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Vegas isn’t sure of the memory, at first.
It swims to him out of the darkness of his dreams - nightmares, longings - through the drug induced stupor he’s been in since the gun fight. Since he almost died.
The memory is so, so hazy, everything lit in ripples of blue and green, and with it comes the remembered tang of copper flooding his mouth, the pain that had burned through his chest, his abdomen.
He’d fallen, he thinks. He assumes, anyway, since that’s what happens when you get shot multiple times, and how the fuck did he live, anyway?
And the answer comes in the dreams, in the memory that slowly rebuilds itself for him piece by piece, more details fitting together as he tries to take it in, to accept it.
He doesn’t remember much about that day, truthfully. The doctors have told him it's normal, given what he’d gone through. Fuck that, he thinks, because he's Vegas, he's not fucking normal, but mostly because he hates not knowing. What he does remember is hazy - bits and pieces of blood and battle, of the way his father’s face had looked frozen in death and how he’d somehow staggered outside.
After that is blank, though, and all he has are the glimpses he gets in his dreams.
Someone had been there. Someone dressed in white and black, illuminated against the darkness with crimson wings of blood marked along his back. Vegas had just gotten glimpses, at first, but gradually it had come together, a full picture that takes his breath away and makes no fucking sense.
He’d been standing over Vegas, and somehow his presence had been of fury and rage and vengeance, and when the figure lifted his arm the sound of gunfire rippled through the dream, muted and far away like it was happening somewhere else. It was like something out of a movie, and none of it made sense to Vegas at all because it seemed like the person was protecting him, and who would protect him with that sort of passion? His guards had been dead at that point. Everyone had been, except him.
He can’t get any of it out of his fucking head, and night after night the dreams return, gradually becoming more and more vivid. The last to fall into place is the strongest, though. The same scene all over again, except this time his last glimpse hadn’t just been of the figure standing over him, it had been of the person dropping to their knees beside him and screaming, and when Vegas wakes up he's panting, the sound still ringing in his ears.
Vegas knows that sound, because he’s inflicted it. He’s just never had someone express that sort of anguish or grief for him before.
What it’s telling him makes no fucking sense, but he continues to dream it over and over again, and though it’s still hazy, other things start becoming clearer, glimpses of the moments just before. Familiar dark eyes that drew him in with their shadows and depths of emotion, and a smile that’s like sunshine through the deepest darkness. A voice that had kept him from tipping over the precipice, the same as the one that had screamed at his side as he slipped away into near death.
He thinks that he’ll escape it once he’s truly on the road to recovery, when the drugs are tapered off and he spends more time awake. Instead it just starts to play on a loop through his waking thoughts, though, and Vegas hates it when he realizes that he doesn’t know if he’s furious or terrified, that if he's honest, he knows who it was.
Or hopes.
It’s been a long time since Vegas let himself hope.
He gets his answer on a sunny afternoon when he’s sitting in his bed, resting. He’s awake, but doesn’t want to deal with anyone’s shit, so he keeps his eyes closed. Hopefully whoever it is will get the message and go away. One of the hospital staff, maybe, here to poke and prod him again. Except usually they know better than to open the fucking curtains, but he stops when he opens his eyes, ready to spit insults.
It’s not a staff member, standing there. It’s Pete.
A glance at the chair tells him Macau is still there, but he looks fast asleep. Vegas doesn’t know whether he’s glad of that or not, but he doesn’t have time to worry about it because Pete is turning back towards him.
Vegas only realizes that he’s started smiling when Pete smiles back at him, making his breath stutter in his chest for a moment, the pain of it almost worrying him for a moment until it eases as Pete speaks.
“You’re up?” he asks.
“For awhile now,” Vegas replies, and thank fuck he actually sounds normal, and not like his heart is suddenly pounding out of his chest. Pete’s been there before, in and out, but they haven’t really talked, not properly. He’s been avoiding it, and there’s something that tells him that Pete’s been letting him, that he's being patient until Vegas is ready. “Where have you been?” he asks.
Pete’s answering, saying something about food for Macau, but Vegas isn’t really listening because Pete’s moving, coming closer and fuck, he’s sitting down on the bed.
Vegas just stares at him for a moment, not able to tear his gaze away. The moment drags out, but finally he makes himself speak.
“Why? Why are you still here?” The words are in English, and Vegas isn’t sure whether or not he wants Pete to understand, to answer, but it occurs to him that they’ve had a few moments like this, now. Something about Pete just draws it out of him.
He can’t tell what Pete is thinking, and there’s another moment until he speaks again.
“I can’t run off anywhere.”
His voice is quiet, but the words hit Vegas like a slap, his chest tightening again for an altogether different reason.
He doesn’t want Pete to feel like he has to stay. The idea is completely fucking foreign, though part of him knows that it shouldn’t be when it hasn’t been so long since he’d kept Pete as his prisoner. He doesn’t, though - he doesn’t want Pete to feel like he has to stay, but how does he fucking say that when it doesn’t even make sense? He has no idea what he’s even doing, and he’s lost everything, anyway, so why would Pete even want to stay, and -
A hand touches his, and it’s like a balm on wounded skin, pulling Vegas out of his thoughts. Pete’s hand is in his, and when Vegas lifts his gaze the other man is looking at him, and something in his expression makes Vegas feel like he wants to run towards him and away at the same time.
“If you run now,” he finally manages, the words clearer than he expects them to sound. “I’m all right with that.”
There’s a part of him that screams at the words, the emotions so red hot and furious that they threaten to overtake him, but Vegas ignores them, refuses to let them win. Pete will probably leave, but he has to fucking do this. He can’t have Pete staying with him if it’s out of guilt, or obligation, or because he feels that he has to. Imagining not having Pete at his side is like a vast pit yawning open in front of him, but it’s all right, because Vegas has spent most of his life in there. He’ll figure it out.
“I've got nothing left.”
Pete’s just watching him, and Vegas wishes that he would say something, but fuck, he just wants to get this over with because he can feel his eyes stinging, and he doesn’t want Macau to wake up and see him being this pathetic.
“I don’t want to be your burden.”
Pete’s still just watching him, and Vegas waits for him to pull away, to leave. When he does move, Vegas braces himself, but instead of going to the door Pete is moving closer, and his hand is gentle and reassuring on Vegas’ arm, and there’s something in his gaze that’s so deep and warm and understanding that Vegas struggles to breathe through it.
“I just wanna follow my heart.”
The words don’t even make sense, at first, and Vegas struggles as he takes them in. How is it possible that Pete is still there? After everything Vegas has done, after losing everything, he’s staying? Staying, and implying that his heart is why?
The words don’t even make sense, but Pete is just sitting there, watching him with a hint of a smile that brings out that dimple in his cheek, and somehow everything about him says that he’s happy to be there, and he’s really not leaving. Vegas’ chest loosens a bit with the realization, a flood of warmth and emotions he can’t comprehend or manage coursing through him.
“From now on you’re no longer my pet,” he finally says quietly. “You’re the most important person in my life.”
Fuck, the words are way too emotional, too pathetic and cheesy - but Pete is still there, still meeting his gaze, and then he smiles, and the sheer happiness in it makes it a bit like those dull grey days where the clouds part to let the sunshine in, illuminating everything and chasing away all the haze and shadows.
Vegas can barely breathe, let alone speak, so he just leans forward, waiting for Pete to pull away or say something when it becomes obvious he wants to kiss him. He’s still there, though, letting Vegas touch his cheek, letting him move closer, and then their lips are touching and Pete’s lifting his hand to touch him too, and their second kiss is somehow even sweeter than the first.
I’m here because I want to be here, it says, and it feels like a precious gift laid gently at his feet.
Of course Macau has to choose that moment to wake up, though of course he’s been listening. Vegas expects to be angry, but he’s… not, somehow. It’s like all the room for anger has been carved out, for the moment, and all that’s left is a strange but welcome warmth that’s settled in his chest, intensifying every time he finds himself meeting Pete’s gaze.
It seems like it takes an eternity for Macau to finally leave, but he does, and then Vegas is alone with Pete. Really alone, though he knows that there are hospital staff outside, and even a guard on standby. None of that matters right now, though, because Pete is closing the door behind Macau and coming back over to the bed.
Vegas looks at him for a moment and then finally draws up the courage to ask. “It was you, wasn’t it?” he asks quietly.
“Me?” Pete asks, smiling a little as he sits down. “I think I need to know more before I agree.”
Vegas smiles a little, but can’t look away as he thinks about the dreams again. The memory. That's changed since he talked to Pete, too, the shift from rejecting it as a dream to wondering - hoping - if it had actually happened.
“You saved me,” he says at last, quiet. “I kept having this dream, but it didn’t make any sense. Except it was you, wasn’t it? You killed the man who shot me. You probably worked with him, if he was with the major family.” The man had just been doing his job. Vegas doesn't care that he's dead, but he wants to know why.
Pete’s expression is more serious, now, and Vegas sees something else in his eyes. Something dark and implacable. It’s always there, but Pete doesn’t show his shadows to just anyone. Finally he nods, holding Vegas’ gaze.
“You said you wanted it to be me, if someone killed you,” Pete says simply. “He had no right.”
Vegas has to laugh at that, partly at the simplicity of the response and partly because they both know Pete had been given the chance to kill him and hadn’t. He’s serious again almost immediately, though, his gaze finding Pete’s once more.
“I..” He false starts, and grimaces. He doesn’t falter over his words like a schoolboy, but somehow this - Pete - brings it out in him. “I thought I heard someone screaming,” he continues slowly, finding himself avoiding Pete’s gaze. “But - that wasn’t you, was it?”
As soon as the words are out he wishes he could take them back, hating the gnawing pit in his stomach at the answer. It’s probably just something he imagined, after all. He knows that Pete’s going to stay, but what does that mean, exactly? Because Pete’s whole job has been looking after Vegas’ fucking cousins, so that could be why he tried to protect Vegas, couldn’t it, simple force of habit? Could it be why he’s still here now?
Then the brush of fingertips on his skin somehow filters through, and Vegas surfaces from the churning roar of his thoughts to register Pete’s hand on his cheek a split second before he’s being kissed again, long and slow and sweet. It’s like a whisper of fresh air in a raging fire, a sip of oxygen for burning lungs and Vegas hears a choked sound and realizes that it’s come from him, that his arms are tight around Pete as the two of them kiss until they’re breathless and finally have to break apart, panting.
“Of course it was me,” Pete murmurs into the silence. "I thought I'd lost you."
Vegas closes his eyes as he takes in the tone in the other man’s voice. It’s foreign to him because he’s only ever seen it directed at other people, but he recognizes it, and even though it’s new he’s pretty sure he wants - no, needs - to always hear it there.
Loyalty. Affection. Protectiveness.
Love.
They’re still just sitting there, foreheads pressed together, and after a few moments Vegas sighs, slowly becoming aware of his body relaxing, tension seeping away that he hadn't even realized he was carrying. He doesn’t need to open his eyes to know that Pete’s smiling a little, but the other man’s hands are stroking down over his back, now, and Vegas doesn’t resist as Pete guides him down until they’re both settled against the pillows, arms still tight around each other.
He can’t bring himself to open his eyes, not just yet. But he’s starting to believe that from now on when he opens them, Pete will always be there.