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Pete walks through the halls of the hospital on the balls of his feet, the tips of his toes, careful not to make a sound. It’s dead quiet when it’s this late, the floor is mostly empty save for the couple of nurses he greets with silent waves and bows, who return his smile with an equally warm one.
Technically, he shouldn’t be allowed to be here. Macau being Vegas’ blood relative means he gets all the visiting privileges he wants, but those same privileges hadn’t extended to Pete.
It didn’t stop him of course, when he’d barged into the hospital soaked in Vegas’ blood demanding to see him. It didn’t stop him when a nurse had urged him hours later that he needed to go home, if not because visiting hours were far from over, then because they couldn’t let him see Vegas anyway. Not until he was out of surgery and that wouldn’t be for awhile.
Eventually, the nurses stopped urging and Pete got to come in and out of Vegas’ room as he pleased. He has no doubts it was because of the same pulled strings that are keeping Vegas at the hospital in the first place, receiving some of the best medical care in the country free of charge and with no questions asked, despite it all. Pete doesn’t think about it or question it. He’s not sure enough about any of it to feel grateful for it either. But whatever the situation’s reality, it’s keeping Vegas alive, giving Macau a place to stay, and letting Pete watch over them both.
He’s extra careful not to make a sound when he opens the door to Vegas’ hospital room, careful to not wake anyone who may be sleeping inside. The curtains are open, flooding the room with moonlight and Pete is grateful he won’t need to open any light to see. Macau is nowhere to be seen, and Pete panics for a second before remembering that he’d told Pete he would be staying late at the university to study. Pete had encouraged him to take it easy, that a break from school was well-deserved, might even do him some good. Macau laughed it off and Pete didn’t press further, knowing school might be a burden but also a welcomed distraction from everything going on.
Pete puts his bag down and slowly approaches Vegas’ bed. He sits down carefully at the edge and reaches out his hand until it falls onto the soft waves of a sleeping Vegas’ hair.
It’s unbelievable to see him like this.
Pete can’t say he prefers to see him the way he was at the start of his hospital stay, pale as a ghost and cheeks hollowed, with tubes, wires, and needles stuck in every and any place the doctors could manage. He’d looked small and helpless then, but Pete was used to that. He’d seen Vegas look small and helpless a hundred different ways in the time he’s known him. He’d seen him be in pain and anguish, be furiously tenacious and stubborn just like he’d been when he was fighting for his life in the ICU. It hurt to see him like that but it felt familiar. It was a reminder that Vegas was here, and every breath he took may have shuddered through him but he was breathing. It’s the peace on Vegas’ face when he sleeps that terrifies him. It’s a peace he’s only ever seen on Vegas’ face one other time: when he was lying unconscious on the side of the pool, oozing out blood from four gunshots.
Pete’s not proud of it, not proud to poke and prod at a sick man, but it’s become a habit for him to rouse Vegas while he sleeps just so he can see him move. He’ll give him the smallest pull of hair, a tiny pinch or scratch or tickle of the skin just so he can see Vegas’ face scrunch in discomfort or hear his breathing deepen or feel him twist under his touch. Any small, definitive proof of life so Pete can breathe a little easier.
His hands take purchase in Vegas’ hair and are about to give a tug when Vegas turns his head entirely, slowly blinking his eyes open to meet Pete’s.
“Pete?” he mumbles groggily.
”Did I wake you?” Pete asks, apologetic.
Vegas eyes slip closed again and he leans his head into Pete’s touch. “No,” he says softly.
Pete moves his hand from Vegas’ hair to cup his cheek and Vegas reaches up to grab it, intertwining their fingers and pulling their hands to hold against his chest.
“You should go back sleep,” Pete whispers as Vegas begins to stroke his hand with his thumb. He moves to pull himself out of Vegas’ grasp but Vegas holds tight and pulls Pete closer.
”Stay,” Vegas says, eyes meeting Pete’s again. It sounds like a command, but Pete knows it’s a plea, a hopeful suggestion.
He nods and Vegas begins to pull him even closer.
“Stay,” he says again.
The rational side of Pete’s mind worries about the possibility of hurting Vegas if he climbs into the bed with him, a possible sudden movement that could end up ripping a stitch or a touch that could put pressure on something fragile and set off all sorts of problems. But it’s a side of Pete’s mind that’s playing a losing game because Pete is already kicking off his shoes and climbing into the bed anyway.
He takes Vegas’ arm, the one not healing from a gunshot wound, and lays his head down onto the bicep. When he looks up to meet Vegas’ eyes, they’re closer than he thought they’d be and for a second he can’t breathe. Vegas takes his other arm and snakes it around Pete’s back, at a distinctly low angle, and tries to push him closer, but Pete holds still.
”If I get any closer than this, I’ll hurt you,” Pete protests. “Your wounds are still healing.”
”It’ll be fine. Are you just being shy again?” Vegas says smiling at him.
Pete rolls his eyes but Vegas forfeits, lays his head back down on his pillow and starts rubbing circles into Pete’s back.
“How are you feeling?” Pete asks softly.
“Better now,” Vegas replies in the same cadence, eyes roaming Pete’s face slowly like he’s trying to memorize it.
”Macau?” Vegas asks after a moment. He’s moved his hand from Pete’s back to his hip, gripping it tightly and stroking the side with his thumb.
”Still at school,” Pete answers and wills himself not to shiver at the touch.
”He should take it easy,” Vegas says.
Pete nods lightly.
“That’s what I keep telling him,” he says.
Vegas moves the arm under Pete to bracket his head so he can put his hand in Pete’s hair. Pete finds himself closing his eyes, lost in the touch, the proximity, the warmth between them.
“And what were you doing all day?” Vegas asks.
Pete’s eyes open again but he avoids Vegas’ gaze and hopes he doesn’t notice. It’s not really a secret. It’s not. He just wasn’t sure he wanted to bring it up.
After a moment, he says, “I went to see my grandma.”
He feels Vegas instantly tense and meets his eyes. There’s worry there, and shame, and something else Pete can’t quite place.
“You went all the way back home?” Vegas asks.
Pete gives a small shrug.
”I had the time,” he says.
Whatever was in Vegas’ gaze is gone now, subdued under a pretense of casualness when Vegas asks, “How is she?”
Pete thinks the small talk is funny, didn’t think Vegas was really the type to beat around a bush.
”She’s really good,” Pete says. “She asked me how my trip was.”
He’s smiling when he says it because it’s funny but that doesn’t keep the shame from creeping back into Vegas’ gaze.
“Did you tell her what happened?” Vegas asks carefully and Pete can sense the second question that goes unsaid, did you tell her about me?
”Not really, she still thinks I’m working for the main family,” Pete says. “I’ll tell her eventually, bit by bit so she doesn’t get overwhelmed, doesn’t get too upset.”
Pete’s face sours a little.
“She’s a big fan of Khun Korn.”
Vegas sneers and Pete chuckles.
It lightens the tension and Vegas goes back to playing with Pete’s hair, pulling strands up and watching them fall from his fingers.
”What’s she like?” he asks and Pete knows it’s not small talk anymore, warms at the fact that Vegas genuinely wants to know.
”You’ll like her. She’s a lot like me,” Pete says smiling, smug. “You’ll see for yourself soon enough.”
Vegas’ hands still again and the earnest surprise on his face makes Pete’s chest feel tight.
“Oh?” he says.
And suddenly Pete is a ball of nerves; he didn’t think he’d be confessing this so soon. He ducks his gaze down and reaches his hand out to start playing with the strings on Vegas’ hospital gown.
“Well, yeah,” he says, trying not to mutter. “I mean, when you’re better and discharged and everything and Macau has time off from school. I want to take you to meet her. I want to take you to see my home.”
He says it all in a quick single breath, eyes fixated on the string he’s swirling in his fingers and he feels silly to be this nervous because he means it. He means every word. He thought about it all day, for his entire trip home and his entire trip back and he came to this conclusion convicted and steadfastly convinced. The tumult and turmoil of his past with Vegas and the daunting reality of everything they’ve yet to work out isn’t lost on Pete. But this. The closeness and familiarity he’s felt in this hospital room, with Vegas and with Macau, separately and together. He wants this. He wants to keep this and protect it. He wants this family and he wants his family to be a part of it too.
He looks up again to meet Vegas’ gaze, and he wants to drown in the affection pouring out of it. But those other things, the shame and nerves and worry, are there too.
“What’s she gonna think?” Vegas says with a shallow smile.
“God, she’s gonna be obsessed with Macau,” Pete replies, exasperated, and it rips out a sudden laugh from Vegas. Pete feels so lucky that he got to catch the way it shaped Vegas’ face, the way it scrunched up the corners of his mouth and tightened his eyes.
”Oh yeah?” Vegas says, still grinning and Pete can’t help but grin back. He can barely help not falling into a fit of giggles himself.
“Oh my god, she’s gonna eat him up,” he says gleefully. “Stuff him with food, pinch his cheeks, fuss over his clothes. He’s not gonna get a second to breathe.”
”He’s gonna love it,” Vegas says with an amused hum and Pete nods in total agreement.
“It’s a shame I don’t have Macau’s baby face to fall back on,” Vegas says and something about the feigned nonchalance makes Pete want to scream.
He wants to scream at this child he’s laying face to face with, this man bedridden in a hospital bed from four violent bullet wounds who’s figuratively shuffling his feet, hands behind his back, shyly looking down and so worried at the prospect of this elderly woman he’s never met not liking him.
Pete can’t promise him otherwise, of course. He can’t say he hasn’t wondered the same thing, wondered just how much about Vegas he should let his grandmother know, wondered if she’ll recognize his voice from their phone call. But he also can’t say he’s worried about it. In fact, he’s more worried at the moment about the ridiculous endearment consuming him as he watches Vegas avoid his gaze. Then again, there’s no reason to worry about that either. There’s plenty of things about Vegas that are ridiculous. There’s plenty of things about him that are endearing.
Pete reaches out to lay his hand on Vegas’ cheek.
”Well, you’re in luck. Handsomely chiseled faces are also a favorite of hers,” he says, running his thumb across Vegas’ cheekbone and bringing his finger down to run along Vegas’ jaw. He feels it tense under his touch and when he stops his finger just under Vegas’ chin, he keeps it there for longer than he means to.
Vegas is handsomely chiseled. Pete can’t promise him much about how his grandmother will react to him but he can certainly promise she’ll agree on this. It’s borderline fact. He remembers her gushing over Kinn and thinks maybe she’ll appreciate their similarities; the same pale skin, the same thick, pitch-black hair, the same striking gaze, the same soft cadence. There’s plenty of other aspects to Vegas’ attractiveness to bring up too, but he feels there’s a few his grandmother most likely won’t share his particular affection for. Aspects like Vegas’ hands, his smell, the dip of his waist, the sharpness of his teeth, the softness of his lips, the precision of his tongue, the shape of his-
”Yeah?” Vegas says, barely a whisper, and Pete snaps out his trance, doesn’t realize he was staring at Vegas’ mouth until he has to tear his gaze away to meet his eyes. When he does, the worry and nerves and even the affection and amusement that were in Vegas’ gaze are gone. All replaced with something else, something hungrier.
“Yeah…” Pete says, almost in a daze as he feels Vegas’ grip on his hip tighten and he lets his eyes find Vegas’ lips again. He still has his finger placed under Vegas’ chin and thinks about how just the smallest movement could have his fingers find Vegas’ lips too.
“This is dangerous,” he whispers but he already has his thumb running across Vegas’ bottom lip, teasing it down.
Vegas breathes in, in his own daze, but his heart is racing against his chest. Something about Pete being the one to insinuate that their close proximity is dangerous. Something about Pete confirming he wants Vegas, still wants Vegas even after everything, just as much as Vegas wants him. It makes Vegas swallow.
“Pete,” he breathes out, feeling the ache of a bedridden month under his skin.
“The doctor says you won’t be cleared for sex for awhile,” Pete replies, pouting, and Vegas surprises himself when he chuckles, but it luckily lifts the charge between them a little.
“You asked my doctor when I would be cleared for sex?” Vegas asks incredulously. He’s amused but his heart’s racing again.
“Well, thankfully it didn’t come to that,” Pete says, unaware, as he moves his fingers from Vegas’ lips down to rest against the base of his neck. “He not-so-subtlety slipped it into the conversation the last time we talked. Very firm. Kept reminding me that any relapse in your recovery would mean he’d have to wait even longer before clearing you for ‘strenuous activity’.”
“Shame,” Vegas says, gripping Pete’s hip tighter and pulling him closer.
“Yeah,” Pete says, eyes half-lidded and trained on his target. “Doesn’t mean we can’t do this.”
He snakes the hand he had on Vegas’ collarbones around the back of his neck, pulls himself even closer so he can nose along Vegas’ cheek before kissing him.
Despite their hunger, they kiss slow. They take their time before ever even opening their mouths and when they do, it’s a languid movement of one mouth against the other. Even their hands roam leisurely. Pete finds his trailing down Vegas’ chest, careful of the bandages. Vegas’ hands are traveling up and down Pete’s back before finding their favorite spot: cupping his cheek with a stroke of his thumb.
They lick into each other’s mouths in exploration, tasting, teasing, and nibbling unhurried and unbothered. The sounds they pull from one another are ones of content. Happy hums and soft sighs mingling between them. When they wind down, it’s with small kisses exchanged serenely. A few more to the lips, one from Vegas to Pete’s dimple, one from Pete to Vegas’ nose, one from Vegas to each of Pete’s eyelids, one from Pete to Vegas’ cheek, all with smiles in between.
Pete pulls himself up slightly and moves to bring his head to nuzzle into Vegas’ bandaged shoulder. He kisses the spot on his bicep where he knows the graze from his bullet sits. He’d know the exact spot even if it heals and fades without a trace. He hopes it won’t. Before he can stop himself, he brings his hand up and squeezes lightly at the wound, flitting his eyes up quickly so he catches the look on Vegas’ face when he winces. It’s a satisfying expression, eases the little bit of bitterness in Pete’s chest.
Vegas wishes he could give him more, wishes he could let Pete tear him open in retribution. Not even to subside his own guilt, but purely for this. For Pete’s satisfaction.
“You saved my life,” he says.
Pete smiles slightly as he starts playing with the edge of the bandages.
“I’d be lying if I said that was my only intention,” he says unashamedly. Vegas wants to kiss him again.
“Honestly, I would’ve shot you between the eyes if I could be sure you’d survive.”
And Vegas does. He tilts Pete’s head back up to his and slots their mouths together, breathing in when he feels Pete’s hands in his hair.
I love you, Vegas thinks. I love you so much.
He hasn’t said it aloud since the garage.
Pete hasn’t said it at all.
Vegas couldn’t care less.
He doesn’t need Pete to say it, doesn’t even need Pete to feel it until it makes sense for him. All he needs is this: Pete here, with him and by his side because he wants to be and chose to be. And in whatever capacity, it’s enough. It’s certainly not going to stop Vegas from loving him. He won’t tell him because he doesn’t want him to feel it’s something that needs reciprocating but he’ll love him. He’ll love him when he’s here in his arms and when he’s not. He’ll love him when he smiles, when he kisses him, when he says his name. He’ll love him when he’s soft and when he’s warm and he’ll love him just like this: ruthless and unapologetic, tenacious and unyielding, disdainfully fond. He’ll love him and keep loving him and will only ever stop if Pete tells him to.
They pull apart and Pete presses a final kiss to Vegas’ forehead before knocking his own against it and flashing him a grin. It’s different than the grin he flashed him the last time they were in bed together, and Vegas thinks it unbelievable he’s going to get to discover all the different kinds of smiles Pete can give. This one is warm. It makes Vegas feel flushed in its presence.
“You should sleep,” Pete says and he starts positioning them more comfortably, taking Vegas’ arm and placing it back around Pete’s waist.
Sleep had already been creeping onto Vegas but it engulfs him completely at the same time as Pete’s embrace. Still, he keeps his eyes open just long enough to watch Pete close his and his face slip into the peace of slumber. Vegas’ own eyes begin to droop closed, and laying so closely together like this, he and Pete both find the sense of each other’s heartbeat to be an easing comfort.
——————
It’s well past midnight when Macau gets to the hospital. His friends had offered him a place to crash so he wouldn’t have to travel back so late, but he’d declined. It’d been a month but there’s still something that worries him about going too long without seeing his brother.
But when he enters the room, he’s greeted with a reminder that he doesn’t have to worry at all.
There’s something that just fits about the image of Vegas and Pete tangled up in each other’s arms, dead asleep and at the most peace they’ve ever been. It’s the same way they had all fit together, dog-piled on Vegas’ bed giggling from kisses like they’ve been doing this their whole lives. Macau doesn’t know much; doesn’t know much about Pete besides him being the former head bodyguard of the main family, doesn’t know much about how his relationship with Vegas had happened, and despite how close they are, he really doesn’t know much about Vegas either. Sure, he knows his brother inside and out, but Vegas’ dealings and happenings, the things that go on in his life, Macau has always been carefully sheltered from it all. Although there’s plenty of things Macau had figured out on his own; marks, bruises, scars that can’t be so easily hidden away.
Macau doesn’t know much but he does know this: this feels right. It feels right and natural and safe in a way that whatever was supposed to be a family between his brother, his father, and himself never did, in a way that whatever was supposed to be a family between his cousins and his uncle never did. Main families and minor families and mafia families bastardizing the word, when the closest Macau has ever come to understand what it means to be a family is in this very hospital room and it’s small circle of inhabitants.
But as sweet as the sight of Pete and Vegas cuddled in bed may be, Macau is still a 19-year-old with a phone in his hand and a knack for teasing his brother.
He snaps a few dozen photos for good measure, moving around the bed to make sure he gets some particularly embarrassing angles. And when he’s tucking himself in to fall asleep on the armchair, he’s contemplating the most opportune time for him to use these pictures to his best advantage.