Being Ray Kowalski

quick chapter links: one | two | three | four | five | six | seven | eight | nine | ten | eleven | twelve

cover illustration, "The Man in the Mirror," by JS Cavalcante: original size (1500x1251) | leave her a comment

notes and acknowledgments

When the phone rang, way too early in the morning, Rae Kowalski buried her head under the pillow and tried to go back to sleep. Ben would get it; he was probably up already. If it was important, he'd come and wake her.

The phone rang again. And again. Fuck, thought Rae blearily as she fumbled for the receiver on the bedside table without opening her eyes. Had she slept so long that Ben had already left for the Consulate? She'd had strange and unsettling dreams, dreams of running through Chicago and not getting anywhere, and she didn't feel rested at all. She felt numb and a little dizzy, like she'd had too much to drink last night (had she been drinking? Oddly, she couldn't remember) and needed a whole lot more sleep than she had managed to get.

Her hand found its target, and she pulled the phone to her face, stretching the cord to its full extent. "Yeah, this is Rae," she said, and whoa, her voice sounded weird. Maybe she was coming down with the flu. Her whole body felt leaden. Just moving her arm enough to get the phone was like picking up a fifteen-pound dumbbell.

"Good morning, Detective," said Welsh's voice in her ear. He sounded more alert and cheery than anyone had a right to be at this hour. Whatever this hour was. "Sorry to interrupt your beauty sleep, but we got a vandalism report down at Grant Park. Guy who called it in said it looked like a ritual, or something. Why don't you pick up Fraser on the way—as I recall, he's good with that hocus-pocus stuff."

While Welsh spoke, she opened her eyes—and nearly dropped the phone. What the hell was she doing in her old apartment? She'd moved out over a year ago, when she and Ben got the house together. Christ, had she gotten so drunk that she'd gone to the wrong place? Wait a minute—in that case, how had she managed to get in?

She squeezed her eyes shut again, trying to fight through the fog in her brain. Had she even been drinking last night? Or was it whatever she was coming down with that made her feel so hung over, that made her chest ache and her stomach….

Holy shit.

Involuntarily she shivered, despite the warm weight of the covers. Something was seriously wrong here.

"Vecchio, you there?"

Vecchio?

She swallowed hard, opened her eyes again. "This is Rae Kowalski." Not that anyone could tell, listening to her, she thought. And she could feel something between her legs, something resting against her thigh that wasn't supposed to be there…something very, very, very wrong.

"I know who you are," said Welsh. His sigh was clearly audible even over the phone. "Now get moving."

She was only too happy to hang up the phone, because there was no way she could concentrate on talking to her boss. Not with all the alarm bells in her brain going off like this. Part of her wanted to push back the covers and find out what the hell was going on; part of her wanted to pull them back over her head and go back to sleep, and maybe when she woke up again everything would be normal.

She compromised by looking around, turning her head in a slow sweep. From the way the sun slanted weakly into the room, she could tell it was later than she had thought. Maybe Ben had already left for work. But he didn't seem to have been here; there was no dent in the mattress next to her, no smell of him on the pillow. She had been the only one sleeping in the bed. He had probably spent the night at home. Which still didn't explain what she was doing there in her old apartment.

Which, she realized as she scanned the room, still had her stuff in it. The old bureau she'd picked up at a yard sale, the dumbbells in the corner that she never used because she preferred going to the gym. And Welsh had called her here.

Something freaky was going on. And it started with whatever had happened to her body, and she totally did not want to think about this, but it was time, she was going to have to face it, so she took a deep breath, threw back the covers, and swung her legs to the floor.

Whoa. Maybe she was still drunk, if in fact she'd been drinking, because her body felt all uncoordinated, like she was going to stumble and fall at any moment. Instinctively she glanced at her feet, and as she did so her glance took in her whole body.

Which wasn't her body.

Okay, she'd figured that out a while ago. Or at least, it had been uncomfortably clear that something was pressing in her groin area that was not supposed to be there, and her chest felt weird and—okay, stop it, Kowalski, stop it, chill out, she told herself as she took a deep breath that ended in a nervous shudder. It was the booze, or the flu, or whatever was making her head spin and her skin numb. But she'd been trying not to think about it, because as long as she pretended everything was normal she could put off the freak-out that she felt lurking right at the base of her throat, all tight and scared and confused.

So much for that idea, she thought, as that ball of tightness started spilling out. Her teeth started to chatter and her hands shook, and she grabbed at the nightstand just for something solid to hold onto.

Because this was not her body. Her body did not usually wear boxer shorts to bed. More importantly, what she'd been feeling at her crotch, pressed against the fabric with the need to pee, was not something she associated with her body at all. And now that she could see the bulge that should not have been there, damn it, she couldn't keep pretending.

She had a dick.

Apprehensively she pulled the waistband away from her waist. Holy fuck. That was a penis, all right. And she was looking down across a flat chest, which, okay, she didn't have big breasts to begin with, she called them A+ because they were just a little small for a B-cup, but she was not as flat-chested as the flat chest that was there, just above her stomach and her boxer shorts and her dick…

She raced for the bathroom and retched into the toilet, dry heaves, nothing coming up, but she felt weird, she felt sick, she was in a body that was not her own body, and that was even freakier than being in her old apartment. She was in someone else's body, and that someone else was a man.

Suddenly a horrible thought struck her. Welsh had called her "Vecchio." She couldn't possibly have turned into him somehow, could she? Taking a deep breath, she took three shaky steps to the mirror.

It wasn't Ray Vecchio who stared back at her, thank God, but it wasn't Rae Kowalski, either. It was…it was kind of like her, but it was definitely a guy. Her hair looked almost the same, a little shorter in the back and on the sides. She ran an appraising hand through it. A little mousse and it would look almost like hers. Her eyes were the right color, but they were shaped just a little different, under eyebrows that had never been plucked. Her lips were thinner and her chin a little more prominent. Thoughtfully she rubbed the back of her hand across the stubbled (stubbled!) line of her jaw, and the chain on her wrist slid down her arm, a cool line of metal.

Which didn't make any sense at all. It wasn't her face, it wasn't her hand—too big, too broad—but that was the same chain she always wore around her wrist, the cheap fake-silver chain she'd been wearing for years. If this was somebody else's body, how come it was wearing her bracelet? And then her eye caught sight of a flash of red and black on her right shoulder, and she turned so she could see it in the mirror.

Holy shit. That was her tattoo. The Champion logo, because the Lakeview Lions had kicked ass and won the statewide trophy, not despite having a woman on the team but because of it, because she was the best goddamn left halfback in the league. Except she'd had it done on her back, just above the right shoulder blade, and here it was on her arm.

She lowered her lashes halfway and let her eyes go out of focus, and the reflection in the mirror looked sort of like her. But then she opened her eyes again, and whammo, there he was, not-Rae. So maybe she'd turned into a guy somehow. But if she'd turned into a guy, how come her tattoo was in the wrong place, and how come she was in her old apartment, and what was with Welsh calling her Vecchio, and where the fuck was Ben?

Terror gripped her, and she ran back out into the bedroom, her legs feeling like they might tangle up with every too-long step. "Ben!" she rasped. "Ben, are you here?" No answer. She opened the door to the living room, and was hit with a fresh wave of disorientation. It was her apartment, like it was when she'd lived here…only not quite. The couch was in the wrong place. The bike hanging on the wall was the wrong color. And was that a terrarium with a turtle in it?

It was like her face—if she squinted and overlooked certain details, it kind of looked right. But it was wrong. And the wrongest thing was that there was no Ben in it. "Fraser, get your ass in here!" she tried, but her voice didn't sound familiar and it didn't sound convincing, and the last word hung weakly in the air. It wasn't a very big apartment. If she didn't see him, he wasn't here.

Okay, think, she told herself. Deep breaths. Focus. She could do this.

Welsh had told her to get down to Grant Park. She'd better take a shower, get dressed—hopefully there would be some clothes in the closet that would fit this body. Stop by the house and get Ben, and hope he didn't freak out when he saw what had happened to her.

She went back into the bathroom, pulled off the boxers, then stared critically at her dick. If she was going to have one, at least it looked like a decent one: not embarrassingly small, not inconveniently large. Guess I'd better figure out how this thing works, she thought, and lifted the toilet seat. Fortunately it was like what's-his-name's dog; the body knew what to do, even if it felt strange to her, and she flushed the toilet with a completely ridiculous sense of accomplishment.

Shower next. That was easy enough, but she still couldn't shake the weird feeling of not quite fitting in her body. Everything was just a little off: her legs were too long, her hands moved oddly, and what they moved over was totally unfamiliar. Bigger biceps. A flat, muscular chest. And she almost dropped the soap at the unexpected sensation of her slippery hands on her own cock and balls.

Jesus. She had a cock.

She cupped her hand experimentally around her balls. Huh. Then someone else in the building must have turned on a shower, because the water cooled just that much, and that brought her mind back to things with a jolt. Got to get going, got to find Ben. Got to figure out what's going on. Got to get to work.

When she slid the soap down her legs it was almost as if she felt every single hair. Need to shave, she thought absently, and then snorted out loud. Yeah, she needed to shave her face. That would be an adventure.

Looking in the mirror as she toweled off, she decided it didn't look too bad. Lots of the detectives at the 27^th got away with stubble. Besides, it would take too much time. At least makeup was out of the question. Reflexively she opened the bathroom cabinet and hey, there was her hair stuff. Right brand and everything. She squirted some on her fingers and ran them through her hair to spike it, then went back into the bedroom to look for clothes.

The clothes in the bureau and the closet were guy clothes, buttons up the wrong sides and boxer briefs instead of her hi-rise bikinis, but they fit, anyway. Stuffing the new equipment inside clothes felt strange, too; how did guys deal with it every day, the cloth against their skin, the bulges against their legs? The shoes in the closet were guy shoes, looking absurdly huge, but they fit the absurdly big feet at the end of her legs. Her shoulder holster was hanging on its usual peg, and her gun was in the right drawer, next to her badge case. The eyeglasses on the nightstand were these big clunky things, totally different from her own glasses—but when she tried them on, they were the right prescription. Weird. She slipped them into her pocket and stepped back out into the living room.

There was a half-open box on the kitchen counter with three donuts in it, and she grabbed one as she headed out the door. Not too stale, she decided as she took a quick bite of it; too bad there was no time to make coffee. Hopefully the Goat would be parked where she usually left it—at least the keys on the counter looked right. She'd go to the house, try to explain things to Ben, and maybe they could figure out what was going on while they headed to the crime scene.

The gray-haired woman frowned. "Did you say Ben Fraser? I'm sorry, there's nobody here by that name. Just me and my daughter Louise—she's still asleep," she added pointedly. As if her bathrobe didn't already send the message that Rae had no business knocking on her door that early.

"That's all right. Must have gotten the wrong address," Rae told her, and she nodded and closed the door.

Except it wasn't the wrong address, thought Rae as she slowly walked back to the car and got in. She and Ben had been living there for more than a year. When his apartment building had been burned down, she'd invited him to move in with her—they'd been seeing each other for a couple of months, and okay, that was moving kind of fast, but they were both in their thirties, and they'd each been through enough relationships to know what they wanted. But her apartment was too small for the two of them, and anyway Dief really needed a yard to run around in.

They'd started looking for a house almost immediately, although it had taken nearly two months to find the perfect place: bigger than the apartment but not too big, a reasonable commute, rent they could pay on a what a couple of cops made. It was great having all that room, especially now that they were married and talking about maybe having kids…

Married.

She looked at her left hand, on the steering wheel. No ring. Of course no ring, she was a man, a man wouldn't be married to Fraser, but still, it was kind of weird to look at her hand (which still looked totally wrong, too big, too lumpy) and not see a ring. Not that she'd even gotten used to wearing the ring, yet. But it was just another item on the list of things that were not the way they were supposed to be.

As she maneuvered through traffic she rehearsed what she would say when she got to the Consulate. "I know I don't look like myself, but I'm actually Rae, you know, your wife…" No, she decided, that would freak him out. "Hi, I know you don't know me, but can we talk for a minute?" Yeah, that might do it. Get him alone, get him quiet, explain things.

A parking spot almost in front of the building opened up just as she arrived; she pulled in, turned off the ignition and took a deep breath. Okay. Get out of the car, Rae, you can do it without tripping over these stupid big feet. Walk down the sidewalk, turn, up the stairs. Open the door.

Oh, Christ, Constable Turnbull was at the reception desk. On the other hand, thought Rae, this might not be a bad thing. Nothing seemed to faze Turnbull—or maybe it was just that nothing managed to penetrate his thick skull. She swallowed and began to speak. "Hi, I know you don't—"

"Ah, Detective Vecchio! You must be here to pick up Constable Fraser. I'll just ring him for you, shall I?"

"Uh, yeah. Okay," said Rae, stunned. Turnbull had recognized her—the body she was in, anyway—and called her Vecchio? And so had Lieutenant Welsh, on the phone. A sudden thought struck her, and she pulled out her badge case and flipped it open.

The face in the picture on her identification card was the same face that had looked back at her out of the mirror this morning. And the name on the card was Ray Vecchio.

She shook her head, trying to clear it. This made no sense at all. The man she'd turned into didn't look at all like Ray Vecchio. She knew him—she'd worked in the same station with him for the better part of a year, after she'd transferred in to work with Jack Huey after his partner had been killed, until Vecchio got tapped for some undercover work. That was how she had met Benton Fraser, who had first come to Chicago on the trail of the killers of his father, blah blah blah, as he'd go on to anyone who didn't shut him up in time.

And as though thinking of him had conjured him up, there he was, striding down the hallway with Diefenbaker at his heels. She closed her badge case and put it away.

"Hello, Rae," he said, walking up to her, and she felt a leaping in her chest, a quick burst of happiness, because he knew her. He had recognized her despite her changed appearance—no, she suddenly realized, and her elation evaporated. Turnbull had called her Vecchio. So he had probably said "Ray," not "Rae." He thought she was Ray Vecchio, like everybody else. Hell, Dief probably thought she was Ray Vecchio.

But still. This was Fraser, after all. So as they left the Consulate and started down the sidewalk, she said, "Okay, I want to ask you a dumb question. You know who I am?"

He seemed to take it in stride. "Yes, of course. You're Ray."

"Ray Vecchio," she said flatly. She opened the passenger door for him and Dief, and then went around the car to get in on the driver's side. As she put the key in the ignition, Fraser spoke again.

"Well, that is your alias at the moment, yes."

Her hand froze. "Alias?"

"Ray, are you quite all right? Has someone perhaps kicked you in the head?"

"Yeah. I mean, no. I'm just a little, you know, disorientated this morning."

"Ah. Of course, "disoriented" is the more common usage in—"

"Whatever. It's early in the morning and I haven't had any coffee yet. So pretend like I don't know what's going on. Why do I have an alias?"

"To protect the real Ray Vecchio, of course, while he's undercover. He went to Las Vegas, you came to the 27^th District, and in order to preserve the illusion that Ray Vecchio is still here in Chicago, you assumed his identity and his unofficial partner. That is, me."

Rae blinked. Of all the weird reasons people might be calling her Ray Vecchio, that one had never entered her mind. And with good reason, because that story stank like a load of cockamamie bullshit. Vecchio went undercover, yeah, Rae knew about that, although Welsh had never said nothing about Vegas. But the whole idea of someone having to go undercover as Vecchio was the stupidest thing she'd ever heard. Especially the guy she'd turned into. He wouldn't fool a blind man—well, maybe a blind man, but that would be about it.

"So, okay," she said slowly. "If I'm just pretending to be Vecchio, who am I really?"

He frowned. "I'm not sure what you're getting at. I haven't forgotten your real name, if that's what you're asking."

"Yeah. I'm asking."

"Your name is Stanley Raymond Kowalski. Although you go by Ray." He shook his head. "Are you quite certain you haven't received a head injury?"

Rae stared at him for a moment. Stanley? "And I'm a man. I mean, I'm not a woman."

Fraser looked at her as though she was nuts, which she guessed it probably sounded like she was. Then he nodded slowly. "I think the stubble on your chin, the result of your neglecting to shave this morning, amply demonstrates that indeed you are a man."

She started laughing. Only Fraser would say something like that, so totally deadpan earnest. God. She started the car and pulled out into traffic, heading for Grant Park. "What would you say if I told you that I was a woman? That my name is actually Stephanie Rachael Kowalski? Although I go by Rae."

Dief barked, and Fraser turned around in his seat. "Don't be rude, Diefenbaker. Even though…well…yes, that's true." He turned back to Rae. "I suppose I'd say that you probably have a hole in your bag of marbles."

"Yeah," said Rae. "I kind of thought you'd say that."

Shit. She stared out through the windshield and drove more by instinct than anything else, her thoughts wildly circling around the crazy and contradictory things she'd just been told. Fraser didn't know her. Or rather, he knew her as a man who had almost her name and almost her face, a man who worked for the 27^th with a badge that said Vecchio. Which meant he didn't know her.

Somehow she'd ended up in a freaky world in which she was a guy. What the hell was she going to do?

The guys from Forensics were there already, taking pictures and samples while the uniforms strung crime-scene tape across grass which was still wet with dew. An older black man in a city uniform paced nervously, watching them, and Rae figured he was the one who called it in. "Chicago P.D.," she called, striding toward him, holding out the badge that wasn't hers, with the photo that wasn't hers, with the name that definitely wasn't hers. "You the gardener?"

"Groundskeeper," said the man, in a voice that sounded too cultured to belong to someone in a city uniform holding a rake. "George Carver."

"Okay, Mr. Carver. Tell me what happened."

"I came in to work this morning—it's time to get the mulch down for the winter, you know—and the first thing I noticed was the smell." He looked at Rae expectantly, so she inhaled, trying to detect what Fraser had scented.

"Smells like a park. Grass and stuff."

"Smoke," said Fraser. He was walking toward the tape, smelling the air as he went. He looked almost as though he was following a trail. "Burnt…wax, I believe. Ah, candles." He sniffed the air again. "And blood, of course."

"Exactly," said Carver, looking approvingly at Fraser. "I came over here as fast as I could, and I saw this." He gestured toward the taped-off area.

Rae frowned. With the forensics guys walking around, measuring and photographing and sampling, it was hard to tell exactly what it was that Carver had seen. But blood, that couldn't be good. There was a big splotch of it, the size of a small child, perhaps, which was a creepy thought. "Did you see any people? Any bodies? Anyone leaving the area in a hurry?"

"I thought I saw a white girl running off, but she was too far away for me to see her face. No dead people. Just the blood, and the candles and other things on the rock slab next to it, there."

"To its east, actually," said Fraser, his eyes following Carver's gesture. "Some cultures attach special significance to the east because it's where the sun rises. And the way the things are laid out on the rock makes me think that it's intended to be a sort of altar." He ducked under the tape and headed for the rock, Dief at his heels.

"Whoa, Fraser," said Rae, following as quickly as she could. "That stuff is evidence. Better not mess with the chain of custody."

Fraser squatted down next to the rock, craning his neck for a closer view but not actually reaching out for the things on it. Which Rae was relieved to see, although the woman nearest to them, who was taking pictures, frowned at him. "It's okay, he's with me," said Rae.

The woman rolled her eyes. "He's always with you, Vecchio. Just don't let him touch anything. The dog, either."

"He knows what he's doing," Rae muttered. Apparently the woman knew this Stanley Ray Kowalski guy, and probably knew the whole Vecchio story Fraser had told her; shit, was Rae supposed to know her? What if there were different people at the 27^th in this world, people that Ray Kowalski knew but that weren't there in the 27^th she was used to? It was going to be a minefield.

At least it was easier to think of Ben as Fraser and not Ben while they were in working mode; that was natural, that was the way they always did it, so she didn't have to worry as much about screwing up. It had been weird in the car, because she had wanted to blurt out everything, had wanted to lean her head on his shoulder and just be held. But the look on his face when she'd said "Stephanie Rachael Kowalski" had said it all. He wasn't her Ben. He was someone else's Fraser, and she had to pretend to be that someone else, at least until she could get back to where she belonged.

For a moment she watched him silently. The way his nostrils flared when he sniffed at things, the way his hand shaped the air around the stuff he wasn't supposed to but obviously wanted to touch. Kind of like the way she was feeling right now about him. She took a deep breath, tamped her feelings into place. Concentrate on the case, Rae.

She squatted beside him; Dief nosed in beside her, and reflexively she buried her fingers in his fur. "Okay, what have you got?"

"The candles, first of all. Note that the black one appears to be in the shape of a female, and the white one is in the shape of a male."

"They're in the shape of lumps of wax, Fraser."

"Well, yes. But if you look here, at their bases, you can distinguish the shapes of feet and legs." He pointed at the bottoms of the candles, which were surrounded by puddles of wax that had melted and re-solidified on the rock. "The angle of the legs on this black candle suggests a figure with wider hips compared to the white candle. In other words, it's likely that this one represents a female and the other one represents a male."

Rae squinted at them; kind of hard to tell, considering they were burned halfway down. But she could make out feet and legs and yeah, the black one had hips and the white one didn't. "Okay, one's a guy and one's a girl. So what does that mean?"

"Well, in the Vodun religion, white candles are generally used for protective and spiritual cleansing rituals, while black candles are used for banishing spells and revenge spells, as well as for reversing other spells."

"Oh, no. Please don't tell me this is more of that Voodoo stuff," said Rae. They'd just finished that crazy case, beginning with getting her car stolen and ending with the grass growing all over the station. If she never went back to the Voodoo community it would be too soon.

"Vodun, Ray," said Fraser reprovingly. "I don't know. The other items seem to incorporate different traditions. The flowers, for example, which would be an appropriate offering for a Hindu god. I'm not sure what the ring is intended to symbolize. And then there's—hmm."

"Hmm, what? What hmm?"

"Hmm." Fraser peered closely at…it was a feather, the lower part light with a pattern of dark splotches, the tip dark. "Do you remember the dreamcatcher I gave you?"

Rae couldn't help but smile. "Yeah, of course."

"Where is it?"

"Hanging over our bed." Ben looked at her sharply, his brows drawn in confusion, and suddenly it hit her, what she'd said. "I mean, my bed. My bed, yeah," she said, even though she didn't remember seeing it there when she'd gotten up. Of course, she'd had other things on her mind. "Why?"

"I believe this is an eagle feather. The possession of eagle feathers, as you may recall, is very tightly controlled. I'm just surprised to see another one in Chicago."

"There are almost three million people in Chicago. So one of them has an eagle feather, okay?"

"I'm sure you're right, Ray. But we can find out for certain easily enough. You see, feathers, like all biological material, are made up of molecules containing carbon, and the ratio of isotopes in any given feather can be used to identify the bird that that particular feather came from."

Rae frowned. "You're losing me, Fraser."

"Just think of it as a sort of fingerprint."

"Okay, fingerprints. So you can identify the bird. What good does that do—wait a minute. You think this came from my dreamcatcher? You think I did this?"

Fraser looked shocked. "Of course not. But it may provide a clue."

Rae got out of the car and looked around nervously as she locked the doors. It wasn't like she was scared, or anything like that. But that last case was still fresh in her mind. These people were weird. And if one of them had done some bizarre ritual in the middle of Grant Park, something involving blood and candles and maybe eagle feathers, she would bet that they weren't going to be too friendly about it.

But fortunately, Mama Lolla seemed as bewildered by Fraser's description of the items that had been laid on the makeshift altar as the police were. "That isn't something we did," she said. "You want to check with one of those New Age stores. Up Belmont Avenue, you know the kind of place I mean? Filled with candles and incense and crystals, things like that." She shook her head. "Those places are no good for anybody but those kids, the New Age hippies. Any real magic they do is by accident."

Fraser borrowed a phonebook, finding a likely sounding store in the yellow pages; with relief Rae drove away from Mama Lolla's and towards Moondust, as the place was called. She found a parking spot almost directly in front of the store, and grinned as she pulled in. "Just like magic."

Moondust's windows were draped with colorful scarves and hung with strings of small prisms that caught the sunlight, fracturing it into rainbows that danced across the walls of the small store. A row of tiny bells fastened to the inside of the door chimed as they entered. Inside, the air was fragrant with some kind of incense, spicy and floral; Rae could see the smoke rising in tiny spirals from the smoldering lumps that sat in dishes scattered around the room.

The woman behind the counter looked up at their approach. "May I help you?" Her voice was high and sort of breathy, like a child's. Long hair curled past her slender shoulders, and she wore a long, floaty skirt, a white blouse and about two dozen bangle bracelets. She was looking at Ben, of course, as women always did. Rae had gotten used to it; besides, Ben never looked back at them with any more than polite interest, not since…oh, shit, she remembered, this Ben wasn't her Ben, she couldn't make assumptions like that any more. But he wasn't looking at the woman with any more than polite interest, anyway, as he tipped his hat and introduced them.

Her name was Serenity, or at least that was what she called herself, and she nodded at Fraser's description of the things they'd found in the park. "Could be a mother-goddess ritual, perhaps. Last night was the full moon. A great deal of energy can be harnessed from the moon, you know."

Rae rolled her eyes, which was safe to do because Serenity was ignoring her entirely in favor of gazing up at Fraser with an earnest expression. For his part, Fraser looked totally absorbed in what she was saying. "What exactly would this type of ritual be intended to do?"

"Oh, it could be one of any number of things. It would depend on the kind of power focus."

Tuning them out, Rae walked around the shop, looking at the various objects on display. Incense in sticks and cones and powder. Decks of cards with weird pictures on them; she would bet you weren't supposed to use them to play poker. Crystal balls on fancy stands. Dozens of silver necklaces, each with a different color stone set in the middle, hanging on a black velvet display, glittering in the rainbow light from the prisms in the window.

One wall was entirely taken up by a case of candles in all different colors, red and green and white and black. Some looked like normal candles, the kind you'd put in a candlestick, but others were fat pillars with odd designs; next to them were candles shaped like skulls, and like men, and like women.

"Hey, Frase," she called. "Take a look at these candles."

Fraser came over to where Rae stood, Serenity floating behind. "Good eye, Ray." He turned to Serenity. "Of course it's hard to tell, as the candles at the crime scene were burnt to mere stubs. But I believe they were similar to these—the human figures."

Serenity nodded. "The figures can represent masculine and feminine principles, or they can represent actual people. Different spells have different requirements." Her delicate fingers, tipped with sparkling pink fingernails, hovered over the display for a moment before settling on a red candle shaped roughly like a man. She held it up for Fraser's inspection. "Red is the color of love, passion, energy. If I wanted to cast a love spell on you, for example, I would use this one."

"Matches his uniform, anyway," muttered Rae. Thank God Ben looked entirely oblivious to Serenity's machinations, because the whole situation was beginning to piss her off. Feminine principles, yeah, whatever; it wasn't like Rae was a girly girl or anything, she liked having short hair and working in a non-traditional profession, but that didn't mean she wanted to have a penis. Seeing Serenity there in her swirly skirt, talking in that little-girl voice and flirting with her husband—except in this weird universe of course he wasn't, and she shouldn't care, but damn it, she did care—it just made Rae want to pop her one in the jaw, except she was a cop and she couldn't do that. What she really wanted was to be in her own body, with her own Ben.

"That would make the spell doubly powerful. The figurine would stand for both the specific person—that is, you, Mr. Fraser—as well as the general masculine principle." Serenity gave the figure a caress as she placed it back on the shelf; if Rae had been a dog, her hair would have stood on end. Or maybe she'd have growled.

"I find it hard to believe that a spell would single me out from among my colleagues who wear a similar uniform," said Fraser mildly. Rae snorted to herself, imagining Serenity with Turnbull following after her like an overeager puppy. That would serve her right.

"Well, of course the proper ritual would require something actually belonging to you. Hair or fingernails work the best, but I've heard of successful love spells being cast using a coffee mug."

"A coffee mug?" repeated Rae.

Serenity shrugged. "Hey, your lips touch something every day, it's got to have some psychic residue." She turned back toward Fraser. "So what color was the candle?"

"There were two, actually. A black female figure and a white male figure."

She chewed her lip for a moment, apparently deep in thought. "Destruction of negative female energy, enhancement of male attributes. Huh."

"What, like a sex change?" said Rae without thinking. Then it hit her, and a shiver ran down her spine. Sex change. "Okay," she said, trying to hide her sudden discomfort. "Did anyone purchase candles like this recently? Can you give us a name, a description?"

"Do you think we keep track of that kind of stuff? Anyway, I'm only here Wednesdays through Sundays. Maia is here by herself on Mondays and Tuesdays, and if you ask me, she's kind of spacey."

Rae glanced at Fraser. She could see the amusement lurking in his eyes, his silent acknowledgement of the look in hers, the acknowledgement that they were thinking the same thing. Maybe she'd been changed into someone else, but at least that someone was on the same wavelength as Fraser, just like Rae usually was, and that was a reassuring thought in the middle of all this weirdness. And right now, she'd take any reassurance she could get.

It was unnerving, being in the wrong body. Normally, she never noticed being in her body, but now every time she moved the differences hit her like a wrong note in a song, like she was off-key from what she was supposed to be. Her stride was wrong when she walked, her voice came out wrong when she talked, and when she picked up a candle to look at it, she was distracted by the hair on the back of her hands, her too-long fingers, the flat breadth of blunt fingernails, the absence of her wedding ring.

The talk about male and female energy made her uneasy, and the smell of incense was starting to give her a headache—and Serenity's mention of coffee mugs reminded her she hadn't had any caffeine yet today. God, she needed coffee. "Okay, it wasn't a love spell, 'cause the candles were the wrong color," she said abruptly. "So what kind of spell was it?"

Serenity shrugged again, her eyes cutting toward Fraser.

"We might be able to use the information to construct a profile of our perpetrator," he told her, and maybe it was just because it was coming from him, but Serenity started nodding eagerly.

"I don't know offhand, but I have some grimoires and stuff I could check. Can you give me a list of the other things that were used in the ritual?"

Fraser pulled a notepad and pen out of a pocket—trust him to have proper preparation—and began to write in a small, careful script.

Serenity sidled up next to him, craning her face to see what he was writing. "Eww, does that say blood?" Her face scrunched up in disgust as she tapped Fraser's notes with a shiny pink fingernail. "No way would that be anyone who comes here. We don't mess with blood magic. That's dangerous."

Ray snorted. "Like the rest of this stuff isn't?"

"Oh, please. Our clientele is only interested in spiritual harmony," Serenity said piously, and Jesus Christ, she was fluttering her eyelashes at Fraser, and Rae was just about ready to throw up again.

She rubbed the heels of her hands across her eyes. Her head was pounding and she was starting to feel dizzy, the combination of incense and no goddamn coffee and not being able to really talk to Fraser because of, oh, yeah, this totally wrong body she was stuck in, and—the hell with it. She tilted her head from side to side, feeling the crack as her neck stretched. "Frase, can you finish this up?"

"Of course, Ray."

"Fine. I'm waiting in the car," she announced, and with one last glance at the weird candles she headed out the door.

"Got time for lunch before I take you back?" asked Rae, swerving around a double-parked Dodge Dart. From the back seat, Dief barked enthusiastically.

"Apparently we do," said Fraser, with a pointed glance over his shoulder. "You should know better than to mention food when Diefenbaker's reading your lips in the rear-view mirror."

"Good," said Rae. "I got to get some coffee." Among other things, she thought as she parked the car in front of a diner. That weird sense of dislocation she'd experienced in Moondust had only gotten stronger as she thought about heading back to the 27^th. It was bad enough masquerading as Ray Kowalski-or-Vecchio while talking to people she didn't know, like Carver and Serenity. The idea of being at the station, around Frannie and Huey and Lieutenant Welsh, quite frankly freaked her out.

It was hard enough being around Fraser, whose manner towards her was just different enough to be unsettling. He wasn't opening doors for her any more, for example, although the fact that she noticed and missed it was really funny, considering how annoying she'd found it when they first started working together. But the worst part was that normally, when something drove her nuts, when someone was getting on her case and she had to vent about it, who did she talk to? Ben.

She wanted to touch him, to lean against him, to tap his arm, to inhale his smell. All the little things they always did, it was like breathing, and she missed it like crazy. Each time she found herself halfway to touching him she caught herself, pulled back, because she was Ben's guy partner now, and guys didn't do that.

In desperation she'd asked him if he'd come back to the station with her. Just the idea of letting him out of her sight made her heart start racing. And if he came to the station, she could depend on him to smooth things over if she said something stupid—he was good at that. But he'd shaken his head and explained that he had a great deal of paperwork that had to be completed before the end of the day.

As they took their seats in a booth by a window, she wondered if she could get him to tell her more about Ray Kowalski. Or maybe, she thought as she looked across the table at his honest, open face, maybe she should just tell him everything.

After the waitress had taken their order and headed back into the kitchen, Rae took a deep breath. "Okay, Ben. I've got something really important I need to tell you."

"Does it have something to do with what we discussed in the car this morning? When you asked me to pretend that you, as you said, didn't know what was going on?"

"Right," said Rae. Maybe this was going to be easier than she thought.

"So someone did kick you in the head?"

"Ben! No, Christ, nothing like that."

His eyes narrowed, and he looked at her appraisingly. "But apparently there is something wrong with your memory. You've been acting peculiar all morning."

Shit, didn't take him long to figure things out. She slumped back against the thinly-padded backrest. "Peculiar, like how?"

"For one thing, I don't believe you've ever called me 'Ben' before." She closed her eyes. All these little things that could trip her up without her even thinking about it. Christ, she was never going to get through the day. Maybe she shouldn't even go in to the station. When she opened her eyes again, he was leaning forward, his expression sharp and curious. "You've got something really important to tell me. What is it?"

Now or never, Rae decided. "What I said in the car, about being a woman? Stephanie Rae Kowalski? I was not kidding you. I woke up this morning in this body, but this is not me."

Ben raised an eyebrow. "You've always been a man—well, for as long as I've known you."

"Yeah, yeah, you know this body, you know this guy Ray Kowalski, right? Except he isn't me. I don't know where he is, maybe he's in my body," she said, and suddenly the image came to her of this poor guy waking up with breasts and no dick, as confused as she'd been. And Jesus, waking up next to Ben, who would have no clue, no more than this Ben in front of her. She shook her head, trying to clear it. "Look, this is like—like a parallel universe or something, you know, like Star Trek. In my universe I'm Detective Rae Kowalski—that's R-a-e—and nobody calls me Vecchio, and I call you Ben because—" She broke off, looked down at the table for a moment, marshalling her courage, then back up at him. Now or never. "Because we're married."

"We—you—Ray, is this—you're not trying to play a joke on me, are you?" His face was beginning to turn red; he blushed easily, Rae knew—when he was really embarrassed, his face got redder than his uniform.

"This is not a joke.  I wouldn't joke about something like this."

"Perhaps you don't intend to joke," said Ben, frowning. His blush had quickly faded, though his ears were still pink. "Perhaps you believe that you used to be a woman, but I assure you, Ray, yesterday you were just as you are now."

"Christ, Ben. You don't get it, do you."

"You have to admit it sounds rather farfetched."

The waitress came by with coffee, thank God, and Rae added two packets of sugar to her cup, then gulped down a hot mouthful. Maybe that would help her think of something to convince him. What would she know about her husband that this male Ray wouldn't know? Victoria—that was before she came to the 27^th; it was probably before Ray came to the 27^th, too. "Look, I'll prove it to you," she finally said. "You've got a bullet near your spine where Vecchio shot you. When you—when Victoria was—"

"You read the file," said Ben, interrupting her in an oddly clipped voice. "Of course you'd know that." He'd gone all stiff and strained, and Rae figured the Victoria of this world must have been as much of a bitch as the Victoria in hers.

But if Ray in this world was like Rae in hers, he knew everything having to do with Ben's work life, just like she did. And since Ben wasn't married to her in this world, he hadn't experienced any of the things they'd done together as a couple. Except…

She leaned closer to him and lowered her voice. "Your, um. You're not, you know. Cut. Circumcised."

To her surprise, the blush returned full-force to Ben's face. "I wasn't aware you'd been looking."

She couldn't keep from smiling. "More than just looking—"

"Oh, God," he muttered, burying his face in his hands. When he looked up, his cheeks were scarlet, and he was carefully focusing on something over her left shoulder. "Of course you must have—that is, in the men's room, you've had opportunity to—I mean, that doesn't prove—"

A sudden thought hit her. "You're not—I mean, you and Ray—"

"No!"

She shrugged. That would have been interesting, actually. Just the thought made her own cock twitch a little, and how weird was that? It almost made her want to reach down and touch it, see what it took to get this body going. Feel what it was like from the other side.

"Ray," said Ben, finally looking at her. His face was still flushed, and his breathing sounded like he was still trying to get it under control. "Did anything happen to you last night?"

"You mean other than waking up with a cock?"

His lips tightened. "I mean, anything that would have resulted in your believing that this wasn't your normal state. Perhaps a head injury. Or—"

"Damn it, aren't you listening to me? I'm not the Ray you think I am. What do I have to do to make you believe me?"

"I believe that you believe you're not Ray."

"You—oh, Christ, Ben, this is ridiculous." She ran a hand through her too-short hair and exhaled with frustration. "Look, this is me, telling you the truth. You've got to believe me."

"It's a preposterous story!"

"No more preposterous than your father's ghost talking to you," she shot back. "If I could believe you when you told me that, you can believe me now."

To her utter astonishment, Ben's eyes widened. "You know about Dad?"

"You told me."

He shook his head slowly. "I'm quite certain I didn't."

"Oh, you did," she said. "When you asked me to marry you, on the Bounty, after I almost got drowned trying to get out of that fucking freighter, the Henry something, I forget."

"The Henry Allen," whispered Ben. "What—what did I say?"

"We'd just had this fight, before the thing with the Henry Allen. Living together and working together, it kind of put a strain on things, I guess. We were having, uh, arguments. All the time."

"Communication difficulties."

"Right. We had this big shouting match on the pier, and—"

"Shouting? Not…hitting?"

She stared. "What the fuck, Ben? Like I'd ever punch you in the face or something, are you kidding me? And you'd never hit a woman."

"But you aren't—" He swallowed. "Go on. Please."

He was looking at her so intently, it was almost scary. She took another sip of coffee, cradling the warm cup in her hands like it could give her the strength she needed to convince him. "Anyway, you got offered a transfer to Ottawa, and I got offered a transfer to the 12^th, and we were both thinking of taking them which would have meant breaking up, right? But then we had to do the Henry Allen thing and there was the buddy breathing thing and the little submarine thing and—"

"Ray." His eyes were fixed on her as though he was concentrating on something inside her skull. "What did I say about my father?"

Rae smiled, remembering. "You said he talked to you sometimes. And I told you that you were a freak. But then you said he'd told you that partnership was like a marriage. That you needed to trust your partner. That it was the most important thing. And you said you thought about it, and you decided that what we had worked, being partners and all, and that you didn't want to give that up." She looked up through her lashes at him; he was still staring at her, looking faintly stunned. "You said that it worked as a partnership, and maybe it would work as a marriage."

"Did it?" he whispered.

"So far. 'Cause we got that trust thing going. Right?"

"Right," he said, his voice still hushed, as though he were in a church. Looking at her like he was really seeing her. Finally. "My God. Rae." And this time she could almost hear the difference in his tone, the wonder in the way he said her name; it was her name. He believed her.

"I can't do this," Rae said as they pulled up in front of the Consulate.

"Of course you can. You appear just as you always have—that is, as Ray has always looked—your manner is nearly identical to Ray's, and there's no reason for anyone to suspect you're anyone else."

"You knew."

"I noticed certain peculiarities, yes. But I assumed they were due to natural causes, and I imagine anyone else who notices will do the same. But I don't think anyone will notice. You're not—that is, I'm probably the only one who—" He broke off and looked out the window. "Well. I should get to work."

"Yeah." She smiled, leaned toward him—then froze when she realized what she was doing. Kissing him goodbye for the day, like they always did, and damn it, she'd almost blown it right there. The 27^th was going to be a nightmare. "Sorry," she said weakly, slumping back against the door and closing her eyes.

"Rae," said Ben. She opened her eyes to see him regarding her with an odd mixture of apprehension and concern. "How do you think he's doing?"

She frowned for a moment, not understanding, and then his meaning burst over her like a shower of cold water. It was Ray he was concerned about, not her, and even though she knew that made sense—that Ray, not her, was this Ben's partner—she couldn't help but feel a little put out. "He's probably bitching about having to wear a bra."

"Rae!"

He looked stricken, which made her feel instantly guilty. Okay, this Ben cares as much about his Ray as my Ben cares about me. Even if they're both guys. She forced a smile. "I'm sure he's fine. Hell, look at me—I'm okay. I mean, I freaked out a little this morning, but I'm coping, right? See how well I'm coping? He'll cope."

Ben exhaled, nodded. "I'm sure you're right," he said, opening the door.

"Maybe tomorrow morning I'll wake up in my body and he'll wake up in his, and everything will be a-okay."

"Maybe," said Ben, and he got out of the car.

Yeah, thought Rae. Maybe. She watched him disappear behind the heavy doors of the Consulate, then leaned her forehead against the steering wheel. The tension that had seemed like a steel band around her chest had eased up when she'd finally convinced him who she was, but now that he was no longer beside her she felt it tightening again, squeezing her lungs, making it hard to breathe. How the hell was she going to make it through the rest of the day without him?

Finally, reluctantly, she put the Goat in gear and headed toward the station. Familiar cars were in the lot, anyway, and as she strode down the hall she saw the usual familiar faces. She nodded at Sheryl, at Branford, at Huey, and they all nodded back at her, like they knew who she was. Into the men's room, not the ladies' room. Piece of cake.

Except Lieutenant Welsh was just zipping up as she walked in, and thank God he was finished, because if she'd seen his dick hanging out she'd have been scarred for life, no question. Quickly she turned her head so she was looking straight across the room.

"Ah, Vecchio, you're here," said Welsh as he walked to the sink and splashed water onto his hands. Vecchio. Christ, she was never going to get used to that.

"Yeah, I'm here. What, I can't take a leak?"

"This is a police station, not elementary school. Of course you can take a leak."

"Gee, thanks." He showed no sign of moving, though, and no way was she going to whip it out with Welsh standing there. The thought was even weirder than the idea of seeing his equipment. Instead she studied the urinal in front of her as though she'd never seen it before. Which was more-or-less true.

Welsh sighed. "When you're quite finished here, Vecchio, into my office."

"Yes, sir," she said, and finally, finally he left the room. Maybe it was a guy thing, peeing in front of each other, but it was kind of disgusting to have to pee in public—well, semi-public, anyway. And then after she'd done it, there she was, her brand-new parts dangling in the air, trying to figure out a graceful way to get those last droplets off. At home she'd just used a bit of toilet paper, but to do that here she'd have to cross the room to one of the stalls, and what if someone came into the men's room at the exact wrong moment?

She gave her penis a tentative shake, then another, feeling totally stupid. Did men actually do this? Too bad she couldn't take a class in Being a Guy 101. Fortunately nobody walked in, and she zipped up with a sense of relief and went over to the sink.

As she washed her hands, she looked in the mirror, just to convince herself again. The body was one thing—and yeah, it was definitely a man's body, she'd just proved that again to herself two seconds ago—but somehow a penis didn't seem quite as immediate as a face. Maybe it was because she was looking out through the eyes, as though the part of her that was her, her soul or whatever, was trapped directly behind those eyes. "Hello, Ray Vecchio," she said quietly, watching the not-quite-familiar mouth form the words.

Welsh was on the phone when she rapped on his door, but he waved her in and she stood there waiting while he finished telling Mrs. Vandiver that no, the police were not going to get Fluffy out of the neighbor's tree as they were too busy solving murders and drive-by Voodoo rituals. Finally he put down the phone and looked up at Rae. "What do you have for me?"

Quickly Rae outlined the situation: what Fraser had thought of the items arranged on the rock at Grant Park, the conversation with Carver, the visit to Moondust. "The blood's at Forensics, the stuff on the rock's in Evidence, and this Serenity person is supposed to call Fraser so we can profile the perp."

"All right," said Welsh, shuffling through the papers on his desk. "In the meantime, I'm sure you have a large number of unsolved cases that are worthy of your attention."

Welsh was no different in this world than he was in hers, she decided. "Yes, sir," she said, and headed to her desk. Except Tom Dewey was already sitting there, which made no sense at all, and she stared blankly at him for a moment until he looked up and said, "You want something, Vecchio?"

"Nah," she replied, swaggering off, because he'd just accidentally given her the answer she needed. When Vecchio had gone undercover and she'd switched over to being Fraser's liaison, they'd brought Dewey in to partner up with Jack Huey. Which actually worked pretty well for all concerned, really, because she and Huey had gotten along okay, but she couldn't help but think that Dewey was a better match for him. Not to mention that Dewey would have driven Fraser crazy—well, crazier, anyway.

So Dewey had come in and he'd taken Vecchio's desk, but in this world Dewey had her desk, which meant…bingo. Vecchio's desk. Not a whole lot different than her own desk: a little messier, maybe. The weird thing was there was nothing personal on it, unlike hers which had the "Men of the NHL" calendar and the funky woodcarving of Dief that Ben had given her. Maybe it was because this Ray was supposed to be undercover as Ray Vecchio. He couldn't have his own stuff on his desk, because it wouldn't be Vecchio's stuff.

She pulled open a drawer and rifled through the folders. Familiar names jumped out at her; yeah, there was the jewelry store heist, and there was the family looking for the runaway, and there was the John Doe they'd found in the dumpster behind Zacco's that they still didn't have an ID on. A couple of cases were nothing she'd ever seen, and it didn't look like anybody was killing Dino's girls in this world, but other than that, Ray's unsolved cases were about the same as hers.

She was about to pick something random to work on when it occurred to her that maybe someone had killed Dino's girls. Maybe Ray had already made the collar. If that had happened, it would be in the files; wouldn't that be greatness, to have it all figured out so when she got back, whammo, perp in the can.

The closed cases were in the file cabinet, so she went over to take a look. Nothing about the hookers, unfortunately. Or fortunately, for them, she supposed. But the files were sprinkled with familiar names—Franco Tucci, Andreas Volpe, Bradley Torrance. Guess it made sense that it was mostly the same assholes doing the same garbage, both in her Chicago and this one.

Curious, she pulled out the Torrance case and leafed through the folder. Problem was, the dry language of the reports only told her so much. Ray wouldn't have had Janet and her kids over to stay—the apartment was too small, and anyway, it had been Fraser's idea. Probably Fraser had taken them over wherever he lived. Had his apartment had been burned down the same way it had in her Chicago? That one had been a really bizarre case, the first one she'd actually worked on with Fraser.

She was flipping through the folders, looking to see whether the Garbo case was there or whether it had been moved to archives, when she heard Frannie's voice behind her. "Hey, bro."

"Bro?" she said, without thinking; then it hit her, and she had to stifle a laugh. Of all the dumb-ass things. It probably really pissed Frannie off, having to call Ray her brother.

But Frannie's usual sneer was absent as she leaned against the file cabinet, disconcertingly close to Rae, toying with a sheet of paper. "So, Fraser coming in today?"

"Nah. Paperwork day at the Consulate," Rae said, and watched Frannie's face fall. Huh. Frannie had always avoided her—hell, Frannie had hated her, ever since Rae and Fraser had started dating. Phone messages mysteriously evaporated somewhere between Frannie's desk and hers, and forget about trying to get something faxed or photocopied. At first, Frannie had never missed a chance to saunter by Rae's desk so she could make some backhanded comment on Rae's hairstyle or clothes; since she and Fraser had gotten married, though, it seemed Frannie simply went out of her way to avoid her.

But apparently, she was perfectly friendly with Ray. Called him "bro," and how weird was that? Probably just trying to cozy up to him because he was Fraser's partner, trying to get to Fraser that way. Wasting her time, obviously, because Fraser would never be interested in Frannie. But Frannie was more tenacious than a pack of bulldogs, and in this world Fraser was still available, and Ray was no threat.

Frannie was still leaning against the cabinet, which was disconcerting as hell. Finally Rae looked up from the folders. "You want something, Frannie?"

"Oh! Oh, right," she said, handing Rae the sheet of paper she was holding. "Forensics lab said the blood was from a cow. Creepy, huh?"

"Better than human," Rae said, shrugging. She'd let Welsh know, and he would probably bump the case down the priority list, and if the city didn't want to press charges, it would be dropped entirely. Nobody killed, no permanent damage done to the park—they had way more important stuff to deal with, and too much of it, to spend time on what was probably some kid trying to cast a spell to make his girlfriend put out.

"Blood is blood. It's still a real pain to get out of clothing," said Frannie sagely.

It was weird, driving back to her old apartment building. She'd automatically started toward the Consulate to pick up Ben before remembering he didn't live with Ray in this world. So it was back to an empty apartment, the perfect rotten ending to this miserable day.

She'd managed to make it through the rest of the day, but it had been hard. Watching what she said, watching what she did, pretending to be a guy, pretending to be Ray Kowalski pretending to be Ray Vecchio. It was like a whole extra layer of undercover on top of everything else. Maybe what she'd said to Ben this morning would be true: maybe she'd wake up tomorrow and be back home, back in her own body. God, she hoped so.

Rae parked the car and reluctantly headed upstairs. She'd gotten so used to having Ben there that it was hard to remember what it was like before he'd leapt into her life, all bright red uniform and thank you kindly, his eyes as blue as any movie star's, looking at her like she was the only person in the universe. Especially after a day like today, spent in their separate buildings on their separate paperwork, coming home to Ben was always greatness. Rae would sprawl on the couch with her feet in Ben's lap, and he'd tell her what had happened in the Consulate that day, and she'd tell him what she'd been doing at the station, and it was like a little dose of relaxing happy pills. Which meant that coming home to an empty apartment really, really sucked.

As she turned the key in the lock she saw someone else coming down the hall, a woman in her late twenties, early thirties maybe, short dark hair, oval wire-rims. She gave a quick nod and mumbled, "Hey, Ray," as she disappeared into what was presumably her own apartment. Nobody Rae recognized, but in this world she and Ray obviously knew each other.

She stepped inside her own apartment—well, Ray's apartment—and closed the door behind her. Now that she wasn't in a rush like she'd been that morning, she examined the living room thoughtfully. It was kind of like Ray Kowalski's life—just like hers if you didn't look too closely, but when you did there were all these small differences that weren't quite what you expected. It was the exact same apartment she'd lived in, and mostly the same crappy furniture, a combination of cast-offs from friends and relatives and yard-sale finds, but things were in the wrong places, and a few things—the coffee table, a bookcase—were completely different. Her chili-pepper lights were strung across the kitchen the same way, but there were different dishes in the cabinets. And the cookware—shit, didn't this Ray guy ever cook? Total junk, the stuff they sold at K-Mart for $20 the set.

She opened the fridge and found that yeah, this Ray guy didn't ever cook. Half a pizza, some cartons of Chinese, a bag of wilting greens—which threw her for a moment, until she remembered the turtle tank she'd seen by the window—and four bottles left from a six-pack of Old Style. At least they drank the same beer. But how the hell had he made it to his mid-thirties on just take-out?

Not that she herself particularly liked cooking. But shortly after moving out of her parents' house she realized it was cook, starve, or go broke on restaurant food. If it hadn't been for her old roommate Stella, patiently teaching her everything from boiling water on up, she'd have been sunk.

Rae sniffed at the cartons, decided they weren't too old, dumped the contents of one into a bowl and popped it into the microwave. Wonder what Stella's doing in this world, she thought idly as she kicked off her shoes and settled down with her food. Not that they were on very good terms any more, even though they couldn't avoid working with each other from time to time, considering Stella worked for the State's Attorney office. After Stella had passed the bar, it seemed like she was too busy for her old friend Rae, the city cop from the wrong kind of family, the wrong side of town. She'd bet that Stella wasn't any friendlier with Ray than she was with Rae.

The lo mein was okay, especially after she washed it down with a couple of beers. She put some clean water and some of the green stuff into the turtle tank and watched the turtle sit there placidly for a few minutes before deciding that turtles were boring. Maybe something good was on the tube. That and another beer—two bottles usually got her nice and buzzed, but this evening she didn't even feel it—would be a decent way to kill an evening.

But first she had to get rid of the beers she'd had, so she headed into the bathroom to take a leak. She was getting the hang of it, she guessed, unzipping and pulling it out, but it still looked weird to look down and see a cock sticking out of her pants. And then the actual pissing part, that was weird too, because it was different. It kind of…tickled. In a good way.

Which got her thinking that maybe there was a better way to kill an evening. She'd never been shy about sex, never had problems telling her partners what she liked and what she needed, even though sometimes it was like walking a tightrope to get the message across without getting the guy upset: touch here, don't touch here, flatten your fingers, don't press so hard. Too bad the guy couldn't just feel what she felt—then he'd understand. But Ben, on the other hand—he seemed to find it difficult to express what he liked. They were still figuring out what each other liked, and sometimes she got frustrated, trying to make him feel good. He'd always assured her that it was great, that she was great—but what if he was just too embarrassed to tell her what he wanted?

Here she was in a guy's body—when was she going to get another chance like this to find out what things felt like from the other side?

Leaving her pants unzipped, she moved to the bedroom and pulled them off, then did the same with her shirt. When she was naked, she opened the closet and inspected her image in the full-length mirror on the inside of the closet door. Not bad, Kowalski. She'd always had a skinny ass and no hips to speak of, but on a male body it looked lean and sexy. Weird to see a flat chest, and the tattoo in the wrong place, and weirder still to see her chin covered with stubble. She rubbed the back of a hand against it, feeling the sandpapery scrape against her skin. Tomorrow morning she'd shave—she'd seen an electric razor in the bathroom, so at least she wouldn't kill herself in the process—but right now she was going to enjoy it.

Ben was rarely less than clean-shaven, and the straight razor he insisted on using left his face perfectly smooth, but she'd always liked stubble on a guy; the contrast of rough skin and soft lips never failed to turn her on, and fuck, it was turning her on now. She closed her eyes and tried to imagine it was Ben's jaw she was caressing, but it wasn't nearly right, it wasn't the right shape, and anyway, she felt it so strongly from the other side that she couldn't pretend it wasn't her jaw, wasn't her body. But that was sexy, too, and her cock gave a little jump. She opened her eyes again. Wow.

Experimentally she ran a hand down her chest and rolled a nipple between two fingers. Not the same sensation as when Ben played with her nipples, but there was something there, she could feel it jumping down her nervous system, little electric jolts, and her cock twitched again. A different kind of feeling than what she was used to, getting turned on, getting wet, because she could feel her cock lengthening and filling, she could see it, and that was even more of a turn-on. And even though at first Ben's uncut cock had seemed funny-looking to her, she was used to it now, so the lack of foreskin on her own cock made it seem strange and exotic.

Well, stranger and more exotic, anyway. Considering that just having a cock was strange enough all on its own.

She moved her hand lower, slowly, caressing a sharp hipbone and sliding toward the thatch of dark blond hair that fuzzed around her groin, and that was amazing, that was so incredibly hot, because it was a man's body, a sexy man that turned her on, but at the same time it was her body, the body she was in. She was looking at it and feeling it all at once, the shape of a man's cock in her hand, smooth, soft skin over hardness, and at the same time the touch of her fingers as they curled around the shaft. Both sides at once, touching and being touched, and she gasped aloud as the sensations mingled and fizzed at the base of her spine.

Jesus fuck, that felt good. And it was amazing to watch, too, like watching porn made just for her. But doing it standing in front of the mirror was kind of distracting, because she had to choose between concentrating on watching and concentrating on feeling, and anyway, standing up was a lot of work. Maybe it would be better lying down.

With one last look at the guy in the mirror, she turned away and headed for the bed. It was still unmade from this morning, and she pushed the covers aside, lay on her back. Slowly she moved a hand across her cock, the lightest possible touch against the fine hairs that covered its base, curving her fingers to shape around her balls. Wow. Every place felt different, every place felt good; she tried mapping the sensation onto what it felt like when she rubbed against her clit, pressing deep or sliding against the edge of her thigh, and came up blank. It was like apples and oranges—no, it was like apples and hand grenades, or maybe like donuts and coffee. Both good but nothing like each other.

What she wanted was pressure, she found, pressure and friction, hard and sure. Her hand squeezed, but it didn't slide right, not the way she knew she wanted, not the way her hand slid on Ben's cock, the foreskin sliding on its own lubrication. Hmm. Maybe in the nightstand?

She pulled open the drawer, looked inside, and started to grin. "Ray Kowalski, you old dog," she said aloud, reaching in to grab the bottle of Astroglide. A couple of squirts of that stuff, and oh, man, that was good. Warm with the heat from her hand, slippery and smooth.

Fucking amazing. With the extra slick she could squeeze harder, and she explored the way it felt in different places: around the head, on the shaft, at the base of her cock. And it was a whole new kind of exploration, like having a new lover, where you weren't quite sure what you could do and what you couldn't, what would feel good and what would feel better. Not the same old stuff, 'cause it was a completely different body.

She still felt that way with Ben, like they were still learning each other's bodies, even though they'd been sleeping together for more than a year. But even though he didn't know her body the way she did—yet—it felt better when it was him touching her than when she was touching herself, because there was all this emotion bound up in it. All this love. The way his arms curved tightly around her when he held her from behind, his chin resting on her shoulder. The ecstatic look in his eyes when she rode him. And then, when they were both exhausted and satisfied, he'd pull her into his arms and murmur, "I love you so much," and that was better than anything, better even than the orgasm.

God, she missed him, wished it was his hand on her body and not her own. Wished she was touching him, listening to his breathing get rougher and harsher. Just thinking about him made her balls tighten. The way Ben licked his way across her breasts, down her body… wouldn't it be something if he'd do it to her in this body? If his lips would move across the stubble on her chin to whisper in her ear? If she could feel his tongue on her cock? Oh, yeah.

She tightened her grip and moved faster, thinking about the slim hips and stubble of the guy in the mirror, thinking about Ben, thinking about what it might be like to fuck another person instead of her hot wet hand, thinking about Ben, about fucking Ben, oh, Christ yes, and then her cock was pulsing and spurting and she wasn't thinking at all.

Wow.

She lay back against the pillow, breathing hard, letting her heart rate slow. She'd forgotten what a mess it made. She hadn't given a guy a handjob in ages, not since she'd moved from fumbling in backseats to actual sex. What a mess. On the sheets, on her chest, all over her hand. Ugh. But damn, that had felt amazing.

Shower first. Then change the sheets…nah, too much effort, too late at night. Her entire body felt boneless; no wonder men fell asleep right after sex. A damp washcloth would have to do, and she'd just sleep over on the other side of the bed. The rest, she'd deal with in the morning.

Rae was at her desk, feet up, on the phone with Mr. Goldman at the jewelry store, when she caught the red of Fraser's uniform out of the corner of her eye. Finally. She had to force herself not to slam the phone down, jump up and grab him. Instead she gave him a nod and he gave her a nod, just like normal; then she informed Mr. Goldman that she really did need that list of all of his employees, and the cleaning service, and the security firm, hung up, and turned to Fraser. "What's up?"

He ran a thumb across his eyebrow. "No change?"

"No change," she told him, and he nodded, like he'd been expecting her to say that. She hadn't really been surprised either, when she'd woken up in the morning still in Ray's body.

"Serenity called. She was able to determine what the ritual was."

"Old news, Fraser," said Rae. "The lab said the blood wasn't human, so the case has been back-burnered. Nobody cares if someone does a wacko ritual in Grant Park if nothing got damaged and nobody got killed."

"Wicca, actually."

"What?"

"The modern practice of witchcraft is pronounced Wicca, not wacko. And I believe you will care, when you know what it was."

Rae leaned forward on her elbows, resting her chin in her hands. "Spill."

Fraser jerked his head sideways, and Rae sighed and got up to follow him past where Frannie was petting Dief, down the hall to the supply closet where they always…no, he kept going, stepped into the men's room, and Rae had a brief panicked moment of no, can't do that before she remembered that yeah, she could. Fortunately nobody was in there, because Fraser headed straight for a stall like he expected her to follow. So she did.

"You and Ray always have conferences in the men's room?"

"It serves the purpose," said Fraser, reaching behind her to latch the door. It was a pretty small space in there, barely big enough for a toilet and one person, and even though Fraser was up against one metal dividing wall and she was against the other, only inches separated them. Not that she minded being pressed up against his body—hell, it took all her control not to throw her arms around him. Just to hold him and be held, absorb his strength and share her own with him. Just for the reassurance that they'd get through this together and come out alive on the other side.

And okay, so maybe she was shallow, but she wanted to rub up against him because he smelled good and looked good, and that thought was enough to make her dick twitch in her jeans. Jesus, she knew that men were always looking to screw anything that moved, but this was ridiculous. Anyway, she was a man now, which meant that Fraser wouldn't be interested, so she dropped her hands in front of her crotch to cover for her stupid dick and tried to lounge casually against the divider without bumping into Fraser.

"So, tell me why I care about wackos. Wiccas, whatever."

"Wiccans. And you care because apparently the ritual was intended to exchange a female spirit with a male spirit."

"Holy fuck," whispered Rae. That off-key feeling she'd had in Moondust swept over her again, buzzing in her ears, vibrating in her brain. What had happened to her wasn't a coincidence. It had been a result.

"Language, Rae," said Fraser disapprovingly.

She gave a hollow laugh. "Sorry, Fraser, but I think 'holy fuck' is a totally reasonable thing to say when you give me information like this. I mean, Jesus! Someone did this to me on purpose!"

"Not exactly."

"What do you mean, not exactly? You just told me that this ritual was supposed to exchange a female and a male. And here I am, a female exchanged with a male, and—it was the feather, right?" She jabbed an index finger into Fraser's chest. "You said you thought that feather was from my dreamcatcher. I looked all over the apartment for it this morning, couldn't find it. I bet that's what they used."

"I wouldn't be surprised," said Fraser. "But think for a moment. The spell couldn't have been directed at you."

"Yeah? You see anyone else change sex around here?"

"It wasn't your dreamcatcher. It was Ray's."

It only took a second for her to get it. "Shit. You're right. Okay, who would do this to him? That guy Carver said he saw a woman running off, right? So that's who we're looking for. Someone who's upset with Ray and wants him to get a taste of what it's like to be a woman. Is he a pig?"

"A pig?"

"A chauvinist pig. You know him, I don't. Does he treat women different?"

"I treat women differently."

"Yeah, but from you, it's sweet. From some men it's just another way of letting you know that they think they're better than you are. They put women on a pedestal, sure, but it's only to get them out of the way."

"I don't think Ray's like that. But of course, I'm a man. Doubtless a woman might see things another way."

"Yeah, maybe." To be honest, she didn't think Ray could possibly be a pig. Because he was her, sort of. And she was fair-minded, more or less; she was always aware of how much she had to strut and act tough to get the guys to take her seriously, and maybe because of that she was careful to respect everyone, even the women who put on a ditzy act because they liked being put on pedestals. Like Frannie, for instance. "You think it could have been Frannie? A ritual like this is exactly the kind of woo-woo stuff she's always going on about. Maybe after she banished the grass from the station she decided to get even with Ray for something."

"I doubt it," he said, shaking his head. "She seems to take her sisterly relationship with Ray quite seriously. Unless you—that is, unless he and Francesca had a fight, perhaps?"

He was right—she'd been thinking about the Frannie she knew, not the Frannie who called Ray "bro" and sat on the corner of his desk. "Nah, she came over and talked with me yesterday afternoon—hell, she's friendlier to me in this world than she ever was in mine. Anyway, if she'd done it, no way would she have been able to resist saying something, trying to find out if it had worked." She thought for a moment, remembering the woman in the hallway of the apartment building. "He got a girlfriend? An ex-girlfriend, maybe?"

"Well, there is his ex-wife, but I hardly—"

"Whoa, Fraser. Ray's got an ex-wife? And you didn't tell me?" Holy shit. She ran a hand nervously through her hair, bumping her elbow solidly into Fraser's collarbone. "Sorry. We, uh, done?" Fraser nodded, and she opened the stall door, walking out into the men's room. Nobody had come in while they were there, and they hadn't even used the facilities, but she was amused to see Fraser head automatically to the sink, anyway.

As they headed back out into the bullpen, she asked, "They on good terms? Am I likely to run into her somewhere?"

"That's a possibility. Assistant State's Attorney Kowalski occasionally comes here to the station. But I can't imagine that she'd be involved in—in 'woo-woo stuff', as you put it."

Rae frowned. Assistant State's…oh, shit. "Don't tell me. Stella?"

"I take it you know her as well, then."

"You could say that." Stella? She'd been married to Stella? Okay, they'd been close friends for a long time, but she couldn't imagine Stella marrying any cop, let alone Ray Kowalski. If anyone at the 27^th was her type, it would have been Vecchio, who at least was a sharp dresser.

They reached her desk, and she sank down into her chair. "All right. Officially, I'm concentrating on the Goldman heist. Unofficially, I think we gotta pursue this, this—" she waved a hand in the air.

"Woo-woo stuff," said Fraser.

"Exactly." She looked at her watch. "Okay, I've got to make some more phone calls, and then I've got a meeting, but why don't you come over for dinner tonight, and we can start figuring this thing out?"

Ben sniffed the air as soon as she opened the door for him, and Rae grinned. "Pretty good, huh? Rosemary chicken's one of your favorites—I mean, you in my world, you. We cook it all the time." Which made it one of the few things she could make without a cookbook. She'd stopped by the grocery on the way home to pick up the ingredients, along with one of those bagged salads and a roll of refrigerated biscuit dough.

He shook his head and smiled. "It's still difficult to think of you as someone other than the Ray I know. But rosemary chicken is a convincing argument. I was expecting you to order pizza."

"Man cannot live on take-out alone. Nor woman, neither," she told him. "Sit down, it's almost ready." She watched him walk through the living room toward the small dining table which she'd already set. As good as he looked in uniform, she had to admit that he looked even better in a simple shirt and jeans. Made him look more human, somehow. Like he'd taken off the Mountie-mask with the uniform, turned from Constable Fraser into just Ben, the guy she'd married.

It almost felt like she was dating Ben all over again. Like it was all new, which it was, sort of. She'd changed into jeans and a sweatshirt, soft and comfortable, and had looked critically at Ray's face in the mirror, fluffing up the soft spikes of hair, feeling just a little foolish, but hey, who wouldn't want to look good?

She gave a little step-and-slide as she carried out the food, a bit of a swagger and a one-two-three dance step, setting it in front of Ben with a flourish. Cooking was something she wasn't too bad at. Ben had always had more domestic skills than she had—she couldn't sew a button back onto a shirt without sticking a needle in her finger, and he always did more of the house cleaning, because when she did it, he'd frown and do it all over again when she wasn't looking. But she was a tolerable cook, thanks to Stella, and he'd always appreciated that.

More than tolerable, she decided as she reached for a second helping, but Ben didn't look as appreciative as usual; he was pushing the food around on his plate, hardly even picking at it. "Not to your taste?"

"It's fine. I'm just preoccupied, I suppose."

"Yeah, me too. So, okay, the ritual down at Grant Park did a spirit exchange between me and Ray, right? Did the Moondust chick tell you how we can undo it?"

"In a manner of speaking." He ran a thumb across his eyebrow, which meant something was seriously wrong, and her heart lurched in her chest.

"In what manner of speaking? Can we undo it or not?"

"We cannot. The spell can only be reversed by the original caster, or by the caster's death."

Rae stared at him for a moment. "You mean I'm stuck like this?" Her words echoed in her own ears, the pulse of blood in her veins hammering, and the whole world contracted to Ben's grim face. Suddenly she couldn't take it any more. She slammed down her knife and fork and leapt to her feet, knocking over her chair. "Shit!" She strode to the wall, turned, paced back to the table and leaned on it, looking Ben right in the eye. She wanted to grab him, shake him by the shoulders, which was stupid, it wasn't his fault, but damn it, he was just sitting there, and she needed to do something. "This is not happening. Tell me this is not happening."

"You're not the only one who is, shall I say, stuck."

His quiet tone made her realize she'd been shouting. With effort, she lowered her voice: "You said it can be reversed by the original caster, right? Fine. We find him. Or her. No problem, right?" She slammed her hand down on the table. "Moondust. We get their records, who they sold the candles to—"

"I've already asked them. They sell enough candles that none of their staff remembers who bought them."

"Okay, we subpoena their credit card records."

"On what basis?"

Fuck. He was right; nobody would buy their story, not that she wanted to tell it to anybody. She picked the chair up from the floor, set it backwards, then straddled it, arms folded across the back. "Shit. Okay, okay, we work the other end. You got any ideas about who might have done it to me? I mean, to Ray?"

"I'm afraid not."

"Come on, Ben, you gotta—"

"I'm hardly privy to the details of Ray's personal life," he said, and Christ, he sounded pissy.

"No way," she said in disbelief. This was Ben. And sure, Ray wasn't her, but he was who she was in this world, and it didn't add up. "Okay, so you don't have exactly the same relationship here that I have with my Ben, you're not married, but come on. You're still partners, right? You still got that communication thing, right? You tilt your head and Ray draws his gun, he moves his elbow and you jump to the right. You're best friends—you've got to be best friends, right?"

"Please don't presume to tell me about my relationship with Ray."

If he'd sounded pissy before, now he sounded positively icy. She spread her hands in a gesture of apology. "It's not that hard to figure out, okay? You thought I was Ray this morning, and it was obvious how the two of you get along. And Ray's me—I mean, he's who I would be if I was a guy. So I can tell. Of course you're best friends. Just like me and Ben. Neither of you has anybody else."

"Correct," he said bitterly. "And now we don't have anybody at all."

She stared at him. His face had turned slightly pink and his jaw was set in a grim line. He held her gaze for a moment, then abruptly dropped his head into his hands. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean—I'm just—it's just that you're not Ray. And I mi- I'm worried about him."

"You miss him." Some part of her wanted to reach over and shake him: why wasn't he worried about her? But of course that was because she was thinking of him as her Ben, and he wasn't. In her own Chicago, she supposed, Ben was eating dinner in their house, staring across the table at someone who looked like his wife but insisted he was a guy named Ray. And maybe there was a Chicago where a guy named Ray was eating dinner with his wife Benita Fraser, and neither of them had any idea that things could ever be any different.

"I first came to Chicago on the trail of my father's killers." He looked up, finally meeting her eyes. "I met a man named Ray, who despite being as different from me as chalk is from cheese, became my very good friend. Then I went back to Canada for a visit, and when I came back, he was gone. The man who introduced himself as Ray in his place was a very different person, but we also became friends. Best friends, as you say." His thumb snuck back up to smooth his eyebrow. "Now he's gone as well."

Her mouth went dry and she twisted her fingers nervously in the strands of her bracelet. "He's going to come back. He has to come back." Because she had to go back. Being a guy was okay for a couple of days, but she wanted her own body back. Her own life back, damn it. She wanted Ben to be her Ben, not this man sitting across from her who regarded her as a stranger. As an interloper trying to take the place of his best friend.

He looked down at his plate again. "I don't seem to have a very good record when it comes to those I care about."

"Don't say that, Ben," she said fiercely. "Do not say that. It's not true. Look, what happened to you happened to my Ben, too."

"I assume you didn't try to pass yourself off as Ray Vecchio."

"No, of course not. You and I, we already knew each other—but that's just it, see, we met while you were working with Vecchio, so when he left it made sense I took over from him. By then, we'd been going out for a while. And let me tell you, it was not easy to get you to go out with me. You said you didn't have a very good record with women. You told me about her."

"Victoria," murmured Ben.

"Yeah, Victoria." She bit back her instinctive next words; it had taken a long, long time for the Ben of her world to get over his heartbreak over finding out her true nature, and even now Rae was always cautious never to come right out and say what a bitch she thought Victoria was. Because she was a bitch, no question. And the whole reason Ben had managed to finally come to terms with things was because of her, because of Rae, and she didn't exist in this world, not as a woman. So she'd bet this Ben was still pretty messed up about the whole Victoria thing.

Just thinking about that made her heart ache. Because that right there was a reason why this wasn't her Ben. But it wasn't right and it wasn't fair that he should be so messed up about it, because he was still Ben, and she couldn't help loving him, couldn't help wanting him to be whole and happy and in love. Just thinking about it made her gut twist.

Taking a deep breath, she looked him in the eye. "You said you didn't have a good record, and I said that records were meant to be broken. You said you'd never give your heart to a woman again. But you did."

"I can't imagine it," said Ben softly.

"You did. We went out together, and we slept together, and we moved in together. And we almost got drowned on the Henry Allen, and we got married at the courthouse, and the whole 27^th and every Canadian in Chicago came to the reception. And—oh, shit," she muttered, grabbing one of the paper towels she'd set out for napkins and wiping at her eyes. Talking about everything she used to have, everything she didn't have any more, was making the stupid waterworks go off. She hated it when the emotion surged up like this, threatened to overwhelm her. She was pretty tough most of the time—had to be, to be a cop—but every once in a while the tears just bubbled out of her and she couldn't keep herself from crying.

"It's all right, Rae."

"It is not all right." She stood in one swift motion, walked into the living room so she wouldn't have to look at him. Her tears always came a little easier around Ben, maybe because she loved him and trusted him, knew she didn't have to act tougher than she was in order to keep his respect. But that didn't mean she liked crying in front of him. Even if this wasn't really Ben, not her Ben.

She took a deep breath, then turned around. He was still sitting at the table, his chair turned slightly sideways; his expression was guarded, like there was still something he was holding deep in his heart that he didn't dare let out, not even to her. "You miss Ray, and yeah, I look like him, but when we talk you can tell I'm someone else. But you—Christ. You're almost my Ben, but you're not him, and it hurts so fucking much."

"I'm sorry."

"Yeah, I'm sorry, too." She was miserable, and he was miserable, and it was just so stupid, just so fucking wrong. But he was all she had right now, and maybe… "I know this sounds kind of dumb, but I would really like—I mean, if you wouldn't mind, if you could just come over here and—close your eyes if you have to—but I just want to pretend for a moment that I'm me, you know, Rae, who I used to be, and that you're my Ben, and—I just want—I just want to hold you, and be held. Just for…" She trailed off, her voice small.

"It's all right," said Ben, and then he was out of his chair, striding across the room to take her in his arms, and she didn't care that she was stuck in a stupid man's body, a stupid different world, it was okay, Ben was there, and she felt the tension whoosh out of her like she'd suddenly let out a breath she'd been holding for two days. "It's all right," he murmured again.

"You're always so damned chivalrous," she whispered into his neck, and oh, he smelled so good, just like her Ben, that clean soap smell, and she nuzzled against his skin. Weird to be resting her head against his cheek instead of on his shoulder, but God, it felt good. His arms wrapping around her, holding her close, and they'd figure it out, the two of them, they always did. She pressed her lips against his neck in just the briefest bit of kiss, and he made a small, helpless sound, his arms tightening around her even more, and that made her heart ache with wanting him, with needing him.

It was instinctive to slide her mouth up to meet his, to find his lips, to slip her tongue gently into the familiar space of his mouth, and for a moment she relaxed into it. Then the unfamiliar body she was trapped in reasserted itself, male arousal and male need, her cock twitching and filling and wanting, pressing against Ben's leg, sending secret messages of desire up her spine. Her eyes flew open to see that Ben hadn't closed his eyes; he was staring at her, his expression unreadable in the instant before he pushed her away.

"Christ, Ben, sorry, I'm so sorry." She knew she was babbling, she couldn't help it; it was all her fault, it was an accident, she hadn't meant to, she hadn't intended it at all.

"It's all right," he said, in a tone very different from the way he'd said those words just a moment before, clipped and anguished and all closed in again. It made Rae want to punch something, hit the wall, anything. It was her fault, she'd freaked him out—and of course it would freak him out, a guy kissing him, a guy getting hard from touching him.

But then she noticed that his face was faintly red, and that his jeans looked just a little too tight there in the crotch, and it all became instantly, ridiculously clear. It hadn't been her arousal that had freaked him out. It had been his own.

"Ben, it's okay," she said, willing him to understand. "He feels the same way."

"You don't speak for him. How do you know what he feels?"

"Because he's me. I'm him. It makes sense."

Ben shook his head. "You're you. You see things through a different lens. I can't do this, Rae. I should go."

He looked sad, so sad, and she wanted to reach out and pull him toward her again, but instinctively she knew it would be the wrong thing to do. He had too many thoughts going on in his head. Maybe it was still Victoria's influence that made him not trust relationships; he'd jump out a second-floor window after a perp without a second's thought, but when it came to people it was like he couldn't take one step without figuring all the angles.

"Yeah, okay," she finally said. "You need a ride?"

"No, thank you kindly," he said, opening the door, and she wanted to hit him for that, because he could thank-you-kindly any asshole on the street, but damn it, Ray was his partner, even if he wasn't his lover, and they should be fucking well past that.

But she wasn't Ray. That's what he'd said, and as long as he believed it, it was like being partnered with a stranger again. Worse than that, because they'd hit it off instantly, the moment they'd met; this was like going back to zero—no, even farther, turning the dial back past the beginning, into the minus numbers—and it sucked.

So now she had two problems to deal with: getting her own body back, and getting Ben back. Of course, if she solved the first one it would take care of the second one, but from what Ben had said, Rae had a nasty suspicion it wasn't going to be so easy. And if getting back home was going to take a while, there was no way she was going to be able to do it without getting Ben back on board. No fucking way.

She'd give him space, okay, let him figure the angles like he always did. And on Monday she'd keep her hands to herself. Maybe she couldn't have Ben—and yeah, that sucked, no two ways about that—but she couldn't do this without Fraser.

Saturday morning, and at least she didn't have to go in to work, which meant she didn't have to shave or look through the ratty collection of clothes in Ray's closet to find something decent to wear. Not that her own collection was designer stuff. She'd never been into clothes much, and if she had needed something nice, she'd always borrowed it from Stella. Which was probably one reason Stella had decided they needed to split up, find their own places to live, because it had been so predictable it was almost funny: every time Rae went out on a fancy date or had to dress up to go to some city function uptown, she ended up having to chase after some petty punk, or getting a plate of linguini thrown at her, and you could only dry-clean and sew up rips in a borrowed silk dress so many times before your roommate started getting pissed off.

Yeah, maybe it had been Stella that had at least prodded her into getting a few nicer things, even if she pretty much only wore dresses in the summer when she could get away without having to wear pantyhose and heels, which Rae was convinced were part of the male conspiracy against women. But on weekends she could just slip on a pair of sweats, and Ray's sweats weren't a whole lot different from her own. She pulled a pair of soft gray pants from a drawer, topped it off with a Chicago PD sweatshirt. They fit a little different—tighter across the biceps, stretched around bigger legs—but they were comfortably soft and worn nearly threadbare at the collar and cuffs.

After a couple of hours of clicking around the channels she started getting bored. Thing was, she'd gotten used to having Ben around on their days off—which they carefully coordinated—and even when they weren't actually doing things together, he was always there. People always asked them if it drove the two of them nuts, being around each other 24/7, but the truth was, it wasn't really 24/7. Fraser had his Consulate responsibilities, and she had paperwork and research, other stuff like that, so it was pretty much only a couple times a week they actually worked together. And working together meant working. So the quiet time they had together, when they were off duty, was nice.

Except that last night had turned not-nice in a hurry. Ben had obviously been uncomfortable about kissing her in Ray's body and the way his body had reacted. Maybe he didn't know he was bisexual. Maybe he had just gone with it because she'd asked him to hold her, and he was sympathetic, the way he always was, and whoa, suddenly he was getting hard and that had taken him by surprise. That would surprise anybody, wouldn't it?

Or maybe it was no surprise at all. Rae could tell that this Ben cared about Ray; it was clear in everything he said. He'd turned red and denied it when she'd casually asked if they were having a relationship, but maybe the reason he'd turned so red was because he wanted to be having a relationship with Ray. Wanted one, but was too scared to ask, because of his fucking stupid track record, because of Victoria, because of his dad being such a lousy example of a loving spouse.

Rae would have to set him straight (and that thought made her grin, because 'straight' was totally the wrong word, wasn't it?) and tell him to get with the program, because she would bet that Ray was just as interested in Ben as he was in Ray. Because Ray was her, sort of, and she was sure as hell interested. Probably Ray had wanted to get into Fraser's pants for as long as Fraser had wanted to get into Ray's.

And now, she suddenly realized, he had his chance. Because Ray was in her body; Ray now had breasts and a vagina and a husband named Benton Fraser, and there wouldn't be any question about sexuality, it would just be a man and a woman—at least on the outside.

It was an oddly unsettling thought. If Ben had sex with Ray while he was in her body it would be—in a way—like cheating on her. Because it might be her body, but it wouldn't be her brain. It wasn't her soul, or spirit, or whatever it was that had gotten swapped. It wasn't her.

Would Ben even be interested, if he knew that it wasn't really her? This Ben had been able to tell that something was up—would her Ben? Assuming, of course, that Ray hadn't woken up in her body and freaked out, right there in bed next to Ben, and she'd put money on that having happened, so, yeah. Ben would know. He wouldn't know what to make of it, but he'd figure it out eventually. And he'd have to explain things to Ray, because Ray wouldn't have any clue at all, waking up in a strange house, in bed with his partner, with different parts than he'd had the night before.

The question was, would Ben want to have sex with a guy, even if he was in her body? Because unless Ray was so completely weirded out by having breasts and a vagina instead of stubble and a dick, she'd bet he'd want to try it out from the other side, just like she did. And, okay, there was a tiny chance that maybe he was strictly heterosexual, and totally against the idea of making it with any man, let alone Fraser. But she didn't think so.

She used to think the whole idea of 'soul mates' was pretty stupid, the kind of thing Frannie mooned over, the kind of thing that girls who read Cosmo believed in, thinking their prince was out there somewhere in Lincoln Park. But as soon as she'd met Ben, it was like, whammo, this is it; it had taken a little longer to convince him, and there had been some serious bumps in the road, but on the whole, it was greatness all the way. And then she'd ended up here, where she was a guy, and Ben was his partner.

It didn't make sense that they were only soul mates in one version of the world. This Ben wanted Ray, she was sure of it, even if he didn't know or understand it himself—and she'd bet a hell of a lot more than just air that Ray wanted him, too.

Thinking about Ben made her feel antsy again. Maybe they could just hang out, watch a game or something. Maybe it would help him get his head straight again, remember that above all they were buddies, and it would all be okay.

If Ray kept his address book where she did—yeah, there it was, near the kitchen phone. She flipped through to the Fs, but Ray didn't have Fraser's home number, just the Canadian Consulate. Maybe he'd memorized it.

Ray kept his Chicago phonebook where Rae had, too, stuffed in a drawer in the kitchen. There were a couple inches of Frasers, and Rae wondered if any of them were Canadian—who the hell knew there'd be that many Frasers in Chicago?—but there were no Bentons or Bens or even B Frasers.

Damn it.

Well, she had to do something, 'cause she was going to go crazy if she didn't. Maybe she just needed to get started on trying to figure out who had sent her and Ray switching into each other's bodies, so they could get unswitched. There was a pad of paper and a pen in the same drawer as the phonebook. The dregs in the coffeepot had gone cold, but she heated it up in the microwave and dumped enough chocolate into it that it wouldn't taste too bad, then took the coffee, the paper, and the address book over to the kitchen table.

Okay, who were Ray's friends—or former friends? Leafing through the address book showed that Ray was as much of a loner as she was. Not too many names, and she recognized most of them. A lot of the names had lines through them, and she nodded as she ran her finger down the page, remembering. Alice had moved away, she and Mat had kind of drifted apart, and when Dean got married six years ago, he didn't want much to do with any of his single friends, and apparently that had included Ray as well as Rae.

And there, under S, with no last name listed, was Stella. Ray's ex, and how insane was that? Fraser had called her "State's Attorney Kowalski," but maybe Ray was still hurting too much to list her with his own last name. Kind of unfair, wasn't it? Stella got the name and Ray got stuck being called "Vecchio."

In Rae's experience, exes were usually at the top of the list, so she wrote Stella's name on the top sheet of paper. For good measure she added Frannie's name under it, even though she was pretty confident in what she'd told Fraser earlier, that Frannie would have said something if it had been her. Secrets and Frannie were two things that did not go together, that was for sure.

She sat there drumming her fingers against the tabletop, ta-ta-ta-ta, looking at the list. Stella and Frannie. Nah, it didn't fit either of them. Stella might have had the motive but it wasn't her method, and Frannie was the other way around. Stupid idea, she thought, crumpling the paper and making a three-pointer into the trash.

Back to the address book. The problem was that even if she knew who Ray's friends were, it wouldn't help. This was something that an enemy would do. The question was, who were Ray's enemies? The same as hers, she guessed; she'd pissed off a lot of people, couldn't help it, came with being a cop. She always worried a little when some scumbag she'd helped to put behind bars made parole, or when a slick lawyer convinced a jury that the guy couldn't have done nothing wrong. But turning someone into a woman was not the kind of thing mob bosses and career criminals did to people who pissed them off. Concrete boots and a swim in Lake Michigan, yeah, but not wacko Wicca sex-change operations.

Maybe the thing to do was look at it backwards. Get the stuff from Evidence, see what she and Fraser could make of it. So that meant getting dressed and heading in to the station after all.

She'd put on jeans and a decent t-shirt, and was pulling on a leather jacket when she heard a knock. She opened the door, and there was the dark-haired woman from down the hall.

The woman smiled. "Looks like I just caught you, huh?"

She gave Rae's arm a casual poke, like she and Ray were pretty good friends, and that meant Rae was going to have to be careful. It was a lot easier with people like Turnbull and Dewey, who she knew in her normal world. But Rae didn't even know this woman's name, let alone her relationship with Ray.

Uh-oh, she thought suddenly, this better not be Ray's girlfriend. Because even though she wasn't anywhere near as feminine-looking as Stella, there was something that reminded Rae of her, just a little. The same lifted chin, like she was telling the world to take her or leave her, and the same slender body. She wore jeans and an untucked plain black t-shirt which made her look almost flat-chested, oval wire-rimmed glasses on her face; her brown hair was even shorter than Rae's, and she wasn't wearing any makeup. Still, kind of pretty, in a tomboy way.

She'd have to feel her way through this one. Casually she leaned against the doorjamb. "Yeah, got some things to do. What's up?"

"I know I said last week I wouldn't be up for the game tomorrow, but my plans fell through. So come on over around three, okay?"

The game tomorrow, that meant Sunday, and that meant football. It could be a date, or it could be a party. And the way she said it, it sounded like Ray had invited her first. Better stall. "Your place?"

"My turn, remember? I mean, if you want to watch it over here again, we could, but you had me over twice in a row, so I owe you."

She looked up at Rae—not by much, she was almost as tall as Ray was, which meant she was probably about the same height Rae had been—and shrugged a little, as if to say, no big deal either way. Like it was a buddies thing and not a girlfriend-boyfriend thing.

It would be safer to say no. Hey, you said you couldn't make it, so I made other plans, sorry. But on the other hand, it sounded like this was a regular weekend thing, what with the bit about it being twice in a row. Like it was something Ray did, and she was supposed to be Ray, so she'd better stick with the program.

Okay, that was an excuse. The truth was that being without Fraser sucked. Just this one Fraser-less day had Rae restless and bored; the thought of a whole, bleak, Fraser-less weekend stretching out in front of her—well, "sucky" didn't even begin to cover it. Any human company was better than spending it alone with the damn turtle. So she nodded and said, "Yeah, okay, sounds good. Want me to bring over anything?"

The woman frowned. "My turn, remember?" She sounded a bit astonished, and maybe it was because Ray would never actually offer to bring stuff over—yeah, that was a girl kind of thing, wasn't it—or maybe it was because she and Ray had some kind of system worked out already, and Ray would have known it. Either way, time to backpedal and cover.

Rae smiled a little bit, shrugged. "Right. Don't know what I was thinking. Guess I'm just, you know. Preoccupied." She waved in the direction of the elevator, things to do, places to go, and the woman took the hint.

"I won't keep you. See you tomorrow," she said, as she headed back toward her own apartment.

"You bet," said Rae.

On Saturdays it turned out that there was only one person at the Evidence desk, a woman Rae didn't recognize and who didn't recognize Ray, who reluctantly signed out the bagged items from the Grant Park thing. Christ, even with a dead-end investigation Evidence made you fill out paperwork and cross your heart, hope to die before letting you have anything, thought Rae, but she obediently scrawled "Vecchio" in the appropriate places, hoping it looked more or less like Ray's handwriting was supposed to, and took the bags back to the bullpen.

The station was crazy, of course—thank God she didn't have to do a weekend duty shift any more. But her little corner of it was reasonably quiet, and nobody was paying attention to her anyway.

Clearing a space in the center of her desk, she laid out the stuff. The feather, which sure looked like one from the dreamcatcher. Huh. She hadn't seen it anywhere in the apartment, but that didn't mean anything by itself, since Ray's stuff was all just a little different from hers. The half-melted candles, which looked spooky, like deformed dolls in black and white wax. She lifted one of them and turned it in her hands, looking for a store label or price on the bottom, but there was nothing.

The next item was a silver ring with a script "C" on it, and that had to be a clue. Too small for a man's hand, had to be a woman's ring. Or maybe a guy with really tiny hands. Who did she know whose name started with C? Or more importantly, who did Ray know? She tried to visualize the sparse entries in the address book; Dean Czerny had been the only name under C, she was pretty sure. Maybe it was someone Ray knew a little, not a lot; not enough to put his name, or her name, into his address book. Or maybe it was one of the scumbags Ray had crossed in police work, a working girl or a drug dealer. Someone who held a grudge and had a really weird idea of payback.

She put the ring back down and opened the next bag to sniff at the brown powder inside. It smelled sweet and a little moldy, like a spice that had sat in the kitchen cabinet for too long. Something Stella would have put in cookies, except of course before it got moldy. Too bad Rae got her cookies these days from the supermarket bakery shelf, because she couldn't identify it. She'd bet Fraser could. Even though he thought cookies were bad for you because of all the fat and sugar.

Fraser. She really needed to talk to Fraser. She scrabbled through the papers on her desk, opened the drawers, hoping to find something, anything, even a scrap of paper saying this is Fraser's phone number, dumb-ass. Nothing that looked even useful, and she slammed the drawer shut with a sudden surge of anger. It was stupid and unreasonable, because in just a few days she'd see him, and he would smell the powder and turn the ring over in his hands and get that look on his face, and say something like, "Well, Rae, obviously this belongs to a left-handed secretary from Sheboygan," and they'd go to Sheboygan and find the perp, case closed, stick it in a box marked done.

But damn it, she wanted to get this thing done now. She wanted back in her own goddamn body in her own goddamned world, and having to wait even a day made her want to punch the wall, hard. Which just went to show how screwed-up she was, because normally, okay, she was a little moody, especially at certain times of the month, but she'd never felt like putting her fist through a wall before.

Reluctantly she reassembled the evidence bags and took them back down to the vault to check in again, then drove back to the apartment. She was halfway to the elevator when a thought occurred to her: maybe she could find out the name of the woman who lived down the hall. Spinning on her heel, she backtracked to the mailboxes.

The slip of paper taped to the mailbox said Lembo. No first name, not even an initial, but it had been a woman's ring, and Rae wondered if the missing first name began with C. Maybe the whole reason Lembo had knocked on the door and asked Ray over to watch football was because she'd done it, because she wanted to see the results. Maybe she wanted to catch out the person who'd been catapulted into Ray's body, have a laugh at Ray's expense.

Except she sure hadn't acted like that was what she was doing. When Rae had messed up and said something Ray wouldn't have said, Lembo had looked confused, and that didn't jibe with her being the one to cast a woo-woo spell on Ray. Admittedly, she didn't have much to go on but instinct, but when you didn't have hard evidence you went with whatever hunch you had. That was how Rae had always done things, and it usually worked.

She turned things over in her mind as she walked to the elevator. If Lembo had done it, maybe she would have knocked on Ray's door and invited him over, but what would be the point of all the "my turn" stuff if it was just to put Ray on the spot? Then again, maybe it was all a plot to get Ray over to her apartment, do something even weirder. Then again, she sure didn't act like a pissed-off ex-girlfriend, or even like a girlfriend.

Sighing, Rae jabbed the elevator button and tapped her foot impatiently, waiting for it to come down from the top floor. It was all starting to sound way too complicated. Maybe it had been Lembo, and maybe it hadn't. Tomorrow she'd go to her apartment, pretend to be Ray, watch the game. She'd just have to play things by ear.

"Hey, come on in," said Lembo, opening the door wide. Out drifted a really good smell, melted cheese and something spicy. Mexican food. Didn't have to have Fraser's super-nose to identify that.

She led Rae inside, then went into the kitchen. The layout of the place was the same as Ray's apartment but mirror-image, and unsurprisingly it was a lot tidier than either Rae's apartment had been, or Ray's apartment currently was. (Rae and Fraser's house was freakishly clean, of course. No thanks to her own housekeeping skills.) Her furniture was a notch or two better than Rae's Early American Yard Sale, fat blue cushions on the couch and matching armchair, a couple of oriental-type rugs. On one wall was a print of that famous photo of Patti Smith, the one with that fuck-the-world expression on her face, and opposite it were some weird-ass carved wooden masks with big noses and scary expressions, African or Mexican maybe. Not something she'd want looking at her all the time, thank you very much.

The pre-game stuff was on the television, Paul Maguire and Suzy Kolber talking earnestly to any player they could corner. Rae tuned it out. The Bears were at Philadelphia—the game would probably suck. Assuming both teams were having as bad a season in this world as they were back home, anyway.

She wandered toward the kitchen. Maybe Lembo did the same thing Rae did, tossed her mail on the pass-through until she was ready to deal with it. But there was nothing there but a small stack of books, an ashtray, and a bottle of red wine, and she slammed her hand down hard on the counter in frustration.

Lembo turned from the fridge, a bottle in her hand. "Hold your horses, I was just getting your beer," she said, opening the bottle and holding it out.

Sam Adams, the label said, and Rae took a swig. It was pretty good stuff, and she almost said something, but caught herself just in time. Maybe Lembo always served Sam Adams, in which case Ray would be used to it. Maybe it was something special, and Lembo was waiting for Ray to comment, in which case—shit. This was going to be a pain in the ass.

Instead she mumbled a thanks and slouched back to the couch, which apparently was the right thing to do, because Lembo came out with a plate of nachos and sat down beside her just as the teams got ready for the kickoff, and then it was easy, yelling at the referees, at Matthews, at Maguire, and at the stupid goddamn commercials which seemed to take up just as much time as the game. All of which meant that Rae didn't have to actually talk with Lembo about anything other than what was happening on the screen.

Except at halftime Lembo clicked on the mute and turned to Rae and said, "So, anything interesting happening down at the station these days?"

Fuck. Conversation. Well, at least this was an easy one. "Can't talk about active cases, sorry."

"Your fault if tomorrow's front page is all national crap, then. But you get any good stuff you can share, don't forget, you bring it to me first." She didn't look particularly upset as she uncoiled herself from the couch. "Want another beer?"

"Yeah, sure." It would be her third, counting the ones Lembo had gotten them during one of the commercial breaks, and she wasn't even close to buzzed. She wondered if Lembo was feeling the alcohol yet; Rae would have been feeling it, in her normal girl-body, and by her estimate Lembo probably weighed about the same as she used to. Two beers would have given her that nice, relaxed feeling, nothing she couldn't pass a Breathalyzer test with, but enough to smooth all the rough edges from the world.

Tomorrow's front page, Lembo had said. So she was press. Usually they just got their leads from the scanner and then if they called, PR would feed them whatever the brass wanted them to print, but sometimes a reporter would manage to get to a detective at a scene, color or whatever they called it. She could see how it would be useful for a reporter, having a friend in the precinct.

"Here you go." A beer appeared on the coffee table in front of her, and then Lembo came around the couch. "I can't believe you had a completely boring week," she said, taking a swig from her own bottle as she plopped herself down next to Rae. This time she sat a little closer than she had been before, and when she turned her head to look Rae in the eye she looked—interested. Like maybe they were just friends, just buddies, but the look in Lembo's eyes said that they could move things up a notch, if she wanted.

Rae didn't want, she did not want at all, but apparently Ray wanted. Or maybe it was just the guy-thing, the little head with a mind of its own, but her jeans were getting too tight and sure enough, Lembo's eyes flicked down and then back up again, and her mouth quirked just a little, just a hint of a smile. Shit. What was she supposed to do?

"Huh," she said, taking a drink of her own beer. "What makes you say that?"

"You seem awfully tense. Like you're waiting for the call to come in that will tell you where the body's hidden, so you can go bust the guy who did it." Then she grinned, and added, "And when you do, you call your buddy at the Tribune, right?"

Good call, Lembo. Not that she was going to say anything; Rae just stretched and cracked her neck, leaned back into the soft cushions of the couch, willed the fucking erection to just go away already. "Nah, just the usual shit going down. Just life, you know?"

"Yeah," said Lembo, and her voice was rich with sympathy. "I know." She put a hand on Rae's arm, and it was like electricity or something, like the way magnets grabbed at each other when they got close enough, because all Rae wanted to do was lean into that touch, and where the hell did that come from?

She looked over at Lembo, and it was like her whole body language had changed: she was all loose-limbed and heavy-lidded, not quite coming on to Rae but giving off the signal, the definite signal, that all Rae would have to do would be to make one move. Oh, yeah, she knew that look. She'd given that look to guys, back in the "B.B." days—before Ben.

Rae found herself wondering what it would be like to take her up on the offer she saw in her eyes. And that wasn't just Ray's body talking. Because even though Rae had always gone for men, loved the feel of strong arms around her and a thick cock inside her, sometimes she thought she might be just a little bisexual. Not that she'd ever done anything about it. But sometimes she looked at women—at certain women, who for some reason caught her eye—and she thought about switching sides, just to try it out.

Back when she and Stella had been living together, she'd sure thought about it, especially when Stella had just come out of the shower and headed for her room dressed only in a towel, all wet hair and long legs. It had always made Rae feel a little gawky and unsteady, looking at Stella, who was so secure in her femininity. She knew how to wear high heels, how to put on makeup, and it had been Stella who had patiently showed Rae how to pluck her eyebrows so it didn't look like she had furry caterpillars on her face. But Stella was into guys, at least as much as she was into anything that wasn't her future career, and Rae wasn't about to say something that might mess up their friendship. Of course, it got messed up later, but at least that wasn't her fault.

Yeah, there was something about the way Lembo carried herself that reminded Rae of Stella. But if she had to be totally honest about it, it wasn't that she looked like Stella as much as it was that she looked a little like Rae had looked, when she was in her own body. Dark hair instead of blonde, but still. Kind of like Rae. And that wasn't too surprising, because the women who attracted her were always built more-or-less like her.

Maybe it was one of these ego things, like she'd read somewhere once: supposedly everyone just wanted to fuck themselves, which was actually kind of funny when you thought about it. Or maybe it was just that she was her own type, because Ray Kowalski had looked pretty damn good in the mirror.

When she'd had her hand on her cock—on Ray Kowalski's cock—Rae had wondered what it would be like, sex from the other side. What it would feel like to fuck a woman. This was her chance to find out. All she'd have to do would be to smile back, to slide over just a little, to put her hand on Lembo's thigh. Piece of cake.

But…she couldn't do it. It didn't matter that it wasn't really her body. It would be cheating on Ben, and she couldn't do it. And that was why it was so tempting, so fucking tempting, so nice to be touched that she wanted to purr like a cat. Because Ben had backed away from her like she was made out of explosives or something, and that made her want to throw something hard at the wall and watch it shatter into a bazillion pieces.

It was Ben she really wanted to slide up next to, and maybe she couldn't have him, but she wasn't going to cheat on him. So she put down the beer, too fast, almost knocking it over, and jumped to her feet. "Gotta take a leak," she muttered over her shoulder, and it was a good thing this apartment was the mirror image of hers, because she could head straight to the bathroom like she'd done it hundreds of times before.

In the bathroom (neat but not fussy, not even as much make-up scattered on the counter as Rae herself had, and she wasn't exactly the poster child for girly stuff) she leaned on the sink and took deep breaths, one after another, until she felt like she was in control of Ray's body again. Okay, she thought, looking at the still-unfamiliar long fingers gripping the edges of the sink. It wasn't like Lembo was making any actual moves. It was just an unspoken invitation, for Rae to follow up or ignore, and she could ignore it. No matter what Ray's dick wanted to do.

Might as well use the facilities while she was there; two beers wasn't enough to get Ray's body drunk but it was enough to fill his bladder, so she got rid of the beer and then washed her hands. She took one glance at the mirror, out of habit, and then a thought occurred to her, and Ray's reflected face broke into a slow smile.

She slid open the medicine cabinet. Boxes of Band-aids, bottles of sunscreen and moisturizer, aspirin, ibuprofen…there. Rae twisted the prescription bottle so she could see the name on it: Carol Lembo.

Jesus Christ, thought Rae, and her heart started pounding. Could Lembo be C? She visualized Lembo's hands, wrapped around a bottle of Sam Adams, resting on Ray's shoulder; she didn't remember seeing any rings, or even any indented skin where a ring might have been until recently. Fuck.

She took one more deep breath, then let it out slowly. Maybe she was just feeling paranoid. The body-swap thing had obviously been the work of somebody that had it in for Ray, and the way Lembo—Carol—had looked at Rae a few minutes ago was strong evidence that she did not exactly hate Ray's guts. Pretty much the opposite, in fact.

Okay. Back to the couch, back to watching the Bears suck and pretending that she was totally not interested in making out with her neighbor. Just a few more hours, then she could escape back to her own apartment. And tomorrow she'd see Ben.

But Fraser didn't show up at the station at all on Monday morning. Not that they'd have been able to go over the Grant Park stuff right away; Welsh was coming down hard on everyone, muttering about solve rates and hanging cases, and if Rae was going to pass as Ray, she was going to have to get his job done first. So she was going through the list of names that Goldman had faxed over, checking for priors. Obviously it had been an inside job, or at least someone inside had helped, and the sooner they had a line on who it was, the more chance there was that the goods hadn't been moved yet. The computer always drove her crazy, though. Fraser was way better at using it than she was.

And there she was, thinking about him when she should have been thinking about inside men and crimes of opportunity. But it was impossible: everything reminded her of Fraser. The computer, the empty chair near the desk, the guy in an improbably red blazer who was hammering his hand on Jack Huey's desk and demanding that he do something about the kids who kept spray-painting his door.

Finally she picked up the phone and dialed the Canadian Consulate. "Yeah, Turnbull. This is Vecchio." It still felt wrong to refer to herself that way. "Get me Fraser, will you?"

There was a long pause before Turnbull came back on the line. "I'm terribly sorry, Detective. Constable Fraser is extremely busy and won't be able to join you at the station today."

"Can I talk to him?"

There was another long pause. "Rae?"

Warmth coursed through her at the sound of his voice; funny how just hearing him made her feel better. "Fraser, I need your help here. We gotta get moving on the Goldman case or it's going to be too late to do anything."

"I realize that. Unfortunately, I have things to do here, and I'm afraid I'm not going to be able to get away." And that made her tense up again; his voice was perfectly even, perfectly smooth, and she couldn't tell if he was—well, he wouldn't be lying, exactly, but he could put up a stone wall like nobody's business, if he wanted to. Maybe he was still freaked out about things. She couldn't tell, not over the phone.

"Lunch? Can I pick you up for lunch?" Christ, that sounded whiny. She wished she could just say what she was really thinking: I miss you. I just want to be with you for a while. Yeah, like she'd say that into the phone while she was sitting in the bullpen. Not even in her own world would she have done that.

"Sorry, Rae. I can't get away."

"Yeah, okay. Maybe tomorrow," she said, and hung up the phone. Probably just one of those days. Even Canada had Mondays, right?

But she couldn't concentrate on a damn thing. All she was aware of was the stupid body she was stuck in, the dick in her pants and the stubble on her face, the wrong hands at the end of the wrong arms, everything wrong, wrong, wrong. People kept calling her Vecchio and she wanted to punch them in the jaw. Fraser was the only person who knew who she really was.

He had to show up. He had to. If he didn't, she'd drown here, lost in Ray's body, lost in this world where everything was wrong. She'd have to be Ray all the time. It would be like a pile of snow in the spring, the sun beating down on it, melting it bit by bit until there was nothing left. Everything that was Rae would melt away, if she didn't have Fraser there to hold onto, to remind herself she existed.

But the next morning, no Fraser, and Turnbull was weirdly evasive on the phone, first saying that there was a meeting, and then that Fraser was on another line. Finally Rae slammed down the phone in disgust, grabbed her jacket, and headed out.

"I need Fraser," she informed Turnbull as she strode into the Consulate.

Turnbull stood hastily, darting panicked glances at the empty corridor behind him. "I'm sorry, but Constable Fraser is unavailable at—"

"Is he here?"

"I'm afraid I have to tell you—that is, I've been instructed—"

"Is he here?" demanded Rae.

"Well. Er. Yes, he's here, but—"

"Fine," said Rae, and walked past the reception desk. Turnbull moved towards her, his hands flailing in the air, but stopped short before he actually touched her, so she just kept going even though she sensed him hovering nervously behind her. She knocked once at Fraser's door, then opened it.

"He just barged in," said Turnbull over her shoulder, before Rae could say anything.

"That's all right, Turnbull," said Fraser. He sounded weary, as though he hadn't been sleeping well. Well, that made two of them. Three of them, if you counted Dief, who lay on the floor next to Fraser's desk, head on folded paws. He had opened his eyes when Rae had come in, but that was it.

Fraser looked good, though. Maybe it was just that she'd been missing him so hard that he'd have looked good no matter what, but she couldn't help noticing how blue his eyes looked, how nicely his shoulders filled out that crazy red uniform. He was holding up a folder of papers like it was a shield, like he was trying to put whatever he could between the two of them, and it took all the self-control she could find not to grab that folder and throw it to the ground.

She'd been counting on him being there for her, damn it. It was driving her crazy, the disconnect between being Rae and pretending to be Ray, and he was the only thing keeping her from going totally unhinged and screaming in the street. But he was hiding behind his fucking paperwork, trying not to look her in the eye, and that pissed her off a little. She leaned forward onto his desk.

"I understand your country needs you," she said, gesturing at the papers he held, "but, you know what? So does Chicago. Specifically Mr. Goldman of Goldman's Jewelry. You know, the store we happened to be walking by just as they discovered they'd been robbed? Turns out that the ex-husband of one of his -"

"Rae," said Fraser firmly. "I'm certain you can handle it yourself."

"Uh-uh. You're my partner, you're my backup, and I ain't going in without you."

"I'm afraid you'll have to find other backup."

And that pissed her off a lot. Because yeah, she wasn't Ray, but she had to do his job, and damn it, Fraser was part of that job. She slammed her fist down onto the desk, making a satisfying thunk. "No way, José. You cannot leave me—you cannot leave us high and dry like this! How do you expect me—"

Behind her, Turnbull cleared his throat loudly. "Sir, would you like me to show Detective Vecchio out?"

"I ain't leaving," she said, turning to him and raising her chin. Another door in the hallway opened and she heard the distinct click of high heels; a moment later, Inspector Thatcher appeared in the hallway.

"Is there a problem here?"

Rae had been kind of hoping that it would have been the same with Thatcher as it had been with Frannie, but from the ice in her voice it was clear that she didn't like Ray any better than her own world's version of Thatcher liked Rae.

"Detective Vecchio was just leaving," said Turnbull, with what he probably thought was a menacing undertone but which just sounded silly coming from him.

"Yeah," Rae said. "Along with Constable Fraser, who I need for this case we're on." She looked at Fraser, who shook his head.

"As I said before, I'm otherwise occupied."

"Well," said Thatcher. "In that case, Detective—"

"But I need Fraser's liaising services," said Rae smoothly. "Oh, I didn't tell you the suspect's Canadian, did I?"

"Really?" Fraser's eyebrows made his disbelief clear.

"Really," Rae said. "Come on, Frase, would I lie to you? No, don't answer that."

Fraser looked at Thatcher with what even Rae could tell was an appeal for help. But she just gave a brittle smile and said, "Duty calls, Constable," then turned on her heel and headed back to her office.

"Ah, well, in that case I suppose I must accompany you," said Fraser. Putting the folder down, he stood slowly and came out from behind his desk. Dief looked first at him, then at Rae, then trotted over to stand by the door.

"Great," said Rae. "Come on, I'll explain things in the car."

"Tell me about this Canadian suspect," said Fraser, once they were in the GTO.

Rae put the car in gear, checked the mirror, and pulled out into traffic. "Well. Actually, he's not exactly Canadian."

"Not exactly?"

"Okay, not at all." She sighed, ran a hand through her hair. "Look, Fraser, you're supposed to be my partner."

"Unofficially. And I'm Ray's partner, not yours."

"Yeah, but as long as I'm being Ray, you're my partner. And you can't just decide you're not going to do it. You can't leave me without backup, Frase, that ain't safe and it ain't fair."

Fraser was silent for nearly a block. Then he said, "I find myself conflicted."

"Conflicted, like how conflicted?"

"I find myself caught between my duty to Ray and my duty to you."

"What's that supposed to mean? We're both me." She frowned; that hadn't come out right. "Ray's being me right now, and my Fraser is taking care of him, right?"

"Is he?" There was something weird in Fraser's voice, like the words were all gummed up in his throat, and Rae turned to look at him. "Watch the road, Rae."

"Duh, of course he is. He's Fraser—you think he'd do anything else?"

"Do you think they're having sex?"

Rae's head snapped toward him and the wheel turned in her hands; she jerked it back before they hit the car in the next lane, but it was close enough to scare Dief, who barked an alarm into her ear. "Whoa, wait a minute," she spluttered. "I'm talking about being there on the job, Frase. The one-two punch when we're out on a case. What we do when we get home is our own business." Although it was perfectly true that when she and Fraser got home, they headed for the bedroom more often than not. Some of it was the excitement, the stuff that got into your bloodstream and made you all jumpy and alert, had to be bled off when things weren't hopping any more. And some of it was just the joy of still being alive and together at the end of the day. Hard enough being a cop, or being married to a cop, and being both was double jeopardy. That was reason enough to take pleasure in what you had while you had it.

She snuck a look over at Fraser. He'd gone a little pink and was staring resolutely forward, like he was afraid to look at her. "So maybe they are having sex. Wouldn't surprise me, because Ray wants you, and he can do it now, right?" Fraser turned even redder, but still didn't look at her. "So what if they are?"

"It doesn't bother you that your husband might be cheating on you?" Fraser sounded incredulous, and more than a little upset. Like it bothered him, which she guessed maybe it had reason to, considering that he was sort of talking about himself.

"Oh, for Christ's sake," she said, exhaling explosively. "It's not cheating. It's still my body. It's still me."

"But it's not you. It's Ray."

"Yeah, okay, Ray isn't exactly me, but he sort of is. I mean, it's like he's me but translated into another language, or something like that. Like from English into German. Or American into Canadian." She darted another glance at him, but he was still gazing fixedly at the street ahead. "If Ray was a girl, he'd be me. If I was a guy, I'd be him. Which I am, right now, in case it has escaped your notice. So I don't see how it matters one way or the other."

She'd thought about it a lot over the weekend. Whether it would be cheating or not, and how she felt about it. And she'd decided that it didn't make any difference to her.

Sure, the person in her body wasn't her. And if it was just some other woman—or some other man, for that matter—she'd be furious. Like, what if Frannie had somehow managed to transfer her brain into Rae's body? That would have been a betrayal, because even though it would have been her body, it would have been Frannie taking advantage, Frannie having sex with her husband. And there was no way Frannie would have been able to keep it from Ben, because he'd notice, he'd be able to tell in an instant—so that would mean Ben would be cheating on her.

But Ray was different. It was as if she'd been able to squish her own body around into a man's shape, being Ray, because he'd had more or less the same life she'd had, the same experiences. Just as a guy. So for him, being her was just like being himself except with different parts, right?

And the key thing was that Fraser was Fraser, no matter which world he was in. Okay, so what happened to one Fraser didn't necessarily happen to the other at the same time, but it seemed like most of the important stuff did. Becoming a Mountie. Coming to Chicago. Victoria. And even though this Ray was just this Fraser's partner, and she was her Fraser's wife, she was pretty sure that both Frasers were in love with the version of her in that world, whether it was Ray or Rae.

She pulled over and parked. "Look, are we good? Because we got to talk to Hope DiMonte and find out if she accidentally on purpose let the safe combo slip to her ex-husband. Who it just so happens has a couple of counts of insurance fraud on his cute little white-collar record."

"We're fine, Rae." And that sounded like Fraser again, like he'd reached back into his bag of special Mountie-starch and filled himself full of duty and honor and all that, all the things that Rae loved about him and that drove her crazy, so she turned the key and opened the door and they went up to Ms. DiMonte's apartment.

The peephole in the door darkened for a moment, and then there was the sound of a security chain being slid back just before the door opened. Ms. DiMonte was an overweight bottle-blonde in her mid-forties, weary and sad-faced, and she didn't look particularly happy to see them.

"Detective Vecchio, Chicago P.D.," said Rae, flipping out her badge.

"Yeah, I remember you. You're the cop that came into the store. Listen, I've got to get to work."

"Just a couple of questions. We'll only be a minute," Rae reassured her. Maybe Hope DiMonte was protecting her scumbag ex, and maybe he was strong-arming her, but either way, this kind of thing was always easiest to crack when the woman was at home. At work they had to have their armor on—hell, she knew it from her own experience. At home they were more relaxed, and maybe more vulnerable. A sympathetic woman cop was usually all it took.

Of course, Rae wasn't a woman cop at the moment. But it didn't really matter, because Fraser was there. And sure enough, all it took was for Hope DiMonte to invite them in and lead them across her living room, and Fraser to notice something hinky about the way she was walking, and ask, in a concerned voice, how she'd hurt herself, and two minutes later she was sitting on her couch, sobbing the whole story into Fraser's uniform.

And half an hour later, she was in the police station, giving an official statement, which Rae signed with a flourish, remembering just in time to use 'Vecchio'. Then they left her in the care of Frannie, who had ready sympathy for an abused woman, and Dief, who had laid his head in her lap when they'd gotten into the car, and refused to let her out of his sight once the arrived at the station, and headed out for the office of one James DiMonte, independent travel agent, unlucky gambler in hock to the Mob—or so his ex-wife had told them—and about-to-be-apprehended jewel thief.

DiMonte's oily smile didn't hide the flash of panic that Rae saw in his eyes as soon as she stepped into his tiny office and flashed Vecchio's badge at him. After she told him that she'd had a very interesting discussion with the former Mrs. DiMonte, he shook his head. "Now, gentlemen, I'm sure there's been a misunderstanding. You know what exes are like. She'd say anything to get me in trouble."

His tone was almost patronizing—more than almost, thought Rae. She'd heard it directed at her enough times that it grated on her like a loose bearing in the GTO's engine, and it was nearly as bad hearing it directed at someone else. Especially since DiMonte was acting like it was something they were all in together, all three of them: we're all men here, and we know what lying bitches those women are. Made her want to grab him by his shirt collar and pop him one, right in the jaw. And that wasn't anything new—perps pissed her off on a pretty regular basis—but the sudden surge of heat in her blood was unexpected, the instant and physical response, and she had taken two steps toward DiMonte before Fraser made a noise behind her and she realized what she was doing.

Reluctantly she backed off. "Yeah, maybe. But in the meantime, you're a suspect." She pulled out the notebook in which she'd jotted down the information from the files. "Says here you had a plea bargain three years ago over an insurance fraud case."

"That's water under the bridge. I've given nobody any trouble since." DiMonte spread his fleshy hands like he was showing that he had nothing to hide, but Rae wasn't buying.

"Your ex-wife suggested that you might be having problems meeting certain debts," said Fraser.

"Gambling debts," Rae added.

"What does she know?" DiMonte sneered. There was a rough, angry edge in his voice, and Rae was suddenly very glad that they'd taken Hope to the station. If they couldn't bring him in now, she'd push for protective custody.

"What we care about right now is what you know," Rae said. "So how about you come down to the station with us and give us a statement."

"Hey, I can give you a statement right here. I don't know nothing about no jewelry theft."

"Oh, yeah? So how come you even know there was a jewelry theft? I don't remember telling you about that."

His eyes narrowed and his expression turned ugly. "I don't have to answer your fucking questions."

"Fine. You can not answer them down at the station."

"I want to call my lawyer," said DiMonte, reaching to open the top drawer of his desk.

"Rae!" shouted Fraser, but she had been tense from the moment DiMonte had opened his mouth, and she was already diving for the floor, keeping the desk between herself and DiMonte as she yanked her gun from its holster and whipped it forward. Or tried to, anyway, because she was used to the slightly different angle of her own holster, which was set for a woman's body rather than for a man's, and fuck, she should have practiced, but it was too late: she was still fumbling her gun free of the holster by the time DiMonte had his own gun in his hand and was pointing it -

- at Fraser. "Drop it," shouted DiMonte, waving the gun. "Or Red here gets it."

She risked a quick glance around to Fraser, and why the hell hadn't he drawn his gun? "Fraser!" she hissed, but DiMonte shook his head warningly.

"I'm not fooling. Drop it."

"Don't do something you might regret later," said Fraser, in that calm, even voice that he always used when he was confronting a perp who had more firepower than the good guys did. It had taken a while before Rae had realized that it wasn't an act; Fraser really did want whatever scumbag they were confronting to back down, not just because he didn't want to get shot but because he honestly felt bad for whoever it was. Which she could see, yeah, when it was some kid, some teenager from the wrong side of town who'd been given nothing but bad breaks from life, made a lot of dumb choices. A kid like that might be salvageable.

But someone like DiMonte, now, he was a real slimeball. The prospect of putting him away didn't bother Rae one bit. He'd probably never actually killed anyone—he was kind of chunky, and the way he was waving that gun around, it didn't look like he actually knew what he was doing with it—but he looked nervous, real nervous, sweat shining on his forehead, and that made him even more dangerous.

"Okay, okay, chill out," Rae said slowly, holding her gun up by the barrel so DiMonte could see she wasn't aiming at him. As she rose from behind the desk she slid a little farther to the left, away from Fraser, and in the corner of her eye she could see that he was doing the same, edging away from her. Splitting the targets.

"Shooting an officer of the law carries a much higher penalty than theft," said Fraser.

"Not paying off Big Mickey carries an even bigger penalty," muttered DiMonte. "You, the cop, toss it over here."

"Sure," said Rae, trying for Fraser's reasonable tone. "Then we come back with the whole force and arrest you. It'll be a lot easier if—"

"Shut up and toss me the gun!" He was starting to look desperate, his face twitching and his arms shaking from side to side as he swung the gun to cover her. Great, just what she needed. Rae glanced over her shoulder and Fraser nodded almost imperceptibly. She smiled as she turned back toward DiMonte.

"Yeah, okay. Here you go," she said, throwing it hard toward his head, then stepping quickly to the left side of the desk and ducking low. To her right, Fraser was a blur of motion as he launched himself forward. A shot rang out, freezing her for one terrible moment; then DiMonte yelled indistinctly, and his gun came skittering toward her across the floor along with her own. Fraser must have finally pulled his gun, thought Rae with relief, and she grabbed the guns, sticking DiMonte's in her jacket pocket and pointing her own at where Fraser had DiMonte pinned against a poster of the Eiffel Tower.

"Got to make it hard on yourself, don't you," she said, shaking her head. She reholstered her gun, then yanked DiMonte's arms around his back. Fraser held him still and she slapped on the cuffs as she gave DiMonte the Miranda spiel.

"I want my lawyer," said DiMonte. His nervousness had been replaced by sullenness, and when Fraser let go of him he stayed huddled against the wall.

"You get your phone call at the station," said Rae. "I get mine first." She pulled out her phone and called for a squad car to come pick up DiMonte, then turned to where Fraser stood watching over him. "Okay, they should be here in ten to fifteen."

"Good," said Fraser, in a thin, odd, voice. His face was queerly pale, his white skin contrasting sharply with the vivid red of his uniform, and….

"Holy crap." Two long strides took her to his side. "When did you get hit? Did you do this?" she demanded, grabbing DiMonte and shaking him. Christ, if he had hurt Ben, she was going to pound him into hamburger right there in his own office. She could do it, she had Ray's muscle backing her up, and it was only by sheer force of will that she was able to restrain herself from slamming his head into the wall. "You fucker! What did you do? Did you shoot him?"

He shrank away from her. "I didn't do it! It went off by itself!"

"Rae, Rae, I'm all right," said Ben, pulling at her arm and forcing her away from DiMonte.

"No, you're not. Look at you, there's blood all over your uniform. Christ." Red blood on the red serge, no wonder she hadn't noticed right away. She grabbed onto his wrist, needing to hang onto something. God, please let him be all right. Fighting to keep her voice from shaking, she told him, "As soon as they get here, I'm taking you to the hospital."

"I'm all right," he repeated, but he winced as he touched the blood-soaked cloth on his right arm. "It was only a grazing shot. I expect the bullet is—ah, yes, there it is," he said, walking back towards where he had been standing earlier. The bullet had ripped through the sheetrock, leaving slivers of various colors of paint and peeled wallpaper exposed. "Although I'm afraid this tunic is going to be a loss."

"Forget the tunic!" It came out louder than she had intended, and his face tightened; biting her lip, she looked away. Damn it. She just wanted to grab him, to shake him, to hold him as tightly as she could. But with DiMonte there, huddling in the corner, all she could do was stand there and wait. This was the tough part of being in love with your partner. Knowing that you shared a dangerous profession, that any day could be your last together.

The wail of sirens outside broke the tension. She opened the door and saw the squad car pulling up to the curb. "Okay, there's DiMonte's ride. Your ride is taking you to the hospital. Come on."

"I don't need a doctor," repeated Ben for what must have been the fourth time. "Rae. Look."

"I'm too busy driving to look." Too busy driving, and breathing, and trying to keep from freaking the fuck out. Every time she allowed herself to think about what had just happened—what had almost happened—she started to shake. And she couldn't lose it. Not yet. Not until she was sure that Ben was okay.

"Rae. Look."

The light ahead turned red, so when they came to a stop, she turned to him. "Okay. I'm looking."

He held his arm up for her inspection. Apparently he'd been busy while they were driving, because his arm was wrapped in white gauze, the torn edges of his sleeve neatly turned back and tucked away. Impressive. "You did that with one arm? Not bad."

"When one spends a great deal of time on one's own in the wilderness, one learns how to take care of oneself."

"Yeah, if "one" is Benton Fraser. I guess if you break your leg out there, you can carry yourself back, huh."

"There's no need to be snippy," he said, sounding a bit snippy himself.

Okay, maybe she had been a little short with him. Thing was, she didn't get many chances to take charge, and even though that was one of the things she admired about him—that he was so frighteningly competent at so many things—it was kind of nice when he screwed up, just a little, because then she could be the competent one, taking care of him. Not that she liked things being screwed up. But there was something about the feeling of being needed, knowing he depended on her, even if it was just sometimes, just for a few things.

"Yeah, you're right. Sorry." The light turned green, and she pulled into the intersection. "Anyway, you've got to clean out the wound, put antiseptic on it."

"The wound was free of cloth fragments. And I've already dressed it with antibiotic salve."

"You carry that stuff with you?"

"Proper preparation—"

"Prevents poor performance, yeah, yeah." She turned the corner a little harder than she probably should have, and they swayed to the left, Fraser almost falling into her from the force.

"But you're right. I'll clean it properly back at the Consulate, if you'll take me there."

She snuck a glance at him. The bandage was still snowy white, so she guessed the bleeding wasn't really bad. Maybe she was overreacting. "Okay, no hospital. But you're not going back to work. Thatcher can't expect you to do paperwork when you've just been shot."

"Rae—"

"I'm taking you home. Just tell me where it is."

"The Consulate, please."

"I'm not backing down on this. But I don't know where you moved after the place on West Racine burned down. I mean, my Ben moved in with me, but you obviously didn't move in with Ray. So I guess you must have got a new apartment, right? Just tell me where to go."

"I just did," said Fraser. He sounded a little embarrassed. "I'm, er, living at the Consulate these days."

"You're what? Don't tell me Thatcher let you take over the Queen's Bedroom."

"No, actually. I've got a cot in my office, and really, that's all I need."

"Jesus Christ." She shook her head. Of all the crazy things. And his apartment had burned down over a year ago. "You've got to be kidding. You're living in your office?"

"It's not that bad."

"Oh, yes, it is. I've seen your office. You're staying with me."

"Don't be ridiculous," Fraser said stiffly.

"It's not ridiculous, it's common sense. You go back to your office, the Ice Queen is going to put you to work, which you shouldn't be doing on account of you just got shot. You want to spend the whole day writing stuff on forms with a wounded arm? Uh-uh. You're staying with me tonight."

"What about Diefenbaker?"

"He can stay, too. Just don't tell the landlord, 'cause she's going to want to double the security deposit."

"There are things I'll need from my office. Clothes, my shaving kit—perhaps it would be best for me just to return to the Consulate."

"Uh-uh. No way. You tell me what you need and I'll get it for you. You're not getting out of this."

Fraser was silent for a few blocks as Rae piloted the car toward her apartment. Finally he said, "You're used to taking care of me, aren't you."

"Yeah, well. You take care of me when I need it. That's what being partners is all about, right?" That reminded her. "Although I was beginning to wonder. Why the hell didn't you pull your gun?"

"I'm not licensed to carry a gun," said Fraser, sounding puzzled.

"Jesus Christ." She let her head thunk back against the headrest. "I wish you'd told me before we went in there."

"I take it that, er. That the me in your world does carry a gun?"

"Yeah. Shit, I should have known—I mean, you didn't get licensed until we got married. It made the forms and stuff easier, being married to a citizen, having your green card paperwork in the pipeline and all that." How could she have been that stupid? She should have noticed that he wasn't carrying. She had been too wrapped up in just seeing him, in how weird things were, too busy trying to be Ray instead of Rae. Too many things to pay attention to, and she'd missed the one thing she should have noticed.

"You must find it difficult, though. Being with your…your husband," Fraser said, stumbling slightly on the words, "and facing down the criminal element, as we did today. Knowing the risk."

"Of course it's difficult. It's always difficult. But it's the same for you. We just deal with it. 'Cause you trust me at your back more than anyone else, just like I trust you."

"Provided I have a gun."

"I bet Ray's told you that you ought to be carrying."

"Many times, yes. But I imagine the protective instinct is stronger when you're in a romantic relationship."

She snuck a quick glance at him. He was looking out the window, his expression unreadable. "Don't give me that. It doesn't matter that you and Ray aren't fucking," she said, and at that she heard his indrawn breath. "You're partners, you're friends. You care about each other. You love each other, and do not tell me you don't, because I know, okay? You went after DiMonte and got yourself shot, which by the way was a stupid thing to do. But you did it because you were protecting your partner."

"That's different."

"No, it ain't. I mean, yeah, it's different when your partner's just your partner. Like I was with Jack Huey—we liked each other, but we weren't dating."

"Ray and I aren't dating, either."

"Yeah, but you wish you were."

"That's enough," said Fraser. His voice sounded weary and unexpectedly sharp. "I don't need you to remind me of what I cannot have."

"Who says you can't—"

"Rae, please."

She looked over at him again. He had slumped back into the seat and closed his eyes; his face was as pale as it had been in DiMonte's office, when he'd been bleeding all over the place, and she wondered how badly his arm was hurting him. She was pretty sure there was Advil in the medicine cabinet in Ray's apartment. Maybe Ray had some leftover prescription stuff, although even if he did, it would take some major sweet-talking to get Ben to take any.

But he sure didn't need her picking at him, so she just said, "Yeah, okay," and they drove the rest of the way to the apartment in silence.

After she'd taken Ben up to her place—and it was funny how quickly she was starting to think of it as her place, even though it still felt weirdly off—and ordered him to relax in front of the television, she headed back out again. The first stop was the Consulate.

"Ah, Detective," said Turnbull as she walked in. "Did you apprehend your Canadian suspect?"

She blinked at him once, confused, before remembering what she'd said earlier that day. Seemed like it had been a week ago, so many things had happened since then. "Oh, yeah, we got him. Listen, I need to get into Fraser's office, get him some stuff."

Instantly Turnbull's welcoming expression darkened. "And where is the Constable?"

"He's at my place," she said, waving her arm vaguely. "So, can I—"

"Have you kidnapped him? Are you keeping him away from Canada under duress?"

"What? Jeez, no, of course not. Come on, Turnbull, you know me—would I do that?"

"I know who you appear to be, true. But what if you're not the real Detective Vecchio? Maybe you're an impostor."

He frowned at her, and it took all she had not to bust out laughing, looking at his face. He had no idea how right he was; Christ, if he did, it would probably make his head explode, because she was an impostor pretending to be another impostor, and that was enough to make anybody's head explode.

Fighting to keep a serious expression on her face, she shook her head. "It's just—it's just a complicated case, and we're going to be working pretty late. He's looking over some of the files," she improvised.

"Ah," said Turnbull, nodding mysteriously. He tapped the side of his head with a finger and gave her a knowing look. "The Canadian connection, eh?"

"Yeah, right. So are you going to let me get his things?"

He winked at her, which was more than a little disturbing, but she wasn't going to complain, not if it got her what she needed. "Carry on, Detective."

Okay. Carry on. She nodded and breezed by him, into Fraser's office. The book he'd asked for—a novel by someone with an unpronounceable name—was in the second desk drawer, just as he'd told her it would be, and the shaving stuff was in the bathroom. She winced as she put his straight razor into the bag she'd brought with her; it was bad enough shaving her face—Ray's face—with the electric shaver. She'd always thought it was sort of romantically old-fashioned, shaving like that, but now that she had some face-shaving experience it just seemed scary.

She went to his closet to get his clothes, then hesitated, her hand on the knob. Back in her normal world, Ben had told her that his father lived there—well, not lived, exactly, considering that he was dead, but that when Ben opened the closet, sometimes it led to a cabin, and his father's ghost would be sitting at a desk there, as though he were in his own office. Taking a deep breath, she opened the door.

Nothing but a closet. Which, okay, was what she'd been expecting, because Ben had said that nobody else saw him. The weird thing was that despite what she'd said in the diner, that she'd believed Ben's story about seeing his dead father, she had really only kind of half-believed him. If anyone else had given her a story like that, she would have given him a ride straight to the mental hospital. But for all that Ben was unhinged in a lot of ways, he was dead earnest about what he believed, and yeah, part of it was that he was asking her to marry him at the time, so she was inclined to say yes to pretty much anything he said.

At first, in the back of her mind, maybe, she had thought that it was just an excuse, a way to ask her. But it had seemed like a dam breaking, like telling her about it had taken this huge weight off his shoulders, because after that, when she caught Ben having furious conversations with the lamppost or chair, he'd shrug and say, "Just Dad again." Maybe it was weird, but maybe there was something to it.

And then she'd ended up here in this other reality where she was a guy, and suddenly all the woo-woo stuff about seeing ghosts seemed a lot more normal. So after she pulled the jeans and flannel shirt from the hanger bar and some underwear from the shelf, she moved aside the folding cot (and Jesus, the poor guy had to sleep on that? Her Ben didn't know how lucky he was!) and peered behind the rest of the clothes. Nothing there but the back of the closet. Kind of disappointing, but also kind of a relief.

In the kitchen she found Dief's bowl and a big bag of dog food, and hesitated for a moment. If she took the whole bag, Ben might think she was being pushy, she decided, so instead she poked around the kitchen until she found some Tupperware, and scooped out a bunch of dog food to take back to the apartment. Enough for a few days. If Ben and Dief decided to stay, they could always buy more, right?

Turnbull was on the phone when she headed out, which saved her from making any more conversation with him, thank God, so she loaded Ben's stuff into the car and drove to the station to pick up Dief.

Of course it wasn't that easy, because as soon as she walked out onto the bullpen floor, Welsh cornered her and told her to get the damn paperwork done on DiMonte, and there were six messages on her desk, and by the time she was done with all of it she was hungry enough to eat Dief's dogfood. They'd missed lunch, going after DiMonte. She grabbed some calories out of the vending machine in the break room. Fraser was probably starving too, but hopefully he wouldn't let some weird sense of politeness keep him from raiding Ray's fridge.

Finally she went over to Frannie's desk. "What'd you do with Dief?"

Frannie looked up from what she was doing, which seemed to involve painting tiny flowers on her fingernails. "That woman you brought in, Hope? She was freaking out a little, talking to the State's Attorney people, and it kind of calmed her down to pet him, which makes sense, 'cause I read in this magazine that petting an animal's fur lowers your blood pressure. Hey, maybe we should get Lieutenant Welsh a cat to keep in his office, what do you think?"

"He doesn't even pet Dief," Rae told her. "So where is he?"

"In his office, as usual, and he's going to give himself a heart attack if he—"

"Dief, Frannie. Where's Dief?"

"I told you, he's with Ms. DiMonte." Frannie gave a theatrical, put-upon sigh, which made Rae want to throttle her. Obviously, having Frannie not hate her guts in this world wasn't the same as having Frannie actually being useful.

In her head, she carefully counted to three, then nodded. "Okay. And Ms. DiMonte is…?"

"Oh, she's in Interview Room Two," said Frannie, and went back to her fingernails.

Rae sighed. "Thank you, Frannie." Like it would have killed her to just say it in the first place.

At the door to room two she knocked once, then went in. Hope DiMonte was no longer teary-eyed, but there was a big pile of tissues on the table between her and—yep, that was Stella, all right. And there was Dief, his head resting on Hope's lap as she stroked his fur.

"Hey," she said.

"You don't have to talk to him if you don't want to," Stella told Hope gently, before swiveling her head to look at Rae. "We've got her statement already. She's going to testify in exchange for immunity. We'll be calling you and Constable Fraser for the preliminary hearings."

"Yeah, all right." A weird sort of tingling went through her body when Stella's eyes met hers, a jittery feeling that reminded her of the way she'd felt in that store, Moondust. Her dick gave one restless twitch in her jeans, and that was really weird. Maybe her body, Ray's body, was still in love, a little, with Stella.

Stella jerked her head back toward the door. "If you don't mind, we're busy here." Her voice was sharp and dismissive, her expression stony; maybe Ray was still in love with Stella, but it sure didn't look like she was still in love with him.

"I just came in to get the wolf."

"Wolf?" said Hope, snatching her hand away from Dief and shrinking back into her chair. "I thought he was, you know. One of those Alaskan huskies?"

"Canadian, actually," said Rae, and damn if Dief didn't move his head in what looked like a nod. "And he's half-wolf, and he's coming with me." Dief barked and looked toward Hope.

"He doesn't look too interested," said Stella.

"Come on, Dief." He didn't move. "Look, Fraser needs you," she finally added, feeling a little silly. Not that she didn't talk to Dief back home, almost as much as Fraser did. Sometimes she would swear it was almost like Dief understood, which was really freaky. But it would be too much to answer the barks and whines Dief let out in return, pretending like it was an actual conversation, which Fraser did all the time. It was bad enough talking to the wolf in front of Stella, whose amusement was obvious. Probably thought Ray had become unhinged.

But as soon as she mentioned Fraser, Dief rested his chin on Hope's thigh again and licked her hand once, then trotted over to Rae, with a look on his face that she had to admit somehow looked questioning. She bent to rub him between the ears. "All right, then," she said. Nodding toward Stella and Hope, she headed out, Dief at her heels.

She didn't hear the television when she opened the door, and for one moment she felt a surge of fear and anger: had Ben gotten up and walked back to the Consulate? That would have been just like him, and for some reason just the idea that he might have done that pissed her off. But Dief went straight to the couch, so maybe he was just asleep. She shut the door as quietly as she could, putting the bag with the things she'd gathered from the Consulate on the counter, then going over to see how he was.

He lay on his back, sleeping shirtless on the sofa, and Rae just had to stop and look at him. Just for a moment. Not like she hadn't seen it before, but it had been nearly a week, and she drank in the sight. His broad, smooth chest, the corded muscles of his arms. He'd neatly rebandaged his wound over his bare arm, and her eyes were drawn to the white gauze for a moment before she lifted them to look at his face.

Funny how she missed it, just being able to look at Ben in an unguarded moment like this. When he was relaxed—sleeping, or after sex—the lines on his face softened and dissolved into his skin, giving him a young, vulnerable look that went straight to her heart. Maybe one day she'd take it for granted, when they were old and had been married for years and years, but now it was still new and precious to her.

His eyes fluttered open. "Rae?"

She watched the change on his face, as he shifted from seeing Ray to remembering that she was Rae, and something tightened and twisted inside her. So easy to forget that this wasn't her Ben. "Damn, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to wake you. How're you feeling?"

"I'm fine." He rubbed his face. "Although I suppose I was more affected by the wound than I had thought. I didn't expect to fall asleep." At that, Dief gave a soft woof and nosed at the bandage on Ben's arm. "It looks a lot worse than it is," he told him.

"It's okay. I'll be quiet, you rest some more if you need to."

"No, I should get up."

"I don't see why." Rae crossed back to the counter and picked up the bag of clothes. "Here's the stuff you wanted."

Regretfully she watched Ben's chest disappear as he pulled on the flannel shirt she'd brought. He took the jeans from the bag, then hesitated. "I'll just change in the bathroom."

"Nah, go ahead and use the bedroom. More space."

While he was getting dressed, she started dinner. Nice to have him over again, kind of like normal. She still couldn't believe that for this Fraser, 'normal' was eating dinner in the Consulate's kitchen and sleeping in his office. What a weird way to live.

Actually, this whole business with parallel worlds, or alternate worlds, or whatever they were—that was what was really weird. You'd think that everything would be exactly the same except for the one change, that everything would be exactly like she was used to, except for her being a guy. But it was one thing leads to another, that guy Dewey coming in instead of her back after Gardino got killed, and so Ray and Fraser had just met when Garbo did her arson thing, so Ray didn't invite him to stay with him. And even if they had known each other, it would have been different, because by then Rae had been sleeping with Ben for over a month. Even if Ray'd been there in the 27^th by then—nah, she thought, her lips curving in a smile. Ray and Ben had known each other for over a year now, and they still weren't sleeping together.

And that was a damn shame. Because as Ben walked into the room, still soft and rumpled-looking from his nap on the couch, a wave of longing and desire flooded her, and she wanted nothing more than to grab him and take off the clothes he'd just put on. To slide her naked skin against his, to thread her hands in his thick hair and kiss the breath out of him. To remind them both that they were both still alive.

He could see it on her face, or maybe he felt that way too, because his face turned faintly pink as he placed his folded uniform in a neat pile on the couch. "Smells like spaghetti sauce," he said.

"Yeah, something easy for a work night. Boil water, open a jar, you know." The kind of thing they did all the time, because they never knew when one or the other of them were going to run late, or if both of them would be out running through an abandoned warehouse after drug smugglers. Or ducking a travel agent's wild shots.

While they ate, he asked about her afternoon, about the case against DiMonte and how Hope was holding up, and Rae answered mechanically, automatically. She couldn't take her eyes off the slight bulge under his sleeve where the bandage was, couldn't keep from thinking about the what-ifs. What if DiMonte's shot had really hurt him—what if it had killed him? Even knowing that her own Ben waited for her in her own world didn't keep the anger from wanting to spill out. There were too many ways things could have gone down badly.

The same hot fury she'd felt in DiMonte's office bubbled up in her again, that overwhelming urge to grab the bastard by the throat and slam him against the wall. Since he wasn't there, she took it out on her spaghetti instead, stabbing her fork into it with an angry jab.

Ben raised an eyebrow at her across the table, and she shook her head. "Just getting pissed off again at that asshole."

"I'm not hurt that badly."

"Yeah, I know." And it was true; hell, she'd seen him hurt far worse before. "But I can't stop thinking about it, and it makes me mad, I can't help it. Furious. I feel like a volcano or something, just wanting to, you know. Go boom," she said, gesturing with her fork. "It's weird. I wanted to throttle him. Kind of wish I had."

"Ah," said Ben. "You're not accustomed to the androgens."

"The what?"

"Androgens. Male hormones. The most well-known, of course, is testosterone."

"Oh, testosterone." She rolled her eyes. "Why didn't you just say that? But okay, it makes sense, I'm a male, I got male hormones."

"Of course, women produce it too, but in lesser amounts. It's what's responsible for the aggressive impulse."

"Huh," she said. "So what you're saying is that being in a man's body is like having permanent PMS?"

"Well, I wouldn't go quite that—hmm. I take that back. You may be right," he said, and he smiled at her, and damn if that smile didn't do all sorts of things to whatever hormones she had running around in there, guy hormones, girl hormones, it didn't matter.

She could feel the glow from that smile all through the rest of dinner, and while they did the dishes and put stuff away. Dief snuggled up against Ben's legs, making little snuffling noises, and she wanted to do the same. Just slide over next to him, push her head up against his hand the way Dief was doing, see if she could get him to stroke her like that.

"Yes, of course," Ben was saying, apparently in response to one of Dief's noises. He turned to her. "It's time for his evening constitutional." She frowned at him. "His walk."

"Oh, yeah. We can go for a walk."

He looked across the room, not into her eyes. "I could just walk back to the Consulate."

"You are not walking back to the Consulate," she said, jabbing two fingers toward his chest.

He looked down at her hand, still poised at his chest, and something changed in his face. His eyes met hers for a moment, then he nodded. "All right."

It was pleasant going out for a walk in the crisp air, the wind swirling leaves and crumpled bits of trash around their feet. Pretty soon the crispness would turn to a raw chill, the wet breeze off the lake making it seem even colder than it was, but for now it was just cold enough to make them walk quickly and stuff their hands in their pockets, lost in their own thoughts, while Dief sniffed at the lampposts and did his business.

Ben stopped again at the entrance to the building. "There's no need for me to put you out of your bed, Rae. I can easily go back—"

"No," she said fiercely. "You got shot, Ben. Do you know—no, of course you don't know, you tell me you and Ray ain't like that. You don't know what it's like to feel like your partner might have got hurt." She stomped up the stairs, then turned to make sure he and Dief were following. His face looked strange in the yellowish glare of the streetlights, the shadows all flattened and his color weird, but she could see that he was staring at her as though he'd never seen her before. "Well, come on."

When they were all back in the apartment, she threw her jacket onto a chair and slumped onto the back of the couch. "Look, I'm sorry about snapping at you just now. Must be the guy hormones fighting with the girl-instinct, I don't know. Sorry."

"It's all right."

"I'll get—you can take my bed, and I'll make up the couch." She slid to her feet and started toward the linen closet, but Ben put out a hand to stop her. "What?"

"I understand how you feel."

"Yeah, you told me. You think it's different 'cause we're married. Well, I don't think so."

"I know," said Ben, and there was something in his tone that made her look up at him. His cheeks were still reddened from their walk, making his eyes look impossibly blue in contrast. "Listening to you made me think about how I'd feel if you'd been shot."

"Don't worry. I'll take good care of Ray's body for you," she said, trying to keep the bitterness out of her voice.

"As though it were your own?" Ben's face was an unreadable mask, but she could hear the loss and pain behind his light words.

"No, wait, hang on," she said. "Jesus. I totally forgot to tell you, on account of how crazy everything was today. But I got the stuff from the ritual out of Evidence and took a look at it. There's got to be something there to give us a clue about who did this." She waved a hand vaguely in front of her body. "I want you to come out and do your Mountie detecting thing, 'cause I don't care what you say, I'm not ready to give up."

His eyes flashed and hardened. "I wasn't planning to give up."

"Oh, really? What was that line you told Turnbull to feed me—that shit about being unavailable? I had to drag you out of the damn Consulate."

"I just…" He shook his head, ran a thumb over his eyebrow. "I needed to back away. Get some perspective."

"Oh, so now you have perspective."

Ben exhaled, a sharp sound that seemed unaccountably loud in the small apartment. "No."

She folded her arms. Christ, Ben was acting weird all of a sudden. "Okay, what's that supposed to mean?"

At first, he didn't answer. Instead he walked over toward the window, looked down into the turtle tank and reached a hand down to stroke the turtle's shell. "It's an odd thing," he finally said. His eyes were fixed on the turtle, not on her. "When I discovered that you were not the Ray I knew, my reaction was much the same as when I returned from Canada to find Ray Vecchio gone. I was confused. Angry. I felt as though something had been taken from me."

"Yeah, well, something had." And from her as well, but she wasn't going to say anything. Ben looked heartbroken, he looked like she felt, and she didn't want to push him. What she really wanted to do was go over there and put her arms around him, but he'd probably freak out again. So instead she leaned against the back of the couch. "But he'll be back, 'cause I ain't staying here. I want to get home."

"I know."

"So we find who did it, get it undone, and no problem."

"But until we do, you're here." Finally he turned and looked toward her. His eyes were deep blue, the pupils huge. "I was worried DiMonte might shoot you."

"He was aiming at you."

"He was aiming at both of us. Not very accurately, though, and that was a good thing, because it occurred to me that if you were to be killed here, Ray might well be stuck in your body."

"Christ," she whispered, closing her eyes. She hadn't even thought about that. Not that she was planning on getting killed. But it made sense, in an unpleasant kind of way. And if Ray got killed in her body…. "Nobody's gonna get killed," she said. Hopefully.

"That's part of it. But I don't want you to be hurt, either."

"Yeah, don't want Ray coming home to damaged goods." She hadn't intended to sound so bitter, but she couldn't help it. Which was stupid. She had her own Ben, waiting for her at home. She didn't need this one. He was Ray's.

"It's not that. You're right, Rae. You're you, but you're also him. I can see that. The way you acted in DiMonte's office. It was just what Ray would have done."

His jaw was set, his expression so earnest that she had to look away. "Yeah, well," she said to the floor. "Neither of us wants you getting shot."

She looked up at him and saw him swallow, visibly, like he was steeling himself for a confrontation. Then he walked back across the room, right up to where she was sitting on the back of the couch, up close and personal. She could feel the heat pouring off his body. "And I don't want either of you getting shot."

He slid his arm along the back of the couch, around her waist, and she jumped back. "Whoa. Whoa, Ben. Fraser. A minute ago you were gonna walk halfway across town just to get away from me."

"Not quite that far," he said. "And it wasn't so much to get away from you as to get away from.…" Trailing off, he looked out the window, then over toward Dief, who was placidly curled up on the floor, then finally back at her. "To get away from what I wasn't willing to admit to myself that I wanted."

Oh, God, his eyes were so blue. And the way he was looking at her—looking at Ray—it didn't matter which of them he was looking at, if he was seeing his partner or the woman that his partner could have been, because she could see it in his eyes, the emotion, the love. Like her own Ben.

"Then how come you're willing to admit it now? Whatever 'it' is," she added. Pretending she didn't see his desire written in his face. She'd seen that look before, on her Ben, and seeing it now did queer things to her body. To Ray's body. Which might have been full of guy-hormones, but they were obviously gay-guy hormones, the way her blood seemed to run hotter in her veins from that searing look.

"Because you're right," Ben said. He reached out, touching her cheek, running his fingertips down to her chin. Stubbly and angular, but he didn't seem to mind, and it felt so good, so damn good, just his fingertips, and she leaned into the touch instinctively. Knowing she shouldn't, but unable to keep herself from doing it. "It's hard seeing someone you love get hurt. It's frightening, isn't it? Imagining what could have happened. A centimeter or two to the side, the bullet might have shattered my arm." His voice sounded oddly detached and distant as his fingers left her jaw, touched his sleeve over the bandage. "Nine or ten centimeters, perhaps it would have killed me."

"Ben, don't."

"Before we even had the chance. Before I could tell him—"

"It's okay, don't worry," she said, interrupting him before he could finish, because the expression on his face was making her uneasy, and the way he was touching her—God, it wasn't fair, it was exactly what she wanted, but it was wrong, it was all wrong, the weird look on his face, the way he sounded. "Look, we've made it this far, we're not going to get ourselves killed. We'll figure this thing out, find who did it, and get us switched back the way we're supposed to be. You'll get your chance."

She stepped away from him, and it was almost painful to do, but she knew it had been the right move when his face cleared. It was like seeing shutters snap down, seeing the hearty Mountie-mask again, but it was better to look at Fraser than it was to look at a lost and unhappy Ben. "Yes, of course. I'll come to the station with you tomorrow and look at the evidence. There's bound to be something we can use as a starting point."

"Sounds like a plan," she said, and headed to the linen closet to get sheets for the couch. "See you in the morning."

Rae had originally figured they'd just head in to the 27^th in the morning, get things going right away, but Fraser had pointed out that his uniform was an unwearable mess, so she dropped him off at the Consulate. At first she was going to walk in with him and wait, so she could drive him and he wouldn't have to walk or take the bus or whatever he did when Ray didn't drive him, but the thought hit her that she might run into Turnbull, or, God forbid, Thatcher. That would mean a lot of questions she really didn't want to answer, so she pulled up to the curb and watched him walk into the building, then drove to the station.

There were still a few forms to fill out and calls to make on the Goldman thing, and she did it all with half her attention on her work, half on the clock, and half on the hallway, where Fraser was not appearing like he ought to have been. Damn it, she thought. If he'd gotten cold feet again, she didn't know what she was going to do. Storm Canada, maybe.

She couldn't help thinking about how he'd looked last night. Hell, it was about the only thing she'd been able to think of all night and all morning, that naked yearning, and what a damn fool she'd been to pretend she didn't see it, to cheerily send him to the bedroom alone. It would have been a mistake, yeah, she knew that, but the thought of what it would have been like kept running through her head, keeping her awake as she moved restlessly on the couch. It had been big enough for her to sleep on when she'd been a woman and a couple of inches shorter, but it didn't do so good in her current situation. At least, that's what she had told herself as she tried to find a comfortable position at two in the morning. It wasn't the images of the thick emotion in Ben's eyes, the way he'd slid a hand along her jaw. It wasn't the thought of what it would have been like to take his cock into the larger mouth that was now hers, or—and she had to suppress a groan, thinking about it—the thought of Ben, bending to her own cock, licking along its length, taking it in. It was the goddamn couch.

She stretched, cracked her neck, looked toward the hallway again where Fraser still wasn't, then went back to concentrating on signing Ray's name (Vecchio, Vecchio, she reminded herself). As soon as the last report was done and filed, she ran down to Evidence to check out the altar stuff; when she got back to her desk, thank God, there was Fraser. "Okay, see, this is what we got," she said without breaking stride, and dumped the bag out on the desk, all the little bags that each contained one bit of whatever Forensics had deemed important. She scooped up one and handed it to him. "There's this powder, I figured you could ID it."

Their fingers touched as he took the packet, and she nearly gasped with it, feeling his skin, his nearness. He opened the bag and took a cautious sniff, then a deeper one. Made a hmm sort of noise. Then he licked his finger, and that went straight to her lizard brain like a jolt of caffeine. Don't think about him licking your cock, she told herself, but it was already too late; the body part in question was twitching like it thought it was going to get some action. She hid it by sliding into her chair. "What do you think—Christ, Fraser, don't eat it."

His finger paused at the opening of the bag. "I'm pretty sure it's incense."

"Huh. Oh, I get it, like in the shop the other day, right. What's it for, do you think?"

"Your guess is as good as mine."

"What, they don't teach that in Mountie school?" She grinned to show no big deal, and Fraser shrugged and smiled a little, too, but inside was this little voice saying this is not good, this is not good, over and over. Hell, he'd figured out so many other things just by licking or smelling or touching the evidence; in some way, she guessed she'd been counting on him to do it again. "So is it the exact same incense? I mean, do you think it came from the shop? Like the candles?"

"Maybe. Certainly the same type they sell, but not the same as was burning during our visit."

"I'm still thinking subpoena. See, we got an initial." She pushed the bag with the ring toward him.

He put down the incense and picked up the ring. "A single initial's not much to go on, Rae. Now, if it were an uncommon letter such as X or even Z, the situation would be different."

"Yeah, but what else do we got to go on? We got nothing, that's what. Melted candles, burnt-up stinky stuff, a feather that may or may not have come from my dreamcatcher—"

"Oh, I'm nearly certain this feather did indeed come from your dreamcatcher," said Fraser, putting down the ring and taking the bagged feather in his hands. "Of course it's possible that it's merely from a similar-looking eagle, but it looks distinctly familiar—"

"Oh, yeah, Frase, you remember exactly what it looked like," she muttered, but at the wounded look on his face, she shut up. Of course he'd remember exactly what it looked like. This was Fraser. "So, it's from my dreamcatcher. And that helps us how?"

"Not much, I'm afraid."

"Exactly. Not much. So we gotta find this C person."

"Right. So, let's get started."

"Right."

They stared at each other for a few seconds. Finally Rae said, "I was hoping you had an idea."

"Ah. Well." Fraser gave every indication of thinking seriously about the problem. After a moment he said, "Perhaps someone you—that is, someone Ray encountered in the course of his work, someone who holds a grudge."

"A woman we sent up who got paroled, maybe?"

"Why limit your search to women?"

"That ring wouldn't fit any guy over the age of twelve, Frase."

"True. But it has the look of an heirloom. It might belong to the perpetrator's mother or grandmother."

"Yeah, right. Or his sister or his girlfriend, and that means his name might not begin with C, and hell, let's just check everybody in the entire city of Chicago, what do you think of that?"

Fraser pursed his lips; he had that "Rae, you're being silly" look on his face, and she waved her hand to cut off whatever he was going to say. "I know. Needle, haystack, right? It's just—this just doesn't seem like something a man would do, okay? So we get through the women first, then we can figure out what we're going to do next. Let's check the files." She started toward the cabinet, but Fraser jerked his thumb toward the computer. "Oh. Yeah, that's probably quicker, huh?"

It seemed to her it took Fraser longer than it usually did to cross-index whatever it was that added up to "female criminals who might be pissed off at Ray whose names begin with C." He kept glancing up at her like he wanted to say something, and his fingers seemed oddly clumsy, like they were tripping over each other and hitting the wrong keys, something Fraser had never had difficulty with before. Maybe he was still thinking about last night, too.

Or maybe he was thinking about Ray, his Ray, trapped in her body, because when he'd finally gotten the computer to spit out a list and print it out, he stared at it for a long moment before letting her take it from him. Then he looked at her, with a weird sort of intensity. "We'll get you back."

"Yeah," she said. Of course they would.

But of course it wasn't as easy as that, it never was, and even though after crossing out all the people who were in jail or dead they only had a handful of names, Rae had a bad feeling about the whole thing. Yeah, she wouldn't put it past any of them to slash the Goat's tires, but this woo-woo stuff with incense and candles was something else. It just didn't fit.

Still, it was the only lead they had. Over the next few days, when Thatcher didn't have Fraser writing official Canadian thank-you notes or running to pick up her dry cleaning, and when she herself wasn't dealing with the cases that Welsh slapped down on her desk, they looked for C.

It was depressing, was what it was. The door would open a few inches, and she'd shove Vecchio's badge into the crack, and the bimbo on the other side—or worse, her big, tough boyfriend—would glare at her and Fraser, pure loathing oozing from every inch. "I ain't done nothing, Officer—"

"Detective," she'd growl.

"—and you ain't coming in without a warrant." And once there'd been a click, just a faint one that she barely heard, but out of the corner of her eye she saw Fraser's jaw move a fraction and she knew, she knew that a gun had been cocked in there and was pointed at her heart, and don't do anything stupid, Kowalski, she told herself.

But none of the scumbags they talked to had any clue about the woo-woo. It was obvious even with the cautious way Rae danced around the edges of what she wanted to know (because she was damned if she was going to come right out and ask a tough cookie like Darla Carter if she'd been lighting incense and chanting spells), and it was the only lead they had, maybe, but eventually they had to admit they had nothing.

They finished the list on Friday evening, after three days of dead ends and aggravation. Rae was about ready to punch something. Or someone. Maybe even Fraser, who seemed like he was always either avoiding looking at her, or staring at her, and it was just on the edge of pissing her off.

They were at the diner, drowning their sorrow in quarter-pound patties with enough grease to sink a battleship. Despite the NO DOGS sign, the waitress had given Fraser a wink and Dief a smile; fuzzy dogs got them every time, thought Rae. That and the uniform. Tonight it was all the fuzzy dog's doing, as Fraser was in ordinary clothes. Although he might as well have been naked, the way the waitress was all sweetness and light every time she talked to him.

It didn't hurt that Dief was as well behaved as could be—at least until he was under the table at their feet. "I've told you many times that Diefenbaker does not need your handouts," said Fraser as he looked out the window.

"I'm not giving him handouts." Surreptitiously Rae snatched her hand back from under the table. "It's not like hamburger is bad for him, anyway, he's a wolf. It's just like pre-ground-up caribou or something. And besides, I've got to distract him so he doesn't take a bite out of my leg."

"He's just being friendly."

"Yeah, like he's friendly with doughnuts and everything else he wants to put in his mouth."

Unaccountably, Fraser blushed at that, and that was it, that was the last straw. "For Christ's sake, Frase, what the hell is wrong with you tonight?"

Fraser studied the saltshaker. "I'm just—it's just that I'm aware of who you are."

"And who I'm not, right? That's what you mean. I'm not Ray, yeah, I know that, I'm trying to get back to my own universe, okay?" Suddenly the burger was sawdust in her mouth; deliberately, slowly she placed what was left on the plate and pushed away from the table. Digging into her pocket, she got her wallet and threw enough bills on the table to cover their tab. "You want a ride back, or you walking?"

She didn't look back as she headed for the door.

"Rae, it's not like that." Fraser caught up with her just as she stepped out into the chilly evening air. Dief barked in agreement, and she whirled.

"It's not like that, okay, tell me what it's like, then. You've been weird around me ever since I got here, and yeah, I get that, I'm not the partner you're used to, but you don't have to treat me like I—like I got Ebola or something."

"Ebola?"

"You know. Like I'm diseased. Like you don't want to get too close, 'cause that would mean you're being disloyal. Or whatever."

"Do you really think that's why I'm trying to maintain my distance?" Fraser's voice was strained and thin; she looked sharply at him, and then she knew.

"Fuck," she muttered. "Get in the car."

"I really don't think—"

"Get in the car. Or don't get in the car. You gotta make a choice here, Ben."

Maybe it was the "Ben"—it just kind of slipped out, because it wasn't Fraser she was pissed off at, really, it was Ben, not the Mountie but the man. Or maybe it was the raw yearning she could hear in her own words. Whatever it was, he blinked twice and then ducked into the car, Dief jumping in afterward. She slammed the door and hurried around to the driver's seat, sliding in and starting up the car before he could change his mind.

They didn't talk. She looked straight ahead, trying to concentrate on driving and not on Ben, wire-taut in the passenger seat, and she sensed rather than saw the moment when he figured out they were going to Ray's apartment. When she turned off the engine, she turned to him, braced for a fight.

In the yellow light of the parking garage Ben's face was all planes and shadows. Then he looked over at her. His eyes were huge dark pools; she could fall in and never hit bottom, she thought, just drown like in Lake Michigan, if he didn't save her again.

"Rae," he said hoarsely, or maybe it was "Ray" but she didn't care, it didn't matter. She slid toward him, and he reached for her like he was grabbing onto a lifeline, like he was the one drowning and she was the only thing that could save him, and he was holding her and she was holding him and God, finally, kissing him, and he was kissing back.

It was Ben's familiar mouth on hers, and the way he smelled, Ivory soap and leather oil, comfortable and exciting at the same time. But the unfamiliar shape of her own mouth, of Ray's larger mouth, tilted the feeling just a little off-center, like she was kissing him for the first time, and that was a turn-on in another way. And knowing that it was the first time for him, that he and Ray had never done this—it was incredible, her dick was ramrod-stiff and she'd bet Ben's was, too, and if they kept kissing like this they'd never make it to the apartment.

A low yip of warning from the back seat brought them to their senses; another car was driving in, and they sprang away from each other. As it drove by Rae stared at the wall and listened to her heartbeat, which seemed unbelievably loud and fast and frantic. "Upstairs," she muttered when they were alone again, and it was never so far to her apartment as it was that evening, with Ben right there, right there, wanting her.

Somehow they got upstairs and through the door. As soon as it closed behind them, Ben was in her space, kissing her again, his body pushing her into the wall. With a wordless noise she pressed back against him, wrapping her arms around his body and feeling his slide around her, pulling her close. Christ, she'd missed this. She'd been starving for his touch, for his mouth, for the way his hands gripped her waist.

His chest was the same but different without her breasts between them, and their heights were subtly off, like when she wore shoes and he was barefoot. But he smelled the same and tasted the same, and under her too-large hands he felt the same. Ben, her Ben, no matter what crazy universe they were in.

His lips trailed across her jaw, down to her neck, and she murmured, "Yeah, that's good, that—oh, yeah." He was hard, she could feel it against her hip, and the swelling in her own jeans was starting to get really uncomfortable. As he ground against her she had a moment's panic that he'd back away like he did before, because it would be unbearable to get just a taste and then have to stop; but instead he gasped and buried his face at the junction of her neck and shoulder, whispering something against her skin.

When he finally lifted his lips from her collarbone she slipped her jacket off and let it fall to the floor. "Getting a little warm in here."

Ben just smiled. "Come on, you too," she said, and pushed his jacket off as well. He bent to pick it up and draped it neatly across the back of the couch, then began unbuttoning his flannel shirt in his usual efficient way. That was folded and set on the jacket; then he pulled his undershirt over his head, revealing an ugly scab surrounded by reddened, healing skin, the spot where DiMonte's bullet had creased his arm. "Healing up, huh."

"At the moment I don't even notice it," he said, his voice husky as he reached for her again. She let one of her hands slide between them, nothing between her fingertips and his warm, soft skin.

She stepped back to pull her own shirt off so they could have skin on skin, and yeah, that was definitely weird without the breasts. Funny to look between them and not see her nipples standing up. She shimmied her chest against Ben's, reaching an arm around his neck and burying her fingers in the thick hair at the back of his head to pull him in for another kiss; this time she took his mouth boldly, a deep, wet kiss that left him looking soft-face and dazed.

She grinned at his debauched look. "Want to get naked and horizontal?"

"Rae!" he said, blushing, and right, this was his first time, even though for her it was old married sex, no need to be coy, just jump in the sack. Time enough for foreplay after they'd gotten undressed. Hell, now that she knew just how uncomfortable it was to get a hard-on trapped under stiff blue jeans, she was amazed Ben didn't strip off the rest of his clothes right there in the living room.

She palmed the crotch of his trousers; there was something about feeling him through his clothes that she had always liked, the way it felt almost dirtier than touching his naked dick. He groaned and tried to kiss her again, but she stepped away.

"Come on, it's more comfortable in a bed. We can make out in there just as well as in here, and we won't have Dief watching us." She walked toward the bedroom, tugging at his hand.

"Dief isn't watching," said Ben, but he followed, and as soon as they'd stepped inside he closed the door and drew her close for another deep kiss.

It was crazy how hot just kissing was getting her. Not that fooling around with Ben didn't turn her on in her own body—God, he'd kiss her a few times, curve his big hand around a breast, and she'd feel the wetness in her panties, the slick feel of her body wanting him—but doing it in a guy's body, wow. It was like someone was whispering in her ear, a constant stream of sex now sex now sex now that made her skin itch with wanting.

"Naked and horizontal," she reminded him. With effort, she stepped away from those amazing kisses, sitting on the edge of the bed so she could get the rest of her clothes off, and Christ, how did men stand it, all folded up under their pants? She sighed with relief as the damn things came off, then looked up at Ben, who was still half-clothed, still standing. Staring at her—no, at Ray's body.

"Ben?" she said softly. "You still okay with this?" For one horrible moment she was afraid he'd say no, that he was going to button up and back out of the room. But she could see it in his face, in the way he stood there staring; he was looking at her like Ray's body was the most beautiful and precious thing in the world, like maybe he'd been holding back not because he didn't want Ray or he didn't want her, but because he wanted them so much that everything else faded away next to that desire.

Ben stripped slowly, deliberately, never taking his eyes from her. Nothing she hadn't seen hundreds of times, sure, but the sight still got her hot: his broad chest, his narrow hips, the way his cock jutted out, thick and dark. And the scorching intensity in his eyes was something else. Like they'd been when they first made love back in her own, real world, when she'd finally battered through all the defenses that Victoria had made him build, when he'd finally admitted to himself that he could love her, that he did love her.

The last of Ben's clothes fell to the floor. In one quick move he was over her, and that was it, skin to skin all the way down, better than incredible. "More than okay," he whispered in her ear.

"Yeah, I'll say." She tilted her neck, and Ben kissed it, his hot mouth igniting crazy trails of sensation down her skin, everything converging on her dick. Forget foreplay, she thought. All she wanted was friction, now. Ben's solid thigh was great but it wasn't enough, and she ground shamelessly into it. Her hand snaked down between them to touch him, and he gasped.

"My God—Rae—"

"It's okay, right, you said it was okay," she said, unable to stop stroking him, Christ, it felt so good, finally, having him there.

"God, yes." His eyes fluttered shut for a moment. "I'm just not—it's not what I—I'm sorry, Rae, I don't know what I'm doing," he said, looking at her helplessly.

She grinned. "That's all right. I know what you like." A firm grip around his cock with one hand, the other rubbing behind his balls. Deep kisses, lots of tongue. And okay, he liked to sink into her, to slide inside her, but that wasn't going to happen.

Or maybe it was, she thought, with a sudden shiver. Guys did it up the ass, right? There was supposed to be something up there, made it feel good, although the two times she'd done it that way with a guy—not Ben—it was just kind of weird. But men were different, with the thing, supposed to be like a G-spot, and hell, no other way to find out. "Come on, touch me," she murmured.

Ben's fingers whispered down her sides, feather-light touches that had her writhing against him, God, please, anything, and then his hands were right there, and Jesus Christ, that was better than her own hands by fifty miles, it was fantastic. She thrust into his hands, desperate, crazy for it.

His lips were moving against her neck. "What do you want me to do? What do you like?"

"Hell," she gasped, "I have no idea. That's, oh. Yeah, good—oh—there's some lube in the drawer, why don't you—"

Ben's hands stilled. "I'm not sure we should do that at this point," he said almost primly.

"Oh, Christ, Ben. I just mean, your hands, to get your hands, you know."

His eyes blazed with sudden heat. "Ah. Well. I could—" and then he licked his palm and brought it down between their bodies.

Her back arched involuntarily. So good, so amazing, incredible, nothing could possibly improve on this, forget doing it in the ass, this was all she wanted. She tried to think back, what it had been like in her own body, and maybe if Ben hadn't been stroking her cock with his wet, hot hand, maybe she could have remembered. But all she could think about was the sensation, all she could feel was his hand, his skin, his eyes steady on hers, his lips whispering encouragement as she thrust, thrust, and lost herself in pleasure, pulsing into that tight grip, into Ben's hands, his amazing, wonderful hands.

When she opened her eyes again Ben had an ecstatic look, like he was the one who'd just come all over the two of them. She looked down between their bodies; no, he was still hard, that was good. "Hang on. Let me clean up a little, okay. Then I'll get you messy again." She rolled over and grabbed a bunch of the tissues on the nightstand.

Ben kept looking at her as she dabbed the tissues at his hands and thighs. "That was all right?" he finally said.

"Are you kidding? That was amazing." She wadded up the tissues and aimed them at the trash basket. "Of course, you're lucky I'm a guy. In my own body I don't let you quit at just one."

A weird expression crossed Ben's face, and Rae wanted to kick herself for having brought it up, that she wasn't Ray. Quickly she reached for him, rolled against him. Ray's body next to his, Ray's face next to his. "I'm sorry, okay, I didn't mean to say that."

Ben exhaled, and it seemed as though a bit of the tension in his body went out with his breath. "It's all right, Rae. But I want you to know. It's not just Ray—I mean, the Ray I'm accustomed to, that is—I'm not saying this very well, am I."

"Ben," she said. She ran a hand down his side, let her fingers splay out across his hip. "You still up for this? 'Cause I'd really like to make you feel good."

He tilted his head forward so their lips were touching, and she figured that was her answer, right there. A deep, dirty kiss, and his cock was pressing against her thigh, and that was all the go-ahead she needed.

She slid down his body, her mouth on his skin, and he moaned. Oops, she thought, Ray's stubble probably feels like sandpaper, and she lifted her head a little, but Ben's fingers caught in the spikes of her hair, pushing her gently back down, and okay, maybe he liked that rough-raw feeling as much as she did. Or maybe he knew where her mouth was heading.

Ben's cock slid into her mouth as sweet and easy as his tongue had earlier. This she knew how to do; she knew what he liked, and she liked doing it to him. Her lips, her mouth, her hands, sucking and stroking, reveling in the taste of him, the way his skin felt under her touch.

Under her, he shifted so his legs fell open; her Ben did that too, sometimes, when she went down on him like this, and she had never really thought anything about it. Until now. Because she'd been thinking about guys doing it up the ass, and his legs were just open, like he wanted—maybe he wanted her to—

She licked at her fingers, slid them down under his balls, hesitated. Maybe she was thinking too much. But then he made another noise, and shifted so that her fingers slid closer, closer, and she thought, what the hell, and slid a finger in.

Oh, yeah, that had been the right thing to do. Because Ben was moving, on her hand, in her mouth, and his breathing was getting rough and ragged and yeah, he liked it. Maybe she should try that on her Ben, when she got back. Maybe she should get this Ben to do it to her now, while she was a guy, because the way Ben was getting more frantic, his hand scrabbling across the back of her neck, his hips thrusting, he was right on the edge, he was gonna lose it, and she made an encouraging mmm noise as she pulled him deeper, pushed in deeper, and that was it, he was gone.

Rae slid up next to him as he lay there catching his breath, not exactly snuggling but making sure that some part of her stayed in contact with his warm, solid body. God, she'd missed this. Not just the sex, but having Ben there, the familiar sound of his breathing, the pulse of his heartbeat that she could feel through his side. She'd thought she'd gotten used to sleeping alone again over the past week, but now that he was here the thought of him leaving—going back to the Consulate, for Christ's sake, to sleep in his office—the thought was unbearable.

Suddenly Ben shifted against her, and her eyes opened. She didn't remember closing them. The dusk outside had turned to full dark. "Must have fallen asleep."

He gave her a lazy grin that made her heart leap. "Careful. You're picking up a lot of bad male habits."

"Hey, I fall asleep after sex when I'm just me." Well, sometimes she did, and anyway, Rae wasn't surprised by it. It was like she'd been missing something important, one key ingredient, and she felt more relaxed now than she had in days, than she had ever since she'd found herself in Ray's body.

And Ben…she'd been a little worried he'd regret it once they actually did it, that he'd panic, freak out, but he was stretched out on her bed, calm and quiet, looking at her with such affection that she couldn't help but smile back. She remembered he'd been like that the first time in her normal world, their other first time: the crazy battle to get him to say yes, and then everything was all right.

He'd made up his mind, she could see it. It was like there was a switch in him, like he could only love utterly or not at all; that was why he had tried to join Victoria, even though he knew she was bad-wrong-evil. Back in her world she'd finally convinced him to love her. And here she'd done it again, gotten him to say yes to her and to Ray both.

It had been a crappy week of tracking down crappy leads, and they were no closer to getting her back to her own body than they were when they'd started. Too depressing to think about not getting back at all, so she hadn't. Every time those kinds of thoughts poked their heads out, she'd whack them with a mental sledgehammer, shove them into their box at the back of her mind where she didn't have to look at them.

But now, lying there in bed with Ben, she thought—well, it wouldn't exactly be great, being stuck here as a guy. It still made her twitch when she looked in the mirror and saw somebody else's face; she wanted her own life and her own body, her own goddamn name. But if she couldn't, if she was stuck here forever, at least she'd have Ben again, and that would make it bearable.

Next to her, he stirred. "Diefenbaker's probably anxious for a walk."

"All right." Rae got up and started for the bathroom. "Maybe we should pick him up some food." She turned and looked at Ben, daring him to say he wanted to go back to the Consulate, but he just nodded. She took her time in the shower, half hoping he'd join her, but he waited until she'd emerged before stepping in himself, and showered so quickly that she was still doing up her fly when he came out into the bedroom.

They stepped out into the living room to get the rest of their clothes. Behind her, Rae could hear Ben telling Dief that no, it was none of his business, and she grinned. They recovered their shirts and jackets, finished getting dressed, and then headed out into the hallway.

Suddenly Ben frowned, sniffing the air. "Hmm."

"What, hmm?"

Instead of answering, he sniffed the air again and began walking down the hall as though he were following a trail.

"Ben, what is it?"

He passed three apartments, then came to a stop in front of the fourth door. Carol Lembo's door. "Incense. It's the same fragrance that was in the evidence bag."

"Holy shit." She moved past him quickly and banged on the door. There was the sound of a security chain being moved aside; the door opened a fraction and there stood Carol in sweatpants and a black t-shirt.

"Oh, it's you, Ray. Hang on a sec." She pulled the door closed just enough to slip off the chain, then opened it fully, glancing past Ray at Ben and Dief before turning back to her. "What's up?"

"So it was you," Rae snarled. She could smell the incense now, like spice and flowers, the scent filling the air. She fought back the impulse to wrap her fingers around Carol's neck. "You did it, didn't you."

"Did what?"

Fraser tapped Rae on the shoulder and tilted his head, telling her to move aside. Stepping toward the door, he ducked his head, like he was tipping the hat he wasn't wearing. "Good evening, ma'am. I'm sorry to disturb you, but I believe my friend here would like you to return his dreamcatcher."

Carol frowned. "Well. Sorry, Ray." She shifted nervously from one foot to the other. "I mean, I know I said I only needed to borrow it for a week, but I haven't quite finished my project, so if it's okay—"

"You haven't finished, right. You got run off before you could finish. We found the stuff," said Rae, pushing past Fraser into the entryway of the apartment. "Candles, flowers, blood, a woman's ring." She counted them off on her fingers. "And a feather from my dreamcatcher."

"We found the remnants of a Wiccan ritual," interposed Fraser. "I take it that was you?"

Carol stared at them both, astonishment written on her face. Finally she sighed. "Yes, that was me. Sorry, Ray, I told you it was a photography project because I know how that sounds—chanting and lighting candles and stuff, sounds sort of silly, right?" She gave them an apologetic half-smile, but Rae just crossed her arms and stared at Carol until she looked down, embarrassed. "Anyway, I was planning to re-attach the feather before I returned it to you. But the groundskeeper came while I was starting to clean up, and I didn't want to get caught, so I ran off in a hurry and, well. I'm sorry. I've been looking for a replacement, but nothing I can find looks right. Did you know that in order to get eagle feathers you have to write to this place in Colorado? They said four to six weeks, can you believe it?"

"It can be as many as four months," said Fraser, and Rae rolled her eyes. Trust him to focus on the damn feathers.

Carol nodded. "That's why I borrowed yours—when you told me they were eagle feathers, I couldn't believe my luck." Then she brightened. "Wait. If you found it, then you can put it back on, right?"

"Putting the feather on is not the point here!" Rae jabbed two fingers toward her and was pleased to see her recoil slightly. "The point here is this wacko ritual, which I don't know what you got against Ray, but you are going to undo it, pronto."

Bad move. "Don't order me around," Carol snapped, her eyes narrowing. "That is so fucking typical, thinking you can order me around just because you're a man and I'm a woman."

Dief barked, probably set off by her tone, and Fraser took him back out into the hallway, apparently explaining something. "Look," said Carol. "It was just a crazy idea. It's not like I really believe in all that magic stuff, but I thought it might…" She finished the sentence with a shrug. "Anyway, it didn't work."

"Oh yes, it did. Maybe it didn't work the way you were expecting it to, but it worked, all right."

"It did not work. I'm still—well, never mind."

"You're still what?" demanded Rae.

"She's still female," said Fraser suddenly, returning to the doorway, Dief at his heels. "That's what she was doing. I believe she was trying to change herself into a man."

"Holy shit," breathed Rae. It was all coming together in her head now. But if the woman had been trying to change herself, why had it been Rae who had changed?

Carol darted a suspicious glance in Fraser's direction. "You know the Goddess rites?"

"I've done a fair bit of research."

She raised an eyebrow, then looked over to Rae. "Who's your friend with the dog?"

"He's my partner. Constable Benton Fraser, Royal Canadian Mounted Police, came to Chicago, blah blah blah. And you're Carol Lembo, and you're going to undo whatever the fuck it was you did to me."

"What I did to you?" Shaking her head, she looked Rae up and down. Her gaze rested pointedly on Rae's crotch for a moment before flicking back up to her eyes. "I don't get it. I mean, you are a man. I don't know what your problem is, but I don't see how it has anything to do with me."

"Ray is a man. But I'm not Ray. I'm Rae-short-for-Rachael, or at least I was until I woke up in this body a week ago Thursday, and I have no fucking clue who you are other than you're the person who got me into this mess."

"Is this some kind of a joke? You were just over here on Sunday, watching the game."

"Yeah, and if I'd known you were the one who did this to me, I would have killed you then," Rae said, the anger bubbling up inside. Fraser put a hand on her arm warningly, and, okay, this was the person who could fix things, better not kill her. "I'm not Ray, okay? It's my brain stuck inside his body."

"Apparently Rae, here, is the feminine analogue of our friend Ray," Fraser said smoothly. "In her world, she, too, is a detective at the 27^th Precinct, and she is my partner. And she has always been a woman."

Thank Christ for Fraser, thought Rae. Always so calm and reasonable, which was a good thing that somebody was. Considering that all she wanted to do was grab Carol by the shoulders and shake her hard.

Carol's eyes widened, and Rae could practically see the wheels turning in her head as she made one connection after another after another. "So it did work. Wow. But it didn't change the body, it just—wow."

"Exchanged the body, as it were. Or rather, the personality inside it," said Fraser.

"The feather must have had a strong enough resonance to override the energy focus," she murmured, nodding slowly. She reached behind Fraser and pulled the door shut. "I guess we need to talk."

She led them into the living room, to the couch where Rae had sat with her to watch the football game. The smell of incense was stronger there; Rae turned her head to see a gray curl of smoke rising from the ashtray on the kitchen pass-through. Dief sniffed at it once, then trotted disdainfully away to curl up as far from the incense as he could.

Carol sat in an armchair to Rae's right, then leaned forward, studying Rae curiously. "So you're from an alternate plane, huh?"

"I'm from Chicago. All I know about planes is that they leave from O'Hare."

"Plane of existence, I mean. An alternate universe."

"Hey, as far as I'm concerned, this is the alternate one," Rae pointed out.

Carol smiled at that. "Yeah, makes sense. So in your universe, am I a man or a woman? I mean, the analogue of me?"

"I wouldn't know. I haven't lived in this building for over a year. Not since me and—well, I moved out," Rae finished, with a quick glance at Fraser. Better not make things any more complicated than they were, she decided.

"Huh. I just moved in three months ago. You helped me get the couch in—I mean, Ray did." She shook her head. "This is kind of weird."

"You think you've got it weird, you should try it from this side."

"That's exactly what I was trying to do."

Rae frowned. "How's that?"

"It's what he said. I was trying to change myself into a man."

Holy fuck. "So this was what, an accident?" demanded Rae. Carol nodded. "Jesus, don't they teach you how to aim your spells so you don't hit any innocent civilians?"

"I imagine it's quite a bit different from shooting a gun," said Fraser. "Remember what the proprietor of the magic store told us about representing me simply by the color of my uniform."

"Right, right, she's probably got Turnbull crazy in love with her by now," said Rae. She turned back to Carol. "So okay, any particular reason you wanted to mumbo-jumbo yourself into a man? Or you just decided, hey, wonder what it's like having a dick?"

"Look, I put a lot of thought into it, okay? I've always felt like there's something off with my body, like I wasn't supposed to be female. I didn't just wake up one day and decide that I wanted to be a guy."

"Goody for you. But I didn't even get to make that decision. You made it for me."

"Yeah, I'm sorry about that. I swear I wasn't even really expecting it to work—let alone work on someone else like that." Carol ran a hand through her short hair, then cocked her head and looked appraisingly at Rae. "But it's kind of cool that it did, isn't it?"

Rae stared at her. "Are you nuts?"

"It's hard enough being taken seriously as a reporter. Let alone a girl reporter," she said, making quote-fingers in the air.

Fraser frowned. "I've found the female members of the press to be just as serious as their male counterparts."

"Yeah, but you're Canadian. Nobody takes the press seriously around here."

Carol nodded. "If I'm lucky enough to even get a decent assignment, half the time the guy I'm interviewing spends the whole time staring at my rack instead of answering my questions." She sighed. "Not to mention there's the whole menstrual thing."

"Kind of a radical fix for cramps."

"I bet you get taken more seriously as a cop."

"Okay, maybe I do. Maybe I don't have to deal with the perps and their sleazy lawyers trying to put the make on me now, but so what? The point is," said Rae, stabbing her fingers in Carol's direction, "I am not supposed to be a man. I have my own life, and my own body, and I want it back, now."

"Not to mention that Ray—that is, the Ray who ordinarily inhabits that body—doubtless would like his own life back as well."

Rae shot a glance at Fraser. She couldn't argue with what he said, but still. Some part of her was a little pissed off; she'd just had sex with the guy, and already he wanted her gone? But he wasn't even looking at her. He was looking at the floor, actually, and his face was going just the tiniest bit pink, and maybe he was feeling as weird about this whole thing as she was.

She turned back to Carol. "Okay, it sucks being a woman sometimes. Pisses me off when another detective tries to send me out for coffee thinking I'm a secretary or something. Or when someone checks me out when I'm trying to get some work done. But I'd rather fight back as a woman than give up—'cause that's what you're doing, by wanting to be a man. It's giving up."

"You don't get it. I'm supposed to be a man. I know it. This body I have is wrong. It's not who I was supposed to be."

"Then go find a surgeon," Rae snapped.

"I've been thinking about it. Honestly. And that's really serious—I mean, no turning back kind of serious. So when I found this book of spells down at Booklegger's, I thought, hell, might as well try it, just for fun, right? I mean, I didn't really expect it to work!"

"Oh, it worked, all right," said Rae grimly. "Ought to be illegal."

"But if it had worked on me, like it was supposed to—"

"Uh-uh. If you switch places with someone else, your analogy or whatever, like I did with Ray, you gotta consider the guy you'd be switching with. He didn't sign up for being a woman. You can't just stick him in your body."

"He's right," said Fraser, nodding. "That is, she's right."

"So change me back and we'll call it good."

"Well." Carol looked faintly embarrassed, and Rae felt a sudden horrible twisty feeling in her gut.

"Do not tell me that you don't know how. You did it, you can undo it."

"The ritual, yes. It's probably just a matter of reversing the male and female candles. I'd have to look it up. But I can't do it until the next full moon."

Oh, shit. "Which is when?"

"Moon phases run in a twenty-nine-and-a-half day cycle," said Fraser. "That would put the next—"

"Twenty-nine days? Jesus! I gotta be a guy for twenty-nine days?"

"Only twenty days, counting the nine that have passed," said Fraser, but he didn't look any happier about it than Rae felt.

"Twenty-one, actually," said Carol. She was looking past them to where a calendar hung on the wall, one of those calendars with little moon symbols on it. "It's not always exact because sometimes the boundary falls at different times of day. I'm really sorry about this."

Twenty-one more days. Twenty-one days of walking on eggshells at the station, remembering she was supposed to be Ray Vecchio instead of Rae Kowalski. Twenty-one days of using the men's room and pissing in front of anyone who happened to be there. Twenty-one days of shaving her face.

It was ironic, was what it was. Because just a few minutes ago, lying in Ben's arms, she'd thought she might be coming to terms with being stuck permanently in a male body. But now that she knew she'd be able to go home, she wanted to be there now. Yeah, it had been kind of fun getting to play with the new equipment, and the whole idea that there were all these different versions of Chicago out there was a real eye-opener. But she'd been a man for nine whole days already. That would have been enough.

"But you can do it in twenty-one days?" Rae demanded. Carol nodded her head.

Twenty-one more days as a man. This was going to suck.

When they headed back out into the hallway, Ben started for the stairs instead of for Ray's apartment, and Rae's stomach clenched again. Having him with her again was the only thing that would keep her going for the next twenty-one days. "Sorry," she managed, as she turned back toward her own door.

"You're not coming with us?" Dief gave a little snuffling noise, and oh, right, the wolf needed a walk. Rae fell in with them but couldn't quite look Ben in the face. It wasn't until they were halfway around the block that she mustered up the guts to ask.

"So. You're staying over, right? I mean, I'll take you back to the Consulate if you really want, but neither of us have to work tomorrow, so I figure—"

"Rae," he said quietly, interrupting her. But then he didn't say anything else, and somehow his not speaking was louder than his actual voice. All she could hear was their footsteps, thudding in her ears like muffled gunshots. Boom, boom, boom.

At the corner store, where they could pick up some dog food, Rae stopped under the yellow glow of the streetlamp. This was it, this was make-or-break, and she leaned against the peeling paint of the storefront and folded her arms, forcing herself to make eye contact with him. Not saying anything, just looking at him, trying to say it all with her expression.

After about a million years, he said, "All right."

"Good," said Rae, relieved. She pointed at the store: "I'll just—"

"All right," he said again, and she almost ran inside, just so she wouldn't have to say anything else.

She bought some of the expensive stuff, a small bag so it wouldn't look like she was counting on too much, and went back out. "This okay?" she said, holding the bag out to Dief, who woofed unenthusiastically. "Can't have burgers all the time," she told him, but Ben didn't take the bait and just stood there, patiently.

They began their walk back to the building in silence. Maybe this wasn't a good idea, maybe she had pushed him too far, Rae thought, and tried again: "I can take you back, if you want."

"No, I want to stay with you. I'll stay tonight. But I don't think it's a good idea to make a habit of it."

"You made a habit of it in my world."

"I imagine it was more acceptable there."

"Who cares what's acceptable? You and Ray are buddies, right? Anyone asks, we say you were sleeping on the couch." And if that's what he wanted, that's what he could have. He could sleep on the couch, or she would. Whatever it took.

"They aren't going to ask. They'll just believe the evidence of their eyes, and draw their own conclusions."

"So, let 'em."

Ben shook his head. "You don't have the right to make that decision for Ray."

"He wouldn't care, either," she muttered. Which she knew wasn't true, because until she and Ben started going out, she got a lot of shit—not to her face, they wouldn't say it to her face, but it got back to her. Of course Kowalski was a dyke, they'd say; all women cops with short hair were, they all liked to carry guns because they didn't have dicks. Nothing she could do about it, but it ticked her off. So Ben was right, Ray probably wouldn't appreciate it. "But okay, all that means is we got to be discreet. I can do discreet."

"I'm counting on it," Ben said, giving her just the hint of a smile. "It's well understood that we spend a significant amount of time together. I don't see why we can't continue to do so."

"Okay, good. We spend time together, we keep doing it. You think we can spend some of it in bed? Discreetly, of course," she added.

"You must know I want to," he said quietly.

"But what?" She could hear the "but" in his voice as clear as if he had said it out loud. "I want to, you want to, so what's the big deal?" They'd reached the apartment building, and she pushed the door open. Dief ran through ahead of them, like he was giving them privacy.

"You'll be going back to your own world and your own version of me in twenty-one days."

"Yeah, don't remind me, I got to wait twenty-one days. And that's why I need you, Ben, I can't do it alone. You got to help me get through it. Twenty-one days, that's a long time from now."

"Yes, it is." The anguish in his voice was palpable. "It's long enough to get used to something I already know I don't want to lose."

Rae had thought it would be easier, now that she knew this wasn't going to be permanent, but it wasn't, really. On the plus side, despite what he'd said Saturday night, Fraser really was in it with her for the long haul—or at least, for twenty-one days. He spent the night in the apartment, in her bed, and the next morning, he'd woken her up with gentle caresses and hot breath on her neck, and whoa, no wonder guys liked morning sex.

On the other hand, after the morning sex he insisted on returning to the Consulate. Which sucked. But still, somehow it helped. It made this Fraser more like her Ben, like she didn't feel she had to guard against making mistakes with him the way she had to with everybody else in this world. He knew who she was, and they loved each other, and it helped.

But the weird thing was that in some strange way it made things worse. Because yeah, she could relax a little more into this borrowed body, but maybe that wasn't a good thing. It was like—well, for some reason, Rae had the thing about lobsters stuck in her head: how if you tossed a lobster into a pot of boiling water, it would freak (well, that was the story; she wasn't actually cooking lobsters on a cop's salary), but if you just put it into warm water and slowly turned up the heat, it wouldn't notice until, whoa, suddenly it was dinner. Maybe she was getting a little too used to being a guy.

That first week had been hell, what with having to remember to use the right bathroom and answer to "Vecchio." Being back in the old apartment was weird. Sleeping alone again was depressing. And on top of all that had been the odd disconnect between who she knew she was and who Ray's body told her she was. Walking with a longer stride, holding a pen with a bigger hand—everything was subtly off-balance from what she expected. Like there was something at the edge of her vision that disappeared when she turned her head to look directly at it, or like a dog whistle that she couldn't quite hear but which made her backbone itch. Little things that grabbed her attention because they were wrong.

Except somehow in the past ten days, she'd stopped noticing. It wasn't like she didn't notice the big stuff: she still sort of expected to see her own face every time she looked in a mirror, and so it was a shock to see the stronger features and stubble of Ray Kowalski staring back at her. But it was a shock, maybe, because it seemed to come out of nowhere. She didn't notice being a guy any more when she walked down the hallway at the station, because it didn't feel wrong like it used to. It just felt normal, like it was her own body sitting at the desk, pacing in the bullpen, getting in a perp's face when he tried to get away with bullshitting them.

So it was like she was normal, she was Rae again. Then she'd hear her own voice sounding all husky and low, or she'd be in the bathroom—or worse, she'd get a hard-on for some weird reason, and feel the constriction of her jeans reminding her you are a guy now, you are Ray—and it all crashed down like a case gone wrong.

And feeling easy with Fraser didn't help this part of it at all, because it was just one more thing that made the normal stuff seem more normal, which meant that it made the not-normal stuff worse. It meant she had to remind herself that this Fraser did not carry a gun, because if she forgot and they went into a bad situation again, he might end up with more than just a creased shoulder. It meant that Ray's apartment was emptier and lonelier than it had been, because somehow it was worse to have him all day and not have him at night than it had been to not have him at all.

By Wednesday, Rae thought she might crack. She'd spent the afternoon at the Consulate with Fraser and Inspector Thatcher, who wanted a detailed plan for providing security for some Canadian singer who was coming to Chicago. Weird to be planning for something that she wouldn't actually be around to do. She'd have to leave notes or something, make sure Ray got the picture. Unless maybe he was doing the same thing in her world.

It was torture, being there with Fraser, knowing that she was going to have to leave him there in his stupid office room to sleep on his stupid cot, while she went back and stared at the television in the apartment she'd grown to hate. She was scribbling a few more notes after Thatcher had left, wondering whether Ray's plans would be the same as hers, when she noticed Fraser had moved a little closer to her. "Yeah, okay, almost done. I'll be out of your hair in a minute."

"I was hoping we could have dinner together." That had her head snapping up to look at him, because that tone of voice ought to be illegal, and he was standing right there, and the look on his face…

"I thought you said we couldn't, that we, you know."

"I said that we ought not make a habit of it. I didn't say we couldn't continue our usual behavior." His voice dropped on the last words, and Jesus, Rae was getting hard, and it was totally unfair. But Fraser was calmly gathering a few things into a small pack, and when he said, "Let me just change out of the uniform," her heart started pounding.

"Yeah, sure. I'll just—" and she motioned toward the door, went out to wait in the hallway, because if he took his uniform off in front of her, they wouldn't make it out of his office.

They barely made it out of the Consulate, and they didn't bother trying to find a restaurant. Rae drove straight to the apartment, and they went straight into the bedroom, and it wasn't until after they had each had a thoroughly satisfactory orgasm that she even started thinking about food.

It turned out that "not making a habit of it" was Fraserese for "every two or three days," so from a sex life perspective, things didn't suck too bad. And even though she liked sex just fine in her normal girl-body, it was still kind of extra cool to be doing it as a guy. Even if it was messier and more awkward, and meant she had to do a lot more laundry.

Sometimes she sucked Ben off and sometimes she used her hands, which was, surprisingly, a lot more enjoyable than she'd expected. The thing was, when standard ordinary man-and-woman sex was something you could have, it was what you did all the time. If she'd wrapped her fingers around Ben's cock, it was just foreplay, a few strokes before the main event. But now she reveled in giving handjobs with intent to orgasm, fast, hard pulls that she'd discovered she liked on her own cock, and without the distraction of her own pleasure, she could concentrate on making Ben go all flushed and panting. Which she never got tired of doing.

She never got tired of Ben's hands on her, either, or Jesus, his mouth, which he was just as good with on Ray's cock as he was on Rae's clit. It had always been obvious that he loved doing it, loved licking her gently, pressing his nose deep against her pubic hair and inhaling her scent, loved tonguing her and stroking her and making her come. This Ben had the same look of joy in his eyes as he licked her shaft and then took it in his mouth, and probably afterward as well, although she was usually too busy gasping and coming to pay attention.

One evening she managed to remember to let her legs fall open the same way his had, and when she nudged his hand in the right direction, he took the hint, and holy fuck. It was totally unfair that guys had all this sensation up their asses, and women didn't.

Then again, she had to admit she kind of missed coming two or three times in a half hour, so maybe things were even.

But this fingers-up-the-ass thing was amazingly good, and after Ben had reduced her to a limp mess she murmured, "I bet it would feel real good with, you know. With your cock up there."

Instantly he stiffened, and not in the good way. "I don't think we should do that now, Rae."

"Okay, not now." She was still feeling pleasantly floaty and relaxed; she could wait until next time. "But we got, what, less than a week now? So we should do it soon."

Ben was silent for a few moments. Finally he said, "I don't think—I don't want Ray to think—that is…." His voice trailed off, his tongue stealing out to lick at his lip. "He can't give consent."

"But I can. And I do. So what's the big deal?"

"It's his body."

The happy floaty feeling vanished. "Yeah, it's his body. But you've been doing a lot of things to his body. You've just had your fingers up his ass and his cock in your mouth, or didn't you notice?"

He colored and looked away. "Well, yes. But that's a different—a different level, if you will."

"It's all sex, Ben! S-e-x sex! There's no difference!"

"There is to me," he said quietly. "These have all been intimate acts. But this act in particular is…particularly intimate. Surely you considered intercourse to be special, your first time?"

She opened her mouth to protest, then closed it again. Although by the time she'd lost her virginity she'd thought of it more as an annoyance rather than anything else, he was right; the whole idea that a penis "counted" where fingers or a tongue didn't made it special. She could see that. "Yeah, okay, I get it," she finally said.

"And it's not that I don't think you're—it's not that I wouldn't want to do it with you." He stroked her side softly, his fingers tentative and gentle. "But it's Ray's body. It should be his choice."

"I get it, Ben. It's okay." It was kind of sweet, to be honest, and it made her heart ache with affection and love, because, really, how could she possibly be jealous of herself? "You want it to be Ray."

"If he'll have me." Ben closed his eyes. She could see the strain in the corded muscles of his neck, feel the sudden tension in his fingers as they stilled on her hip.

She slid up close to his side and folded an arm around his chest; Ben's body seemed even hotter than usual, like all the emotion he couldn't let himself express was trying to pour itself out through his skin, and he held himself tense and rigid. "Don't worry," she murmured into his neck. "He isn't gonna run. It'll be okay. You'll see."

Whispering reassurance, she stroked his side, willing him to relax. Slowly, slowly she felt him unbend into her embrace. Long moments later, when he turned in her arms to face her again, his lashes were moist. "The Benton Fraser in your plane of existence, your—" he swallowed, "—your husband. He's a very fortunate man."

She felt her own eyes fill with tears, blinked them back. "You will be too, Ben," she said, hugging him fiercely. "You will be, too."

Rae hadn't been back to watch football with Carol since that first Sunday. They had both admitted it would be awkward, and anyway, Rae was spending as much of her free time as she could with Fraser. Football was great, but compared to sex? Football didn't have a chance.

When she knocked, Carol immediately opened the door. "I figured you'd be by," she said. "Come on in. I take it you still want to go back."

"Yeah, I want to go back," said Rae. "Don't tell me there's a problem. I do not want to hear there's a problem."

"No, no problems. I've started assembling what we'll need. I've already got the complementary set of candles."

"You get them free if your spell fucks up and works on the wrong person?"

"I mean complementary, like opposite. To undo what was done."

"So, uh. You got to buy more stuff?" Rae started to dig in her pocket for Ray's wallet, but Carol shook her head.

"Don't worry about it. I'm the one who messed it up. I'm really sorry, okay?"

"Yeah, all right," said Rae. "So what do you do about getting blood?"

"That's free—I've got a contact at a slaughterhouse," said Carol, leading her into the living room. She picked up a thick black-bound book that sat on the kitchen pass-through and opened it to a place marked by a bookmark that appeared to be a credit card receipt. "Do you want to see the spell?"

Rae peered at the page Carol had marked, which looked sort of like one of Stella's cookbooks, the kind where all the recipe titles were in French and the ingredients were things you couldn't get at Stop and Shop. Except that instead of stuff like bake at 350° it said things like turn widdershins, whatever the hell that was. "Is that what you did, or what you're gonna do to undo it?"

"Both. It's more or less the same ritual, just done with opposite intent."

"As long as it works."

"It should. Although—didn't you say you had my ring and your feather?"

"They're in an evidence locker at the station, yeah."

"The spell would probably be more likely to work if I use the same feather I used for, you know." She made a back-and-forth gesture with her hands. "For the other direction. I mean, I could use another one, but, hang on…." She flipped through the pages until she found the one she wanted. "Yes, that's what I thought. To undo a spell, it's best to use as many of the original components as possible. So it would be best if I could have the feather back. And the ring, which was supposed to tie the spell to me." Rae raised her eyebrows, and Carol shrugged. "I mean obviously it didn't, because the resonance of the feather overrode it, but since it was part of the original spell, having it there the second time would help duplicate the original circumstances."

"Okay, we can do that. You just need to come down to the station, sign an affidavit, stuff like that. Since the city didn't pursue charges it ought to be easy. I'll push it through for you." Then a sudden thought hit her. "Oh, shit. If we've got to do everything the same way, that means we've got to do it in the middle of the night at Grant Park, doesn't it."

"Four-thirty a.m., actually. You wouldn't believe how many people are out even at two."

"Then we do it at four-thirty a.m. Just clean up the blood before the groundskeeper sees it. Why the hell did you decide to do it in the middle of the park, anyway?" Carol shot her a look that suggested she was considering not doing it at all, and Rae took a breath and tried to look as though she didn't think Carol was unhinged. Don't piss off the nice lady who's your only hope of getting back, she told herself, and added, "I mean, this time of year it's pretty chilly at night. Why not just do it here? Other than the fact that you'd probably have to say bye-bye to your security deposit."

"The invocation must be under the full moon, out in the open. Believe me, I'm not exactly thrilled about freezing my ass off out there, either. And we should be out of there long before dawn. Only reason I was there when that guy startled me was because I was still trying to figure out what went wrong."

"Well, nothing'd better go wrong this time. And that includes having to explain to the groundskeeper what a Chicago cop is doing defacing public property."

"Then maybe you'd better not come along. You weren't there the first time."

"Oh, no," said Rae firmly. "I'm going to be there, you can bet. Fraser, too."

"You sure?" Carol gave a small, nervous laugh. "I mean, it's not like I actually know what I'm doing. And it's a little embarrassing. Laying out the stuff, chanting—I felt kind of stupid. It'll be really weird having someone watching."

"Too bad. There is no way we're going to miss it."

Carol sighed. "If you insist." She glanced at the not-a-cookbook again, then looked back up at Rae. A wistful look crossed her face. "So, have you enjoyed your sojourn as a man?"

"Jesus," said Rae. "I woke up in an apartment I haven't lived in for months, and my face is covered with stubble and I got a dick, and I don't know how to walk or talk or even piss in a fucking urinal. And my husband…." She broke off; no way was she going to tell Carol about Fraser, about what he was to her in her own world. Because Carol wasn't stupid, she'd put two and two together and no way would she come up with anything but four. Fraser didn't deserve that, and neither did Ray.

And of course that train of thought led right to the Gay Sex With Fraser station, which—okay, she had to admit she did not regret one bit. Yeah, she got a little more respect from the guys at the 27^th, and Frannie actually did useful work when Rae asked her to do something, but none of that was a big deal. Having a whole different set of sexual equipment: that was a big deal, that was the big deal, and even though she was looking forward to normal ordinary sex in her own normal ordinary body, even though she was going to jump Ben as soon as she got home and get the real actual honest-to-God fucking that she really, really missed doing—being a guy had been worth it, just for that.

"It was okay," she finally said.

Carol grinned. "I figured it would be."

On Friday it seemed like the 27^th was even crazier than usual, starting with the elderly Lithuanian woman who had her purse snatched on the street and was screaming Lithuanian curses at every uniformed officer she saw, and ending with six men dressed in Girl Scout uniforms who were still wandering around the station as Rae got ready to leave.

"It must be the full moon," said Frannie. "Drives people nuts."

Dewey snorted. "Hey, Ray, you got the urge to walk around in a dress?"

You have no idea, thought Rae, but she just said, "No, but I got the urge for some of those mint cookies. See you guys later."

"Watch out for werewolves," Dewey called after her as she headed down the hall.

Full moon. She was going back tonight. Well, tomorrow morning at oh-dark-thirty, but that was basically tonight. She'd pick up Fraser, who she had not seen in two days because of some Canadian business that thank God was supposed to have been finished this afternoon. Then they'd get something to eat, and they'd get some sleep, and then go do the woo-woo and it would send her back home.

Except of course when she got to the Consulate, the Canadian business was not even close to over. Instead she had to cool her heels in the lobby listening to Turnbull chattering anxiously about the soon-to-arrive Canadian singer, sounding for all the world like a 14-year-old girl whose idol was coming to town. Maybe there was a universe where Turnbull was female. The mental image was enough to make Rae snort with laughter; unfortunately Turnbull thought she was laughing at him, or maybe that was fortunate, because he sniffed at her and said that obviously the detective did not share his discriminating taste in music, and ostentatiously turned to the papers on his desk. Which was just fine with Rae.

The bad thing, though, was that this left Rae with nothing else to do but think about the woo-woo, and she was a jittery wreck by the time Fraser was finally done with whatever it was he was doing. They headed for Soo's—Dief had been left in the Consulate for the night—and as soon as they were in a quiet booth at the back, Rae slumped into the corner.

"Listen, if this doesn't work, I want you to kick Carol's ass for me, okay?"

"Is there a chance it won't?" There was an odd note to Fraser's voice, and she looked up at him sharply.

"Do not tell me you don't want it to work. I know you want things back exactly as they were—"

"Not everything," said Fraser quietly. "But no, I want it to work. Ray needs to be here with me, and you need to go home. And I won't deny I miss Ray terribly." He looked down at the paper mat with the Chinese zodiac symbols printed on it, then back at Rae. "But I won't deny I'll miss you, too."

There was nothing she could say to that. Because she wouldn't miss Ben, not really; the man across the table from her was, in every way that mattered, the same Ben she loved, and it was impossible to think of them as two different people. It was going to be hard to see her own Ben and remember that they didn't share the experiences of the last month.

Fortunately the waiter arrived then, and they ordered, got their food, and ate pretty much in silence. Not a bad silence; a familiar silence, the kind of silence that always hung between them when they were on a stakeout, or driving to a meet-up with a suspicious character, or about to sneak into a warehouse where they had no business being. Like something big was going to go down, which might be good, might be bad, and they just had to get ready to roll with it because it was going to happen no matter what.

When their plates were empty—Rae supposed the cashew chicken had been good, but she hadn't noticed it much—they paid and left, and she drove them back to the apartment. The clouds from earlier in the day had cleared away, thank God, because it was going to be bad enough going out to the park in the middle of the night without having to do it in the rain; now the moon shone brightly just above the skyline.

"It's nearly nine," said Ben when they had closed the door behind them. They were the first words he'd spoken in some time—in English, anyway—and it startled her for a moment.

"Huh, okay. I'd better set the alarm. I guess we should try to catch some sleep." Rae shrugged off her jacket and tossed it across the back of the sofa as she headed into the bedroom. "Three-thirty, Jesus Christ," she grumbled as she fiddled with the clock. She hated that thing even when it was set for a more normal hour.

"Then we should use our time wisely," said Ben, coming up close behind her. His arms slid down her sides to grip her hips, and she shivered.

"You keep doing that, we're not getting any sleep."

"Did I say anything about sleep?" His lips were near her ear, his hot breath sending shivers down her spine. One hand stole around to start unbuttoning her shirt.

"Jesus, you are crazy, you know that?" She turned in his arms and they kissed, long and slow and sweet, and then their clothes came off in a hurried rush as they dove for the bed and for each other.

Strange to think that this would be the last time doing it like this, in the shape of a man. Remember this, she told herself, as Ben slipped a hand between their bodies. Remember the feel of his mouth on your dick, remember the way his palm curves around your balls. How immediate and desperate everything feels.

Ben's face was buried in her neck, kissing and licking, and when she arched back and moaned with the pleasure of it he lifted his head. His face was flushed, his eyes dark. "Rae," he said, and his voice was thick and broken. "God, Rae."

"Yeah," she murmured, stroking his hair. She slid the other hand down to where he held their erections cupped together and ran her fingers gently across both of them, enjoying the odd sensation of alternately feeling his cock and her own.

He groaned. "I want—maybe you could…"

"What is it?" she said, when he fell silent. "Anything, you know that, I'll do anything."

"I want to feel you," he whispered, and his hand, between them, stroked her cock and then slid over to her hand, taking it, guiding it between his legs to his hole.

Her mouth went dry. "I thought you said we shouldn't, that it wasn't fair to Ray."

"I said I shouldn't do it to you. But if he doesn't…if he won't…." His voice trailed off, and then all in a rush, he said, "I want you to do it to me." His face was pink, like just talking about it got him embarrassed, and it was sort of sweet, but, Jesus, they were grown—well, grown men. It shouldn't be embarrassing.

So she said, as casually as she could, "Oh, you want me to fuck you?"

His eyes fluttered shut and she could feel his cock twitch against her stomach as he whispered, "God, yes, Rae, please," and that was it, that unstrung her totally. Ben wanted it, Jesus, it was like when she'd been touching herself that very first time, what she'd imagined, what she'd fantasized.

"Okay," she rasped. "Hang on." She rolled over to the bedside table for the Astroglide, and shit, the condoms were in her wallet, Ray's wallet, in the pocket of the jeans which lay crumpled on the floor. Not as though they'd been exactly practicing safe sex, but it was the principle of the thing. She didn't know for sure that Ray was clean, although, Jesus, he'd damn well better be.

With shaking hands she retrieved the wallet, found what she was looking for. "You, uh. You done this before?"

"There are many things I haven't done before."

"Straight answer, Ben."

"'Straight' is hardly the applicable word," he said, raising an eyebrow, and that broke the tension enough that she had to grin.

"Point taken. Needless to say, I have never done this before, so don't let me hurt you, okay?"

"I'll be fine," he said, but he gasped when she pressed into him with slippery fingers, gasped again when she positioned herself between his legs and pushed gently, a fraction of an inch at a time for what seemed like forever, until everything gave way.

Jesus fuck. Is this what it felt like, to him, when he was buried in her? She couldn't imagine that it was the same, all sorts of different muscles down there, but it didn't matter, it didn't matter at all. What mattered was the tight grip he had around her, her cock, hard and wanting, wanting to thrust, wanting to move, wanting to feel. The friction all around, the heat.

And something else, something that radiated from her cock and from her heart, enveloping her, enveloping both of them. This was why they called it making love, she thought. The feeling of incredible closeness, of being joined. Sex was fun, it felt good, and Ben always took such obvious delight in having his hands or his mouth on her, whether she was in this body or her own; but Jesus, being like this, being inside, this was something else, something beyond all that.

She levered herself carefully above his body, looking for pain in his face, seeing only joy. "You okay?"

"I'm fine," he said, although she knew he'd say that no matter what.

"I want—can I move?"

"Please."

She tried an experimental thrust, and Jesus, that was incredible, that was amazing, better than his hands, better than his mouth, he was right there, spread out under her. "I gotta—I need—oh, Christ, Ben, Ben," she panted, and he was shifting under her, thrusting his hips back up toward her, letting her fuck him, fucking up into her.

"This, is this?" she asked, unable to form complete sentences, for Christ's sake, unable to focus on anything but the clenching tightness, the warmth, Ben under her, his face. His long eyelashes fluttering, his head thrown back, the way he was gasping, groaning with each stroke, wordless groans that still sounded like Rae, Ray, Rae.

His hands gripped her hips, guiding her, pulling her in. His mouth was open and he was breathing hard, breathing with the rhythm their bodies set, and he was looking at her with so much love it made her head spin. Like they were the only people in the entire world, the only things that existed, that mattered.

And the sensation, Jesus. The slide of their bodies, of her cock, the smooth warm grip of Ben's body as she thrust into him and he thrust onto her, around her, fuck, fuck, she couldn't stop moving, pushing it higher until she was there, she was coming, Jesus, coming into Ben's ass.

For a few moments she could do nothing but breathe. Her arms were jelly and she let herself collapse onto Ben's broad chest; after a moment she felt him squirming under her. "Rae, could you—?"

"Oh. Sorry," she said, and slid out of him, and wasn't that a weird feeling. The condom felt and looked ugly on her dick, and she carefully pulled it off and wrapped it in a tissue, and oh, shit, what if Ray found this in his wastebasket? It wasn't like she didn't expect him to figure it out—it wasn't like she didn't expect he'd been doing it with her Ben—but she didn't want to rub it in his face. Especially since sex was a new thing for these bodies, for this Ben and this Ray.

Maybe Ben could read her mind, because he pulled her down to him again and kissed her, a gentle press against her lips, a light swipe of his tongue across hers. When she lifted her head, he said "Thank you," and that was kind of weird, wasn't it? Like he was thanking Frannie for making a photocopy for him, like Rae had just done him a favor by fucking him up the ass.

She rolled off next to him. "Ben, you okay?"

His eyes were huge pools of blue, deep like she could drown in them. "Rae," he whispered, and his voice was so full of emotion she felt tears start to form in her own eyes. "My God, Rae."

"You liked that, huh?" She reached down to stroke his cock; he'd gone a little soft but he hadn't come yet, and he deserved a brain-blower.

"That was the most incredible—the most intimate—I don't think I can describe it."

"Intimate, no kidding. I was inside you. Jesus." She shook her head. "Amazing."

"Mmm," he said, as her fingers danced over the head of his cock. He was starting to sound dreamy, like he was paying attention to what she was doing and not what she was doing, and hey, that was fine. That was the idea. "You liked it, then."

"Liked it—Jesus, Ben, that was amazing. Maybe guys take it for granted, I don't know, but, wow."

"I hope that I don't take it for granted. In your world."

"Not you, Ben, never you." She slowed down her strokes, tightened her fingers, and he made a small mmm noise and pushed into her hand. God, she could do this forever and never get tired of it, never get tired of touching him, of listening to him groan with pleasure. "Jesus. Every woman should get to do it to a guy like that, once in her life."

"And every man…"

"More than once, I hope." She started slithering down along the bed. "You're not going to be able to keep him away from your ass, you know."

"I'll just assume you know what you're—ahh!" He broke off as she gave the head of his cock a nice, big lick.

She looked up the length of his body at him. "Want me to talk, or suck?"

"Oh, God, don't tease me," he said, so she didn't; instead she took him in as deep and as hard as she could, using her hands to stroke and squeeze what she couldn't get in her mouth. He arched into her mouth and moaned, and she let him lead, let him set the pace, taking his thrusts as they became more and more frantic. "Oh, God," Ben groaned again, and then please and then yes and then nothing but wordless gasps of pleasure as he came into her mouth.

She licked him off and wiped him up, then moved back up the bed to lie next to him. He turned on his side and she wrapped herself around his back, feeling oddly protective of him, filled with a sudden surge of fierce and unstoppable love. In a few hours Ray would be back in this body, and even though she'd assured Ben that it didn't make any sense for Ray to love him any less than Rae did, she almost wished she could stick around somehow, look over Ray's shoulder. Make sure he treated Ben right. Make sure the Ben and Ray in this world were as happy as she and Ben were in hers.

Maybe she should write him a note, she thought, and then she was asleep.

Rae woke immediately to the sound of the alarm, even though she hadn't slept nearly enough. Her whole body was thrumming with anticipation, with urgency, as though on some deep level it somehow knew what was coming. Like it was getting ready to toss her out and welcome Ray back.

She slid out of bed and showered quickly and quietly. By the time she was back in the bedroom Fraser had made the bed, and she stifled a smile: Ray would take one look at those neat corners and know exactly who had folded them.

While Fraser showered she made coffee and put it in travel cups, one for each of them, and when he stepped out of the bedroom she handed him one. "Ready to commit an act of vandalism?"

"It's not vandalism if we clean up after ourselves," Fraser said as he pulled on his jacket.

"You can clean up. I'm going to be kissing the sweet ground. The sweet carpet in my house, whatever." They left the apartment and Rae went down the hall and knocked on Carol's door. No answer. Fuck. She kicked the door once, hard, in frustration. "Come on!"

"Ah, Rae," said Fraser behind her. He held up a folded piece of paper. "This was taped to your door."

She took it from him, read the few lines on it, felt her anger dissipate, the anticipation return. "She's gone on ahead. Okay, that's good. Let's go." She had refolded the note and was about to put it in her pocket when she remembered what she'd planned to do. "No, wait, hang on a moment."

She ran back into the apartment. At the kitchen counter, she unfolded the paper and turned it to the back, to the side that said "Rae" in big letters just under the crease. She crossed it out, wrote, "Ray," and then hesitated.

What should she say? What could she say? How much would he have figured out from being in her body—and how much would he be able to read in a glance from Ben's face? So many things she wanted to write, but they all sounded stupid when she thought about actually writing them, and anyway, she didn't have much time; they had to get going. Finally she scribbled two words under Ray's name, underlined them with a bold stroke of the pen:

Love him.

That would have to do. She went into the bathroom and tucked the paper into a corner of the mirror, where he'd be sure to see it, then headed back out of the apartment.

Between the streetlights and the full moon, Chicago seemed to glow as Rae drove toward Grant Park. Few cars were on the street in the pre-dawn stillness; they'd make it in plenty of time, she thought, and then the impulse struck her. She swung left on a side street, then right, navigating through the neighborhoods. In the corner of her eye she saw Fraser's head swivel toward her, sensed his questioning gaze, but she didn't turn her head until she'd pulled into a parking spot and stopped the car.

"I thought you might want to see where we live."

Fraser regarded the house silently for a few moments. Finally he said, "It's nice."

"Small place, but the rent's not bad, and there's a decent yard out back. Dief really likes it. Two bedrooms, one bath." She glanced at him; he was staring at the moonlit house as though he thought it might disappear if he looked away. "Anyway, if the people in it moved in when we did, their lease will be up next September. I'm just saying, think about it."

She put the car in gear and headed back into the center of the city, but Fraser didn't speak until she'd parked the car at the edge of the park.

"I never thought I'd stay in Chicago," Fraser said quietly.

"You're happy here," said Rae, feeling a bit defensive. "You're with me, and we love each other. Besides, it's part of the deal."

"Deal?"

She'd spoken without thinking. Did she really want to tell him this? But he was looking sort of sad, like he'd lost something important, and yeah, she knew how much he missed his country and his home. Maybe this was something he needed to hear.

"We made a deal," she said, looking out the window. "Chicago, I mean, okay, it makes sense right now, 'cause we both have jobs here. But, um, I got that biological clock thing, you know? Maybe when we have kids—well, it's a hard thing to ask of a kid, to have a cop for a mom." She stole a glance at him; he looked like someone had kicked him in the head, but for all that he looked stunned he looked kind of—hopeful. Happy. "And you're always going on about how good it would be for a kid, growing up in the Northwest Areas, hunting caribou or whatever, and I—"

He put a hand on her arm. "It's all right, Rae. I don't want to know everything about my other life; it's enough to know that I'm happy there." Then he smiled, shook his head. "Children. Now, that's a surprise. Somehow I never imagined we'd be planning to have children."

"I've always wanted kids. One day." She grinned. "It's going to be a hell of an adventure."

When they reached the spot, Carol was laying out her woo-woo things on a white cloth that gleamed brightly in the moonlight. The candles—a female with exaggerated hips in white wax, a hulking male figure in black, both still unlit—cast weird shadows across the other items, distorting their shapes, making it look as though they were moving. Like funny-shaped insects scuttling away from the light, thought Rae. Spooky.

Carol turned as Rae and Fraser approached. "Maybe you'd better stay back, okay? I mean, since you weren't here the first time, your presence might change things, and I don't want any interference."

"I am not interference," Rae began, but Fraser put a hand on her arm and said, "Understood."

"And be quiet. I've got to concentrate." She bit her lip, looked at the ground. "And please don't laugh at me."

"We wouldn't dream of it," said Fraser.

"I'm sorry, I'm just—I didn't expect it to work the first time, and, well. I just hope it works."

"Yeah," said Rae. "Me too."

Carol met her eyes, then, and for a moment Rae thought she was going to hug her; but she only nodded. "I'll do my best." Then she turned back to whatever it was she was doing, which frankly didn't look all that interesting. Picking things up, putting them down. Arranging them on the rock slab where they'd found the stuff before. Looking in her black book, muttering to herself. It was like watching a homeless drunk staggering along the street—kind of interesting for the novelty value, but only for about twenty seconds.

Even with a heavy jacket on, it was too cold to just stand in one place. Restlessly Rae shifted from one foot to the other, hoping something would happen soon. She stole a glance at Fraser, who looked ridiculously comfortable, impassive. Must have been all that statue practice in front of the Consulate.

Finally Carol straightened and took a few steps back from the rock, then walked toward it slowly, formally. She lit something and carried it in two cupped hands, holding it aloft as she walked in a small circle around the rock; it was the incense, Rae realized as she caught a whiff of it, spicy like cinnamon but sharper, more intense.

Carol returned the incense to the rock and recited something that sounded like it was cribbed from Mass, all 'accept this our offering' and 'beseech thy blessing', except instead of God or Jesus she kept saying 'gracious lady'. Then she walked the circle again, sprinkling something dark from a silver goblet, and Rae realized with a shudder that it was probably the blood. Then came more offerings and blessings, and then another circle with the flowers. When Carol had placed those back on the rock as well, she lit the two person-shaped candles and began chanting again.

This time, it didn't sound like church; in fact, it didn't sound like it was in English. It hardly sounded like words at all, thought Rae, as she hugged herself against the cold and tried to focus on what Carol was chanting. But somehow the words twisted away from her, like they were slipping sideways, and the more she tried to concentrate the less she understood. Maybe it was the smell of the incense, which seemed to be getting stronger and sharper, as though it was gathering around her, even though she was standing out in the open air.

If it was getting to her, it was probably really getting to Fraser, what with his incredible sense of smell, she thought, and she looked over at him. Or tried to, anyway: her head felt heavy, lead-balloon heavy, and it took all her energy just to turn her head. And somehow when she finally managed to get to where she was looking at him, it was like she was looking at him through a tunnel, or that little telescope he had, but turned the wrong way around, so that everything looked small and far away.

"Fraser?" Her lips were numb, her throat hollow. "Ben, are you there?" She couldn't hear herself speak, wasn't sure the words had made it out of her mouth. All she could hear was the strange chanting, words that weren't words, words that turned into wind that rushed by her ears, filling them with the dull whoosh of formless noise, and she was flying over Chicago, she was flying, she was flying, she was falling…

Bright sunlight on her eyelids woke her, and she lay for a moment with her eyes closed, letting the last shreds of her strange dreams fade. Flying, falling. She felt numb and dizzy. Maybe she should just go back to sleep, she thought, pulling the pillow closer to her face to blot out the light. Then she remembered.

Last night—no, just a few hours ago, it must have been—she'd been in the park, watching Carol perform the ritual that was to send her back to her own world. Either it had worked, or it hadn't. She'd know as soon as she opened her eyes—which, oddly, she found herself reluctant to do. Whatever had happened, opening her eyes would make it real; while she lay in bed with her eyes closed, she could pretend she was still dreaming.

In bed. Her arm was crooked around a pillow, holding it to her face, and she could feel the weight of a quilt above her. So she wasn't in the park any more, at least. Had Fraser carried her back to the apartment? Had she awoken back in their bedroom, back in her house? Was she still Ray, or was she Rae?

She brought her hand up to her neck. Okay, you can do this, she told herself. Slowly, slowly she swept her fingers down her chest.

Breasts. Thank God, she had breasts, and as she shifted position she could feel them there on her body, small but solid, her breasts, her body again. She started to smile as she slid her hand down farther, and yes, God, yes. Relief overwhelmed her like cool water splashing from her head to her toes, and she started quietly laughing, uncontrollably, giddy with it. Her own body. Thank God.

She opened her eyes. The familiar pale-blue walls of the bedroom surrounded her; she turned her head toward the sun, toward the window, and yeah, there were those yellow-and-blue curtains that she kept meaning to replace but hadn't gotten around to doing yet. Then she tilted her head back on the pillow, so she could see the headboard.

And there it was, her dreamcatcher, the dreamcatcher that Ben had given her.

He wasn't there next to her, but that was okay, she could see the indentation where he'd been even though he'd smoothed the covers back after he'd gotten out of the bed. She smelled bacon and eggs. It was Saturday.

She swung herself out of bed. Funny how off-balance she felt, back in her own body, but she'd bet she'd get used to it again in a hurry. Breasts, hips, legs, they were all there where they belonged, and it felt oddly wrong after so long in a man's body, but on a deeper level it felt absolutely, completely, incredibly right.

Her clothes were in the closet, next to Ben's, familiar and reassuring. She pulled her robe from the hook and put it on, slid her feet (her feet, her own size nines, not Ray's size elevens) into slippers, padded to the entrance to the kitchen.

Ben was at the stove, cooking breakfast, and something caught in her throat at the hominess, at the simple familiarity of it all. Then he looked up and their eyes met, and the feeling in her throat expanded, set her heart thumping wildly, threatened to leak from the corners of her eyes. Ben. Her Ben.

He was looking at her, and then he saw her, and the smile that broke across his face was as wide as the sky.

"Ben," she whispered. "It's me."

"I know, Rae, I know." In three long strides he crossed the kitchen and folded her in his arms; then he kissed her, long and sweet, and held her like he was never going to let her go. "Welcome home."

story notes and acknowledgements | Anima, the story of Ray's sojourn in Rae's world, by JS Cavalcante

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http://hieroglyfics.net/beingray.htm | written July 2006-November 2007 by Isis