Title: The Letter

Author: Shippy Angel

Summary: When Stella is injured during a misson, Mac is forced to face his feelings for her.

Disclaimer: I mean no profits with this story. The show and its characters belong to their owners.

A/N: Damn, I'm sorry for the delay, but I just couldn't help it. Criminology and Psychology have been killing me (AND MY FREE TIME!). Here it is though.

A/N²: Just so you settle yourselves in the story, Mac went to take Stella out of the hospital and he offered to take her back home. But, before that, they'll drink coffee in Central Park.

# The Letter III #

By Shippy Angel

Two weeks later

Central Park - 5:30 p.m.

"This is my favorite coffee in the whole city but that's not why you brought me here. Is it?" Stella questioned, knowing better than to push Mac to say something when he didn't want to, but unable to stop her need to understand what was going on.

Their shoulders were touching, every once in awhile, as they walked side by side through one of Central Park's camps, until Mac picked a bench for them to sit in and talk, away from other people who were having their own fun.

Mac didn't feedback her, almost as if he didn't hear her. And maybe he really didn't, lost in his thoughts. But Stella knew him better than that. If he was staring at the black liquid in his cup it was because there were some nagging thoughts running through his head.

He got up, looking out in the horizon, rubbing the back of his neck. And, by analysing the whole scene, she realized he was trying to relieve his tension, but in vain. After what seemed like an eternity of indecision and internal battles, Mac spoke softly "I've got something that belongs to you."

Stella arched a brow as she went from wonder to curiosity, while Mac reached for his pocket, taking a still perfectly folded paper from it. Her face, then, went from shock to inevitable acceptance. Stella took it from his hands, fingers accidentally touching, without fixing his eyes with her own.

She unfolded it and carressed the words written there, just like he did in her place, knowing by heart each and every one. Mac just stood there, stunned by her natural beauty and waiting for her to show some disapproving.

But she didn't and, after a couple of minutes, staring at a paralyzed but careless woman, Mac asked "Aren't you going to yell at me?"

"Do you want me to?"

Mac hesitated "That's not the point." He shook his head. "Aren't you feeling...?"

"What, Mac?" Stella interrupted, annoyed. "You think I should be mad because you went through my stuff and found this? Or to be assamed because you read my oh-so-secret words, uh?", she added, in her most sarcastic tune. "It was obvious, really."

Their breathing sounds were easily audible as they both searched for the words. To Mac, Stella should have been angry, resentful or something. Anything (!) but act like she acting then. Maybe it was easier for him to deal with her that way, maybe that was how he pictured having that conversation with her.

What he didn't know is that she had had many of those converstations in her head as well. And, God, maybe it was due to the drugs or maybe it was way before them, but Stella was just so exhausted from painful and sleepless nights that she could barely sit in that bench without crawling.

"I just..." he tried to explain. "I hate myself for opening that letter."

She looked up, reading him, trying to understand the exact meaning behind his words. "Why, Mac? Because you're the by-the-book kind of guy and it kills you to have finally broken some rules, even if just this smallest one, by finding a note while choosing a pair of clothes? Or is it simply because the truth hurts?" she let out a frustrated sigh. "Why, Mac?"

"Maybe, both."

Mac slid in the bench, closer to her than he was before, his knees intimately touching hers. He was moving his cup in circles, watching his moving coffee getting cold, as if the syllabes were written there to help him out of that one. But they weren't. And her voice was so honest and open that startled him out of his musings when she whispered "What is it, Mac, that scares you?"

He frowned, almost hurt at first. The words, then, sunk in, as he accepted and understood their meaning. Their true meaning.

"Because you've sort of moved on from the whole Claire thing. In your own way. Right?" Her voice caught in her throat but she fought the knot tied there and proceeded. "I mean, you took off your ring, like... what, months ago? And you flirt with other women, you've dated Peyton. So what is it, Mac? Is it me?!"

Mac left his cup in the wooden bench to bury his face in his hands, not quite enjoying the direction that the whole thing was taking and realizing that no matter how many times you picture a situation, it never quite happens that way. You can never predict things and calculate every single reaction when it comes to people. Not everything is exact science.

Impulsively, then, he took her left hand in his right one, in a desperate sign and raised it, touching her wrist and feeling her skin against his forehead. "Nothing is wrong with you, for christ's sake." He, by speaking, understood that, no matter how hard, nothing seemed so easy as releasing a hidden confession, like he was doing right then. "It's just different."

"Different?" she demanded.

"I dunno, Stel. It just is." He shrugged with his shoulders. "I can't compare Peyton or any other women and whatever we've had with what we do. Me and you. I mean..." Mac swallowed deeply "It would never be just sex. It could never be. There's too much to lose and God, Stella, I though it was just me, a guy spending too much time and sharing too much space with a woman. It would have been ok to just fantasize about it, about you, about... you know? And I could keep myself away as long as... it was just that."

"Just attraction and nothing more?"

Mac agreeded with his head.

"But it isn't?" she pushed him, trying hard enough not to persuade him of her truths. But she knew, she learned thrgouh the years, that it wouldn't have been right.

He swallowed once again, trying to make the knot in his throat diseappear, letting his eyes move along her body curves. "So what brought this up, Mac?" he went still, drewing her scent as the wind left him with no other choice.

Mac Taylor got up from the bench, his knee cracking as he did so, which brought a smile to the corner of his partner's lips. Nervously, his fists were clenching and unclenching, while he gazed at the clouds far away.

"I saw you lying there through the glass window. There was blood all over the room." He paused, taking a huge breath. "I went to your place to get some clothes and... Hell, I swear the place has 'Stela Bonasera' written all over it: the chaos, the smell, the colors, the life. It's all you. And I was affect by that and I never wanted to get out of there and I don't even remember the last time I felt that." His supressed revelations were finding their way out of his chest and Stella couldn't quite believe it. Her eyes were drowned in hot tears but Mac kept going. "And I wanted to get back to that fucking hospital and to take you in my arms and... and I knew these foolish thoughts would be over as soon as you woke up." He faced the ground. "They always do."

The air was getting cold as the sun was setting behind the trees. But there was too much going on between those two people for them to feel what was happening around, to feel anything but them. Right then and there. Alive and safe.

"But?" she sensed there was something more.

"But I went to your bedroom and you bed was undone, which is no surprise, since you're the least organized person I have ever known." They laughed, bitterly, sharing one of their many secret jokes. "And I saw your clothes, your books, you jewelry, your pictures. Everything supposely in its place, waiting for you to come back. And I almost could see you there, pacing from one side to the other, working, calling your friends, doing whatever it is that you do. And I realized that I don't know that much of you and I wanted all of you." Mac grimaced. "And then I thought 'I don't do this' and I saw my name written in a piece of paper and I debated on whether to reach it or not."

"And apparently you did."

"I did" he stated the obvious, with his back to her so she wouldn't see his also drowned eyes. "And I felt so mad."

"Mad?" she felt intrigued.

"Hell, yeah." he sustained, a bit too loud. "I could almost hear your voice saying the words, reinforcing how lucky you were to have me, when all along, Stell, I was the lucky one. And reflecting on how much of a coward you were, when actually I am the one who refuses to admit that I'm in love with you."

She gasped, realizing he spoke the words aloud as the awesome power of the naked truth, lying right before her eyes, was beyond anything she had ever felt.

"And I hated reading those words because..." Mac hesitated, fearing his words could become true. "because I thought it was too late."

Stella got up, needing to understand. That was the moment. They had opened a door and, if they didn't break it down, if they didn't force things to change, they would sink back into the life of make-believe they were leading. She came from behind and she held his frame, letting her head rest in his broad shoulders. "But it's not too late, Mac. I'm here. And you're here." He caressed her arms that were around him, tracing her long fingers with his fingertips.

He felt better like that.

So he turned around and he strained to catch her evasive stare. One almost as tall as the other so their breaths were mingling as they searched for each and every emotion they carefully hide along the years. And hiding is definately a matter of practice. Until it loses their fun or meaning. It becomes a tragedy, then.

And more than papers, it was the truth unfolding in front of them.

Mac Taylor held Stella Bonasera in his arms, careful not to hurt her injury even more. "Does it hurt?" he asked, stroking her back, feeling his anxiety receding. She said no with her head, making her curls caress his face.

Nothing ever felt more right to him or more secure to her.

Their lips brushed and Stella whispered, repeating his previous words, at the beggining of that conversation.

"I've got something that belongs to you too." She whispered close to his ear, nibbling it gently.

"Hell, what now?" he replied, rolling his eyes, with a smirk on his face.

Stella took his right hand with affection and put it on top of her breastbone, letting him feel the beating of her heart, one expressing to the other what no letter in this world possibly could.

The End

A/N: Thank you guys so much! For every single word!