CHAPTER 1: THE FRONTWHEEL EMBARGO
The blue fiberglass of the front fairing was three inches from the gray fabric of her zip hoodie when she hit the record button.
Leo Vance didn’t kill the engine. The 750cc twin-stroke sat beneath his thighs in a rhythmic, oily low-register vibration, its heat rising against the inside of his heavy riding sleeves. He kept his gloved palms fixed flat over the rubber grips, his fingers resting precisely on the cold steel levers of the brake and throttle. He did not look up at her face. Through the dark tint of his visor, his world was limited to the sharp edge of a black smartphone case and the twitching white rubber soles of Sandra’s sneakers planted flat on the asphalt grit.
“Stop right there, you are not leaving this mess!”
Her voice had the dry, rattling texture of wind through dead hedges. It carried across the manicured turf of the Whispering Pines easement, cutting through the thin morning air. To his left, three clear polyethylene contractor sacks sat slumped against the concrete curb line. Through the stretched plastic, the jagged, chalky white profiles of broken plaster molds and unmixed cement chunks pressed outward like skeletal knuckles. White powder had already leaked from a torn seam, tracing a pale, dusty crescent across the dark gutter.
Sandra leaned lower, her broad shadow blotting out the glare of the digital dash display between Leo’s handlebars. The plastic lens of her phone camera hovered inches from his face shield, catching the reflection of his matte-black helmet. Her arm was rigid, the black crossbody bag pressed taut against her ribs as her chest heaved. “I am recording you too, do not twist this!” she yelled, her fingers tightening around the edge of the screen until the knuckles showed white. “Look at me. Look at the camera.”
Leo remained perfectly still within his leather shell. He didn’t blink. His left wrist remained dropped, keeping the clutch fully compressed, holding the transmission in its neutral, waiting notch. He could feel the small, cold drip of sweat trailing down his temple, but his face remained a mask behind the polycarbonate glare. He had calculated the distance to the curb strip. If he tilted the chassis five degrees to the right, the rear tire would clear her left hip by an inch, but the maneuver would require an abrupt twist of the throttle—a gesture she would interpret, and document, as vehicular assault.
She wanted the reaction. She needed the physical escalation to validate the stack of orange violation notices currently sitting in a neat file on his kitchen table.
“Touch that bike again and you answer for it!” Sandra snapped, stepping closer until her leggings brushed the black metal of the engine guard. Her index finger stabbed downward toward his throttle hand, her loose blonde hair swinging forward into the shadow of the bike’s fairing. “You think because you drive a commercial rig you can turn this cul-de-sac into a landfill? The board is done with you, Leo. I’m done with you.”
Across the two-lane street, a slatted window blind inside the brick facade of number forty-two shifted upward by half an inch. A pale forehead pressed against the glass. Behind Leo’s back, the distant, hydraulic wheeze of a delivery van slowing down at the intersection signaled the arrival of a wider audience. He didn’t turn his head to look. His gaze remained locked on the small, silver screw heads holding Sandra’s phone case together. He knew the camera was rolling, but he also knew his own helmet mount was humming with a faint, steady green indicator light.
Then came the low, heavy thrum from the end of the block—the unmistakable, flat weight of a standard municipal V8 engine shifting down into second gear.
