Max loved Christmas time. It was always filled with cheer, and no one seemed to need a reason to be nice. It was genuine. People take you out to lunch just out of the kindness of their hearts. Off the lunch she'd just shared with OC, Max headed to Logan's.

She bounced happily into his penthouse to find the man (where else?) in his office, excitedly clicking away on his computer.

"You beeped?" she asked, peeking over his shoulder. He was making hotel reservations for the weekend for two people.

He turned in his chair and minimized his screens. "Yeah, um," he said, standing, his exoskeleton crackling with electricity. "Can we talk about something? In the living room."

Max followed him to the couch and sat on the arm of it. Logan took a deep breath. "I have some good news."

"What?"

"Well, I've been in touch with a scientist who used to be a professor at UCLA. She thinks she can help us with the virus."

Max smiled. "That's great! She has the cure?"

"Well, not yet, but she has come up with a… workaround." Logan rubbed his hands together.

Already, Max didn't like the sound of this. All she wanted was to not have to worry about killing him if they accidentally touched. 'Workaround' sounded like another 'window of opportunity' that would eventually lead to 'disappointed, anticlimactic goodbye-to-the-romance kiss-off in an old junkyard.' "Okay, what's the workaround?" she asked skeptically. She would at least humor him.

"Dr. Sutter says she can redirect the virus to someone else's DNA," he divulged, getting straight to the matter.

"Oh, please tell me we have a vial of White's blood." She almost laughed. The Ghost of Christmas Past sure was a great gift-giver. She smiled, ear-to-ear, but it faded the moment she realized how screwed up the world is and that it was probably too good to be true.

Logan smiled. "No. It's not that easy."

Max piped up, the idea in her brain making its way to her mouth. "So we're just going to find some random person off the street and assume I'll never see them again?"

Logan smiled again. "Actually, we have a volunteer."

Max recoiled. There was someone out there who hated her enough to volunteer to never see her again? She catalogued everyone she knew, dismissing every one of them as they came to mind. Almost everyone she knew was her friend – or at least would be around, and as far as she knew, none of them had a death wish.

"Who? Lydecker?" she asked out of desperation.

"Actually, Alec."

Again, Max recoiled. "Alec?" She wasn't aware of his apparently strong disdain for her. He really hated her that much he'd just offer himself up to be the willing target to the deadly retrovirus? "Why would he do that?"

She kept thinking about it as Logan started some speech about the scientific way this would all be achieved. Why would Alec do that? So she'd stop slapping him upside the head every time he suggested or did something stupid (aka, every five minutes)? So she couldn't lay a finger on him and he could just rile her up with no consequences? Surely he hadn't thought this through. And surely, neither could have Logan.

"…so all we need is his blood and about a hundred thousand dollars…" Logan rambled on, gesturing with his boring, stumpy fingers and weighted words.

Unless Alec was doing this to try to pay her back for all those times she'd bailed him out of trouble. It was possible that for once in his life, he was repaying a debt. He seemed to do the 'right and noble' thing for the transgenics in TC, but she, herself, rarely needed help, and he hadn't paid her back to date.

"…and are you even listening?" Logan interrupted, stopping his own speech.

Max hadn't been. She was in her own world, trying to sort it all out. "I'm sorry, yeah. I just… I gotta-"

"He said he's paying for it, too," Logan said excitedly, his eyebrows rising with glee.

When her face didn't show the spirit he had hoped for, he asked, "Hey, are you okay?"

And that had given her an out. "I'm feelin' kinda punk," she began. Realizing she might need to show a little enthusiasm to the older man, she added, "Great news about the virus. I'll talk to you more about it tomorrow."

Logan frowned. "What's wrong? Is it the tryptophan deficiency?"

Max turned. "I think I just need to rest," she lied, heading toward the door. "See you tomorrow."

With some form of anger she hadn't realized, she pulled his door shut and bolted for the stairs. No elevator today. Why is it no one could just take the stairs and rely on their own bodies anymore? But since no one took the stairs, it afforded her the excuse to use some of her transgenic strength, bounding over half a flight of stairs at a time. She was alone anyway, so why not?

Stupid men, she decided. Making decisions in your life without so much as asking you – the concerned party. Yeah, men definitely suck. And she was going to lay some independence on Alec next time she saw him. No, scratch that. Now. She had to find him now.

Alec knew why Logan had called him instead of anyone else. The man just plain didn't like him, maybe because he was too close to Max, or was just like her, or maybe he was intimidated by his own… shortcomings, and saw the X5 as a threat to his not-like-that relationship with a certain female alpha X5.

In any event, he was more than willing to play along in Logan's ridiculous scheme. He'd taken joy in placating the Ordinary over the past year and change, and he knew Max was never going to let it happen. The fact that Logan didn't immediately deduce the same result was truly a testament to the cyber-journalist's idiocy.

Max would never allow an innocent to take the brunt of consequences meant solely for her. She liked to clean up her own messes.

And because he knew she'd be livid, and because he liked the way her body shifted and her eyes darted all over him whenever he'd been shirtless and boxing, he'd been at the eighth floor's gym in TC for going on four hours, waiting for the feisty brunette to make her appearance. He'd gone to town on two of the not-completely-destroyed bags and had worked up quite a sweat when she finally showed. Good thing, too, he noted, his calves were going to be a little sore tomorrow from all the float-like-a-butterfly's he'd been enacting, but it would all be worth it.

He pretended not to have heard or seen her until he circled the bag, punching extra hard. He did a double-take of her and stilled the bag with his fingertips, making sure his face was in on the drama before turning to face her. "Hey, Maxie, what's up?"

The brunette fury advanced toward him, her face flushed from something. Running? he wondered. All the way here?

"You had no right to do that," she said, her peppery eyes piercing into him.

"What?" he baited.

"You know exactly what I'm talking about."

He pretended it was nonchalant. "Oh, the virus thing?"

Max's eyes rolled over his chest, her pupils partially dilating, before she returned her glare to him. "Yeah, 'the virus thing'. That's not your decision to just offer yourself up as Logan's scapegoat lab rat!"

Wow, she must be pissed, because she was mixing metaphors. "Scapegoat?"

"I understand that I've been a bitch to you maybe more times than not, but do you really hate me that much that you get some sick pleasure from redirecting the virus so I could never touch you again?"

She was rambling. Her anger gave her cheeks a pink hue he found kind of hot. Plus, the fact she had said 'I could never touch you again' instead of 'you could never touch me again' or 'we could never touch again' put a smile on his face. She wanted to touch him.

"And yeah, scapegoat. Instead of facing his problem and taking some responsibility, he called you? What did he offer you? Money? Is that why you have a hundred grand to spare?"

Yeah, definitely rambling. 'His problem?'

"Except that doesn't make sense," she mumbled, staring at the bag.

Alec nodded in agreement.

"I don't know. This whole thing just feels wrong."

"Maxie, I just want you to be happy," he said. He knew she'd get the very look she was sporting this very moment – the one where she doesn't like being indebted.

"Yeah, but this isn't your mess to clean up."

Alec looked over her should and back to her. "Max, for some reason – and maybe against your better judgment – you've saved my ass more times than I can count. I just want to repay you. Plus, it's one hell of a Christmas present."

Max eyed his hands, unsure of what to say. "But Alec, that means we'd never be able to touch again."

He smiled with a mixture of panic and confidence. "Oh, what? You're telling me you just can't keep your hands off me, eh, Maxie?" Alec turned toward his gym bag and began removing the tape from his hands.

Max felt an urge rising up through her core. "I can't accept that gift. It's too expensive."

Alec balled the used tape and threw it in his bag. Turning back to Max as he started on his second hand, he began, "It's stolen money, and I can think of no better use for it. Besides, I already agreed to it."

Max bit her lower lip. She watched his hand as it unwrapped the other, thinking about him never touching her. He'd barely shaken her hand since they first met. Was she really ready to never fight or spar with him again?

She remembered how comforting he'd been when she explained about Ben, and she asked herself if she was ready to let go of that, too. Did he realize that one of them would have to leave? They couldn't touch ever again, and to her, that meant it'd be easier if one of them left. There would be no opportunity for accident.

Which brought up another question. Did he want to leave? And if so, who was she to stop him?

She cleared her throat. "You're really gonna do this? For me?"

"No, I'm gonna do it for Logan, because we're besties and I'm his wingman," Alec replied. He dropped the sarcasm and answered again. "Yes, of course I'm doing this for you."

"Why?"

Alec finished unwrapping his other hand. "Because, Max, as long as I've known you, you've always let things prevent you from being happy, and if I do this, at least you'll actually have a chance at going after it."

She wasn't sure whether or not to be offended. Was she really the one who stood in the way of her own happiness? Was it that simple?

Alec tossed the tape aside and swung his arms back, observing how her eyes kept returning to his hands, and when they weren't on his hands, they darted nervously to his chest, and when they weren't on either, he was pretty sure she was staring at his lips.

Max fought the nervousness and traveled the short distance to his eyes, staring as if the longer she stared, the more she'd be able to discern the meaning of all of this.

Alec wouldn't break the stare. He was transfixed by what he couldn't read in her gaze.

Finally, she spoke again. "Can I ask you for a favor?"

"Anything," he said, without hesitation.

He expected she was going to tell him not to butt into her life, or that she wasn't going to let him sacrifice himself just so she and Logan could be together, partly because she wouldn't want to owe him, and partly because it would allow her to punish herself more and prevent herself from going after happiness.

Max shifted in her stance. "If you're gonna do this, will you let me… touch you?"

Suddenly, this whole thing was more serious than either X5 had imagined. Alec's mouth went dry. She was going to accept his gift, a gift on which he originally had no intention of following through. He swallowed hard. Immediately, his skin heated up. He nodded slowly.

He focused on her hands as she wordlessly approached him, removing her gloves. He remembered how hard her hands had felt against his face in the ring; even then, they'd seem like they should be softer. Her hands looked so smooth, and the closer they got to him, the more he imagined their softness, and the closer she got to him, the more he panicked, frozen in place imagining this would be the last time she touched him. His heart raced with the seriousness, wondering where she'd touch him first.

Max let her gloves fall to the floor and raised her right hand. Alec held his breath as her eyes raked over his body. She swallowed hard and pressed her fingertips to his stomach, keeping her hand completely still. He was hard and smooth and sweaty. She couldn't move.

Alec took in a sharp breath. She looked up to him, alerted to his change in breath. He suddenly felt like a teenager, nervous and trying to suppress the fidgets he so desperately felt coming on. Even when he was at Manticore, his first couple of teen years were awkward, trying to get used to his body and be confident in it.

And it was hot in the gym, and her hand on his bare skin created a strange sensation, first of cooling him at the surface, then of heating him deep at his core.

"Is this okay?" she asked.

For fear of showing something he hadn't intended for her to see, Alec shut his eyes. "Yeah," he managed to push out.

When the soft ridges of her fingertips smeared his sweat into his abs, he held back from responding to the surge of electricity coursing through his body.

Before he knew it, she placed her other hand on his body and traced the lines of his stomach in a symmetrical pattern before pushing her splayed palms up his chest.

In all of his experiences and sexual conquests, he'd never felt so vulnerable. If she wanted to end his life right now, he'd be powerless to stop her. If she wanted him to take a step, he wouldn't be able to move. Her touch woke him up and paralyzed him simultaneously.

She moved her fingers along his collarbone, sending involuntary shivers through his whole being. He let tiny breaths escape barely parted lips. Her fingers inched up his neck, her left hand's digits circling around to his barcode. She stroked it gently, as if plucking a harp, and the music it created in Alec's mind nearly caused him physical pain. His face contorted as he endured this beautiful torture, this torture he'd brought on by accepting Logan's proposition.

"That hurts?" Max asked, barely any space between them.

He refused to open his eyes for fear it would show her how he felt, and that he was questioning his decision. He couldn't go back on his word, now, and it was too painful to imagine. "No, Max," he answered.

Her hands crept up to his face, cupping his cheek with one hand and beginning to pad at his cheeks and forehead. It dawned on him when he'd felt this before. It was when Joshua had to say goodbye to Annie, and she had wanted to memorize his face before he 'left.'

It had qualified as one of the most beautiful moments of his life – the love Annie had shown just by mere touch – and it hadn't even been for him. But here Max was, unknowingly mimicking those movements and touches.

Max felt his face, memorizing its masculine contours. His face had been sweaty from working out, but the sweat below his eyes was so warm.

Alec hoped she hadn't noticed his tears. What kind of soldier, what kind of man, cried at such a simple touch?

She thumbed across both sets of eyelashes, sweeping his tears aside, and dragged her fingers rake-like over his broad shoulders and down his muscled arms. She discovered his hands were immobile at his sides. She picked his right hand to grab, and as she did, he tried to will his eyes to stop betraying him.

He felt her lift his hand with both of hers, palm open, and place it at her cheek. Using her right hand, she moved his thumb over her eye.

His eyes snapped open to reveal the same pained look he was sure he was giving plastered to her face. She was crying so silently he hadn't heard it. Without hesitation, his other hand came up to her face and smeared her tears into her cheek.

With such a sad desperation in her expression, Alec was certain he had to do this for her. He recognized this as a goodbye touch. He wouldn't be able to stay in Seattle. Not if he'd have to watch her be with Logan. "Maxie," he tried to soothe, pulling her into a hug.

He'd forgotten about his utterly sweaty body, but she hadn't cared. As she buried her face in his chest, Alec stroked her hair and held her tightly. She swept her hands up his back, smoothing over its angles, and up around his shoulders. With her ear pressed to his chest, she could hear his heart beating quickly. She wondered if it was because of her.

Pulling her head away, Max stared up to him. She didn't want to say goodbye. Everywhere she touched him felt like a gift she had taken for granted, and which was just now being given one last chance to appreciate before it left her. Before he left her.

Dragging her fingers down the slope of his back, Max relished in the perfection of his body. She stepped back from him and felt his hands grip at her waist in a minimalist desperation.

But she didn't take another step. Gently grabbing his hand again, she brought it to her face again, and closed her eyes. It became painfully clear to him at that moment. She was allowing him to touch her, too, to memorize her before she left. He stepped closer and slid his hand through her hair, curving it at her barcode. She drew in a sharp breath before shaking off her coat. Didn't matter where it landed.

And before he knew what it meant, she dragged his palm forward along her skin, along the side of her neck, then down, down, until his flat palm rested over her heart, itself beating faster from the pressure of holding in her tears.

This is it, he realized. This is goodbye. She's gonna let me do this. She has chosen Logan.

Max reached her hands out toward him again, and he couldn't help but watch, mesmerized by how intently her hands swept up his chest, agonizingly slow.

She had stepped closer, which invited his hands back toward her neck and face. With a gentle push, Max's fingers tilted Alec's face up toward the shabby ceiling. She stood up on her tiptoes and dragged her bottom lip up his Adam's apple, a move which sent a charge through his body, a move she didn't understand why she was doing. She felt his nervous swallow on her bottom lip, then felt his skin between both lips.

Alec gasped, unable to contain the sheer beauty of what was happening. He felt another tear slip from the corner of his eye but dared not remove his hands from the woman before him.

Max gently kissed his Adam's apple. Slowly, her tongue dabbed listlessly along his neck, her hand sliding around to the back of his head and ruffling through his hair.

Alec's head drifted downward as Max's mouth moved unbidden toward the soft skin below his ear, making its way along his jaw.

His mind was racing, trying to figure out the logic behind it all. Why would she be extending this touch session? And hadn't she asked just to touch him, not to smear her lips all over him? And so dangerously close to his mouth? And didn't she know there was a limit to how much a man could take? And was she really pulling him toward her-

His thought process was interrupted the moment her lips grazed his. He tilted his head down and dragged his mouth across hers, unable to prevent himself from experiencing this one, specific, touch before he had to disappear, before he had to never see Max again. And if she was going to insist, he was going to oblige.

She parted her lips and pulled him toward her so that their bodies were practically touching.

It was all the invitation he needed. Scooping both his arms around her back, Alec pulled her small frame up toward his tilted head. Their tongues probed forward, creating a salty vacuum neither transgenic seemed able to stop. He heard a tiny murmur escape her throat, only to feel it vibrate into his mouth. It carried a small spark of desire – he was certain.

They broke apart when suddenly Max felt a wall slam against her back. They realized they'd somehow moved twenty feet and ended up against it. Returning breathlessly to one another, mouths agape, Alec searched Max's face and watched her lips for the words which might suggest she'd like a repeat. But she was speechless.

She pulled at his neck again and felt her heart rate increase as he began another languid, gentle kiss, smearing his lips across her chin and down the crook of her neck. He fingered the soft skin barely under the hem of her shirt. He returned to her mouth, and their kisses, infused with fervor and need, began to push past gentle into intense.

Unsure of what this all meant, but completely certain she didn't want these sensations to stop, Max crossed her arms between them and peeled her shirt up. Pausing to get it up over her head, the two trasngenics stared into one another. Max tossed her shirt aside and finger-walked both hands up his arms and back to his neck.

Alec noticed the suggestion of her smile and dipped his head back down to hers, smashing his lips to hers. Continuing his ministrations and both increasing their speed, Alec was having difficulty keeping his hands off her.

Something about his lips on her skin seemed so right. She considered that maybe she was just horny; it'd been a long time since her last heat, which incidentally, was the last time she'd had sex. And, she told herself mentally, it was no secret how hot Alec is – not even to him.

Or maybe it was the fact that this could be the only time she could touch him, and she was taking advantage of it, because after this, there could be no more. After the scientist took Alec's blood, Alec would leave; he would leave her to be happy with Logan. Leave her.

Or maybe there was some unknown tenderness to him she hadn't bothered to see before, and now here it was presenting itself to her, and here she was, saying goodbye to it. Like an idiot.

But could she really be begrudged of one last touch? Could she really use someone like that? Could she really use Alec like that?

His tongue dragged down her neck and she shivered. Okay, maybe he wasn't exactly being used in the scenario. Before she knew what he was doing, he had lifted her by her rear end and she instinctively bent her legs around him.

From the excitement, she was losing her breath, and only one thought kept creeping into her mind, one thought that made her so emotional.

After this, there won't be anything else. Ever. No more hitting him upside the head, no more ring-fighting, no more sparring. No more lips on her skin, no more tongue delving out to devour her, no more skin against hers, against a wall. No more of him pushing against her.

She froze at the concept. No more Alec. After this, there would be no more Alec. No more smart-mouthed, hot-bodied, innuendo-making, always-there Alec. The idea overwhelmed her, and the tears began to flow more freely.

She didn't understand why, but Max found herself stilling his movements, his kisses, and pushing at his arms until he released her legs from his support.

And when she saw his face, she panicked at the look of sheer confusion and heartache all over it.

"Max?"

Max looked past him. "I can't do this," she said, tears succumbing to gravity. She squeezed her eyes tight to wring out a few tears, and decided she couldn't look at him again if she expected to be able to see where she was going. Collecting her shirt, she hurried out the door, leaving Alec alone in the gym.

Alone in his apartment with a half-drunken Scotch, Alec swirled the liquid in his glass, desperately searching its contents for the answers which eluded him. He gulped down the remaining amber ale and headed back to his kitchen for the bottle.

Damn it; why did he have to go opening his mouth and volunteering for the worst idea ever known to transgenic- and mankind? Never touching Max again, especially after what happened in the gym, was going to kill him – disintegrate him from the inside out. Their touch-fest had already unraveled him to the core, and now he was stuck, doing the noble thing, the right thing, by letting her go, by letting her run into the arms of the man she loved, by letting her run out of his.

He yelled a ferocious growl as he hurled the tumbler at his wall and winced when it hit and shattered to the ground. God damn it, Alec, he scolded himself. It was an historic fuck-up to rival all fuck-ups throughout history. It's my punishment, he thought darkly, remembering all the things he'd done while under Manticore's orders. He grabbed the bottle by its neck and slid down the face of the refrigerator.

Tears of frustration leaked from the corners of his eyes. He removed the cap from his bottle and threw it to the same fate as the tumbler, and then took a long swig from the bottle. Looking around his apartment, he realized it was all just stuff. He could pick up and go, plunk himself down in some other city thousands of miles away, and try his damnedest never to think of Max again.

Max and her tearful eyes. Max and her tearful eyes, memorizing him by touch, just to say goodbye.

It was dark when Max realized her legs had carried her all the way back to Logan's, and it was in a self-made puddle just outside his penthouse doors when she realized it had been raining. She had been pounding on his door, she was sure, because there were fist-sized parts of the door which held some droplets transferred from her gloved hands.

Logan got to the door slower than normal. He peeked through the peephole and, seeing it was Max in a state of wet and agitated confusion, pulled the door open. "Max, are you-"

Max brushed past him with barely enough time for him to get out of her way. "We can't do this," she said, nearly stomping into the living room before turning back around to face him.

"What? What are you talking about?" he asked, observing her fully.

Max looked a little tired, but wound tight like a tightrope, and he had a distinct feeling she was balancing on one idea alone. She was soaked through and through, and she seemed to be raw about something. Finally, he noticed the seams of her shirt.

"What's going on?" he asked. "Why is your shirt inside out?"

Max looked down at her shirt, noticing the exposed seams. She considered lying and telling him it was the style now, but she couldn't concentrate on telling another lie. "We can't do this. We can't let Alec do this. It's too expensive a price."

Logan recoiled, now fully awake as the topic of discussion sharpened his focus. "He volunteered, Max. Why can't we let him?" He head a sneaking suspicion Max was about to shatter his world.

Max's eyes welled with tears at the repetitious thought circling around her mind, bumping into every aspect of her life. No more Alec. No more Alec meant, well, no more Alec. And she just wasn't ready for that. "Because he's Alec!"

Logan pressed his lips in a slight frown. "Max, you're a pretty logical person – in fact, logical to a fault sometimes, but right now, you're not making a lick of sense."

Lick, Max thought, remembering Alec's tongue on her neck, her lips, her mouth, her tongue. Wait, did he just say 'logical to a fault'? Her eyes narrowed. "What the hell do you mean by that?"

Logan took a step toward her, adjusting his body language so as to be less threatening and more comforting. He put his hands out in front of him in a defensive position. "Sorry, I just meant that you usually base your decisions on logic. Alec offered, we have the means and the ability, and then you come storming in here saying we can't do it."

Max's mouth fell open, unsure of what to say.

But that wasn't a problem, because Logan took care of it for her. "But what you're really saying is that you can't do it."

Her eyes squinted, filling with tears. That's what she had said to Alec before she left him in the gym. With a start, she realized that she hadn't explained anything to him then. She had just left.

Logan stepped forward. "He's giving us the greatest gift, and you're denying it."

Max sniffled and let two tears fall before looking up to Logan's expectant stare. He looked angry.

"Why?" Logan pushed. "Why are you denying it? Don't you love me? Don't you want to be with me?"

"No!" Max grunted angrily, and suddenly, surprise overtook her face, everything becoming clear to her. It wasn't a question of logic at all.

Shocked, Logan took a step back and sat down on the couch. He looked confused, as if he'd just been shot and was in denial that the bullet wound would be fatal. "What?"

Max took a deep breath. "I loved you," she said, and her use of the past tense worried him even more. "But you don't do this to someone you love."

She moved toward the door with haste. She needed to find Alec; she needed to explain herself and apologize for the gym.

"Wait, Max," Logan began. "I'm sorry."

But his apology fell on deaf ears. All he saw was Max's retreating back as she left.

A quiet knock came at his door, and Alec knew it could only be Max. Was she so eager to get this virus-redirection started that she couldn't even wait until morning?

"It's open," he said softly. He brought the glass bottle to his lips and chugged the remainder of its contents as Max slowly entered his apartment.

Alec sat on the floor in front of his fridge, clearly very distressed. His apartment seemed to be untouched, except for the shards of glass partway across the kitchen and the dent in the wall where whatever glass used to be had met its fateful end.

Worriedly, Max watched as he gently set the bottle down next to him and stared up at her. She leaned against the back of his door until it clicked shut.

"Alec," she began.

Her dark chocolate eyes met his stare, finally, and he raised a hand in defense. "No, yeah, I'm ready. Let's go do this."

Max's heart broke as she heard the cracks in his voice. He was still going to follow through with what he'd promised, even though his actions earlier proved contrary to his own desires. He was willing to let her go if it meant she would be happy.

She could tell he was completely raw from the day's emotions and hadn't the strength to hold up his Manticore mask. "No," she said.

Alec paused in his not-too-convincing motion to get up, instead leaning his arm on his bent leg and his hand on the floor. "What?"

Max closed the distance between them and squatted down. She pushed his arm off of his knee, pushed his knee to flatten his leg, and fell to her knees, straddling him. She crawled further up his legs until his face was within reach and leaned forward.

"What are you doing?" he asked, wondering if he had drunk himself into insanity and was imagining this whole interaction.

"I just need to see something first," she said. She pressed her lips to his gently.

The sentiment that it might be a pity kiss evaporated when he felt her hand circle around the back of his neck and pull him forward, opening her mouth to him. Placing his hands at her hips, he pulled her forward, sweeping his hands up her back to hold her against him as he deepened their kiss. It was languid and sweet, and he took his time tasting her, unsure if this would be the last time he ever kissed her. But before he was ready for her to, she was pulling away.

He opened his eyes, concerned, and waited as her eyes slid open at a painful, sap-dripping pace. Her face was flushed and her lips swollen from the kiss, and as the corners of her lips curled up, he felt his heartbeat quicken.

"Yeah, that's what I thought," she said, grinding into his lap and leaning forward to kiss him again.

He pulled back this time. "Did you know your shirt is inside out?"

"Won't be for long," she responded, leaning back in and massaging his lips with hers. She deepened their kiss again before he broke it off again.

"Does this mean you're not-" he began to question about the virus redirection plans.

Max smiled, caressing his eyebrow with her thumb reverently. "Stop talking."

"Yes, ma'am," he said with a smile, pulling her back against him.

Yes, Max definitely loved Christmas time. Especially this year.