Chicago
November, 1982
He watched her from the corner, studying her as if they'd never met. Fashionable shoes, well-tailored blouse and skirt, a small and sturdy handbag. She stood several feet back from Seurat, gazing up at the massive painting with an expression he identified as part awe, part envy. Talent always did recognize genius. With her head tilted and her hair twisted back in a sleek knot, he could see the fine lines of her throat. An Immortal wouldn't have to swing hard to cut right through that naked, vulnerable neck, sending Tessa Noel's head thumping to the gallery floor -
Duncan MacLeod drew in a sharp breath. No, no, no. No one would harm Tessa, not while he lived and breathed. That morning, when they'd first arrived at the Art Institute, he'd felt the fleeting touch of another Immortal. No threat had materialized since then, but he'd found himself unable to relax and enjoy the museum.
"It's marvelous, isn't it?" Tessa asked, stepping up beside him, her gaze still fixed on the work of art before them. Her warm, soft hand touched his shoulder. "Magnificent."
Duncan didn't tell her he'd first seen the painting when its oils were still fresh and the details subject to change. He'd spent more than one lazy afternoon stretched out on the grass, watching Georges sketch out the rounded dresses and curved umbrellas that would add symmetry to the composition. Children laughing, women gossiping, boats gliding by on the river . . . one magic step into the frame might return him to those long-ago days, a hundred years back through the barrier of time.
But time-travel worked only one way for Duncan MacLeod - forward, ever forward, chopping off heads and losing loved ones on the way.
"Yes, it's magnificent. But it's not as beautiful as you." Duncan wrapped his arms around Tessa's waist and pulled her close. "The most beautiful work of art in this entire museum."
She smiled indulgently. "I think you exaggerate, Mr. MacLeod."
"The most beautiful work of art in all of Chicago," he continued. "In all of Illinois. In the entire - "
Tessa kissed him to shut him up. Her perfume washed over him like a shower of tiny lilies. The warm press of her against his chest made him want to take her to the floor and ravish her right there, in front of the bored security guard and a frazzled teacher with a gaggle of school children in tow.
She broke away with a smile. "You know what I think?"
"No. What?"
"I think we should go back to the hotel right now, so I can strip off all your clothes and - " Tessa whispered the rest in his ear.
Her suggestion made Duncan's imagination soar. He pictured her straddling him on the massive four-poster bed of their room. Her hair tousled, her lips very red, her thighs strong and slender as she lowered herself -
"Let's go," he said.
Once outside, they snagged a ride from the long line of yellow cabs waiting on Michigan Avenue. The brisk wind flapped Tessa's coat and rain began to pelt down as Duncan ushered her inside. He thought he felt a faint, skittering buzz and pulled back to scan the area. He saw only hurrying pedestrians and the stop-and-go traffic. Unsettled, Duncan slid in after Tessa. The interior smelled like new vinyl and cigar smoke, but at least it was warm and dry.
"The Tremont Hotel," Duncan told the driver. The grimy, gritty city began to roll by outside.
"You tourists or honeymooners?" The tall, elderly cabbie glanced at them in the rearview mirror. "I'm betting honeymooners. You got the special glow."
"Tourists," Duncan answered firmly. Tessa looked out the window, her expression betraying nothing.
"Oh, well, tourists are good, too." The cabbie launched into an impromptu narration of landmarks and famous buildings. Only half-listening, Duncan leaned over and nuzzled Tessa's cheek.
"Would you like to eat out tonight, or just order room service?"
Tessa shrugged slightly. "It doesn't matter."
He wondered if she was thinking about marriage, the unresolved issue between them. After revealing his immortality to Tessa the previous year, he'd asked her to leave France with him. He'd told her he had business interests abroad that needed tending, and that his friends and customers in Paris had begun to notice he wasn't aging. He hadn't mentioned the Game, or the alarming number of head-hunters that had begun finding their way to his door.
"You told me you always wanted to travel," he'd said late one night, drawing his finger down her bare shoulder. "Let me show you the world."
"My mother would be scandalized," she murmured, drowsy after their lovemaking. "Her innocent daughter running around the world with a strange man, living in sin."
The topic of marriage had gone unspoken for several weeks, but Duncan sensed it lingering in the air. He didn't know how to tell Tessa about the gypsy curse that hung over him. He wasn't even sure he believed in the curse himself. But he knew he wasn't ready to marry her, to wed her permanently to his violent, turbulent, childless life.
At dinner one night she'd said, "Isn't there something you want to ask me?"
Duncan sipped cautiously at his wine. "Something like what?"
Fire flashed in her eyes. "The question you've been avoiding."
Duncan put his wineglass down. He couldn't be completely honest with her, nor could he blatantly lie. As gently as he could, he said, "Perhaps I'm not ready to ask it."
"Perhaps you shouldn't assume I'd say yes," she retorted.
For a week she remained frosty around him. Duncan thought her behavior childish. But then again, what did he expect from a woman in her early twenties? She had only her own limited experience and the advice of older women to guide her. Being with her was like robbing the proverbial cradle. Then again, the only women his own age carried sharp weapons under their coats and shared none of Tessa's fresh, unjaded opinions of the world.
As much as he loved her, he began to think she would not leave Paris without a ring on her finger. But she surprised him in that, just as she had surprised him in so many other ways.
"I'm not ready to be married," she said as they strolled along the Seine. "I just want to know that I'm worthy of being asked."
"You're worthy of everything I have and everything I am," he told her, and meant it.
Despite her parents' vehement protests - or perhaps galvanized by them - Tessa agreed to leave Paris with Duncan. They flew to Scotland, and he showed her his beloved Highlands. Next came New York City, where they explored every nook and cranny of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Connor had been off headhunting somewhere in Australia, a somewhat fortunate circumstance. Duncan wasn't sure he wanted Connor and Tessa to meet just yet. He wanted to keep his Immortal life and everyday life as far apart as he could.
After New York they went down to Philadelphia, then up to Montreal, back down to Chicago. They traveled wherever and whenever they wanted, free from job commitments or worries about money. Duncan hoped to keep moving west, to eventually live in Seattle or Vancouver or somewhere in between, but he had no deadlines. He wanted Tessa to see as much of her new country as possible before settling down.
"You didn't like that museum," Tessa said abruptly, pulling him from his thoughts.
"What? Of course I did."
"You brooded all day long."
"I don't brood," Duncan said. In addition to the list of things he hadn't told her about himself or Immortals, he hadn't mentioned the powerful lure of museums. Grand collections of objects from the past tended to draw his kind like moths to flame. Many drifted through the galleries cloaked in private thoughts, gazing at the tangible reminders of lives once led. Others preferred to work as docents educating the public, or to sit on boards of directors. As long as Tessa insisted on visiting every major museum they passed, Duncan had to deal with the possibility of a challenge.
He'd been lucky so far. The short, mousy-looking Immortal in the men's room at the Met had fled with hurried excuses about leaving his sword at home. A red-haired woman at the Chagall exhibit in Montreal had given Duncan a cool, appraising look before continuing her lecture to a tour group. Compared to France, where practically every fourth person on the Metro had a supernaturally long lifeline, North America seemed sparsely populated by Immortals.
Every fight held the promise of losing his head and Quickening. He'd dealt with that possibility for centuries, had come to terms with it in his heart and head. But the potential loss of Tessa to the Game terrified him. More than once, wives or lovers had been targeted by enemy Immortals as weak spots to be exploited or prizes to be captured and raped. He'd suffered through those horrors before. He had, to his great shame, used the same tactics on others.
"Mac?"
Duncan blinked. "Yes?"
Tessa touched his face. "Where do you go, when you look like that?"
"I'm right here," he said, sidestepping the question. He put his hand on her thigh and added, with a smile, "I just can't wait to get back to our room."
The cab pulled up to their small, meticulously well-maintained hotel. The lobby bar was full of European expatriates. The murals on the walls depicted Chicago at the turn of the century. The old-fashioned elevator with its scrolled iron grill glided smoothly up to the fourth floor. A waiter rolling a room service cart to the room across from Duncan and Tessa's momentarily blocked the way. Duncan eyed the silver-domed trays appreciatively, salivating at the smell of steak. The woman in a blue robe who opened the door had been crying, her face blotchy and red. When she saw the trays, she burst into tears all over again.
Tessa asked, immediately, "Are you all right?"
"I'm fine," the woman managed to say, her hands over her face. "Are you alone?" Tessa asked.
The woman was indeed alone. Her lover had just left her, had cruelly broken off their relationship. Duncan and the waiter both shifted uneasily, preferring to just get the food delivered and continue on with their lives. Tessa touched the woman's arm and patted her shoulder.
"Everything's going to be just fine," she said. "Let's go inside." The woman signed for the food. The waiter rolled the cart inside and made good his escape. Duncan dreaded the idea of being pulled into the room to consult on this lovers' quarrel, but Tessa evidently had no need for his help. "I'll be over soon," she promised across the divide of the hallway, and then closed the door in order to comfort her newfound and distraught friend.
Duncan went inside his own room, hung up his coat and kicked off his shoes. The sky grew dark outside the windows while he watched an old Rosalind Russel movie. Concerned at how long Tessa had been gone, he tiptoed across the corridor and put his ear at the door. He heard the two women talking, but he couldn't make out their exact words. Back in the room, he studied the room service menu and ordered baked chicken, salad, chocolate mousse and wine.
When the food arrived, he knocked on the other woman's door and said, "Tessa? Our dinner's here."
She opened the door a few inches and said, apologetically, "I already ate."
Duncan tried to hide his exasperation, but he didn't think he succeeded very well. "Are you going to be over here all night? You don't even know her!"
"Her name is Eileen and she's very upset," Tessa said, as if that perfectly explained why their evening had to be so grievously interrupted. "I'll be over soon."
It took another hour for Tessa to return to the room. Half-asleep on the bed, Duncan felt her slide up beside him and rest her head on his shoulder.
"All better now?" he asked, still a little testy.
"Men can be so cruel," Tessa whispered. "Don't ever leave me, Duncan."
He rolled over to face her, all annoyance forgotten. "I won't," he said, the promise coming out of him automatically.
"She gave him everything she had. He took it and threw it away. He didn't even tell her to her face, he just wrote it in a hateful letter. I don't understand."
"There are two sides to every story," he reminded her.
"Don't ever run away," Tessa repeated, her hand on his face. "If there comes a day when you don't love me anymore, or when you must go away - tell me to my face. Don't run away like a coward."
"I will always love you," Duncan insisted. They kissed softly. He undid the pins in her hair and ran his fingers through the golden strands. At that moment, in a dark hotel room in Chicago, with their future opening up ahead of them, he knew that much to be true. He loved Tessa Noel like he had loved no woman before. He loved her so much he felt like he was the first man to really, truly, honestly know what love meant. He would give up his fortune for her, he would surrender his honor for her, he would unquestioningly die for her.
But he would not let her die for him.
"I will never run away," he whispered, lowering himself to her waiting arms, knowing he'd just lied. He could too easily imagine the day when he might indeed have to leave her, to protect her from the most dangerous players in the Game. And on that day, if that day came, he might not have the courage to say goodbye.
"Duncan," she murmured, calling him home.
"I will never run away," he lied again, and began making love to her. In betraying her he betrayed himself, but he'd done worse in his life, and Tessa Noel was worth it.
The End