Disclaimer: These characters are not mine, and I am making no money off this.

Author's Notes: Beta'd and helped along by brynnmck and snoopypez. I wouldn't have been able to say what I wanted to without you guys.

Story Notes: This was a More Joy Day present for sdwolfpup, who requested art that captured the feeling of the song "Engine Driver" by the Decembrists. My brain doesn't really work that way, so I had to write fic first.

1. on a long run

Ray's favorite thing about Vegas is the desert at night. He drives and drives, and it's so flat he wouldn't know how fast he was going if the speedometer didn't tell him. The sky is black and there are a million stars, not like Chicago.

He doesn't like the Bookman's cars, though. They're nice cars, Italian cars, a Ferrari and a Maserati and an Alfa Romeo. They've got air conditioning. Ray drooled over these cars as a kid. Hell, as a grown-up. Recently. And why doesn't he like them? Is it because they don't have solid American-built engines? Is it because they aren't a 1971 Buick Riviera?

No. It's because they don't have a Stetson on the dashboard.

2. there are powerlines in our bloodlines

He feels guilty for liking the job sometimes. But he does. He loves it, even. He loves the thrill of knowing these bastards are going down because of him, the high of knowing that the only thing standing between him and a quick death is his smarts, the full-body wash of relief after a scare.

It's a Vecchio thing. They live dangerously. Look at his pop, always with some shady deal going, always relying just a little too much on his family connections to keep him safe. Look at Frannie and her extreme sports approach to dating. They need that adrenaline rush.

Ray's played it straight his whole life. He never hustled pool or card-sharked like the other kids in his neighborhood, because his Ma would have died of shame and because who needed cheap thrills like that when they were sneaking into the Zukos' house three nights a week? He never did drugs, and he never did anything for the mob. Not one thing.

But it's not like he became a cop for the quiet. And partnering Fraser--he's pretty sure partnering Fraser was better than cocaine.

3. I am the heart that you call home

He learned to do undercover from Fraser. Not like Fraser taught him or anything. Fraser couldn't do undercover if his life depended on it, which sometimes it did. But there were people who wanted to hurt Fraser, and they had to be intimidated, even if Ray wasn't naturally a very scary guy. Or maybe he was, but he'd never really wanted to know about it.

And then, of course, there was the unrequited love angle. Fraser was the best detective Ray'd ever met, and Ray had had to hide a pretty damn big secret from him almost from the first day they met. Had to act natural a million times and a million ways, had to give Fraser a hearty slap on the back when he wanted to kiss him blind. And he'd succeeded. He'd been the one guy in Chicago who wasn't asking Fraser for anything.

4. take my hand for tender

"You made a promise, Tony," Ray says to the kid cowering in front of him. "You shook my hand and now you're gonna stab me in the back? Do you know who I am?"

"I'll get the money, I swear!" the kid says, sweating.

"You were supposed to have it last week," Ray says. Like the kid needs reminding. "Do you know where we borrowed the money to build this casino, Tony?"

The kid shakes his head.

"The Teamsters Pension Fund. What do you think would happen if people started not paying me back, Tony? Lotta nice old men and widows and orphans would be out in the street. Is that what you want?"

"No! Of course not!" More than just the kid's head is shaking by now.

"Then get me my fucking money," Ray says. "Next time I won't be so understanding." He opens the door to his office and shoves the kid out into the hall, hard.

This is the Bookman's job, making sure loans get repaid. It's Ray's least favorite thing about Vegas, and not just because a lot of it involves beating the crap out of people.

Money is important, not to be parted with lightly--he's known that since he was a kid. But he's also always known that when one of your own needs something, you don't count the bills, you just hand over your wallet.

It felt normal paying for Fraser. A fifty here, a twenty there, like Fraser just cut a hole in his pocket with that Bowie knife. It even felt good, in a way. Ray bitched, sure, he felt a pang at the sight of that hard-earned fifty disappearing into a bag lady's pocket, but he never thought of saying no. He never thought of calling it a loan. The only time he ever asked Fraser to pay him back for anything, Victoria showed up.

In Vegas there's money everywhere, piles of it, whole rooms filled with cash. Guys from New York and Chicago come with suitcases and fill them up with thousand dollar bills, and you can't even see the dent. But if the wrong guy thinks you're trying to short him a nickel, you'll be getting two behind the ear from the man closest to you--not your best friend, though, because wiseguys don't have friends.

Ray didn't realize that. Ray Vecchio doesn't have friends in Vegas, sure, he knew that going in. But it took him a while to figure out that neither does Armando Langoustini. "Friend" doesn't mean anything when the guy you spend every waking moment with could be ordered to kill you any second, or you him. Taking a bullet for someone and giving away money start to sound equally stupid.

Vegas and the mob are cash-based economies. It's the Bookman's job--Ray's job now--to keep it that way.

Ray thinks about the guy playing him sometimes. Is he opening his wallet for Fraser? His heart? Ray doesn't know whether he hopes he is, or hopes he isn't.

5. trying to rid you from my bones

Ray was never very good at pool or poker. His ma got nervous if he spent too much time at Finelli's. But the Bookman is great at pool (although, thank God, he's lousy at poker, so all Ray had to do was learn his tells). Ray spent the two weeks before he left for Vegas in the basement with his pop's pool table, playing tapes of Langoustini talking to drown out the crying from upstairs and watching security footage of the guy playing pool. He shot solo game after solo game, mimicking his angles, learning the table. At the end of the two weeks he was as good as his pop had ever been.

He can do this, pretending to be someone else. He's even good at it, great at it, and he's not sure he's ever been really great at something before. But it doesn't solve his problem.

At first he was afraid it would be a danger to the mission--put him in the wrong headspace, distract him, pull him out of character. But loving Benny has always been something he did only where no one could see. He's got practice at this. Which means it's safe, and which also means there's nothing to make him stop. He sexually harasses showgirls and thinks about how sometimes women made Benny blush and sometimes he could interview a stripper in full costume and not even blink. He yells at his soldiers and remembers Benny's hair, how he used to smooth it down with his hand and spike it up in the front like pre-emptive hat hair.

He's gone two thousand miles, broken all ties, turned himself into an entirely different person. But apparently loving Fraser is like herpes or mono--once you get it in your system, there might or might not be any symptoms, but it's there for keeps.