Making It Right (Most Likely To #3)

“Ha!”


The radio in the car paired them with an instructor, while the other cars on the track also housed students with a set instructor talking to them.

“Have you done this before?” she asked.

“Not here. Have you?”

“Academy. Pit maneuvers, high-speed basics. Nothing I’ve had to use that often.”

Lenny turned over the engine. “You’re in luck, I’ve had my share of chases and haven’t killed my partners yet.”

“Let’s keep it that way, Deputy.”

“Car five . . . are you ready?”

They were car five out of six on the track.

“Standing by,” Jo said into the radio.

“Okay, kids . . . ease onto the track and take the third position. Don’t let anyone pass you.”

Jo glanced at Lenny . . . “Something tells me there will be more than one person vying for third.”

Sure enough, car six was side by side within seconds of making the first turn. When the pace car sped up, so did everyone else.

Car six pulled back.

“Where’d he go?”

Jo swiveled around to notice the other cars on the track spread out. Car six sped up.

“Coming around your blind side.”

Lenny positioned the car to keep six behind him and not on the side.

They slowed on the turn, and six spent a few seconds in the dirt before moving behind them again.

“Looks like they’re positioning for a pit maneuver.” All the other cars had eased back, and the two in front kept the pace.

Sure enough, car six kissed the corner of a back bumper as Lenny sped up. They swiveled a few times, but Lenny managed to keep the car on the track.

“Car five . . . work your way into the lead.”

Jo kept her eyes darting from car to car. “Guess we passed.”

Lenny hit the gas and wove in and out until he set the pace.

Several laps later, four of the cars peeled away from the track, leaving them and car two.

They were instructed to hold their speed and stay alive. That was all the warning they received before out of the passenger window of car two, the long barrel of a paint gun slid toward them.

“Brake!” Jo yelled.

Lenny listened, and the red paint ball whizzed past the front of the car.

“There are civilians in the street, car five,” the instructor over the radio said.

“Pit him,” Jo suggested.

Lenny sped up, dodged another paint ball as he attempted to get into position.

Each time they came close, the armed car outmaneuvered them.

Paint balls started hitting the car.

Jo swiveled around. “Shit, another car behind us.”

“Well son of a—” Lenny hit the brakes and swung the car around, skidding tires as he went.

Jo held on to the door and the dash to keep from being flung around. By the time she knew what Lenny had done, he’d managed a 180-degree turn and positioned himself behind both cars.

“Well played car five . . . now what?” the instructor taunted.

Jo picked up the radio. “Is backup available?”

Jo glanced at Lenny. “Worth a try.”

Lenny swerved away from flying paint.

For a brief minute, Jo thought the third car pulling up behind them was backup.

That was until a splash of green paint hit the side of her window.

They managed another lap before they were forced off the road and ended up boxed in.

When the instructors called time, both Lenny and Jo sighed in relief.

Lenny lifted a fist in the air. “Nice dying with ya, Jo.”

She managed a fist bump before they stepped out of the car.

Jo wasn’t at all surprised to see that the shooter from the first car was a familiar face.

Gill walked up, set his paint gun on the front of their car. “Sheriff . . . Deputy . . . not bad.”

“Not all that good either, we’d be dead if this were real life,” Lenny conceded.

“We normally tap newbies out with two cars.”

Jo swatted Lenny upside his left arm. “Way to drive, Ohio.”

The course filled up with new drivers while Gill and another instructor went over the things they did right, the things they could improve. By the afternoon Jo was in the driver’s seat, a little better prepared for what to expect.

Only when it was her turn, only two cars were needed to stop her and put her in the kill zone.

While the frustration was there, so was the sheer adrenaline rush from the exercise.

The clocked rolled around to the end of their day. Jo stood beside Lenny, Bess, and a few of the other trainees before they changed out of the FBI standards and into their civilian clothes.

Out of the corner of her eye, Jo saw Shauna walking toward her.

“Hey, stranger,” Jo said. “I haven’t seen you all day.”

“I’ve been helping with hand-to-hand. How did it go out here?”

Jo leaned against a beat-up car, arms crossed over her chest. “Makes me wanna build a track like this close to home to practice.”

“That good, huh?”

“You’d have to come up with old cars,” Lenny said.

Jo thought of the many cars that broke down and had to be towed out of River Bend or risk cluttering up the back lots of forgotten farms. “Finding the cars won’t be hard . . . making sure they run would be the challenge.”

“Or we can meet here every other year or so.”

Jo liked Bess’s suggestion.

“I don’t think my department would go for that. Hard enough to get the okay to be here this time.” Sal dusted his hand on his pants. “Well, kids, I’ve had it.”

A chorus of see ya tomorrows went up as Sal made his way into the locker room.

“Wanna grab a bite to eat?” Shauna asked Jo. She looked to the others in the group. “There’s a local dive, great burgers, some decent beer on tap.”

Lenny’s eyes lit up. “You had me at burgers. Beer sealed the deal.”

A couple of others decided to join, while two peeled off to rest for the next day.

The way Jo saw it, she could rest when she flew back home.

Shauna drove Jo to what she labeled a dive.

Bar stools and oak filled an entire wall in what appeared to be a bar dating back over a hundred years. Two side walls were floor-to-ceiling brick, with the only windows framing the front of the building. Class in this place was defined by age. From the smells coming from the kitchen, the burgers would be memorable.

Like many bars, this one sported a couple of dartboards and a pool table that had a dozen or so players milling around it.

Lenny pushed through, did a quick head count. “I’ll get us a table for eight.”

“Make it nine,” Shauna said over the noise of the crowd.

Lenny scurried off in search of open space.

Wearing jeans and a slightly less revealing shirt than she had on when she’d met Gill in DC, Jo felt a little more at home. She left her hair loose, something she found herself doing less and less in River Bend. Only when she was with her friends did she try to relax. For some reason, her hair in a tie changed her attitude from play to business.

“Place is busy for a Tuesday night.” Jo studied the crowd.

“This place is always crazy.”