Hank thought about Bree, sketchbook clutched to her chest, eyes wide and certain as she described Einstein’s hands closing around a dull silver cylinder. His gut tightened.
“I’ve been around racing my whole life,” he said. “You hear things. The Dragons have always pushed the gray areas. Aggressive mapping, borderline fuel mixes. This weekend, some of their speed did not line up with what I was feeling on my own bike or what I was seeing from other top guys. I talked with Brian and Colby, and we decided it was worth asking tech to give them a closer look.”
Mac’s gaze searched his face. “On what grounds?”
“Pattern of behavior,” Hank said. “How they treated access to the bike. The way Einstein worked. It felt like they were guarding something. I couldn’t ignore it and still sleep at night.”
It wasn’t the whole truth, but it wasn’t a lie either. It was the version that protected the woman upstairs, who had already risked more than he liked.
Brian chimed in. “We didn’t point fingers and walk away. Colby came to you, Mac. Respectfully. All we asked was that you run the book on them, like you ran it on us.”
Mac’s mouth twitched. “Appreciated. For the record, Copper Moon Performance’s bike passed with flying colors.”
The sponsor rep cleared his throat. “We’re not here to re-litigate the Stoke situation.” His tone was smooth, but it still made Hank’s hackles rise. “Our concern is the integrity of the series moving forward. We can’t afford a narrative that this is a den of cheaters.”
Diaz rested her forearms on the table, expression calm and unbothered. “You can’t afford bikes exploding under riders either. Let’s keep perspective.”
The man’s jaw worked, but he shut up.
Diaz turned her attention to Hank. “From what my officers heard in the paddock, there was a previous… altercation between you and Marcus. Any chance this was personal?”
Hank held her gaze. “Marcus tried to run me wide in practice and nearly put me into the wall. He plays dirty on the track. I don’t like that. But I didn’t ask tech to strip his bike because of a grudge. I did it because I saw enough off-notes to know the song was wrong. And what difference does it make if it's personal? They were trying to cheat. Doesn’t make it okay because I don't like Marcus.”
Mac grunted. “That hidden bottle wasn’t a home game hack. Whoever plumbed it in knew exactly what they were doing. Clean install. Proper routing. Right materials. If I hadn’t been looking for it, I might’ve missed it too.”
Brian made a disgusted sound. “So you’re saying there’s a professional business in the ‘make your bike into a rolling grenade’ field.”
“Wouldn’t be the first time,” Mac said. “Back when I worked Supercross, we had a guy doing illegal ECU flashes on three continents before we shut him down.”
The operations woman swiped on her tablet. “Our preliminary assessment is that the nitrous system was fitted off-site by a specialist, not installed by Einstein alone. He doesn’t have the background for that level of work.”
Diaz nodded. “We picked him up on charges related to the illegal equipment, but he’s already out on bail. His lawyer is claiming he was following marching orders and didn’t know the full extent of the risk. Heidi Renner’s calling this a smear campaign. Their sponsors are… concerned.”
“Of course they are,” Colby muttered. “Got caught with their hand in the cookie jar and now they’re worried about the crumbs.”
Hank’s jaw set. “What happens now?”
Mac checked a page. “From the technical side, the Dragons’ Cup results are void. They lose all points from this weekend. The bike stays impounded until we finish our analysis. Depending on what else we find, the penalty could extend to the rest of the season and likely a permanent ban from racing.”
Diaz added, “From PD’s side, we’re digging into where that hardware came from. I can tell you this much, James. The machining on that bottle, the gauge integration, the switch routing. That’s not something some backyard mechanic cooked up. Someone’s supplying pro-grade illegal kits to whoever’ll pay.”
She let that hang in the air.
Hank felt the old familiar shift in his brain, like someone had flipped a switch from race mode to threat assessment. He’d seen that pattern before, in a different desert, with different hardware. Someone with expertise cuts corners for money; regular people pay the cost.
“Do you think they installed those kits for anyone else here?” he asked.
Mac and Diaz shared a look.
“It’s on our radar,” Diaz said. “Right now, we have no direct evidence of other bikes running that setup in this paddock. That doesn’t mean it’s not happening elsewhere.”
The sponsor rep cleared his throat again. “We can’t go on a witch hunt.”
“No one’s talking about that,” Diaz replied calmly. “We’re talking about following leads. Which, Mr. James, brings us back to you.”
Hank raised his eyebrows. “To me.”
Mac tapped the folder. “You’ve got credibility with other riders. You talk, they listen. If you hear anything about these kits, about people bragging, about a guy who knows a guy who can find speed for a price. You come to us. Quietly.”
