Disclaimer: I own none of these characters. If I did, I wouldn't be seen in public for months on end.

Author's Notes: This was written in response to the Get Fraser Laid challenge. Huge thanks go to my Betas nos4a2no9 and Aukestrel, for handholding and general immoral support.

Story Notes:

Time and grief have not been kind to Frank Zuko. They have made hollows of his cheeks, drawn deep furrows around his mouth, filled his eyes with the perpetual horror of the bereaved.

I know that look all too well. After my mother died, I became accustomed to seeing it in my father's face. I feared it would eat him up, and for much of my childhood I had a lingering fear of men with unshaven faces, a fear which precipitated my running away.

That and a boomerang, but that is not strictly relevant at this juncture.

He isn't taking care of himself; it's six o'clock in the morning and judging by the rumpled state of his clothing and the sluggish way in which he moves, he has not slept a wink.

"Drink?" he asks. I half expect him to offer me something alcoholic but instead he pours me a cup of tea and takes one for himself. I take the seat he offers, looking around his study. Nothing has changed since I was last here. It's as if the house has been holding its breath since Irene died.

In bereavement, we seek to either obliterate the memory of the dead or lovingly preserve every trace we have of them. Fire removed my careful preservation of my father's possessions, but my father remains, at least in some form, though whether he is a manifestation of a deep-held need or a `restless spirit'-

Frank Zuko interrupts my thoughts.

"I've been reading Shakespeare. Thought I'd get some culture, finally grow up some. So I read this play, about this kid, and his dad, and the ghost that gets him in a tailspin, and you know what I think of Hamlet? It's shit. Only person who gets anything out of it is Fortinbras. He gets the revenge Hamlet was too chickenshit to go after, and we never even see him. Hamlet's father kills Fortinbras' old man, and his death is avenged through the actions of others without Fortinbras even having to lift a finger. And Horatio is left at the end, the only one standing, doomed to tell Hamlet's story. Even though it's got nothing to teach us."

It is clear that he doesn't expect a response from me to continue with his bizarre monologue. He's obviously not at all concerned about whether I agree or disagree with his assessment of Hamlet, and in truth, I am not sure myself. As I pursued my father's killers, sometimes I imagined revenge; at other times, clemency. In my thoughts, I killed as many times as I allowed to live, and each time I killed, the guilt within me at taking a life warred with a feeling of utter, bloodthirsty vindication. Clemency won out, although my resolve was sorely tested not once but twice by Gerrard's presence. If I had paid attention to my father's wishes-

"Hamlet's father was selfish anyway. He wanted too much from his son and he was too stupid to stay dead, and he sure as hell didn't know enough about what he could and couldn't do. But Irene-"

He breaks off and takes a deep breath, mastering himself.

Irene Zuko. She will be a constant presence in his life, as Victoria is in mine. And, like Victoria, she will always be a source of guilt for Frank Zuko.

I hope he gains something from her presence someday; something more than a raw wound, at any rate, and an empty room in a house that has stopped breathing.

His own man again, Zuko hands me a brown envelope. The postmarks indicate that the package was mailed yesterday from Joliet prison, an institution with which I am intimately familiar.

The envelope contains a series of newspaper clippings. They are crumpled and look to have been frequently read and handled. One is from the Tribune: it's a cover story about the Bolt train hijacking and features a small corner photograph of Ray Vecchio grinning at the camera. He's surrounded by a sea of red serge but I don't bother to look for my own face in the crowd. The caption reads "Chicago's finest meets Canada's musical ride: hero cop Ray Vecchio on North-South relations." It was the one article that didn't overly dwell on my part, giving Ray the credit he deserved. I read it still, especially now that he's gone. His comments about the hijacking are so typical it's as if he is talking directly to me. It never fails to make me smile.

The other clipping is yellow with age; I conclude that someone has gone to enormous lengths to locate and preserve this particular article. It is little more than a grainy photograph of a man in a blue uniform. Underneath the caption states simply "Officer Raymond Kowalski, cited for bravery." Mrs. Kowalski ordered three copies of the newspaper when she heard of the citation via a family friend. One copy is framed on the wall of their trailer. Ray always tries to persuade her to take it down when we go and visit for Sunday dinner. Thus far she has proved herself to be as intractable as her son.

The third scrap of newspaper is immediately familiar, and instantly terrifying. It is a picture of Ray at Beth Botrelle's clemency hearing. The caption calls him Ray Vecchio.

It is over. Ray might as well be dead now - both Rays. The sender is irrelevant; anyone with the time, initiative and malice could have done it.

For a brief, blinding moment, I hate Frank Zuko. I hate him for telling me that he knows. I hate him for making me wait, paralysed, for the deaths of the two men closest to my heart. And there is nothing I can do. I don't know whom I can trust within the police department; Sam Franklin, Damon Cahill and Brian Kilrea have all proved corrupt within the past year, all officers in positions of trust. Lieutenant Welsh can do as little as I, and I would have to tell him how I came by this information. And although I will have to tell Ray, he is in the same position as I am in.

Contra Mundum. The only way I can hope to keep both of them safe is action. I can do nothing from a distance: phone calls can be intercepted; a letter is slow and unreliable. I stand up, start to pace, back and forth, back and forth as every option seems to lead to their deaths, save one.

One that I will take, regardless of what Frank Zuko wants.

"When did you receive this?" I ask finally, my voice overly loud in the stillness.

"Half an hour ago," he answers, scanning my face.

"You called me immediately?"

"I pay my debts," he says, his tone suddenly flat, his face closed off.

"There was no-"

"Not to you."

Irene. I send a brief prayer, wishing her peace, and frame my request carefully, wondering how far this debt extends, how much he is willing to give.

"I am not familiar with...procedures within Las Vegas, and within Armando Langoustini's domain. If I am to be convincing as someone who belongs in the Las Vegas mafia, I need some idea of how things work, where he is likely to be, and whom I can claim to be working for," I say, placing the envelope carefully on the desk.

He is not surprised by my request: he knows me, and knows that I will go to Las Vegas and rescue Ray myself without hesitation if it means that he will live.

He thinks for a few minutes, leaning back in his desk chair. "The Bookman's hunting ground is the Traviata Club in Vegas. It's a high-class joint, better booze and better table stakes than any other club in town. And you don't ask directly for the Bookman. You could be working for..." he taps a pencil to the side of his mouth, eyes narrowed. He smiles slowly, coldly, and I am reminded of the impromptu basketball game we played years ago, how sure he was that he would win, how intent he was on ensuring that victory, regardless of the dictates of honour or fair play.

The memory chills me.

"Wilson Warfield," he says, snapping his fingers. "Owns a couple of clubs. The man has no history, came up from hired thug to rich hired thug. Your American dream, really. But so far he's stayed in Chicago. If he ever wanted to widen his interests to the west coast he'd go to Langoustini. Vegas has heard his name, of course, but they know he's a coward. If he wanted to do a deal in Vegas, he'd send someone along in his place, see if that person returned with all his limbs attached, and then he might consider going."

He leans back with a triumphant smile, inviting me to be impressed. I nod to show my understanding.

"The Bookman is a dealbroker, ruthless, and with power in his own right, but he has fingers in so many pies at the moment it's a wonder Vecchio hasn't been found out before. The guys who set him up, they didn't worry too much about him, did they? Makes you wonder how they made him do it."

"Surely duty-"

He laughs. "Yeah, Vecchio's a good guy, give him a medal. But this sort of thing's a job most cops wouldn't touch. There's no backup, no glory, you can be found out at any minute - and you do not want to be found out. Either side can kill you and get away with it. No, Vecchio's different."

The subject makes me uncomfortable, brings questions I have long had to the front of my mind. It also hardens my resolve. Whatever his reasons for accepting the assignment were, he needs to be brought home safely. I stand up, clutching the envelope. "Thank you."

He shrugs dismissively. "I told you, I pay my debts."

But not to me.

* "Ray, wake up! I have to talk to you."

See, this is not how it usually goes. He doesn't talk when I'm dreaming about him. My dreams are like Buster Keaton movies without the stunts and the really hinky honky-tonk piano. So if this isn't a-

I wake up instantly, jolting into overdrive, which is something I try to avoid in the morning cause it scares the ever-loving shit outta me. Usually I wake up real slow, gentle, with coffee and anything sweet I can find, but Raymond Kowalski can go 0 to 60 in zero seconds, all six cylinders firing. Trouble is when I start out like this I make even Tibbet look balanced, I'm so antsy and trigger-happy. So right away I'm leaping out of bed, grabbing my gun, jumping into my boots and running for the bedroom door to apprehend whoever's been jaywalking or littering this time. My pulse is hammering and it's like when I was standing on the roof of that car, pointing my gun, and Fraser's there, trying to cut through the mist, and-

"-Ray. Ray. RAY!"

"Gnuh?" Fraser's still sitting on my bed.

If this is an emergency, he's being very leisurely about it.

"Frase, it's stupid o'clock. What the hell are you doing here? Where are the bad guys?"

I turn on the light, get out my stakeout bag from my closet, and start checking supplies. Vest? Check. Lucky chess piece? Check. Mag Light? Check. He makes a few attempts to speak, but ends up just handing me an envelope. He looks...lost.

"Frase? You ok?" I ask, concern cutting through the adrenaline. He smiles slow, like it's a real effort.

"No, Ray. I'm not. Would you look inside the envelope, please?"

I open it, handling it like it's a bomb.

Clippings. Fuck. Oh Christ.

"I fucking told them! Get a better lookalike, I said. Get someone who don't attract trouble, I said. Get someone who isn't-" I stop myself. This ain't helping any. "Do the feds know?"

"No."

He didn't tell anyone?

I guess it could have been someone in the feds who blew Ray's- my- our cover. And Fraser and I haven't had a lot of luck trusting cops lately, I guess, what with Franklin and all. So Fraser gets points - as usual - for the fast thinking.

"Only we know?"

"Yes."

"Right. Right. OK. And you think you can just hotfoot it up to Vegas and rescue him?"

Before I've even finished asking, I know the answer is `yes'. Because if anyone could...

This is possibly the dumbest thing he's ever planned on doing.

"Cover story?"

"Warfield. I'll be working as his emissary."

Warfield. Serves the scumbag right.

"Why?"

"Well, he has-"

"No! Why are you working for him?"

He looks blank.

"You need to be a different person. You'll never be a convincing lackey. You're too smart and too educated." He blushes and makes his who, me? face. "You need to be a person who ain't a Mountie, but has brains. Your- your father owed Warfield lots of money. Gambling, I guess. He died a couple of years ago, and you inherited his debt. You gave up a promising career in literary research to work it off, otherwise he takes the family home. You're in it for six more months. How's that sound?"

"It's a very good cover, Ray."

"Thanks," I say. Another pat on the head to be taken out and examined when he's not here. God, I'm pathetic. "Have you booked a flight?"

He nods. Well, he has the logistics. Course he does. He's Mister `I's and `t's. "Does Thatcher know you're going?" He looks shifty. Not so good. "I have the `flu. Real bad. You're looking after me, so neither of us will be showing up for work."

Understanding dawns, then confusion. "Why would you be taking time off?"

For someone so smart-

"The Vecchios need guarding. You think anyone connected to Vecchio is gonna be left alone? I'll stake them out. It's not much-"

"Ray, I cannot allow you to put yourself at risk-"

"Bull. Shit. They're my family. You didn't think I'd just sit here and hide, did you?"

Fraser won't meet my eyes. He looks like he's trying to fish a logical argument out of his head that's not `Ray, my friend, I never even thought of that. Silly me.' God, he drives me crazy. He thinks I don't care about them, about any cop's family? "What sort of a homecoming would that be for Vecchio?"

He flinches, looks down at his clasped hands.

"I- I hadn't thought of that, Ray," he murmurs, and now I know how serious this thing is. See, when Fraser hasn't thought of every single detail of every single thing that can ever happen in his plan, something ain't right. He had all of his focus on getting Vecchio back safely, and the rest of us could go hang. He gets so goddamn fucking single minded sometimes, so bad I wanna kick some sense into him, but now?

Now, whatever rubber band has been propelling him from Zuko to me has run out of juice. He isn't sure any more. I hate it when he's not sure. It's like when you discover your parents aren't always right, and you can't always depend on them. It rips something out of you, makes them mortal. I crouch in front of him, make him meet my eyes. "You'll bring him home, and it'll be fine. Just let me look after things in Chicago, ok?"

He sighs; I feel his breath warm on my face, and I'm suddenly aware that I'm wearing boxers and my headkickers. Classy, Kowalski, real classy. I stand up, pull on yesterday's jeans and my favourite T-shirt, and do a mad hopping dance to get them over my boots. "When's the flight?" I ask through a mouthful of toothpaste.

"Check in is at 7:00."

"Cool, you can phone Thatcher and the 2-7 on the way there. Answering machines don't ask questions."

*

In the space between waking and opening my eyes I am Raymond Vecchio, and I can pretend I am home. I can be a good man, for a few minutes, between the crisp sheets that wrap me in a warm cocoon. I can look into the mirror and like what I can see; I'm a dedicated son, a protective brother, a good partner to a better man. For a few minutes, I float on those thoughts, and then I must wake, go from truth to fantasy, and face the world.

"I hope you slept well, Boss."

Same every morning. I open my eyes, sit up and take the dressing gown he hands to me.

"Yes, Nero. Like a baby."

Strange. Armando Langoustini never dreams. * When he parks the car, I expect him to get out right away. Instead he reaches into the back seat and rummages in the sports bag he takes with him on stakeouts, muttering to himself. At last, after some twisting that would impress a contortionist, he locates what he was looking for, and, with a triumphant grin, pulls it out of the bag.

"Good old Mr. Kevlar. No holiday's complete without a bulletproof vest and some sunscreen," he says, patting the vest affectionately.

"Ray, I can't take this, it's yours."

"Benton Fraser, you are going to stick this vest in your suitcase, you are going to put it on the second you step off the plane in Vegas, and you are not going to argue with me, because if you do, I am going to tell Inspector Thatcher you're planning to elope with Turnbull as soon as the money from the bank job you did has been laundered."

Now that is a very low blow.

"You wouldn't."

He gives me a wolfish grin. "Try me."

"Very well." I sigh, getting out of the car and going round to the trunk, where my battered old suitcase has been stowed. Ray joins me after doing a victory dance that is modest compared to his usual. I remove my Stetson and examine it intently. I cannot prevent my nervous hands from twisting the brim.

"Stand still," I tell him. He obeys, looking at me curiously. I put the hat on his head and take a step back. It is too big for him; he looks absurd, childish, but endearing nonetheless. His eyes are solemn, and I think that he understands the gesture, because he leaves it on his head as we make our way into the departure lounge.

We stand facing each other, creating our own pocket of stillness as people rush around us. He looks across at me, eyes shaded by the Stetson, and by his look of concentration, he is memorising my features as I am his.

"See you in a couple of days, Frase," he says at last with a smile, as if there is no doubt that he will. When he reaches out his hand to shake mine, I take it, and pull him into an embrace like the one he surprised me with the first time we met.

When I walk away, I do not turn back. I do not need to look at him; I know he is standing still, watching me from beneath the brim of the Stetson as I disappear from view. Were our positions reversed, it is just what I would be doing.

* "Well, Dief, it looks like we're going to be spending some quality time together," I say, looking into the back seat at the still-sulking wolf. He whines, and puts his muzzle in his paws. "Aw, c'mon, I'm not so bad. I know I'm no Fraser, but you could at least pretend staying with me isn't gonna suck ten ways from Tuesday."

He ignores me.

It's going to be a long day.

I get back to my apartment, take a real shower and get into some clean clothes. Being in a car the whole day is hardly going to make me feel like Mr. Personal Hygiene, and there's no point making the wolf sulk any more than he already is. I don't need coffee or breakfast, but I make myself lunch, fill up a couple of thermoses, then interrupt Dief from his staring match with Waxy, my turtle. Those two have some sort of weird love-hate thing going on, I swear, because Waxy sort of huffs when I pull Dief away. I put a Young Canadians CD on repeat to make it up to him, lock up my apartment, and make my way down to the car. My turtle has very cool taste in music, and he can dance better than Fraser can.

Not that that's difficult.

I put the Stetson on my head, wondering if it would give me superpowers if I wore it in a phone booth. I feel like a cheerleader who's just been given the quarterback's letter jacket. If Dief wasn't here, I'd sniff at it, but he is, so I put the brim at an angle and try a little swagger. I bet James Dean would have worn a Stetson eventually. I mean, it was only a matter of time. * It's funny, but most of the time I don't think like Ray Vecchio. I feel dislocated, saying and doing things he- I - would never have done. I look in the mirror and my eyes are not mine any more.

I think it helps, sometimes, makes me dead to what I'm doing, who I am.

Sometimes Ray Vecchio will kick in right in the middle of a deal, or after I've ordered a hit, and I'll feel like screaming, running out of the room and into the blistering desert sun where the light will bleach my bones pure white; and I have to bite the inside of my cheek so hard I draw blood. Once the danger and the guilt pass, I look into the mirror and I'm Ray again, at least for a while.

It's when he stops interrupting that I'll know I'm lost.

* I don't look like me. Well, I am me, of course, but the man staring back at me out of the gold, cherub-framed hotel mirror room looks...

...young, vulnerable, his mouth too soft to avoid being hurt, hair ruffled, dressed in a suit that seems to whisper as he walks, that doesn't itch like the serge, that makes him feel expensive somehow, wasteful in a way his grandmother would never have approved of. He is me, and I am him; and I am beginning to understand howboth Raysmust feel about undercover work.

Impostor. Fake. Phoney. Yet my lies don't seem to matter so much here. I deceived the hotel clerk with a false name, dissembled when the man who fitted the suit asked me if I was in Nevada for business or pleasure. I lied to the shop assistant who helped me to choose shoes and a shirt, I told the waitress in the diner that I was here on vacation-

Pretence is the norm here. It is embodied in the casinos pretending the games have fair odds, in the gamblers pretending they have every chance of winning, in the ostentatious presentation of so much wealth, so much plenty. Yes, pretence and gluttony - that is Las Vegas, this lush city in the middle of the desert. I look into my own eyes, wink into the mirror. I speak out loud to the plush hotel room. "My name is Robert Kennington. It's a pleasure to meet you."

The keys jangle in my pocket as I descend the stairs, two at a time. * Fucking snow. There had to be snow, and I don't wanna use the heater too much and run down the stupid motorpool car's battery, so I'm stuck with my too-thin sweater and t-shirt. I wish my vests weren't all in the wash and that Chicago hadn't decided to be so goddamn fucking seasonal.

There's no sign of movement at the Vecchio house - Tony and Maria and the rug rats are in Miami, so it's just Frannie and Ma. They have some sense, and, more importantly, they don't leave the house at night except when Frannie goes out to bars with her girlfriends and drinks bizarre coloured cocktails with weirdass names like `between the sheets' and `dirty banana', and probably spends way too much time discussing Fraser's ass.

If I ever have a son, the best piece of advice I could ever give him will be `beware of women in packs'. I'll tattoo it backwards on his fucking forehead, so he can avoid the female of the species when she's at her scariest.

I love women, don't get me wrong, but they have these signs they give to each other, like ants, and you just know they're casting aspersions on your smell, or character, or how you opened the fucking door! Guys don't do that. With guys, it's simple. Go into a bar, smile at him right, and five minutes later you're getting blown in some alleyway by some guy who's too tough to complain about his knees hurting. You don't have to send flowers, or walk on your tippy-toes to avoid the little lawyer traps Stella used to set, like how when I said I liked salad dressing she'd make out that I was in some way saying she should do more sewing, or that she wasn't doing her fair share of the cooking. With guys you can go straight to sleep afterwards, and guys don't think you're avoiding talking about feelings, cause they're about as fucked out as you are. The traps guys set are different, but they're easier to spot.

Course, society has traps too, and they sure as hell ain't easier. The moral fucking majority speaks with one hell of a loud voice in this country. A lot of people seem to think it's ok if a queer gets bashed up, cause really they're asking for it, being proud of who they are and everything. For a cop to be open about it-

Some people are cool with it, but I've heard stories from other divisions about officers getting tanked, having their calls for backup ignored, the whole enchilada. It's too damn dangerous to have that sort of isolation, wrong as it is. When my last partner found out, after the divorce, well, things got a bit difficult down at my old division, which was why I took this undercover gig, and why, for reasons that do not need exploring at this juncture, I'm currently freezing my ass off in a car that's as uncool as Steve McQueen wasn't.

If Frase were here, he'd have some Inuit story to tell about a whole lotta other cars that were as uncool as Steve McQueen wasn't, and he'd probably stick a caribou in there somewhere just to keep things consistent. Then there'd maybe be an ear anecdote I didn't hear the time Kuzma bit me, and I'd sit and listen to him nattering about ears, and gazelles, and whosiewhats, and it wouldn't be so cold, and his voice'd be real soothing and warm, like it gets when he's telling stories. Course, if he were here, this whole situation wouldn't be happening, so I guess it's just another Godel thing.

And I don't want to face it, but there'll be no more stakeouts with Fraser now. Once Vecchio comes back they'll be partners again, and I'll be shunted along to another division.

In fact, if I'm right about Fraser and Ray Vecchio, well, I make a shitty third wheel so I'll be moving my ass right on out of their lives. And God, I'll miss him. I'll miss that potential we had, that real cool `best buddies but could be more' vibe we had going, cause it gave us an edge, a sorta- shit, what's the word, frizz- frais- frisson, yeah, a frisson. Even as we are now, even with this whole thing we're skidding along the edge of, in a sort of limbo, I want to know him forever, be like we are forever. I know it ain't perfect, but perfect scares the shit out of me, makes me too scared to move in case I upset something. But with me'n Fraser, there are things to fix, stuff we can sort out together. He can be my sparring partner, my friend, my...fuck it, my everything. Love. I guess it's love, but it's so vast, so deep, so hard to get a hold of that `love' don't even begin to describe it. And that'll be gone, close the door on your way out, finished, kaput.

Well, for now I have Dief. Least he don't need too much encouragement to lick my ear. Ew.

You know you're old, and sorta bitter, when you start thinking teenagers in love are dumb instead of the most romantic thing in the world. A couple's walking up the street, holding hands, and all I can think is how stupid they are, doing silly things like going for walks in the snow when in a few years it'll be fights about whether the dishwater in the sink is too hot or not hot enough, because the glasses streak when it's cold, and Stella could never stand that.

I mean, I tried dating, I went to fucking Mexico, and if that ain't a date, I don't know what is, but it really didn't work out. That was when I figured out the whole Fraser thing, because I kept looking at the incredible view of the ocean from the hotel balcony and then turning to Fraser to make sure he saw it. Only he wasn't there. Used to be Stella I looked to. She was the person I measured experiences by. But in Mexico, I practically had a `What Would Fraser Do?' bracelet on. Fraser tinted glasses.

Besides, being with Laura felt like I was cheating on Fraser. Cheating! How fucked up is that? We haven't done anything together, I don't have the engraved invitation or the matching towels, but I've had this whole mental red serge chastity belt on. And for all I know, he could be dating, he could be a complete Lothario, or have a line of prostitutes trailing out of the Consulate doors, and he pays them money, and-

Gives them cups of tea, talks to them politely, and doesn't treat them like fucktoys, but doesn't think he's better than them because of it. "See, Ray, you really can make a difference with a simple bit of kindness. And my grandmother always used to say, "A cup of tea and a sit down would make things seem much better."

Well, Frase, all I have is coffee, and my ass is numb from sitting down, but I'll drink to you.

Mental note - maple syrup plus coffee equals bad taste. I just run out of sugar so damn fast, and I can't drink coffee black, the taste's too bitter, so I use anything sweet I can find. Once I crumbled cookie dough into it, which was...interesting. I'm pretty sure Fraser thinks this is funny, because once he saw me putting actual sugar into my coffee and asked if I was feeling ok. I told him I was going old school, and he nodded wisely. Then I explained what `old school' meant, and he nodded wiserly- wiserly? Wisererly?

I drain the thermos, look at my watch. It's past ten and still no movement. "Hey, Dief," I say, putting the thermos flask back in my bag, "how about a game of I Spy?"

Deaf half-wolves just have no sense of humor whatsoever.

* Leonora's eighteen today, and she reminds me so much of Frannie that I have to pinch myself. She's wearing the prettiest blue dress I've ever seen, ladylike, with a hem down to her ankles, but there's something about it that makes me happy, reminds me of home. It's- It's blue, the exact shade of Benny's eyes when he laughs.

She spins around in it, preening in front of the mirror in her mother's pearls. Beautiful. Tonight we'll have a party, and she'll dance until her feet are sore, and tell me all about it in her rapid chattering voice, talk to me about nothing in particular, about all the things that are important to a girl of that age, and, for a while, I'll believe I have a family here.

* I stand where I can see the doors of the club. They are having a birthday party; there is a banner hung over the main doors saying `18 at last, Leonora' in blue and silver writing. Below the banner a pretty dark-haired girl in a blue dress receives her presents. It was easy to gain entrance. A smart suit seems to speak more than words in this place: appearance is everything.

For all of the mental rehearsal I have done on the plane journey, for all the time I dedicated to thinking up a plausible background for myself, I can apparently fall back on a smart looking suit. I vaguely contemplate introducing myself to someone in the crowd, to see if my cover story would convince them: the feeling of having gotten away with something is heady. Appearance and attitude seem to work to a greater degree than having composed a plausible history for oneself.

It is strangely fitting that the hard lesson I learnt in Frank Zuko's office is being reiterated here.

As I take one of the champagne glasses that are being offered by white-gloved waiters I scan the room for possible threats. The club opens onto the street, and there is an alleyway outside the kitchen doors. The windows at the front of the club are bullet-proof glass, but the door is not. The skylight is easily accessible, and looks as if it uses a simple bolt mechanism. Escape is not, therefore, impossible, but would take some skill.

I've noticed that many of the guests also seem to be mapping out possible escape routes. There is a tangible undercurrent of tension in the room, but no outright hostility. Still, it has been my duty to attend many ambassadorial functions in the past, and there is little difference here, apart from the large number of firearms, of course.

"A party. Well, this is a piece of luck, son."

My father is standing next to me, looking out at the guests in the room. One of them could have received an envelope from a Chicago prison, or had a voice mail from an anonymous caller -

"Yes, Dad. On balance, it is."

"Are you worried?"

I nod.

He seems satisfied by this. "Good. You should be, son. You're dragging the Yank out of a viper's nest, and breaking countless rules while you do it."

"Thank you for such a...comforting summary," I say tartly, which, as usual, has no effect on him.

"You're also committing yourself to the only course of action that your conscience will allow. Duty is more conscience than rules, son."

I nod once more, my throat too tight to speak. My father wanders off, dressed in his RCMP uniform, out of place yet unable to attract anyone's attention but my own. I pretend to take a sip of my champagne;Ray taught me how to do it after Inspector Thatcher complained that I never seemed to let my hair down. I don't like alcohol, or the solution it has sometimes seemed to present: it makes me into a person I neither like nor wish to be.Ray seemed to understand this- there are many things in his life that he has not felt ready to share, for all that he wears his heart on his sleeve regarding Stella - and I suspect that at one point he had a problem with drink.

In my less charitable moments, I wonder if he also has a Stella problem. He has thrown himself at her mercy so many times, and been rebuffed with such reliable frequency, that I have a horrified admiration for a man who is prepared to make such a fool of himself for love.

I envy him.

A man stumbles into me in a state of inebriation. "Hey, watch it!" he snarls. I saw him arguing with a woman half an hour ago- he is quite obviously spoiling for a fight.

"I'm terribly sorry," I apologise, taking a step away from him.

"What, you some kinda wiseguy?"

"No, sir, I was merely-"

He attempts a right hook, but alcohol has impeded both force and accuracy, and I am able to avoid the blow. A small crowd begins to gather, more eager to watch than to help. His momentum makes him stumble, and I am able to restrain him as he tries to regain his footing.

"Sir, if you could just sit down, I am sure we could resolve this amicably."

I am met only with swearing and a renewed struggle. I am starting to contemplate knocking him unconscious when the crowd parts and goes silent.

"Is there a problem here?"

Ray.

What have you made of yourself? Your father would be proud, I think, of the way you wear your authority, speaking in a soft voice that is used to obedience. Prouder still of the fear in which you are held here.

My assailant appeals to one of the men who stands next to Ray.

"This man punched me, boss. I tried to walk away, but he wanted a fight even though the rules tonight say no violence."

Ray looks at me. His eyes are dead, flat and cold, where before they would light up with a smile, or spark with anger. Now menace is all they hold.

If I did not know Ray, I would fear him. I saw this side of him, briefly, before Irene Zuko's tragic death, and I had hoped that I would never have to see it again. For a moment during those dark days I believed he would actually kill me without compunction.

He is acting. This is all a faade. He would never hurt me. I repeat these thoughts to myself like a mantra even as he looks at me as if I am dirt under his shoe.

He looks over his shoulder to the hired thugs- Ray Kowalski would call them goons- standing a step behind him.

"Take him out," he commands.

They steer me out through the back door and into an alleyway. I am too shocked to do anything other than obey although I know that he has to preserve his cover. I have no idea what he was thinking as he gave that order. He is too good at concealment, now, for me to guess.

Suddenly I don't want to talk. I don't want to diffuse the situation; I want to fight, to injure and be injured regardless of winning or losing. I want to hurt the people who are connected with Ray's situation; I want to punish.

I keep my eyes fixed on the ground, unable to contain my smile.

"You gonna go quietly?" one of them asks. I raise my head, a desperate sort of joy coursing through me.

"No."

He raises the gun, the other two holding my arms keeping me in place, and aims it to my heart. I wait. Then, as if guided by some terrible instinct, he raises it so it is pointed to my temple. The safety catch ratchets off with a harsh metallic click. His finger tightens on the trigger-

Then I move, sweeping his legs from under him with my still free feet, using his companions' support of my upper body to sweep again, this time aiming for the head, wondering briefly, absurdly, whatRay Kowalskiwould say if he had seen me kicking someone that way, and I'm free of their hold, diving for the gun-

"Stop right there."

I freeze, as do my assailants. Palming the gun, I stand up to face Ray.

"Shoddy. You people, always having to gloat. Only gloat once the person's dead, then you can use all your wiseass remarks on a corpse. Now here's how it's done."

The gun is in my right hand; it is shielded from all but Ray's view. His eyes flick to it, once, and although we have been apart for well over a year, I know exactly what he means. He aims for the heart, he flicks the safety catch off, his finger tightens on the trigger, there is a bang and I crumple, body curled around both the gun and the bullet I shot into the ground by my right foot.

"Now go serve the canaps. I hope you make better waiters."

He kneels next to me. "Where are you staying?" he breathes, mouth close to my ear.

"Excalibur, room 241."

He stands and leaves. I wait thirty seconds, then I'm up and running, hoping that soon he will follow.

And then I wait for him. Here, in this hotel room with its plush carpet and gold taps, I am about as out of my element as I could possibly be. In Chicago, in the beginning, Ray was my guide, taking me home to his family, showing me the peculiarities of urban life, opening my eyes to a city where the crisp quiet silence of my homeland was an aching absence. Here, in this city, Ray could guide me, but the knowledge that he has acquired-

I do not want to be able to navigate this place. I need it to be alien, this city in the desert, this place where man's intervention can slow the mighty Colorado to a trickle and replace it with a river of neon lights. I need to feel separate from the smoke, from the dry desert dust.

I need to take Ray home with me before this city becomes his grave.

It is two hours and forty-six minutes before I hear measured footsteps coming up the corridor to my room. I stand in the middle of the room and wait for him to let himself in. The reading lamp by the side of the bed is the only source of light in the room, and my reflection in one of the mirrors in the room is pale, shadowed, ghostly. He picks the lock, slips into the room, closes it, locks the door, pulls a dresser in front of it, shuts the curtains and turns off the bedside light. I remain where I am.

"Who told you?"

Now he sounds more like my best friend and former partner; tired and nervous, yes, but there is no trace of the arrogant coldness in his voice that so shook me before. "Envelopes were sent to a number of prominent figures in the Maf-"

"Benny. Who told you?"

"Frank Zuko."

"And you trusted him?"

"I had no choice. I couldn't let you die, not when I was able to save you."

I try to soften my voice, make it soothing, but he is still angry, eyes blazing. "You could have been killed! I'm amazed you weren't, crashing a party like that. What if the fight had turned nasty? The guy who started it was carrying two guns and a switchblade, Benny, and that ain't something you can talk your way out of. If he'd got lucky-"

I point to the Kevlar vest I have removed and laid onto the chair.

"That guy in the alley was aiming for your head."

"I knew you would come and help me," I say, trying to keep my arms loose and relaxed by my sides. I don't know what I had expected from this reunion. I don't think I expected a fight.

I didn't expect to be unable to help him.

"You knew? I didn't."

"I know you. You have saved me before, from myself and other people, and would do so again."

"Benny," he says, shaking his head in that old, affectionate way of his, "I'm not the same guy I used to be." His voice darkens and I ache for him, for the things he's had to do in order to fulfil the demands of this assignment. "You don't...you don't know me any more. I... don't know myself."

"Of course I know you," I tell him. "I know you as well as I know myself. And I trust you with everything I have to give."

And that terrifies me, Ray. More than you will ever know.

He sighs tiredly. "You trust too easily. Look, Benny, I called my contact, they're going to pick us up here at two. They didn't know about my cover being blown, but they've sent some agents to Chicago to watch the house. How'd you get the vest?"

"Ray...err, Stan helped me with that."

He gives a soft laugh. Funny, how he is metamorphosing from Armando Langoustini to Ray, my Ray. "Yeah, I remember Stanley. He been taking care of you?"

"Yes," I answer softly, "but he wasn't you, Ray. God, Ray, I m- missed you so badly. So very badly."

My voice is husky; I feel close to tears. I bite my cheek, trying to gain some measure of control. He puts his hands on my shoulders and examines my face in the dim light. "Beautiful as ever, Benny, like Botticelli painted you and forgot to put in the wings."

There is such warmth in his voice, such wonder in his eyes, that I am undone once more. "I lit a candle for you, every night, every night I hoped, and prayed as much as I was able, and-"

Another sob, this time loud in the silence of the room. Ray is still, so still that we are a tableau, balanced in a moment. I blink, and it passes, the enchantment gone.

"You can cry, Benny, I've got you," he murmurs. His voice is warm, so warm. I try to turn my face away, but he holds me, long fingers cupping my cheek. Tears flow down my face, trickle onto his thumb, then the joint, drawing my eye with their glistening path. He sees my fascination, brings his wrist to his mouth, licks the trail-

The sight sends a jolt straight to my groin, puts a hitch in my breath for another reason. His eyes are holding a question, a challenge, and he licks his wrist again, catlike, fastidious. I- I need. I need something from him... anything.

I reach out, grasp his wrist, bring it to my lips, lick a broad swipe down to the cuff, my tears and his saliva mingling. I lick his thumb methodically, round the base, up to the tip, his palm, salty tang of sweat here, the delicate skin of the underside of his wrist, parchment fine, pulse fluttering under my tongue. Now he trembles, his other hand tight on my shoulder, tight enough to leave bruises.

Not enough. Too much.

"Ray-"

He laughs, a little shakily. "Ssh, Benny, s'ok."

His other hand cups the back of my head, draws me closer until our breath mingles. He moves his hand away from my mouth, presses his lips to the side of my face in a chaste kiss, and whispers, quietly, so quietly, "show me what you want."

My lips seek out his in an answer. He is gentle, patient, willing to let me lead. I want him, all of him, I want to take the roughness with the tenderness, no holding back. I deepen the kiss, tasting the spicy warmth of his mouth, swallowing his gasp as my hands grasp his backside, pulling him right up against me. He is hard, whimpering as our crotches meet, as I push him to respond to me, shivering, coltlike, as I stroke the small of his back with gentling touches. At last his control breaks, and he's with me, completely, matching me touch for touch, push for pull. His hands on my shirt tremble, fumbling with my buttons, and my own are shaking as I undo his overcoat, his jacket, his-

"Too many clothes," I say firmly, earning a slightly choked laugh from Ray.

"Defeated by a few buttons, Benny? That's three Mountie points lost already."

I scowl, and attack his clothing with renewed fervour. I unbutton his shirt, but leave it on his shoulders. Shirt hanging open, outline of his erection clear through his trousers, he looks more beautiful then anything I've ever seen, all long slender lines and curves, green eyes almost eclipsed by heavily-dilated pupils, lips moist and reddened.

"God, Benny, when you look at me like that-" he breathes, as if he is sure I will disappear.

"You're beautiful. Why shouldn't I look at you?"

A shrug, eloquence in brevity, shifting the shirt on his shoulders to expose a slender gold chain with a crucifix hung on it between his sharp clavicles, fragile looking, the beginning of angular hipbones, hair running down his navel, below the dip of his waistband. Perfect, even with the slight thickening around his waist that he pulls in his stomach to hide.

He shifts, uncomfortable, then attacks, hands deft on the button of my trousers, slipping my shirt off my shoulders. I'm briefly, absurdly grateful that I took off my shoes waiting for him, then his hands, those delicate hands, stroke over me, over my sides, up my back, noting every scar on my body.

There are calluses on those otherwise soft hands, on the places where a spade handle would rub. One day, when he is not so raw, I'll ask how he got them. Now I just shiver at the roughness of them over my skin, standing obediently still as he touches me. So much touch. Even Victoria-

The first time, in the snow, it was about survival, about proving we were alive. Years later, it was loneliness and revenge, and she took whatever pleasure she could from me, leaving no trace, no fingerprints. She didn't touch me, not like this. He learns me as we move to one of the beds, fingers ghosting over my body. I stay still, now that he is here, afraid to scare him away from me. I had never even dreamed that he would want me; never dared to. He pays attention to the nape of my neck, to the crisp hair of my armpits, to my hipbones, to the bullet scar in the small of my back. His touch there is soft, tender, as if he is afraid that the smallest pressure on the old wound will cause me pain.

"Lie down, Benny," he murmurs, voice husky. His hand has not strayed from the scar. I lie down, on my front, the sheets cool and crisp against my skin. "Close your eyes."

Now I have to listen to him, to the sound of the zipper on his trousers, to the slithering ripple as they hit the floor, straining to hear his movements as his hands leave me completely. I wait. I can wait for this. For him.

His hands return, finally, skimming once more over my shoulders, down my back, then out, fanning across my buttocks, thumbs resting just on the cleft. He is patient, leisurely, maddening. I wait, and my breathing is harsh against the pillow as his thumbs dip deeper, relaxing me even as I quiver with need.

"You want this?" he asks, voice serious.

He is here. Finally, he is here with me and nothing else matters. Over a year of worrying about him, and now he is here, with me, and he is asking me that. I want to tell him everything. Every word I wondered if I would be able to say to him as I made my way to his side. Love gives them wings, yet fear traps them. I can say nothing but-

"Please." I want us to be joined, until I cannot tell where one of us ends and the other begins. I want everything you have to give and more. I want to grow old with you, I want forever. "Please."

I wait as he prepares me, fingers scissoring, the stretching just on the edge of pain, a pleasurable ache that spikes into pleasure as he brushes against my prostate, then I'm not waiting any more, I grope behind me, needing to pull him close, wanting him in me, wanting him to stop being so damned careful.

I dimly hear the crinkle of a condom packet, and the silky slide as he puts it on. Now his touches are commanding, bringing my knees up, pushing a pillow under my hips, gentling touches to my waist, then his one hand is running through my hair, the other clutching at my hip as he enters me, slowly. I turn my head, eyes closed, seeking out his fingers, drawing them into my mouth, wanting to complete the circle we are making, and the last of his control breaks with a moan.

He moves, and all I know is the sweet ache that fast becomes eclipsed by the keen edge of pleasure, the warmth and connection of the sensation of his beautiful fingers held within my mouth gives me, the friction as I rub against the cotton sheets. All I want is to stay here forever, about to topple over the edge into climax, knowing that it will spiral up and I will fly, and take him with me, and the waiting will be over and he will never leave me. I come first, his fingers blocking the words I try to say, but he knows anyway, stiffening, climaxing, then slumping over me, face in my shoulder, whispering the same words over and over.

"I'll stay. Always. Always, Benny."

We do not touch at all; not in the car on the way to the airport, not on the plane and not in the car driving to the house. Home. My home. I look, though, look at the way exhaustion has taken all the starch out of his spine, how he sprawls in the seat next to me-

I see why he sits up so straight usually. If he sprawled like that in public, who could resist? I can't. I never could, really, and if he had asked me to become his lover before, I probably would helpless schmuck that I am.

His lover. I go over that phrase in my mind, and it's a rosary to me now, giving me strength and peace as I prepare for homecoming.

He sees me looking at him and he smiles at me, and it's as if I'm wrapped in his arms once more. So many questions and promises in those eyes, so many old hurts he carries about with him like bullet wounds in his back.

I want to take them all away until he can smile at the rest of the world like he does to me.

God, I'm glad Turnbull's here, and I never thought I'd be saying that. When Frannie saw what was happening outside she called the consulate first, thinking Fraser'd be able to help, and then the 2-7. Turnbull must have taken the initiative, because when I came around the second time I was laid out on the living room floor, and he'd taken over like it was a completely natural thing to do. I guess there's a reason he became a Mountie after all.

Frannie's still shaking, with the occasional sob, and Turnbull's got his arms wrapped around her, letting her hide her face in the red of his uniform, giving her more than I've got to give right now.

Christ. What a fuck up. Two of the feds are still here, looking real uncomfortable, and it serves the fuckers right. They shoot three unarmed guys at point blank range in front of her youngest child, and Ma Vecchio ain't gonna be bringing out the pasta.

Welsh and Thatcher are talking to her in the kitchen, and me? Standing outside, looking in at the scene, wanting a cigarette so bad I can taste it. I want to see them first, see if I'm right, before all the family descends and Thatcher gets to tell Frase off, and Ma shouts at the Feds for letting her Raimundo get so thin. I want to see if my hunch is the real thing, not the lack of sleep and excess of caffeine talking. Then, if it's an open and shut, QED, case, well, then I'm done. Doneski.

I look out to where my car's still parked, and I can't help noticing how the blood glistens on the sidewalk. I try not to gag again.

They didn't have to shoot them, not like that. And not in front of Frannie, who still thinks being a cop and following in Ray's footsteps is the best thing she could do. Life hadn't rubbed the shine off of her eyes yet. I sort of hoped it never would. A car pulls up, a black, nondescript armored vehicle that drives real quiet. People know they're Fed cars- if they drove beat-up Chevys with peeling paintwork and a heater that don't work, no one would notice them. It's stupid, just grandstanding.

Fraser gets out first, and his shirt's untucked and he looks real rumpled. But, God, he's beautiful, like someone cracked open a marble statue and the real person popped out. He's showing the rest of the world the face he used to keep for me. He notices me right away, leaning against one of the porch lights, and the concern in his face is almost funny. "Good God, Ray! What on earth happened to you?"

"Hey, Frase. Weather good in Vegas?" I say. I do not want to spill my heart out in front of the Action Twins currently standing by the car. Vecchio gets out next, and the look on Fraser's face is the clincher for me. If they haven't slept together, my first name ain't Stanley.

And I don't like either fact very much.

"Your colleagues are in the house. It would be appreciated if they left it with all expedient haste," I tell the Fibbies, who nod in unison. And ok, that's polite speak for `get those jerks the fuck outta that house,' but I don't really care. Both Vecchio and Fraser give me a confused look, but I'm saying nothing. Fibbies one and two climb the porch steps together, and if the feds thing don't work out I'm sure there's a synchronized stair climbing contest they could enter. They should call their agents, get a better gig than, say, flashing their badges and interfering with cop work.

Vecchio comes up next, and for a second he looks like he's bracing himself. Poor schmuck. Feeling sympathetic means when he turns and gives me this long stare, I don't snarl or glare back; I just look at him until he breaks eye contact and goes into the house.

"Ray, what happened?"

Fraser's cool fingertips brush my face lightly. "It's not as bad as it looks," I tell him, scuffing one of my feet on the ground. He snorts sceptically, but to my relief drops it. I stay outside, trying not to think of anything. All I can hear are three separate gunshots, then a horrified, high-pitch scream that seems to go on forever. I shake my head to get rid of it. "Owwfffuck!" I forgot about my head and the shake dislodges my brain or something.

"Not as bad as it looks?"

Oh great. Now I get the smug Mountie lecture. "Come inside, Ray. Mrs. Vecchio has some medical supplies. Unless you'd like to go to a hospital..."

He leaves the threat hanging, and that's all he needs to do. I let him steer me inside. Turnbull, Thatcher and Welsh are in the kitchen, so he takes me up to the bathroom and sits me down, a line appearing between his brows when he sees how I climb the stairs like an old man. "Who did this?"

I meet his eyes. He's angry, but not at me. "One of the other mob guys in Chicago got a letter and sent three goons to deliver a warning to Vecchio. One of those real friendly `finding the bodies of your immediate family' warnings. I got in their way. They weren't too happy." In fact, they were planning on beating me senseless but leaving me alive to hear what they were doing inside the house. I guess I went apeshit, kicked and punched like crazy, then one of them pistol whipped me, knocking me right out. I guess they must have kicked me some more; my ribs are fucking wrecked. My stupid voice shakes slightly so I skip the narrative forward.

"Then the feds came, and I guess Frannie must have come out of the house too, after phoning for help, cause I woke up to three gunshots and Frannie screaming. Point blank range, they didn't even have their guns. Not a chance. That ain't right, Ben. We do that, we might as well be them."

He finishes cleaning the scrapes on my face. No one says anything. I guess there's nothing to say. I have to stop myself from leaning forward and sniffing him, he's so close, and his hands are so warm I want to rub myself catlike against him, wind around his legs and-

Whoa. Control. I press one of my arms into my busted ribs, which hurts like a bitch but works like a cold shower. I can't quite stop the gasp from escaping, but I guess he puts it down to him cleaning up one of the scrapes on my face.

"Are you injured anywhere else, Ray?" he asks. He knows damn well I'm injured pretty much everywhere else, but I'm not gonna admit that. I shake my head, try for a smile. He isn't convinced - his lips purse and he gives me this real old-fashioned look - but he doesn't say anything. "Well, by some miracle, you've avoided concussion. A few days of bedrest, and you'll be right as rain."

"Do I get a lollipop for bein' brave?"

He shakes his head, despairing, affectionate. "Well, Ray, I'm sure I can find you a sugar-free lollipop. In Inuvik we used to eat pemmican lollipops; it was said they were very good for the teeth. Eric always said-"

I'm too busy being grossed out by the idea of pemmican lollipops to notice the pain I get going down the stairs. I let his voice wash over me and the next thing I know we're waiting to go into the kitchen. Time to step up, Kowalski. This is the last chance I'm ever gonna get to tell him.

"I-"

I pause, throat dry. I can't upset the apple cart like that. What I want has nothing to do with them. Fraser and Vecchio don't owe me a thing.

"Yes, Ray?"

He says my name different from how he says Vecchio's. I'd never have known if I hadn't seen them together, and I'm sort of grateful I have, because now I know he thinks of us as two separate people, not as 'Ray' and 'Substitute Ray'. That'll help, later, when I've hotfooted it out of there. It'll help that he saw me, and not just a hole where his partner should have been.

"I'm glad you brought him back safe."

It's true. I am.

And the smile he gives me, the real one, the one that makes his eyes crinkle at the corners, convinces me. He's where he belongs. With Ray.

"Thank you," he says, and squeezes my shoulder, gently. The yawn I give feels like I'm going to split my face in two, and Welsh chooses that exact moment to come out of the kitchen.

"Right, Kowalski, I'm driving you home. Clear?" Welsh glares at me, daring me to argue. "Go tell Mrs. Vecchio goodbye."

The thought of all that noise makes me cringe but you don't argue with the Lieu. "Yeah. I guess I'd better."

Ma Vecchio is not the sort of lady whose house you leave without saying goodbye. Given a gun, I just know she'd be a crack shot. Even unarmed, she sure scared the feds.

***

Rayshuffles into the living room like a man awaiting execution. He stands patiently as Mrs. Vecchio fusses over his wounds and tells him he is still too thin, and he listens with the air of someone well used to matriarchal attention. I almost expect her to get out a handkerchief and rub a smudge off his nose. Meanwhile, Ray is talking quietly to his sister, who is still shaking slightly but keeping herself together. Turnbull looks at her as if he is trying to puzzle something out, but when he sees that I'm watching, he rearranges his features to vapidity once more.

Once things are settled down, he and I are going to have a talk.

"A moment of your time, Constable."

Despite Inspector Thatcher's phrasing, this is clearly more order than request. I follow her out to the corridor. "Ma'am, about-"

She interrupts me with an upheld hand. "Constable, I don't think Detective Kowalski is quite recovered from his illness. Perhaps you should take a few more days off."

I nod, stunned by this kindness. As she re-enters the living room, I can distinctly hear her saying, "at least one of us can avoid Turnbull's love songs."

Frannie is now talking to Ray, and has left her brother looking at Turnbull with an expression of dawning horror.

"Is something wrong, Ray?" I ask, keeping my voice bland.

"Turnbull and my sister?" he whispers, looking slightly frantic. "What happened with you?"

"I suppose her affections were...diverted, Ray. And I didn't know you liked to share."

He looks dangerously close to choking. Lieutenant Welsh is giving me a deeply suspicious look, a look that sees far too much. He is a fine detective. I pathis shoulder heartily, and go and inspect a painting on the wall to give Ray room to go and talk to him. I cannot help overhearing, even with the murmur of other conversations in the room.

"Frannie told me you made a great substitute brother."

Hegives a short laugh. "Yeah, I guess I didn't drown her hamster, so I'm a step up."

"Up? Across. Sideways. Possibly down, but never up."

"Yeah, suure."

"Kowalski!"

"Vech-chi-ohh."

"Oh, for- - Look, thanks. You saved my family and kept my cover. I'm grateful. I don't know if I'll ever stop being grateful. If you need-"

"I'm fine. Thanks for the offer. And the cover thing? Well, you know how you used to be a real smart dresser?"

He leaves the question hanging. Ray's voice, when he recovers it, is about an octave higher than usual.

"So you weren't pretending to be a hobo? These are your-"

"Your."

"My normal clothes?"

"Yup. I guess you never knew you liked army surplus, huh?"

"No. Funny what you learn."

Oh dear.

Raytakes his leave of the Vecchios, shakes hands with Turnbull and sketches a salute to Inspector Thatcher with a grin that's more friendship than mockery. Then he is leaving, Lieutenant Welsh steering him out in a way meant to hide how much help he actually needs to move.

Inspector Thatcher and Turnbull don't stay for long after that. Turnbull takes his leave of Francesca in a way that is guaranteed to raise Ray's blood pressure an unhealthy amount.

But Ray is not there. I go to the door with my colleagues, ostensibly to guide them out, and I seehim standing in the porch, where RayKowalski had stood earlier, looking grimly at the evidence of the shootings. His face is closed off, shuttered to everyone but me. He looks lost. I join him out on the porch, ignoring the cigarette smoke still hanging acrid in the air. He says nothing for a while, and I am content just to listen to his breathing, to the steady thrum of his pulse, until he is ready to speak.

"I'm a stranger here," he says suddenly, a dullness in his voice.

"You're home, Ray," I say, feeling hopelessly inadequate. I have yearned for my homeland for so long, with such intensity, that I cannot understand why Ray would feel anything other than joy at his return.

"Home. And it hasn't changed at all, right?" he asks me, with a slightly bitter smile.

I consider his question. There have been no changes to the layout of the furniture or the interior decor, and apart from the bullet holes and some patchwork done following the unfortunate fire two years ago the exterior is as it was when Ray left. Mrs. Vecchio is certainly as formidable as she has ever been, Francesca's character remains uniquely hers, so Ray should-

But the hand that fits inside the glove has changed, I realize. Ray has changed. I see another man staring out from his eyes sometimes and it seems to be a conscious effort for Ray to be Ray Vecchio, where before he could be no one else.

"You're acting. With everyone, you're pretending," I murmur, wishing I could just take him into my arms and keep him there.

"I have to, Benny. Do you think Ma would ever forgive herself if she thought she'd let her kid turn into what her husband tried to be?"

He gestures down at his clothes, now travelworn but still a sign of ostentatious wealth, and the self-loathing in his eyes cuts me deeply. Yet this is something I cannot solve, cannot change. It is what has happened, and I must-

"Why did you do it, Ray?" I ask, Zuko's cynical mocking words in my mind.

He shifts, uncomfortable. "You're not gonna let this drop, are you?"

"No, Ray."

Ray sighs in defeat and begins to speak, never meeting my eyes. "They'd been trying to get me to do this gig in Vegas for a while, but I said no. I knew what happened to guys who go undercover in the Mob- there were stories, guys who went missing from the force and didn't even get a proper funeral, or if they did, the coffin was weighted down with stones. I'm no hero, Benny, I like being alive. I like my job, and the pizza in Chicago's really something. So I ignored them."

"Then, well, it was pretty much the day after you went for your holiday, I get called into Welsh's office, and there are these two suits there. They tell Welsh to leave, and they tell me about Langoustini. He's had a car crash, he ain't gonna survive, the Mob don't know where he is, there's an opening there... and I said no again. Then they bring you into it. Do you realise how many influential people you have lobbying for you to come back to Canada? Kinda funny, isn't it, how you're still posted to Chicago? But there are people in the government who really do not want you back, and they're the people who matter, the spiders with their webs and their fingers in every pie.

"So they're telling me this, and, well, inferring things. Things like you'll be stuck in this city for the rest of your life, but they can pull a few strings and get you back up to Canada if I cooperate. They promised nothing; it was all politician speak, all `chances' and `possibilities'. First I wanted to mash their faces into the fucking desk, but they gave me time to think about it. I had a day, and five minutes after they left that office my mind was made up."

I'm shaking. I can't seem to stop it, however fiercely I clench my fists. "How could they?" I whisper.

He gives me a gentle, heartbreaking smile. "It's what they do, Benny. It's what they always do."

Strange, how I had wanted to comfort him, but now his arms are wrapped tightly around me and I can only bury my face in his neck and shake. He hushes me, soothing me with sure gentle hands, and every residual feeling of having been abandoned, discarded with only a phone call, is assuaged.

My Ray. It was for me all along.

We stand outside until Ray begins to shiver from the cold. Both Mrs. Vecchio and Francesca have gone to bed, so we are left to sit on the sofa and hold hands in companionable silence. I imagine how we will be, thirty years ahead, in married domesticity. Perhaps we will be in my cabin, in front of the stove, in rocking chairs. Ray will still be complaining about the cold, of course. I can teach him ways to survive in the cold, ways to appreciate the colours of the snow, the beauty of the blizzard-heavy sky, or the brightness of stars when city lights cannot steal their glow.

"What are you thinking about?" Ray asks, lazily, voice sleep-muddled.

"Rocking chairs," I answer with a smile.

He understands; I see the way his eyes soften, and the curve of his mouth becomes tender. "Two rocking chairs?"

"Two rocking chairs." ***

It's four in the morning, on the fifteenth day of the resumed life of Stanley Raymond Kowalski and I'm running again, running running running away, fast, so I'll never catch up to myself, so the pulse pumping in my ears drowns out everything, so the lights blur and it's all empty shopfronts, muddy pools of light, the bitter taste of adrenaline in the back of my throat and the burning in my legs, my lungs, my heart.

I stop and bend over, breathing heavily, and it hurts like hell. My breathing is harsh in the silence that isn't really quiet, that's never still.

Fraser must be constantly surrounded by noise, with his bat ears - in fact, it's probably sensory fucking overload for him. Sex must be incredible for him. Or maybe it's too much and he wishes he was numb to it, deadened. Maybe it's painful, feeling that much. Maybe that's why he's so damn scared of women. God. Poor Fraser.

Thinking about him gives me this sweet ache, like the kind you get after exercise or great sex, that pull in your muscles that makes you feel tired and satisfied all at once.

Hell, I'll always miss him, but this way there's no bitterness. I got out before he had to get rid of me, before I started to jeopardise what he has with Vecchio. I got out while we were still friends, before the arguments about kids, or how I never dressed up for jerky fucking lawyer functions, how I still liked punk and wore jewellery, how I boxed and chased perps and or took too many risks, or didn't show my feelings enough, or too much, or how I was just me, and nothing I did could ever change that. This time I got out when there was no blame, only a situation. There was no pivotal point, no place where I wasn't quick enough off the mark, nothing I could have done differently and been able to live with myself.

I can only think like this when I've been running. Other times I just wanna punch walls at the sheer fucking unfairness of it all, so I box until the bag has beaten me down and my arms are like spaghetti.

With Stella, after I got the divorce, it was drinking by night, and working by day, and if I forgot my Kevlar vest, well, I got a proper cop funeral, and ma would have been able to tell her friends about her `brave boy'.

This way, at least it's exercise. Soon I'll be able to outrun Fraser. Hell, I already have, moving apartments, vanishing completely, only telling my ma where I'm living. I even bought a different car, cause the GTO's hard to miss, but it's hard to think of it on blocks right now, so I don't.

I outran him in a metaphysical sense; I'm not allowed to see about transferring to a different city until the end of the three weeks Welsh gave me to `think it through'.

Conditions. I have to see him twice a week, talk to him, so he can see I'm looking after myself, otherwise he'll `tell Big Red exactly where you are, Kowalski'. And I have to write Fraser a letter explaining myself, once I'm settled wherever I'm going. He drives a hard bargain, but Welsh is not the sort of lieutenant you say `no' to, not if you got any sense. He's been to too many cop funerals to ever make the mistake of not caring, and he cares. I know he does, and he knows he does, so when he tells me off, or gives me one of those stares that seems to strip layers of skin off of me, it's cool, because I know he's got my back. He's been a better father to me than-

No. Things were hard for my dad, with losing so many relatives in Auschwitz, coming to Chicago and finding that the only job he could get was packing meat, working so damn hard he was hardly ever home, and getting nowhere because his second name wasn't `Smith' or `Johnson'. And my childhood wasn't too bad.

See, this time, I'm taking the steps backwards to where everything began, not just Stell. Back to Tommy Lipniki, and the way he'd make his own nose bleed by running to make his heart beat faster. Back to Ralph Peterson, whose dad drove a truck, but Ralph swore blind he used to be James Dean's driving double. To pretty little Clara, with her black curls and broken front tooth, who never spoke, but was the best skipper on the block. To skinny Stanley Kowalski, with the messy hair, and the difficulty learning words. Stanley, who took up boxing at fifteen, gave himself a new name and got the swagger to go with it, and the cigarette habit to go with that. I thought I was so damn cool.

Fuck it, I was.

So how'd I get here?

I pause at the gates of my old high school. Coming here, after me and Stella had first kissed, going into the Spanish lesson and spending the whole time staring out of the window and getting myself a detention for it, but not worrying because I knew she'd take my side, and wouldn't mind me being late to meet her. She had looked at me, eyes all wide, and said `you took a detention because you couldn't stop thinking about me?', and from that moment I was hooked, I was her white fucking knight, and for three whole days, I was a hero.

For so many years, I needed another person to measure myself by; first Stella, then Fraser. With Fraser, it was like he saw how I could be, without my failures. He knew I wasn't perfect, but when I tried, that was enough, it made me close to an angel in his book. Stella only used to notice when it went wrong. God, they were negatives of each other. Matter and anti matter. Heh.

Now I have to be me without anyone else to reflect me.

Ah, hovel sweet hovel. Only place I could rent on such short notice, and it's the kind the brochures describe as `compact', but it's really `open door, step into living room, one pace gets you to the kitchen, don't inspect the window fittings too closely and sorry about the mold. Oh, and the broken heating. But the toaster's complimentary'. Well, the toaster don't work, and I really hate toast anyway.

Fumble with my door keys, get it open third key I try, step into the living room. I must have left the kitchen light on. Funny. I guess I was on autopilot when I left the apartment. I strip off my sweatshirt and T-shirt, which is almost wringing wet. My breath comes out as steam in the cold, but I'm acclimatized to it now. All manly about it, and there's no one to say `well done, Ray, you can get your badge for freezing your ass off. You need to sew it onto your sleeve between your driving a burning car into Lake (the lake they call Michigan) Michigan badge and your sleeping on the floor badge.' Dib dib dib.

I dance into the kitchen ignoring Vecchio, get out the orange juice-

Vecchio? I glance over. Still there, watching me with a smile that's half `come on, do me' and half amusement.

"You gonna offer me a drink, Stanley?"

Of all the people to hallucinate...

I ignore him. Or try to. "Look, I know I'm unhinged, but couldn't my subconscious have dreamt up anyone prettier to drive me bugfuck?"

"Subconscious?"

He sounds kinda insulted by this.

"Yeah. You're a delusion. Not real. If you were you, you wouldn't be being you in my kitchen," I explain, trying to keep it simple. I guess there's no reasoning with figments, though, because he makes the one step it takes to get to me, and clamps his hand around the back of my neck.

OK. Maybe he's real.

How the fuck did he find me? Welsh would never spill, and my ma's one stubborn lady.

His hand is warm and dry on the back of my neck, a contrast with the cooling sweat that makes my skin clammy. And the back of my neck has always been hardwired to my cock, and it's all I can do to stay standing, the shock is so intense.

"Not real, Stanley?" he breathes into my ear, and I've always hated my first name, but he gives it this little twist, and he's talking dirty to me by just saying it. His hand is flexing on my neck, like he's a cat, every separate pulse a new jolt, and all roads lead to horny, and I'm thinking of walls, tables, chairs-

"Vecchio, breaking and entering is a criminal offence," I say, real cheeky, trying to get my mind out of my shorts and his hand into a fist. Fists I can deal with.

His grip tightens on my neck, and suddenly I feel his anger, right under his skin, so tight he's practically humming with it.

"Not a word. Not a single goddamn word. You think you can just take off like that, without a word to your partner, to your ex-wife, to your friends? Swearing your mother to secrecy, without a thought for how worried Benny would be?"

Yeah, Vecchio, I thought, you selfish jerk.

"You got anything to say?"

He shakes me a little. "Fuck you, Vecchio," I spit, reaching one hand up to get free, and suddenly I'm getting cosy with the fridge door, face mashed against the fridge magnets. Not a grunt from him. He's stronger than he looks.

"So you think you're too good to explain yourself, huh?"

Explaining is where it gets complicated. Explaining is what turns a suspicion into something real you didn't want confirmed. And I know how Fraser is with a secret. It would have been days, hell, hours, before he ground me down.

"I wasn't needed any more."

And man, that hurts. My voice cracks halfway through the sentence, the rawness I had buried under miles of running rubbed back to flesh again.

"So you ran."

"Gee, Vecchio, one more solve like that, and you'll be heading the division with an office of your very own."

He doesn't rise to it. His grip is steady, sure, his hand warm on my neck. "Do you love him?"

"Yeah, Vecchio, I'm going to tell you that. Hell, let's tell Jerry and Oprah, too, spread it across the broadsheets." Then I shut up, shocked he's even guessed that much. Some undercover cop I am.

"I'll make you a deal, Stanley. Look me in the eye and tell me you don't love him. Do that, I'll leave, and never tell a soul. Not even Benny."

"And if I don't?"

His thumb massages my neck. "You'll see."

His free hand snakes around to my still hard cock, heel grinding against the worn denim until I'm bucking my hips and biting a finger to keep myself from whimpering. It's like he fucking owns me, he's so casual.

I say nothing. The fucker's got me, and he knows it. There's no way I can say something like that, not even to get a bit of peace. I won't betray Fraser like that.

"Put your hands behind your back."

It never even occurs to me to disobey, not until I feel the cold metal sliding onto my wrists, and the chink and click of the cuffs. His hand gives my cock one last stroke, a sort of `hey, nice to have met you', then he steps back from me, gives me room to step away from the fridge and look at him.

He looks...kind. There's a bone-deep tiredness in his eyes, but a measure of peace there too, and I can tell he's really fought hard to gain that. It takes a lot to make your place in the world and stay there, but he's managed it.

I just don't know why he's letting me into his place.

"I can't figure you out," I tell him, too tired and horny to dance around. "You could leave me here; it was my own choice. You owe me nothing; you couldn't have stopped me going. I want to know why you're trying."

"We need you," he says simply. "Benny needs to know where you are, or he'll never stop searching and worrying. I don't want you to become another Victoria for him. Every guy with bag lady clothes and spiky blond hair will become another you he didn't stop from leaving."

I need more. I need to know about him, too. "You. Why do you want me there?"

"Fishing, Stanley?" he asks with a lazy smile.

"Why do you want me there?" I say again. He can't fob me off- if I have anything to do with them, I have to know what the fuck I'm getting myself into.

"I can't tell you that. Not when I have trouble finding words for it myself. Some things, word trap `em, put them in cages. Stick around, Stanley, you'll see."

Leave the cuffs on, Vecchio. I ain't brave enough for this one. I'm tired of being a guy who knows what he wants is impossible, but leaps every time, and misses. I've thrown myself against this brick wall too damn many times, and I want to rest my heart for a while. Leave them on, take me to him, and he'll make it all fine again. And whatever comes out of this will be worth saving, worth having.

"You gonna get me a coat or something? Guys who go out dressed like this get arrested."

It's the most I've got to give him, but I think it's enough. He nods, eyes serious, gets my coat from the kitchen chair and drapes it around my shoulders.

"Your chariot awaits," he says with a mocking bow, hooking the keys from my still way-too-tight jeans. Well, it's not the first case of blue balls I've ever had.

His eyes flick to my crotch, and the bastard smiles. Fuck you into the fucking wall, Vecchio. It's like he read my mind, because he gives a slow smile, like some sort of lizard basking. A sexy lizard, if they exist. He pats my ass possessively. "Later, Stanley."

Bastard.

He's seething. Seething, horny, tired and confused, the smell of sweat and sex rolling off him so it's a job to keep control of the car.

He hasn't shaved in a while. The guy behind the bar where I finally tracked him down said he hadn't been getting drunk or starting fights, he just sat and drank this weird herbal thing- despondency or something. I guess he'd picked up Benny's habit of putting gross things in his mouth. He hadn't told the bartender anything. just sat for a few hours and stared into his glass, hardly moving. The bartender was kinda worried, actually- Kowalski hadn't said anything, but he could tell he was on a major downer.

God, he shows everything, every bit of vulnerability, every way you can hurt him. I can see all of it, all of him, but it's still hard to work him out. Benny talks about him a lot, about how he makes these mental leaps and gets to the answer quicker than Benny, the scattershot way he thinks, his nonexistent filing system and how it frustrates Benny when he's so haphazard. His loyalty. How brave he is. The way he moves.

The affection in Benny's voice is not something he tries to hide. I guess he's so used to being honest he doesn't see why he should lie now. I'm glad. With Benny, he can tell you the devil's own truth with a face like an angel, nearly kill you with it, but you still feel grateful to him for being straight. I'd forgotten what honesty feels like, I guess, and now I'm hooked on it again.

So Benny loves Kowalski, and that's enough truth for me. Fraser's got a big heart, big as the country he comes from, and I'm not enough to fill it. He needs him. I think I might too. I think he might understand about how hard it is sometimes just to be yourself. Benny only sees half of it; he only experiences the way other people see him, how they don't get behind the manners and the mask. Sometimes I feel so hollowed out, there's nothing behind the mask. Nothing for people to even get behind.

He's gone again. Funny, how empty the apartment seems without him. I'm not accustomed to so much space, living as I did in what was essentially a glorified cupboard. Well, sleeping there, anyway. My living was done outside that space, in Chicago as a city. But here I `live' in both this apartment and the city. With Ray. Who is gone. Whom I miss.

Dependence of this sort is not something I am used to, or comfortable with, and the urge to call him back, to tell him to stay, is strong. I lie here instead, staring up at the ceiling in the near quiet of the morning. Half past three, and there is still traffic here, but it is as quiet as it can be in Chicago.

We moved out of the Vecchio house last week. Mrs. Vecchio didn't complain, although I'd expected her to. She must have guessed at least some of the content of the nightmares that I held him through, and perhaps she realised living there, at home, would remind him of what he's lost. So she smiled at him, told him to come and eat a proper meal at least once a week, and to remind `Stanley' to come and see her, because `that boy never eats enough'.

Ray Kowalski. Another subject I ought not to, don't want to think about, but I can't stop myself. I'm impressed at how completely he's disappeared, how eager he was to cut the ties of his own life.

Eager? No, prepared -and able to do so thoroughly.

Not even Stella knows where he is, a fact that has annoyed her no end, and I was certain he would tell her. He never does what one expects. Trying to work him out is - was fascinating and frustrating in equal measure.

I miss him greatly.

I would like to know why he left. I would like to know if I was too slow to ask him if he was all right, too fast to chastise or correct. Did I not offer him enough support with the Botrelle case? Should I have asked him about Sam Franklin's less than professional demeanour around him? Was Stella causing him pain? ...was it me?

My grandmother always used to call questions tree trunks because they branched into so many other questions, each generating another set of questions, making the first question more precious than a thousand answers. `Asking questions is the fastest way to reach infinity,' she would tell me as we peeled potatoes, or darned the socks I always seemed to wear through.

Infinity to me is an endless expanse of snow, dwarfing me as I stand, staring up at the sky.

These questions, however, do not generate wonder. They're guilt, self recrimination frustration, and they will lead me down the same path that Victoria led me down, a path which I can only follow.

So many could-have-beens. There were times in my partnership withRay when I thought, hoped, that we would become...more- more than friends, partners, colleagues, more like-

Lovers.

Yes, I did hope we might become lovers.

Sometimes.

My heart was so balanced betweenboth Raysthat I was afraid to make a move in either direction, and the conflict troubled me deeply, but now that it's gone, I miss it.

I never wanted to choose between them; the choice was between light and dark, summer and winter, snow and sky, and choosing either lost me something precious. Two men whom I loved, who, I think, held me in regard even if they did not love me, and now one of them is gone, and his leaving has offset the joy of the other's homecoming.

Chiaroscuro. Light casts a shadow, and accepting that is the hardest lesson I have ever learnt.

So I can only think now that I miss him, and that I hope that he's all right, and that I'm glad Ray is here, and will return to me. Those, at least, are certainties - Ray Vecchiowill always keep his promise to me, and I will always wonder whereRayKowalskiis. Ironic, that these two simple truths now rule my life.

I hear Ray's car about three blocks away. Poor Ray. Another car destroyed in the lake they call Michigan (or the lake Ray insisted on calling Lake Michigan), and so he is currently driving one of the motor pool cars, which he hates, because it has no style, apparently, and the engine doesn't `sing'. It strikes me as being a perfectly serviceable vehicle, but I would not say this to Ray: I was involved in the destruction of both of his cars, and so keep quiet on the matter.

Diefenbaker, I think, misses the car; he makes sure he comforts Ray when he is driving it. He cannot understand why Ray objects to having his ear licked.

Ray's car pulls in, the driver's door opens and closes; then the passenger door opens, and another person gets out of the car. I stay still, heart thundering, as two sets of feet ascend the stairs; Ray's loafers, the heavier sound of boots following him, dragging somewhat. Ray unlocks the door, flings it open, and I get out of bed, a sheet wrapped around my middle, and pad across to the door of the bedroom. A coat is draped over the chair, and I hear the chink of handcuffs. I go to the door, pull it open, intending to ask Ray what on earth is going on, but the sight that meets my eyes makes me freeze into speechlessness.

"Hey, Benny! Look what I just found!"

THE END