Disclaimer - I don't own the Miami characters - sadly, they belong to Jerry Bruckheimer and CBS. I do own Tim's wife and son, though and any other characters I might introduce as this little story progresses.

Rating – PG

Summary - Horatio finds one day that nothing is as he thought.

Eric Delko sat in his department-issued Hummer, tapping his fingers nervously against the steering wheel as he waited for a light to turn green. Just a little more than two hours ago, he'd been sure of a few things in his life - he loved his job, loved his girlfriend even more and was ready to propose to her. He'd been sure he'd lost his best friend in the world five years earlier - on the floor of a jewelry store in downtown Miami.

But Calleigh had just put his entire life into a tailspin with three small words, "Tim is alive." She hadn't asked him to go to New Orleans, and he hadn't asked her permission. He simply accepted Tim and Leanna's address from Calleigh and drove home to pack a bag. Now, he was turning into the long-term parking lot at Miami Dade International, anticipating the plane ticket that was waiting for him at the counter.

What would he do when he saw Speed for the first time? Part of him wanted to deck the bastard for putting them all through this nightmare. The other part of him wanted to gather his best friend in his arms, and hug him until neither had any air left in their lungs. His emotions ran the gambit from intense anger to gratefulness and back again.

He pulled into an empty parking spot and shut the Hummer off. He rested back in his seat and sighed. What would he do when he saw Tim Speedle again?

Horatio used the extra key Leanna had given him to open the kitchen door and step inside. The house was quiet and he assumed Leanna might be taking a nap. She'd told him earlier that morning that she was taking Nicholas to pre-school and then had some errands to run. He dropped his keys on the baker's rack near the door and opened the refrigerator door to pull out one of Tim's cold beers.

He pulled the tab to open the beer, and was about to take a sip when he heard something. A low, deep, throaty groan. A chill ran down his spine. It went without saying that Leanna's voice wasn't that deep. It was a man's voice - and when he heard it again, he unholstered his gun from his side. With precision and years of training, he took the stairs leading to the second floor quietly, pausing just outside the door to Tim and Leanna's bedroom.

One hand was on the doorknob, ready to throw the door open and kill the intruder when he heard Leanna's voice. "God, Tim!" she cried out.

"Let it go, baby," Horatio heard him answer passionately, "just let go."

Horatio shook his head and would have laughed if his heart hadn't been racing nine hundred miles an hour. He leaned back against the wall before making his way back downstairs.

"Did you hear that?" Tim whispered.

Leanna shook her head, a sleepy, satisfied grin crossing her face. "Can't hear, can't feel my toes..."

Tim rolled away from her and pulled on his boxer shorts. He dug a small key out of Leanna's jewelry box and used it to open the nightstand drawer. He took out his gun, sliding the clip located in the second drawer into the bottom of the nine-millimeter pistol.

"Lea, stay here," he commanded.

"Sex suddenly turns you into Rambo?" she teased, shrugging into her robe. "Give me the gun, Tim."

"What?" he asked incredulously.

"Oh please," she said with an eye roll, holding her open palm out to him. "You want me to break out the statistics for how many times I've been shot versus how many times you've been shot?"

Tim narrowed his eyes at his wife. "What makes you so damned sure I cleaned it?"

"Cause I'd kick your sorry ass if you ever tried that again," she explained with a shrug.

Tim opened the bedroom door slowly, instinctively holding one arm out to shield Leanna as the two made their way downstairs. He kept the gun trained in front of him, his eyes sweeping the familiar hallways and rooms of his own, preparing himself to come face to face with Bruckson, or worse.

"Don't shoot, it's just me," Tim heard Horatio say from the kitchen. The couple made their way into the doorway to find Horatio grinning at them.

"You damn near gave me a heart attack, H," Tim complained, leaning against the doorframe.

"No more than you gave me earlier," Horatio shot back, eyeing his former protege's attire - or lack thereof. "I'm not speaking to you until you go put some clothes on."

"Ha, Ha, Ha," Tim laughed sarcastically before making his way back upstairs.

"What did you find out?" Leanna asked, opening the refrigerator door and taking out a bottle of water.

"Jack Collins is an ass," Horatio said, shaking his head with dismay.

Leanna laughed. "I could have told you that."

"He knows everything, Lea," Horatio sighed, "everything."

She didn't look as shocked as he thought he should - she looked more like she'd known all along and was hiding it from him. "Leanna?" he demanded.

Leanna scratched her forehead and took a deep breath. "I suspected that he did. I had nothing to prove it, and Tim categorically denied it over and over. There was just something about him I couldn't trust."

"Your instincts were always good, Lea." He glared at her. "Is there anything else you've been keeping from me?"

Leanna's eyes darted to the floor. "I think Jack's a mole."

Horatio smiled softly - he'd already reached the same conclusion. Jack Collins was in on this - somehow, someway. "And he said your skills were slipping."

Her green eyes went wide with anger. "If I ever get my hands on that jerk..."

"What jerk?" Tim asked, coming back into the kitchen clad in a t-shirt and blue jeans. He took the cordless phone from its base near the built-in desk and tossed it to Leanna. "Call Shelby and ask her to go get Nick from school, and invite her and the kids over to dinner."

Lea eyed her husband suspiciously. "You're staying?"

"Yup," Tim answered casually, taking down a large pot from the rack above the stove. He sat it down on one of the burners while Horatio and Leanna both continued to gape at him. He ignored them and opened the freezer, sorting through several packages before turning to Leanna. "Baby, where's the veal I bought last week?"

"What are you up to?" Horatio demanded angrily.

Tim smiled. He remembered how much his boss hated being left out of the loop. He had a plan, and he thought it was a good one.

"Tim," Leanna said softly, swallowing the lump in her throat, "isn't it going to be dangerous for you to stay here?"

Tim turned his attention back to the freezer. "Where's the veal, Lea?"

Her eyes nervously scanned the tile floor, as if it might be able to give her some answers. Horatio watched her take a deep breath before crossing over to her husband. "Here," she said quietly, reaching past him and taking the package of veal off the second shelf.

Tim caught her arm as she tried to pull away. "Baby," he whispered just loud enough for her to hear, "I know what I'm doing."

"I'm glad you do," she shot back, tears filling her eyes. She took the phone with her as she fled the kitchen. It sounded as if she took the stairs two at a time, the way she stormed up them before slamming the bedroom door.

"Speed," Horatio said in a warning tone. "I'm going to ask you one more time. What are you up to?"

"Now that you're here, and I have some backup, I'm getting this thing over, once and for all," he explained.

"How is Jack Collins involved in this?" Horatio demanded.

"Fucking traitor," Tim laughed bitterly as he unwrapped the veal. "The one time in five years I allow myself to have a friend, and this is what happens. Bruckson's goons got to him. They figured out that he had a woman on the side, and was in debt up to his eyeballs - trying to keep Shelby from finding out about Tiffany. They offered him a shit-load of money to give me up."

"Bail him out for giving up his protectee," Horatio shook his head with angrily. "Some friend."

"Quite possibly the understatement of the century, H." Tim reached up and selected a skillet; then set it gently on the counter.

Leanna re-emerged from upstairs, clad once again in the blue running suit she'd been wearing earlier. Both men could tell she'd been crying, although she'd thrown some cold water on her face to reduce the puffiness. Tim swallowed hard as he looked at his wife. The last thing in the world he wanted to do was to hurt her.

"Shelby and the kids will be here in about thirty minutes," she said quietly, setting the phone back in the cradle and breezing past Tim. She sat down at the kitchen table and pulled her legs up against her. "You maybe wanna fill me in, Speedle? It's just, you know, my life, and our kids' lives your playing around with here."

"Kids?" Horatio asked curiously.

Tim glared at Leanna - who gasped and looked away. She hadn't meant to say that, but she was angry and it just came out. No one knew yet - not even Shelby.

"Lea's about nine weeks pregnant, H," Tim said softly, dropping a pat of butter into the skillet and turning the burner on.

"And you think now is the best time to be going after Bruckson?" Horatio demanded, his eyes steely and angry.

Tim didn't hesitate to return the look. "I wasn't given a hell of a lot of choice in the matter."

The two stared each other down before Horatio finally broke eye contact. He titled his face toward the ceiling and shook his head in disappointment.

Tim was the first one to speak. "Shelby will be here soon, H. I need for you to call Calleigh and make some arrangements. I need for the girls to go to Miami, where they'll be safe."

TBC...