The Mojave Desert had a way of bleeding the color out of everything. By two in the afternoon, the sky wasn’t really blue anymore; it was a washed-out, blinding white that made you want to keep your head down. I sat on a wooden stool in the open bay of my garage, a grease-stained rag in my hands, methodically wiping down a pristine chrome carburetor.
My name is Frank Vance. For the last decade, I’ve owned a small, run-down service station and garage sitting on a lonely stretch of Arizona highway. I pumped gas for lost tourists, patched tires for truckers, and spent my evenings rebuilding classic motorcycles. It wasn’t a glorious life, but it was a quiet one. And quiet was the only thing I truly valued.
I wiped a smudge of oil off my thumb and glanced toward the small, dusty office attached to the garage. Underneath the counter, hidden behind a stack of old invoices, was a heavy steel lockbox. I hadn't opened it in thirty years. I intended to go to my grave without ever turning the key. Inside that box was a life that belonged to a different man, a man who didn't exist anymore.
Martha, my late wife, used to tell me that the desert was a place for starting over. When we bought this station, she planted a row of resilient little cacti near the front pumps. She watered them every morning until the cancer took her five years ago. Now, I watered them. It was a simple routine. Wake up. Drink black coffee. Work on my 1948 Indian Chief motorcycle sitting on the hydraulic lift. Water the cacti. Go to sleep.
But today, the routine was broken by a sound that didn't belong.
It started as a high-pitched, angry whine echoing off the canyon walls in the distance. It wasn’t the low, rumbling thunder of a classic cruiser or a passing semi-truck. It was the synchronized scream of inline-four engines being pushed to their limits.
I set the carburetor down on my workbench and grabbed a clean shop towel, wiping my hands as I walked out from the shade of the garage into the punishing sunlight.
Four sleek, aggressively styled superbikes tore off the main highway, their tires kicking up a massive cloud of pale dust as they hit my gravel lot. They didn’t slow down until the last possible second, braking hard and skidding into a loose semi-circle that completely blocked the exit from my garage.
The engines cut off in unison, leaving a sudden, ringing silence in the hot air.
The leader kicked his side stand down and swung his leg over the seat. He pulled off his heavy black full-face helmet, revealing a mop of bright, dyed red hair. He looked to be in his mid-twenties, wearing a pristine black leather racing jacket that cost more than my entire tool collection. Behind him, three other men dismounted. They wore matching leather vests with no club patches, just the arrogant swagger of young men who were used to taking whatever they wanted.
I recognized the red-haired kid immediately. His name was Dax. He ran a local extortion crew that had been terrorizing the independent businesses in the neighboring county. Over the last month, a massive corporate syndicate led by a man named Silas Thorne had been buying up thousands of acres of worthless desert land for some massive private development project. Anyone who refused to sell to Thorne's shell companies got a visit from Dax and his boys.
“We’re closed,” I said quietly, tossing the shop towel over my shoulder.
Dax smiled, a cold, empty expression that didn't reach his eyes. He rested his helmet on his hip and walked slowly toward me, the gravel crunching loudly under his heavy boots. His three shadows—a tall, lanky kid I’d heard called Viper, a muscular brute named Brick, and a third guy nervously chewing gum—fanned out behind him, stepping onto the concrete apron of my garage.
“You’re Frank, right?” Dax asked, stopping three feet in front of me.
“The sign says closed,” I repeated, keeping my voice even.
Dax sighed dramatically, looking around the dilapidated station. He pointed at the rusted gas pumps. “This place is a graveyard, old man. I don’t know why you’re being so stubborn. Mr. Thorne is offering you fifty thousand dollars for this dirt. That’s forty-nine thousand more than it’s worth.”
“It’s not for sale,” I said.