Title: Making a Choice

Author: Lysa-uk

Feedback: Please do, If you want it, ask first, and it's yours

Rating: T

Summary: Can Ed persuade Danny to make an important decision?

Disclaimer: These characters do not belong to me, they belong to Gary Scott Thompson/Universal Studio's/NBC and everyone else who isn't me.

Notes: This is my very first 'Las Vegas' fanfic. I have a number of fics archived, but they are all Buffy, so this is new for me. This is set a few days after the events of 'Silver Star', without having seen the episode after. I love the whole dynamic between Danny and Mary, their friendship and relationship, so this is kind of about that. I don't know if I've pulled it off, some of it may seem out of character, but I am interested in adding another chapter or two of this if anyone wants to read it.


The surveillance room was quiet, which was good, because that was just how Danny McCoy liked it. There were still people milling around watching the hundreds of monitors that covered the room, everyone at their own stations with their own areas to concentrate on, just like always, but he was alone at this console.

He was sat in the middle of the room, the place Mitch usually occupied, the wall of video screens just in front of him. He had sent the other guy out a half hour ago, lying through his teeth by citing that he just needed to go through a few things for Ed, and that he could go for a break if he wanted and Danny would cover for him. Danny hoped that he wouldn't be back any time soon.

There didn't seem to be anything going on down in the casino, which was a good thing, considering how much attention Danny was paying to it. As in, he wasn't paying any at all. He was paying more attention to the more than familiar girl sitting at one of the tables in Bella Sera.

Mary Connell.

God, she was beautiful. He had always known that, so why had it taken him so long to do something about it? Why did it take nearly being killed to make him see what he wanted so much?

Her waved hair was hanging around her tanned shoulders and bare arms. She was concentrating on something in front of her that Danny couldn't quite see, but it looked like paperwork, while the pencil in one of her hands tapped the table in a rhythm.

He was thankful that there weren't any distractions today. There always seemed to be something happening somewhere in a resort like this. Or, actually, three or four something's all at the same time. That usually meant noise, and noise meant people and trouble, usually of the criminal kind, and that was definitely not where his head was right now. Problems meant talking, yelling, phones ringing, running around and usually violence. It meant checking surveillance footage over and over again, and Ed Deline on his back. For the moment, he was happy being here alone, no Mike relaying the specifics of the latest 'Engineering Weekly' or whatever the hell it was he read, and no whales with outrageous requests to see him in swimming shorts. That was something he'd only do once.

Well, maybe 'happy' wasn't exactly the right word. He was nowhere near happy, hadn't been for the past few days, and seriously doubted he ever would be again. Not that he was being melodramatic in any way, but losing the only person he had ever felt any kind of connection to tended to bring out the negativity in him.

He hadn't really slept much in the past few days, not since Mary had… He didn't finish the thought, because thinking about what had happened between them made it feel like someone was ripping into his chest with a blunt pair of garden shears. He wasn't big on sleep, anyway, even before the recent spell back in the Marines. This job wasn't exactly nine to five, and he liked that, he had gotten used to it a long time ago, but lately it had been worse. No sleep equalled cranky Danny, as some of his friends had dubbed him lately, and he thought that maybe he needed something with routine, like that job at the construction firm that his father still managed to drop into the conversation every time they talked.

Maybe he should have taken that job back when he had first been offered it. Maybe he should have just said 'thanks, dad, that'd be great', without ever considering the Marines. That would have meant that he had never left Mary back then, not run away from what was happening – or starting to happen – between them. He considered, for just a minute, packing up his life in the Montecito, walking right out of that door and going to his old house and telling his father that he was ready. But he couldn't, because as much as he loved his father, he didn't deserve to be saddled with someone whose heart lied elsewhere.

Despite his problems, Danny loved his job, he loved this room, he loved every part of the Montecito, and he loved everyone who worked within its confines. Maybe that feeling was just temporary, and it was possible he might change his mind sometime in the future, but right now, this is where he felt like he belonged, however hard it was for him.

And it was hard. It wasn't the greatest situation when you and your ex worked in the same place. It was hard because he saw Mary everywhere he looked. Granted, that was his own fault when he'd been using the surveillance equipment to track her every move since she had given him the engagement ring back, but still.

That reminded him…

The engagement ring.

He fished into his pants pocket, taking out the diamond band he'd kept on him ever since she'd given it back, just so he could touch it and feel it whenever things got really bad, just to remind him of what he'd had and lost. He held it in the light of the lamp that sat on the desk in front of him. The light reflected off the facets, glinting at him, taunting and laughing at him almost, and he figured maybe he had been here for too long if inanimate objects were making fun of him.

He wished he could just throw the ring away – or, considering how much it had cost, put it back in the box and pawn it sometime when he was short on cash. But Mary had been worth it. He would have paid it ten times over, a hundred times over, because she meant more to him than anyone else ever had, or ever would, and he'd wanted her to know that. But he did wish that he could forget about it, forget about Mary and what they could have had.

But he couldn't.

His eyes were drawn back to the screens ahead of him, watching her as the pencil she was holding came to her hair, twirling around a few locks of it to make it curl when she let go to write something on the paper in front of her.

She was dressed in black today. In fact, if his memory recalled, she had been wearing the same colour for the past few days, ever since they got back from L.A. Actually, looking down at his shirt and pants, and then at the jacket that was hanging over the back of his chair, he realised that he had been doing the same. He wasn't sure if it was conscious or subconscious, but it was like he was going through some kind of mourning period, and he wondered if she felt the same.

Today she was wearing black pants and a black tank top, detailed with tiny sparkling sequins around the v-shaped neckline that showed just the smallest hint of cleavage. It was driving him crazy because he actually knew how amazing she looked underneath, could see it when he closed his eyes, could imagine how her skin felt under his touch and how she smelt. He felt his jaw clench when he thought of it never happening again.

She had been in Bella Sera for a while now, flicking through pages that looked like entertainment requests and programmes, sipping on iced mineral water, and he knew how long she'd been there because he'd been watching her all day, ever since she'd gotten to work this morning. He'd barely seen the outside of this room in the past few days, other than when he was arriving or leaving. Any problems on the floor had been attended by Mike or Ed, or Danny had radioed for security to handle it, and nobody had really questioned it, which surprised him, because he was usually the first person down there. But in here, he could sit in a corner and use the monitor that he could turn around and move so that no one else could see, use it to watch as she sashayed down a hall or across the casino, watch how every guy in the room turned to look at her, and how she was completely oblivious to it.

He could also watch how she kept using her thumb to rub the finger where the engagement ring had been not so long, and he wondered if she even knew she was doing it. She'd do it when she was talking with guests, or when she was reading through her programme, or when she was having lunch with the girls, like she had done today. She had sat with Delinda, Sam and Nessa out by one of the cabanas, picking at a salad with a fork but never actually eating anything, touching that finger so much that Delinda had reached across the table to take her hand, and he wished he could have heard what they were saying because he could feel his ears burning.

The girls knew now what had happened between them, which was good because when they first found out the engagement was off they'd come straight after him. Judging by the looks he had received from some of the other employees, pretty much everyone in the casino thought it was his fault, but he was okay with that. The girls, though, they were pissed. They had all asked him why, asked him how he could do it to Mary when he knew how much she loved him, and he hadn't said anything because they wouldn't have believed whatever he had told them. After everything that happened, after all that they knew of his and Mary's relationship, he was the one they thought most likely to break her heart, and he had to say, if he was looking at things from their point of view, he'd be thinking the same thing. Now they knew the truth, and they had all apologised, but he didn't mind, because at least he knew that Mary had them to rely on, and knowing she was okay was the only thing that was keeping him together.

But how could she be? That was what he didn't get. She was the one who, for the past year, had made it perfectly obvious what she wanted from him. She wanted him to face up to their past, and to what he had been hiding from all of this time. And when he did face it, what did she do? She tore out his heart and stamped on it with her six inch stiletto Jimmy Choo heels, squishing it into the expensive upholstery of the casino, or that's how it felt. Had she been waiting to do this since he had left all those years ago when he joined the Marines? Was this some kind of payback?

He already knew the answer to that. Mary wasn't that person. He had lived in Vegas his whole life, met more liars and cheaters than he cared to remember, and she wasn't like that. Mary was sweet, and honest, and loyal, and loving, and she'd do anything to help anyone, and he knew that she wouldn't do that to him. He wouldn't have blamed her if she did, but she wasn't that person.

His eyes found her on the screen above again, watching as she smiled, not her wide, bright smile that showed perfect lips and perfect teeth and made her cheeks dimple in the most adorable way, but still, a smile, maybe the first he'd seen since they got back. Then he saw her talking, and he realised that he had pushed in on her image so much that he couldn't see anything else. He let one of his hands hover over the keyboard in front of him, let his fingers tap in a sequence, and the image widened.

And he didn't like what he saw.

He had been so deep in thought that he hadn't seen the guy who had been sat at the bar earlier who was now approaching her.

The guy was about thirty or so, from what he could see, with dark hair cut close to the scalp. He had brown eyes, tanned skin, and what looked like a pretty good body underneath his Gucci pants, sports coat and white shirt, not that Danny was looking, of course. And he was drinking a Lite Beer.

Danny laughed to himself condescendingly. A Lite Beer? Please. But he wasn't laughing when the guy pulled out the chair next to Mary and sat down, smiling, and chatting away to her. He recognised the guy now as one of Sam's high rollers, remembered him from a couple of months ago when he had lost fifty grand at the blackjack tables, and he couldn't suppress the smirk that came to his face.

But he only had picture here, no sound. Where was Mike when you needed him? He wished the other guy was here to run down there and plant a microphone or two so he could hear the conversation. Whatever it was, it must be good, because she was still smiling, and coquettishly lowering her head and blushing, and he wanted to go down there and punch the bastard, even more so when the guys brushed his hand over hers on the table and she hadn't moved away.

Walk away, Danny mentally urged, his fingers rapping on the desk in front of him, obviously frustrated, until he sharpened the image so he could look closer at the two of them, trying to read their lips and minds. It didn't take much with the rich guy in the suit, not with the way his eyes kept travelling over Mary's body, and the way he was reaching out to touch her hair, briefly but intimately, something he used to like doing because he loved the smell and the feel of it against his skin.

"What's going on?" A voice asked, and Danny instantly recognised it as belonging to his boss. He palmed the ring that still sat in his hand, closing his fingers around it tightly as he quickly typed in a sequence on the keyboard to disappear the screen that he had been watching so intently.

"Uh…" Danny said nervously, the image of the Mary and the loser in Bella Sera being replaced with that of one of the roulette tables in play. "Uh…not much," he mumbled, his arm coming up to wipe away the beads of sweat that were forming on his forehead with his shirt sleeve.

"Good," Ed commented, looking around the room, his eyes narrowing. "Did I give everyone the day off or somethin'?"

"What?" Danny asked, following his eyes across the room with a confused expression.

"Mitch, Mike…" he said, "Where are they?"

"I sent Mitch on a coffee break," Danny informed him. "And Mike is down at valet. Some problem with a limo breaking down."

Danny watched his boss, guilt written all over his face, as Ed came over to the desk he was sitting at. The older man pulled out the black leather chair next to him, and sat down.

"Everything looks pretty quiet," Ed said.

"It is," Danny agreed. "We had a snatch-and-run earlier. Security caught it. Metro took the guy away."

Ed nodded to himself, leaning back in the comfortable chair that had been sat in far too many times, swinging it slowly from side to side as he watched the young man. The former Marine was sweating, he could see the beads of perspiration forming on his forehead, despite his earlier attempts to hide it. He could see the young mans eyes flicking over the screens in front of them, anything from Bella Sera suspiciously missing. He could see the boy's hands shaking, something gripped tightly in one of them, while the other ran over the keyboard, and Ed guessed this was him trying to look busy.

"She, uh," Ed began warily, "She's a beautiful girl, Danny."

Danny turned his boss, confusion and panic on his face. "Huh?" he asked.

Ed reached to his right side, pulling the surveillance system at the other end of the desk over to him. He quickly ran a sequence over the keys, and with a beep the image of Mary and the guy in Bella Sera came up onto the screens in front, stretching over the entire wall in a way that made Danny pull away a little, exhale loudly and fall back in his chair.

"I, uh…" he said nervously, stumbling over his words and shooting worried looks at the former CIA man. "I was just—"

"Like I said," Ed began, leaving the image on the screen and watching Danny's reaction, watching the way his eyes didn't leave the girl in front of him, "She's a beautiful girl. If you're gonna break up with someone who looks like that, you've gotta expect some other guy to make his move."

"Why does everyone think it's my fault?" Danny asked, his eyes and an angry expression directing towards Ed.

Ed put his hands up in a defensive, passive gesture. "Sorry," he apologised. "I just assumed—"

"Yeah," Danny snapped, "Just like everyone else in this place."

"Hey, kid," Ed said, leaning forward to rest his elbows on the desk. "I didn't mean anything by it. I just—"

"It's okay," Danny said, shaking his head and letting out a long, slow breath, his expression changing from charged to weary. "Don't worry about it."

Ed watched the screen for a second, before looking back. "We haven't seen you on the floor much recently," he commented.

"Yeah," Danny agreed. "It's just…I thought it would be easier if I stayed out of the way for a while, you know?" he said. "Kept a low profile?"

"You mean you didn't want to run into Mary?" Ed translated.

"Something like that," Danny told him. "It's too hard. For both of us."

"You wanna talk about it?" Ed asked.

"I really, really don't," Danny said.

"You sure?" the older man asked. "Because sometimes it helps."

"Is it gonna change what happened?" Danny asked. "Because if it isn't, I really don't think there's a point."

"Why don't you listen to someone who's got a years on you, okay?" Ed said. "I don't exactly go offering my services to all my employees. If I make you an offer, you take it, simple as that."

"You're threatening me?" Danny asked sceptically.

"I was kinda hoping it wouldn't come to that," Ed told him.

"Look, she broke it off, okay?" Danny said, obviously irritated. "Can we just leave it at that?"

"I'm afraid not," Ed said. "I'm struggling to understand what happened here, Danny, I really am. One minute the girls are telling me you're in L.A. to elope, and the next I find out it's all off."

"Elope, huh?" Danny asked. "I guess now I understand what all of those billboards were about."

"They wanted to do something nice for you both," Ed explained.

"I know," Danny said. "But it just kind of made it worse when she gave me this back…" His hand came to the table, his fingers releasing the item trapped within it, the ring sitting in his palm, the indent of the diamond imprinted into his reddened skin.

"Danny, that girl," Ed said, pointing to the screen in front of them, "She loves you. No matter how much I tried to talk it out of her while you were away, she does, that much is obvious."

"But she thinks it's not right," Danny said. "That's what she said. That she loved me, but that sometimes things just don't work out, even if you want them to. And then she walked away."

"And you didn't go after her?"

"Why would I?" Danny asked.

"Here's the thing I've learned about women, son," Ed said, "When they walk away, sometimes all they want is for you to go after them."

"You're saying it's like a test?"

"Sometimes," Ed said. "Do you agree with her?"

"About it not being right?"

"Yeah."

"No."

"Then why did you let her walk away?"

Danny's face fell, his eyes flickering from the video wall, from the girl smiling, down to the ring on the table. "Because she deserves better than me," he said seriously. "She deserves more than what I can give her. She deserves the best. I'm just not sure I can give her that."

"And you don't think that maybe she should be the one who makes that decision?" Ed asked. "You didn't even give her the choice, Danny. You let her walk away, probably believing that you agree with what she said."

"I don't," Danny told him. "If I believe anything…it's that Mary and I are supposed to be together, and I know she believes it, too, in her heart."

"Then why did she say what she did?"

"Because…" he said exhaustedly, "She knows me too well. She knows that when I'm scared, when I don't want to deal with something…I run away. I did it when we were younger. I did it when I came back and I couldn't deal with happened over there. I did it when you told me about the Silver Star thing."

"She thinks you're going to run away from her?"

"Yeah," Danny said sadly. "She thinks that when things get tough, I'll leave."

"And you don't think you will?"

"I know I'll want to," Danny admitted. "But she means too much to me to walk away, you know? If those few days in L.A. taught me anything, it's that I don't want to ever be apart from her, that no matter where I go, I'm always gonna come back to her."

"And you think that's fair on her?"

"Of course I don't," Danny told him. "Why do you think I'm staying away? She thinks that when I came back, I proposed to her because I didn't want to die without having something to show for my life. She believes it's a reflex thing, to rush into something with her because I'm scared to be alone. She thinks I just want someone in my life to take my mind off the nightmares and everything that happened over there."

"I have to say," Ed commented, "Not that it's any of my business, but those thoughts did occur to me. Danny, I've been where you are now, but when I came back to Jillian, it was because I knew, without a doubt, that she was the one for me. I knew that I loved her, that she's the only one I'll ever love."

"It's that thing, isn't it?" Danny asked with a smile.

"What thing?" Ed asked, confused.

"What's the line, 'when you realise you want to spend the rest of your life with someone, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible'."

"Why does that sound familiar?"

"'When Harry Met Sally'," Danny said.

"The movie?"

"Yeah," Danny told him.

"This may come as a surprise, Danny, but I'm not really the chick flick type, you know?"

"And you think I am?"

"You're the one pulling quotes out of your hat."

"Mary must have made me watch that movie a million times over the years," he said. "I think she was trying to drop me a hint."

"It's one of Jillian's favourites," Ed said with a smile. "Delinda's, too."

"Is that how you felt?" Danny asked him. "When you were away?"

"Oh, yeah," Ed told him. "Absolutely no question, but we're not talking about me. What about you, kid?" he asked, his eyes on the screen in front of him. "Do you love her?"

"How do I know?" Danny asked desperately.

"I can't tell you that," Ed informed him. "What do you feel when you look at her?"

"She makes me feel like love is more than just the way my heart races when I see her or the way my palms sweat and my hands shake," Danny said fondly, his eyes hazing over and a smile coming to his face. "It's something that I can feel running through my veins, that I can feel consuming me. It makes me want to protect her from everything, and I know that I'd die for her. All I want is for her to be safe and happy. It makes me want to be a better person.

"When I was away, she was the only thing I thought about. She was the thing that kept me alive, that made me want to be alive. She's the reason, you know?"

"For what?"

Danny smiled, his eyes sparkling. "For everything," he said simply.

"Well, kid," Ed said, "If that ain't love, then I don't know what is."

"Maybe so," Danny allowed. "But that doesn't mean I'm going to do anything about it."

"And why the hell not?" Ed asked, his expression a mixture between angry and bewildered.

"I've known that girl my whole life," Danny said emotionally. "And she has been through too much for me to screw up her life now. Mary didn't have…the greatest childhood. She put up with a lot. So much that even I'm surprised by how amazing she turned out."

"She had you in her life," Ed said. "Of course she was going to turn out great."

"Are you kidding? If anything, it's the other way around. She's my best friend in the whole world. Don't get me wrong, Mike, Delinda, Sam, Nessa…even you… You're all great friends, really, but Mary… I know that no matter how awkward things may be between us now, she'll still be there for me, she'll still be my friend at the end of everything. And vice versa. I can't risk that."

"You have to."

Danny turned to his boss, "What do you mean?"

Ed pointed to the screen, "Look at her, Danny," he told him. When Danny looked uncertainly from him to the video screen, and than back again. "I mean, really look at her," he said firmly.

Danny's eyes settled on the girl in front of him, the girl he knew better than he knew himself. "I'm looking at her," he said. "I'm also looking at that guy making his move on her."

"Don't worry about him," Ed said, waving a hand in the air.

"Why not?"

"You don't remember him?

"I know he's one of Sam's clients."

"And you think he's interested in Mary?"

"You think he isn't?"

"I think she has two things he's not really into, and missing one thing he really kind of is into."

"Meaning?"

"Figure it out, Danny." He watched the perplexed young guy. "He's gay. He's down here because he fell for one of our dealers the last time he visited. Apparently some long distance romances do actually work out."

"He's…" Danny's jaw fell, before a smile took over his face. "Oh. Great."

"Can we get back on topic now?"

"Sure."

"Do you love her?"

Danny's smile faded, that pained expression back in full force. "Yes."

"Then, kid," Ed told him. "You've gotta make a choice."

"A choice?"

"You have to decide if you can live every single day without her in your life," he said solemnly. "You have to decide if you can have her as a friend and nothing else, if you can see her every day, but never know how it feels to have her in your arms, to hold her hand and kiss her. You have to decide if being her friend is gonna be enough for you. You have to decide if you can live with seeing her with another guy, because even if it isn't that guy, there's gonna be someone else just waiting to take that place. You have to decide if you love her enough to fight for her."

Ed let himself fall back, his spine resting against the comfortable black leather. "So what's it gonna be?" he asked, turning to the younger man.

There was no one there. The only thing he saw was the matching black chair spinning on its axle after its occupant had made a quick exit, and a glance at the desk confirmed the engagement ring had gone.

Ed grinned to himself. "That's what I thought."

His fingers tapped in a familiar sequence on the keyboard still in front of him, adjusting the screen with the joystick to follow the figure now running down the stairwell out of the surveillance area, through the blank, concrete hall and through the door onto the main casino floor. He followed him as he ran through the blackjack tables, the roulette wheels, the players and the dealers, past the coffee shop and the gift shop until he appeared in front of Bella Sera.

He watched as Mary continued her conversation with the guy in front of her, totally oblivious to the man standing just a few feet away. That was until, however, she caught a glimpse of him out of the corner of her eye, whatever she was saying forgotten as she trailed off.

He watched as she stood up, taking a few steps back, as Danny approached her, taking long, purposeful strides with a look in his eyes that was pure determination. He watched as the man finally met her, watched as Mary was obviously struggling to breathe, tears springing into her eyes as Danny reached up and brushed a lock of hair away from her face, tucking it behind her ear with tenderness, before it moved to her cheek, a smile on his face that said exactly what he had been trying to drum into the kid all through their talk.

He watched as Danny cupped her face, his free hand coming to rest on her other cheek as he said something to her, something Ed couldn't quite distinguish without any sound, and his view partially obstructed. He watched as Danny touched his lips to hers gently, and that was when he switched off.

"Good for you, kid," he said to himself with a smile, the many monitors in front of him switching to different views from all over the casino. "Good for you."