We carom off bumpers, slam into car after car. Headlights shatter, alarms go off. But the truck’s built to take abuse and Letitia is giving it plenty. We slam a swath through the sea of cars and hit the driveway leading out to James M Wood Boulevard.

I’ve never understood naming streets after people. Wood was some big-time L.A. union leader in the seventies nobody remembers. You’re dead now, congratulations. Have a street.

Letitia slows down before getting on the road and merging with the rest of the cars. Like she’s trying to blend in. Good luck with that.

“Where the hell did you get this monster truck, anyway?”

“Stole it off the street.” She doesn’t look happy with the admission.

“Tsk. And you a police officer.”

“That’s just my day job.”

Behind us we can hear sirens. Whatever magic Werther was doing to keep everyone away from our little imbroglio must have shut down once Letitia bounced him into the air with the truck.

A few blocks further on I say, “So what now?” I’m wondering why Letitia is here. Why she came to my rescue. And how she knew I was here in the first place. I’m still not convinced I haven’t jumped from one fire into another.

“If any of Werther’s people are looking for us we’ll lose them in heavier traffic then ditch the car,” Letitia says.

“Wasn’t what I was asking, but it’s kinda moot at the moment.”

“Why?”

“Because they’re about half a block behind us.” She searches the rearview until she sees Werther’s three cars.

“Shit.” She slams on the gas and shoves her way through the traffic. She pops the curb, mowing down parking meters until she finds a clearer patch of road and really guns it.

Car chases in L.A. are both fun to watch and pointless to be in, so they’re already one up on golf. Nobody actually gets away in a car chase.

First, you’re gonna get helicopters on you, mostly news crews. Then there’s L.A.’s roads. They’re not exactly easy to navigate. Some are laid out in grids along old Rancho property lines, others are leftovers from when a neighborhood was an entirely different city that got swallowed up by L.A., and still others look perfectly fine until you realize they curve to avoid the river and you’re heading back the way you came.