Chapter 24 – Christmas Eve, December 24, 2006

"Explain this to me again. Who commits a crime on Christmas Eve?" Flack asked grumpily, meeting Stella and Lindsay in the break room. "I thought we had gift exchange plans for Monroe's place."

Lindsay sighed. "So did I, but three dead in a mall on Christmas Eve takes priority." She wished with all of her heart it didn't.

Mac joined them ten minutes later, interrupting their whining and complaining over the stupidity of humans. "Results?"

"Nothing's in yet," Stella answered. "We considered tossing around theories but got a little preoccupied. Why are we here again?"

"Because someone or some one's murdered a bunch of people in the middle of a mall on Christmas Eve," Lindsay replied, her tone bitter. "I want to be at home right now."

"We all do," Mac responded. "Look, I'm going to have to call Hawkes and Danny back from that robbery I sent them on. Three is too much for us to handle without more help."

"You don't have to call them both back," Stella protested.

"If we want to look at getting out of here at any decent hour, we're going to have to take all the help we can get."

"Mac Taylor, you mean to say you have plans that aren't paperwork?" Stella asked incredulously.

Lindsay and Flack chuckled. Stella was the only person who could get away with being that impertinent.

"I do things on Christmas," he protested.

"I'm the only one without my gifts here," Lindsay spoke up. "If you talk to Danny, can you ask him to bring them?"

"He has your keys?" Stella asked, interest palpable in her tone.

Lindsay blushed. "I gave them to him when he brought my tree."

"Did you really?" Stella replied, sure that there was another reason for Lindsay to be giving Danny a set of her keys.

Lindsay rolled her eyes and turned her attention back to Mac. "Please?"

Danny came into the break room, his arms filled with brightly wrapped bags and packages. "Did you get somethin' for everybody, Montana?"

"Something like that," she answered with a smile, relieving him of some of his burden.

He followed her to the tree in the corner, Hawkes not far behind with another armful of gifts. "Somethin' like that? Who'd ya miss?"

"Well, your gift isn't here," she revealed sheepishly.

"What?"

Lindsay shrugged, looking over his shoulder at Hawkes. "I couldn't have you carrying your present all the way here," she lied. She turned her attention to the things in Hawkes' arms.

"Montana, that's not fair," Danny whined.

She chuckled. "Sorry, Dan"

He continued to grumble under his breath.

Lindsay waited until Hawkes was gone and they were alone in the room. "I…I figured we could exchange ours… tomorrow. If you're still coming over for Christmas," she said softly, blushing bright red.

That changed his mind completely. He had to admit he'd rather give Lindsay her gift when it was just the two of them. Glancing around to make sure no one was about, he pressed a quick kiss to her lips. "You've got yourself a deal, Monroe."

She smiled brightly, helping him with the rest of her gifts and putting them under the tree.

It was eleven before Sid, Stella, Mac, Marty, Adam, Hawkes, Flack, Danny and Lindsay sat in the break room, gazing at the overflowing underside of the tree.

"I must admit, if I do have to work on Christmas I do believe I would prefer to be doing this with all of you," Sid said happily, delving into the gifts and pulling one out. He turned it over to Stella.

"Sid!" she exclaimed with a huge grin as she pulled out a light blue box. "Tiffany's?" It wasn't but she loved the pair of pearl earrings anyway.

By the end of the exchange of Secret Santa gifts there was still a bunch of brightly wrapped presents under the tree. It was Lindsay that approached the left over gifts. "There's one for everybody," she said, starting to hand them around. She gave Adam, Marty and Sid theirs to open first, since they were the bought ones. It was the knitted and hand-made ones that were closest to her heart. She carefully gathered those in her hands, waiting until Marty, Adam and Sid had finished unwrapping theirs before slowly handing Mac his.

The scarf that fell into his hands had jaws across the room dropping. "Where did you find this," he asked, inspecting the knitting carefully.

Danny couldn't help the proud smile that skittered across his face when she blushed and mumbled.

"What was that?" Stella asked, admiring the scarf along-side Mac.

"I made it," she repeated. She was bright red.

"You what?" Hawkes asked in awe as she placed a gift in his hands.

"Made it. Knitted it."

"You had that much spare time?" he asked, carefully removing the tape and finding a similar scarf, though his was knitted a deep green colour instead of black and grey.

She shrugged. "I made them pretty early,." She was still bright red and couldn't seem to get her face to cool down at all.

Stella squealed when she pulled out three pairs of knitted mittens, one white, one red and one black. "These are fantastic," she gushed, wrapping Lindsay in a tight hug.

Lindsay blushed again. "It was nothing." She handed her last package to Flack.

"These are so well thought out," Stella protested. "It must have taken you forever to come up with these."

"My mom and I used to knit all the time," Lindsay explained, watching apprehensively as Flack pulled the paper off of his gift.

"These are hand-knitted?" he double checked, looking over his own scarf.

She nodded, only slightly embarrassed at the repetitiveness of her gifts. She figured Stella would be the only one appreciative of mittens, and she hadn't wanted to knit anyone a sweater.

"What about Danny?" Stella asked.

For the first time in her life, Lindsay hoped her blush hadn't died down, that way she could attribute it to the gifts and not to the fact that she was about to lie. "I haven't finished it yet."

Stella nodded, unable to find any loopholes in her argument.

Mac cleared his throat. "Is there anything we can do in the next six hours?" he asked.

Everyone shook their heads.

"Then get out of here," he said. "I'll give you a call tomorrow when we need you."

They didn't need to be told twice. The break room was cleaned of garbage and empty in record time. Danny held Lindsay back in the locker room. "We still on for tomorrow?"

Lindsay nodded, considering for a moment. "You could just stay at my place. It would save the commute in case Mac really does call us in." Inside, her stomach was flipping. She'd taken a chance inviting him to stay again and she knew it.

"You know what, Montana. That might be a good idea. Saves on how early I'll have to get up to make it to your place."

It also meant she didn't have to take the subway home at almost midnight and she was thankful for that.

It was forty minutes before they stepped into Lindsay's apartment and checked the clock.

Lordy. I'm hoping this doesn't seem rushed and I'm hoping you'll bear with me about Lindsay and Danny's presents, and I'm hoping you won't kill me about not knowing who Lindsay got for her secret santa or what she got… Don't shoot me, okay?

And have a good holiday to everyone, with a special Merry Christmas for those who celebrate.

Oh, two more things. 1) Prepare your toothbrushes. Christmas Day is going to be fluffy like cotton candy. 2) December 29-30 are not going to be pretty days, you have been warned. Those days you might need to go eat chocolate, but I promise they'll have a happy new year!