Disclaimer: As usual, I'm just borrowing.

Notes: This is my first attempt at writing for Mac & Stella. I hope I haven't screwed them over too much. Thanks to Amy for the plot bunny, and to Traci for helping the said plot bunny develop.

XxX

ser•en•dip•i•ty
1.The faculty of making fortunate discoveries by accident.
2.The fact or occurrence of such discoveries.
3.An instance of making such a discovery.

XxX

It was funny, Mac thought to himself as his eyes glanced up at the clock, that after fifteen minutes of some of the finest and most elegant castigation he had ever heard that she still hadn't run out of steam. That was Stella though. When it came to expressing her rage and displeasure, she was vocally gifted. She was a barely controlled blaze of fury and he should have been paying attention to what she was saying (yelling) because he knew she had a point, but he wasn't. Not really. Instead his brow was creased in concentration as his mind drifted back over the events of the day, trying to remember if she had or hadn't.

XxX

He wasn't sure when making her smile had become the highlight of his day. He only knew that he woke up one morning and it wasn't enough to simply see her smile; he had to be the one to make her smile, and if he didn't or couldn't do that then he went home feeling strangely discontent.

It wasn't always easy. Sometimes she really made him work for it. Sometimes it didn't matter how lame his jokes were – and Mac Taylor had learned some of the lamest jokes ever spoken simply because Stella Bonasera had professed a liking for them – she would just look at him in that way that said, 'you are a certifiable idiot and I can't even believe that you think that lame-ass attempt in any way constitutes a joke,' raise her brows and leave him wallowing in the sour aftertaste that only a bad joke can leave. Those were the times that Mac Taylor, lame-o extraordinaire, took a long hard look at the hole that he had buried himself in for three and a half years and wondered if it wasn't so bad in the dark after all.

But then there were the times that she bestowed them when he hadn't even been trying. The times when for no reason at all he'd look up and she'd look up and their eyes would meet. Her lips would begin to curl as some kind of silent communication that he hadn't quite learned to decipher yet passed between them, and then all of a sudden bam! There it was. A custom made Stella Bonasera smile that was his and his alone, and if he knew that if he could only figure out how he'd coaxed it to appear, he'd spend the rest of his life doing that exact thing over and over again. Those were the times that Mac Taylor, king of the world, moved one step further out the shadowy hole that was beginning to suffocate him and back into the realm of the living.

Those smiles of hers that came unbidden and unexpected and lit up the whole room, holes included, were the ones he liked the most. Those were the smiles that he wouldn't be seeing anytime soon though, because she was pissed. And what was worse, she was pissed at him.

There were certain things that should never be unleashed upon the unsuspecting public. Stella Bonasera's temper was one of them. She was all flashing eyes and scathing tongue, and she did something with her pitch and tone that left no room for him to defend himself at all, and while he knew it was mostly bark he couldn't help but wonder what would happen when she allowed her bite free reign.

Something told him that he didn't want to be on the receiving end of that little display. Still, her bark was more than enough to contend with at this particular time, and he wished that she would lower her voice just a little, because while people were looking at him with sympathy no one was going to save him from something that they all probably thought was well deserved.

"And it was stupid," she finished quietly, and he wasn't sure whether she'd run out of breath or things to say, but he was thankful that at last the storm seemed to be abating.

"I know," he agreed mildly, because he did know. It was perhaps one of the stupidest things he'd done in a long time and if he'd seen anyone else do what he had just done then he'd be reading them the riot act too. But this was him and Stella and technically he was the boss, and she should at least pretend to respect that.

She studied him closely. "Do you, Mac? Because I would think that if you did, you wouldn't have done it."

"In hindsight, maybe –"

"Maybe?"

He guessed that she'd only stopped to catch her breath after all, because before he could explain himself she was off again. He had a fleeting thought that she probably shouldn't be yelling at him like that – at least not in front of an audience – and that he certainly shouldn't be standing there and silently taking it, but he couldn't for the life of him seem to find the right words to interrupt her.

"And unnecessary," she challenged, like she was just waiting for him to contradict her.

He knew that, too. Besides, he wasn't stupid enough to actually challenge Stella Bonasera mid-rant. Especially when he was unequivocally in the wrong. "I know."

She narrowed her eyes suspiciously. "I don't need you to protect me from the big bad. Especially when it was stupid and unnecessary and I had the situation completely under control until you came blundering in."

"I know."

"So why'd you do it?"

Why? Because there was a gun, and there was Stella, and there was a man pointing the gun at Stella, and while she had him covered and was telling him to, put it down, NOW, in that tone that brooked no opposition, he didn't think that the gun was listening. He'd made a determination based on the size of the suspect, the desperation in his eyes, the gun he was waving around, and the proximity of Stella Bonasera to the powder keg situation that was about (he thought) to explode. He'd reacted before he even knew he what he was doing, and so what if in drawing the gunman's attention he had startled him into firing at him? It was only a graze and he could live with the scar it would leave because she was safe and unhurt and he was just so very thankful that she was still able to yell at him for being such an unthinking idiot.

"Well?" she prodded.

"I don't know," he lied, because lying was easier to deal with than the truth.

"You almost got yourself killed and you don't know? What were you thinking?"

"I don't know," he repeated. "I only know that I'd do it again." He offered up a weak smile as the proverbial olive branch and waited to see if she would beat him with it.

She said nothing but her eyes softened and her lips began to curl upwards. She stepped into him, careful of the bandage and sling that now graced his right shoulder and brushed his cheek gently. "What am I going to do with you, Mac?"

He didn't know that either, but it seemed to be a rhetorical question anyway. Besides, he liked the way she was suddenly looking at him, and he really liked the mysterious yet knowing half-smile he'd just discovered.

So he just stood there, looking at her looking at him, smiling at her half-smiling at him, and knew that today he would go home content.

End.