The place was packed.
Not just busy. Not just a decent turnout.
Packed.
Cars filled every marked space. More lined the edges of the gravel lot. Trucks sat backed in along the perimeter, chrome gleaming under the fading light. And weaving between all of it, like something pulled from an entirely different world, were rows and rows of motorcycles.
My stomach gave a strange little flip.
There had to be dozens of them.
Maybe more.
The bikes were lined up in neat, intimidating rows—black, chrome, matte paint, polished metal catching the last of the evening sun. They looked expensive. Dangerous. Loud even when they weren’t moving.
Maya slowed the car to a crawl. “Okay. I was not prepared for this.”
“Neither was I,” I admitted.
“No one told me there’d be…” She waved vaguely through the windshield. “All this.”
“What exactly is all this?”
She gave me a deadpan look. “Motorcycles, Emma.”
I laughed. “I can see that.”
“No, I mean…” She lowered her voice even though the windows were down and nobody could hear us. “This feels like biker biker.”
I looked back out at the lot.
She wasn’t wrong.
There was a heaviness to the place. Not bad. Not yet. But there was definitely a presence. Men stood in small groups talking beside the bikes, broad shoulders and dark clothes and a kind of confidence that didn’t ask permission to take up space. Even from the car, they looked like the type of men people noticed and then wisely chose not to stare at for too long.
After circling once, Maya found a spot near the far edge of the lot when an SUV pulled out.
She parked and cut the engine, but for a second neither of us moved.
“Well,” she said finally.
“Well,” I echoed.
“You ready?”
“No.”
“Same.”
I grabbed my small purse from the floorboard and pushed open the door. Gravel crunched beneath my sandals the second I stepped out. The evening air was warmer than I expected, heavy with the smell of dirt, gasoline, cut grass, and something smoky drifting from somewhere nearby.
Music thumped faintly from inside the building.
People laughed near the entrance.
A man in jeans and a black t-shirt walked by carrying a case of beer on one shoulder like it weighed nothing.
Maya stepped up beside me and smoothed a hand over her hair. “If I get murdered, tell my boss I’m not coming in Monday.”
