Jack knew it was holy ground but he still felt his stomach in knots. An immortal might have a dangerous reason to go lurking about a church. He looked around, checking out the parishioners, but there must have been twenty people praying and mulling around. No one had made eye contact with either one of them. Where was the immortal?

"No one's coming forward. Where are they?" he asked Rose. She was staring straight at the altar, unblinking.

"It's the priest," she said calmly.

Jack looked followed her stare to the robed priest who slowly and calmly approached the two young immortals waiting at the entrance. He had been looking at them from the altar from the first moment they entered.

"I take it you were expecting some rather different," the priest smiled.

"Yes, but no one in particular," Jack waved his hand.

"I'm Darius. And you're welcome here."

"Jack Dawson," he put out his hand.

"Rose MacLeod," his friend did likewise.

"Well, then I think we've some friends in common. They've already been by. One in particular perhaps needs to speak with you, my young friend," he nodded at Jack.

"I don't understand…" Rose looked from Darius the priest to Jack.

"Think for a minute, Rose. I don't know why I didn't I think of it immediately!"

"What?" asked Rose incredulously.

"Immortals can tell their own. They can feel pre-immortals too. If they meet one, they know." Jack took a deep breath.

He glanced at Darius who was perhaps too old to be caught off guard by such an outburst. Rose, on the other hand, looked embarrassed. She must be tired of intrigue and secret lives. Underneath her dark façade, Jack could see, there was a deep and painful desperation to be a normal person with normal, everyday problems. Jack's unusual problem at moment, however, directly involved her.

"I need to go," he said to Rose.

"Go now? Why?" She sounded annoyed. Either she hadn't picked up on it yet or she wanted to have the first word on it. But he couldn't talk to her about it yet.

Should have kept my mouth shut, he thought.

"I need to," he pleaded. "I promise I'll be back later. I'll explain everything."

"Fine," she said without emotion. God, how he hated it when women said 'fine,' it made him nervous. "Just go already. I have a life. I can spend the day without you."

Jack felt it hard to move. The priest said nothing and waited for the young friends to finish. Her tone was so harsh. Since when was she so damn mean? Life had dealt him a pretty nasty hand too. He was angry, but said a polite goodbye to the priest and an awkward goodbye Rose. He seemed like the good sort; perhaps Rose would be better off in Darius's presence than in his own.

He left.

Jack had sent the Ryans a letter at their Seacouver address and a neighbor forwarded it to them in Paris. Knowing Jack was in town, Tommy sent him a letter and they planned to meet after Jack had found his old friend Tessa. Jack did not intend to find himself at Ryans' so early until the previous realization had come over him.

"Look my old boy's come for a visit. Look at him! Have you gotten any taller? You look it!" Tommy smacked Jack on the back, laughing at his own joke. He walked Jack through his little house near the Seine and showed him how lovely and quaint it was.

"I didn't know you two liked France so much…" Jack folded his arms.

"Well…" Rita smiled, "we decided we can do anything and I said I felt like Paris for the summer."

"It's Christmas," Jack said shortly.

Rita's face dropped.

"Tommy wanted to go out earlier, spend a year or so…"

"Tom, we need to have a little chat." Jack said.

"What's the matter with you?" Rita was a little annoyed, Jack nearly rolled his eyes. She was more likely to take a club to Tom than he ever was. Jack thought she of all people would understand.

"I ran into an old friend last night."

"Merry Christmas to you too, Jackie boy. Since when am I the authority on all the immortals in my city of residence? If it's You-Know-Who or Lovejoy…I only know about Darius, but he doesn't go anywhere…" Tommy looked around. "I think one of the MacLeods is around somewhere, but that's just rumor…"

"A few things: just say 'Clement.' No one dangerous is in town, and I did meet Darius and a buddy of your friend Duncan MacLeod."

"Really?" Tom sat on the kitchen table and Rita almost shooed him off, but let him be this time.

"Yeah. She almost took my head off. "

"Was it my old pal Amanda?" Tom lied.

"No. I've never seen a red head wielding a samurai sword, but I guess there's a time for everything." Jack shook his head.

"You didn't tell him?" Rita looked at him without the reaction she wanted. "Liar!"

"Rita love!" Tommy opened his arms, offended.

"Mentiras. Siempre mentiras." she shook her head quietly.

"You knew too!" Jack's voice nearly cracked.

"It wasn't mine to tell or to discuss. I thought someone did. Sorry!" She threw up her arms.

"Alright! Alright!" Jack waved his arms. "Just tell me why. Why in the hell didn't you tell me?" Neither of them said anything, but they occasionally deigned to make eye contact. "This is an open-ended question and either of you should feel free to jump at any time."

"What could you have done if I told you?" Tom walked slowly toward his former pupil. "Gone to look for her to find her mortal and happy with your best friend? Find out she lost her head the moment she came to? I did not want to put that decision on your shoulders, boy. You had your own life to worry about. I wanted to let life happen and if she were destined to live as an immortal…well, then. You'd know."

"You should have trusted me with that. You should have believed in enough me to handle it. I care about it. But Jesus, Tom, I'm not still in love with her! That was one night almost nine years ago."

"No one should have to make that decision. What would you have done?"

"I don't know!" Jack exploded. Rita and Tommy backed away and Jack moved into the living room and sat in front of the fireplace on the couch. Tommy followed. "I'm sorry, okay? I probably wouldn't have done anything…you should have told me. It doesn't make it better or worse, I know. I just thought you thought…"

"Thought what?" Tom sat across from him on the chair.

"That I was a man and not a boy."

"Well, I was wrong, alright? In that case, it's just hard sometimes to let the children you love grow up…or admit they've grown up."

"I'm not Peter Pan and it's a little different when you train said children to be killers."

"I know, Jack. I'm sorry. How is she?"

Jack slumped down into the couch, sighed, and gripped his hair in his hands.

"Alive. Angry. Grieved."

"Grieved?" Rita had come in from the next room.

"Fabrizio's dead. They were killed together. He's gone now. Merry Christmas," he shrugged.

"I'm sorry, Jack. He was a good lad. I know you loved him," Tom moved to the couch and took his young friend's shoulder.

"They'll be a day for all of us. Some just sooner and easier than others," Rita sighed. Tommy looked painfully toward her.

"Well, you can be mad if like. You've the right to. But think of it this way, laddie…it's a good anecdote."

"Anecdote?"

"Yeah," Tommy elbowed him in the shoulder, "say you're at party, people getting a little bored, you say, 'This one time my old girlfriend tried to kill me' they say 'Big deal' but you say 'No, wait for this, lads.'"

Jack sighed. It was hard to argue with Tommy because he could turn any situation into a joke.

After the Ryans, Jack had finally tracked down his other friend living on the seedier side of Paris. She had more or less retired from her life of prostitution by becoming a madam.

"Yes, poor baby, I was getting too old!" Tessa Dupont laughed in her kitchen. The kitchen smelled of stale bread and Tessa's perfume. Now she had an entire apartment to herself and she had an airy, melodic voice that traveled through the whole of the building. "You know, in ancient China, whores were the most educated of women! What did they call them?"

"Sing-Song girls," Jack answered. He took off his cap and sat down at Tessa's table. Tessa had a sing-song voice, but was hardly as well-rounded.

"They had talents that went beyond the bedroom, mon ami. And some of them married their customers. Why Europe never worked that way, I'll never know." She hobbled over to the table and sat facing Jack. "It's true. Whores are the best people. You can say thing to them you could never say to a wife."

"Not a problem, Tess. I don't think I'll ever have a wife. How's the crutch holding up these days?" Jack asked.

"You, you are a nice boy. You'll find a nice girl. I know you. Yes…" she thought, "I think I get a wooden leg when I have the money. I'm getting close. I'm a business woman now. But most of my funds get all eaten up," she tossed her arms and laughed.

"How so? A bit of spendthrift, are we?"

Tessa got up, put a long finger to her lips, and walked backwards out of the kitchen. "Come," she smiled.

She led him across the hall into the bedroom and at the opposite corner of the bedroom door was a sleeping baby.

"Luc," she said softly.

Jack said nothing. Tessa Dupont was not a violent person, but motherhood fit her as well he fit into a pair of high heels.

"Where did you find him?" he whispered after a few moments.

"Find him," she snickered, her voice still lowered, "why look at him! He's my spitting image!"

"You had a baby? I mean, you kept a baby?"

"Yes, after an abortion or two or three I thought I could never. But here he is. Healthy and normal as ever…there was no reason not to. I couldn't go back to that table again, making my insides purple and bloody. I'd lived too long to die like that and I didn't want to risk it again. I was going to give him away as soon as he was born but I couldn't do it." Jack said nothing. Tessa breathed. "I know the father too. It was after I started pimping out girls of my own. He was a real lover. Never paid me a dime. Ran off with one my girls before I knew about Luc. Wretched creature. But a real lover, Jacque. Ah, it was nice while it lasted."

"What now for you two?" Jack looked down at the sleeping baby. His face was half-hidden by a new blanket and the most Jack could see of him was a tiny blue lump rising and falling in the middle.

"Nothing new. I'm his maman and he's my child. I'll raise him into a man. I'm thinking of owing a haberdashery one day. But now I've built up a reputation and respectable work might not happen. Eh, being respectable seems boring…I was in love once, you know." Tessa was always liable to insert little phrases like that when she wanted to talk about herself for long periods of time.

"Oh, really?" Jack knew this was the only response he was supposed to give, but this time he was truly interested for Tessa had never talked of love before.

"I was sixteen. He was a customer—a university student at the time. That's who told me about Sing-Song girls. He forgot about me when he graduated. He never really loved me, but I'm sure he has a few fond memories still." She stopped. Jack waited for her to continue. "What? That's it." She laughed. "Tell me, Jacque, what do you think of my Luc being baptized. He hasn't yet and he's nearly six months. I don't know if I was. Hmm…perhaps the both of us?"

"Well," he smiled, "if it helps I know a good priest."