Author's disclaimer: The guys belong to Pet Fly et al., but their life on my hard disk is a lot more pleasurable. Nobody here making any money

Author's notes: Contains serious Blair-worship and galanga.

Lucky After All

Released at last from duty, Jim Ellison made record time on the way home--although if any member of the Traffic Division of the Cascade PD had seen him flash by, he might have lost quite a bit of time talking himself out of a ticket. Or not. He couldn't really claim an emergency, at least not as either the Department or the Traffic Code might define it. "Speed too fast for conditions," which were rainy, as usual. Not to mention too fast for the posted speed limit.

Finally reaching 852 Prospect, he parked quickly but none too well, and headed up the stairs at a run. The elevator was working; he just didn't want to take the time to wait for it. Not until he reached the door of #307 did he stop. Blair was home. He could hear the familiar heartbeat, smell the enticing scent not only of his lover but of something that was going to grow up to be dinner. Jim leaned his forehead against the cool surface of the door, taking deep breaths, willing himself into calm. This was ridiculous. He was paranoid. Of course, according to Dr. Sandburg--Paranoia, thy name is Sentinel. He straightened, pulled his shoulders back, and reached for the doorknob.

Blair's eyes met his as he entered the loft, catching his partner in the act of licking a spoon.

"Jim--you're home on time, great! Hope you're in the mood for chicken; I've got a great new sauce I wanna try. You'll love it--nothing too weird in it."

"By your standards or mine, Mr. Pan-Cultural Cuisine?" Jim deposited his keys in the basket, hung up his jacket, and headed toward the kitchen at what he hoped was a normal pace.

"By the standards of any even semi-sophisticated adult living in a large Pacific Rim metropolis. Want a taste?"

"Yes," Jim replied softly, taking Blair's face in his hands and tilting it just enough, as he bent his head to claim the irresistible mouth. He licked a fugitive drop of the sauce from the corner, then tasted the familiar lips slowly with the tip of his tongue. Only after he had his fill of them did he deepen the kiss, as Blair's mouth opened beneath his, inviting him inside. Jim's tongue languidly explored the soft surfaces of that warm, moist cavity. He could taste the lingering flavor of the sauce. It was good; another time he might try to identify all the elements of its complex flavor. But right now, he needed only to fill his senses with the reality of his Guide--the taste of his mouth, the feel of the compact, muscular body that had automatically molded itself to his own, the small sounds of pleasure Blair couldn't seem to avoid making whenever they kissed like this. Only sight was getting cheated, and eventually Jim released Blair's mouth just enough to look at his face.

"Well--" Blair announced a little breathlessly, "I'd planned to use a spoon, but I like your technique better. Not as accurate, taste-wise, even for a Sentinel--but way more fun."

"I thought so," Jim replied. "I was afraid you might not be home yet, since you weren't sure how long your research meeting might last. How did it go?"

"It went great!" Blair beamed. Normally he'd be bouncing and waving his hands at this point, but Jim seemed to have forgotten to let him go. "It was so smooth--by academic standards, anyway--I got home an hour earlier than I expected. The faculty at Cascade State are really jazzed about it, and the students were over the moon. It's not often undergrads, even upper-division honor students, get to do real-world research like this. It'll be great experience, and look very nice on their applications to grad school."

"How do the faculty feel about you directing the research project--an anthropologist who's not an academic? You were a little worried about that." Jim's voice held an undertone that suggested anyone who did object would be on a par with an ax-murdering, child-molesting cannibal with bad breath, and on Jim Ellison's permanent shit list.

"They were amazingly cool with it. The anthro types are mostly younger faculty who are used to the idea of anthropologists working in non-academic settings. And the Police Science faculty are thrilled to be dealing with an anthropologist who's also a real live experienced street cop and not just some ivory-tower idiot."

"They actually said that?"

"Not in so many words, of course. A fly on the wall would have heard only the politest of phrases, if rather stuffy ones. You have to know how to translate professorese."

Jim smiled at the look of excited animation on his partner's face. He hadn't seen that precise look in way too long. "You look pretty jazzed about it yourself. It's been great working with Detective Sandburg, but I kinda missed Darwin. I'm glad he's back."

Blair leaned his forehead against Jim's chest. "Yeah, me too." Only a Sentinel could have heard the little catch in his voice. Only Jim Ellison could truly appreciate what it meant. "I was so fed up with Rainier after the way the Chancellor acted, I might've just told them to piss off when they offered me a way to finish my dissertation. If it weren't for you encouraging me--even pushing a bit, I might have blown them off. And that would have been stupid, and a slap in the face to the people there who were on my side."

Jim kissed the top of the head that was still resting against his chest, then lifted one hand to comb through his lover's hair. "It was the least I could do, since if it hadn't been for me they wouldn't have kicked you out in the first place. You deserved that degree. Besides, I couldn't stand the idea of you being anything less than you could have been, because you protected me. Because you were crazy enough to love me."

Blair rubbed his cheek against his partner's chest before lifting his head to look Jim in the eye. "Crazy like a fox. I admit, at the time it was sheer hell...but in the end I got a badge, I got a doctorate, and I got you. Just getting you was worth it all." Jim wrapped both arms around Blair again, pulling him so close that the smaller man's next words were spoken against his ear. "My Wiccan friends would tell you it's the Rule of Three--whatever you do, for good or ill, comes back to you threefold."

"Then how did I get so lucky?" Jim whispered.

"You're a Sentinel. The hours stink, the pay is nonexistent, but the fringe benefits are great. You get a Guide who loves you forever."

At the last word, Jim's arms tightened even further, and Blair heard him make a strangled sound, low in his throat, that was almost a sob. Jim continued to hold him, head buried against Blair's neck. In the background, the fan whirred softly, the sauce bubbled gently, all in counterpoint to the sound of Blair's hands as they gently rubbed his lover's back, straying now and again into the softness of Jim's hair. It seemed like a very long time before Blair pulled away to search his partner's face.

"OK--what's wrong?"

Jim kept his eyes downcast. "Why do you think something's wrong?"

"As soon as you got home you glommed onto me like a barnacle on a boat hull. Ever since you haven't let go. Not that I don't love having you wrapped around me like kudzu, but you act like if you get more than a millimeter away from me, the bad fairies will come and snatch me."

Jim raised his head to meet his lover's eyes. "How is it that you can read me so well?"

"Because I know you. Because I'm the world's greatest authority on James Ellison. Because I love you."

Jim moved back to lean against the counter, but kept holding Blair's hand. "After you left this afternoon, there was a Homicide call."

"How bad was it? Geez, Jim, not a kid--"

Jim shook his head. "No. Believe it or not, that would have been easier. At least for me."

"Worse than a kid? God, what could possibly..."

"A guy about your size, about your age. Looked an awful lot like you did when your hair was short. He was beaten to death with a lead pipe, or two or three, in an alley next to Yardley's Lavender Bar. He was a bartender there. The ME thinks it probably happened between five and six this morning, but the body wasn't discovered until early this afternoon."

"Yardley's? You think it was a gay bashing?"

Jim nodded. "It's the only thing that fits. Everyone we talked to said he was a great guy. Funny, articulate, charming--and no jealous lovers, because he'd been monogamous for a long time."

This time Blair was the one to move to Jim, wrapping his arms around the larger man. "Now I understand. He may have reminded you of me, love, but he wasn't me. I'm still here."

"I know. That wasn't the worst of it."

"Come on, tell me everything."

"I was the one who had to tell his partner. They were together almost ten years. The guy was almost crazy with worry when his lover didn't come home--he was the sort who'd call if he was going to be half an hour late for dinner. When Megan and I got to the door and told him who we were--" Jim's voice broke at that point. The telltale muscle in his jaw was twitching faster than Blair had ever seen it, and he knew that only years of practice at stifling his feelings kept Jim from breaking down right then.

"It's OK, sweetheart..." Blair lifted a hand to the back of Jim's neck, gently rubbing the tense muscles there.

"When I was a Ranger," Jim continued, "We were on a mission in the mountains--never mind where. One of the guys in my unit was standing on the edge of a cliff when it gave way. There was no way any of us could get to him in time, and it was a 200-foot drop. He was dead and he knew it. I'll never forget the look on his face..."

"Jim--"

"That guy had exactly the same look on his face when I told him his lover had been murdered."

"Baby, why did you have to tell him? Megan would have done it."

"I know--she offered. I guess I thought it would be better coming from me, because he'd know I understood exactly what he was going through. It was bad enough he had to get news like that--I wanted to be damn sure he got from someone who'd been there. I know we weren't lovers yet when you--when you died--let alone together for ten years, but..."

"But close enough," Blair said softly. "Do you think he understood what you were saying? Did you come out right out and tell him you had a male lover? In front of Megan?"

Jim nodded. "I didn't give him your name and badge number, or say you were my partner at work, but otherwise I was pretty clear. I told him about the fountain, and how close I'd come to being right where he was." He searched Blair's face anxiously. "You don't mind, do you? That I told him?"

"Of course not," Blair assured him. "I glad it was you who broke it to him, and with somebody like Megan to back you up. I'm sure it was important to hear it from somebody who really understood, instead of someone who'd treat him with thinly veiled contempt, or trivialize it. There are still some who would."

"Yeah, 'it's not like losing a wife or anything,' right? One of the uniforms at the scene actually said that earlier. If Megan hadn't grabbed my arm and yanked me away I'd be explaining to IA right now why I decked the little twerp. Then we'd both be in deep shit."

"No place we haven't been before, love." That almost got a distant relative of a smile out of Jim. "I wish I'd been there with you, but I'm glad Megan was at least."

"She was really great, especially afterwards. I don't think anything I said to the guy surprised her, you know."

"I don't think much gets past her. She figured out you were a Sentinel in a matter of months, when people who knew you for years hadn't a clue. Sometimes it's easier to do that when you come to a situation from outside, without preconceptions."

Jim lifted a hand to touch Blair's cheek. "Kind of a like a certain anthropology grad student did years ago? It only took you a few months to learn things about me my family didn't know, or Carolyn." His hand moved under the thick mane of hair to the back of his lover's neck. "Actually, the twerp was right. Losing you wouldn't be like losing a wife."

Blair stood quietly, waiting for the rest of it.

"If I lost Carolyn, even now, I'd be sad. I'd feel the world was somehow diminished without her in it. I loved her when we were married, and I still love her, in a different way. But if I lost you--" Jim drew his partner to him in a rib-bending embrace. "If I lost you, I don't think I could survive. I'd be like that guy on the cliff edge--dead except for the impact."

Blair let Jim hold on almost until oxygen deprivation set in, then pushed gently on the larger man's chest. Jim loosened his hold immediately. Blair turned to the stove and turned off the heat under the sauce, then took his partner's hand and led him toward the stairs. Jim followed him upstairs, wordlessly, never letting go of the hand entwined in his.

The light upstairs was soft, and warm, the room lit only by the lamp on the dresser. Blair pulled back the comforter and nudged Jim down to sit on the edge of their bed. With a deft economy of movement, he removed his outer shirt and laid it over the chair. Shoes and socks were tucked under it, then t-shirt, pants and boxers were added to the pile. Next he turned to Jim and ran his hand down his partner's chest, appreciating the soft feel of the sage-green sweater. Reaching the bottom edge, he tugged it upward, and Jim lifted his arms to allow its removal. His t-shirt followed, and Blair added both to the growing pile. Next he knelt between Jim's legs to remove shoes and socks, tucking both out of the way under the bed. Still kneeling, Blair began to unbuckle Jim's belt.

As he had been from the beginning, the Sentinel watched each movement with an intensity that bordered on a zone. The movement of Blair's muscles under his skin fascinated Jim, as did the almost startling contrast between the fair skin and the dark hair that shadowed his jaw, ran riot over his chest, and arrowed down the middle of his body like an enticing signpost to a familiar and well-loved country. Backlit by the lamp, Blair's long hair appeared dark where it framed his face, but almost red at its outer edges. It was as if his life force was so strong the blood that carried it couldn't stop at the surface of his skin but permeated every cell, even granting its warmth to the air that surrounded him.

Feeling a tug at what remained of his clothes, Jim pushed down with his arms and lifted his hips off the bed, just enough to allow Blair to pull off his slacks and boxers. His Guide stood, turning to add the last of their clothes to the pile, moving with an unhurried grace that had the air of ritual about it. Turning back to Jim, Blair took Jim's hands in his own and pulled his lover up to stand in front of him. They moved into each other's arms, mouths seeking each other like iron and magnet. Once again, the smaller body molded itself to the larger, but this time with no barrier of cloth between. Blair wrapped his arms around Jim's neck as Jim wrapped his arms around Blair, holding the other man's body as closely as humanly possible. His hands began moving incessantly, tangling themselves in the wild hair, stroking across the planes of Blair's back, sliding down the hollow of his spine to the firm swell of his rear, traveling back upward along flank and sides, only to begin the same journey all over again.

As their bodies pressed together, their mouths feasted on each other. Like his hands below, Jim's tongue tried to be everywhere at once, reveling in the exquisite difference in texture between outer lips and inner, front surfaces of teeth and back, the fleshy cobblestone feel of taste buds and the muscular smoothness under the tongue. The taste of the sauce was still there, but fainter--scallions, lemongrass, coconut milk; the faintest hint of galanga. Blair's mouth alone was a whole world, a world that would reward a lifetime of exploration. Only when he could feel Blair becoming breathless did Jim reluctantly break the kiss and loosen his grip.

Blair unlocked his hands from behind Jim's neck, spread his fingers wide, and trailed them slowly down his lover's chest, eyes on his face. Jim shivered at the light touch, drinking in the transformation wrought in the familiar face before him. Those incomparable lips were even fuller than usual, reddened by devouring kisses. Blair's eyes were dark in the low light, only a slender rim of smoky blue surrounding a deep pool of black, deep enough for a man to lose his soul in.

Blair moved away from Jim to lie on the bed, arms and legs open in invitation. Jim knelt between Blair's legs for a moment, devouring his lover with his eyes. He was like a symphony--the sight of his chest rising and falling, now in a faster rhythm, was matched by the counterpoint of air rushing in and out of his lungs and and swift shussing of blood dancing through veins and arteries. Heat and all the complex scents of arousal rose in waves, especially around the smooth column of flesh rising from between Blair's legs. Jim's gaze lingered there, and that hungry look alone caused it to twitch in response and rise even further. A soft moan escaped Blair as his hips lifted, his body seeking what it needed by instinct.

Jim leaned forward, covering the man beneath him but supporting the weight of his upper body on one arm. His lips surrounded Blair's earlobe, sucking it gently inside his mouth, letting the tip of his tongue explore the silver loops that pierced it, tugging just enough to make Blair gasp. Moving to the strong column of his partner's neck, Jim gently licked and kissed his way downward, then followed the delicate line of collarbone with his tongue. As he reached the swell of pectoral muscles, his sucking became harder, sometimes leaving the marks of his passage on the fair skin. His free hand found one nipple, reveling in the change in texture as it hardened and rose under his fingers. His mouth sought the other, first licking gently, then sucking hard. Tugging the silver ring here brought a sharp sound from Blair, halfway between a shout and a sob. Blair's arms and legs were wrapped around Jim, and now he moved one hand behind Jim's head, pressing it into his chest, begging for more of the exquisite sensation.

Jim obliged for a long while, though time had ceased to mean anything, trapped as he was in an eternal present of pleasure. Eventually he resumed his journey, hands stroking Blair's sides as his mouth followed the trail of hair down the center of his lover's body. Sometimes his tongue would burrow to the skin beneath; sometimes his lips would explore the individual strands, marveling at how the texture changed, becoming wirier as he approached the dark thicket between the muscular legs. His tongue traveled along the furrow where thigh and torso met, then he raised his head over Blair's now weeping erection. Locking his eyes with those of his Guide, he bent his head just enough to kiss the velvet tip.

The cry that issued from Blair's lips at that touch seemed wrenched out of the depths of his soul. His hands clutched the sheets, then groped blindly toward the nightstand. Jim pulled himself back up towards Blair, kissing him tenderly while taking the tube from his hand. Getting as close as possible to his Guide, burying himself in the sheer physical reality of him, was now a desperate need. Only the overriding need to protect him as well gave Jim the self-control to prepare the way. First a single finger, the two, then three, entered the tight passage. At each separate invasion, Blair's inarticulate sounds became more needful, the hands clutching Jim's back gripped harder, the thrusting against Jim's fingers became more demanding. When the time came to coat his own rock-hard erection with the gel, the Sentinel's hand would barely obey his brain.

At last he entered his lover's welcoming body, burying himself to the hilt almost in a single stroke. Blair cried out, wrapping his arms and legs even more tightly around Jim, trying to draw them closer together. Jim was still for a moment, intense physical need warring with an intense desire to make this precious feeling of oneness last as long as possible. The vision of their spirit animals merging had been one of the most profound and terrifying experiences of Jim's life, and in retrospect one of the most precious. Mere flesh could never quite replicate that soul-changing unity, but at times like this it seemed so close, so close...

Finally, the flesh could be denied no longer, and Jim began to move. His strokes were slow and deep at first, as he felt every exquisite inch of his passage in and out of that tight, welcoming channel. Before very long his body's instincts swamped everything else, and he began to thrust harder and faster. Blair matched him, legs locked behind Jim and pulling him downward, hips thrusting upward, driving their bodies together like matter and antimatter seeking mutual annihilation. Blair came first, loudly, and the sight and sound and feel of his lover's orgasm pushed Jim over the edge. For a fleeting second, Jim could almost feel the wolf and panther meet in life-giving light; could almost feel the physical boundaries between himself and Blair dissolve, meld together. Then reality came crashing back in.

They were two people again--two sweaty, sticky, almost-boneless people breathing like they'd run all the way to Heaven and back, which wasn't far off the mark. Feeling too wrung out to be able to support his weight, Jim reluctantly pulled out of Blair and rolled sideways to keep from collapsing onto the smaller body beneath him. His head stayed on Blair's chest, however, and one arm circled the Guide's torso. Coherent speech seemed beyond Jim, so he let one gently stroking hand express his love and gratitude--what words could he possibly have found for that, even if he could speak? The Sentinel listened to the trip-hammer heartbeat beneath his ear gradually slow to normal. Lulled by the sound, emotionally drained by the events of the day, Jim Ellison let the soft dark claim him.

He woke slowly, profoundly relaxed, his senses seeming to come online one at a time. Touch was first. Jim could feel Blair's hand lying gently on his head, fingers playing with his hair. The comforter now lay over them both, in a compromise position--high enough to keep Blair reasonably warm without smothering his lover. A naked Blair was a beautiful thing, but an uncomfortably cold one after the throes-of-passion warmth dissipated. Smell--a rich musk to a primitive Sentinel, but a shower was definitely in order for both of them before they went out among the more civilized denizens of Cascade. Hearing--a strong, slow beat beneath Jim's ear, the heart of a healthy thirty-one-year-old man who got a lot of exercise, both on duty and off. Especially off. In counterpoint to the steady beat there was a loud rumbling. Funny...big trucks weren't allowed on Prospect this late at night. Jim raised his head.

"Blair--did you eat lunch?"

Blair looked startled for a moment, then began to laugh. "Not quite the romantic declaration I expected after one of the more profound sexual experiences of my life, but it'll do."

Jim kissed Blair's chest, now bouncing too much with laughter for use as a comfortable pillow, and moved up to lie beside the smaller man. "Sweetheart, profound sexual experiences happen too frequently with you for my romantic declarations to keep up. My college courses were a lot less wide-ranging than yours, Dr. Sandburg--and romantic declarations are not taught in the U. S. Army or the Police Academy. Besides, actions speak louder than words."

"Your actions, Jim Ellison, are absolutely eloquent," Blair acknowledged. "And you're right, words are supposed to be my department. Did you know the Yakut shamans of Siberia had a poetic vocabulary of three times as many words as any other member of the tribe?"

Jim raised himself on one elbow to study Blair's face. "I don't think it was the Shaman as Poet who was at work here tonight, but the the Shaman as Healer. Thank you."

"For what?"

"For knowing something was wrong. For knowing what I needed, and being willing to give it to me, without even thinking about it, just as you always do." Jim leaned over to rest his forehead against Blair's. "You are the most generous, the most loving person I've ever known. I don't tell you that as often as I should."

Blair's reply was some time in coming, and rough with emotion when it did. "As romantic declarations go, that's about as good as it gets."

Jim laid one palm against Blair's cheek, angling his face upward until their lips met in a long kiss. "And you're right, tonight was something special. One of those times I feel like I could just lose myself in you, and not care. That used to scare the hell out of me, but now--every time it happens I treasure it."

For once, Blair was rendered speechless, letting another kiss speak for him. They lay together in silence for a while, just looking at each other--until an even louder rumble broke the mood.

"You didn't eat lunch, did you?"

"Not unless you count a granola bar I found at the bottom of the glove compartment," Blair confessed, "with a sell-by date that was a dim memory before the pyramids were built."

"What happened? You left early enough to grab something on the State campus before your meeting."

Blair rolled over on his back, glaring at his all-too-eloquent stomach. "That was the plan. Unfortunately there was a fire at Robson, near MacKenzie, that completely screwed up the traffic for miles around. Then when I got to campus I discovered the Visitor Parking lot nearest the Social Sciences Building was closed because most of it turned into a whopping big sinkhole during the last rainstorm--the one before this one, that is. The other Visitor lot is approximately equidistant between West Hell and the Planet Mongo. I barely got to the meeting on time."

"Then we should go downstairs, grab a quick shower, and I'll help you finish dinner. I'd like to find out what that sauce tastes like with chicken instead of Sandburg."

"Are you sure you don't want to trade off on the showers? We might not eat until pretty late."

Jim got out of bed, collecting comfortable, schlep-around-the-house sweats for them both, letting Blair enjoy the warmth of the comforter until the last minute. "Very flattering, babe, but after that I may not recharge for days."

Blair grinned, grabbing the clothes Jim tossed to him as he emerged from his cocoon. "Mind if I test that hypothesis tomorrow?"

Jim just managed to swat his lover on the rear as the younger man headed downstairs at a run, clutching the clothes, trying to cut down the time between warm bed and warm shower. "Anything for science, Doctor," Jim yelled after him as he followed at a slightly more dignified pace.

As it turned out, the sauce was delicious on chicken, almost as tasty as it was on Sandburg--but not quite. Blair's stomach was now happily digesting as they cleaned up the kitchen, so Jim stopped worrying about being tracked down by the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Guides. Did giving your Guide one of the most profound sexual experiences of his life make up for temporarily starving him? Blair certainly seemed to think so, but who knows what the SPCG might think. Jim decided he was getting more than a little punchy--pretty soon he'd convince himself there really was an SPCG.

As Blair put away the last of the dishes, Jim moved into the living room to check on the fire they'd started before dinner. Blair had put on a stack of CDs, and Andean flutes were now playing quietly, over the familiar Cascade background of soft but relentless rain. As Jim added more fuel to the fire, he could hear Blair turn out the kitchen light and come up behind him, his slippers padding as softly as wolf paws.

"So, Wally, whaddya wanna do now?"

"There's a good movie that starts at nine-thirty, Beav, if you think it's OK to stay up that late on a school night."

"Sure, I'm full of energy now. But what can we do until then?"

"Gosh, how about necking on the couch?"

"Golly, Wally, isn't that incest?"

"That's enough of that scenario," Jim laughed as he pulled Blair close for a most un-brotherly kiss. They moved to the couch and settled comfortably, Jim's arm around Blair and Blair's head resting on Jim's shoulder. They sat in comfortable silence for a while, listening to the haunting music of Peru.

"They're playing our song," Blair said.

"Can't dance to it, though," Jim replied. "Although I'd like to see Simon's face if we tried."

"As long as we didn't do it in front of Chief Warren, or somebody who has it in for us, I don't think it would matter much any more. It sure wouldn't tell anyone in Major Crimes a thing they don't already know. It's just a little fiction we maintain within the family--heavens, no, there's no mad Aunt Tillie in the attic, and Blair and Jim are just buddies who haven't dated women in a couple of years and go everywhere with each other. And no, Jim's not a Sentinel. Heavens to Betsey, no."

Jim leaned his head back against the cushions and stared at the distant ceiling. "I'm not sure even the Chief would care anymore. We make him look way too good for him to be willing to break us up."

"Still, it's against regs for married couples to be partners, and that's essentially what we are, if not technically. Sure, there's extenuating circumstances--the Sentinel/Guide thing--but there's no such thing as a Sentinel, so--?"

"So, we have to play our little game. I swear, if your job ever changes, I'm gonna plant a big wet one on you right in the middle of the bullpen."

"To cheers all around, no doubt," Blair replied. "But why would my job change?"

"Now that you've started doing the anthropology thing again, who knows where that might lead? You managed to Guide me working part-time when it was a lot harder than it is now, when my senses were all over the map. Dean Robinson said you could invent your own career, and I think you've started doing that. You might even be teaching again, sooner than you think."

"At the Academy, maybe, some day--"

"Or at State, or Pacific Tech, or a lot of other places. Everybody uses a lot of part-time faculty these days, don't they?"

"Yeah, more than they should, but--God, Jim, I've just started. One meeting does not a successful research project make."

"It does when Dr. Sandburg's in charge," Jim said confidently. "And it's a great idea, studying--what's that juicy title you put on the grant applications?"

"Cross-cultural Survey of Attitudes of Immigrant Groups toward Law Enforcement and their Impact on the Utilization of Police Services."

"Just rolls off the tongue, doesn't it?" Jim grinned.

"Hey, it got me the grant money," Blair replied. "That's why the Chief went for it, you know--he gets to sound off about heading this forward-looking, culturally sensitive Department, and it costs him hardly anything."

"Pompous old fart doesn't have to do any of the work, you do. Probably on top of your regular assignment, if I know the brass."

"Probably. If I could be a grad student and a teacher and a guide and a semi-cop at the same time, I can manage being a Guide and a real cop and a research project director simultaneously. You might have to dig deep into your memory and remember how to write a report, though."

"Ouch. Just because you've got three jobs now..."

"Two," Blair corrected. "Being your Guide isn't a job--"

"It's an adventure?"

"It sure is that. But as I was about to say before I was so rudely interrupted by my smart-ass Sentinel, it's a calling. " Blair kissed his way up Jim's neck to his cheek. "And often, like tonight, it's a very great pleasure."

Kissing replaced conversation for some time, as the rain and the music continued their duet, and the fire burned lower.

"I think we missed the beginning of the movie," Jim finally announced.

"I think we missed about a quarter of it," Blair corrected. "Do you care?"

Right now, Jim Ellison was too content to care if the Antichrist appeared and knocked at their door. "Nope. We could just go to bed early. Whisper sweet nothings. Actually get some sleep for a change. It's been quite a day."

"That it has. Curling up in bed with you sounds like a great idea. This whole day is beginning to catch up to me, too--I think I just hit the wall."

Jim checked the locks as Blair banked the fire. "That meeting meant more to you than you were willing to admit to yourself, babe. Now that it's over, and things are going well, reaction's setting in."

Blair smiled as he turned out the lights. "You're getting good at this interpersonal stuff, Ellison. Must be osmosis."

"And you're getting to be even more of a smart mouth. Must be natural talent."

Upstairs, they sorted through the clothes that were still piled on the chair, hanging up those that were salvageable and tossing the rest into the hamper. Blair scooted under the comforter and stretched luxuriously while his six-foot bedwarmer turned out the bedroom light. As soon as Jim got into bed, Blair draped himself over his lover like a blanket and sighed contentedly. Music still played in the background. Blair had loaded up the CD jukebox with an eclectic selection of soothing going-to-bed music. They lay there quietly for some time, letting some intricate jazz fusion wash over them. Now and again Jim would comb his fingers through Blair's mop of hair, finally back to its pre-Academy glory, or Blair would stroke the muscled torso that lay under his hand. Jim was almost asleep when Blair spoke.

"Jim--that guy you saw today--the one whose lover was killed?"

"Hm?"

"Just how badly did he take it? Are we talking suicide-watch bad, or 'I have to go through hell now but someday I'll come out the other side' bad?"

Jim brought both arms around Blair's back in reflex, holding him close. "Somewhere in between, I think. Why?"

"Do you think it would be OK if I talked to him? I have an idea that may help him a little. Not now, it's too early, and his grief will be too raw. But eventually."

"What idea?"

"I've been thinking for some time that it would be good to have a citizen's group here that worked against hate crimes. Something like Community United Against Violence in San Francisco--People who keep track of local hate crimes on a neighborhood basis--what happens, to whom, and exactly where. It would help us spot patterns, and raise awareness in general. CUAV just covers sexual orientation, but Cascade could be a broader group, or several groups in a coalition. If we could encourage some of the victim's families to get involved it would help them deal with their grief, too. What do you think?"

Jim slipped one hand behind Blair's head to press his lover's forehead to his lips. "I think that this great city is damn lucky to have a shaman like you. And I am even luckier to have you in my life."

"So that's a yes?" Blair whispered.

"That is most definitely a yes."

"Great." The Shaman sighed contentedly and relaxed even more bonelessly against his Sentinel. Jim continued to hold Blair, stroking his hair, his back, until he relaxed even further, his breath deepening into the rhythms of sleep. As he drifted closer to sleep himself, one very tired Sentinel cast his mind back over four years ago, when his senses had kicked in again and almost destroyed him. Then, and many times after that, he had resisted accepting the path laid before him. His Sentinel abilities had seemed to be nothing but a curse--fated to bring him only trouble, and pain, setting him apart when all he wanted to do was live his quiet life. Yet if it hadn't been for those abilities, a certain anthropologist never would have walked into that rather poor excuse for a life; never turned it upside down and inside out; never gotten him to enjoy the ride.

So, a curse turned out to be a blessing in disguise...and Jim Ellison decided, just before he drifted off, that he'd turned out to be one very lucky man after all.