Frank froze.
"I found this six months ago."
He placed it on the table.
Frank stared at the box.
"Where?"
"Inside an old wall at the Iron Horse."
Frank's heartbeat increased.
"That building was demolished."
"The basement wasn't."
Garrett opened the box.
Inside was an old cassette tape.
A photograph.
And a handwritten note.
Frank picked up the photograph.
Danny.
Smiling.
Standing beside a truck.
Frank turned it over.
Written on the back were five words:
THE TRUTH IS UNDERNEATH.
Frank looked at Garrett.
"Did you listen to the tape?"
"No."
"Why?"
Garrett pushed the cassette across the table.
"Because I thought you should hear it first."
Frank stared at it.
Thirty-one years.
Three decades of silence.
Then he suddenly understood.
Cole's harassment at the gas station hadn't been random.
It had been a test.
They wanted to know whether Frank was still capable of defending himself.
They had no idea what they were testing.
Frank put the cassette into an old player Garrett had brought with him.
Static filled the diner.
Then a voice.
Danny's voice.
Frank closed his eyes.
"If you're hearing this, Frank, something went wrong."
Frank's breathing stopped.
Danny continued.
"Kane isn't working alone."
Static.
"He has people inside the club."
Garrett looked at Frank.
The tape continued.
"There's someone higher."
A pause.
"Someone nobody suspects."
Then the recording ended.
Frank opened his eyes.
Garrett whispered:
"Someone inside your own club."
Frank looked toward the window.
Outside, a motorcycle passed.
Then another.
Frank's expression became cold.
"That was thirty-one years ago."
Garrett nodded.
"Yes."
Frank stood.
"And somebody has spent thirty-one years making sure we never found out who."
The Name Beneath the Name
Cole Blackwood believed fear was power.
It had worked for him for years.
He had built his reputation by humiliating people publicly.
New riders.
Old riders.
Shop owners.
Anyone who looked weaker than him.
He didn't consider himself cruel.
He considered himself practical.
Fear kept people obedient.
Respect, he believed, was just fear with better marketing.
That night at the clubhouse, Cole sat in the president's office.
Across from him sat his father.
Victor Blackwood.
Seventy-one years old.
Victor no longer rode.
He walked with a cane.
His hair was white.
His face looked harmless.
That was the first thing people noticed.
The second was the coldness in his eyes.
"Did you find him?"
Cole nodded.
"The old man."
Victor looked up.
"Frank Morrison?"
"Yes."
Victor's fingers tightened around his cane.
For the first time, Cole saw something like fear.
"You touched him?"
Cole smiled.
"I pushed him."
Victor stood so quickly the chair scraped backward.
"You did what?"
Cole frowned.
"What's wrong?"
Victor stared at his son.
"That man isn't a retired biker."
"I know."
"You don't know anything."
Victor walked toward the window.
"Frank Morrison was a military intelligence officer."
Cole laughed.
"No."
"He spent years overseas."
"I've seen old military guys."
"Not like him."
Victor turned.
"He was the man who nearly destroyed Kane's operation."
Cole's smile faded.
Victor continued.
"Your mother and I built our lives after that night."
Cole stared at him.
"You were there?"
Victor didn't answer.
That was answer enough.
Cole felt something change inside him.
For years, he had believed his father was simply a businessman who had survived difficult times.
Now he understood.
His father had been part of something much darker.
"What happened to Danny Whitfield?"
Victor's face hardened.
"He should have stayed out of it."
Cole stared.
"My God."
Victor walked closer.
"You wanted to impress your friends."
Cole said nothing.
"You wanted to prove you're a real man."
Victor pointed at him.
"Now you have a chance."
"A chance for what?"
"Finish what they started."
Cole swallowed.
"Frank has the evidence?"
"We don't know."
"Then why attack him?"
"Because if he has it, he'll come looking for us."
Cole stared at his father.
"And if he doesn't?"
Victor's eyes became empty.
"Then we make sure he never does."
The following morning, Frank visited the old Iron Horse property.
The building was gone.
Only the concrete foundation remained.
Garrett waited beside a pickup truck.
They searched for nearly an hour.
Finally, Garrett found a section of cracked concrete that sounded hollow.
They removed several pieces.
Beneath it was an old metal container.
Frank opened it.
Inside were documents.