He reaches in with two fingers. I hear a small snap, and he pulls his hand out. Sitting on his palm is a black rectangle about the size of a matchbox. A small LED on one end glows solid green.
Green. Active. Transmitting.
"It's live," Mickey says. He looks at me. "This thing has been pinging since cell service came back up after the hurricane. Whoever's on the other end of this has probably known exactly where this bike is for weeks."
Ron Jackson has known where his bike is. For weeks. He's been sitting in Alabama watching a dot on his phone that says his motorcycle is parked at a bar on the beach road in Panama City, Florida. He's known where Stormy is this entire time.
"Why hasn't he come?" I ask.
Mickey turns the device over in his hand, examining it. "Could be a lot of reasons. Could be he's being patient. Watching the pattern, seeing if the bike moves, figuring out the situation before he makes a move. A man like this, from what you described, he's not impulsive. He's methodical."
"Or he's waiting for the right moment."
"Right." Mickey stands up. He puts the tracker in his jacket pocket. "This is coming with me."
"Where are you taking it to?"
"Hypothetically speaking again, this tracker might end up hidden somewhere in the impound lot. The same place it would be if the bike itself was impounded or confiscated by the police. If your man in Alabama is watching his app, what he sees is his motorcycle parked now at an impound lot. That sends a very different message."
"That the police have the bike now?" I ask.
"Maybe. Or the person on the bike was picked up for some reason and the bike was confiscated. In any case, it will appear as if the bike is now in law enforcement custody, not sitting at a beach bar. Which means showing up to collect it involves walking into a police station and explaining how heknows where it is, which means explaining the tracker, which means explaining why he's tracking a motorcycle that a young man took when he fled an abusive situation." Mickey allows himself a thin smile. "Even a man with a good reputation thinks twice about that conversation."
"It won't stop him forever."
"No. It only buys time. It changes the calculation. Right now, he thinks he knows where the bike is and by extension where the kid is. After tonight, the bike is at a police station and the kid is somewhere else. He has to start over."
I lean against the wall and look at the Sportster. This machine carried Stormy out of hell, and it's been broadcasting his location back to the fucking devil ever since.
"What should I do with the bike?" I ask.
Mickey glances at me. "As a cop, I can't give you the answer to that specific question. But you know a lot of bikers, Tex."
"I do."
"A man who knows a lot of bikers probably knows someone who could turn a motorcycle into something else. Someone with a shop and some tools and a willingness to reduce a Sportster to parts that don't have serial numbers anymore."
"I might know a guy," I say. "In fact, I know lots of guys."
"Yeah, well, I've never heard of such a thing," Mickey says. "Chop shops are illegal and I'm a sworn officer of the law." He picks up his flashlight. "But if a motorcycle that nobody is officially looking for were to quietly cease to exist, that would solve several problems at once."
I know exactly who to call. Two guys who've been tearing down bikes and rebuilding them for thirty years. They don'task questions. They work fast. A Sportster would be in pieces by morning and spread across three states in parts by the end of the week.
"I'll handle it right away," I say.
"Handle what, Tex?"
"Not a damn thing."
"Exactly."
We go downstairs. Mickey picks up his plate of ribs wrapped in foil. I walk him to the door.
"Mickey, did you run the tag?"
He reaches into his back pocket and pulls out a folded piece of paper. Hands it to me without a word. I unfold it. There's a name. An address. A phone number. Ron Jackson. A road outside a small town in Dale County, Alabama. The salvage yard. Everything right there in black and white.
I fold it up and put it in my back pocket.
