Is he asleep?" Lorenzo whispered.

"At last," Elena answered just as softly.

Lorenzo tiptoed out of the baby's room, but Elena stayed behind to lower the window a little, so the baby could have a breeze but not too much of the warm spring night air. Then she came back and peered into the lace-festooned bassinet. Yellow down peeked out over the blanket, making his head look—and feel, she remembered—a bit like a chick. Resisting the urge to touch the baby once more, she smiled and nodded at Francesca, the nanny, who had diplomatically left the nursery when Elena and Lorenzo had entered but now hovered in the doorway, ready to go back to her charge. Elena followed her husband through the connecting door and into their own suite of rooms.

"Whew!" he said. But he was smiling, and Elena ran her fingers through his hair then put her arm in his and walked him toward their bedroom. "Two days of having a newborn, and I'm already exhausted," he said. But as they got to their bedroom door, Lorenzo stopped suddenly and asked, "Are all the arrangements made for the baptism tomorrow?"

"Of course they are," she soothed him. "Your mother made them, remember? Bishop Tartelli at the baptismal font in St. Peter's. We are honored."

"Yes," he said. Looking at her sideways, he asked tentatively, "You don't mind, do you? About my mother making the arrangements?"

"No, of course not," Elena said, smiling. Before she'd married Lorenzo she had decided on a strategy to deal with his mother, the very strong-willed current matriarch of the Ponti family. Elena would let Gina Ponti have her way at every possible opportunity, so that on the rare occasions when Elena did challenge her, Gina would know it was serious. The system had worked quite well so far. Tomorrow at the christening, however, Elena allowed there might be a small problem.

Well, might as well get started. Bluntly, she said, "I'd like to christen the baby Marcello."

Lorenzo blinked. "What? Where did this come from? We decided to call him Roberto, after my grandfather."

"No," she said sweetly but firmly. "You decided that." His mother had helped with that decision. "I want to call him Marcello, after his grandfather on his mother's side of the family."

"His grandfather? But your father…" His eyes narrowed. "Your father died in the seventeenth century," he said in a loud, somewhat angry whisper, "and besides his name was … Alvaro, wasn't it?"

"I don't mean my father, my love," she said, stroking his face. "I mean Ana's father."

"Ana's father?" he said, totally and utterly surprised.

"Yes, remember Ana Monteverde? The blonde hairdresser you slept with and got pregnant? The mother of the little boy down the hall?"

Lorenzo took her hand and pulled her toward him. "_You_ are his mother!" he declared forcefully.

"Yes, now I am. But for nine months of pregnancy and ten hours of labor, Ana was his mother. And she said she'd always wanted to call her firstborn after her father."

Lorenzo walked away from her, looked out the window, then came back to stand in front of her. "When did you meet Ana?" he asked in the same tone he would have asked, "When did you dance naked at noon at the Piazza San Marco?"

Elena smoothed the ribbon of her nightgown under her breasts, then looked up at him. "Right after we flew back from Scotland. I would never, ever forcibly take a child from his mother, so I wanted to be sure, absolutely sure, that she was willing to give up the baby."

Now he was angry. "Do you think _I_ would force her—"

"No, of course not," she said, soothing him again, putting her hand on his bare chest. "But someone might have, in your name. One of the lawyers. Or perhaps one of your father's friends might have made her an offer she couldn't refuse."

"That's ridiculous!" he said. "I would never let such a thing happen. I spoke to her myself!"

"I also needed to speak to her myself," she answered. "I'm satisfied on that score. But when she asked me for one thing, to be allowed to suggest a name for him, I agreed."

"You agreed? Without consulting me?"

Elena sighed. Lorenzo was a generous, honorable, Italian male. Time to appeal to his sense of chivalry. "It was the right thing to do, Lorenzo. She's a sweet girl; she's given up her child and brought us immense joy. How can it hurt to give her this one thing?"

"A sweet girl?" he echoed, flabbergasted. "You told me you'd kill the little bitch! And considering you're an … Immortal," he said, stressing the word, "I thought you really meant it. To kill her, that is."

Elena had really meant it. Then. "That's before I met her. She's what we call in Spanish an infeliz. An innocent girl, not yet twenty, who …," was seduced by a handsome, rich young man, she wanted to say, but instead went with, "… stumbled into this affair without realizing the ramifications." She shook her head. "I gave her my word, Lorenzo."

Lorenzo knew what Elena's word meant to her. It was the same thing his word meant to him. She hoped that would end the argument. It almost did. He was silent for a moment, then suggested, "How about Roberto Marcello Ponti?"

Elena rolled it on her tongue. "Actually, it sounds better than Marcello Roberto. Agreed, but be aware that I will call him Marcello, Marcellino when he's little, and I will insist that everyone else call him Marcellino, and that's the name he'll be known by."

"And we tell my parents … what? That you just like the name Marcello?"

She shrugged. "It happens to be true, and if you don't want to tell them the whole story, fine."

He shook his head. "We should talk about this some more," he said, but she had agreed to include his grandfather's name, he was willing to cross his mother, and Elena knew she'd won.

"We have all night," she said, moving closer, putting her right hand around the nape of his neck. "But there are several other things I'd rather do with my nights," she suggested silkily, running her index and middle fingers softly along his lips.

He snorted. "We haven't had any sleep in two nights, Elena. I'm not an Immortal. I'm only a man, and I am not from Havana!" he said, but he was smiling.

She giggled then lowered her hands behind him and squeezed his very muscular—oh, yes!—very firm ass, pulling their two bodies together. She could feel him swelling against her abdomen. Something else was very firm.

"You're going to kill me, you know. I'm going to have a heart attack," he prophesied.

"You're twenty-six years old, you have the body of a Greek god, and besides, you'll die with a smile on— Is that the baby?" she asked, hearing a very familiar cry. They'd left the intervening doors open just for this purpose, and she turned towards the baby's room, but Lorenzo caught her hand and pulled her back towards him, although she was still facing in Marcellino's direction.

"We have a nanny, remember? Why don't we let her take this one?" he suggested.

A moment later the baby stopped crying, and Elena could hear soft crooning. Francesca, of course. Good. She might work out.

"There," Lorenzo said. Without waiting for an answer or for her agreement, he swept her up and kissed her hard on the lips. Then he walked over and put her on their bed. Kneeling on the bed and looking down at her, he softly stroked her face, then said, "I'm going to make love to you."

"Si, mi amor," she answered, as passionate as always.

* * *

**THE END**

**Elena and Peter Shaw meet again in the story "Elena's Journey"**

* * *

**AUTHORS' NOTES**

**Thanks to:**  
Robin and Livia for the Italian  
MacNair for the enthusiasm  
Bridget for the planning  
Harlene, Terry, and Livia for the eagle eyes and discerning taste.

**STORIES IN THIS UNIVERSE**  
For more about Elena and Peter Shaw, read "Elena's Journey"  
For more about Elena and Cassandra being friends, read "Hope Remembered III: Confidante" and "Hope Triumphant III: Anamchara" (chapter Timeless)  
For more about Elena and Cassandra on the cruise, read "Duende."  
For another story by Vi and Parda, read "Invisible Darkness"

For more stories of Elena and the MacLeods, go to Vi's page

For the story of Elena and Bethel, read Vi's "Elena in New York" and "Elena in Argentina."  
For the story of Connor trading swords with Elena, read Vi's "Trust II."  
For the story of Elena and Simon Andrew, read Vi's "His Better Half."

For more about Alex and Cassandra's plans, read Parda's "Hope Triumphant II: Sister"

**In case you were counting, the thirteen Immortals whom Alex has met are:**  
(1,2) Connor and Kane in HL3 (in Parda's stories "Wild Mountain Thyme" and "All the Good Women")  
(3,4,5) Duncan, Richie, and Sean Burns at Alex's wedding in Parda's story "All the Fun"  
(6,7) Elena Duran and Simon Andrew in Vi's story "His Better Half."  
(8) Cassandra in Parda's story "Hope Remembered I: Friend."  
(9) Evann in "Hope Triumphant II: Sister"  
(10) Grace Chandel in 2002, in "Hope Triumphant II: Sister"  
(11) Yaliti in this story in 2003.  
(12, 13) Amanda and Methos at Duncan's wedding in Parda's story "Goddess Child."

* * *

**Translations: (those not marked otherwise are all Spanish)**  
CHAPTER 1  
chiquito/a - little one

CHAPTER 2  
bien - good

CHAPTER 3  
!que barbaridad! - wow!  
Signorina (Italian) - Miss

CHAPTER 4  
mi amor (Spanish), querido/a (Spanish), cara mia (Italian) - my love  
cojones - balls (as a measure of manhood)  
idiota - idiot

CHAPTER 5  
cabron - asshole  
per favore (Italian) - please

CHAPTER 6  
grazie mille (Italian) - a thousand thanks  
Dio mio! (Italian) - my God!  
carpe diem (Latin) - seize the day

CHAPTER 7  
carajo - double damn  
!gracias a Dios! - thank God!

CHAPTER 8  
scusi (Italian) - excuse me  
Inglese (Italian) - Englishman  
il telefono (Italian) - the telephone  
tsuba (Japanese) - small handguard between hilt and blade.


End file.

Highlander, Drama, Romance