He tried to answer.
Nothing came.
Ellie climbed onto the chair beside him.
“You can tell me.”
Samuel looked toward his daughter.
She gave a small nod.
He took Ellie’s hand.
“I was afraid.”
“Of the biker?”
Frank almost smiled.
Samuel shook his head.
“No.”
“Of bad people?”
“Yes.”
Ellie thought about that.
“Are they still bad?”
Samuel looked at Frank.
“I don’t know.”
Frank frowned.
“What does that mean?”
Samuel reached into his jacket pocket.
His fingers shook.
He took out a small brass key and placed it on the table.
Frank stared at it.
Samuel said,
“That wooden box under my bed contains more than the patch.”
Frank felt his chest tighten.
“What else is in it?”
Samuel looked briefly toward Ellie.
“A photograph.”
Ray leaned closer.
“What photograph?”
“And a letter.”
Frank’s eyes narrowed.
“From who?”
Samuel hesitated.
Then spoke a name Frank had not heard since 1981.
“The mechanic from Tulsa.”
Frank stared.
“He died.”
“Yes.”
“When did he write to you?”
“Two weeks before he died.”
“That doesn’t make sense.”
“He sent it to me.”
Frank’s thoughts began racing.
“What did the letter say?”
Samuel looked at him.
“I never opened it.”
Ray nearly shouted.
“What?”
“I was afraid.”
“For forty-three years?”
Samuel nodded.
Frank stared at the brass key.
“You kept an unopened letter connected to the reason you vanished for forty-three years?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because part of me always knew that someday I would have to find out what was inside.”
Frank pushed his chair back.
“We’re opening it.”
Samuel looked uneasy.
“Frank…”
“You are not disappearing again.”
Samuel stayed silent.
Frank closed his hand around the key.
“Where do you live?”
“About forty minutes away.”
Frank stood.
“Then we go now.”
Samuel looked toward his family.
His wife released a long breath.
Then nodded.
“All right.”
Forty-five minutes later, four motorcycles and two cars turned into the driveway of a modest white house outside a small town.
Before Samuel unlocked his front door, Frank had already called two surviving members of their old riding group.
Ray had contacted another.
By the time everyone gathered in the yard, six older men were staring at someone they had believed dead for more than four decades.
None of the reunions began warmly.
Tommy Burke crossed the yard toward Samuel and punched him once in the shoulder.
It was not especially hard.
Still, Samuel stepped back.
“That’s for my mother crying at your funeral.”
Samuel nodded.
“I deserve that.”
Then Tommy grabbed him and pulled him into a hug.
He held on longer than anyone expected.
The others followed.
Some cursed.
Some cried.
Some only placed a hand on Samuel’s shoulder, almost as if they needed physical proof that he was real.
Frank stayed near the porch.
He watched without speaking.
Something inside him was shifting.
He had imagined fury.
Instead, seeing the surviving men together made him feel twenty-seven and seventy at the same time.
Samuel finally led everyone into the house.
His bedroom was plain.
A bed.
Two bedside lamps.
A bookshelf.
A framed family photograph.
Samuel lowered himself carefully and reached beneath the bed.
When he pulled the wooden box into view, Ellie’s description proved exact.
Dark wood.
Small brass lock.
Scraped corners.
Samuel sat on the edge of the mattress.
Frank handed him the key.
“You open it.”
Samuel pushed the key into the lock.
For several seconds, his hand would not turn it.
Then he forced himself.
Click.
The lock opened.
Samuel raised the lid.
Inside was a folded patch.
Identical to Frank’s.
The same compass rose.
The same red line.
The same words.
HOME IS THE ROAD BACK.
Samuel touched it with two fingers.
Ray turned his head away.
Beneath the patch rested a black-and-white photograph.
Samuel lifted it out.
Frank stepped nearer.
Twelve young men stood in front of a row of motorcycles.
The original group.
Frank recognized his younger self immediately.
Long hair.
Thin face.
Arms crossed.
Samuel stood beside him, laughing at something beyond the camera.
Tommy was there.
Ray.
Eddie.
Lucas.
Martin.
All twelve riders.
Seven were gone now.
Five remained.
Frank swallowed.
“I haven’t seen that picture in years.”
Samuel turned the photograph over.
There was handwriting on the back.
Frank frowned.
“That wasn’t there before.”
Samuel looked confused.
“Yes, it was.”
Frank took the picture and read the faded blue ink.
If anything happens to me, find the boy in this photograph.
He is the one Pike is protecting.
Do not trust the police.
Frank stared.
Ray moved nearer.
“What boy?”
“There is no boy.”
Samuel flipped the picture again.
Twelve bikers.
Motorcycles.
The front of a garage.
Nothing unusual.
Then Ellie spoke from the doorway.
“There is.”
Every man turned.
She walked into the room and pointed toward the far left corner of the photograph.
Behind one motorcycle, near the open garage entrance, stood a child partly hidden from view.
Only half of him could be seen.
Maybe eight years old.
Frank stared.
“I never noticed him.”
Samuel whispered,
“Neither did I.”
Ellie studied the picture.
“He has the same necklace Grandpa wears.”
Samuel immediately touched his chest.
Beneath his shirt was a thin chain.
He pulled it free.
A small metal disk hung at the end.
Frank compared it to the photograph.
The child did appear to be wearing something similar.
Samuel’s face turned pale.
“No.”
Frank looked at him.
“What?”
Samuel sat down heavily.
“That boy isn’t wearing my necklace.”
“Then what is it?”
Samuel stared at the photograph.
“He’s wearing my father’s.”
A different kind of silence entered the room.
“Your father’s?” Frank asked.
Samuel nodded.
“My father gave me this after my mother died.”
“Where did he get it?”
Samuel looked stunned by his own memory.
“He told me it belonged to his older brother.”
Frank began thinking quickly.
Walter Carter.
Samuel’s father.
A quiet man.
A paper mill worker.
A person who rarely talked and almost never joined the riders at gatherings.
Frank remembered Walter standing at Samuel’s funeral.
Hands deep in his pockets.
Face empty.
Then another memory surfaced.
Something Frank had never thought important.
Walter had not cried.
Not once.
Frank looked at Samuel.
“Your father knew you were alive.”
Samuel stared back.
“What?”