New York City, New York

Lukkas Tammela runs nervous hand after nervous hand through his golden-tinted light brown hair as he embarks on his latest case to solve: Evelyna MacKinnon-Tammela's present for Christmas.

There's so much you can give to the woman of your dreams, but only certain things to a pampered FBI-agent who is also a mother of three wonderful sons. After all, he'd had a hand in adopting them from the start.

He's already gotten her: a hat trick on Madison Square Garden ice, tickets to a game or two, a vacation to Colorado with the kids, a romantic sleigh ride through the heart of New York City...what more could there be to give her?

He's so lost in his head, that he doesn't realize he's stopped before a crosswalk that leads across to a small shop that is nestled away on the side of an old building. Behind him is the infamous Grand Central Park that is bathed in fresh snow from the chilly New York winter. With two black gloved hands, he pulls at the fur-lined hood of his black winter jacket and stares at a set of rusted, dimly lit letters that spell out the name of the shop, "Lover's Lane Trinkets and Things."

Cute.

He knows that one of Evelyna's favorite things to collect are trinkets, so this could be just the place he's been looking for for the perfect present.

Overhead, the sun is sinking lower and lower toward the horizon, casting an array of dark purples and pinks that fade away into the dark blue of the evening. A bitter wind whips the air around him, drawing some of his wispy hair strands with it.

He shakes off the chill and shoves his gloved hands into the pockets of his dark denim jeans. Then with a huff of visible steam from a sign, he starts across as the white walking man shows in the electronic road sign's communication box. One more store for an idea won't hurt, and then I'll head back home.

Lukkas halts at the door, trying to peer into the shop. The windows are darkly tinted and there is no visible image of the indoors, which strikes Lukkas oddly. His gaze trails down to the handle, which seems normal enough. He grabs it and wrenches the door open toward him allowing a blast of warm air to hit him.

He looks around him, seeing the cars bustling along and people hurrying left and right. Everyone is out shopping for the holidays. With that last thought, he steps inside and lets the door close behind him.

A young woman with jet black hair spins around from the counter to greet him. "Good evening, sir." She brushes her hair to the side, a pair of devilish, beady gray-green eyes peer back at him.

There's a familiar grandeur about this dark haired woman. He takes in her outfit, a cute black gothic look. She's got knee-high boots on that buckle around a pair of fishnet tights that come up to her exposed belly. A short leather cheerleading skirt with a black belt that has silver spikes is hung loosely around her hops with a silver chain dangling off one side. He can see threads from the skirt dangling down freely over her pale legs that shine through the fishnet material. She's also got on a loose crop top that displays some kind of metal band on it and around her neck is a choker that is similar to the belt she has on.

"What can I help you to find today?" the woman asks, setting down a black nail file that she's been using to file her short black painted fingernails.

Lukkas smiles at her and puts his hand on a display case, dragging his fingers along the top of the glass and eyeing the jewelry trinkets below. There's bracelets with charms on them, rings, necklaces and other various items. "I'm hoping to maybe find something unique for my, um--"

"Girlfriend?" the woman finishes, coming toward the brunette.

"No, my wife," Lukkas chuckles, dragging his hand off the glass and back to his side. "You see she loves to collect trinkets, so I was thinking about getting her a unique gift from here. I've already run through all my other possible present ideas and I really, really, just want to get her something different and special, from the heart. You know?"

"I see..." the woman says, looking at the glass that his fingers had just touched. "Something from the heart..."

Just then, there is a muffled noise and soft banging sounds that seem to emulate from the back of the room. Lukkas looks toward the desk, where the woman had first been to greet him.

"Everything...alright...?" Lukkas asks, cocking an eyebrow in question.

The woman smiles innocently. "Absolutely. Probably...just..." She slowly turns around as she speaks, raising her voice little by little until she is barking the last part. "...the kids that run around out back THAT NEED TO KEEP IT DOWN!"

The banging continues with what sounds like muffled grunts.

Lukkas passes by the woman and walks toward the desk to peer behind it. He sees nothing. But the banging is louded and the muffled noises sound more...human. He turns back to see the black woman smirking as she slides a deadbolt into place.

"Wait, what are you...?" Lukkas gasps.

The woman snickers softly. "You don't recognize me, Lukkas Tammela?"

Lukkas shakes his head, pressing his gloved palms against the top of the desk as the woman struts toward him.

"The perfect setup, the perfect disguise. But who could plan on the two perfect, convenient customers who'd come stumbling into my little abode."

Lukkas leans back, craning his neck as far as he can get it.

"I told him to keep it down, when I saw you across the street. But he clearly didn't listen to me," the black-haired woman sneers, her face now hovering an inch or two away from the brunette's face that he can feel her warm, moist breath tickling his nose and smell the grease -- yeah, like burning grease -- on her lips.

Lukkas bites his lip and swallows the waves of nausea that pulse through him. He can feel the sharp, stinging pain as the edge of the desk digs into his tailbone. "What--who...?" But he can't form the words and get them out.

"It's me, Mallory Lewis, Lukki Pooki," Mallory muses, jumping up onto the desk and thrusting her crotch into Lukkas'. Her skirt flips up, flashing the concealed entrance. (Good thing for tinted windows here) She tosses her hair to one side and reveals the black eyeliner around her eye. "They let me out of jail early, isn't that awesome."

Her eyes are shimmering with maddening delight. She looks like an insane woman who is obsessed with evil.

"Mallory?" Lukkas' blood runs ice cold like he was still outside and not in a heated shop room. He gulps nervously and his lips part as he struggles to breath properly with his heart racing inside of his chest at a million thumps per second.

"That's my name, sweetheart!" Mallory says, shoving Lukkas down and pinning him to the desk's top. "Don't wear it out."

Lukkas finds he can't move but can only stare up into the wild, mad black outlined eyes of the gothic chick, who'd helped Lucifer Wassmuth with kidnapping Riley Huntington, the kids and carrying out a dastardly scheme to destroy his wife.

"You're looking for a Christmas present for Evie the Profiler?" Her eyes reach a new craziness as she straddles his waist on the desk. Totally unprofessionally. "That's really too bad that you came in here."

Mallory slides a hand up, gasping sexual shudders of thrill as she does, Lukkas' chest and over the far side of the desk.

Lukkas keeps his eyes trained and locked on the wicked female's as he hears the sliding noise of a drawer open and close with a rumbling of objects between. Then he feels her hands grabbing his wrists and a cold metal clamping on each.

Mallory leans down and whispers into his ear, "You won't need that thick, burly jacket soon, I'll tell you that much, Finn."

Lukkas gasps as the metal is tightened into place, locking his wrists together. Mallory snickers as she slips off the desk and back to the floor. She pulls Lukkas up by his cuffed wrists and guides him into the back.

Lukkas' heart plummets as his eyes land on a familiar brunette male. The dark, styled curly waves of his hair. The pale skin and the terrified, wide deep blue eyes. The Finn would know him anywhere, for he helped to save him once.

He even battled with him for the heart of his wife.

Riley Huntington is tied down to a chair with rope, his wrists pulled together tightly and wrenched behind his back. His ankles are also bound tightly and held securely by another taut rope to the base of the chair. A few strands of tape have been ripped off of a roll and slapped crudely over his mouth.

He's got a loose black tank top on and a pair of tight black jean pants with black tennis shoes. Given the cold outside, he had to have been wearing a thick jacket that is missing at the moment.

Lukkas also takes notice of a jagged scar to the side of his left eye that's crusted over from blood. How long has he been kept prisoner here?

"Remember! Remember! Remember, how I suggested tying a victim down to a chair in class long ago, Lukki Pooki?!" Mallory inquires, getting all giddy from the sight. "That's my signature hostage restraint!"

Lukkas' crystal blue eyes lock on the scared deep blue ones of Riley.

Riley twists his head around to see what is going on as Mallory guides Lukkas past the French-Canadian male damsel. He attempts to say something through the tape pieces that comes out pathetic and like a bumblebee in a jar. He kicks in vain with a sharp jerk at the taut rope holding his bound ankles together and shrugs his chest back and forth as he works the rope that is binding his wrists.

"Riley Huntington," Mallory scolds. "Shut up!"

"Evelyna's gonna find out about this! When I don't come home, she'll come looking for me!" Lukkas grunts as Mallory shoves him down into another chair.

Mallory laughs. "Yeah, by which time, both of you will be...well, let's just say, vampire food."

"Very realistic," Lukkas growls. "Vampires are totally real, Mallory."

"I'm teasing, kind of," Mallory jokes, patting Lukkas on the arm and turning away from him. "No, actually, I'm going to hypnotize the Frenchie to fall in love with your Evelyna. She'll never see it coming. They'll be together as the ending should have been, and, you'll be my prisoner, forever more."

Lukkas grunts, jerking at the cuffs that are pinning his arms together and the rope that is wrapped tightly around his upper torso, pasting him in place to the chair. She struts over to Riley, plucking a gold chain with a white crystal charm that pulses a bright red light every second.

Riley shakes his head, craning his neck back and giving a terrified whimper behind the tape that is over his mouth. He is eyeing the pulsating crystal.

"Don't you dare!" Lukkas growls. "Leave him alone!"

Mallory's fingers are grabbing the end of the tape as she bites her tongue, emitting a soft sound of amused jubilation in the process. Then she rips the adhesive away. "Riley, baby, hopefully the tape didn't damage those beautiful lips too much."

"What the hell did you mean by kind of teasing about vampires?" Riley gasps, gulping in air and frowning at Mallory.

Mallory flashes him a toothy grin. "My sister thinks she's one and would love to bite your neck. That's all."

Riley scoffs. "Why do you jerks always insist on kidnapping ME?"

"Because you're so easy," Mallory chuckles and slaps his cheek, playfully.

"And pretty?" Riley questions.

Lukkas suddenly realizes that French-Canadian is stalling. He keeps his eyes on the young villainess as he swivels his hands in the cuffs, hoping to slip himself free from them. After finding no luck, he decides to try something else.

He closes his eyes and relaxes all of his muscles. He sucks in a deep breath through his nose and mouth and then exhales. When he does so, that's when he tenses his muscles and gives a sharp, powerful yank.

The chain between the cuffs snaps and his wrists are free!

"Yes!" he hisses under his breath and jumps up to his feet. He cracks his neck and lifts his arms up, balling his hands into fists.

Mallory lifts the chain up and begins to swing it back and forth before Riley's eyes. "You will find Evelyna MacKinnon and you will seduce her, romance her, take her for your own and break Lukkas Tammela's heart into pieces. You will--"

"Do nothing!" Lukkas growls, bringing his fist into the gothic girl's face.

Mallory gasps and staggers to the side, dropping the hypnosis chain. Lukkas storms after her, lighting her up with a kick to her shin this time and then a nice uppercut that seems to finally bring an end to her.

She slams against the wall with a pained gasp that is forced out of her as the wind is knocked out of her. She loses consciousness and plummets down to the ground in a sprawling heap.

Lukkas stands, hovering over her, making sure that she isn't moving.

"Lukkas!!" Riley gasps. "You kicked her ass!"

Lukkas spins, after he is sure that the gothic woman is down and out for a while. "That's what athleticism and training will do...well, at least does for me."

Riley chuckles. "You're hilarious. Now come and untie me!"

"You would not last long in BDSM, my friend," Lukkas remarks, coming over and helping to untie Riley from his chair.

"No, what were you doing here anyway?"

"I was trying to find a present for Little Red, but alas, I've come up with nothing."

Riley chuckles. "Have you thought of proposing to her in Times Square on Christmas, under the giant Rockefeller Tree?"

Lukkas steps back from Riley, blinking with shock. Genius! "Riley Huntington, you're a genius! What you lack in strength and staying out of trouble, you more than make up for in romantic ideas."

"Thanks, I guess," Riley laughs. "Just do me one favor?"

"What's that?" Lukkas inquires, as he resumes helping to free Riley from the bondage.

"Let me know how it goes! I'm hoping it's magical and everything that she ever wants!" Riley's eyes glitter with dreaminess.

Lukkas smiles at him. "I can arrange for that."

THE END.