Mexico's a fucking nightmare.

He's not expecting the explosion when it happens, so he goes flying. But then, so do the bastards pointing guns at them, so Brian's not really gonna complain about a couple of bumps and bruises. He's got a gun in his hands as fast as he can, and he's putting all that time on the ranges to good use. Short, controlled bursts, his firearm instructor's voice echoes in his head. Only he's played enough video games – and been in enough shootouts – to know that already.

Soon as he's clear, he jumps in the nearest car, which just happens to be the bad guys' Hummer, and he's totally cool with that. It's gonna be a bitch getting it back through the mountain, but he doesn't exactly have time to shop around.

Dom's got some son of a bitch pinned up against a car, beating the shit out of him when Brian rolls up, and the first time he yells at him to get in, he just turns and looks at him and goes right back to beating the guy up. It takes a little more yelling and the sound of an alarm to get his ass moving, and Brian's off as soon as he sees Dom's ass hit the seat.

He doesn't stop until he's well clear of the border, and then he pulls off to an underpass that he thinks is hidden enough to work okay. He's got to call the office first. He's got to tell them what's going down, and he's got to do it quick, while they've got Braga by the balls.

Only problem is, some little prick at HQ puts him on hold for at least five minutes. He's just about to give up and try calling again when, finally, he hears a beep and Penning's voice on the line asking him where the hell he's been.

"I got the shipment."

"'I got the shipment,' or 'we got the shipment'?" Penning answers.

Brian feels his gut twist. "What are you talking about?" It comes out sounding a hell of a lot cooler than he feels, but he guesses that's kind of what he's there for: his cool, and his mad skills in keeping it.

"Traffic cams in the area picked up pictures of you and Toretto together," Penning says, and Brian bites back the swears that rise to the tip of his tongue, because shit. Shit. Shit. Shit. "Listen to me, O'Conner. Bring in the shipment and bring in Toretto."

There's no way in hell that's happening, Brian thinks. He'll cut town and go back to fucking Mexico before he turns Dom over, so Penning can take that idea and shove it right up his ass. Or Stasiak's.

What he says, though, is, "But I thought the point was to get Braga. We got an opportunity here." Because he still thinks he can swing this. He still thinks he can make this work. He's worked too damn hard for things to go to shit now. If he can just get Penning to see his side of things—

"Brian, the clock stopped ticking." And there it is. It's final. At least, as far as Penning's concerned. "Bring them in. We clear?"

But before Brian can answer, something catches his eyes. In the light from the highway over head, he sees something glinting on the ground. Drops. A trail of them, and there's this sick, awful feeling in his gut, because he knows what it is. He's been a cop too long not to.

Penning's voice is still coming through the phone, but he's already dropped it from his ear, and as he follows the trail of blood on the asphalt, he ends the call. He'll deal with that later. There's something more important.

The trail leads back around the Hummer, and Brian follows it all the way to…

Dom.

Shit.

Dom's standing behind the back of the Hummer, a couple of the hard plastic cases from the back in front of them, and he's opening one of them up when Brian gets around. Inside, Brian sees silver-wrapped bricks all packaged neatly, and he knows what they are without checking.

He doesn't care.

"So this is what sixty million looks like," Dom's saying, but Brian's more worried about what his shoulder looks like.

He's been shot. It doesn't look bad, just into the top of his shoulder, and shit, Dom's probably got so much muscle, he bets it didn't even get in that deep. But he's bleeding, and a gunshot wound's a gunshot wound. "Yeah, we got to get you to a doctor."

"We got to find a place to hide this."

Brian doesn't want to admit it – he wants to shove Dom in the back and drive him to the nearest hospital, to hell with the drugs and Braga and the manhunt, because what the hell's it all for but Dom anyway? – but Dom's right. They need to hide the drugs, or else they lose their leverage, and the whole thing really does go to shit.

But then it hits him.

"I got a spot." And he does. See, he happens to know of a certain impound lot that's getting inspected tonight.

And he also happens to know of one that isn't. The impound lot he moved Stasiak's man's shipment to should be clear, at least for another forty-eight hours. That should be plenty of time for him to figure all this out.

"You sure about this?" Dom asks as they get out of the Hummer. He doesn't sound real convinced.

Brian is sure about it. But he's sure as hell not going to tell Dom how he's sure about it. He's not about to tell him that he was playing musical drug stash for a dirty Fed. It's bad enough he knows about it himself. And anyway, he just got Dom to stop hating him, or at least to do a better job of hiding it; the last thing he wants to do is screw that up.

He tells himself it doesn't matter that he's doing it because of them, because of Dom and his sister. Because he isn't. He's doing it for himself, because he can't stand to see them get hurt. It's his choice. He doesn't deserve any special considerations. He just needs to get this shit over with. He's got to get out.

Which means that, for now, he's got to keep moving.

"Yeah," he says. "The last place they'll check? They're own impound yard." At least this one. "Trust me." And he even manages a smirk, because hell, why not enjoy the fact that this shitty little deal he's got with Stasiak's actually working in his favor for once? It's the little things, right?

Dom doesn't say anything, but the fact that he starts walking away is all Brian needs. Maybe he doesn't trust him, but he trusts that, and that'll have to do for now. He falls into step beside him and tries to start another conversation before Dom gets to wondering just how he's so sure. Because Dom's good at calling bullshit, and this isn't the time.

"You know, I've been thinking: when you blew up your car back there, you blew up mine, too." Well, the Feds', but that's beside the point. He put in the wrench time.

Dom cuts his eyes over at him, and there's a hint of a smirk on his lips. "Yeah?"

"Yeah." Brian feels his own lips pull upwards. "So now you owe me a ten-second car." And when Dom glances over at him, he can't keep the full-on grin off his face.

"Is that right?"

"Yeah."

Instead of firing some smartass remark right back, though, Dom just starts walking a little faster. If Brian didn't know any better, he'd say he's looking for something. Brian doesn't figure out what until he cuts in by a Subaru Impreza, and it doesn't really sink in, until Dom smashes the damn window out with his elbow.

He watches, smile growing, as Dom very deliberately reaches in past all the shattered glass and pulls the door open from the inside. He even holds it for him, the cheeky bastard.

Brian just laughs it off, though, and tries not to get any glass shards in his ass as he slides into the driver's seat.

They don't end up going to the hospital. Honestly, Brian knew they couldn't from the get go; he was just kind of freaked out. Which is weird, when he thinks about it, because he's shot people. He's killed people. It's just different when it's Dom.

A lot of things are like that.

He ends up calling Mia, though, which kind of goes against the whole point of the thing, trying to keep her out of it, but he doesn't know where else to go. He sure as hell doesn't know how to treat a bullet-wound. All he managed to do was pour a little alcohol on it and bandage it with some gauze until the cavalry could arrive, and even that had been a little outside of his comfort zone. Not that he let Dom know that.

Watching Mia play nurse is both one of the scariest and most awe-inspiring things he thinks he's ever seen. He's always known she was smart, and he's really freaking proud of her for going through with the whole medical school thing. She can make something of herself like this. She can be something, help people and herself and be happy, and he's so glad she's got that chance, because she deserves it.

He's happy as hell when she finishes, though. Dom's like a damn statue while she's patching him up, even has a smile on her face, but Brian knows that doesn't exactly feel like getting a handjob from an angel, and he wouldn't wish it on anyone. Well, not most people.

Definitely not Dom.

They order Chinese in for dinner, and there's this weird sort of familiarity to it. It's not one of the famous Toretto family barbeques, but sitting around the table with Mia and Dom, with his family, Brian can almost pretend that everything's okay. That he's not in over his head. That he's not drowning.

"You want some of this?" Mia says, and her voice brings Brian back out of his head to the table. He's not sure how, but it looks like his plate's gotten more full since he spaced out.

No doubt Mia's doing. She's one of those food-lovers, not that she loves food, but that she uses food to express her love. He thinks that's a Toretto family thing. He's got no complaints. They're food-lovers, and he loves food. It's the perfect relationship.

Heh. He wishes.

Mia's hand flashing in front of his face once again snaps him out of it – and wow, he needs sleep or something, because this shit's getting ridiculous – and he watches her pass over a container to Dom.

"It's spicy," she warns.

He can't help himself. "I like it hot," he says, and it's definitely not intentional or meaningful that he glances over to Dom when he says it. He just thinks he'll get a kick out of it.

Dom glances up at him and makes a sound low in his throat that could either be a chuckle or an agreement around a mouthful of lo mein.

"Dom, what are you doing?" Mia says, not sharply, but a little but…well, sharply. "You reached first. You have to say grace."

Then for some unfathomable reason, Dom looks across the table at Brian, like he's gonna have something to say on the matter. Honestly, he's never been really religious anyway; he just did it because it was important to the Torettos, and he never wanted to offend.

But it is important to the Torettos. It's important to Mia, and he knows it's important to Dom, even if he's maybe got a lot going on in his head right now. So he just kind of tips his head and makes a point of folding his hands in front of his face. He knows Dom knows what he's doing, because he smiles, and Brian smiles too because of it, because he feels like he just did the right thing. For once. And it feels really, really good.

"Thank you, Lord, for blessing this table," Dom says, his voice low and familiar and somehow weirdly soothing. Dom's whole presence is like that, he thinks. Weirdly soothing. Grounding. It helps calm some of the chaos in Brian's head, and God knows he needs that.

And then there's Mia. Her voice is a different kind of calm. It's gentle, soft, musical. "With food, family, and friendship."

It's been a long time since Brian's had all three of those together. Hell, it's been a long time since Brian's had two of those things just by themselves. Family…friendship….

Sometimes, in the middle of all this craziness, when he's getting kicked down and walked over and used and abused, and it just feels like it's never going to stop, it's easy to forget why he's doing all this. It's easy to forget why he's trying so fucking hard.

He remembers, now.