Chapter 7:

"Pop the trunk Karr," Knight said as he dropped down the steps outside the house in tracksuit bottoms and a workout vest. Karr obliged.

"Are we leaving already?"

"Nope."

"Then where are we going?"

"You are staying here, and keeping an eye on things. I am going for my morning run," Knight answered, pulling a heavy kitbag out of the cars trunk, and fastening it on. "Might get away with you driving alongside normally, but not when we're undercover."

"I suppose," Karr admitted grudgingly.

Knight shut the car's trunk, patting it as he did so. "I'll be back soon," he said, then ran down the driveway, and headed off down the street.

**************************************************

Brian rubbed his eyes tiredly as he settled down at the table. "What time did you get up?"

"Did I wake you?" Mia asked, her tone loving and amused at the same time.

Brian gave her a boyish grin. "No, but your absence did."

Dom looked up from the newspapers sports section. "Happy as I am that you make Mia happy, that was not something you want to say in front of her older brother."

Mia rubbed his bald head affectionately. "Go back to your paper."

Dom harrumphed, and returned to his reading as Jesse bounded in with his usual enthusiasm. "Hey Bri, is your friend up yet?"

"Haven't seen him Jess, why?" Brian asked, as Mia put breakfast in front of him.

Jesse flipped a chair round and straddled it. "I was hoping he'd let me have a peek under that Trans-am's hood. I wanna know what he's running under there," he said enthusiastically.

Brian grinned. "You and your engines."

Jesse coloured slightly and mumbled. "They calm me down a bit."

"Yeah I know man," Brian replied, tugging the beanie Jesse was wearing down over his eyes playfully. "I'll go see if he's up. He might not murder me for waking him up," he said.

Mia tutted slightly. "It'll go cold…"

Brian kissed her cheek. "No it won't," he answered before he headed into the sitting room. A few seconds later his voice came back . "He ain't here."

"His car still outside?" Dom called back, without looking up.

There was a bang and a muffled curse from Brian as he tripped over something. "Yeah."

"Then he'll be back," Dom said.

Brian shrugged as he came back in. "I know. Just isn't like him to be up this early."

"People change," Mia said softly. Just look at us."

"I guess," Brian said, smiling at her, then took a mouthful of his breakfast. "Mmh, this is good."

Mia gave him a grateful smile and headed back into the kitchen.

**************************************************

When Brian left for the Edge five minutes later, Knight was outside, doing pull-ups on one of the awning supports. "Hey man, when did you become such a fitness freak?"

"Life's all about self improvement Bri," Knight replied, not looking at him, or breaking rhythm. "Figured I needed to start taking care of myself a bit better."

"I guess," Brian grinned. "Still, it's not like you to be up before midday either."

Knight grunted in response, and dropped down from the support, and pulled off the kitbag. "Can't waste the whole day."

Brian gave him an "I'm not buying it" look. "Your full of it bro."

Knight shrugged as he pulled a towel from the bag and rubbed away the sweat from his workout. "You're gonna be late for work."

Brian checked his watch. "What are your plans for the day?"

"Nothing much really. Looking up a few friends maybe."

"Alright," Brian answered. "Meet me at the Edge about four. I'll take you to DT, show you around."

"Alright, cool," Knight nodded, stuffing his bag back in car's trunk. Brian slapped his shoulder and got into his Skyline. With a squeal of tires, the Nissan took off down the street and around the bend. Knight scratched the back of his neck and knelt beside Karr. "Anything to tell me?"

"Nothing."

"You were listening right?" Knight asked, his tone amused.

Karr made a snarling noise. "Of course."

"Alright. Call Michael, tell him that we've got into the street racing world here, and that we've earned the trust of the main suspects. I'm gonna get a shower."

The cars scanner rippled once in acknowledgement as Knight got to his feet and headed back indoors.

**************************************************

"Man this car is tight," Brian said as they pulled over. "I mean, for a domestic."

"You have no idea how special this car is," Knight replied, smiling slightly as he heard Karr's scanner ripple with pride. "This car can do all kinds of things."

"Uh huh," Brian said, with a disbelieving roll of his eyes. "C'mon, I'll show you round," he offered, shutting the Trans-am's door.

Knight nodded and muttered under his breath. "Keep your scanner's peeled, get all you can on the building," to Karr, then got out and followed Brian round to the entrance. The lower half of the building was painted white, a metal sign proclaiming "DT Garage" in big blue letters. Two caravans were parked behind the fence, to the left and the entrance to the garage was on the right. A black Civic was parked with its hood open, but Knight couldn't see who was working at it until Brian called out.

"S'up guys?"

"How you living, Chumpy?" Letty asked, popping her head out from the Civic's hood, her cheeks grimy with engine oil and sweat.

Knight raised an eyebrow and looked and Brian. "Chumpy? I thought your nickname was Bullitt?"

"Bullitt?" Letty asked incredulously. "Where the hell did you get that idea from?"

"Back in Miami, Brian got known as Bullitt, he was the man to beat," Knight explained, then looked puzzled as Letty almost killed herself laughing.

"Yo Dom, you heard this? Chumpy here gets called Bullitt in Miami!"

Brian gave his best 'little boy' grin as Dom came out of the small back office. "You gotta be kidding."

"I was running a Skyline then too bro," Brian offered.

Dom gave him a disbelieving look. "So what happened to it?"

"Cops got it with an ESD," Knight smirked. "Fried the electrics. One of the sweetest rides in the world and Brian still couldn't outrun them. Not like me."

"Now I know you're shittin' us, no way you'd escape the cops with your T-top, no matter how good it is, not if a Skyline couldn't," Dom replied.

Knight smirked. "I was running a BMW M3 CLS at the time. And had a bit of luck."

"No real racer relies on luck," Nyssa said quietly from the office doorway, giving Knight a distrustful look, before turning to Brian. "Can you run this order over to Harry's for me?"

"If you don't need me here, sure," Brian answered, looking at Dom. Dom grunted slightly. "We're quiet today, only the Civic to be worked on. Run it over to Harry's and take the afternoon off."

"Alright man, cool," Brian nodded. "I'll just give Knight the grand tour first."

Dom nodded in acknowledgement. "Back to the paperwork I guess. I hate paperwork."

"I take care of most of it for you," Nyssa reminded him. "So stop complaining."

Dom gave her a dirty look as Brian and Letty struggled to hide a grin. Brian grinned and punched Knight's arm. "Ok, so this is DT Garage. Little office at the back there. Tools here there, everywhere, and part displays. Upstairs there's a pretty much unused staff room, and a parts store, plus the odd car manual for reference, although those are used less often than the staff room."

"Not bad for its size," Knight offered.

Letty looked at him from where she was working. "Hey, we're the best in LA for tuning."

"I was expecting something a little more like Tej's place in Miami," Knight shrugged.

Brian shook his head. "Man, Tej's place is ridiculous, nothing there more than a couple of months old, best that money can buy. And while the first part may not be true here, the second is."

"So what are the trailers for?"

"Race wars," Brian said, with an air of mysticism. "Holy grail of street racers. Christmas and new year all rolled in to one."

"Sounds impressive," Knight said, glancing around, then back at the Civic. "Whose is that?"

"A client's," Letty said archly. "And its being a pain in the ass. Piston housings too tight, and so it isn't running smoothly."

Brian laughed as Knight gave her a blank look. "Let, that means nothing to Knight here. He knows nothing about engines."

Letty raised a curious eyebrow. "You're a racer, but you don't know engines? I mean, I know few work on their own engines, that's my job, but they know their engines well enough to know when something's wrong."

"I can do the odd bit of tuning," Knight said defensively. "Nothing major though I'm afraid. Just tweaking for best performance, leave the hard work to others. Way out of my league. I'm more about the racing than the engine."

"So it would seem," Letty replied, then turned back to the Civic's engine. Knight raised an eyebrow at her dismissiveness. "C'mon Chumpy, I'll drop you back at Harry's to pick up your Skyline."

Letty chuckled as Brian made a noise of protest, and started arguing with Knight as they walked out of DT.

**************************************************

Evening

**************************************************

"Where are you two going?" Dom asked, folding his arms across his chest.

Brian gave his best 'innocent' expression. "Just going to pick something up."

"An hour before races?" Dom asked suspiciously . "What are you two up to?"

Knight and Brian shared a look and answered at the same time. "Nothing."

"Right," Dom said, giving them a look that said he knew they were lying. "Don't be late for races."

Knight bristled slightly. "I'm not part of your team. Don't try pushing me around and telling me what to do."

"And don't try giving me back talk in my house," Dom replied, his jaw set. Knight narrowed his eyes at him slightly, but backed down, although there was an edge of sarcasm in his tone as he replied.

"So can we go?"

Dom gave him an 'I'm not amused' look. "Go on. Do whatever it is you plan to do, and get to races."

"We hear ya Dom," Brian grinned. "C'mon bro, let's go."

Knight shrugged and headed out of the house, not noticing the apologetic look Brian shot Dom before they headed out.

**************************************************

"Where we going bro?" Brian asked. "I mean, we're not far from Nyssa's place, and as Rome would say, these are some big old rich peoples homes."

"I know. My employer keeps a beach house here," Knight explained. "I'm crashing here while I'm in town. Even storing my Beemer for me," he grinned slightly. "Pretty cool right?"

He opened the Trans-am's window as they pulled up to an iron gate and punched buttons on the combination lock. With a mechanical whir, the gates opened, closing behind them after the Trans-am passed through and pulled up to the house, much more modest sized than Brian would have thought. "So what exactly do you do?"

"Bit of this, bit of that," Knight shrugged as the car pulled to a stop in the drive-way. "It's complicated."

"Complicated. Right," Brian said. "And what complication arose that you got to crash in a pad like this? Show off."

"Yeah, that's why I drive a Trans-am, rather than a flashy Skyline," Knight retorted, opening the garage door and punching in the alarm code. "If I recall, you were the one that used to show up and purge your nitrous to let everyone know you were there."

"Good times," Brian laughed. "Can't argue that one."

"Nope," Knight answered, a silent sigh of relief as he saw the BMW sitting silently in the garage, glad that Michael had come through with getting the car here to back up his story. He ran his hands down the car's bodywork lovingly before pulling a large dust cover over the machine. Brian frowned. "You aren't trading cars while we're here?"

"Nah," Knight replied. "She hasn't been run in a while, needs to be checked out before I race her again. I just came for the keys. May get Jesse to take a look at her though so that I have the option."

Knight closed the garage back up, hoping Brian hadn't realised he was lying as he locked up. Moments later, he was back with Karr, rolling the sleek black car down the driveway and hit the streets.

End of Chapter 7…