A/N: So I'm an idiot. Who is incapable of even counting, apparently. I'm sorry, guys. I gave you 2 chapters in Chapter 5 instead of 1, and ended up giving you 3 chapters in all. It's a long story. Don't ask. Basically, this is nothing new, I just figured out that 6 comes after 5 and 7 comes AFTER 6, not before. I'm a genius, I know. Forward all my awards to charities. So I'm going to post a new chapter tomorrow, just because i feel bad about faking you guys out.

Somehow, Stella knew she was dreaming. She didn't know how she knew, but she did, and in the dream she saw Mac. They were in the lab again, surrounded by their team. They were laughing and chatting casually, and Stella looked around, happy that she was finally back among her people.

"Ah s'pose youse be missin' yuh's people purdy badly," Shuggah's voice reverberated through the room, but everyone else acted like they hadn't heard anything. She looked around and there he was, standing behind her and grinning.

"I do," she said.

"Yuh glad tuh be gittin' tuh see yuh's people?" he asked.

"I am, Shuggah," Stella said immediately. Shuggah laughed.

"Ah knows it!" he said gleefully. He laughed once, and the laughter echoed throughout the room mockingly.

"Yuh wuz powerful lonely in New Ohleahns, wuzn't yuh, Miz Stey-la?" he said matter-of-factly.

"Yup," Stella said, "But I'm home now, Shuggah, so I'm not lonely anymore." As soon as the words left her mouth, a shot rang out. She ducked immediately, looking around. She was the only person who had reacted at all. The only exception was Lindsay, who was lying on the floor closest to her, dead from a gunshot wound to the head.

Suddenly, Stella was no longer sure she was dreaming.

"Lindsay! No!" Stella screamed. Everyone else continued talking happily, unaware that one of them had been shot. She looked, confused, at Shuggah. He shook his head, looking mournfully at Lindsay lying on the floor. Another shot came, this time hitting Flack. He fell to the floor, dead.

"Flack!" Stella screamed, helpless to do anything but watch. Around her, no one seemed to notice that two people now lay dead on the floor.

"Why?" she yelled at Shuggah. "What did they do to deserve that?"

Shuggah said nothing, but looked at her sorrowfully. Another shot. Danny crumpled, dead before he hit the floor. Stella screamed again, now sobbing.

"WHAT THE HELL, SHUGGAH?" she screamed. Shuggah just shook his head silently. Another shot rang out, and now Shuggah himself crumpled. Stella screamed again as more shots rang out, hitting Sheldon, Adam, and Sid. Now the only ones left were herself and Mac. She and Mac made eye contact, and she felt a thrill of fear.

She knew what was going to happen next, knew before it even happened. Mac was standing alone in the back of the room. The bodies of all their friends lay between them. He still didn't appear to recognize what was going on, but Stella knew. She screamed for Mac to duck, to hide, to get out of the way, but it was too late. She watched in horror as the bullet appeared from nowhere, headed directly for Mac's heart. She tried to run, to push him out of the way, but there wasn't enough time. Instead, everything moved in slow motion. She watched the bullet pierce his flesh, saw the surprise register on his face, heard his yell, and watched as the life left his eyes like someone had flipped a fatal switch. She ran over to him, screaming and sobbing and calling his name.

…and someone was calling her name…

"Stella!" Mac's voice shattered the horrible nightmare as Stella sat up, screaming "Mac!" She looked around frantically. Mac was standing a few feet away, his gun drawn.

"Stella! Are you all right? What the hell happened?" Mac asked anxiously. Stella looked up at him, bewildered, and then burst into tears. She slumped back onto the makeshift bed, muttering what sounded like a prayer in Greek and saying "Oh God, oh God, oh God," over and over. He set his gun down on the coffee table and sat down next to her. Immediately, she hugged him to her protectively, sobbing hysterically. Mac, taken aback by Stella's tears, nonetheless took her into his arms around her and rocked her back and forth, trying to soothe her.

"What happened, Stella?" Mac asked when at last her tears seemed to subside.

"You all were killed," Stella said bleakly, rubbing her eyes. She released Mac and curled up in a fetal position, wrapping her arms around her knees, looking like a small child.

"None of—you—ever—s-saw it c-c-coming," she said disjointedly. "Lindsay, Flack, Danny, Shuggah, every last one of you, all gone, all my fault, and no one could tell me why"— she paused and took a gasping breath—"and none of you had any warning, and I could see it all and no one seemed to notice you were –oh!" she said as more tears leaked out of your eyes. She shook them away, lost in the apparent horror of the nightmare.

"They saved you for last," she whispered. "Everyone else was dead, and it was just me and you and I tried to stop it, and I c-c-couldn't!" she dissolved into tears again, and this time Mac brought her into his lap and rocked her like a child, holding her close.

"Shh, shh shh-shh-shh-shh-shh," Mac shushed her comfortingly. She slid her arms around his neck and buried her head into his chest, sobbing like her heart was breaking.

"I –was so –sc-scared f-for you," Stella sobbed softly after a few minutes.

"I know," Mac said. "You're safe now, it's all right, and you're okay."

She brought her face out of his neck and looked at him, looked him straight in the eyes.

"I saw you die," she said, looking haunted as the scene replayed in her mind.

"I know," Mac said quietly.

"I didn't know –I-I-" she couldn't finish.

Mac simply nodded. Then everything seemed to slow down. In that one second, all of Mac's worrying seemed to make sense, and then Mac made a decision.

He kissed her.

Stella let out a little gasp when their lips touched, but she didn't immediately pull away. The kiss was gentle, comforting, and yet—

Stella moved her head back and looked at him questioningly. Mac said nothing, but lowered his mouth to hers again, and this time Stella didn't hesitate.

Stella turned her head slightly, and together they deepened the kiss. Mac's hand slid up her back and into her hair, while his other hand slid to the small of her back, holding her closer to him. Her own hands, encircling Mac's neck, slid down and grasped his shoulders. She shifted her body to a more comfortable position on his lap. He held her to him tightly, and she clung to him like he was a rock and they were in a storm, a storm of loneliness and fear, and they held on to each other, afraid to become separated and lose each other. Mac's tongue brushed against Stella's lips, and they parted with ease, and he was exploring the inside of her mouth, discovering new things about his ex-partner, things he hadn't known he wanted to find out. And Stella was enjoying his kiss, his gentle touch, because she had been alone, alone for so long, and never kissed like this, even when she'd been with Patrick—

Patrick. Stella's eyes snapped open.

Patrick had been a coworker.

Mac…was a coworker.

She'd decided after Patrick that she couldn't get involved with coworkers.

Coworkers didn't work out.

Stella broke off the kiss abruptly, stumbled off of Mac's lap, looking at him in a new light. She took several unsteady steps backward.

She couldn't get involved with him.

That bastard Patrick had taught her that.

Mac was looking at her, confused.

"Are you okay, Stella?" he asked uncertainly.

"That –that was a mistake," she said unconvincingly, looking anywhere but him. She and Mac were both breathing hard.

"A mistake?" Mac asked harshly. She nodded, feeling suddenly like a deer in headlights.

"I can't –I can't do this," she gasped.

Mac stood up, looking at her searchingly. Stella tried to compose herself. Finally Mac sighed, his face a stone mask.

"All right," he said unemotionally. "If that's the way it needs to be."

She nodded again. "Yes," she whispered, averting her eyes to the floor. She felt a single tear slide down her cheek, but she didn't wipe it away.

He nodded and turned back, heading back into the bedroom.

"Goodnight," he said casually.

"I'm sorry," she whispered brokenly after him. He pretended to not hear her. He went into his bedroom and shut the door with a snap.

"Well," he muttered to himself. "That answers two questions."

He did indeed have feelings for Stella.

Not only that, but she had feelings for him, too, even if she wouldn't admit it.

And he definitely didn't want to see Jo anymore.

In his living room, unbeknownst to him, Stella was sobbing again. She sobbed quietly, as to not bring back Mac. Their kiss had affected her so much, answered so many questions she hadn't even known she'd had until he'd answered them. Part of her wanted to go into his bedroom, apologize and kiss him again and again, until they had melted the loneliness that she had felt for so long.

However, another part, a deeper part of her, warned her that to do so would be a mistake. She was forcibly reminded of her first kiss with Patrick, and how she'd gotten involved with him with little misgivings. She thought of the disaster that had followed and she knew that she'd done the right thing.

That didn't mean it didn't hurt her to do it. She cared about Mac, if not as a coworker, then certainly as a friend. He was a good person, a kind person, and didn't deserve to be jerked around by a coworker. He didn't need to go through that.

She couldn't go through that again.

So she cried, quietly, wishing desperately that something could change. She knew she was in love with him, had been for a long time, and that nothing could change. She tried to quiet herself, get herself to stop crying, but the tears kept coming. Finally, Stella gave up. She lay down and let the tears seep into the pillow, sobbing silently and slowly inhaling Mac's familiar scent while she waited for the sleep that wouldn't come.

Mac wasn't sleeping either. He lay staring at the ceiling, his brow furrowed in thought. He thought of Stella –surely asleep again by now –in the other room and sighed. He didn't know what he was going to do, didn't know if there was anything he could do. His and Stella's kiss was nothing he'd ever experienced before. He'd kissed plenty of women, but Stella kissed in a way that was entirely new to him –freely and without abandon, innocently, but with experience. And the fact that it was Stella—familiar, dependent Stella—made it all the more phenomenal. He sighed, trying to comprehend it all. He couldn't wrap his head around it, but he tried, for hours.

Around dawn, Mac thought of something else: what was he going to do about it? He'd been alone, except for the occasional night with Jo, for the better part of five years. This was his choice, but now, for the first time, he began to question his bachelorhood. Was he ready to get into another serious relationship? Mac thought that he was, but Stella clearly wasn't. He wondered why, thinking back to their conversation on the phone, and when he couldn't think of anything, went over everything he knew about her.

She'd had to shoot Frankie, but that was years ago. Mac didn't think that was it, but something told him he was close. He thought again to his conversation with her on the phone. Then he sat straight up in bed as it hit him.

The person you just described is my ex, Patrick Andries. He worked with me at the New Orleans Crime Lab up until a few months ago.

You start dating him and then before you know it, you're hauling his drunk, naked ass out of your office in handcuffs and almost get fired because of him.

Almost get fired because of him.

My ex.

Worked with me.

Almost get fired because of him.

"God dammit, Patrick Andries," Mac cursed him. That explained everything. She didn't want to get involved with him because of what had happened with Andries. He groaned and put his head in his hands.

Great. Now he knew why, but he hadn't made any progress. She was still going to compare him to Andries. He needed to prove to her that he wasn't going to hurt her.

"Well, how the hell am I supposed to do that?" he muttered aloud. His bedroom didn't have any answers to offer him, not that he'd expected it to. Groaning, he conceded defeat to sleep and went into the bathroom. He showered and dressed, all the while thinking of ways to win Stella over. He had to admit, even to himself, that they weren't very good. He controlled his thoughts and focused his mind, unsuccessfully trying to clear all thoughts of Stella temporarily from his head, at least long enough to make it to the lab with her. He opened his bedroom door. To his great surprise, Stella was awake. It looked like she'd had around as good a night as he had, maybe worse. Her eyes were puffy, and her hair, already curly, now coiled away from her head at random angles as she sat on the couch, staring off into space. Still, he had never seen a more beautiful woman.

"Good morning," he said somewhat stiffly. She looked over to him, such a profound sadness in her eyes that made him want to wrap his arms around her and never let her go, and snorted quietly.

"Good morning," she said sarcastically. Mac smiled; Stella wasn't a morning person on a good day.

"You want coffee?" he asked casually. She nodded.

"I'm gonna use your shower," she muttered, standing up. He nodded and went to the closet to get his coat. Stella grabbed her toiletries bag and a change of clothes and went into the bathroom. She closed the door, looked in the mirror, and groaned.

Her hair was sticking up all weird and her eyes were puffy and red from hours of crying. She looked like an angry garden gnome that had lost his hat and then ran through a wind tunnel. The analogy made her smile, but she still turned her back on her reflection and started the water for her shower. She undressed and quickly got into the billowing steam, hoping it would erase some of the marks last night had left on her.

When she got out five minutes later, she was relieved to find herself almost back to her normal-looking self. She had bags under her eyes, but they were the only sign that she had done anything other than slept last night. She covered them up with a little makeup and then applied her usual makeup, taking a little more care than usual.

She finished dressing and getting ready, and stepped out of Mac's bathroom tired, but looking fine. She could smell coffee and she smiled. She put her things back into her suitcase and then followed her nose into the kitchen, where Mac had brought the coffee.

Mac looked up from where he was sitting at the table when she entered and smiled at her.

"Feeling better?" he asked. She nodded and sat down across from him.

"Much," she said. She took a swig of coffee. She sighed as the warm brown liquid filled her stomach, warming her and chasing away all the bad feelings from the night before. Mac slid a newspaper across the table at her. She shook her head. She didn't want to read the news first thing in the morning; it would depress her when she was already having such a good day. He shrugged and opened it himself. Stella drank her coffee in silence, staring at the table. A few minutes of silence went by. Finally, Mac cleared his throat and set down the newspaper.

"I want to apologize," he began, "If anything I did last night upset you in any way. It was not my intention to upset you."

Stella nodded. "I know—" she began, but he held up his hand to silence her.

"That being said," He continued, "I can't truthfully say that I regret it." He looked her squarely in the eye.

"I don't need an explanation, and I don't want one. It won't happen again unless you want it to," he finished simply.

Stella nodded.

"Okay," she said simply. She took a sip of her coffee, and then looked up at him.

"I don't regret it either, Mac, but'—she swallowed, her throat dry—"it can't happen again."

Mac nodded, looking into her eyes. They were the only part of her anatomy that betrayed her, saying things that he didn't think she could. But he still nodded, knowing that if one part of the body showed her true feelings, the rest could conceivably follow. They finished their coffee, and then Mac stood up.

"You almost ready to go?" he asked her. She nodded.

"All right then," Mac said with dry enthusiasm, "let's go catch a serial killer."