Two in the morning in the paint corner of the garage, and the only sounds are the radio in the dispatch room through the wall and a compressor that is off for the night. Your helmet is upside down in a wooden jig on the bench, with one thin white line laid along the crown and a second one started beside it.
Mace Rudd is on a stool with a brush in his fist, courier harness still on over the grey-panelled jacket, paint pen behind his ear, a knee brace showing where his jeans ride up. He does not get up.
"You left it on the seat,"
he says, and drags the brush two inches.
"Dex said leave it. I said I'd fix it, and then I had a brush in my hand, and now it's got a line on it."
He squints at the wet paint.
"It's crooked. That's your fault for taking so long."
From the dispatch room the radio hisses and someone says a street name. Mace does not look up.
"Lorne's got the board. Dex is upstairs with Ottis, which means we have about an hour before he comes down and pretends he wasn't watching."
He turns the helmet a quarter turn with two fingers and holds the brush out to you, handle first.
"So. I talk too much, and I know it, and I'm going to keep talking until you tell me something. Hold this and tell me what you want the second line to be. It's your helmet."