Eggs in a Basket

Chapter Seven
Conned Again

On their five o'clock break, Amanda showed up and spirited Methos away before he and Molly could start a conversation. The coach had doors on either side of it, and the side away from the visitors opened into a vacant corner of the children's room with a door to a stairwell. As soon as they were on the landing, Amanda pushed the door shut behind them and began fumbling at the Velcro closure on the front of Methos's costume. It was put there so a man could relieve himself without having to remove the whole costume, but Amanda clearly had other ideas.

"Why, Amanda, I never knew you cared," Methos laughed, although he was fairly certain he knew what she was up to, and dreaded the thought.

"Oh, shut up, I need your help," she hissed at him.

"MacLeod holding out on you?" he teased.

He didn't hear what she said in reply, but he was pretty sure it included profanity. He pulled away and grabbed her wrists. The rabbit gloves didn't provide for much of a grip.

"Help with what?" he demanded.

"I need to hide something," she said, wriggling free and going for his fly again.

"No. Oh, no!" Methos objected, protecting his nether regions with both big, furry paws. "I knew this would happen! I bloody knew it!" he started to rant, just barely managing to keep his voice to a furious whisper. "I refuse to be your patsy Amanda, and I will not help you smuggle stolen goods out of the museum. Whatever it is, you just put it back where you found it and leave me alone!"

Lower lip wobbling, Amanda said, "Please, I can expl . . ."

"No!" Methos insisted, the big, grinning bunny head bouncing and bobbing with every angry word. "You lied to me, Amanda. I knew you were up to something, but fool that I am, I gave you the benefit of the doubt. I don't even know whether to say I am disappointed or not, because you did exactly what I expected of you, although I was hoping you wouldn't. What I really feel is hurt because you lied to me, and angry that you think I will help you now."

"But I didn't . . . mean to . . . take it," she said, and began sobbing with soft little hiccoughs. "I didn't . . . mean . . . to take . . . it."

"Oh, bloody hell," Methos sighed inside the rabbit head. For centuries, he rode with the Horsemen. Death on a horse. The cries and screams of the wounded and dying hadn't bothered him then. Men, women, children, even infants. He'd slaughtered them indiscriminately like cattle, worse than cattle, vermin. Vermin cluttering up his landscape, and his heart was hard and he didn't feel a thing.

Then he had evolved, become a human being again, regrew a conscience that he had spent centuries losing. And now the mascara tracks running down the face of one very troublesome, very attractive little thief was turning his resolve to jelly. He would have offered her a handkerchief, but he didn't have one on him. So instead, he pulled off one of his rabbit paws and turned it inside out for her to dab at her eyes without staining. He didn't know what he would do if she blew her nose in it.

"Tell me . . ." Shit. I don't really want to know. But every little hiccoughing sob was like a needle in his chest and he knew he had to ask. ". . . what happened?" he finished with resignation.

She sniffled, wiped her eyes, and choked out, "Really?"

Methos sighed, rolled his eyes inside the rabbit head and said, "Really. And make it quick before I change my mind."

"I was walking past my boss's office, to check on the egg for the presentation," she began, "and I saw something on his desk. I just wanted a closer look, and then I just wanted to touch it. Before I knew what I was doing, I had picked it up and . . ."

"And pocketed it!" Methos interjected. "Bloody hell, Amanda! You really are hopeless, aren't you?" he raged.

Hearing his voice echoing in the stairwell, he forced himself to lower it.

"You're a lost cause if ever there was one!" he hissed angrily. "How bloody stupid of me to have trusted you!"

If not for the rabbit head, he would have been bashing his skull against the wall in frustration.

Amanda's lip started to wobble and her tears started to flow again, and even though Methos was certain he was right, he felt like a bastard.

"That's not what happened," she sniveled, "but you won't believe me anyway. Just forget I asked!"

She started to storm off, but he grabbed her by the wrist. "I'm sorry," he said softly, surprised that he at least halfway meant it. "I shouldn't have jumped to conclusions. What really happened?"

"I dropped it and it broke!" she cried, and showed him a rather gaudy-looking necklace in one hand and a large faceted diamond in the other. "Then I heard my boss's voice, and I wasn't supposed to be in there, so I gathered the pieces and hid in the closet."

"Oh, Amanda," Methos said sympathetically. Why the hell do I feel sorry for her? "Why didn't you just fess up?" I'm sure there's a reason. "Surely if your boss was stupid enough to leave something like that lying out in an open office, he would let you off the hook as long as you didn't tell anyone about his mistake." And why didn't the Machiavellian little imp think of that herself?

"Well . . ."

"Well what?"

"It wasn't exaaaaaaactly lyyyyying out," she admitted.

"Where was it?" Methos demanded acidly.

"In a case."

"In a case?"

"Yes."

"A locked case?"

"Yeess."

"On his desk?"

"In a drawer."

"Also locked." Methos wasn't asking now. "And the office?"

"I picked the lock."

Methos cursed so fiercely in a dozen dead languages that Amanda cringed and covered her ears even though she didn't understand the half of what he was saying, and he did not stop until he ran out of breath.

"I'd seen it earlier in the day and only wanted it to myself for a few minutes!" she explained rapidly, the waterworks starting again. "I really like this job and don't want to lose it. And I don't want to disappoint Duncan. And I'm sorry I've disappointed you. And if I really had wanted to steal it, don't you think I'd have come up with a better plan than an unwilling accomplice in a ridiculous bunny suit?"

Inside the rabbit head, Methos just blinked. Of course she would, you bloody idiot! He realized, and felt horrible for doubting her . . . and stupid for falling for this ridiculous story . . . and certain that she was still lying to him, still playing him, still using him although he couldn't see how . . . and utterly shocked that a bloody great stupid arse like him ever could have kept his head for over 5,000 years.

"All right," he said in a low and dangerous voice. "I will help you, but now, Amanda, now, you owe me forever."

Methos made his way carefully back to the egg coach, grateful that the big feet of his costume made him clumsy and hid the awkward gait caused by the gemstones and heavy gold chain sliding and slithering around his bits inside his briefs. Even the stutter-step he made a few feet from the coach when the chain caught and pulled a few pubic hairs would look to the casual observer like he was simply tripping over his unfortunate rabbit feet.

Taking his seat in the coach, he immediately yelped and jumped to his feet again as a pointy gemstone poked him in the perineum.

"Everything all right?" Molly asked in concern.

"Yeah, fine," Methos panted. "Just a charley-horse from sitting so long." He kept his back to Molly, and used the massaging motion that one would use to ease a muscle spasm to adjust the necklace until it was in a safe position for sitting.

"Amanda's just a little nervous about the unveiling of the Mauve Egg and needed some encouraging words," he explained.

"From you? In that outfit?" Molly said quizzically.

"Well, they tell nervous speakers to imagine the audience naked," Methos replied, taking his seat more carefully this time and sighing in relief when nothing poked him or ripped out any hair. "Why not take encouragement from a giant blue Easter Bunny?"

"If it works, it works," Molly shrugged. "I'm just surprised that it does."

"I just told her relax, that Duncan would be there, and if she kept her eyes on him, everything would be ok," he said.

"Duncan," Molly said. "The best friend she's dating and whom you won't risk losing by propositioning her?"

"Right. Now, please stop teasing me about my supposed crush on Amanda because right now, I really am rather infatuated with you."

"Oh, um really?" Molly stammered, and this time Methos was sure he had her blushing inside her costume. "Why?"

"Because you're a lovely person, you've been kind to me and patient even though I clearly don't know what I'm doing here, I like freckles, and you're the first beautiful woman who has ever expressed an interest in what I do for a living," At least in this life. he told her quite frankly.

"Beautiful?"

"I think so," he told her. "So, this Friday night date you've invited me on, where shall I pick you up?"

"Hmmmm? Oh, the bar actually isn't that far from the museum," Molly said. "Why don't we meet here, plenty of parking, and we can walk to the bar. Say around seven? It will give us time to get there, have a drink, and talk a bit before their gig starts at eight."

"Perfect." Methos agreed.

A knock on the door and Carl's harsh voice telling them, "Break's over!" signaled the beginning of Methos's final hour of hell. He was a bit distracted with the necklace slithering around his groin as children climbed in and out of his lap, and a couple of times the only thing that prevented an inappropriate response was a deliberately summoned, vivid memory of Druscilla the Emasculator, wife of Petronius whom he had served as a slave named Remus in 68 A.D. During a brief lull while a mother was pfaffing about with her child's hair before allowing him to pose for pictures, he tried to shift position and barely stifled a yelp when the chain of the necklace ripped loose another tuft of pubic hair.

"Are you all right?" Molly asked quietly.

"Just another charley-horse," Methos whispered back. "Not used to sitting on my arse this much."

"You know, in that outfit, I can't really tell much about your looks except that you have a handsome face and lovely eyes," Molly flattered him. Then in a teasing tone, she asked, "Is it a nice arse?"

Methos couldn't help himself. He snorted a laugh at that. "I'll let you be the judge on Friday," he told her. "But I will admit I have been told it looks quite attractive in my red jeans."

"Red jeans?" Molly echoed dubiously.

Methos shrugged. "Maybe it takes a particularly fine arse to make them work," he preened smugly.

"Did someone tell you that, too?" Molly asked.

"As a matter of fact, yes," he said, still sounding smug.

"And they specifically said 'fine', not 'great'?"

"Well, I don't remember. What's the difference?"

"Come on, you said you're a linguist, or are you letting your ego cloud your interpretation? 'Fine arse' is a compliment. 'Great arse' could just mean it's awfully big."

Methos had to stifle both his laugh and his retort as the next child finally came in for his portrait. There were only three kids in line behind him, and the children's room had closed its doors for the day. Methos could see the light at the end of the tunnel, and while he hated to say goodbye to Molly, he couldn't wait to get out of his ridiculous suit, and he was even more eager to get rid of Amanda's bloody necklace.

TBC

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