Ace looked at Emma.
“Did he teach you how to work on motorcycles?”
“I’ve grown up around the family connection to bikes.”
That made sense.
He looked again at the embroidery.
The shirt appeared far too large for her.
It was the sort of work shirt a person might keep because it represented something more meaningful than clothing.
Emma had worn it into a garage full of strangers.
She had carried her pink toolbox without apology.
And she had trusted her own judgment when older mechanics dismissed her.
Ace felt a quiet wave of respect.
He’d been impressed by her diagnosis.
Now he was beginning to understand why motorcycles seemed to mean so much to her.
Emma glanced toward the Harley.
“Was your first bike anything like this one?”
Ace gave a small smile.
“Did you love it?”
His answer came without hesitation.
Emma’s smile grew.
That word meant something to her.
She knew people who treated motorcycles as transportation.
She knew others who cared most about how they looked.
But Ace’s response carried the unmistakable feeling of a rider who had never forgotten what his first bike meant.
She could see it in his expression.
The custom Harley beside them might be beautiful and powerful.
It might represent years of riding experience.
But somewhere in Ace’s memory, the motorcycle Henry Brooks had built still occupied a place of its own.
Emma looked down at her oversized shirt.
For a brief moment, the garage no longer felt filled with strangers.
It felt connected to a history she had inherited.
And Ace, standing in front of her, was someone who had actually been part of that history.
She was still smiling when his expression changed again.