Chapter 5

FIVE

The car junkie in Jamie had always dreamed about a high-speed chase through the streets of LA. Had seen it enough times in movies and on TV to imagine how it would go.

Predawn speeding down the interstate in a rented Outback was not the car chase of Jamie's dreams. Hell, they weren't even chasing anyone yet, and there weren't enough cars on the road to qualify for Bureau field training. The former LEO in him was glad for that. The amateur stunt driver was a little disappointed.

"Maybe ease up on the gas," Aidan gritted from the passenger seat beside him. "You're outrunning our backup."

He chanced a glance in the rearview mirror, confirming with his eyes what Aidan had told him. After a quick check forward, he chanced a glance at Aidan, confirming what the tone of his voice had also told him. Jaw tight, skin pale, Aidan was gripping the seat belt across his chest like his life depended on it. He still wasn't good with car chases of any variety. Fair, given his history with how they usually ended. Jamie itched to take his hand off the wheel and give his husband's thigh an encouraging squeeze, but that would probably only heighten Aidan's stress.

He eased off the gas instead and allowed the Bureau cruisers who'd joined them at the last major interchange to catch up, their lights flashing around the interior of the Outback. "Rick, any update?" Jamie asked of Aidan's colleagues on the other end of the open phone line. He and Matt were tailing their suspect in a black Charger with stolen tags toward LAX, as Aidan had suspected.

Or so they thought, until Matt swore.

Aidan leaned forward, white-knuckling the seat belt. "What's going on there?"

"They picked up the tail and diverted."

"Heading east on Imperial," Rick reported, the tracker's icon on the onscreen map confirming the same.

Aidan hit Mute. "I was wrong. More gas." Jamie hit the gas, and Aidan took them back off Mute. "Is it White behind the wheel? Is there anyone with him?"

"Only the driver in the car," Matt replied. "Heat signatures confirm. No positive ID, but by White's vitals, we should see his head over the headrest."

"We don't," Rick said before cursing too, his accent getting thicker by the second. "Exiting the freeway. North on Inglewood."

"Passing the exit for Western," Jamie called as they sped under the freeway sign.

"Take the next one onto Van Ness," Matt said. "Parallel us north."

"Confirmed," Jamie said, darting across lanes in time to exit. He slowed enough on the ramp for one of the cruisers with lights and sirens to take the lead through the intersection, clearing a path for them.

"We need to end this before they get into the neighborhoods or the cemetery," Matt said.

"We're headed toward the Forum," Aidan said. "Can we corner them in the parking lots there?"

"There or the stadium," Rick confirmed.

"Get someone on the horn," Matt called over the other radio to dispatch. "We need some gates opened."

By the time Jamie crossed the next intersection, three options had been identified, one settled on. "Left on West 108, Jamie," Rick said. "Then north on Crenshaw, then left on Pincay. One car will stay with you. The other is going to sweep north to Briarwood. Cut off the path there."

"Confirmed," Jamie said again, then hammered the gas, racing through Inglewood's streets, the lead cruiser's bright lights and loud sirens keeping their path clear. Before long, the sirens began to echo, Rick's and Matt's parallel path closing in. "It's almost over, Irish," Jamie said, keeping his eyes on the road and hands on the wheel but aware of Aidan's quickened breaths beside him. "Not long now."

The sun rose as they sped down Pincay, the sweeping angles of the gleaming oval stadium coming into view on the left, the storied red and white arena on the right, and dead ahead, a far-off vehicle quickly resolving into the black Charger they were all after. "Target in sight."

Then not, all sight momentarily gone, blotted out by the Charger's blinding high beams.

Aidan's "Oh god" threw Jamie back to an early morning in Galveston, Texas seven years ago. But unlike that morning when Jamie had had no idea of his surroundings, no backup, and limited room to maneuver, this morning was a different story. Just before being blinded, he'd glimpsed the familiar and relatively giant five-lane LA T-junction ahead, plus a cruiser flying down the intersecting street where one of the arena's gates had been opened. He could make this work.

Biting back the "Hold on" on the tip of his tongue, knowing that would hurtle Aidan even further back into the past, Jamie repeated his "Almost over" for Aidan, then hit the brakes, swinging the tail end of the Outback out and around. With a quick shift of the gears, he threw the car into reverse, the transmission making a grinding awful protest, but speed and inertia carrying them out of the way of the oncoming Charger and Rick's and Matt's cruiser. A blink later, Jamie's vision cleared, and he watched as the cruiser that had been behind them blocked the Charger's path forward, and with Rick and Matt on its tail, the Charger was forced left, into the path of the oncoming cruiser, the agent inside firing out the window at the Charger's tires. The Charger swung left, right into the parking lot where they wanted it.

By the time Jamie and Aidan caught up, Rick and Matt, together with their backup, had surrounded the Charger, all of the agents braced behind their doors, vests and safeties on. Jamie parked between two of the cruisers behind the Charger and obeyed Aidan's "Stay in the car." Not that he would risk the arrest by doing otherwise. Not his place anymore. But he did roll down the windows so he could hear what was going on.

"Hands where we can see them!" Matt shouted at the suspect, who must have complied, because Matt holstered his weapon and inched closer. "Where are the goods? "

"Trunk," came the reply, the voice masculine, but cracking... like a teenager's?

"Stand clear," Matt called to the other agents, then to the driver, "Open it."

The trunk popped open.

Jamie held his breath as Aidan approached the car. He reached into the trunk and removed a briefcase. The tracker icon on the phone's map moved farther away from the Charger with each step Aidan took back toward their vehicle.

"Tracker says that should be it," Jamie said as Aidan laid the briefcase on the hood. "Now, will the combo Parsons gave Danny work?"

Aidan spun the dials on the combination lock, and a click later, Aidan heaved a sigh of relief. "We got it." He closed the case, handed it through the window to Jamie with a small smile, then turned back to Matt and Rick.

And went rigid, every muscle of his back going stiff beneath the tee, vest, and FBI jacket he'd thrown on.

"Irish, what is it?"

No response.

Jamie glanced back out the windshield to where Rick was pulling the driver out of the Charger. Brown hair, light brown skin, lanky limbs, and clothes that were two sizes too big, the kid couldn't have been more than sixteen.

Aidan wavered on his feet, and Jamie bolted out of the car, orders be damned. Reaching Aidan's side, he wound an arm around his waist, steadying his worryingly pale husband. Was this about their conversation earlier? The topic of kids had been on their minds, but Aidan had handled juvenile cases before, and while yes, they could shake him up, Jamie had never seen him react like this. "Aidan, talk to me. You look like you've seen a ghost."

"I think I have," he said, voice a thready, pained thing, his autumn gaze trained on the stormy blue one glaring at him from beside the Charger. This wasn't about kids in general; it was about this kid in particular.

"You know him?" Jamie interpreted Aidan's silence as a yes. "Who is he?"

Aidan swallowed hard. "My godson, Angel Crane."