Max felt totally safe, even in just her undergarments and a sheet. The Lydeckers and Bruno Anselmos and Normals of the world couldn't touch her. Only one person could touch her and he was sitting across from her on the cranberry-blanketed motel bed, staring into her with the most complicated, beautiful hazel-green stare she'd ever seen. "How did you find me?"

Alec's hand fell from her cheek and he rested it on the bed. He turned away from her gaze, an action she just didn't understand. Weren't they alone, here, if nowhere else? Wouldn't now be the time to be honest? She felt a protest growing in her throat. Don't look away, she found herself thinking. They could say so much more without speaking.

Like the way he clutched me to him after he saved my life. Like the way he looked at me outside the club when we were dealing with the mermaid, the flash of excitement in those eyes. Like the way he shoved that knife into the meadow bed instead of my chest when White tried to scatter his brains. Like that predatory gaze he washed over me with when he first stepped into my cell.

"I don't know. I just had this feeling that something was wrong. And then, I don't know…" he trailed, keeping his stare away, the expression on his face conveying that what he was thinking was crazy.

Not crazy, she thought. It was instinct. Emotion. Something other than the practical tactical.

"What?" she managed.

Alec swallowed hard. "And then I saw you leaving town and I just, something felt like I had to follow you. So I did."

Max's eyes widened at his confession. Not that he saw, though; his eyes were still trained at the industrial-grade carpeting. He followed me out here, over an hour on his motorcycle, to jump into freezing cold water and crack a safe over who-knows-how-many-feet-deep underwater because 'something felt like' he had to follow me?

Alec returned to her eyes, a cover-up smile attached at his lips. "Guess it's a good thing I did, huh?"

Max thought about him, sitting across from her on a shabby motel mattress in just his boxers, flashing her a fake smile because he was too embarrassed to take credit for saving her life. That wasn't like him. This was different.

"You're like my guardian angel or something," she said roughly, smiling for the first time since he pumped that needed oxygen into her.

Alec blushed. The first time she'd ever seen him blush at something.

Maybe he's scared.

Max let the sheet fall as she reached out to fold her fingers around his hand on the bed. He looked down at their hands, a stream of aching emotion washing over him.

"Alec," she said.

He met her stare. "Just don't do that again, okay?" he asked, the wild look in his eyes trying to translate itself into Max's mind. Wild with what? Desperation?

Alec struggled to get the words out that were bumping around the corners of his mind. Maybe she understood a hint of what he was working toward, but he could see the hesitation on her face. She didn't understand why this was so important to him. She'd done dozens of jobs for Eyes Only, for Logan, and she was fine.

"What if I was too late?" he finally offered, dejectedly.

Max pulled her hand back to her lap, surprised. She was sitting right here with him, and he was contemplating what it would have felt like to have lost her? She was so confused by what was happening in his mind. Did he think this was a dream?

Alec saddened by the loss of her hand's warmth on his. He looked down, pulling his own hand back.

Max wasn't sure what to do. She imagined everything she had, everyone she had, disappearing. For the second time tonight. She wasn't used to this, to whether she was there or not mattering to anyone. She lifted her head and watched Alec's eyes dart anywhere but back to hers.

She leaned forward slowly with both hands stretched forward, and placed them at the sides of his face, trying to still his eyes. "Alec," she almost whispered. He looked to her, finally.

Max trickled her hands down his neck, across his broad shoulders, down his muscled arms, and pulled at his hands. His eyes followed the path as if an essence was traveling through him and would transfer to her through his fingertips. Max held his left hand and pulled at his right until she placed it palm-down over her heart, which was beating with a slightly quickened pace. Because of you.

Alec held his breath, waiting for her to let go, but she wouldn't. He looked from her hand to her face. Daring tears slipped out the corner of her eye, falling from her cheek onto his hand at her heart. "You didn't lose me, Alec, I'm right here."

Alec's eyebrows twisted with concern.

She knew.

Max leaned back on the bed, forcing Alec to lean forward. She refused to let his hand free. She couldn't now. Now that she felt the perfection of his skin on hers, his hand over her heart – making it beat faster, his gaze on hers conveying something outside of language, something abstract, she couldn't lose it. He crawled down on the bed next to her, each transgenic on their sides, facing one another.

Max's hair was cold but she didn't notice. These abstract things they were feeling had enough warmth to them.

They laid there, frozen in position and staring into one another. Every hurt, every pain, every excited smile rushed through their minds. Every happy time, every appreciation, every heartbeat floated between them. Their shared pasts and separate lives met halfway in the stares. Alec blinked a couple of times, quickly and hard, as Max inched closer to him. He slipped an arm under her neck, Max resting her head on his bicep.

Finally, she removed her hand from the one that held his at her heart, and hesitantly reached between his arm and his side, trekking over the terrain of his skin so her hand rested at his back. Though no longer required, he still kept his hand at her heart.

Finally, he slid his hand up to her shoulder then swept it around to her back, pulling her closer. Pulling her to his chest, where they no longer could stare into one another with such an absolute honesty. He wrapped his arms around her, tucking her head into his neck and chest, and enveloping her in his embrace.

"You take the breath right out of me," he said slightly above a whisper, tightening his grasp on the angel in his arms.

And she cried. He held his breath for a moment as a small tear snuck out of the corner of his eye and absorbed into the pillow.

They fell to sleep, Max surrounded by him – and though he held her as if hanging on for his own life, he was surrounded by her, too.