Then he stopped.
"One more thing."
"What?"
"The bolt."
The president frowned.
"What about it?"
The boy looked toward the workbench.
"When I saw the strap yesterday, the mounting point looked clean."
"We noticed."
"But the rest of the engine was dusty."
The president waited.
The teenager chose his words carefully.
"If it just fell off a long time ago, wouldn't the clean spot look different?"
The president stared at him.
The boy immediately became uncomfortable.
"I'm not saying anything. I just noticed."
The president nodded.
"Sometimes noticing is enough."
The teenager left with the family services coordinator a few minutes later.
The president remained beside the motorcycle long after the garage lights should have been turned off.
He was beginning to suspect that the Shovelhead hadn't simply broken down.
Someone might have wanted it to stay broken.
The next morning, the lead mechanic arrived early.
He had barely slept.
The collector had called twice during the night, demanding assurances that the motorcycle would be sold before the fundraiser. The lead mechanic had tried to explain that the club president was becoming suspicious, but the collector had little patience for excuses.
"You took the money," he had said.
The mechanic could still hear those words.
He had accepted an advance from the collector six weeks earlier. At the time, his debts were growing, and a series of bad financial decisions had left him struggling to maintain appearances. He owed money on equipment, had fallen behind on several personal obligations, and was secretly borrowing against future income to cover old mistakes.
The collector offered him a way out.
All he had to do was convince the club that the Shovelhead required repairs far beyond its practical value. Once the motorcycle was sold cheaply, the collector would pay him an additional fee. The arrangement was dishonest, but the lead mechanic had told himself that nobody would be seriously hurt.
The club would receive cash.
The collector would receive a valuable motorcycle.
And he would escape the financial pressure that had been consuming his life.
That was how he justified the first false invoice.
It became easier to justify the second.
By the time he deliberately interfered with the motorcycle's electrical system, he had already crossed so many boundaries that turning back seemed more dangerous than continuing.
Now the teenager had forced him to confront the possibility that everything might be exposed.
He entered the garage and found the younger mechanic reviewing the Shovelhead's repair records.
"You're here early," the lead mechanic said.
The younger man looked up.
"So are you."
"What are you doing?"
"Checking the service history."
"Again?"
"Yeah."
The lead mechanic approached the workbench.
"Don't you have other jobs?"
"Not until we know what's going on with this one."