Two words stitched in sturdy lettering.
BROOKS MOTORCYCLES.
Ace went still.
Something about the name struck him with unexpected force.
He looked again.
The letters hadn’t changed.
BROOKS MOTORCYCLES.
For a moment, the sounds of the garage seemed to fade.
The name pulled him backward through years of riding, repairs, and memories he’d kept without knowing why they still mattered.
He remembered a different Harley.
He remembered being younger, with far less experience and a desperate desire to own a motorcycle he could genuinely call his own.
And he remembered the man who had built it.
A mechanic who understood motorcycles so completely that other riders sought him out when ordinary repairs became difficult.
Ace hadn’t heard that name spoken in years.
He looked at Emma’s shirt.
Then at her face.
Something in her features seemed suddenly familiar, though he couldn’t have explained exactly what it was.
Perhaps it was only the name making him search for a resemblance.
Perhaps it was the way she had approached the Harley.
Or perhaps memories of people who mattered never disappeared as completely as we believed.
Emma noticed his expression.
“Something wrong?”
Ace didn’t answer immediately.
He pointed toward the embroidery.
Emma looked down.
“What about it?”
“Brooks Motorcycles.”
“Is that your family’s shop?”
Emma glanced at the lettering again.
“It’s my family’s name.”
His jaw tightened.
For years, that name had existed in his memory as part of a story he never quite knew how to finish.
Now it was stitched across the chest of a girl who had just diagnosed his custom Harley.
Ace looked directly at her.
“Your grandfather was Henry Brooks?”
Emma stopped smiling.
The question surprised her.