Celebratory…the mood of the entire newsroom was definitely celebratory as their coverage of the 2012 Election Night wound down! But Will was beyond celebratory…he felt euphoric but also completely grounded
It really was as simple as just stopping – stop hurting Mackenzie (because when he saw the pain in her eyes it was like opening a wound on his soul as well), stop imagining that her betrayal was anything bigger than her own feelings of rejection and stop trying to deny that he was hopelessly in love with her!
Miraculously Mac had halted him part way through his bumbling proposal and simply said "Yes!" She'd let go of the thousand hurts he'd inflicted over the past several years in an instant when told her he would never, could never stop loving her.
Relief had washed over him. "Thank God" he'd said quietly. And then something more primitive took over as he leaned in to kiss her for the first time in six years. When she answered his kiss with a breathy "took you long enough" he'd known it was real…not just some figment of his fevered imagination. He'd protested a second before she shut him up with a succession of hot, urgent kisses and he pushed her against the wall. For a few seconds the newsroom melted away around them. "We're back in two minutes, lover-boy" she'd whispered breathily in his ear, pulling away slightly. "Get your ass back at the anchor desk." And then she'd leaned in to kiss him one more time.
Sloan was the first to notice. Will's body language had shifted from coiled hurt and rage to happy contentment in under an hour. He had looked like thunder heading back to the desk from the direction of Mac's office prior to that last segment. Now his face was softer and more open than she'd ever seen. Will was a complicated guy but Sloan's intuition told her that his mood change probably started and ended with Mackenzie McHale.
At the next break she was out of her seat at the anchor desk and into the control room before anyone else had even removed their earpiece. "Mackenzie McHale, what the hell did you do to him?" Sloan blurted, gesturing towards Will just now removing his earpiece. "What do you mean?" Mac answered. She was trying to affect a puzzled look but the blush creeping up her neck was betraying her. Mac fidgeted nervously with her hands and it was then that Sloan saw it. There was a diamond ring the size of a quarter on Mac's finger. Sloan yelled "Congratulations!" before pulling Mac into a fierce hug. "It's about fucking time!"
Then all hell broke loose in the newsroom. The tension and uncertainty surrounding them all in the wake of the Genoa fiasco evaporated with the sound of champagne corks popping!
When ACN's election night coverage finally wound up well past midnight no one seemed to want to go home…except maybe Will and Mac. Tomorrow all the team's dirty laundry would be aired when Dantana's lawyers filed the wrongful termination suit. And the taint of the Genoa broadcast that precipitated it still clung to them. But for tonight they wanted and needed something to celebrate. For everyone who worked at NewsNight Will and Mac's engagement seemed both miraculous and inevitable at the same time. Will and Mac were all jagged pieces from their break-up six years ago. They were clearly meant to fit together but no one could actually see how to put them back together.
But in the end Mac's patience and Will's eventual self-realization had smooth their jagged edges into a whole that was certainly happier than the sum of its parts.
Champagne was sloshed around in glasses, toasts were made (most of them by a joyously drunken Charlie) and cigars were lit.
Charlie was rambling drunkenly in Will's ear while Will sat in a chair in the middle of the bullpen smoking a cigar and staring at Mackenzie. She was sipping champagne from a plastic cup, her head thrown back in laughter at something Sloan had whispered in her ear. When she caught his eye she beamed over at him, her face open and happy and utterly breath-taking! Something electric fizzed through his body – love, desire, bliss!
"I mean, who knew he had a thing for Tony Curtis movies…or me?" Sloan babbled.
But Mac was gone, moving towards Will and Charlie. "Hey…" she said beaming down at Will. He pulled her into his lap and wrapped his arms around her waist. "You ready to go?" she whispered in his ear. "I've been ready since you said 'Yes'" he murmured back.
"I think it's time you took your bride to be home" said Charlie affectionately. "Before you two commit an egregious breach of our HR rules right here!"
They were halfway to the elevator when Charlie yelled "No need to rush in tomorrow morning. You look like you could both use a good night's rest" Charlie added knowingly.
They stood in the foyer of Will's penthouse apartment.
"Do you want a drink?" Will asked tentatively. Mackenzie shook her head. "Or something to eat? You must be hungry." Mac held his gaze and shook her head again.
She kicked her shoes off and slowly began to unbutton her blouse. Without taking her eyes off of Will she shrugged off her blouse and reached around to unzip her skirt. He stood transfixed as her skirt pooled on the floor and she stepped out of it.
"What is it, Will?" Mac asked. The smooth, sophisticated anchor had been replaced with a man who looked like a teen-ager before his first kiss. His nervousness was really quite endearing. Aside from the fact that Mac just wanted to fuck him…now!
"I have butterflies in my stomach and lines on my face. My body sags in places it didn't six years ago."
"We're both older, Will. I have a scar you've never seen." Mac said softly. "Besides I love the way you look, I love every line on your face and every part of your body." Her face crinkled in a smile. "And any way sex appeal goes way beyond your anchorman good looks. It's a combination of everything you are – your intelligence and your embarrassment when someone calls you out on being a good guy." She paused, smiling at Will. "It's the way you look at me. Something raw and electric runs through my body when you look at me that way." She bit her bottom lip and sighed. "It's the way you touch me. I feel loved and desired and safe. And that is so fucking sexy, Billy! I have never wanted another man the way I want you" Mac added in a husky whisper.
The look of longing in Mac's eyes jolted through his body like an electric current. He pulled her into a slow sensual kiss. Mac slowly unzipped him and he moaned when her hand lingered at the front of his boxers. With her other hand she pushed his jeans down over his hips. A moment later his jeans and shirt lay in a tangle at his feet and he was laying Mac down on the bed.
Will poised over her on his forearms kissing her. He shifted onto his slide, sliding the straps of her bra off her shoulders, his fingers releasing her breasts from the black lace. "My God, I love your breasts!" Will whispered, running his tongue over a nipple. Mac's hand was tangled in his hair, pressing him closer.
"Why the fuck did we wait so long to do this again?" Mac groaned as Will laid a trail of kisses down her abdomen. She arched her back into his lips and moaned again.
She inhaled sharply when Will's lips reached her panty line. He slowly slid the black lace off and continued his progress. A hum of pleasure coursed through Mac's body. "Oh, yes Billy! Please…don't…stop…ever!" she moaned . Just before she climaxed she pulled his face up to hers and kissed him, long and deep. His fingers replacing his lips, Mac shuddered into her climax, her hands digging into his back and her legs wrapped around his hips.
As her breathing slowed she rolled on top of Will reacquainting her lips and hands with his body. She kissed his nipples and tummy and nuzzled at his neck. Her hand slid down to his boxers and rubbed circles over his throbbing groin. Will hissed in through his teeth and groaned "Jesus, Mac. I want you so much!" He lifted his hips and Mac slid the boxers off. Then she was hovering over him, kissing him, his hands tangled in her hair. She slid slowly on to him and he moaned in pleasure.
"I love you, Billy" she murmured in his ear moving her hips against him.
Slowly, perfectly they moved together, dancing in time to their own shared rhythm.
Once they came, Mac again, then Will moments later, they lay in a tangle of legs and arms and skin. Mac ran her hands across Will's chest as his breathing slowed. "You know you are a bit of an idiot? Leaving that ring in your desk, telling me you'd taken it back?" He shrugged sheepishly. "You did say 'yes'" he replied. "That was only because I was desperate to get you in bed!" she added in a throaty whisper.
Will nipped playfully at her collarbone. "I guess the ring was overkill. You could just give it back" he said.
"Over my dead body" murmured Mac, sleepily nuzzling into his neck.
When the sun found them the next morning Mac was draped over Will, her face still nuzzled into his neck. She opened her eyes slowly and stared at Will sleeping underneath her. They hadn't slept long but Mac felt better than she had in a month. She slipped carefully out of bed and slipped on an old dress shirt of Will's.
A few minutes later she returned to the bedroom with two steaming mugs of coffee. She set the mugs down beside the bed and then crawled back in beside Will and nestled back into his side again. She pressed tiny, soft kisses along his collarbone and up his jaw. His mouth curled into a smile before he even opened his eyes and he pulled her closer with his arm. "Good morning" he murmured sleepily as he opened his eyes and grazed her temple with a kiss.
Just then Will's phone buzzed. He looked at it in annoyance. "Would it be inappropriate to answer by saying 'Fuck off'?" he growled.
"Morning" he said gruffly into the phone. "This better be good."
"I know I told you I didn't expect to see you until the second run-down but the Petraeus story is breaking and I think we need you in…both of you." Charlie replied.
"I'll do my best Charlie, but Mac can't seem to keep her hands off me!" Charlie's laughter roared through the phone. Mac leaned across to pinch him and mouthed "You idiot". Will had slipped his free hand under her shirt and was grinning lasciviously at her. And despite her attempt to look outraged her body was betraying her.
"Gotta go!" Will hung up the phone. He threaded his free hand into her hair, pulling her onto his lap.
"Will, we have to get in to the office" Mac mumbled rather half-heartedly against his lips.
"No way that Petraeus's sex life is going to get in the way of ours" said Will. All thoughts of further objection evaporated when Will pulled the shirt over her head and kissed her deeply.
Sixty minutes and a rather steamy shower later they were at the office. Charlie just arched a bushy eyebrow and thanked them for taking time from their "busy" morning. Mac blushed deeply but Charlie couldn't help but laugh at Will's shit-eating grin.
"Now let's get to work. This is a newsroom not the set of a Jane Austen movie." Charlie bellowed.