Chapter 48

The blinking neon sign read vacancy. Leon pulled into the parking lot of the rundown motel seeking a little peace and quiet for the night. He got out of his car and set the alarm to be on the safe side. He really didn't need some stupid kid making off with his wheels. In the center of the one level motel sat a small office. He rang the bell and waited for a few minutes before the elderly manager made her way to the counter, "May I help you?"

"Yes ma'am I need a room."

"Do you need that on the hourly basis or for the night?" The woman said while looking him over.

"For the night please." Leon always remembered his manners with the elderly woman. She reminded him of his own grandmother.

"So sweet young man, we don't see many like you in here. I have room 108 available, out the door and to the right."

After signing the registration, he took the key from the manager and headed for his room. The room was modestly decorated with furniture from the 1960s and the air conditioner sounded like it was about to quit at anytime, but it would do for the night. He stripped down to his boxers and slid into the worn sheets. The flashing neon sign faded as sleep came fast.

Just as Dom had expected, Letty was waiting at the door when he came home. "Which bitch were you fucking tonight?"

He shook his head and prepared for the all night fight, "How many times do I have to tell you that I ain't with nobody but you? Damn Letty you got to lay off me. If I'm not glued to you ass I'm fucking around."

Sky walked in the door and did her best to get him out of the sticky situation, "Let...girl. He had to come rescue me again. I laid my bike down."

Her anger turned to concern, "Damn you alright?"

"Yeah just a bruised ego. Where's Leon? I need to talk to him."

"He didn't come home. I thought he was with you."

Sky bowed her head and walked up the stairs without commenting. All of her complaining had pushed him away again. It took everything she had not to run to her room and cry. Things were not going the way she had hoped and it looked like there was no hope of fixing the broken relationship.

The morning light brought an end to an uneasy night for many in the team. Sky wondered where Leon was and more importantly who he was with. She regretted going off on him. In her mind it was probably too late to fix things. At 5am with no luck falling asleep, Sky pulled herself out of bed and jumped into the shower. Noticing that the team was still asleep, she slipped out of the house and headed to work.

Dom and Letty had argued most of the night before making up the way they always did. Mia didn't get much rest listening to them go at it, not like she slept much lately. Every time she laid her head on the pillow Brian filled her thoughts. She heard Sky fire up her car and take off. She slid out of her bed happy hoping to see Brian at the store later for lunch.

Vince was sure that Brian was a cop and it pissed him off that Dominic believed the punk over him. He pulled the covers off and stomped to the bathroom wanting to get a hot shower to wake him up. Unfortunately, He was the last to rise from bed and all that was left after the three women of the team took their showers was ice cold water. He decided to forgo the shower and make them suffer from the smell of his dirty armpits.

Jess and Leon were hard at work on the engine to the Supra when Sky pulled into the bay of the garage. Jess greeted her, but Leon didn't even look up from the piece he was working on. She took that as a sign to not even bother trying to smooth things over. Her attention needed to be on her car anyways she told herself. After wheeling a toolbox over to her car she went to work tuning for the upcoming races.

Friday morning finally rolled around. Mia could barely contain the excitement of her date that night with Brian. The rest of the team was off at the garage working on cars and preparing for the night's heist. Mia had the house to herself for a change. She tried on some twenty outfits until she decided on a dark blue dress that revealed just enough cleavage.

Jesse, Leon, and Letty worked together on the engine of the Supra fine tuning while Dom and Brian worked on getting the car set for the motor. Sky felt like the outsider. Two days had gone by without a word utter between her and Leon. She spent her days quietly working on the customers' cars allowing the rest of the team to concentrate on the Supra in order to have it ready for Race Wars.

"You have plans for tonight?" Dom glared at Brian from inside the engine compartment of the Supra.

"I'm taking her to dinner."

"You break her heart; I'll break your neck."

"That's not going to happen."

"Let's go for a ride."

Brian figured Dom wanted to take him somewhere, kill him, and dump the body, but he went anyway. They took the RX-7. Brian was surprised when they pulled up to the Toretto house. Dom got out and opened the garage door revealing a black Dodge Charger. Brian held his breath as he looked at the car, one of the finest machines to ever come out of Detroit. "900 horse of Detroit muscle," he heard Dom say with pride in his voice. As Dom told the story of his dad's death Brian began to get a better understanding of the man. He felt guilty for deceiving Dom and the team. Brian's lies were starting to eat at him.

The undercover house was buzzing with activity when Brian showed up for his usual debriefing. Bilkens was in a particularly bad mood and decided Brian made an excellent target for his rage, "So O'Conner did you get anything or are you having too much funscrewing Toretto's sister?"

"Excuse me. For you information, I'm not having sex with anyone and if I was it would be none of your business." Brian countered back.

"Is the kid giving me flack? Doesn't speak much for police FBI relations?" Bilkens directed his questions at Tanner.

Tanner did his best to calm the situation, "Let's take it easy and go over what Intel Brian has gathered. We'll see where we are in the investigation."

"Toretto is not behind the truck jackings. I'm sure of it. I think he knows whose doing it, but I haven't been able to crack him. He doesn't trust many people."

Bilkens' temper began rising, "This is all you have. Didn't I tell you not to come back here unless you had information we could use?"

"Hey look I'm trying my best. If the case was so easy to crack you'd have solved it long ago, so back off and give me a few more days." Brian stood up and walked out of the house. He didn't look back leaving Tanner standing by the pool.

The restaurant was aglow from the small red candles on each table. It gave the room a romantic feeling. Brian stared at Mia as he sipped his coffee. He set the cup down on the table and went to work on Mia. "So how did the gang come to be?"

"Gang? They don't call themselves a gang. There're a team; they call themselves a team."

"So how did the team come to be?"

"We it's a lot of history." Mia didn't want to spend the rest of her date talking about the team and all of their stuff. She wanted Brian to concentrate on her.

"I got time."

"Well Vince grew up with my brother. Well, he hasn't grown up, but you know what I mean. Letty lived down the street from us. Always into cars since she was ten years old so Dom had her attention and when she turned sixteen she…"

"She had his." Brian finished the sentence for her.

"Funny how that happens."

"What about Jesse, Leon, and Sky?"

"That's even more complicated. Sky, as you know, is Vince's cousin. But it turns out that her and Leon lived across from each other when they were kids. Some bad things happened and they ran away together to L.A., but got separated soon after getting here. Sky was sent away when the cops caught her. A few years later Leon and Jesse showed up on our doorstep and never left."

"That is a lot of history."

"It's like my brother is gravity, everything is pulled to him even you."

"You pulled me in, being friends with you brother is just a perk."

"It feels good to come first for a change. You want to get out of here?"

"Definitely."

Leon watched as Sky pulled open the sunroof of Letty's car and prepared to fire the spear gun to remove the passenger windshield of the truck. His breath caught in his throat as he waited for her to pull the window and get safely back into her seat. Dom pulled his car up in front of the truck and Letty moved to the side. The scanners were still clear as Vince made the leap onto the truck. The heist went off without a hitch. Leon was ready to stop jacking the trucks. He felt the team was taking too big of a risk continuing. Anyone of them might be killed on the next run. He wasn't so much worried about himself as he was about the people he loved.

"Hey Sky." Leon called out to her as she exited the Civic. "Ride back with me?"

"Sure." Sky slid into his passenger seat.

Alone on the highway he had his chance to talk. "We can't do this anymore."

"Do what?"

"Jacking the trucks, it's too dangerous."

Sky sank down in her seat. She had hope he wanted to mend things not talk about the trucks. "It's Dom's call."

"No. You're risking your life. It's gotta end."

"I can't let the team down. There's only one more job lined up that I know of."

"One more job is one too many."

"Let's not argue about it ok."

Leon pulled the car to the side of the road, "No more arguing if you don't do it anymore."

"Leon you can't ask me to turn my back on the team."

"I'm not. Just have someone else do it."

"There is no one else."

Leon pulled the car back onto the road. The remainder of the ride was silent. When they reached the city limits he reached over and took her hand in his. It was a small gesture, but enough for her. Leon drove them to the garage to spend a few more precious hours making up for lost time.