Title: Evil a Lindsey story in the Angelverse
Author: Brenda Antrim
Email: bren@bantrim.net
Rating: NC-17
Disclaimer: no copyright intended.
Spoilers: For Dead End. I love this show.

Angel finally, finally shut up. Not for the first time, Lindsey wondered if Angel could smell Lindsey's arousal and anger, and if he got off on it. He sure seemed to be enjoying himself more than could be natural for a vampire who wasn't actively eating anyone.

An eternity later, comprised of tuneless humming from Angel that nearly drove Lindsey nuts and smoldering, if tangled, thoughts of sex and death from Lindsey, they pulled up outside the Southern California Travel Agency. Relieved to have something else to occupy his mind, Lindsey snorted derisively at the lack of imagination in the naming of Wolfram and Hart front companies. Stepping out of the car, he walked around to join Angel as the vampire plucked Roy out of the trunk just far enough to show him the building. Lindsey felt vaguely disconnected, adrift, caught up in events beyond his control.

Same old, same old.

"Is that where you took him?" Angel asked Roy. The man nodded and grunted through the duct tape, protesting incoherently as he was unceremoniously shoved back in the trunk. Angel took out a battle-ax and slammed the trunk lid shut. He headed toward the building, Lindsey at his heels. Over his shoulder, he asked casually, "Do you know this place?"

"No." Never heard of it until Angel himself had choked it out of Lindsey's lead. He scowled at the pavement under his feet.

Angel carried on, still oblivious to Lindsey's mood. "Well, I'm thinking if it has anything to do with you guys, security will be top-drawer. Window sensors, motion detectors, cellular back-up, guards, obviously."

Lindsey stared up at building, drawing in front of Angel as he scanned the exterior. "Hey, I don't have my laptop."

Angel stopped and stared at him. "Huh?" he asked intelligently.

Coming to a stop as well and turning back to face him, Lindsey explained. "My computer. If you want me to hack into the system and break the codes I'm definitely going to need my -"

Angel broke in. "Wait, wait, wait. That seems like a big bother. What do you say we just fight, huh?"

Confused but willing to rumble, even if he had no fucking clue why Angel should suddenly turn violent on him now, Lindsey squared off hesitantly. Angel stared at him, shook his head a little and waved him away. "You might want to step aside."

It dawned on Lindsey that Angel meant they should fight together, not one another. Pissed off all over again and more than a little embarrassed by being so slow on the uptake, he moved out of the way. Without further ado Angel flung his ax through the window. Alarms went off all over the place. Angel clapped Lindsey on the shoulder.

"Come on," he invited. "Work off some of that aggression, huh?"

He had no idea how right he was. At least Lindsey hoped he didn't. The first wave of guards met them at the door, and Angel plowed into them with style, grace and enthusiasm. Lindsey threw and ducked punches, taking down those who managed to get past Angel, and in one instance, crunching one in the nose that Angel led directly on to his fist. It didn't surprise Lindsey that he and Angel could fight together as if they'd been doing it forever. These guards were all regular humans. They'd worked well together the first case they'd taken, and if the Brewer woman hadn't been an inhuman killing machine who'd kicked Lindsey's ass all over the room, he and Angel would have functioned like a well-oiled machine then, too.

Or maybe he was just kidding himself, putting oil, himself and Angel into a scenario all at the same time when neither of them was attempting to kill the other.

By the time the short, vicious fight was over, he felt much better. Angel didn't appear to have been affected one way or the other. Lindsey looked around the room, seeing cheesy posters, second generation computers, scratched desks, exotic flyers, all the accouterments of a travel agency and no signs of demonic activity.

Although it had been a long time since he'd used a travel agency. Hard to tell, with the demons in LA, what was a sign and what wasn't.

A hollow thump caught his ear and he turned around just as Angel announced, "Floor. It's hollow." Oh. Lindsey'd thought Angel'd been stomping around for the sheer joy of stomping.

They quickly shoved the ratty Persian-knock-off rug aside and looked at the trap door. Angel lifted it easily and gestured, gallantly, for Lindsey to take the lead. Lindsey glared at him. Walk into a possible trap of a pit in the ground with Angel at his back?

"No fucking way," he said bitingly. Angel rolled his eyes and gave a theatrical sigh, but they ended up walking down the stairs side by side. Lindsey was a little disappointed. While he had objections to walking in front of Angel, he had no objections to walking behind him. Nice view, in fact. Shrugging off the thought, he walked further into the chamber of horrors hidden in the basement and peered around.

What they found didn't shock Lindsey, proving that he was indeed as cynical as he expected, but he didn't quite understand what he was seeing. Under the bright lights, there were upright coffin-like capsules holding people suspended in liquid. Machines hummed around them, tubes feeding between them like a cabled web. It was the only sound in the stillness. Lindsey found himself asking a stupid question, but it was out before he could stop it.

"What is this?"

Angel gave him exactly the answer he expected. "You know what this is. Spare parts, for guys like you." Much as he tried to shield against them, the words were like little darts, drawing invisible blood. Angel went on. "You got your 'before' and your 'after.'" He took a closer look. Lindsey followed his lead, horrified but hiding it well as he took note of the missing limbs and eyes on some of the victims.

"More like 'during,' I guess," Angel continued thoughtfully. "Your firm in action, Lindsey. A lot to be proud of, huh?"

Lindsey glanced at him, then looked away. He was feeling off-balance. There was condemnation in Angel's eyes as he looked at him, and Lindsey clenched his jaw to keep himself from saying anything else stupid. That the scourge of Europe could be so self-righteously high and mighty -- he guessed that was what a soul and a shit-load of guilt could do to a guy. Lindsey had to admit, if only to himself, that he felt more guilt than he had in a long time, staring around at the bodies.

Angel moved toward a heavy purple banner with a gold symbol on it hanging from the corner of the ceiling. Lindsey looked up, but didn't recognize the hieroglyph.

"The Pockla blessed this place."

"Who are they?" Lindsey was relieved to have Angel's attention diverted from himself.

"Demon healers. They know how to regenerate flesh. Probably explains why some of these transplants aren't taking so well."

A blurry memory of a large red-robed being chanting over him, gnarled hands and an icy burn along his arm flashed through Lindsey's mind. "Yeah. I'm pretty sure one of them was there when they gave me my hand."

Angel turned on him. "Your hand? I think it belonged to that guy over there. Or what's left of him, anyway."

Biting his tongue again, Lindsey followed Angel's glance, turning to see a man with missing limbs suspended in fluid. To his horror, the man appeared to be conscious, staring pleadingly at him. Lindsey walked slowly over to stand in front of the tank, appalled. Softly, he murmured "Oh, god. I know him. I didn't get the name before."

He stared up into Brad's eyes, which were staring right back at him. Lindsey wondered if he would see tears if not for the fluid surrounding the ruined body. He said softly, "We worked in the mailroom together." The thought struck him that he had escaped, but Brad hadn't. This was one of the unspeakable things the Firm did to its failures. There were worse things than being forced to eat one's own liver. Much worse things than death. He thought of Lilah, then came back to the present. "Brad?" he asked tentatively.

Brad answered, sending more shivers down Lindsey's back. "Kill … kill …"

Anxiously, Lindsey questioned him, "Kill who? Huh? Who do you want me to kill?" Right then, he'd do it. Whoever had done this, he'd kill them. He'd liked Brad. Violence was rising in him at what had been done and how he had benefited from it. He wouldn't give his hand up, but he was incredibly angry at how he had gotten it. Guilt warred with rage and demanded an outlet. The answer he got stunned him.

"Kill me. Please!"

Lindsey stared at him, feeling pole-axed. He'd been expecting a plea for vengeance, not mercy. He threw a wild glance over his shoulder at Angel. For the first time, he asked for guidance. "What am I supposed to do here?"

Staring steadily back at him, Angel said quietly, "I know what I'd do. But this is your deal. Whatever it is, you better do it quickly. They're going to be coming in force so we've got to help the ones we can."

That hadn't done him any good. Lindsey looked back up at Brad, seeing madness and misery in the dark eyes staring down at him. He could feel tears starting in his eyes, misting his vision. He swallowed past a lump in his throat and silently begged Brad for his forgiveness. For being the unwitting cause for at least part of Brad's suffering, and for what he had to do to end it.

"I'm sorry."

The words burned his throat. Keeping his eyes locked on Brad's, he pulled the plug and watched the tank go dark. He held Brad's gaze until those sad eyes drifted closed, seeing gratitude there and hoping there was a measure of forgiveness as well. Behind him he could hear Angel reassuring the people he was rescuing. An eternity later, Brad was dead, and the rage banked in Lindsey broke free. He reached out blindly and smashed everything he could get his hands on. Angel stopped him, much too soon, with a touch to his arm. Lindsey stared blindly at him.

Angel's voice held a mixture of command and gentleness. "Help these people upstairs."

Reminded of the few who could be saved from the nightmare place, Lindsey returned to the living. He ushered frightened, Pockla-banner-draped survivors up the stairs, murmuring as comfortingly to them as he could when it felt like he had broken glass in his throat. As he got the last of them up the stairs and into the lobby he heard the hiss of gas below and realized Angel was going to torch the place. Even as he thought it, Angel joined them, gathering up a pile of papers and taking a lighter out of his pocket.

"Get 'em to the car."

Lindsey hurried the survivors across the street and helped them into the car. Three of them went into the back seat, one curled in the passenger seat. They were in shock, huddled together and shivering, crying softly. He tucked Pockla banners around them and patted shoulders, trying to radiate reassurance when what he really wanted to do was find something and kill it. Violently.

Shortly after they escaped, Angel came running out of the building. He'd cut it fine, but he made it as an explosion leveled the place. Angel stared at the car full of people, then, assessingly, at Lindsey standing on the curb.

"You coming?"

"You take care of them," Lindsey told him. "I'll walk."

Angel gave him a disbelieving look. "Long walk."

Not bothering to answer, Lindsey shrugged and turned away. He had a lot to think about, and he always thought better when he was walking. After a moment, he heard the engine catch and the car pulled away from him. He didn't look back.

Cutting through the alley across the street, he ducked incoming Wolfram and Hart security and headed back to his apartment. Angel was right, it was a long walk. But no one bothered him, and walking those miles in the cool night air helped him get his thoughts more straightened out than they had been in a very long while. By the time he got home, dawn was breaking, and he'd come to a decision.

He took a long, hot shower, washing away the stink of blood and fear, then pulled on his shorts. Standing at the window, he watched the city bustle as he drank a cup of coffee. Taking his time, he went into the kitchen, rinsed out his coffee cup, and picked up his cell phone from the countertop. His first call was to a bank in the Cayman Islands. His second was to a moving company, to come in and pack for him while he was at work. Knowing it would be some time before he would need it, he arranged for his stuff to be put in storage for an indefinite period.

That taken care of, he went into his bedroom and packed a single duffel bag. Jeans, shirts, various demon-fighting weapons, his shaving kit, the back-up disks with incriminating material on Wolfram and Hart that he'd kept from the Brewer case, underwear, some music, his .38 and a box of shells went into it. He stacked clean jeans, tee shirt, leather jacket, socks and boots next to it, and leaned his guitar case against it, then locked the closet holding them so the movers wouldn't take them.

He dressed carefully and drove to the Firm for the last time. Smiling at the guard, he greeted everyone he met pleasantly. Once in his office, he began going through his files, meticulously shredding papers. Booting up his desktop computer, he wiped and reformatted the hard drive. Then he carefully pried open the case and stuck his wooden-handled letter opener through the circuitry, skewering the memory so that nothing could be salvaged. Even magick couldn't recreate what had been burned to slag, not and make sense of it. He closed the case again and tucked his laptop in his briefcase. Locking it, he also took the time and care to mutter a binding chant over it, so if anyone other than himself attempted to open it, their hands would be fried.

Staring around his now-sanitized office, he allowed himself a satisfied smile. He went into the washroom, pausing to look at himself in the mirror for a long moment. For an instant he let the mask slip, grinning savagely at his reflection. Then he controlled himself and went off to the division re-evaluation meeting. Lilah was already there, looking close to the edge. He smiled gently at her. She snarled silently back at him. No more than he expected.

He was really looking forward to this.

Reed gave him a standard death's head smile. "Hello, Lindsey."

"Hello, Nathan," Lindsey returned in a friendly fashion. Reed looked at him expressionlessly for a moment, then smiled genially, signifying his approval of the unexpected familiarity. Lindsey smiled genially right back at him. Two more men entered the room, breaking off the smiling contest. Lindsey moved to sit next to Lilah, who was quivering like a tightly-stretched wire. He resisted the urge to give her a reassuring pat. She'd probably bite his hand off, and he'd just gotten it back.

With no further delay, Reed called the meeting. "Now that everyone's here, let's get started." Everyone still standing took a seat. Lindsey subtly positioned himself to grab Lilah when the time came to stop her from doing anything rash.

"These re-evaluations are always a bit of a mixed blessing," Reed began with blatantly false bonhomie. "It's sad as we lose one of our own. But also hopeful, as we turn toward the future and promote one of our own. Lilah, you have made a lot of great contributions, and I know you've tried your very, very best -"

Lilah cracked. Diving for the gun in her handbag she cried, "No!"

Clamping down on the bag and preventing her from drawing the pistol, Lindsey chided her gently, "Lilah. Lilah, please." She rolled her eyes at him, showing the whites. "They chose me. I'm clearly the guy."

Reed interjected approvingly, "Yes, you are."

Lilah continued to stare at him, fearful and shaking, as Lindsey smiled at her. "You could've had it, but you didn't have what it takes." He brought his right hand up suddenly and she shied away, gasping, as if fearing he was going to strike her. He barely kept himself from laughing aloud. "An evil hand!" he proclaimed.

She stared at him like he'd lost his mind. The room went still. This wasn't exactly how they'd expected the meeting to go.

"I mean, c'mon." Lindsey got up and began to stalk around the table toward Nathan, who stared at him as if he was a snake about to strike but didn't move or breathe a word. "Who here does? Leon doesn't. Charlie doesn't." Lindsey stopped to ruffle the hair of a man who had been worse than pompous to him in the past, playing his apparent madness for all it was worth. "You do know you gave me an evil hand, right?" he asked Reed in a conversational tone. Still addressing Reed, Lindsey backed toward the guard, playing to his entranced, shocked audience. "I've been writing 'kill, kill, kill' on everything. It's crazy." He waved both hands in the air just to see them flinch. "It's crazy! Anything could happen!"

He was in the perfect position to respond when Reed said, exactly as expected, "Allan -"

Lindsey turned to the guard, grinning maniacally. "Allan! How are you?" Still smiling, holding the man's attention, he disarmed the guard with his right hand while punching him in the jaw with a sharp left uppercut. "Uh-oh, uh-oh," Lindsey mocked the guard's poor efforts. As Allan tried to use his headset to call for help, Lindsey shot him in the foot with his own gun. The guard screeched. "Ooooh," Lindsey oozed false sympathy, his accent growing thicker with every word. "That's gonna hurt in the mornin'. Come here."

He wrapped a hand around Allan's neck and threw him to the floor, then turned to aim the stolen gun in the direction of the lawyers now cowering in as dignified a manner as possible. "Stop it, evil hand, stop it," he deadpanned.

Aiming to the left of Reed, he shot out vases and windows, the resulting shattering glass causing a satisfactory shower all over the carpet. Then he shot out the windows and objects d'art to the right of his soon-to-be ex-boss. Reed raised a hand involuntarily but refused to visibly panic.

"I just can't control my evil hand." Lindsey's tone was whimsical, and he was chuckling as he walked the length of the table back toward Reed. "Nathan, I'm so proud that you chose me." He gave Charlie another noogie just for the hell of it, hissing "Charlie!" to see his shoulders hunch up, then turned back to Reed. "But if I would have been in your shoes, I would have chosen Lilah. Let me tell you why."

He gestured at Lilah, standing frozen, staring at him wide-eyed, uncomprehending. "Do you have any idea the hours this chick has logged in? Huh? The files she has on you guys? Deep stuff." Glancing over at each person in turn as he mentioned them, Lindsey reeled off the list of malfeasance he well remembered from his own background investigations. "Ronnie! Your stock manipulations." Ronnie turned an interesting shade of green. "Nathan's little off-shore accounts."

Reed might as well have been carved from marble, he was so still. Lindsey came to a stop beside Lilah and touched her lightly on the arm. She recoiled but managed to control herself. "Can you imagine, if something were to happen to this girl and those files got back to the senior partners? They'd eat you alive! She's been working overtime, boys."

Returning to head of table, he addressed the group as a whole. "She's everything you ever dreamed of. Lilah is your guy." Dropping his voice, he turned and said confidentially to Reed, "Me, I'm unreliable. I've got these 'evil hand' issues …" For the first time since his performance began, he dropped the unnatural cheeriness and sounded completely serious, "and I'm bored with this crap."

Then he regained his grin and laid the gun gently on the table, secure in the knowledge that no one was going to move until after he was long gone. "And besides, I'm leaving. So if you want to chase me, be my guest. And remember," he flashed his right hand an inch in front of Reed's face. Reed didn't so much as blink. "Evil." He knocked on the table with the knuckles of his 'evil' hand just to see them jump, then turned to leave.

He hissed "Charlie!" one last time, seeing the arrogant idiot blanch another shade paler. With a whispered "Good luck!" to Lilah, he continued out the door, goosing her along the way. She jumped and squeaked, and he shrugged apologetically, holding up his hand as if to say he couldn't be held accountable for the actions of such an obviously unspeakably evil thing.

"Evil," he shrugged, and walked out the door.

Lindsey headed directly to his office, picked up his briefcase, and detoured to the front entrance. No one stopped him or even looked strangely at him. His guess would be that, other than revising the minutes and calling for an ambulance, the entire tableful of lawyers was still sitting there in Reed's office in shock. It wasn't often they were treated to a full mental meltdown from one of their own. And they'd probably never had one where the melter had afterward walked out of the Firm under his own steam.

He wasn't going to be demon kibble. Neither was Lilah. Fuck Wolfram and Hart. From here on out, Lindsey was going to play it his way.

Climbing into the Firm's Jag for one last spin, he stopped at a discreet unmarked office door in a professional building in West Hollywood, signed for a metal suitcase, and continued on to his apartment. He cranked up the radio and sang along, feeling as insane as he'd just pretended to be. The surface of his brain was surfing on a wave of adrenaline. The other 98% of it continued planning escape routes. His subconscious had been working on this since he'd first gone to Angel about the blind kids. He'd always been one for covering all the angles.

That talent would be the only thing to keep him alive and undamned, now.

The apartment echoed when he stepped into it. The movers had been and gone. The closet where he'd locked his gear was undisturbed. He placed the metal suitcase and his briefcase in the middle of the duffel bag, arranging the clothing around them and leaving the weapons in easy reach on top before closing it up. He stood at the window one last time, watching the sun set over the LA skyline.

Then he changed out of his suit and into his jeans. Hanging the suit neatly in the now-empty closet, he shrugged into his leather jacket and shouldered his duffel bag. Picking up the guitar case he walked out the door for the last time, not looking back there, either. He tossed the keys to the apartment and the Jag in the mail drop for the manager to sort out, then crossed the street to place his bag and guitar in the bed of his truck. He carefully smothered a grin when he saw Angel lurking by the tailgate. He knew he wouldn't be able to get away without one last slanging match with the vampire.

"If you're here to kill me, grab ya a ticket and get in line."

Angel didn't answer him directly. He looked at the truck instead. "You know, I really like this truck," he mused. "'56, right? First year they had wraparound windshields. You know, back in the fifties we all thought life was going to be like The Jettsons by now. Air cars. Robots. I'd love an air car. Wouldn't that be cool?"

Ironic, Lindsey thought, that one could take the boy out of Ireland, but couldn't take Ireland out of the boy. Angel never did leave the blarney behind. "So you're here to talk me to death."

He got a solemn look in response. "No. I just came to say things don't always work out the way you think. I bet Wolfram and Hart aren't too happy losing one of their best and brightest."

Lindsey tossed him a challenging half-grin. "Yeah, well, let 'em come try to stop me. It'll be fun."

Angel's eyes widened. "Well, I don't know if that's a healthy attitude. So, where are you going, Lindsey? Back to your roots?" Oddly enough, he sounded sincere, not mocking. Lindsey glanced at him, noted the lack of hostility, and softened his challenge.

"Something like that." He let the silence linger, waiting for Angel to blather some more. After a little while, he found himself talking instead. "I hope you're not waiting for me to tell you I learned some kind of lesson. That I had a big moral crisis but now I see the light."

That actually provoked a short laugh. "No, no, no. If you told me that, then I'd have to kill you." Angel paused, then looked at him seriously. "No, I'm just here to say bon voyage. Don't come back."

Lindsey'd been expecting that all along. "To LA? Nah." He opened the truck door then looked back at Angel. "You can have this place." There was nothing left here for him. Not his career, not Darla … not Angel.

"Good!" Angel told him cheerfully. Lindsey couldn't even rally the energy to wish for a stake. "I'm glad I didn't have to do something immature here."

Finding the whole scene weirdly amusing, Lindsey fought back another smile. His expression gradually turned serious. He wanted to go, but he needed to say something first. Whether the vampire knew it or not, he was still on the Firm's agenda. Lindsey didn't want to see Angel fall prey to them. He didn't examine his reasons for the warning he gave. He didn't really want to know. Hopeless causes had never been his favorites. "The key to Wolfram and Hart -- don't let them make you play their game. You gotta make them play yours."

Angel looked surprised. "Thanks. I'll keep that in mind."

Not knowing what else to say, Lindsey turned to climb into truck. Angel, of course, had to have the last word.

"Don't drive too fast, now. Lot of cops out there."

Lindsey peeled out just to spite him. He looked in the rearview mirror, but of course he couldn't see Angel. He laughed under his breath. Like so much of his life in LA, Angel was an illusion. A deadly one. He reached for the radio and set course for the 15 freeway. Along the way, a few people honked at him, and he could see them laughing. He shook his head. Angelinos. Too caught up in their SUVs to deal with a real truck. He ignored them and kept driving.

A mile outside Ontario, he saw flashing lights in his mirror. He glanced down at his speedometer but he'd been traveling a couple miles under the speed limit. Pulling over, he waited for the cop to come up to the side of the truck. Lindsey put on his most innocent expression, easy in this case since he hadn't actually done anything.

"Hello," he greeted the very tall, very beefy patrolman who glared at him through the window.

"License and registration, please," the cop snarled at him. Lindsey blinked. Okay. That hadn't been the reaction he expected.

Reaching carefully into the glove box, since the cop looked like he'd just as soon arrest Lindsey as look at him, he got out his registration. Equally as carefully, he drew out his wallet and handed his license and the truck's papers to the cop.

"Uhm," Lindsey asked tentatively, "What was I doing wrong, officer? I didn't think I was speeding." He widened his eyes and looked even more innocent.

The cop's attitude didn't soften. "Burned out tail light," he growled. Then he walked away, writing furiously on his pad. Lindsey watched him in the mirror. The cop stared at the truck's license plate for a long time, scowl settling firmly on his face, before stomping back to his patrol car and speaking on the radio for an inordinately long time. Lindsey would have gotten out and checked the light himself, but with the cop's bad attitude, he figured it would be safer to keep his butt in the truck.

"Sign here," the cop ordered him, thrusting the ticket book under his nose. Lindsey signed it, confused by the whole situation, then accepted the ticket that was ripped off and shoved at him. He watched the cop go back to his patrol car, stared down at the ticket, winced at the price, and very carefully pulled back out onto the freeway.

The traffic thinned out as he headed into the Angeles National Forest, and he didn't see very many other cars on the road until he was past Victorville. Then, for the second time that night, there were lights flashing in his window. He looked down at his speedometer again.

Three miles over the speed limit.

The thought struck him that Angel must have put a curse on his truck, as his second encounter with the California Highway Patrol followed a path much like the first. Not blaming the cops for the curse, he held on to his patience with both hands as he was barked at by yet another hostile policeman.

For the first time in his life, he got a speeding ticket for exceeding the posted limit by three whole miles. It was unheard of in California, where, if a driver didn't go at least ten miles over the limit on the freeway, he'd get run over by the hordes of speeders who were. Lindsey growled under his breath as he pulled away, very carefully, and merged with the nonexistent traffic. The cop followed him halfway to Barstow before finally giving up and going away.

Lindsey wracked his brain for the next sixty miles trying to think of ways to break curses placed on motor vehicles. He came up empty. Stopping at a brightly lit Mobile station, he filled the tank, not paying attention to his surroundings, totally caught up in trying to figure out what Angel had done to his truck and how to fix it.

The kid at the counter was giggling like an idiot when Lindsey paid him for the gas, but Lindsey ignored him. Who knew what kids were thinking these days, especially out in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night with nothing else to do but wait to get robbed. The kid was probably high on something. Lindsey grabbed a Coke and headed back out to his truck.

He was on the 40 right outside Ludlow when the third cop pulled him over. Lindsey still hadn't managed to figure out just what Angel had done, and he hadn't been able to trace any magickal currents that would give him a hint. This time he'd been five miles over the speed limit, and he groused at himself for speeding at all. He'd been distracted. It didn't help.

This cop had a grin on his face. His attitude was better by far than the last two, but it still confused the hell out of Lindsey. Bright brown eyes twinkled at him from a classically handsome Hispanic face, and full lips twitched under a dark brown mustache. Lindsey found himself grinning back, but he knew his confusion was showing.

"Where you headed?" the cop asked him.

Lindsey stared at him, then shrugged. "Back home to Oklahoma. Had enough of LA," he finally answered.

The cop shook his head, laughing.

"Who'd you piss off, buddy? Break up with your girlfriend or something?"

A picture of Angel came to his mind, and Lindsey scowled automatically. "Something," he admitted.

"I'll let you off with a warning, this time," the cop told him. "But you, uh, might want to get your truck looked at."

He was still laughing when he got into his patrol car and drove off. Lindsey stayed at the side of the road, watching him, until the dust disappeared. Way too weird, he thought. Too tired to worry about it, he pulled carefully back onto the freeway yet again and headed off down the road.

Needles was a sleepy town that early in the day, but the restaurant in the truck stop was a good one, and they had showers. Lindsey parked and climbed from his truck, distracted by the sound of laughter coming from behind him. A nasty suspicion hit him that it hadn't been magick Angel had left on his truck, and he stalked around to glare at the back of his truck.

A sign the size of his tailgate mocked him. "COPS SUCK." Well, hell. No wonder he couldn't go half an hour without getting pulled over. He stared at the sign, caught between rage and laughter, before he finally gave in to the ridiculousness of the situation and cracked up. So Angel hadn't had to do anything immature, huh? Right. Sure.

Two hundred fifty going on twelve.




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