"Are you okay?"

Startled, Mike's head came up, frowning. A piece of toast halfway to his mouth, Steve was staring at him with a furrowed brow.

They were sitting in the small coffee shop attached to the motel. The older man had been unusually quiet all morning.

Steve had slept more soundly than he had anticipated when he'd first stepped into the one-cut-above-a-fleabag motel room where Mike had been staying. "Well, isn't this lovely," he'd remarked dryly as he preceded his partner into the small wood-paneled room with twin beds, both of them made. Mike's suitcase was sitting on the desk; a couple of shirts, both of them short-sleeved and more colourful than what he normally wore, and an extra pair of what looked like blue jeans were hanging on the small rack near the bathroom door.

"Don't complain," Mike had growled as he closed the door, turned the lock then tossed the key on the small table next to the far bed before he sat on it and started to remove his shoes. "It's close, it's cheap, it's clean and you're not paying for it… Anything else you want to say?"

"Who, me?" Steve chuckled as he dropped his bag on the first bed and unzipped it. "Not a thing, Lieutenant… mum's the word." He looked up at the questionable artwork over both beds and frowned, pursing his lips.

Mike, who was unbuttoning his shirt, followed the stare and smiled.

"What do you think that's supposed to be?" Steve asked slowly, indicating the painting above his bed with his chin. "A… fish…?"

Mike chuckled. "I've been trying to figure it out too… I thought it was a dog…"

The younger man laughed as he pulled his pajama bottoms out of his bag. Mike had already gotten up, taken his own pajamas out of his suitcase and disappeared into the bathroom. They went to bed without another word.

The sun was streaming through the thin curtains when Steve finally woke. He stretched as he sat up, only slightly surprised to see his partner fully dressed and sitting at the small desk on the far side of the room, papers laid out before him. Steve glanced at the other bed; it was made. Smiling to himself, he threw the sheet off and stood, picking up his flight bag to take fresh clothes out.

Mike glanced over his shoulder. "Good morning," he said almost perfunctorily.

"Good morning." Steve pulled a t-shirt over his head as he approached the desk. The papers were identical to the ones in the file he'd received from Renneker, with one exception. Reaching out, he picked up the almost square piece of white cardboard. "Jerry didn't have a copy of the fingerprint card."

Mike looked up and smiled. "It's, ah, it's not a copy."

Steve frowned. "What?"

Mike turned slightly in the chair and cleared his throat. "I said it's not a copy. It's the original."

Steve cocked his head and his eyes narrowed. "How the hell did you…?"

Mike's smile turned enigmatic. "You oughta know by now I have friends in, ah, in high places… as they say. I, ah, I borrowed it."

"You borrowed it," the younger man echoed softly, nodding knowingly. He put the card back on the desk. "Say, ah, you know a good place to get breakfast around here?" he asked with a smile as he crossed to the bathroom.

"Just so happens I do," Mike answered over his shoulder as the bathroom door closed.

And now they were sitting in the motel's diner. The coffee was good, the eggs cooked to perfection and the toast crisp and warm. Mike hadn't touched a thing.

Shaking his head slightly, as if bringing himself back to the present, the older man half-smiled self-consciously. "Sorry… I was miles away…"

Steve smiled softly. "Yeah, I could tell…" He dropped the piece of toast on his plate and sat back slightly. He studied the other man, still not quite used to seeing his now somewhat hirsute partner wearing a floral short-sleeved shirt, jeans and sneakers. The Giants baseball cap was sitting on the bench seat beside him. "What are you thinking?"

Mike sat back with an almost melancholic sigh. He looked at the younger man evenly for a couple of beats before asking, "So how much did Jerry actually tell you?"

Steve shrugged. "Well, he told me about you and Gus and him and his partner being the first ones on the scene, about how disturbing it was…"

Mike snorted mirthlessly and looked down. "Disturbing… yeah…" He reached out and pushed the untouched plate away, then leaned forward, his forearms on the table and his hands clasped. He looked down. "I'd seen dead bodies before, of course… Hell, during the war, I was responsible for a few of them… but this was…" He took a deep breath. "This was different…"

He swallowed heavily, and it was obvious he was reliving those moments in his mind's eye. Steve waited.

"Helen and I were trying to have a child at the time and, ah… well, we weren't having any luck…" He glanced up at his young companion and smiled slightly with a soft snort before looking back down. He inhaled deeply and let it out slowly through his partially open lips. "And, ah, and there she was… Brigitte Larson… this beautiful young girl – just a kid, really… I think it shook Jerry up just as much as me. In fact, I know it did."

He raised his head again and met Steve's eyes. "That was the moment I knew I had to make it to Homicide, and that I would do everything in my power to get there." An ironic smile crossed his lips. "It took me awhile, I had to pay my dues just like everybody else… but I finally did it…"

Steve smiled warmly, nodding. Then he shrugged slightly. "So, ah, so why didn't you ever mention this case to me? I mean, you know, you had the file and everything…"

Mike chuckled softly, leaning back and shaking his head. "To be perfectly honest, I forgot about it." He snorted almost in embarrassment. "These past few years… you know, after Helen got sick… and then I had Jeannie to look after… and then you came into my life…" He shrugged and smiled softly. "It's, ah, it's been kinda busy, you know…"

With a gentle chuckle, Steve nodded. "Yeah, I know… for me too."

Mike smiled and nodded. "To be perfectly honest, Jerry's call caught me completely by surprise. But everything came back really fast… and I knew I had to move just as fast to get down here, to see if he was right, to see if we could finally put Lonsdale away and get some justice for Brigitte Larson and her parents. To close the book, so to speak."

He snorted in embarrassment and looked down. "I, ah… I didn't deliberately take off without talking to you first or leaving you a note… I honest to god didn't have time. I even called into the office the next morning from the road – I'd left home around 4 and I was halfway down here before I called in and told Art to let everyone know I was taking the next two weeks off." He smiled knowingly. "I knew it would only be a matter of time till you tracked me down."

Steve smiled and shook his head. "I, ah, I wasn't sure how you were going to react when I got into the car last night. I was just hoping you weren't going to tear my head off." He cringed playfully.

Chuckling, Mike smiled softly. "I wouldn't do that. As a matter of fact, I was sort of counting on you to show up." A twinkle appeared in his eyes. "It's really boring sitting in that car alone most of the day…"

Laughing, Steve sat back, shaking his head. "Speaking of which, what time do you want to start again today?"

Still smiling, Mike exhaled loudly. "Well, I've been getting there around two, two-thirty. Make sure I get a good parking spot, you know…"

"What have you been doing to kill time before then?"

Mike smiled and looked down. "I've, ah, I've been walking on the beach. You know about the beaches here, right?"

Steve grinned. "You mean Muscle Beach?"

The older man nodded.

"I've heard of it, never been there."

"Well, let me tell you, Smiley, you take a walk down there and you'll be hitting the gym when you get back home, believe me." Mike laughed. "You game?"

Chuckling, Steve nodded. "You bet. But, ah, I really don't think you should be going anywhere on an empty stomach, do you?" He gestured towards the forgotten breakfast plate.

Confused, Mike looked down at the table then snorted softly. "Oh, ah, yeah, you're right…" He started to pull the plate closer.

"Wait, wait," Steve said quickly, looking up at the counter and trying to catch the waitress's eye. "That's cold by now, I'll have her heat it up and bring you a fresh cup of coffee."

Mike leaned back slightly, with an appreciative smile.

Steve, who was watching the waitress approach their table, glanced at the older man and froze slightly. "What?"

Mike grinned and shook his head. "Nothing."

As Steve talked to the waitress, Mike continued to stare as his young friend with an almost contented smile.

# # # # #

There wasn't a cloud in the sky as they walked through the sand along the narrow strip between the water and the permanent workout installations. Already a few tourists, and even some of the locals, were milling about, taking pictures of the small coterie of bodybuilders who were putting the gym equipment to work.

Steve grinned and shook his head, clocking a particularly muscle-bound blond doing pull-ups at an astonishing rate. "Dear god," he sputtered, stopping to watch, raising his dark glasses to get a better look. He glanced at his partner, who had stopped as well. "That was always my least favorite mandatory requirement. How many could you do?"

"Me?" Mike laughed, his hands in his pockets. He started to walk again. "Seven. That's all I had to do and that's all I ever did."

Chuckling, dropping his sunglasses back into place, Steve followed. "Me too. I don't think I can do that anymore. You?"

Mike snorted, glancing over his shoulder. "I haven't been able to do a pull-up in years… and thank god I don't have to."

Steve watched as his partner strolled ahead of him across the firm, wet sand and chuckled as he jogged a bit to catch up. "I've been meaning to ask." He exaggeratedly looked his partner up and down. "I had no idea you even owned an Hawaiian shirt and I would've bet everyone in the department you didn't own a pair of blue jeans. So… what gives?"

Chuckling, his eyes hidden behind his own dark glasses, Mike looked down at the sand and smiled but didn't alter his stride. "I bought the shirts when I got down here so I would… fit in…" He paused for effect. "But, smart guy, the blue jeans are mine. Jeannie bought them for me a couple of years ago… This is the first time I've worn them."

"Ah ha, I see… That makes a lot of sense…"

Mike glanced at him and, even behind the sunglasses, Steve could see the frown.

"What makes a lot of sense?"

"Those jeans, they fit you too well… I knew you didn't buy them for yourself…" he chuckled, clearing his throat and taking the lead in their walk down the beach.

Growling good-naturedly under his breath, Mike watched the younger man with a fond smile, then lengthened his stride to fall into step beside him.

# # # # #

Mike pulled the heavy blue wood-and-glass door open and stepped into Hiraro's for the first time. The establishment was just as hip on the inside as it was on the outside but had still managed to keep a neighbourhood pub feel. There was a long wooden bar along one wall with mirrors and glass shelves of liquor bottles lining the wall behind it. The rest of the place was filled with round tables of various sizes. There was one television set high on a shelf in the far corner; it was off.

His eyes scanned the room, taking it all in and quickly deciding where he wanted to sit so he could unobtrusively keep an eye on the front door while he whiled away the next few hours, he hoped.

The bartender, a handsome tall dark-haired guy who looked like he spent his off-hours at Muscle Beach, looked up from wiping a towel over the bar and smiled. "Hi, welcome to Hiraro's," he said congenially.

Nodding and smiling, Mike gestured vaguely around the room and shrugged.

"Anywhere you'd like," the bartender laughed. "What can I get you?"

With another nod, Mike headed towards a table against the far wall about halfway down the room. "Anything you got on tap."

"Sounds good. Gonna eat?"

"Sure am," Mike grinned amiably as he pulled the far chair out.

"Great. I'll get Becky to get you a menu."

"No rush," Mike chuckled as he took his baseball cap off, dropped it on the table and started to sit. He saw a beautiful young blond woman come out from what he assumed was the kitchen and start towards him with a large menu and a smile.

"Jeez, Danny," he heard the bartender exclaim happily, "where you been, man? Haven't seen you in days!"

Laughter filled the bar as the newcomer parked himself on a stool at the bar. "I had to go up north for a couple of days, see my folks. God, it's quiet in here tonight, what's going on?"

The bartender laughed. "We had ladies night last night… packed the place. It was a zoo."

Mike glanced up from the menu in his hand just as the newcomer looked over his shoulder at the almost empty bar and froze.

He was staring into the grey eyes of Jeffrey Lonsdale.