Sam laid down on the back seat of the police car while an officer with a first aid kit did his best to clean up the leg. They'd called for backup, identified Alesio and Bancroft who had turned their bikes around and raced off in the opposite direction as soon as they'd seen the police car. Even if they went back into the forest, they couldn't stay there long. They had no food and their gas tanks would run dry soon enough. Their names were already on the wanted list.

'How ya feeling, kid?' Al's face was sticking out through the back of the front seat. It looked kind of spooky.

'Real tired.'

'Bet you are,' said the officer. 'Your folks gonna be so happy to see you. You can't imagine.'

'I can imagine.'

Trimble, not even handcuffed, was giving a full statement to the other officer while they waited for the ambulance.'

'They hurt you any?' The officer peered at Sam, the question was loaded, he wasn't asking about a gashed leg.

'No.' Sam shook his head. 'And I did this to myself. They'd put me in kind of a crate to start off and I busted out of it. Caught my leg when I was getting away.'

'No…other?'

'Ray helped me.' Might as well start putting in a good word now.

'Sam, this is starting to look good. It's really looking good.' Al was intent on the handlink. 'Suzie gets back okay to her parents. Bancroft and Alesio will both be arrested by the end of the week. Bancroft,' he shrugged. 'Spends the next four years in and out of jail, gets himself a job as a mechanic. Alesio,' he shook his head. 'Maybe some things are written in stone. Gets tried as a minor, gets off, still dies of a drug overdose before the year's up. But your friend over there in the rusty armor, he takes the cake. Goes back to study while he's doing time, gets a degree in psychology, and is still running a successful detox clinic. Looks like one lame duck you rescued.'

'So why am I still here?'

'Ambulance'll be along soon, Susan,' the officer said. 'We don't want to move you too much, you look like you're suffering a bit from exposure and they can hook you up to a drip. Nicer ride than in the back here, too. You don't want to be with our passenger.'

'He did save my life,' Sam said. 'You have to remember that. In case I don't. He put himself at risk to get me away from the others.'

'Okay.' The officer rubbed his hand along Sam's arm, placating him.

In the distance, Sam could hear the wail of sirens. Ambulance, he guessed, and maybe more police.

'Suzie's parents do okay too,' Al said. 'No split ups, no tablets and bye bye cruel world. So why haven't you leaped?'

Why hadn't he leaped? One siren ground to a halt, two others passed by and faded into the distance.

The police officer walked away for a moment and then came back, smiling, delighted. 'Got a surprise for you.'

'Oh, darling.' A large, heavyset man who could only have been Big Jim Dempsey, thrust himself into the car and gathered Sam into a bear hug. His beard bristled against Sam's ear and he smelled stale and unwashed, ketotic, as though he'd had nothing to eat or drink for days. 'We were so afraid. We were so afraid. We thought we were going to lose you.'

Another pair of arms wound around Sam and he could feel the soft press of a woman behind him, smell her hairspray, feel her face, wet with tears, pressed into the back of his neck. Two ambulance men rolled a gurney to the car's door. Dempsey picked Sam up and lifted him out of the car, then stood for a moment, holding him over the gurney, not wanting to be separated, even for this small moment.

That was when Sam suddenly realized what he needed to do to complete the leap. 'Pies for China, Dad,' he whispered. Susan Dempsey, so wanted, so loved. Worth more than all his money to her father. Worth the risk.

For a moment, Dempsey's grip intensified, as if there might have been anger. Then his hand rubbed against Sam's back, gentle, soothing. 'You have such a good heart. All this and you can only think of others. We'll do something sweetheart. I can't promise pies for China, but something.'

Al, gazing at the handlink, looked suddenly delighted. 'Children's shelter,' he crowed. 'Dempsey creates a trust for street kids. That's gotta be it, Sam.'