Unfinished
by Maya Tawi

part three

"How dare this world make me what it wants
When all I dream about is gone?"
--Call Me Alice, "Out of Sight"

TODAY

The first thing Harrison does, when he wakes up this time, is fall out of bed.

He hits the floor with a thud and winces; something hard and unyielding is digging into his ribs. He reaches under himself, into the tangle of sheets still wrapped around his body, and his fingers close over the empty tequila bottle.

The next thing Harrison does is throw up on the floor.

The third thing he does is run into the front office and check the date.

The fourth thing, before he forgets, is to scribble down the winners he saw at the track the day before on the back of an unopened bill.

Then he just stands there, slumped over, his hands bracing himself on the desk, and stares at the list. Something's stinging his eyes, making it impossible to read his own writing, not that it was easy to read to begin with, and he recognizes the slight tightening in his throat with vague horror, because he doesn't, he can't, he won't....

He's crying.

"Fuck," Harrison grinds out through clenched teeth, "fuck, fuck, fuck," and he drives his fist into the top of his desk and then he feels a little better, because his hand hurts like fuck and now he can pretend he's crying from the pain.

He doesn't cry. He never cries. He hasn't cried since....

A year ago. Exactly.

He feels his legs get weak, feels his knees start to give out; and then he's huddled on the floor, squeezing his eyes shut and digging his fingers into the carpet. Hot stinging tears make their traitorous way down his face, and they feel like acid on his skin.

Fuck, he thought, dazedly. Fuck this, fuck Ray, fuck Fraser and the way he fucking kissed, and fuck Jim and Izzy and Pete O'Toole, and fuck Jack Harper, and fuck fucking Tru because he can't do this, he is so fucking screwed and he just can't do this. He's no straight-A student, he's no track star, he's no morgue attendant or med school student or hospital intern; he's a dirt-poor P.I. who's teetering on the edge of alcoholism, who never quite kicked that gambling habit, and he can't be a fucking hero.

Because it's a year too goddamn late.

---

He doesn't remember falling asleep, but the next thing he knows, someone's knocking on the front door, and every blow feels like it's rattling inside his skull.

Go away, he tries to yell, but it comes out more like "Glah," and the knocking continues unabated. Harrison flails his hands around without opening his eyes, feeling for something to hold on to. His elbow whacks against the desk chair, and he grabs the back of it and hauls himself slowly to his feet. His eyelids feel glued together, and he has to scrub his eyes furiously before he can open them.

"Go away!" he yells again, more coherently this time.

The knocking stops. And then a familiar voice says, "Harrison?"

The voice is like a bucket of cold water. Fraser.

Harrison stares at the door, wide-eyed, as the events of the past few hours come crashing back down on him. Fraser, Ray, kissing Fraser, think about that later, the warehouse, Ray's voice....

He rewound. He fucking rewound.

"Harrison," Fraser calls again.

The sound jolts him into action. "Yeah, yeah," he yells, "gimme a minute, just," and he spins around frantically and scans the office for incriminating evidence. The whole spinning thing reminds him of something else, and he looks down and yelps a little when he realizes he's still naked. Apparently he forgot to put on pants before he ran into the office and started weeping like a baby.

"If this is a bad time," Fraser begins, and okay, Fraser's voice and being naked is doing weird things to his brain right now.

Harrison shakes his head vigorously, and winces as his head throbs in protest. "No, no," he calls back, "wait, just-- stay there," and he darts into the back room, where he trips over the bedsheets on the floor and hits the floor with another bone-jarring thump.

He groans and rolls over onto his back, closing his eyes. "Can I start again?" he asks the ceiling plaintively.

If anyone's listening, they don't dignify that with an answer.

Biting back another groan, Harrison grabs the kitchen counter and pulls himself upright, then starts digging through the pile of clothes on the floor. He catches a faint whiff of sour vomit and makes a face; great, now he's gonna have to fucking clean that up.

Back here, Fraser's voice is almost inaudible. "Really, I can come back later--"

"Don't fucking move," Harrison yells, grabbing a crumpled pair of jeans. He hops into them on his way back to the office, and stops in front of the door to do up the buttons and make sure everything's tucked away where it should be. Then he takes a deep breath, steels himself, and unlocks the door and yanks it open.

Fraser's eyes widen at the sight of him. "I, ah," he says, and licks his lips. Harrison forces himself not to stare. "I hope I'm not interrupting anything."

"I wish," Harrison says, and drags him inside.

"Was that really necessary?" Fraser asks, as he slams the door shut and locks it again.

Harrison ignores this. "Okay, quick recap," he says, leaning back against the door and folding his arms over his chest, and kind of wishing he'd had time to grab a shirt. He's acutely aware of the lack of heat in the room, and just as aware of Fraser's eyes on him. "Ray's missing, you're worried, you guys are, like, sleeping together, so what the hell was that kiss about?"

Fraser stares at him with narrowed eyes.

"What kiss?" he asks.

Harrison blinks. "What?"

"What kiss?" Fraser repeats, with a dangerous edge to his voice. "And-- how do you know that?"

Harrison frowns and mentally replays his last comment. Then he closes his eyes and covers his face with his hand.

"I can't believe I said that," he mumbles into his palm.

He hears Fraser's duffel bag drop to the floor with a dull thud, and then Fraser's standing very close to him and he really wishes he had a shirt on.

"Harrison," Fraser says quietly. "What's going on?"

Harrison drops his hand to his side and forces himself to meet Fraser's eyes.

"You remember my sister?" he asks. He has to clear his throat before he can continue. "What I said she could do?"

"Of course," Fraser says, staring at him. His eyes are dark and shrewd. "Why?"

"Yeah, well," Harrison says, and lets his head fall back against the door. "This ain't the first time we had this conversation." He pauses. "Though I was wearing more clothes last time. I liked that part better."

"You're saying," Fraser says after a moment, "that today is being... repeated."

Harrison smirks at Fraser and taps a finger against the side of his nose. "Stellar deduction, Corporal."

Fraser looks around. He seems uncomfortable. "So your sister--"

Harrison feels his smile fade. "Isn't here," he says abruptly. "Wasn't her this time, it was me."

"Ah," Fraser says. He pauses. "Is this usual?"

Harrison can't help it; he laughs. It's all just a little too absurd.

"Not hardly," he says, with a grin that's probably not too pleasant to look at. "Yeah, look, obviously, I pretty much just peeled myself off the floor. I gotta--"

He breaks off, mouth open, as the sheer scope of the I gotta hits him like a cinderblock.

He's gotta call Davis. He has to keep Ray from dying. He has to talk to Izzy again, and deal with Jim again, and he has to clean the puke on the floor, and he's gotta do it all with Fraser, who kissed him last night, and what the hell was that, and who doesn't even remember, because it never happened.

And they're going up against the O'Tooles.

"I can't do this, Tru," he hisses under his breath, and feels Fraser's worried eyes on him.

Tru doesn't answer, but he didn't really expect her to.

Harrison takes a deep breath.

"Okay," he says abruptly, and pushes himself off the door. He points at Fraser. "You, sit down and wait."

Fraser makes no move toward the chair. "Wait for what?" he asks.

Harrison smirks.

"I gotta put my face on," he says, and shoves past Fraser into his apartment.

---

Benton sits stiffly on the metal folding chair, listening to the sound of the shower running and trying to wrap his head around the fact that, in some other reality, he has already been here.

It seems persnickety, he thinks, to quibble about such a small thing when he's already accepted that, in some other other reality, he died once; but there was an epic scale to that, at least, and if he had to accept that someone could turn back time, it made sense that it would be in response to a matter of life and death. But now, it seems, it has happened again, and-- and....

And, why?

Benton's eyes widen, and he stands abruptly. Before he can form a conscious intent, he's through the kitchen and crossing the one-room living area, not unlike the apartment he had in Chicago, before it burned down; and then he's standing outside the bathroom door, turning the knob, and stepping into the billowing clouds of steam.

He can see Harrison's silhouette in the shower stall through the curtain-- head bowed, hands braced against the wall under the showerhead. Benton swallows hard, his throat suddenly dry, and realizes that this is, in fact, a ridiculously rude and stupid thing to do.

But he has to know.

He clears his throat and says loudly, "Harrison."

"Holy crap!" Harrison yells, spinning around.

The movement causes him to lose his balance on the slick tiles, and he starts to fall; his flailing arms catch at the shower curtain, dragging it down with him, and the shower rod sproings off the wall. Benton watches all this with his mouth open in vague horror, torn between wanting to leap in and help, and wanting to quietly and discreetly slip out of the room.

He settles for a careful, "Are you all right?"

Harrison blinks at him dazedly from the floor of the stall, as the hot spray continues to fall on his head. Benton notes with distant relief that at least the shower curtain is covering... anything that needs to be covered.

"Painful as that was," Harrison says finally, propping himself up on his elbows and squinting through the cascading water, "it's a damn good thing you didn't come in five minutes ago."

Benton feels his face flush. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have--"

"No, you shouldn't," Harrison snaps, as he wraps the shower curtain around his waist and stands. "Look, I don't know what passes for, y'know, bathroom etiquette up there in Inukirk--"

"Inuvik," Benton murmurs.

"Yeah, well, my point is, I shouldn't have to lock my own bathroom door when I'm taking a freakin' shower!" Harrison spins the taps furiously, and the water finally cuts off, but not before having flooded the bathroom floor.

He has a perfectly valid point, of course, and Benton sees little benefit in arguing the matter. He simply sets his jaw and asks quietly, "Ray died, didn't he?"

Harrison gives him a sidelong, wary look, and doesn't answer.

Benton sighs and closes his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Was it something we did?"

"You said that yesterday too," Harrison says, after a long pause. "Why're you so keen to take the blame?"

"It's a valid conjecture," Benton says, feeling numb. "Ray left two months ago. If... this... only happened today, the first day I arrived--" He pauses. "Today, or yesterday?"

"I go with yesterday," Harrison says. "Much less people lookin' at you like you're nuts." He clutches the curtain around his waist with his right hand and reaches for the towel rack with his left, and Benton sees a flash of black and white on the inside of his arm-- the tattoo he got with Ray, the ace of spades. It's the first time Benton has seen it, and to his surprise, it looks perfectly natural, as though it belongs there.

Or maybe he shouldn't be surprised. After all, he can't imagine Ray without his tattoo; it's an integral part of his body, as much as his sharklike smile and his unruly hair and the birthmark on the back of his right thigh.

"Dude," Harrison's voice cuts in, and Benton realizes that he's just standing there staring. Harrison is staring back at him, the towel in one hand, still clutching the curtain in the other.

Harrison jerks his head at the door. "You think we can talk about this later, maybe?"

When one has made an utter fool of oneself, Benton thinks, there's really only one way to respond to that.

"Of course," he says mildly, and walks out of the bathroom with his head held high and his back ramrod-straight.

He closes the door behind him, and a moment later, he hears the lock click.

---

"Jesus," Harrison mutters as he locks the door behind Fraser, shaking his head. He balls up the shower curtain and turns around, pitching it into the shower stall.

Damn it, his ass hurts again from landing on it; he'd thought the rewind would at least get rid of an embarrassing bruise. Harrison tries not to count the injuries he's racked up this morning alone. He figures the number would just depress him.

And that's not even his biggest problem, as he looks down and realizes that, despite having jerked off not five minutes ago, he's hard again.

"You really have a crap sense of timing," Harrison tells his dick. "You know that?"

It remains stubbornly silent and perky, so he sighs, steps back into the shower, kicks the downed curtain rod aside, and turns on the water again.

He really needs to get laid, and soon.

And if his overactive hormones think he needs to get laid with Fraser....

Well, he can't fault their taste, at least.

Not gonna happen, Harry, he thinks, stroking mechanically, not gonna happen with either of them, not gonna happen with both of them-- except, at that last thought, a graphic visual flashes before his closed eyelids, and he feels his toes curl and his back arch, and he can't keep from crying out as he comes.

Harrison stuffs his fist in his mouth, two seconds too late, and bites down hard on his knuckles as he slumps against the wall. Fraser has to have heard that, it seems impossible that he didn't, but maybe he finally caught a clue, because the only sound Harrison hears is the roar of his own blood in his ears.

He wonders if Tru ever had rewind days like this one. No wonder she looked so frazzled all the time.

Harrison turns off the water and steps carefully out of the shower, wary of performing an encore of his earlier gymnastics. He wraps the towel around his waist and pokes his head out the bathroom door, and is relieved to see that his bedroom is empty.

As he gets dressed, he tries not to think about the Mountie in the front office, and especially not about how the Mountie and Ray would look, tangled together on his bed.

He doesn't think the bed would fit three people, anyway.

---

"Here we are," Harrison says, cutting the engine and drumming his hands lightly on the steering wheel. "At the morgue. Yay."

Benton glances at him. He looks nervous.

"Are you all right?" Benton asks.

"'Course," Harrison says, giving him a strange look. "Why wouldn't I be?" He pauses. "Other than the monster bruise on my ass, I mean. By the way, did I mention that's your fault?"

"Once or twice," Benton allows.

"Good." Harrison unbuckles his seatbelt and opens the door. "Long as we got that straight."

He hunches his shoulders as they pass through the doors, and Benton watches him carefully; despite his assurances to the contrary, the young man seems rather discomfited by his surroundings. Of course, that doesn't mean anything in itself. Ray, for one, has always hated the morgue. But he suspects that Harrison's tension has a more specific cause.

Harrison's telephone had rung before they left. He answered with a sing-song, "Hi Meredith, 'bye Meredith,", then hung up without waiting for an answer, and the phone didn't ring again.

"Who was that?" Benton asked, curiosity outweighing decorum. He had already surprised Harrison naked in the shower, after all; he supposed they were beyond niceties now.

"My sister," Harrison said shortly.

Benton frowned. "Not--"

"No, not Tru. My other sister." Harrison paused. "Tru's dead," he said, and declined to elaborate.

Now Benton stares at the stiff set of Harrison's shoulders and, with some effort, refrains from commenting. He suspects that this is the first time he has returned to the morgue since his sister's death.

They descend the stairs to the basement in silence, and Harrison leads him down a long hall to a set of glass-windowed double doors. He hesitates before entering, then visibly steels himself and pushes the door open, striding inside.

"Davis," he says, sounding oddly subdued. "How you doin'?"

Benton follows him into the room, looking around. It's a waiting room of some kind, with various instruments lying around on counters, and a red leather sofa in the middle of the floor. The walls are plastered with diagrams of human anatomy.

Then he glances up as the man Harrison addressed as Davis steps out of an office marked "Staff Only". He's a short, stocky man, with dark hair and a beard, and a white lab coat over his shirt and tie. "Harrison," he says, sounding surprised. "It's not-- I'm not late for lunch, am I?"

"Nah," Harrison says, slapping him lightly on the shoulder. Davis eyes his hand dubiously, and Harrison ignores the look. "Listen, D, we gotta talk."

Davis nods, looking at Benton. "And you are?"

Benton holds out his hand automatically. "Corporal Benton Fraser of the R.C.M.P. I'm, ah," he hesitates, "a friend of Harrison's."

"Okay," Davis says, still staring at him. He wipes his hand on his coat before taking Benton's and shaking it.

Harrison's looking around. "Anyone else here?"

"We're short-staffed at the moment," Davis says glumly.

"Yeah," Harrison says. "Is that a no, then?"

"Yes, Harrison, that's a no," Davis says, with a weary roll of his eyes.

Benton can't stay silent anymore. "I'm sorry, but I still fail to see what we're doing here. If Ray is in some kind of trouble--"

"Yeah, yeah, gettin' there," Harrison says. He takes Davis's elbow and steers him to the sofa; the glum-looking man follows reluctantly. "Siddown, Davis, we gotta talk about Tru."

Davis freezes in mid-sit, staring at him. "Harrison!" he hisses, sliding his eyes meaningfully towards Benton.

"He knows," Harrison says, pushing Davis the rest of the way down. "He's that Fraser. Remember? Five years ago, Chicago?"

"Oh," Davis says, twisting around and looking at Fraser with new interest. "How are you doing? Better?"

"Better than dead, yes," Benton says, and walks around to the other side of the sofa, so that Davis doesn't have to turn to see him.

"Davis," Harrison says, "forget Fraser. We gotta talk."

"So you keep saying," Davis mutters.

"Listen," Harrison says, and perches on the arm of the sofa. He scratches furiously at the back of his head, then leans in a little. "Here's the thing. I, um. I think Tru passed the calling on to me."

Davis stares at him.

"You repeated a day," he says slowly.

"That or it's an acid flashback," Harrison says. He pauses. "Which I only did once, by the way."

"You have the calling."

"Looks like," Harrison agrees.

Davis closes his eyes and scrubs his hand across his face.

"We're doomed," he says mournfully.

---

Davis always suspected the universe had a cruel sense of humor. Now he knows for sure. Harrison Davies as the appointed guardian of fate?

He would almost laugh, if it didn't make him want to cry.

It's not that he doesn't like Harrison. Well... not really. He's just seen how often Tru wasted valuable time on her repeat days trying to bail her younger brother out of one jam after another. Harrison can't be the savior; he's the charity case.

He doesn't dislike Harrison, anyway. Otherwise he wouldn't have agreed to meet for lunch. Except that he almost didn't, because every time they spoke Davis got the distinct impression that Harrison was deliberately needling him, so when he called a week ago and suggested the anniversary-of-death lunch, his first thought was that it was just more of the same.

"Oh, come on," Harrison wheedled, when Davis muttered something about being behind in his paperwork. "It's, like, a Davies family tradition. We celebrate our feelings of loss and abandonment with burgers and pie."

"Yes, but I'm not a Davies," Davis pointed out. "One letter off, I know, but--"

"Yeah, but you're the closest I got, right? Meredith's off tilling the potato fields or whatever, Dad's who the fuck knows where and fuck him, and everyone else is kind of dead right now." He paused. "Besides, you and me, we're the only ones who knew her. Really knew her, I mean."

"I thought Meredith was a lawyer," Davis said, baffled.

"So not the point," Harrison said.

And so he said yes to the lunch, and found with some surprise that he was looking forward to it.

Now, however, he's finding it hard to remember why, because Harrison is irritating the hell out of him.

"Hey, D," Harrison says, snapping his fingers in front of Davis's nose. Davis scowls. "Lucky Penny, Fingers of Dawn-- you gettin' this?"

Davis sets his pen aside and folds his hands deliberately over his notepad, the top page still fresh and pristine. "Harrison, when I asked you to describe yesterday's events, I didn't actually mean the events at the track."

"Well, yeah," Harrison says, unperturbed. "But I left my list at home, and I gotta get this down before I forget everything."

Davis thinks wistfully of Tru's near-eidetic memory. "If your recall is spotty," he says reprovingly, "maybe we could start with the important things."

"You'd think this was important if you'd seen my last bank statement!"

"Harrison," the Mountie says.

Harrison slumps down in his chair with a sigh. "Yeah, yeah."

Davis eyes the Mountie with interest. Even in jeans and a flannel shirt, he's like Dudley Do-Right come to life, with a Ken doll face under thick, glossy dark hair-- exactly the kind of guy Davis instinctively hates, except there's something oddly self-conscious about Benton Fraser that suggests he's not exactly comfortable with the effect his face has on people. He hasn't said much since he arrived, but Davis suspects it would be a mistake to dismiss him. He's taking in everything with wide, alert eyes, and Davis can almost see the wheels turning in his brain.

"Well?" Fraser prompts Harrison.

And that's another thing, the way Harrison actually listens to the guy, seems almost to defer to him. The only person Harrison ever deferred to was Tru. But at the Mountie's prodding, he sighs and leans forward.

"All right," he says. "Ray did this undercover gig a few years back with the O'Toole family."

He pauses, and Davis blinks at him. "Sorry, who?"

Harrison rolls his eyes. "Seriously, what is wrong with you people? Colin O'Toole! Irish wiseguys!" He pauses again, then remarks to the room in general, "Ever notice how Irish things tend to fuck up my life? I think I'm gonna boycott."

"Okay," Davis says dubiously, and writes O'Toole --> Irish boycott on his notepad. Then he blinks, crosses out boycott, and writes mob instead.

Harrison sighs again. "Okay, a little background for the remedial students in the room." He waves his hands as he speaks, for emphasis. "Irish mob and Mafia in this town, they go way back. Turf wars, Southie versus North End, et cetera. The Italians got the upper hand for a while, had the Irish guys basically working for 'em. Then about thirty years ago, here comes Whitey Bulger and the Winter Hill gang, takin' over things. With me so far?"

"Mostly," Davis admits, scribbling furiously.

Harrison nods; apparently mostly is good enough for him. "Right, well, Bulger had FBI guys on his side, feeding him information. Big honkin' scandal-type thing. Colin O'Toole's one of his right-hand guys, running his own little band of thugs. Then in '95, Bulger's about to be indicted, he skips town, and the whole thing pretty much falls apart. Boss is gone, everyone's running around with their heads cut off, a few factions try making names for themselves, and some of 'em are better at it than others. O'Toole was one of the best."

He pauses.

"Then," he continues, when no ones says anything, "comes Ray. It's a bird, it's a plane, it's Super Undercover Cop. Seven years ago, he comes in, makes nice with O'Toole, he's there for a couple months and then Colin goes down for homicide, and I'm thinking that's not just a coincidence. So Colin's gone, baby brother Pete takes over, job's done, everything's hunky-dory, right? Only now Ray's back, and from what I hear, he's Pete's new best friend."

"Obviously," Davis says, "if O'Toole killed him, something changed."

"We started asking questions," Fraser says flatly. "He learned Ray's true identity."

"Maybe, maybe," Harrison says, waving his hands enthusiastically. "We don't know, right? Could be anything happened."

Davis begins doubtfully, "Really, the most likely scenario, statistically speaking--"

"Statistics, schamistics," Harrison retorts, then frowns. "Schma-- schmadist-- my elbow. We can't rule anything out, right? Ray's gotta do everything different," he finishes triumphantly, and Davis thinks he can hear an echo of Tru in that last sentence.

Fraser nods decisively. "So let's find Ray."

"Oh, sure," Harrison says. "You put a Lo-jack on him?"

"He has a point," Davis says. "You said you spoke to a friend yesterday who had connections to these people."

"I wouldn't say friend," Harrison says, looking a little green.

Davis lays his pen down and sits back in his chair. "Oh, well, okay. Obviously, if we're talking semantics, we shouldn't try to save your friend's life after all."

"Sarcasm is not a good look for you," Harrison tells him severely.

In response, Davis pushes his phone across the desk.

Harrison rolls his eyes and heaves a huge sigh. "Yeah, right," he says, and pulls his cell phone out of his pocket.

Davis observes silently as Harrison dials, noting the nervous twitch in his fingers and the tic under his left eye. When Harrison raises the phone to his ear, he slouches even further down into the chair, until Davis half-expects him to slide right off.

"Izzy!" His voice is too bright, too cheerful. "Yeah, it's-- yeah, it's me. Um, I hate to come right out and ask, but I need a favor."

He listens for a few seconds, giving Davis a sickly grin. Then he says, "I need you to call in a marker with Jim Kerry." He pauses. "Yeah-- yeah, I know I'll owe you, but this is important."

After another silence, he lowers his voice, shooting Davis an uneasy look. "Saturday night?"

Davis frowns at Fraser. Fraser just cocks his head and does this weird kind of facial shrug thing.

"I'll be there," Harrison says, and his voice cracks a little on the last word.

He flips the phone shut and slips it back into his pocket, studiously avoiding Davis's stare.

Davis has to ask. "Did you just pimp yourself out for information?"

"No," Harrison says indignantly, sitting up straighter. He squirms a little in his seat, still refusing to meet Davis's eyes. "I'm just gonna, I'm just helping out a friend, is all."

Fraser's eyes narrow. "Helping out how, exactly?"

"Well, that," Harrison says, "is none of your business, and you guys were the ones talking semantics, so zip it."

Davis frowns again. Harrison's right, of course, but it still doesn't sit well with him.

"So!" Harrison says brightly, slapping the arms of his chair and rocking to his feet. "Who's ready to play the ponies, huh? Don't worry," he adds with a grin, as Davis opens his mouth to protest, "it's work-related." He paused. "Hey, do I get an expense account?"

"From whom?" Davis counters.

Harrison rubs the back of his neck. "You got a point there."

Fraser stands and gives Davis a cordial nod. "It was a pleasure meeting you."

"Likewise," Davis says automatically.

"Aw," Harrison says. "What a Hallmark moment. Come on, we don't got all day."

Davis watches them leave. Then he looks at his watch and starts silently counting down the seconds. Ten, nine, eight, seven--

The door opens again, and Harrison's head pokes back in. "Davis--"

"Lucky Penny," Davis says wearily, "and Fingers of Dawn."

"Sweet," Harrison says, and ducks out again.

---

The sign outside the racetrack's betting parlor proclaims it to simply be "The Track", and Benton has to admire their dedication to truth in advertising, if not necessarily their originality. He thinks about saying as much, but Harrison doesn't seem likely to pay attention; he's storming through the door, moving like a small but deadly jungle cat stalking its prey, and Benton catches the door before it slams shut behind him and follows at a more sedate pace.

Whoever he's after has to wait, however, as Harrison stops at the counter and fills out a betting slip. He hands over two crumpled twenties and takes the slip, and only then does he make a beeline for a tall, lanky man with thinning blond hair, who's watching the current race on one of the television screens.

The blond man sees him coming and takes a wary step back. "Harry--" he begins.

Harrison grabs him by the collar and slams him back against the wall. Benton purses his lips thoughtfully and wonders how far he should let this go.

A woman materializes beside him, well-dressed and severe-looking, with her hair pulled tightly back from her face. "Is there a problem here?" she asks, looking like she would very much like the answer to be no.

Benton obliges. "Certainly not. Just a minor dispute."

"Uh-huh." She doesn't look convinced.

"You listen to me, you piece of shit," Harrison is snarling. "You owe Isaac and I'm callin' it in. You tell me where I can find Peter O'Toole's new right-hand man, and maybe I don't put your head through the freaking window."

Check it out, Ray's voice whispers in Benton's ear. The kid's learned from the best.

Benton turns slowly, dreading what he'll see; but to his relief, the only person standing next to him is the woman with the bun. It was simply a hallucination of memory, not an actual ghost.

He has learned not to take these things for granted.

"I assure you," Benton says, turning back to the altercation, "we have the situation completely in hand."

"Five minutes," the woman says. "Then I'm calling security."

"Fair enough," Benton says, and she walks away.

Unfortunately, the blond man in Harrison's grip seems less than impressed by his threats. He rolls his eyes and grabs one of Harrison's hands, prying the fingers from his collar and bending them backwards at an alarming angle. Harrison's mouth opens in a silent yelp and his knees start to buckle, but he doesn't let go.

This far, then, and no more.

"Excuse me," Benton says pleasantly, and steps forward. He closes his hand over the blond man's, and then it's the three of them holding hands in a bizarre parody of affection-- Harrison still doggedly holding on to his captive, the man in question gripping his hand in turn, and Benton's fingers wrapping around them both.

He keeps his voice mild. "If you could just answer the young man's question?"

"Fraser," Harrison hisses out of the side of his mouth, "I got this."

"I can see that," Benton says dryly. He keeps his eyes on the blond man's face. "Well?"

The man sneers at him. "What's this, Harry, you got a cop doin' your dirty work?"

"Oh, Fraser ain't a cop, Jim," Harrison says, with relish. "You wish he was a cop, so he couldn't squash you like a bug."

Benton opens his mouth to set the record straight, then closes it again. It won't hurt for this Jim to labor briefly under a misapprehension.

"As I see it," he says instead, "this is a simple matter of reciprocity. Harrison will appropriate your debt to your friend Isaac, in exchange for information now." He deliberately releases the clasped hands in front of him and lets his arm fall to his side.

Jim gives him a long, slow look-- sizing him up, Benton think. Then he lets go of Harrison and raises his hands in surrender.

"Excellent choice," Benton says, pleased.

Harrison flashes Jim a sarcastic smile, massaging his fingers. "Thank you, that's nice. So where?"

Jim cocks his head to the side and straightens his jacket with a faint smirk. "Try Bagwell's place. There's a game on."

"Really?" Harrison's eyes light up.

Jim snorts. "Yeah, with a five grand buy-in. Good luck with that."

"Foiled again," Harrison mutters to Benton.

"It's for the best," Benton assures him.

Jim grabs his arm as he turns to leave. "You and me, we're even now, right?"

"Not even close," Harrison snaps, yanking his arm free. "You an' Isaac are even. I'm still pissed."

"You gotta learn to let go of things, Harry. Grudges ain't good for your health."

In response, Harrison just points a warning finger at him as he backs toward the door. He does, however, remember to stop at the counter and collect his winnings on the way.

"Thank you kindly," Benton tells Jim. He nods at the well-dressed woman, then follows Harrison outside to the car.

"I assume he means a card game of some kind," he adds, once he is safely ensconced in the passenger seat, with his seatbelt buckled.

"Yeah," Harrison says mournfully, as he starts the car. "Five grand. Just a little out of my league." He shakes his head. "Damn, if I coulda put more on Fingers of Dawn-- I was just lucky I scrounged as much cash as I did."

Benton hesitates, trying to decide how to frame the question. "Far be it from me to pry," he says finally, "but you appeared to harbor a certain animosity toward that man inside."

"Correction," Harrison says, pulling into traffic. "I wanted to kick his ass. You're allowed to use grown-up words, you know."

"I did use 'grown-up' words," Benton says, miffed.

"And there's your first mistake."

Benton thinks this is just his way of deflecting the question, and doesn't respond. A few minutes later, Harrison sighs.

"Jim's the only one who knew we were looking for Ray," he says. "Yesterday, I mean. If, and that's an if, that's why he was killed--"

He breaks off, and Benton nods slowly. "Then this Jim must have tipped them off."

"Ergo," Harrison says, "animosity."

Benton stares out the window, suddenly wishing that he hadn't been quite so polite to the man.

---

Bagwell's is a nondescript bar in Southie, owned by Lionel Bagwell himself, and favored watering hole of people in O'Toole's circle. Harrison isn't in that circle, isn't even in orbit of that circle, but he's met Bags once or twice, enough so he thinks he can talk his way inside.

Fraser's having none of it. "It's an unnecessary risk. We'll wait here until Ray emerges."

"And what if whatever got him killed is happening right now?" Harrison retorts. "All we know, he coulda pissed someone off by taking their money, or borrowed too much and lost it."

Fraser gives him a narrow-eyed look.

"Not that I ever did any of those things," Harrison adds.

Fraser nods thoughtfully. "And the black eye and the split lip?"

He grins. "Cheating husband. Was not in the mood for a photo shoot."

They sit in silence for a few minutes.

"Hey," Harrison says, "ask me about the bruise on my ass sometime."

Fraser sighs. "I said I was sorry."

"And now I get to bitch about it. Deal." He unbuckled his seatbelt and opened the door. "I'm going in."

"Harrison--" Fraser grabs at him, fruitlessly.

He gets out, then pokes his head back in the car. "Go inside, check out the men's room. If Ray's there, I'll have him meet you there."

"This is not a good idea," Fraser warns him. His voice is taking on a harder, sarcastic edge that Harrison doesn't think he's ever heard before.

"So stay here and wait," Harrison says, "and I'll go make some quick cash."

"With what money?"

"Money," Harrison scoffs. He winks. "I don't need money. I got connections."

Fraser mutters something under his breath and gets out of the car. He doesn't look happy.

"See?" Harrison says cheerfully. "Teamwork."

"You know," Fraser says crossly, "you really are a lot like Ray."

Harrison's smile fades as he watches Fraser cross the street. The kiss, which he's been doing such a stellar job of repressing, now slams full-force to the forefront of his memory, and he feels an instinctive surge of heat somewhere below his belly.

Get a grip, he orders himself, and jogs across the street after Fraser. Because that just made it blindingly obvious, didn't it? Fraser's not actually attracted to him; he just reminds Fraser of Ray, and that was all it had been. He's flattered by the comparison, of course, not that he'd ever admit it, but it's still kind of depressing.

Which it shouldn't be. It should be a relief.

He shakes his head as he slows to a walk. I'm hopeless.

Fraser's already gone in; he waits around outside for a few minutes, so no one will think they're together and get suspicious. There's a guy smoking across the street, leaning against a chain-link fence and watching him, and Harrison thinks about asking to bum a cigarette, just so he doesn't look conspicuous, but he figures there's only so far he can go in the pursuit of duty. Instead he glances at his watch a few times, making like he's waiting for somebody, and then he shakes his head and mutters disgustedly to himself and goes inside.

Bags is behind the bar as usual, cleaning glasses; Fraser's nowhere in sight. Harrison leans across the bar and grins. "Hey, Bags. Remember me?"

"Buy-in's five grand," Bags says without looking up.

Harrison struggles to hold on to his grin. "Come on, man, you know me. I'm good for it."

Bags sighs and sets the glass aside. "Harrison--"

"Look," he says, pulling his roll of winnings out of his pocket. "Look, I'm on a roll today, right? I can't cover the entry fee, but just get me in there and I'll do the rest."

Bags gives him a slow, assessing look.

Harrison bites his lip, tasting imminent victory-- so close, and still so far. "Listen," he says, thinking fast, "I got a new source at the track, he's feeding me info about the ponies. You spot me, maybe I can pass that information on."

"Really," Bags says. His eyes take on a calculating gleam. "Reliable source?"

Harrison slaps his hand down on his stack of bills. "How do you think I got all this?"

Bags nods slowly, staring at the pile of money.

Harrison grins and tucks the cash back into his jacket. "Come on. Whaddya say?"

Bags looks at him a moment longer, then tosses his dishrag onto the counter.

"Come on," he says, turning and walking out from behind the bar.

Harrison follows with another grin and a distinct bounce to his step.

Bags opens the door of the back room and slips inside, closing it behind him. Harrison waits, tapping his foot impatiently, and resists the urge to press his ear against the door. A couple minutes later, the door opens again and Bags beckons him inside.

He steps into a cloud of cigarette smoke and manages not to cough.

"This is Harrison," Bags says. "He's playin' with house money."

"Yo," Harrison says, waving.

The six men around the poker table stare at him in silence, and he takes the opportunity to squint through the smoke and study them back. There's Lou, there's-- oh crap, that's Paulie, there's a couple guys he doesn't recognize, and that guy, there, with the dark hair and the pale, narrow eyes, that has to be Peter O'Toole. And sitting next to him with a lit cigarette dangling from his fingers, watching Harrison with a face like cut granite...

...is Ray.

Harrison smirks at him. "So who's ready to play some poker?"

---

Ray thinks maybe he just had a little heart attack.

One minute he's just sitting there, with a straight in one hand and a smoke in the other, and he hasn't even thought about being Ray Kowalski for two months now, never mind anyone Ray Kowalski used to know; and the next, Harrison fucking Davies walks through the door.

He doesn't think he reacts, takes a long drag to cover just in case, but his mind's working so fast he can barely see. It can't be a coincidence-- he knows Harrison doesn't travel in these circles, made a point of checking, back when he first arrived, because running into anybody he knew would be a bad thing. No, Harrison tracked him down for some specific reason, and the victorious grin that spreads across his face when his eyes light on Ray both confirms his hypothesis and makes him want to punch the kid in the head.

This could all go so very, very wrong.

The bartender leaves again, and Harrison gives the guy a friendly smack on the shoulder as he passes, and if Ray really were the Neil McKenna he's pretending to be, he'd be marking Lionel Bagwell down on his hit list right about now.

Harrison pulls up a chair and flops down, sprawling wide-legged. Ray thinks if he gets any more pleased with himself they'll have to surgically remove his tongue from his own ass. "Deal me in," he says, rubbing his hands together.

Pete leans back in his own chair, exhales a cloud of smoke, and squints at him. "Do I know you?"

Bad move, Harry, Ray thinks.

Harrison opens his mouth.

"I do," Paulie growls, before he can say anything.

Harrison pales, and Ray resists the urge to roll his eyes. This is a whole new world of trouble, right here. This can't be covered with just an eye-roll. This is a good ten-minute freak-out at least.

When Harrison speaks, his voice is even enough. "Hey, man, that was a long time ago, and I kept my end of the deal. We got no quarrel."

Paulie glowers at him, and Pete leans forward and stubs out his cigarette in the ashtray. "If we're done playing catch-up, does anybody want to deal?"

Ray stares daggers at Harrison, but for the first few hands, he behaves himself; keeps his mouth shut, rakes in a respectable pile of chips, enough so he's usually up but not enough to piss anybody off. Ray's just starting to relax when it's Harrison's turn to deal.

"Anyone wanna hit the can first?" he asks, glancing around the table as he shuffles.

"No," Billy says flatly.

Ray thinks maybe Harrison's eyes linger a little bit longer on him, and he feels a sudden thrill of anticipation. This is it, then; this is why Harrison's here.

He stubs out his cigarette and pushes his chair back, standing. "I do. Don't bother dealin' me in."

The whole time he's walking for the door, he expects somebody to stop him. Nobody does. Harrison doesn't even look at him as he passes.

The restrooms are in the same hallway that leads to the back room. Ray stops outside the men's room and takes a deep breath, bracing himself. Then he pushes the door open.

He's not sure what he expects to find waiting him, but he damn well doesn't expect it to be Ben.

And yet there he is, leaning against the row of sinks and watching the door, his usual bland mask replaced with a look of naked hope.

Ray feels something lurch free in his chest, and then he's crossing the bathroom in two wide strides, closing the distance between them so fast it makes him dizzy. Ben stares at him, the hope gradually giving way to a broad, relieved grin.

"Ray," he begins, and Ray grabs his head and shuts him up with a kiss.

He doesn't know how long it lasts, would gladly have kept his eyes shut and kept going, but oxygen soon becomes an issue and he pulls back reluctantly, gasping for air. Ben's eyes are heavy-lidded and glazed-looking, and he's never looked better to Ray than he does now.

Ray licks his lips; when he speaks, his voice is hoarse. "You never learn, do you, Ben?"

"Probably not," Ben agrees, just as roughly. "Learn what, exactly?"

Ray lets his hands drop to Ben's shoulders, and buries his face in the crook of Ben's neck. "Vecchio," he says, his voice muffled. "Hotel room. You called him Ray too."

"Ah." He feels Ben rest a cheek against his head, imagines Ben closing his eyes. "I do apologize."

"Damn straight ya do." Ray doesn't raise his head. "Neil McKenna. Nice to meet you."

"And you," Ben says, after a moment.

Ray takes a deep breath, smells sweat and clean air and something painfully, heartbreakingly Ben, then takes another deep breath and steps back. The loss of contact hurts, but it's necessary.

He runs a hand through his hair, trying to compose himself. Ben watches him with dark, lust-filled eyes.

God. He can't think like this.

But he has to, so he leans back against one of the empty stalls and folds his arms over his chest. There are too many questions running through his head to pick just one, and he settles for the catch-all, "So what's up?"

Ben tells him.

It takes an effort of superhuman restraint, but he manages not to break the mirror.

In fact, he barely gets the chance to begin, "What the fuck," when the yelling starts in the back room.

Ray and Ben exchange a grim look. "Harrison," they say in unison.

Ben starts for the door, but Ray stops him with a hand on his arm. "Hey, whoa, wait! You're not even supposed to be here, remember?"

Ben stops. He's vibrating under Ray's hand, and it's making it hard to concentrate.

"Go," he says finally, with a nod, and Ray's out the door like a shot.

---

Harrison has no idea what happened. One second he was drawing a card, and the next, Paulie's pinning him back against the table with a hand around his throat.

He lets out an undignified yelp, and Paulie grabs at the front of his jacket, trying to yank it off. He squirms, feeling poker chips dig into his back, and across the table Pete drawls, "What the fuck, Paulie?"

"This prick is cheating," Paulie growls.

"I am not!" Harrison says, affronted. He's innocent for once, and the heady rush of indignation loosens his tongue. "What am I, stupid? You think I'm gonna cheat in this room?"

Paulie's still tugging at his jacket. "He's got an ace, I saw it--"

Harrison rolls his eyes. "It's a tattoo, you moron. Look, I'll show you." He pushes at Paulie's arm, and Paulie steps back reluctantly and lets him up, still glowering.

Harrison shrugs off his jacket and turns out his arm, showing off the exposed skin below his sleeve. "See?" He turns around, showing it around the table, and sees Ray in the doorway, watching and looking amused despite himself. "See? No cards. Just ink."

"Sit the fuck down, Paulie," Ray says, and smacks Paulie on the back of his head as he squeezes past to his seat. He lights another cigarette, and Harrison stares; he didn't think Ray smoked. "One more hand and I'm out," he says around the filter. "I got shit to do."

"Me too," Harrison announces to no one in particular, and sits down with a huff. "I'm not playin' with guys who think I cheat."

Paulie snorts. Pete doesn't even look at him; he's staring at Ray. "Neil?" he asks, in a low voice.

Ray leans over and whispers something in Pete's ear, and Harrison tries not to look like he's watching too closely.

He loses two thousand bucks in the next hand, leaving him only fifty dollars up, and is surprised to realize he really doesn't care.

He found Ray, and he's getting Ray out of there, and that's good enough for him.

Maybe he can do this thing after all.

---

Harrison leaves first, squeezing past Pete and Ray on his way to the door and apologizing as he jostles Pete's arm. Pete just ignores him, like he's some kind of bug that's not quite annoying enough to swat, and that right there is one of the reasons Ray kind of likes Pete.

Harrison also taps Ray meaningfully on the shoulder as he passes, and Ray twitches and tells himself not to throttle the kid. Yet.

When he leaves, Ben's waiting outside, across the street. Ben doesn't say anything, or even look at Ray; he just turns and starts walking away, and Ray follows him like they rehearsed it. He hangs a couple blocks back, on the opposite side of the street, and the walk takes forever but of course Ben wouldn't be breathing hard, and after a few years of living on the tundra Ray's really not either.

Maybe half an hour, maybe forty-five minutes later, after the streets have changed, gotten richer and then poorer again, Ben stops in front of a door and knocks. Ray doesn't wait to watch him go in, just walks on past and back around the block, and when he's satisfied he's alone, he saunters up to the same door and raps sharply against it.

It's a detective agency, which he did not expect. HTD INVESTIGATIONS, the sign claims, and Ray's got more than an inkling of who those initials belong to, as well as some strong ideas about what he's going to do to their owner when he sees him.

And just like that, the door opens, and Harrison Davies is grinning at him, like some sort of genie or demon or something that's summoned by a thought.

Well, Harrison always did kind of remind him of a bad fairy.

Before Harrison can even open his mouth, Ray grabs the front of his shirt and balls it up in his fists, marching the kid backwards into the room. Harrison grips Ray's wrists and makes placating noises, but Ray ignores him and keeps going till his back is against the wall.

"Hi, Harry," he says, and smiles.

Judging from Harrison's expression, it's not a very nice smile.

"Ray," Harrison squeaks. He digs his fingers in tighter. "You're alive! Look at you!"

"I'm alive?" Ray repeats, incredulous. "You're the one who just walked into a five-K poker game with five major players in organized crime, you just seriously compromised my cover, and oh yeah-- playing with house money, you dumb fuck?" He shakes Harrison a little, manages at the last second to hold himself back so it's more like a vigorous nudge; he's so pissed he can hardly see straight, and he recognizes this blind rage, knows how easy it can get out of control. "I'm alive? You're alive, and wouldn't Darwin be fucking proud!"

Harrison stares up at him, wide-eyed. Ray bares his teeth. He realizes he's breathing hard, and suddenly he can't help remembering what happened the last time he and Harrison stood this close.

The kid's eyelids start to droop, languid and seductive, and his nostrils flare. Clearly he's feeling the hormones too.

Damn. Those are some serious bedroom eyes.

He catches himself staring at the old cut on Harrison's lip, wondering what it would taste like, and he jumps like he's been scalded and lets go, taking a quick step back.

Harrison rubs slowly at his throat, still watching Ray with that heavy-lidded gaze. It has to be unintentional; no way would he be that blatant on purpose.

Ray thinks.

"Ray!" Ben's voice jerks him back to reality, or what passes for reality in Ray's universe, and he takes a deep breath. "You made it!"

"Yeah, Ben," he says, still staring at Harrison. It can't be on purpose. "I made it."

Harrison averts his eyes, suddenly fascinated by the carpet. His hand slides around to the back of his neck.

"I got... stuff," he says. "You guys catch up. I'll, uh, be back later."

He beats a hasty retreat and locks the door behind him.

Slowly Ray raises his head, looking at Ben, and oh. His eyes-- dark and hungry, staring at him, and one kiss in the men's room at Bagwell's was not nearly enough.

Ben clears his throat. "How, ah, how long can you stay away?"

"Couple hours," Ray says, staring back so hard he's practically vibrating with it.

"We should talk," Ben says, after a silence.

"Yeah," Ray says. "That can wait."

---

Harrison downs the shot in one gulp and slams the glass down with a depressing sense of déjà vu.

Last time he was here, Fraser was with him. Fraser got silly, and then Fraser got drunk, or maybe it was the other way around; but he wasn't drinking alone at three in the afternoon, he was having a night out with a friend, and afterwards they stumbled home and Fraser kissed him, and he's starting to realize that he's doomed to jerk off to that particular memory for a long time to come, while Fraser will never even know it happened.

It's a creepy idea. It makes him feel like some kind of weird inter-dimensional sex offender.

It's also incredibly depressing.

"Same again," he says when the bartender walks by, shoving the shot glass across the bar.

"Long day?" the bartender asks, pouring.

Harrison snorts. "You got no idea, my friend."

"You're not gonna tell me about it, are you?" The bartender sounds worried, like maybe he missed that day in bartending school.

Harrison snorts again. Sure; he's going to walk into his neighborhood bar and be all, My ex-one-night-stand's boyfriend kissed me, and now I can't stop thinking about it, and as far as he's concerned it never happened, and oh yeah, I still wanna jump the first guy's bones, and did I mention they're both men? And oh, hey, look, I am too!

"Hell no," he says, and slams the second shot.

The tequila burns going down. He's starting to feel better already.

---

"We did not just do that," Ray says.

Benton doesn't move. "I'm afraid we did."

Ray groans and gives him a light shove; Benton reluctantly obeys and rolls off of him, onto the carpet. Ray slings an arm over his eyes and groans again.

"What are the odds," he asks, "that Harry's gonna walk through that door right now?"

Benton eyes the door. "Higher than I'd care to contemplate."

"So we should get up."

"We should," Benton agrees.

Silence.

"Damn, that was good," Ray says.

"Likewise, Ray," Benton says.

---

"Seriously, dude," the bartender says. "Slow down, okay? Take a breather. Do some laps."

"Keep pouring," Harrison growls, and buries his head in his arms.

---

They clean up in the bathroom, bumping into each other in the small space as they move back and forth and exchanging small, silly smiles at the contact. Benton feels giddy with it, flushed like a schoolboy on his first date. He can't take his eyes off Ray.

Ray, who's alive and warm and deliciously here. His hair is shorter now, shorter than it ever was in Chicago and severely spiked, and the nascent beard is gone, replaced by more familiar stubble; his mouth tastes dry and ashy, as though he's been smoking; he looks tired, and older, and more distant than he has in a long time.

But he's here, and he's alive, and even if he dies tonight, Benton got to touch him one last time.

But he's not going to die tonight. Benton won't let that happen. He'll drag Ray back over the border by force if he has to.

"So, give me details," Ray says finally, breaking the comfortable silence; Benton sighs, recognizing the return to business, but he answers readily enough.

"According to Harrison, we found you in an abandoned warehouse around two a.m., apparently a popular spot for executions. You...." He swallows. "You hadn't been dead long."

Ray's quiet for a minute, splashing water on his face and wiping it off, then staring at his reflection in the mirror with a hard, unreadable expression.

"How's he doing?" he asks eventually.

Benton blinks and switches mental gears. "Harrison?"

"Yeah." Ray doesn't look away from the mirror. "How is he?"

"Not very well," Benton admits. "His sister is, ah, dead."

Ray's head jerks around, and he stares at Benton. "Tru's dead?"

Benton nods. "He thinks she passed her gift on to him."

"Shit," Ray mutters, and his whole body seems to sag. He stares at the floor, then glances up again. "She was a good kid. He say what happened?"

"He wasn't forthcoming with the details, no." Benton pauses. "But I believe he has been deeply affected by it. I have observed certain patterns of self-destructive behavior, and...." He lowers his voice. "I believe he's been drinking."

Ray looks unconvinced. "So a guy has a drink now and then. Hell, he's entitled."

"Perhaps," Benton allows. "Still, I am... concerned."

Ray sighs. "Yeah. Me too."

---

"She was just supposed to be there, right?" Harrison waves his arms expansively. "She's my big sister, she's supposed to look out for me-- she always looked out for me, you know? Dragging my ass out of one mess after another...."

He trails off. The bartender stares at him, expressionless.

"You're not listening at all, are you?" Harrison asks.

"Not really," the bartender says. "But keep talking. I'm multi-tasking."

"Yeah?" Harrison squints. "You don't look too tasked."

"I'm writing my thesis," the bartender explains. "In theory, anyway. I think better when I'm ignoring people. Entoptic imagery in Palaeolithic cave art is a lot more interesting when the other option is listening to people bitch."

Harrison scratches his head. "Sounds... very academic."

"The problem is, it's all been done," the bartender says dolefully. "There's just nothing new to say. You know what happened last week? I found someone else's thesis online on my exact same topic. On the Internet."

"Ouch," Harrison says with a wince.

"So anyway," the bartender says. "Keep going. I haven't got this much work done in ages."

"Work," Harrison echoes.

"Theoretical work."

"My favorite kind." Harrison glances at his watch and sighs. "Nah, I gotta go."

"Of course you do," the bartender says, looking mournful again.

Harrison stands and slaps one of his hard-won twenties on the bar. "You here every Thursday?"

"Just can't stay away," the bartender says.

Harrison winks at him. "Catch you later, then."

After all, someone ought to benefit from his existence. Someone who wasn't dead.

---

The second Harrison steps through the door, Ray knows Ben was right. They have a problem.

Harrison's visibly tipsy, swaying a little in the doorway as he squints into the office at them-- Ray, leaning back in the desk chair, with his hands behind his head and his boots on the desk, and Ben sitting ramrod-straight in the folding chair. He scowls. "Get your feet off my shit."

Ray swings his legs off the desk and pushes the chair back and forth a few times. "You're doin' good, kid. Got your own rolly chair and everything."

"Thanks for the validation," Harrison mutters. He shrugs off his jacket and lets it fall to the floor.

Ray frowns at Ben and shrugs, and Ben presses his lips together.

"Listen," Ray says awkwardly, and stands. "I'm sorry about Tru."

He doesn't say anything else, because there's nothing else to say. If Harrison wants to talk about it, he will.

Harrison's eyes narrow. "Thanks."

So he doesn't want to talk about it. Ray sighs and glances at his watch, wondering how much they need to know, and more importantly how much he has time to explain.

"Ben filled me in, so we'll skip the play-by-play," he says. "What you guys need to know is, far as I'm concerned, Pete's a friend. Someone's put a hit on him, he thinks maybe the Italians, maybe someone in his own gang, he wants me to find out who." He gives Harrison a hard look. "I didn't think I was getting that close, but maybe I know something I didn't think I knew. Any of this ringing a bell?"

Harrison seems to be having trouble focusing. "What-- no, no. Look, I don't know shit. We just found you like that."

Ben's frowning at him, like he's a puzzle with a piece missing and Ben can't figure out where it goes, if for the sake of metaphor Ben was really bad at puzzles. But the truth is he's scarily good at them, and when he asks, "Why would Mr. O'Toole come to you?" Ray's stomach gives a lurch.

He does not have time to go into this.

"He's got reasons," is all he says. "Look, story is, I'm a friend of the family from out of town. My cover was never blown, so me bein' back here shouldn't turn any heads. But obviously--"

"Someone's head got turned," Harrison finishes. He ambles into the kitchen and opens the fridge, bending over to peer inside; Ray leans back against the desk and watches him narrowly, and maybe enjoys the view a little too. "Have you considered ditching the stiletto heels? Maybe a more sedate, professional look."

"Oh yeah, I was asking for it," Ray says dryly, and kicks Ben in the shin. Harrison's grabbing a beer.

Ben twists around in his seat and sighs. "Perhaps I should handle this," he says in a low voice.

"Be my freakin' guest," Ray says. "I'd rather be with the mob. Let me know how it goes."

Ben turns back to look at Ray, his eyes dark with some unreadable emotion. "You could have told me," he says, still softly.

Ray shakes his head, feels his lips twist in a rueful grin. "Sorry, Ben. Sealed file."

"What reason do you have to trust this man?" Ben's starting to sound desperate. "If he knows who you are, this could be a trap--"

"That's not it," Ray says. "Trust me."

"I trust you," Ben says, standing; that hard, sarcastic edge is creeping into his voice, the one Ray fucking hates. "It's the ruthless professional criminal about whom I have my doubts."

Ray straightens, so they're standing nose-to-nose, and he's reminded of countless times spent in the two-seven's bullpen in just this position, except now he's feeling less compelled to punch Ben and more to just throw him down on the desk and kiss him senseless. But the irritation's still there, and it makes it easier to resist. "Trust my fucking judgment then, my, my instinct, okay? It ain't Pete."

Ben hesitates, reaches out and grabs Ray's shoulder, curling callused fingers tightly around the back of his neck. Ray closes his eyes.

"You don't have to do this," Ben says softly. "We can leave now. We'd be home by lunch tomorrow."

Ray shudders. Home. He almost doesn't dare think about it.

"I owe Pete my life," is all he says. "And I pay my debts."

Ben sighs. "I know."

"Hey," Harrison says from the kitchen. "There's a motel down the block, you know, you guys wanna, just--" He shrugs, pursing his lips in a faux-innocent look.

Ray glares at him over Ben's shoulder. He just smirks, leans against the doorway, and takes a long swig of beer.

"You should go," Ben murmurs.

"Yeah," Ray says, and then he shakes his head and steps abruptly around Ben. "Yeah," he says again. "I'll just--" He jerks his thumb at the door. "Go."

"Also," Harrison says, as Ray's halfway out the door, "next time you guys screw on my floor, put a tarp down or something."

Ray's head whips around, and he stares. Across the room, Ben makes a strangled sound.

Harrison just looks back at him, eyes very wide and very blue.

"Noted," Ray spits out, and slams the door behind him.

---

Harrison smirks and raises the beer in salute as the door slams. Then he takes another long swallow and saunters to his desk.

Fraser's seated in the folding chair again, staring down at the desk and not quite meeting Harrison's eyes. His face is slightly pink.

"Educated guess," Harrison says, and flops down in the chair. He rests his boots in the same spot Ray's had been. "Come on, ease up. I'm just yankin' your chain."

Fraser clears his throat and somehow manages to sit up straighter, which Harrison didn't think was possible. He raises his chin and finally meets Harrison's eyes.

"We need to talk," he says.

Harrison goes ice-cold, and sips at his beer to cover. We need to talk. Four scariest words in the English language, hands down. Had Fraser caught him making eyes at Ray? Or even more terrifying-- he mentioned the kiss that morning, still rattled and half-asleep. Does Fraser remember? Lord help him, is he going to ask for details?

And then Fraser half-rises and leans across the desk, plucking the bottle from his hand.

Harrison blinks at him. "Dude, if you want, there's a six-pack in the fridge--"

"Harrison," Fraser interrupts, "I think you have a problem."

Harrison blinks again.

"Gee," he says. "What was your first clue?"

Fraser coughs. "No. I mean, ah, a specific problem." He sets the bottle down meaningfully on the desk.

Oh, Harrison thinks, with a sinking feeling. This, now.

Well, he knew it was coming sooner or later.

"Listen," he says, "before you trot out the whole speech, thing, whatever, I'll save you the trouble. I know."

Fraser stares at him. "You... know?"

"I'm an addict," Harrison explains, waving a hand expansively. "It's what I do, it's my personality, whatever-- I was a gambling addict, and Tru actually made me go to meetings and shit." He smiles a little at the memory. "Got sick of pulling my ass outta the fire all the time, I guess."

"And then what?" Fraser's voice is soft, and a lot nicer than he's ever heard it-- except maybe last night, the night that didn't exist.

Harrison's smile fades. "And then I stopped going. And how is this your business exactly?"

Fraser's eyes darken and his jaw sets. Well, the nice thing was fun while it lasted.

"Ray's life is in our hands," he says in a low voice. "If you are inebriated, your reflexes slowed, your judgment impaired-- if something happens to him--"

"Won't happen," Harrison says.

"You can't--"

Harrison stares daggers at him. "Won't. Happen."

Fraser glares back at him. His mouth open.

The phone rings.

Harrison grabs at it; he's never been so happy to hear the damn thing in his life. "Yeah?"

"Where the hell have you been?" a vaguely familiar voice growls. "Do you ever check your messages, Mr. Davies? Are you even aware of how an answering service works?"

And then he remembers.

"McGruff," he sighs, closing his eyes.

There's a pause. Then Welsh says, "Let me speak to Constable Fraser."

"Corporal," Harrison corrects, and hits the speakerphone button.

The sound quality of the speaker isn't any better the second time around. "Const-- Fraser, if the urgency of the situation has passed, I would've appreciated a heads-up--"

"No sir," Fraser says quickly. "I mean, yes sir. Sorry, sir. It's... been a rather hectic day."

There's a burst of static that Harrison supposes is a sigh. "So you were right," he begins. "A couple years before the Vecchio job, Kowalski spent a few months--"

"Undercover here with the O'Tooles, and he took down Colin O'Toole, and his cover wasn't blown," Harrison finishes. "Yeah, we got that."

"Are you quite done?" Welsh asks, after a pause.

"Quite," Harrison says.

"This is highly unorthodox, Mr. Davies."

Harrison mouths the last few words along with him, and grins at Fraser's startled look. "Yeah, yeah. I'm in the loop. Deal."

Fraser gives him a warning glare. "Is that all, sir?"

"Yes," Harrison murmurs.

"No," Welsh says, and Harrison sits up and blinks. "While you two were busy ignoring my messages, I got in touch with the agent in charge of the operation. He was reticent at first, but I managed to persuade him to share."

"How did you do that, sir?" Fraser asks politely.

"Booze," Welsh says, "and lots of it. He didn't say much, but he did let slip two particularly interesting tidbits of information."

Harrison reaches for his still-blank notepad.

"Now this never went into the file," Welsh says, "so it's all very hush-hush. Heads will roll if word gets out, if you catch my meaning."

"Right," Harrison says. "I'll try not to spill to the next FBI agent I run into. What is it?"

"Fraser," Welsh says, "smack him for me, would you?"

"Certainly, sir," Fraser says, poker-faced.

Harrison holds his hands up with a yelp. "Okay, okay! This is me shutting up."

"An inspired idea," Welsh says. "So this Fed, who shall remain nameless, told me that it was a closely guarded secret among the task force that Peter O'Toole knew Kowalski was a plant."

Harrison scribbles about half of this down before his brain catches up to his ears, and his pen skids off the page. "Whoa, wait, what?"

Fraser looks shaken. "Are you certain, Lieutenant?"

"Not only that," Welsh says. "About a year later, one of the agents was caught feeding info to someone in O'Toole's organization, one...." He pauses. "Maurice Flaherty. Word is our ex-agent's doing some work in the area for Flaherty right now."

Fraser makes a soft, pained sound. Harrison glances at him and then does a double-take; he's white as a proverbial fucking sheet.

Harrison coughs a little. "Right. So this Fed, he knows who Ray is, and now he's working for Flaherty. And O'Toole knows too. Fan-fucking-tastic. Anything else?"

"Ex-Fed," Welsh says, "and that's all I have. Listen...."

He pauses. Harrison rolls his eyes and listens.

"Anything else I can do," Welsh says finally, "just call. Any time."

"Thanks," Harrison says, surprised.

"And when you see Kowalski, kick his ass for me."

"Gladly," Harrison says, and cuts the connection.

For a few seconds, he and Fraser just stare at each other. Then Fraser shoots abruptly to his feet.

"We have to find Ray," he says, striding towards the door. "Now."

His left hand's on the doorknob before Harrison catches up with him.

"Whoa, hey, wait!" He grabs Fraser's wrist, trying to pry his fingers off the knob, and then Fraser's hand closes over his throat and he freezes.

"We have to find Ray," Fraser repeats. His eyes are like steel. "We have to warn him."

Harrison swallows, feeling his throat bob against Fraser's palm. "We do," he croaks. "We will! But we need a plan or something, we can't just go running out the door! We have to be smart about this!"

"I have a plan," Fraser growls. "I'm going to find Ray."

"That's not a plan!" Harrison tugs fruitlessly at the fingers around his throat. "That's an admirable goal. Not the same thing. And unless you want to get yourself, and Ray, and might I mention me, killed, we have to stop and think about this!"

Fraser glares at him, but he doesn't say anything. After a moment, his grip loosens.

"Jesus, thank you," Harrison says, rubbing at his neck. "Now I will tell you this again, and I will keep telling you this until it sinks into that insanely thick skull of yours: This. Is the Irish. Mob. They know where the bodies are, because they put them there! We can't take 'em, Fraser. We have to be smarter than them."

He pauses.

"Besides," he adds, "do you even know where you're going? How are you gonna find O'Toole?"

Fraser takes a deep breath. "I had hoped," he said slowly, "to extract the information from some of our... new acquaintances."

"Oh, great," Harrison says, throwing up his hands. "See, that right there? That is not a plan. That is suicide by wiseguy. Learn the difference, pal."

Fraser sighs. "We should have set up some way of contacting Ray."

"Coulda, woulda, shoulda," Harrison says. He holds his hands out like a magician and backs across the room, grinning. "I got a better idea."

"You do." Fraser sounds insultingly dubious.

"Relax," Harrison says. "Trust me." He pulls open the two top drawers, rifling through them at random, and finally finds the small handheld device, buried under some old crumpled bills, a sheet of postcard stamps, and-- he wrinkles his nose-- an old peanut butter sandwich.

He tosses the sandwich in the trash and sucks stale peanut butter off his fingers, then raises the handheld with glee. "So, just for shits and giggles mind you, on my way out of the poker game I just so happened to bump into Pete O'Toole. And wouldn't you know it, I just happened to drop a little tracking device in his pocket."

Fraser's eyes are wide. "Pickpocket," he breathes. "Of course."

"I can take 'em out or put 'em in," Harrison agrees. He waggles the handheld triumphantly. "And this bad boy's gonna tell us where Petey goes on his off hours."

"Impressive," Fraser allows.

Harrison's grin widens. "So am I good, or am I good?"

---

Benton keeps a wary eye on Harrison as he drives, looking for signs of inebriation. Harrison seems alert and perfectly sober now, with no visible traces of his earlier indulgence, but Benton is not reassured.

He considered offering to drive, but if Harrison is anything like Ray-- which, more and more, appears to be the case-- he will not appreciate the suggestion. Besides, Benton has seen how Bostonians drive, and he has no desire to brave the maelstrom himself. He can guide a dogsled with unerring accuracy, but the vagaries of the common combustion engine remain largely beyond his grasp.

He didn't even bother suggesting they walk, or take the subway. Not when Ray's life is in danger. Time is of the essence.

Benton realizes he's attempting to justify his appalling lack of attention to automobile safety, and he sets his jaw and stops trying. Ray is in trouble, and Benton has to get to him as soon as possible. No justification needed.

He hopes.

Still, he has the distinct sensation of narrowly averted death when the Mustang slows to a stop outside a large, impressive brownstone apartment building.

"This it?" Harrison asks.

Benton studies the handheld display in his lap. "I believe so."

"Pete, you swank bastard," Harrison mutters, and throws the car into park.

"There's a security guard at the front desk," Benton reports, peering out the window.

"Probably armed," Harrison agrees. He grabs the handheld from Benton's lap and fiddles with it; a burst of static emits from a small speaker, gradually resolving into a voice.

"Short-range audio transmission," Harrison explains, looking pleased.

"The sound quality is appalling," Benton says, trying not to squirm in his seat at the lingering sensation of Harrison's grasping fingers on his thighs. Really, he shouldn't even have noticed such a brief, businesslike contact. His body had been distracted by Ray's presence.

Harrison shakes the handheld, then smacks it lightly against the steering wheel. "Hey, be glad it works at all. Let's just say I didn't get this puppy at Radio Shack."

Benton's lips tighten, and he concentrates on the sound.

Peter O'Toole's voice is muffled and cracking, and every few seconds the sound fades out, but it's recognizable. He's saying something; Benton hears him say Neil, and he sits up straighter.

"--McKenna?" Another burst of static, and then O'Toole adds, "--gone a while."

"Ray's not back," Benton says, surprise and alarm twisting his stomach. "Is it possible he simply hasn't arrived yet?"

"Not likely." Harrison looks pessimistic. "He left a good half hour before we did, and we hit rush hour traffic. Even using public transportation, he shoulda beaten us back."

Benton leans over and increases the volume on the speaker.

"...Morrie... asking around," a new voice is saying.

"...fuck does Flaherty want with McKenna?"

"...wouldn't say... upset about something."

Morrie. Flaherty. It's like a punch in the gut.

Harrison's eyes are wide. "Isn't he--"

"Maurice Flaherty," Benton says grimly. "The man Lieutenant Welsh said was receiving information from a former FBI agent." He pauses. "And now he's looking for Ray."

"So maybe," Harrison says slowly, "it wasn't O'Toole who popped Ray. Maybe Flaherty's Fed clued him in too."

Benton shakes his head. "It just doesn't make logical sense. If O'Toole knew Ray was a police officer, why would he be worried about him? Why would he call him in the first place?"

"Unless," Harrison begins, and then his eyes flick to the rearview mirror and he pales. "Ah, shit."

Benton twists around in the passenger seat, and sees a large, well-built man on the sidewalk behind them, watching the car with one hand on his hip. Benton suspects he's reaching for a gun, and has no desire to stay and confirm his hypothesis.

Harrison's hand is creeping under his jacket, towards his shoulder holster. Benton grabs his wrist, arresting the movement. "Don't."

"I recognize that guy," Harrison says through gritted teeth. "He was waiting outside the poker game."

"Harrison," Benton says patiently. "Gangsters. Organized criminals. Irish mob. Remember?"

Harrison closes his eyes briefly. "Step off my trope, Fraser."

"Harrison--"

"Yeah, yeah." He slams the car into gear and hits the gas, and they peel off down the street, leaving a trail of rubber behind them.

Benton keeps his eyes on the rearview mirror. The well-built man watches them go with narrowed eyes, making no move to follow.

"Now what?" Benton asks finally, when O'Toole's apartment building is out of sight.

Harrison is hunched over the steering wheel, glaring at the asphalt in front of him. When he speaks, his voice is tight. "Now we find Flaherty."

"I don't suppose you planted a tracking device on him as well."

"No," Harrison says after a moment. "Seeing as I've never met the guy."

"So how--"

"So shut up and let me think." The corner of Harrison's mouth twitches; he looks resigned. "I know someone who'd know."

---

Harrison has to circle the block around Wally's three times before he finds a parking space, and it isn't helping his nerves any.

He's not ready to face Isaac again, not ready for the confusing mix of irritation and hormones that made it so hard to think the first time around. Maybe it's just Ray being in town, and maybe it's something to do with Fraser too, but Harrison's been intensely sexually aware all day, and it's starting to annoy the hell out of him. No point in being turned on all the time when he can't do a damn thing about it.

And now that he's thinking about it, he can look back and realize that what he may or may not want from Isaac, Isaac's been offering all along-- never blatant, but obvious to anyone without his head up his own ass, which unfortunately cuts Harrison out of the running, or so he's starting to think. And whatever miraculous force managed to perform the removal surgery long enough for him to look around and blink, he kind of wants to kick it in the nads.

Ignorance wasn't bliss, but it was sure as hell less disconcerting than this.

Fraser clears his throat, and Harrison realizes he's just sitting there staring at the bar across the street. He sighs but makes no move to get out yet.

"Unless what?" Fraser asks abruptly.

Harrison turns to stare at him. "Unless what what?"

"Back at the apartment building," Fraser explains. "Before you saw that man, you were going to say something. I wondered why O'Toole would call Ray for help, and you said--"

"Unless," Harrison finishes, remembering. "Right. Unless he called Ray because he's a cop."

Fraser's eyes narrow. "So you think it was a trap."

"No, hold on, I'm gettin' there." Harrison waves a hand for emphasis. "Ray said O'Toole's got a hit out on him, right, and Ray's supposed to find out who. Pete got Ray up here to do police work."

"You're saying Mr. O'Toole knows Ray was a police officer, and he doesn't have a problem with it?" Fraser sounds dubious.

Harrison shrugs, embarrassed; he's well aware of the absurdity. "Hey, I'm just saying. It fits."

"Well," Fraser says after a moment, dismissing the idea. "That's not important right now."

Harrison glowers at him, then reluctantly unbuckles his seatbelt.

Fraser leans across the seat towards him before he closes the door. "Don't have another drink."

"Yes, Dad," Harrison says, and slams the door as hard as he can.

---

Isaac's waiting at a different stool than yesterday, and it throws Harrison for a few seconds, before he remembers that yesterday he got here first. Isaac is at the end of the bar this time, in a little alcove near the hallway to the bathrooms, and Harrison slows and feels his face heat.

He's about to turn and run when Isaac looks up and sees him, and a broad grin spreads across his tanned face. He leans back against the bar in a languid sprawl. "Harry!"

Harrison forces an answering smile onto his face. This is just getting ridiculous.

He takes a deep breath and plows through the crowd, and when he reaches the empty stool Isaac has a beer waiting for him. Screw you, Fraser, Harrison thinks, and takes a long drink.

"Twice in one day," Isaac says, watching him. "How'd I get so lucky?"

Harrison gives a nervous laugh. "Hey, I'm a busy guy. Everyone wants a piece."

"Who wouldn't?" Isaac drawls, and Harrison closes his eyes and winces. He really didn't mean to say that.

He swallows another mouthful of beer, then sighs and turns to Isaac. "Look, I don't have time for the song an' dance, so I'll just lay it out for you. I need to find Maurice Flaherty, and I mean right freakin' now, I need to know where he is without him knowing I'm looking. So can you help me or not?"

Isaac gives him a long, slow look, and Harrison stares back, holding his breath.

Isaac sips thoughtfully at his beer, then sets it down on the bar. "I'd love to," he says at last. "But I couldn't ask anyone without word getting back."

Harrison exhales and sags against the bar. Disappointment is making him light-headed, and he realizes how desperately he's been counting on Isaac to know something. "Thanks anyway," he mutters, and moves to slide off the stool.

Isaac's hand on his arm stops him, hot and heavy, and a sudden thrill goes through him at the contact. "Wait. Maybe I can help. Why do you want to know?"

Harrison stares into Isaac's eyes, trying to read his intentions, and then only barely manages to wrench his gaze away. "He's got a friend of mine," he says, and hesitates, wondering how much it's safe to say. "I think... my friend might be in trouble. Later tonight."

Tonight, when the streets are empty and no one will hear a gunshot.

Isaac nods slowly. "There are a couple places," he says, "where this man-- and by the way, don't say his name again-- might have your friend stashed. I can point you in the right direction."

If disappointment made Harrison light-headed, the sudden surge of hope is making him downright dizzy. "That," he says with genuine sincerity, "would be awesome."

And then Isaac leans his elbow on the bar and props his chin up in his hand, giving Harrison a long, thoughtful look. "It'll cost, though. And I don't think one date'll cover it."

Harrison swallows hard, his throat suddenly dry.

Isaac's eyes are dark and liquid, and maybe the alcohol's finally going to his head, because he can hardly see straight. But he manages to find his beer, manages to drain the glass in five long, jerky swallows, and somewhere between the first swallow and the last, he realizes that he's going to do it.

Screw this anyway, screw Fraser and screw Ray and screw the sexual fucking tension; it's not fair, they had sex on his office floor while he was out getting drunk, and anyway he can't remember why he thought this was such a bad idea to start with.

He slams the glass down, grabs Isaac's arm, and pulls him off the stool.

Isaac follows readily, his full lips open in a wide, blinding white grin.

They make it into the bathroom, into one of the stalls, and then Isaac slams him back against the wall, and Harrison takes a deep, shuddering breath. Just before their mouths meet, Isaac closes his eyes and tilts his head forward instead, resting his forehead against Harrison's.

His voice is a hot brush of air against Harrison's lips. "You don't have to do this."

"I know," Harrison says, and swallows again.

"What I said back there, I was just fucking with you. I don't--"

"Izzy," Harrison manages to say, "if you tell me I don't have to, then I won't. So-- please--" He wraps his fingers around the collar of Izzy's long coat, feeling the black wool rough under his skin. "Please don't tell me."

Isaac stares at him for a moment, and then he breaks into another blinding smile and Harrison goes weak-kneed with relief.

Isaac leans forward again and this time their lips connect, and Harrison slides his hands off Isaac's shoulder and behind his head, and God, it's so good, he didn't even remember-- the last time he kissed another man was-- well, it was last night, but that didn't even happen. And then before that it was Ray, and Harrison's starting to think five years is a long, long time to go without this, without the hair on Isaac's upper lips tickling his nose, the scrape of stubble across his face, the hard demand of lips that don't taste like lipstick, just beer and cigarettes and toothpaste, and he figures it's a good thing his mouth is too occupied to say anything, or he'd be seriously embarrassing himself right about now.

And then Isaac pulls back, so that their lips are barely brushing, and Harrison moans a little.

Embarrassing, he reminds himself, and tries to catch his breath.

"So." Isaac's voice is husky and amused. "How will sir be rendering his payment?"

Harrison licks his lips, feels his tongue brush against Isaac, and shudders.

"Your info," he says softly. "Your price."

Isaac's lips twitch against his, and then a heavy hand settles on his shoulder, pushing down, down, down.

Harrison feels a moment of instinctive panic-- he's never done this, not once-- but he goes willingly, sinking to his knees on the tiled floor, and he barely has time to wonder when's the last time they mopped in here-- answer: sometime around World War II-- before he's face-to-groin with Isaac and getting an eyeful of the bulge in his tight jeans.

It looks distressingly big, but he figures anything would when he's about to stick it down his throat.

Isaac's hands settle on his head, tangling with his hair, and for just a second he thinks about Fraser, waiting in the car, and feels oddly vindicated. Then he takes a deep breath and undoes the buttons of Isaac's jeans.

Isaac is wearing black boxer briefs, and his dick is straining at the cotton. Harrison eases them down over his hips, carefully over the bulge, and the dick springs out, flushed purple, and Harrison thinks dazedly, Grape lollipop. He leans forward and takes a tentative taste.

Definitely not grape.

Isaac lets out a choked moan, and he's pleased at the sound, licks again to see if he can get a repeat performance. In response, Isaac grabs the back of his head and thrusts against him; his dick bumps off Harrison's face, leaving a sticky trail on his lips, and Harrison gets the idea, opening his mouth and slowly drawing the head inside.

Isaac moans again, and Harrison starts to suck, flushed and dizzy with power. It's not as weird as he thought, salty and slick against his tongue but nothing, like, freakish, and then Isaac thrusts again, and the dick slides into his throat and he tries not to gag, and balls brush against his chin, and okay, that's a little freakish.

He pulls back, coughing, and wipes saliva from his face. His face is burning.

"Hey." Isaac's hands stroke his hair, surprisingly gentle. "It's okay. First time?"

"Course not," Harrison says immediately, looking up.

Isaac's lips curve in a small smile. "Whatever you say. Just tell me if you need a break. A little lie-down, maybe a nap--"

"Funny," Harrison says, and wraps his mouth as far as he can around Isaac's dick.

Isaac jerks against him, hands pulling tight in his hair, and he winces but doesn't slow down. It's surprisingly easy to settle into a rhythm, but less easy when Isaac slumps forward and braces his hands against the wall over Harrison's head, forcing him to bend backwards to avoid being choked. He winces as his neck creaks, and shuffles slowly back on his knees until his back hits the wall and he can sit up straight again, and then it hits him.

He's on his knees in the men's room of a seedy bar, sucking cock.

He almost comes in his pants.

Isaac starts thrusting again, his movements jerky and irregular, and Harrison grabs onto his hips and holds on for dear life. Fingers dig into his scalp, holding his head in place, and then Isaac's thrusting all the way down his throat, and he doesn't think he can do this, but he doesn't want to stop again. So he closes his eyes and concentrates on relaxing his throat, and tightens his grip hard enough to leave bruises.

Isaac doesn't warn him when he's close. One second he's fucking Harrison's mouth, and the next he's coming with a hoarse yell, gobs of semen sliding down Harrison's throat like mucus. He does gag at that, pulling back, but there's nowhere for his head to go; and then Isaac's dick slips out of his mouth, and the last spurt of jizz hits him right in the face.

Harrison blinks and wipes a hand over his cheek. It comes away sticky.

Isaac stares down at him. His lips twitch.

"Don't," Harrison warns.

Isaac snorts. "Dude, if you could see your face--"

"You dick," Harrison says, without heat.

"Obviously," Isaac says with a grin. He clasps Harrison's hand and hauls him to his feet, and Harrison winces as his knees crack; he's only twenty-seven, for Christ's sake, he shouldn't be creaking yet. Then Isaac stares at him, and his smile fades, dissolving into an intense, heated look.

Harrison looks up at him, squirms a little, and wonders, not for the first time, why he ended up being so damn short.

"What?" He raises a hand to his face. "Crap. It's still there, isn't it?"

"Don't," Isaac says hoarsely, and he freezes. "Don't-- don't move," and then Isaac leans forward and-- oh, shit-- licks the come off Harrison's face.

He groans. He can't help it.

"Now this," Isaac says, "I'm just doing 'cause I like you."

He sinks to his knees, and Harrison lets his head fall back against the wall with a thunk and thinks about the mouth waiting for him, about Isaac's tongue on his skin, about anything but Fraser, still waiting in the car.

---

When Harrison emerges from the bar twenty minutes later, he looks... different. He looks....

Well, there's no getting around it. As Ray would say: He looks well-fucked.

His eyes are bright and heavy-lidded, his lips are even redder than usual, and his hair is in spectacular disarray. His skin glistens, as though he has just splashed water on his face. There's a bounce in his step that has no business being there, not when Ray is in danger, and Benton is surprised to feel a hot curl of anger snake through his gut.

"You took your time," he comments, when Harrison opens the door.

"I'm thorough," Harrison says, sliding into his seat.

"Well?"

"Well, Mr. Pushy Pants, my friend knows a guy who owns some vacant apartments. Said guy also happens to be a friend of Maurice Flaherty, who just so happens to use these apartments for some of his, shall we say, more illicit activities." He brandishes a slip of paper and grins. "I got a list."

Benton keeps his voice even. "And what did you do in return for this information?"

"Asked nicely," Harrison says, and narrows his eyes. "Why, Fraser, you got somethin' to say about it?"

Benton stares pointedly at his swollen lips. Harrison flushes, but raises his chin defiantly and doesn't break eye contact.

"Harrison," Benton begins, and stops, wetting his own lips. What can he say? What does he have the right to say?

He settles for, "Be careful."

It is, apparently, the wrong thing.

"Be careful?" Harrison repeats, incredulous. "Man, you really are my dad. And you got the whole disapproving schtick down, let me tell you."

"Harrison--"

"No, you know what? Just forget it," Harrison says. "I'm a big boy, I can handle my own business, and it's none of yours. You guys have made it very clear that you don't need me around, so--"

He breaks off, and Benton stares at him, perplexed. "Of course we need you. I wouldn't have a chance of finding Ray without you."

Harrison's mouth opens, then closes again. "Right," he says weakly. "I mean-- I meant, yeah, um." He flattens the list of addresses against the steering wheel with rather more force than necessary. "Right. First apartment."

He doesn't look at Benton as he starts the car and pulls into traffic, even though Benton is still staring at him and making no effort to hide it. He knows he just missed something big, and he can't quite figure out what it is.

Harrison twitches irritably under his gaze. Finally, at a red light, he explodes, "What?"

"Nothing," Benton says immediately, looking away.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Harrison's sudden look of dread. "Oh crap. I have something on my face, don't I?" He rubs furiously at his cheek with his right hand.

"No, there's--" Benton clears his throat. "There's nothing on your face, no."

Harrison turns and glares at him, until Benton feels compelled to say, "Green light."

This statement is punctuated by a chorus of angry honks behind them.

Harrison rolls down his window and sticks his head out. "Shut up!" he yells.

Then he guns the engine and takes off with a screech, and it takes Benton two blocks to find enough voice for a sharp reprimand.

---

The first two places are a bust, and by the time they pull up in front of the third building, Harrison's starting to think unpleasant thoughts about Isaac St. Germain and the grime on the knees of his jeans.

It's in a run-down part of town, surrounded by condemned and abandoned buildings on either side. Harrison gets out of the car reluctantly; he's none too keen on leaving it unattended on the street.

"Last one on the list," he says, staring at the front door. "Last chance." He checks his gun for about the millionth time today; his nerves are on edge, every instinct clamoring danger, and suddenly he knows this is the right place, it has to be.

Which is why running inside blindly would be a bad idea, and it takes a few seconds for his brain to relay that message to his legs, which are tensed and ready to sprint.

Fraser nods, looking maddeningly calm. "Shall we?"

"You askin' me to dance?" Harrison doesn't wait for an answer, just shoves his hands in his pockets and strides across the street.

The vestibule door's locked, and what used to be the intercom is a mass of exposed wires. Harrison slips his picks out of his jacket and has the door open in ten seconds flat.

"No need for applause," he says, tucking the picks away again. "I take cash and credit. Give receipts, even."

Fraser ignores him, stepping inside and cocking his head with an intense look of concentration.

Harrison shifts his weight impatiently. "Anything?" he asks, when he can't wait anymore.

Fraser frowns. "I believe somebody is playing an accordion."

"Holy crap," Harrison says, "they're torturing him." He runs for the stairs.

"Actually, whoever it is is quite good," Fraser says behind him. "A lively and engaging polka--"

"Don't talk to me," Harrison snaps over his shoulder as he climbs.

Luckily, or lucky for Ray anyway, the noise isn't coming from the apartment Isaac indicated; it comes from behind a door on the second floor, maybe the only other apartment in the building still being used. Harrison pauses in front of the door, looks at the number Isaac wrote down-- 15, and this is apartment 9-- then shakes his head and moves to the next flight of stairs.

Fraser passes him on the way up, and is waiting on the third floor landing when he gets there. Harrison glances at the door to apartment 15 and nods at it. Fraser nods back and places his thumb against the side of his nose, and the movement is so incongruous that Harrison just stops and blinks at him for a second before moving past him to the door.

Harrison presses his back against the wall by the door, drawing his gun, and nods at Fraser again. Fraser presses his ear against the door and listens; then he steps back, raises one leg, and kicks the door in with one textbook-perfect blow.

Harrison whips around and aims into the apartment.

It's empty.

He frowns but doesn't lower the gun. Disappointment is like a knife in his side. He was sure, he was so sure....

The place looks like it's being torn apart. There are tarps on the walls, covering missing sections of drywall, and a thin layer of sawdust and debris on the floor. An empty dishwasher box stands in the middle of the front room, with no dishwasher in sight. Harrison edges inside to look around, gun still raised, but he can already tell there's no one there.

Still, he checks out every room, looking for clues or something, maybe a handy map with a big red X on it, and he's peering into the cabinet under the bathroom sink for reasons he can't quite articulate when he hears Fraser's hoarse voice, calling his name.

He leans out of the bathroom, hanging off the doorjamb like it's a monkey bar. "Yeah, what? You got something?"

Fraser's in the room across the hall, standing in front of a window with his head bowed and his back to Harrison. He turns at Harrison's voice and holds out his hand.

At first Harrison can't see what he's holding, and then he thinks it's a strand of tinsel and he can't imagine why Fraser wants to show it to him. And then he blinks, and he realizes exactly what it is.

Ray's bracelet.

He's surprised that he recognizes it; he doesn't think it ever even registered with him before, or if it did he forgot about that particular detail. But now that he's looking at it, he remembers, and he has a sudden vivid mental image: silver beads glinting in the sunlight, wrapped around Ray's right wrist, sliding back and forth across his skin....

Harrison swallows.

"He was here," he says-- lamely, unnecessarily.

Fraser nods and steps aside, and Harrison can see he was standing in front of a radiator. "There are scuff marks on the metal here. I believe Ray was handcuffed to it."

"Or else it's an old building with a scuffed radiator. What are you, the Bad News Bear? Try not to envision the worst possible scenario for once." Harrison rocks backwards onto his feet and slams the gun back in his holster with a sigh. "So they were here, and now they're not. And now we're officially outta options. On the plus side, least we know we're on the right track."

Fraser doesn't look like he's in the mood for a plus side; he looks kinda hopeless, and he's gripping the bracelet in a white-knuckled fist. When he speaks, his voice is low. "Perhaps-- perhaps we should go to the police."

"Are you nuts?" Harrison demands, kicking the cabinet door shut. "Say what, this guy's gonna die tonight, and I know because I'm a time-traveler from the future?"

"If we simply say that Flaherty has Ray--"

"Forget it," Harrison says, coming out of the bathroom and poking his head into the bedroom, where Fraser's still standing. "Something like this, we need a pro."

"Exactly, which is why I think the police--"

"Not the police," Harrison says. He flips open his cell phone and scrolls through the list of numbers until he finds the one he's looking for, then hits the call button and puts the phone to his ear. Fraser opens his mouth, and Harrison holds up a warning finger. "Wait for it."

Davis answers in the middle of the fourth ring. "City morgue."

"Davis," Harrison says, watching Fraser. "Emergency, and save the I-told-you-sos for later."

"I have no idea what you're talking about," Davis says blandly. "Meet me here."

He hangs up.

---

Davis wouldn't have said I told you so anyway, mainly because he didn't, really. Besides, he knows Harrison's new at the job, and from what they tell him, he's doing surprisingly well for his first day. He is a tad distressed that most of Harrison's successes have been due to the rather dubious company he keeps, but then he supposes everyone must play to their strengths.

Unfortunately, Harrison seems to expect him to have some brilliant solution to the whole thing, and Davis is coming up blank.

"I don't know, I just don't know that world," he says, shaking his head. "If you can't think of anything, Harrison--"

"Believe me," Harrison says, "I've thought." His voice is muffled; his face is buried in his arms, folded on the desk.

"Then I just don't know what help I can provide."

"A fresh perspective, if nothing else," Fraser says. He's standing in the corner of the office, watching Davis with narrowed eyes, like he too expects some kind of miracle idea, and Davis is bitter at the injustice of it. Why is everyone depending on him for the answer all of a sudden? Tru was always the one there at the last minute, some desperate, last-ditch idea that somehow she managed to pull off. She did all the work, Davis was just the man behind the curtain--

Wait. Last minute....

"Perspective," he says slowly. "We're thinking about this backwards. We don't know where Mr. Kowalski is, but we know where he will be."

Harrison raises his head and tsks out the side of his mouth, and it sounds like he's snapping imaginary gum. "Yeah, six feet under. Unless you're suggesting we dig him up and revive him--"

"There can be only one," Davis mutters, and frowns. "No, that doesn't work."

"Dude," Harrison says. "Focus."

"No, he's right," Fraser says suddenly, and Davis blinks at him.

"I am?"

Fraser starts to pace. "If we can be at the warehouse, waiting for them--"

"Yeah, and do what?" Harrison retorts. "Only two of us, Fraser." He pauses, then shoots Davis a not-quite-contrite look. "I mean, unless you're planning to join us--"

"No," Davis says quickly. "Thank you."

Fraser sets his jaw, looking stubborn. "And Mr. Flaherty is one man."

"One man who ain't gonna go anywhere without his thugs for backup, Fraser. You gotta know how these guys think. He's gonna be ready for anything, he's got muscle, all these guys do, we can't just take him by surprise--"

"No," Davis interrupts, "but," and then he stops. He's getting an idea, but he has to sanity-check it first, make sure it's fit for outside consumption.

"Davis," Harrison says. "Sometime this week'd be nice."

"You're very annoying," Davis tells him, "and I have a crazy idea, and I feel I should warn you up front that it is, in fact, crazy."

Harrison stares at him. "I'm annoying?"

"Please, go ahead," Fraser says, with a quelling hand on Harrison's shoulder. Harrison twists around and looks up at him with annoyance.

"We can't take Flaherty," Davis says, leaning across his desk for emphasis. "But what about O'Toole? He would have more than enough men at his disposal, wouldn't he?"

"But why would--" Harrison begins, and then his eyes narrow, taking on a calculating gleam. "Oh, hell. Of course."

"Mr. O'Toole asked Ray to find out who put a contract on his life," Fraser says. He sounds breathless. "And Flaherty wants to kill Ray--"

"--because he knows," Harrison finishes, "and he's the one who put out the hit!"

"It's merely conjecture, of course," Fraser says. "We can't count on that fact."

Harrison shakes his head, closing his eyes as though remembering something. "No, but, I was watching 'em at the poker game, and Ray and O'Toole, they're tight. O'Toole wasn't faking it. Even if Flaherty's not the guy, O'Toole still wouldn't be too happy about him takin' out his buddy."

"Unless Mr. O'Toole put Mr. Flaherty up to it."

Davis is beginning to wish he had a flowchart.

"I don't think so," Harrison says. "I got a hunch."

Fraser gives him a narrow-eyed look. "You have hunches?"

"Hunches and a cool car," Harrison says. "That's pretty much it, yeah."

"Wow," Davis says, and when they both turn and stare at him, he realizes he said it out loud. He coughs. "It's just, I really, I didn't expect the suggestion to go over that well."

Harrison frowns. "Why not?"

"Because," Davis says, "one of you is going to have to convince Peter O'Toole to go along with this plan."

"Oh," Harrison says.

"Ah," says Fraser.

They turn and look at each other.

"Davis," Harrison says, turning back around and slumping down in his chair, "your idea sucks."

"Yeah," Davis says, without much sympathy. "But it's the only one you've got, isn't it?"

Harrison's sigh is all the answer he needs.

---

"Look," Harrison says, "this ain't up for discussion. He's seen me, he hasn't seen you, we oughta keep it that way."

Benton tries again. "I'm just saying, you've endangered yourself quite enough already. I wouldn't feel comfortable--"

"This is not about your comfort level, Fraser, this is about not getting dead."

They're sitting in the Mustang, parked two blocks down from Peter O'Toole's apartment building. Harrison isn't looking at him; he's staring through the windshield, his knuckles white around the steering wheel.

"Harrison," Benton says, "I am not unacquainted with the criminal element. In Chicago--"

"Yeah, Fraser, maybe all the gangsters in Chi-town know you by name, but that don't mean O'Toole won't shoot you on sight. You saw how quick Jim made you, you look like a cop--"

"Harrison," Benton says loudly, drowning him out. Harrison says something, but Benton keeps talking over him; sometimes it's the only way to get Ray to listen to him, and he's getting quite good at it. "If you go in there, I'm going with you. That's all there is to it."

"Fraser--"

"I came to you for help," Benton says. "I got you involved in this. You've done quite enough already without taking unnecessary risks. Going in there alone, without backup--"

"You don't even have a gun, what the hell kind of backup--"

"Harrison," Benton says, and amazingly, Harrison shuts up.

"Fine," he says after a moment, looking angry and a little frightened. "Backup. But if you get yourself killed, I am gonna kick your ghostly ass all the way back to yesterday, you get me?"

"Perfectly, Harrison," and this conversation, this situation, all of it is so surreally familiar, it's all he can do not to say Perfectly, Ray instead.

---

Harrison wouldn't say so, but he's glad for Fraser's presence at his back when he walks into the lobby. It's weird-- the guy doesn't even carry a gun, but somehow having him there just makes Harrison feel oddly safer.

The security guard's up like a shot when he sees them, coming out from behind his desk with a pleasant yet steely expression. He gives Harrison an insultingly long head-to-toe look, then asks, "Can I help you?"

Harrison ignores the implied dig and raises his hands in what he hopes is a friendly gesture. His heart is hammering in his chest. "We're here to see Peter O'Toole."

"Mr. O'Toole isn't expecting any visitors." Politely but firmly.

Harrison wets his lips and says, "Uh, yeah, surprise visit. If you just tell him we got information for him--"

"Tell him," Fraser interrupts, and Harrison wants to smack him, "that we have reason to believe Mr. McKenna is in danger."

"McKenna," the guard repeats.

Harrison glares at Fraser, then plasters a sweet smile on his face and turns back to the guard. "That's right. You tell 'im that."

The guard looks dubious, but he goes back to the intercom and starts speaking in a low voice.

"Fraser," Harrison hisses out of the side of his mouth, "let me do the talking. Okay?"

"My apologies, Harrison."

Harrison gives Fraser a suspicious look. He doesn't sound sorry.

"Yes sir," the guard says, then turns back to face them. "He's sending down an escort. You're to wait here."

"Waiting," Harrison chirps. He leans towards Fraser and adds under his breath, "Escort? What am I, a debutante?"

Fraser studies him. "I doubt anyone could make that mistake, no. You're hardly properly dressed."

"Thanks for that, Fraser."

They wait, and Harrison fidgets and looks around for someplace to sit, and if they're gonna make people wait downstairs to be claimed like luggage, they really ought to have a waiting room of some kind, never mind a single solitary chair. But there's nothing, so he continues to fidget.

Then the elevator dings, Fraser's spine stiffens, and Harrison tries to remember how to breathe.

The man in the elevator is huge. Six five at least, he dwarfs even Fraser, and when he comes closer Harrison realizes his head is at nipple-level, which is just plain disturbing. The giant's head is shaven, his eyes are dark and narrowed, and he looks very capable of snapping a man in two with his pinky fingers.

"I'm armed," Harrison says immediately, raising his hands again as the giant starts to frisk him. "Left side, shoulder holster."

The giant finds the gun without a word and slips it into his own belt, then finishes patting down Harrison.

"I'm afraid I'm not licensed to carry a firearm," Fraser says, as the giant moves on to him.

The giant gives him a blank look. "And?"

"Just let him see for himself, Fraser," Harrison says warningly.

Fraser sighs but does so, and finally the giant is satisfied, and he shepherds the two of them into the elevator. Harrison twitches as the giant stands behind him, and he feels compelled to make conversation.

"So," he says, staring straight ahead at the floor buttons. "How's tricks?"

"Decent," the giant rumbles.

"Good," Harrison says, "good," and then his brain catches up to his mouth and he shuts up.

It's not the penthouse apartment, but it's big enough. Everything's leather and steel and glass and very, very shiny, and Harrison would be gaping in awe if his attention weren't riveted by the figure draped over the black leather sofa, pointing a shiny black gun at him.

He gulps.

"You," Peter O'Toole says, and narrows his eyes. "You were at the poker game. You're the one with the tattoo."

"Yeah," Harrison says, scratching nervously at the back of his head. "Sorry. I was looking for R-- uh, McKenna."

Fraser clears his throat, and Harrison would elbow him except he doesn't want to make any sudden movements. "Sir," he says, "we have reason to believe Mr. McKenna is in danger from one of your own men."

O'Toole doesn't lower the gun. "How'd you find me?"

"Um," Harrison says, and coughs. "Look in your coat pocket."

O'Toole stares at him for a long, nerve-wracking moment, then nods at one of the thugs behind him-- there are three of them aside from the giant, standing around the room like particularly ugly statues. The thug disappears somewhere into the depths of the apartment, then emerges a minute later, holding O'Toole's coat. He reaches in the pocket and produces Harrison's tracking device.

O'Toole inspects it with interest. "Audio?"

"Short-range," Harrison says.

He nods and hands the device back to the thug, who drops it to the floor and crushes it under his boot. Harrison tries not to imagine the guy doing the same thing to his head.

"Now," O'Toole says, leaning back against the leather, "you have exactly five minutes to convince me not to kill you both."

"Oh, this is going good," Harrison mutters to Fraser.

Fraser ignores him, clearing his throat again. "Sir, forgive me for being blunt, but-- you are aware of Mr. McKenna's true identity?"

O'Toole's eyes narrow again. "I have no idea what you're talking about."

"But," Fraser says with a frown, "you--"

"Fraser," Harrison hisses. "Zip it."

O'Toole gives him a long, measuring look, and then says abruptly, "Get out."

Harrison jerks, startled, but he's talking to the thugs. The three behind the sofa head immediately for the door; the giant lingers, shooting O'Toole a questioning look. O'Toole just shakes his head, and finally the giant goes.

O'Toole rises, tucking the gun into the waistband of his pants. "Come on."

Harrison and Fraser exchange looks, and Harrison just shrugs. Then they follow O'Toole through a long hallway to a laundry room, and even that's palatial, with an industrial-size washer and dryer. Harrison wonders how one man could produce enough laundry to justify the setup, and can't help thinking that maybe he just gets a lot of blood on his clothes.

O'Toole closes the door and locks it, and Harrison's heart jumps into his throat.

"Bug-killers," O'Toole explains, gesturing around the room. "No one's gonna check the laundry room, right?"

Fraser nods. "A fairly ingenious setup, I must say."

"Right," O'Toole says after a moment. He leans back against the dryer and folds his arms over his chest. "So. I'm guessing you guys are cops?"

Harrison glances at Fraser again, and sees his own surprise mirrored on the Mountie's face.

"Yeah," O'Toole says, in response to the unasked question. "I know, and I'm the only one who does. I'd like to keep it that way."

"Excuse me for asking," Fraser begins, "but how-- why--"

He breaks off, and it's maybe the first time Harrison's ever seen Fraser at a loss for words.

"You first," O'Toole says, resting a heavy hand on his gun. Harrison swallows again. "Cops or not?"

"Not," Harrison says quickly. "Not me, anyway. I'm a P.I.-- I have a license--" He reaches slowly for his wallet.

"Forget it," O'Toole says, and he drops his hand back to his side. "Don't need to see it. You?" he asks Fraser.

"Royal Canadian Mounted Police," Fraser says. "Of course, I have no jurisdiction here."

O'Toole frowns. "What's a Mountie doing here?"

"Well," Fraser begins, "I first came to Boston on the trail of--"

"Fraser," Harrison says.

"Never mind," O'Toole says. "How do you know McKenna?"

Fraser hesitates. "I, ah, we worked together. In Chicago. I was stationed at the Canadian Consulate, and I liaised with the Chicago Police Department through Ra-- Mr. McKenna."

Harrison shrugs. "I'm just a friend."

"You," Fraser says, and hesitates again. "You don't know his real name?"

O'Toole shakes his head. "Hell no. Never asked."

Fraser licks his lips, and Harrison's momentarily distracted by the flick of his pink tongue. "Mr. O'Toole, please--"

"Call me Pete," O'Toole says.

"All right," Fraser agrees, though Harrison is shaken by the very idea of being on a first-name basis with Peter O'Toole. "Ah, Pete, you-- if I may ask...."

He trails off without actually asking, but O'Toole gets it. His lips curve in a chilling smile.

"I knew who he was," he says. "How's not important. Fact was, we had... mutually beneficial... goals."

"You made a deal, you mean," Harrison says.

O'Toole gives him a cool look. "You, I don't like so much. Why don't you let your friend here do the talking?"

"Yessir," Harrison mutters.

Fraser cocks a pointed eyebrow at him, then asks, "But you did make a deal?"

"Yeah," O'Toole says. He doesn't elaborate.

Harrison bites his tongue.

"You kept R-- Neil's secret, in exchange for...what?" Fraser sounds lost.

"Power," Harrison blurts out, losing the battle to hold his tongue.

"You don't get to talk yet," O'Toole tells him, and Harrison resists the urge to roll his eyes.

But at least Fraser's getting it now. "I... see," he says slowly. "With your brother gone, you now have control of your organization, yes?" He looks unhappy. Harrison supposes it's not a motivation Supermountie can really comprehend.

Hell, he doesn't much get it either. He'd gladly give up all his newfound power just to have Tru back. Even knowing how much money he could make off this, he'd do it in a second. And Meredith... well, he doesn't really like her most of the time, but he still wouldn't have wanted her coke addiction to land her in jail, even if he could've somehow gotten something out of it.

He guesses that's probably why he was only ever a small-time crook. There's still things he's not willing to give up.

"You don't approve," O'Toole says into the silence.

Real observant, there, Harrison thinks.

"I don't understand," Fraser says after a moment, and Harrison figured it was only a matter of time before Fraser's Canadian politeness ended up saving his ass.

O'Toole looks amused. "Would you understand better if I said he's a sadistic asshole? Or that he's fifteen years older than me, and we were never very close?"

"I would," Harrison says. "But I'm not supposed to talk, right?" He smiles.

O'Toole ignores him, which is a relief, all things considered. He's watching Fraser. "Well?"

"I believe your brother was a criminal," Fraser says, raising his chin, "and he deserved to go to jail. However, were I in your position, I don't believe I would do the same."

Harrison closes his eyes. And things were going so well....

"Wrong," O'Toole says, pointing a finger at him. "If you were in my position, you'd know why I did. You don't get to my position without being that person."

"Are you willing to be equally as cavalier with Neil McKenna's life?" Fraser asks quietly.

"Right now," O'Toole says, his voice just as soft, "I need McKenna. So no, I'm not willing."

There's a silence. Harrison cautiously opens one eye.

"So!" O'Toole says, with a faint smirk. "Now that's out of the way, and we're all such good friends here, you guys wanna tell me what the hell you want from me?"

---

The first thing Ray notices, when he wakes up, is that he really wants a smoke.

It's not the first time today he's been roused from rude unconsciousness, nor is it even the most painful, but it's the first time he's woken up craving a nicotine fix. And he's in trouble, he knows he's in serious trouble here, but all he can think at first is Shit, is now he's officially hooked again, is now he's gonna have to quit... again. Because it was so much fun the first two times.

He's not sure the Inuvik general store even stocks nicotine patches.

Ray opens his eyes cautiously, mindful of what happened last time-- Flaherty keeps injecting shit in his arm to knock him out, and every time he wakes up his eyes are more light-sensitive and his headache's worse, it's like the never-ending hangover from Hell-- but all he sees is darkness.

The second thing he notices is that he's in the trunk of a car.

Well, this is new.

Flaherty cold-cocked him not a block from Harrison's place, and Ray should've seen it coming, but he'd been lazy and stupid from sex and Ben and sex with Ben. By the time he clocked his tail, it was already too late. He woke up in an empty room somewhere, cuffed to a radiator, and even if he wasn't gagged, he didn't think anyone would be around to hear him yell. Everyone knows how Flaherty does business, and more to the point, they know where.

That still didn't stop him from mumbling threats and obscenities at Flaherty through the gag. And then Flaherty backhanded him, and called him "Kowalski", and Ray knew he was a dead man.

He doesn't know how Flaherty sussed him, and right now he doesn't much care. He's focused on the fact that in a few hours, unless Ben and Harry manage to pull something off at the last minute, he's going to die.

He's also struck by the idea that for Harrison, it's already happened. He's trying very hard to repress that thought.

At least now he knows who did it, and why.

It's not much consolation.

Flaherty didn't say much to him after that, just kept pumping crap into his veins. After the third time, Ray started to seriously worry, and had to remind himself that he died from a bullet to the brain, not an OD.

And now he's in the trunk, and the spare tire is digging into his back, and if he thought he had a headache before, now it's the Dirty Dozen Brass Band in there. The pain and the residual drugs are making it hard to concentrate, but he forces himself to focus on details. The car's not moving-- they're parked somewhere. Which means either they just arrived at their destination, or Flaherty's stopped somewhere for a Slurpee run, or-- and this one's his personal favorite-- he's in the car because Flaherty's running out of places to hide him. He prefers that one because it means someone's getting close to Flaherty, someone's breathing down his neck, and Ray'd place even odds it's a guy who looks good in a big hat.

Ben can track a moose over a fucking glacier. Flaherty doesn't stand a chance.

Although, he tries not to think, Ben hasn't been in a city for a long time....

Earlier that afternoon, he and Ben were lying naked on the floor. Now he's got a split lip from where Flaherty smacked him, his shoulders ache from having his hands cuffed behind him, his fingers are numb from lack of circulation, and he thinks he's starting to bleed where the metal's cutting in.

So much for the afterglow.

Ray knows Flaherty's waiting for the streets to empty, and he knows what Flaherty will do when that happens.

He just doesn't know how much time's passed, or how much time he has left.

---

Benton is appalled that Ray considers Peter O'Toole a friend. They seem fundamentally incompatible; Ray is fiercely loyal, and Mr. O'Toole appears to be anything but. I owe Pete my life, Ray said, and Benton wonders if he was referring to O'Toole's silence. He wishes he had known then, had taken Ray by the shoulders and shaken him, said You don't owe him anything, he did it for himself.

But it wouldn't have mattered to Ray, and that's what makes him different from this man.

He was expecting to have some difficulty convincing O'Toole that Maurice Flaherty had turned against him, but O'Toole accepted the idea with relative equanimity, making it even harder for Benton to comprehend his world. Friends and family betraying each other, all for more power-- no wonder criminal enterprise seems doomed to implode, if this is how they conduct their business.

"If Morrie knows what we know," O'Toole explained, "which I don't have to tell you, we don't talk about once we leave this room, it'd be good enough ammo for him to try and take over. Either I can't spot a cop, or I'm working with 'em."

It was this, more than any sense of duty or obligation, that prompted Benton to say, "We believe Mr. Flaherty may also have been the one to take out the contract on your life."

"Wouldn't be surprised," was all O'Toole said.

They agreed to meet at the warehouse an hour before Ray's intended time of death, and O'Toole gave Harrison back his gun, and when they finally make it out of there Benton feels like every inch of his skin is trying to crawl off his body.

"Why do I feel," he asks Harrison when they arrive at the car, "as though we've just made a deal with the lesser of two evils?"

Harrison snorts and shakes his head, unlocking the door. "'Cause you're a Pollyanna, Fraser, you think the good guys win and the bad guys lose."

"I thought I was a Bad News Bear," Benton feels compelled to say.

"Whatever. You're a frustrated Pollyanna who's turned into a Bad News Bear because the world doesn't work the way you'd like. The fact is, compared to how things could've gone, that just went fucking fantastic." But he, too, looks worried as he slides into the driver's seat, and more than a little frightened.

He leans over and unlocks the passenger side door, and Benton gets in and buckles his seat belt. Staring straight ahead, he asks, "So what now?"

Harrison sighs. "We get something to eat, kick back, and fret our little asses off for the next--" he checks the time-- "three and a half hours. Then at midnight we move out."

"Splendid idea," Benton says, as Harrison starts the car and pulls away from the curb. "Where shall we eat?" He doesn't think Harrison intends to cook, and he's not surprised when his suspicions are confirmed.

"We'll swing by the morgue, see if Davis wants to stop at the diner," Harrison says. "Only fair to fill him in, anyway."

Benton's quiet for a moment, and then when Harrison doesn't volunteer any more information, he decides to ask. "What exactly is your relationship with Mr. Davis?"

"Just Davis," Harrison says. "I think it's his middle name." He pauses. "Um, he was Tru's boss, she worked there when she first... found out. That she could do, y'know. This." He gestures vaguely, indicating, Benton supposes, his ability to relive the day.

Benton frowns. "And she just told him?"

"Nah, he figured it out. He was...." Harrison trails off and sighs, then begins again. "Our mom, she, uh, she did the same thing. And she saved his life once, and so that's how he knew."

"I see," Benton says.

"And, you know, he helped Tru. With whatever." Harrison sighs again. "And lord knows I could use all the help I can get."

A sudden thought occurs to him. "You mean this will happen again sometime?"

"Count on it," Harrison says, sounding dismal. "Which, I always thought it would be kinda neat, you know? But this whole thing, I just, I don't know. I don't think I can do it. I mean, look at this-- we got Ray freakin' kidnapped."

"We don't know that's our fault," Benton argues, and Harrison gives him an odd look.

"Whatever. Point is, we lost him, and now the killer's got him."

"He's not dead yet, Harrison," Benton says severely. "And I intend to keep it that way."

"And I'm what, chopped liver? Of course we intend to keep it that way. It just doesn't always work like that."

"Your sister," Benton says slowly. "She lost people?"

Harrison doesn't answer for a minute.

"I did," he says finally, staring fixedly out the windshield. "Well, yeah, she did too. But the first time, it was my fault."

"I highly doubt that, Harrison."

"Yeah?" he snaps, turning around to glare at Benton. "Doubt away. I talked Melissa out of killing herself, and then I left her and she did it anyway. So don't--"

"Harrison--"

"--tell me I'm, like, a fucking superhero, because I'm not. Tru was the hero. I'm just a fuck-up."

"Harrison," Benton says, "watch the road, please."

Harrison makes an annoyed face, but he does turn back to face the road ahead.

Benton hesitates and wets his lips, wondering what he can possibly say to that, what's the truth and what Harrison needs to hear. "It seems to me," he says finally, "that whatever force chose you for this, if there is in fact a force behind it and not just random happenstance, which seems unlikely, that force did so for a reason. If all you are is, as you say, a fuck-up, then you wouldn't have been chosen in the first place."

And that is true, inasmuch as it's what he genuinely believes, and he hopes it fulfills the other criteria as well. He's not used to seeing Harrison like this, angry and frustrated and self-defeating, and he's surprised to find that it hurts him. He realizes that he has come to rely on the young man's resilience, and it's almost frightening to see that resilience stripped away, however briefly.

What the hell was that kiss about, Harrison asked that morning when he first walked in, and Benton hasn't dared ask him to elaborate, but he's starting to see how it could happen. He never thought he would betray Ray like that, but if he did, it makes sense that it would be with a man who reminds him so much of Ray that it makes him ache.

Harrison looks unconvinced by Benton's reassurances, but he doesn't say so. "Yeah," is all he says, "maybe."

And then, "Ask me again in four hours, then we'll see."

---

Ray didn't mean to fall asleep again, but there's fuck-all else to do, and the next time he opens his eyes, they're gummy and scratched. The gag's soggy in his mouth and his wrists are screaming bloody murder, but he holds his breath and lies very still, and then he hears it again, the sound that woke him up.

Footsteps, coming closer. Then metal on metal, the key in the lock. Flaherty's voice.

Ray squirms into position the best he can, holds his knees against his chest and waits, and as soon as he sees streetlight glow and a dull red slice of night sky, he kicks out as hard as he can.

One boot hits flesh and the other hits metal, and there's a piece of luck right there, he thinks, he hit Flaherty's gun and now the fucker's disarmed, and if he can do it again, maybe aim for the face this time--

--except, nice try but no cigar, because Flaherty's disarmed and he's clutching his wrist and howling, but suddenly there are four more guns in Ray's face and he freezes, legs already pulled up for another kick.

Of course Flaherty wouldn't be alone. He should have expected as much.

"You shit," Flaherty snarls, and he grabs Ray's collar with his left hand and hauls him one-handed out of the trunk. Ray's very briefly impressed before a fist slams into his solar plexus and he doubles over, wheezing for air through the wet cotton rag in his mouth.

Flaherty grabs his hair and brings a knee up to his face, impacting hard with his cheekbone. He turns his yell into a grunt, and anyway it's muffled by the gag.

When Flaherty lets go of his hair, he collapses onto the pavement.

The goons haul him back to his feet, and somehow Ray manages to stay upright, even though he's still having trouble getting air and he kind of wants to throw up in his mouth. Flaherty's retrieved his gun, and he's checking it carefully before he slides it back into his holster.

"That all you got?" Ray asks, trying to sound cocky, except it comes out as "Taayagah?"

But Flaherty gets the message. His lips curl in an unpleasant smile.

"You're an object lesson, Kowalski," he says. "I got all it's gonna take."

Ray narrows his eyes, and feels cold dread settle in his stomach.

The goons half-push, half-pull him down an alley to the back of a warehouse, to a small metal door next to a shuttered loading dock. He closes his eyes and sways a little as Flaherty opens the padlock, and then snaps them open again when the goons shove him forward and he stumbles through the door.

It's dark inside, the only illumination from the red-and-white strobing of the neon billboard out the window. Ray blinks rapidly, trying to get his bearings, and then promptly loses them again when the goons drag him to the middle of the empty floor and force him down onto his knees.

Flaherty kneels down in front of him, just out of head-butt range, and smiles. "Detective Kowalski. It's Detective, right?"

"No," Ray mumbles. Not anymore, it isn't.

"You know," Flaherty says, "I feel like I'm meeting you for the first time. Neil McKenna, he never really existed. But Stanley Kowalski--"

"Ray," Ray says, as clearly as he can through the gag.

"I have to say," Flaherty continues, ignoring him, "I never liked Neil." He smiles again. "Always thought he was a son of a bitch."

"Yeah, that hurts, coming from you," Ray retorts. Again he's unintelligible, and again Flaherty catches his meaning. His smile widens, and he leans the barrel of his gun against Ray's forehead.

Ray swallows.

"I hate talking to myself," Flaherty remarks. "So why don't we get a little dialogue going, hmm?"

He slides the barrel down Ray's face to his mouth, between wet fabric and skin, and Ray can't help following its progress out of the corner of his eye. Then Flaherty yanks the gag out with the gun barrel, and suddenly Ray's mouth is free and he's sucking in great lungfuls of air, oh it feels good, and then while he's still got a mouthful of saliva he spits in Flaherty's face.

The punch snaps his head to the side, and his already-aching cheekbone flares into little tap-dancing sparks of pain. Ray shakes his head, forces himself to grin, even though grinning hurts like a motherfucker.

"You love the sounda your own voice, don't you, Morrie?" he asks.

Flaherty stands slowly. He's not smiling anymore.

"Any last words, Detective?" he asks, raising the gun and thumbing off the safety with a loud click.

Ray feels his grin fade. He raises his chin and stares into the darkness over Flaherty's shoulder, and a cold, queer certainty settles over him. This is it. He's about to die.

And Ben won't just leave it alone, Ben will track down Flaherty and try to bring him to justice, and Ben's going to get his stupid ass killed too...

...and. Ben.

Is staring at him.

Ray blinks, thinking he's seeing things, he's snapped and he's hallucinating or else he's dead already-- but no, up there in the dark, on the second floor catwalk and looking down at him, like some kind of Roman emperor about to give the thumbs up or the thumbs down, Ray can never remember which one means the guy got to live--

--it's Ben, and he's the best thing Ray's seen in his whole sorry life.

Ben slides his thumb along the side of his nose and nods at Flaherty. Keep him talking.

Ray winks and obliges.

"So how'd you make me, anyway?" he asks.

"Does it matter?" Flaherty responds.

"Professional pride," Ray says. "I thought I was doin' good. What happened?"

Flaherty smirks at him. "Connections, Kowalski. Got a friend who worked with you, once upon a time."

"It was Krohn, wasn't it?" Ray asks. "That prick." Good old Agent Krohn, who'd turned around and started selling info to the same people he and the Feds had busted their asses to take down. No one wanted to tell Ray any details, but he got the name, managed to browbeat that much out of them at least.

He'd never liked Krohn, anyway. The guy drank designer martinis. That should've been his first clue.

Flaherty's smirk gets nastier. "Funny, he still had some professional ethics. Never told me who the plant was... until he heard you were a fag now. Then he had no qualms about spilling the beans."

Ray goes blank, just for a second. He can't take it in right away. Does not compute.

Flaherty clucks with mock-sympathy. "You let down the brotherhood, Kowalski. You're fair game now."

And then suddenly he's trembling with white-hot rage, so incandescent with it he can hardly see. Krohn, fucking Krohn, selling him out to Maurice fucking Flaherty because of Ben, or no, not even Ben, nothing so concrete as that-- Krohn thinks he's not a cop anymore, he's not worth protecting because of where he sticks his dick--

--and the worst part is, he can't even remember Krohn's first fucking name.

Krohn made some kind of deal, back when they first found him out, wasn't even prosecuted or anything. Not this time. Ray's gonna track him down, and he's gonna make sure the fucker burns.

Track him down. He's going to get out of here, and he's going to track down Krohn, and to do that he has to focus. Here, now. Forget about Krohn, save that for later. He needs Ben, and Ben needs him, and if he doesn't play this right they're both dead.

"So it wasn't anything I did," he says, and is awed at his own calm. Keep him busy, keep him talking. "He just told you, just like that."

Flaherty shakes the gun at him like a wagging finger. "Now, Detective, let's not get ahead of ourselves. You've been poking around in my private business. I asked around, and our mutual friend answered."

"What's wrong, Morrie, you got something to hide?" Ray narrows his eyes, or his right eye, anyway; the left one's already swelling shut. "Maybe something about that contract on Pete's life, you know, something you wanna share with the rest of us? Sharing's caring, Morrie, or didn't you ever go to preschool?"

"Sure," Flaherty says. "Best years a my life, finger-painting like that."

"You took out the hit on Pete, didn't you?" Ray presses. "Jesus, you're planning a bloody fucking coup. What, you miss the old days so much, you decided to reenact 'em?"

Flaherty's smirk fades abruptly, leaving him narrow-eyed and steely. "Peter O'Toole is a joke," he growls. "You know, he actually thought the Italians put the hit on him? The Italians wouldn't touch him. He's a non-fucking-entity. I grew up with Colin, I know how this organization's supposed to be run-- Colin never would've done business with a fucking cop."

"Oh, no," Ray says sarcastically. "Just a crooked Fed. Big diff."

Flaherty glowers down at him. "Why'd you come back, Kowalski?"

"Favor for a friend," he says.

"Your mistake. Pete don't have friends."

"What's he need friends for, when he's got you?"

Flaherty's smile is cold and humorless.

"Good bye, Detective," he says, and cocks the trigger.

Ray closes his eyes. He wonders if he'll feel anything, if he'll even notice.

He flinches when he hears the first gunshot.

And then there's a second, and a third and a fourth and a fifth, and it's slowly starting to dawn on him that if he were dead, he wouldn't be hearing all those shots.

When Ray opens his eyes again, Flaherty and his goons are lying dead on the floor and Peter O'Toole is striding out of the shadows, surrounded by armed men.

The relief is so great, it's almost suffocating. "Jesus, Pete," he gasps. "You took your sweet fucking time."

"Sorry about that," Pete says, with an odd look in his eyes that Ray can't quite place, that's making him a little uneasy. "I didn't want to interrupt your conversation."

"Pure fucking Shakespeare," Ray says, shifting uncomfortably on his knees; he's not even sure he can stand, not without sitting down first, maybe doing some stretches. "So hey--"

--how about getting these cuffs off, he means to say, but that's as far as he gets before Pete stops about five feet away, pulls his gun, and aims right between Ray's eyes.

Ray stares at him, thunderstruck. The words die in his throat.

"Detective Kowalski, is it?" Pete asks, and pulls the hammer back with a loud click. "Thank you for your services rendered. Consider this your termination."

---

"Where's Fraser?" Harrison asks under his breath, as he watches the scene unfolding below, Flaherty threatening Ray. It makes him itch, makes him wants to go down there and do something, but O'Toole's got a plan and more importantly he's got guys with guns, so Harrison waits on the catwalk with Fraser and the giant. And he knows why the giant's there, and that's making him itch too, but what he doesn't know is where Fraser's got off to, in the maybe five seconds since Harrison took his eyes off him.

"Dunno," rumbles the giant, whom Harrison's brain keeps insisting on calling Andre even though he said his name was Mike. Andre looks displeased. "Was gonna ask you the same thing."

Harrison frowns. This is not good. No way he just lost a Mountie.

"Can't have gone far," he mutters, then hisses, "Fraser! Where the hell--"

"Forget him," Andre says, from way too close to Harrison's ear.

Alarm bells go off, and he starts to turn, to pull away from the giant. He's stopped by heavy hands on his wrists, twisting them up behind his back.

Harrison thinks about fighting back. Then he thinks about being stepped on like a bug.

He doesn't fight. Not yet, at least.

Instead, he tries to keep his voice even, twisting his head around to catch a glimpse of Andre's face. "I miss something?"

"Just watch," Andre says, and Harrison doesn't have a hell of a lot of options. So he does.

He watches Flaherty cock the trigger, and he wants to close his eyes, but he doesn't. Because O'Toole's gonna do something. Right?

Shit, they wouldn't have come all the way out here if he wasn't gonna do something. Anything.

Ray does close his eyes, and it makes Harrison's insides twist. This is-- no. He can't watch this. He can't just--

Gunshot.

Flaherty's head explodes.

And then four more shots in quick succession, and Flaherty's thugs are down too, but Harrison can't relax, can't just-- there's something wrong, something going on or O'Toole wouldn't have sicced the fucking giant on him, and--

O'Toole's voice carries all the way up to the catwalk. "Detective Kowalski, is it? Thank you for your services rendered. Consider this your termination."

"Oh hell no," Harrison says, and stomps heavily on the giant's foot.

Andre grunts but doesn't loosen his hold. Harrison tries again.

"Stop that," the giant says calmly.

"Then let me go, you freakin' ape!" Harrison's not trying to keep quiet now, figures O'Toole would expect him to object to this turn of events. He sees Ray's eyes flick toward him, then back to O'Toole, and he says something to him that Harrison can't hear.

"Sorry," Andre says, and he really does sound sorry, which just makes Harrison want to hit him even more. "Just doin' my job."

"Your job sucks," Harrison hisses, twisting futilely in his grasp. "What the-- what the hell does he think he's doing, Jesus motherlovin' Christ--"

"Dude's a cop," Andre says, sounding puzzled.

"Oh, fucking news flash! O'Toole knew that!"

"Well, yeah," Andre says. Now he sounds like he's talking to an idiot. "And now the other guys do too."

"That ungrateful fuck," Harrison growls. This can't be happening. He can't do this, not again. He had to watch Tru die. He's not anxious for a repeat.

Repeat. Repeat day. He was supposed to save Ray, not watch O'Toole shoot him.

But he's doing it, Andre the Giant's the immovable fucking force, or irresistible object, except neither of those sound right but it doesn't matter anyway because he can't get free, he can't do anything and where the hell is Fraser, getting a fucking manicure or something?

"Harrison," Fraser says behind him, and Harrison thinks dizzily, Wow. Fast manicure.

"You," the giant snarls, and infinitesimally loosens his grip on Harrison's wrists, enough so maybe he can feel his fingers again someday.

"Duck," Fraser says, matter-of-factly.

It takes Harrison a second to absorb this. Then he yelps and throws himself forward, against the railing of the catwalk.

The giant doesn't duck in time; he's got farther to go. Fraser's two-by-four impacts his skull with a satisfying thwack.

Andre hits the floor, out like a light.

"Harrison," Fraser says again, breathlessly, dropping the two-by-four. "Now, hurry--"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah." He clings to the railing, hauling himself back up, and fumbles for his gun. His wrists are sore and his fingers are tingling all pins-and-needles, and he almost drops the gun to the warehouse floor before he manages to wrap his hands around the grip and prop his wrists up on the railing.

He's panicking, clumsy with haste, positive O'Toole must've heard something-- but no, he's still down there, talking to Ray. Ray answers back, and Harrison can't see his face, but whatever he says makes O'Toole's expression darken, and Harrison thinks, Take that, fucker.

He licks his lips and asks softly, "Whaddya think? Warning shot?"

Fraser's watching the action too. He looks grim.

"Make it count," is all he says.

Great. Room for artistic interpretation. He can work with that.

O'Toole raises his gun again, and Harrison braces his wrists, squints, and shoots.

The bullet hits O'Toole in the shoulder, spinning him around and dropping him to the floor. Harrison barely has time to admire his handiwork before Fraser pulls him back from the catwalk, pushing him to the floor just as the thugs turn and fire back at him. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Ray throw himself to the side, taking advantage of the thugs' distraction to roll into the shadows. Then he's distracted himself by the feel of Fraser's body pressed full-length against his back, shielding him.

"Nice shot," Fraser breathes into his ear.

Harrison squirms, trying not to enjoy it too much. "Would it be too clichéd to say I was aiming for his head?"

"I'll try not to hold it against you," Fraser says, which isn't helping with the enjoyment thing, like, at all, and then he rolls off Harrison and onto his feet, which does help some but is also pretty damn disappointing. He pulls Harrison up as well, and they run for the stairs, spurred on by the sound of gunfire behind them.

Ray's waiting for them when they descend, crouched under the stairs and trying to work his cuffed hands around in front of him, and suddenly Harrison understands why Tru gave him those huge hugs every time she rewound to save his ass. But Ray's not in a hugging mood; when he sees Harrison, the first thing he says is, "Pick me."

"All right," Harrison says, blinking. "I choose you, Pikachu."

Ray rolls his eyes. "Pick the cuffs, Einstein."

The gunshots are getting closer. Harrison squeezes in next to Ray, behind the dubious protection of the metal staircase, and gets to work.

"Ray," Fraser says softly, behind him.

Ray glances over his shoulder, and the heat, the intensity in his eyes is more than Harrison can take right now. He drops the picks and ducks his head to retrieve them. He doesn't want to see that look. It's not for him, it's for Fraser, and he's pretty sure if he gets in the way, Ray's eyes will burn right through him to get to their intended target.

Which is a bizarre mental image, and he clings to that, because it's better than some of the other images he's been having.

Then, "Hey," Ray says, "come on, come on, we don't got time for a picnic here," and Harrison feels the lock click open.

"Got it," he says unnecessarily, as the cuffs fall away. Ray's wrists are rubbed raw and bleeding, and he wants to-- God, he wants to touch them, taste them, and he doesn't even know where that's coming from, some kind of vampire fetish or what?

What with the adrenaline and the running around and the full-body contact, his dick's starting to forget it just got sucked a few hours ago, or maybe it's remembering, hey, that was hours ago and let's get some attention down here already.

Which. Bad timing.

"Greatness," Ray says, rubbing his wrists, and Harrison drags his eyes away from them with some effort. He leans out from behind the staircase and fires blindly a few times, more to distract himself than anything else. He's pretty sure he's not hitting anything.

"Ray," Fraser says again, in a different tone of voice, and Ray nods and fumbles around in his coat pockets. He produces a pair of black plastic-framed glasses and slips them on his nose.

"Gimme that," he says to Harrison, reaching for the gun.

"I got it," Harrison protests, but weakly. He's a decent shot, but nothing to write home about.

Fraser obviously agrees. "Ray has better aim than you do. He--" He pauses, as an idea seems to occur to him. "Ray, are you still licensed?"

"Not the time, Ben," Ray says, and grabs the gun out of Harrison's hand.

It's kind of cramped, the three of them squeezed into the small space behind the stairs, and when Ray leans over him to poke his head out, his hair brushes against Harrison's chin in a way that's more than a little distracting.

Then a bullet slams into the wall next to the staircase, and Ray jerks his head back, smacking the back of his skull into Harrison's chin.

"Shit," Ray mutters.

"Ow," Harrison retorts.

Ray rubs the back of his head and glares at him. "Holster that jaw there, Butch, before someone gets hurt."

"Yeah," Harrison says, "like me," but Ray's sticking his head out again, and this time he fires, five times in quick succession. Harrison tries to do the mental math, counting how many bullets are left, and then it's moot anyway because the hammer falls onto the empty chamber with a desolate click.

"Shit," Ray says again, pulling back. "You got--"

"Here," Harrison says, tossing the extra clip at him.

"Beauty," Ray says. He slams the clip home and fires three more shots. Then he pauses, as though debating something, and fires once more.

"Come on," he says, crawling out from behind the stairs. After a moment, Harrison and Fraser follow.

Harrison expects to see O'Toole and his henchmen dead in a heap, but to his surprise they're just maimed, lying on the floor and clutching their various bullet wounds. Ray keeps the gun trained on them as he marches across the floor, kicking their weapons toward Fraser, who collects them all in a neat pile.

Harrison looks around, but there's really nothing for him to do.

"Maybe I'll go get a snack," he says, to no one in particular.

Fraser cocks an eyebrow at him, but Ray's not paying attention. He's focused on O'Toole, bleeding from the hole in his shoulder and another one in his leg, and looking righteously pissed.

Ray smiles coldly. "How you doin', Pete?"

"If you're gonna kill me," O'Toole snaps, "do it."

"Yeah," Ray says, seeming to think about it. "That would be fun."

"You're a dead man, Kowalski. All of you--"

Ray makes a blah-blah motion with his hand. "Tell me something I don't know," he says, and then he turns and flashes Harrison a brilliant smile.

Harrison's heart stops. Just a little.

"Harry," Ray says, "call the cops, wouldja?"

---

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