Author's Note: This story was written for the "An Anniversary to Remember" Challenge on the TQ Ficathon. May 19, 2006, is Tracy and Luke's first wedding anniversary. Yeah—I need to get out more.

It was hot in the Maarkam Islands. She'd somehow managed not to expect it, and her northern clothing seemed vaguely incongruous to the surroundings. Tracy tugged at the tight collar, wishing to herself that she was the type to dress in soft, bare-shouldered fashions.

Light things with tiny straps that barely concealed…anything.

She closed her eyes, trying not to notice that Holly's skin was precisely the same pale gold of the moon that hung low in the night sky. She closed her eyes and tried not to notice the pain and anger she felt, the jealousy she'd never admit to anyone. Seeing them together had been harder than she'd expected.

Nothing was going as planned.

She'd thought to come in here, haughty and righteous, and swoop down like Hera herself to claim her husband from the larcenous little tart with the perfect skin and delicate features that seemed to defy the course of time.

Instead, she stood alone in the moonlight, away from the rest of them, alone again in a crowd.

Wanting him, and hating herself for it. Hating him, even more, for not wanting her.

What a fool time had made of Tracy Quartermaine.

She rubbed her neck, tugging at the button that held her collar closed. Her tunic was as ridiculous in the tropical heat as if she'd worn a parka and mukluks. She opened another button, then just threw caution to the wind. She completely unbuttoned the tunic, pulling it off her bare shoulders until she wore only the tiny black shell underneath.

Silky fabric, like Holly's dress. Tiny straps, concealing nothing but age. Tracy hugged the tunic, folded across her arms, against her mid-drift and tried not to cry. This had been a farce, the latest in a decades-long string of humiliations she'd suffered at the hands of her husbands.

If only she'd managed to stay cold. If only she'd never smiled at him, never laughed at his jokes, never cared whether the virus took his life, or his daughter's life.

If only being right were enough.

But being right couldn't stand up to the truth of wearing a tiny slip of a shirt with only the moonlight touching her skin and the tropical breezes whispering in her ears. Being right couldn't hold up to loneliness, no matter how fiercely Tracy fought against it.

"You're an idiot," she murmured to herself as she twisted the tunic in her arms. It had looked so gorgeous to her when she bought it, elegant and sleek and just flamboyant enough to suit her style. Now she felt old and stupid, and she wanted to throw the thing into the jungle.

As it was, she let the mass of fabric fall into the dirt as she stretched, allowing her head to fall gently backwards as she looked skyward at the hazy mist that lingered between the Earth and the stars. She felt arms around her waist, hot breath against her cheek as Luke came up behind her, wrapping her in a light embrace.

"Thought you'd run off into the jungle, Spanky. Where ya been?"

He was dirty, his clothes filled with grime and his skin rough and scratched. He felt hard against her, his body lean and wiry with years of running…from the authorities, from commitment, from his own inner demons. It took everything she had not to lean back into him, to let him support her like he was trying to do, to sink into his arms and take her comfort in any form she could find it.

But Tracy was stronger than her needs, and she wasn't about to let Luke Spencer off this easily. She pulled out of his embrace, digging her fingers into his flesh a little harder than necessary as she jerked his arms away from her. She couldn't find it in herself to speak--she was afraid her voice would crack, her resolve would weaken, and she'd betray herself to him. So she let her body talk, with haughty stiffness, with the cold, withering stare she'd worked a lifetime to perfect, with the tiny, glowering smile that screamed "you're beneath me" with every curve.

"Aw, come on, Spanky. You're not still angry with me about that whole vow renewal thing, are you?"

Tracy would have laughed, if she wasn't afraid it would have dissolved into hysterical tears. This wasn't about the vow renewal. This was about so much more than that, so many hurts and humiliations. The only vows she cared about renewing right now were those she'd made to herself--after Larry Ashton, after Mitch Williams. God, after Paul Hornsby. Vows she took with all the solemnity of a cloistered nun, approaching her final vows, vows of authenticity, autonomy, and aristocracy, all designed to keep her from ever feeling this pain again.

Vows she broke on a regular basis.

"I would have made a lousy nun," she murmured to herself, not caring that Luke was still there, watching her with that expression of pseudo-give-a-damn he affected whenever it suited him to do so.

His eyes widened, and he smiled at her. "I could have told you that, Sugar Plum." He reached out to brush a strand of her chocolate-colored hair from her cheek.

Tracy forced herself not to notice the warmth of his fingertips.

"No, if it's a change of vocation you're looking for, wife, the convent would not be my suggestion to you." He put an arm around her, studiously ignoring the fact that she stiffened in his arms and pulled away as much as she could while still remaining in physical contact with him. Luke leaned close to her ear, his breath hot and his beard scrachy against her jaw as he whispered, "But if you'd like a slightly-used nun's habit for a little kinky fun, I know somebody who could hook you up."

She sunk her elbow hard into his gut and felt a burst of warm satisfaction at his pained grunt. "Save it for your girlfriend, Spencer," she snarled, extricating herself from his embrace.

"Now, I knew you were mad about the Holly thing."

"Mad about the Holly thing?" she repeated in an incredulous tone. "Now why would I be mad about the Holly thing, when I wasn't mad about the Skye thing? Or the Laura thing, for that matter," she added, knowing and not caring that just the mention of his ex-wife's name hurt Luke to the core. "No, why should I be mad, when it's just obvious to everybody from God to the milkman that Tracy Quartermaine was born to play the cuckolded wife." She slapped away the hand he lifted, gently, toward her shoulder. "It's tradition, set forth by Lord Larry Ashton and upheld with honor by the latest successor to the throne." She scowled at him, angrier with herself for letting go of her emotions than at him for provoking them. "At least you did me the courtesy of not cheating on me on our wedding night."

Luke let go with a long whistle. "Which one did that?"

"Does it matter?" She shook her head, more to distract from the tears that were forming there than for any real effect. She didn't want to be having this conversation with him. She didn't want to be on this island, chasing after a man who didn't love her.

It was undignified. Pathetic, just like Daddy said.

That's when she started crying in earnest, hating each drop as they scorched down her cheeks, as her no-good cheater of a husband pulled her into his arms, as she melted against him, let him comfort her, let him kiss her hair because she needed it so much.

Just for this one moment, she needed to be held more than she needed to be Tracy Quartermaine.

And she needed to hold him even more.

It was only a small step from embrace to kiss, and Tracy couldn't help herself as she poured her passion into that kiss, letting it wash through her and over her and around her like the warm tropical breezes. Luke met her passion with surprising ease, weaving long fingers through her hair, easing her body around until they were flat against each other, her arms around his shoulders, his lowering until they formed a powerful circle around her waist.

It had been so long since she'd kissed a man like this, and been sober enough to remember it. Tracy moaned, letting him slide his hand under her shirt, reveling in his touch, not caring that he'd probably slept with another woman on this very island, not caring that this was probably pity, probably self-preservation on his part--knowing he could push her only so far before the gravy train moved on and left him in the dust.

She didn't care that they were only a few hundred yards from where his lover, his rival, her son and his daughter, the whole lot of them schemed and argued and worked through years of familial guilt in a ramshackle plantation manor. She didn't care that the ground was hard and her crème-color slacks where going to be irreparably stained as they tumbled to the ground together, as his hands grew more greedy, his mouth more demanding, and his groans and sighs and whispers of endearments and praise and dirty little phrases grew more frantic, designed as they were to hasten the build-up of passion between them.

And she knew that it would never matter how or why they got here, only that after nearly a year, they were lying together, bodies hastily tugging at clothing, swatting at the occasional mosquito, tugging at stones and twisted limbs and struggling to spread out her tunic to form a make-shift blanket to lie on, laughing with the complete absurdity of it, giddy with sex and anger and wanting and knowing that it was far too complicated to discuss at the moment when they could be making love.

And that is what they did, there in her secluded spot under the pregnant moon, her tiny slip of a shirt tangled in his grimy clothes, just as her body was tangled in his, her life tangled in his, irrevocably, undeniably, their hearts gloriously tangled together, if only for this one night.

And when they came, scratching and nibbling, laughing curses at each other, moaning prayers to a god neither quite believed in, she knew that she'd sleep well, for the first time in a long time, in her husband's arms.

Luke shook himself awake. His arm was asleep, and he was itching in an most unpleasant place. He stretched, still too groggy to know quite where he was, but certain that if he was indeed in a bed, this was the worst mattress he'd ever slept on.

He squinted his eyes open. The moon was high above him, peeking through the thick cover of trees as it continued in its arc towards dawn. It occurred to him that he wasn't alone, and that's when it all came back to him.

The island. The fight.

Tracy.

He rolled over, finding her wrapped in that awful tunic she'd worn. Her hair was a mess--something he'd learned on their honeymoon to love about her. Sound asleep, it seemed, was the only place where Tracy Quartermaine couldn't exercise that rigid self-control she held with such pride. He watched her sleeping for a long moment. The shadows played across her face, which was soft and smiling sweetly in sleep. Her make-up was a little mussed, just like it had been on their honeymoon, and he couldn't help chuckling.

He loved her messy.

He loved her bitchy, too, but this messy, vulnerable, smiling-in-her-sleep Tracy was just…irresistible to him. He leaned down and kissed her forehead, and she mumbled something in Spanish. His rudimentary understanding led him to surmise she'd either asked for a later wake-up call or cursed his ancestry.

With Tracy, either was possible.

Luke snuggled down against her, lifting the tunic to press his body against hers before taking her in his arms. She whined softly into his shoulders, but let him hold her as she slept.

He had to admit, he liked the way she felt against him. Years ago, when he'd first met Tracy, he'd thought she was too skinny, haughty and beautiful, but a little bony for his tastes. Now, the years had added several pounds to her frame and, from where Luke was positioned, they felt wonderful. They gave her a softness and a curviness that he found entrancing, and his body began to respond to hers as they lay there in the fading moonlight, the sounds of the jungle all around them. He could feel her squirming in his arms, feel her fighting it even as she slept, and he wondered why it made him even hotter to know she could still doubt it after everything that had happened.

That she could still doubt them after the explosiveness of their lovemaking.

It was funny. Before she'd arrived, all his thoughts were of Holly. Now, Holly seemed frail and hollow next to Tracy. She was beautiful, but in a less earthy way, in a less…real way.

Holly was the kind of woman you went on an adventure with.

Tracy was the kind of woman who made life an adventure.

It was a subtle difference, but Luke was willing to accept it for what it was worth and take his chances on his lawfully-wedded bride. At least for the time being.

He had to admit, being married to Tracy was going to be a lot more fun now that they were sleeping together. He wondered absently, as he kissed the soft pale flesh of her shoulders, if it was safe now to tell her the truth, that they'd never made love, that the entire wedding night had been concocted to keep her from annulling the marriage on the grounds of non-consummation.

Not that she could use that one now, but Luke had a feeling such a revelation at this point in the game would either amuse her or piss her off royally. And since it was sort of incredibly great having her in his bed, Luke chose discretion as the better part of valor and decided to keep that tidbit of information safely out of his wife's hands, for a little while longer, anyway.

"Wake up, Spanky Buns," he crooned in her ear, flicking his tongue just behind her lobe to tickle the sensitive skin there. "Papa Bear wants to play."

"Papa Bear needs to back off," she mumbled. "Spanky Buns is hibernating." She yawned and pulled herself more deeply into his arms. "Jet lag."

"Aw…." He stretched out again with her head pillowed on his chest and his shirt scrunched into a ball under his own head. It was fine just to let her sleep. Luke was content for now to enjoy her physical closeness without any thought of sexual gratification.

They had the rest of their lives for that.

"They couldn't have gotten far." Dillon sounded worried, and Lulu tried to keep from letting him infect her with worry. "I mean, my mom is not exactly the adventure type."

"My dad is, but even he can't stand up against machine guns." Lulu wanted to tell him to hurry up, but Dillon kept looking behind every tree, and up a few of them, as if her dad and Tracy were some sort of cartoon characters hiding in the leaves overhead. "What the hell were they thinking, running off in the middle of the night?"

"They probably got captured by bounty hunters," Dillon said glumly. "My mother is probably dead, and--oh, yeah, again. My fault."

"Like, how is this in any way your fault?"

"My mother came after me."

"Your mother came after my dad, and possibly the bounty." Lulu rolled her eyes and grunted as she stumbled on yet another exposed tree root. "You are such a drama queen. How does Georgie put up with you?"

And that set Dillon off on another tangent, this time about his guilt over Georgie, how he'd never managed to call her, how he was a terrible husband, blah blah blah.

She was just about to tell him that Georgie was luckyto be rid of him for a few days when she saw the bodies. It took everything she had not to scream.

There were two bodies in a clearing just a few yards ahead, lying on the ground, tangled together in rags, limbs askew, scratches and bruises everywhere. They didn't seem to be moving.

"Dillon!" she said in a choked whisper, clutching his shoulder hard in her fist. "Dillon!"

"What?"

She scrunched her eyes shut, and pointed towards the carnage on the ground just yards away from them. "Look. Corpses."

"What?" Dillon turned around, shielding her from the danger in the trees, peering reluctantly through the brush to get a better look at the battered forms in front of them. "Oh. My. God…." he whispered hoarsely.

"Do you think…" Lulu couldn't bear to think it, much less say it.

"I don't know. Maybe it's two other people."

"Two other…dead people?" Lulu choked out. She didn't want to cry. She wasn't going to cry. Her dad would kill her if she bawled, so she wasn't gonna cry. "We've got to make sure," she said with grim determination. "We have to know for sure before we tell the others that…"

"Mom and Luke are dead." He squinted, turning his head away to keep from looking straight at the horrible sight ahead of him. "Ohmygod. Look at that--they must have broken every bone in their bodies. How else would they get them in that position?"

"You have to go check."

Dillon's eyes shot right up into his spiky hair, and he looked at Lulu as if she were insane. "You want me to go check? That?"

"What if they're still alive? What if they need 9-1-1?"

"Yeah, right, I can hear it. 'Um, 9-1-1? We need an emergency vehicle. Yeah, take a right at the banana tree and follow the monkey dung straight ahead.'"

"Well, we can't just leave them there. We have to know." Lulu drew in a deep breath and steadied herself. Somebody was going to have to be strong, and it obviously wasn't gonna be Prince Valient here. She shook herself, waggling her head slightly from left to right before grounding and centering. Then she tip-toed to the bodies.

They didn't look dead, she thought as she peer through squinted eyes down, not wanting to see any gruesome details. Maybe they were just asleep. Yeah, she thought as she reached behind her to grab a stick. Carefully, she poked the tip at one of the body's--the woman. She lifted the woman's brown hair to reveal the face below.

"Oh, GOD!" she gasped loudly. "It's Tracy!" And when the corpse reached back and slapped the stick out of her hand, she screamed at the top of her lungs.

"Lulu!" Dillon was at her side, pulling her away as the "dead bodies" came to life, naked and angry and clutching frantically for their clothes. "Ohmigod, ohmigod, ohmigod," Dillon chanted as he and Lulu scrambled to find anything to look at besides their naked parents.

"Scarred for life," Lulu was moaning. "I'm scarred for life."

"Oh, knock it off, you two," Luke growled. He was pulling on his trousers, leaning over to grab Tracy's slacks for her. "Pretty rude of you to wake us like that."

:"Pretty rude of you to make us think you were dead," Lulu emphasized the word by slapping Luke hard in the chest. She caught a glimpse of Tracy in her bra and slacks and just turned away again. "Tell me you were dragged off by bounty hunters, knocked unconscious, and stripped naked."

"Yeah, right. Because the only other option is that our parents had crazy monkey sex on the jungle floor last night…."

"Less than 100 yards away from where we slept…." Lulu added.

"Innocent…" Dillon supplied.

"Unaware of the…." Lulu dropped her head in her hands, moaning. "I am so gonna need therapy."

Tracy, by this time, had managed to get herself dressed and composed. She sidled up to Luke, staring at Lulu and Dillon with an amused, if somewhat annoyed expression on her face. "Dear god, it's not like you caught us in anything…unsavory." She rolled the word off her tongue slowly, obviously enjoying the teens' discomfort.

"True, true, wife," Luke agreed. "I have no idea why these two are so upset. It's not like they stumbled upon us last night…." He turned in a broadly dramatic gesture, sweeping her into his arms, lowering his voice into a sultry purr. "When we were locked together in the fervor of connubial bliss, our bodies crackling with the electric pulse of pure passion…."

"Perfectly passionate," she laughed, wrinkling her nose at Luke.

"My pretty pink peppermint popsicle," he added as he kissed her nose.

"Oh, they're killing us with perverted alliteration," Dillon groaned. He turned to Lulu, who looked positively green. "Let's go back to the house before they start singing Air Supply songs."

"Don't tempt me, young Spielberg," Luke said, his arms around Tracy as they watch their offspring practically sprint back to the house and the relative safety of the group. When Dillon and Lulu were gone, he pulled Tracy against him, resting her head on his shoulder for a moment before saying, "That was criminally amusing, was it not?"

"Terribly." She looked up at him, her face bright and happy despite the early hour. "I say if you can't shock your own kids, what's the point of having them at all?"

"Well said, Mrs. Spencer." He pulled back slightly, offering his arm. "Shall we go in search of breakfast?"

"Sounds divine." She linked her arm in his and they headed back to the house together, the sunlight shining down on them as another beautiful day began in the Maarkam Islands.

He found her sitting on the porch, a huge white hat shielding her face from the sunlight as she pushed slowly back and forth on the double-seater swing. The hat looked ridiculous, but Tracy always seemed to find a way of making the most glaring fashion atrocities seem precise and appropriate. She leaned over and smiled at him from under the brim. "Hi."

"Hi, there, Kate. How are things on the African Queen?"

She wrinkled her nose at him, but smiled, holding her hand out to him as he sat next to her on the rickety swing. "So, has Anna made everything better?"

"She's an amazing woman. Robert was an idiot to let her slip away." Luke caught himself. It was amazing how many things he said about other men that could be applied to himself. He glanced at Tracy, who didn't seem to catch the irony of his statement, and felt a wave of warmth overcome him. He was the world's biggest chump, and he'd almost blown the best thing that had happened to him in years. "Of course, I'm nobody to talk about being an idiot," he murmured, his voice low and earnest. "I can't believe how much time I've wasted, Spanky."

"A whole lifetime, no doubt," she countered smoothly, but he could hear the affection under her words. Her entire demeanor was different today, her entire body lighter and more relaxed. Well, great sex can do that for a person, he rationalized. But there was something more, something liberated about her--a freedom in the way she carried herself

She looked whole.

"You're beautiful," he whispered as he leaned forward to kiss her neck.

"You're only saying that because I went down on you last night," she whispered back and laughed as he choked hard with laughter.

"Evil!" But he would suffer any wind-pipe discomfort necessary if only she'd beam like that more often. "It was pretty great, wasn't it?" he said, stroking her cheek with his hand before he kissed her temple.

"Amazing," she purred. "I'm so glad we…" She hesitated, a dark look flickering across her aristocratic features. "I'm glad we got a chance to be together."

"Well, the best is yet to come, Spanky," he said as he buried his face in her neck, grazing his teeth lightly against her throat. "Wait'll you see what we can do with an actual bed."

She eased out of his embrace, reaching over to grab her handbag and open it. She pulled out a packet of papers, which she held close to her breast as she spoke. "I'm glad we made love last night, Luke. I don't think I could have done this if…if I thought I'd never know."

"Done what?" He frowned. She had that look on her face, that Tracy's about to drop a bombshell look. "Never know what?"

She leaned forward to kiss him very lightly, barely brushing her lips against his. "Never know what it was like to have you, to share your passion. That would have…" She closed her eyes. "That would have been hard, Luke."

"Hey, it's not like it was a one-night stand, Sugar Plum. There's plenty of passion where that came from…."

She shook her head, and handed him the folded wad of papers. "It's done."

Luke took the papers, his heart sinking as he read the page heading. "Divorce papers?" He frowned, then shook his head, confused. "We're divorced?"

"I took a detour to Panama. We've been divorced for about three days now," she admitted. "I was waiting for the right time to tell you."

"And now is what you consider the right time? What about last night? What about before I…before we…?"

"It all happened so fast," she admitted, grabbing his hands to stop the wild flaying he was doing. "And I'm glad it happened. I'm glad we're ending it on a positive note. I'm glad we're…"

"I won't sign them." Luke didn't believe the words coming out of his mouth. This is what he'd said he wanted. Freedom from commitment, freedom period. So why was he fighting it?

"It's a done deal. And don't worry about the money," she added, her face darkening. "I've already set the transfer in motion." She hesitated, an expression of sadness flickering almost imperceptibly over her face. "You should have the fifteen million in five days."

"To hell with the money, Tracy. You can't just end our marriage without my input."

A flash of anger lit her eyes. "You gave me enough input when you left me at the altar to chase after your ex-lover." She took a deep breath, and steadied herself. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Luke, because I don't want you to think that this decision is about you. It's not." She took the papers out of his shaking hands and put them back in her bag. "It's really not," she added gently.

"Last night…" Luke looked for all the world like somebody had pulled his plug and let the air out. "We were…"

"Amazing, yes. And there was a time in my life when that would have been enough to change my mind." She leaned against him, letting him hold her as she continued talking. "Every husband I've ever had has mistreated me, Luke. Don't get me wrong--I gave as good as I got, but…." She sighed as she rested her head against his shoulder. "I guess it was realizing I was falling in love with you that gave me the strength to do it." She took a deep breath. "I haven't fallen in love, really in love since…"

"Dillon's father."

She nodded, not saying much of anything for a long while. "When Paul and I split, I made a promise to myself that I'd never marry for love again. Passion, power, sex, money--these were reasons to make a match. Not love, never love." Her voice was so soft he could barely hear her. "I didn't think I was capable of feeling it any more until you came along and swept me off my feet. At first it was great…"

"It can still be great--"

"No," she whispered. "Not like this. Luke, once upon a time, I believed I'd find that person, that perfect man who could make me whole, who could heal my wounds and make me lovable and loved. I dreamed of someone who would ride up on a white horse and rescue me from my own coldness, my own vanity and ambition." She sighed again, nuzzling against him. "I wanted to be the love of someone's life, but that never happened. I gave up on love, on happiness. Until you."

Luke stroked her jaw-line with his fingertips, lifting her chin slightly as he spoke. "You're losing me, Tracy. If I helped you believe in love again, why end it? Why not go for it?"

"Because, thanks to you, Luke, I remember what it feels like to…well, to feel again. And the funny thing about love is that it increases all those other feelings, too." She lowered her eyes.

"Like pain."

"Yeah."

"Tracy, I'm sorry. About Skye, about Holly, about the vow renewal…hell, about everything."

She nodded, her smile tight. "I know you are, sweetheart," she murmured. "And I still deserve better. Better than what you have to offer, and far better than what I've settled for in my life. For the first time in..well, forever, I think it'll be better to be alone and content than with a man and miserable."

Luke didn't have anything to say to that. He'd run up this particular tab, and it was just like the universe to give him this amazing experience moments before the bill came due. "Nothing I can do to change your mind," he said glumly.

"Nope. It's over." She stood, kissing the tip of his nose as she headed back into the house. She paused in the doorway, leaning back for a moment. "Of course, that doesn't mean it has to stay over."

His entire face lit up, and he had to grin at her. "Spanky Buns? What is this, hope you're throwing in my direction?"

"Just ask Alan and Monica. It's not completely unprecedented for a couple to divorce and remarry in this town." She swung slightly on the door jamb. "Of course, this time…" She shot him a downright sultry look. "You're gonna have to earn it, Spencer. Oh, and by the way…happy anniversary, darling." And she was gone.

Luke sat there, dumbfounded, for a long moment. "Well, I'll be damned." And then he began to laugh out loud.

Life with Tracy was definitely an adventure waiting to happen.

The End