Or rather, he heard what was hiding inside the silence. A faint metallic whisper coming from Black Fury's engine block.
A sound so quiet that Dale's scanner missed it. That Nolan's hands missed it.
That Curtis's laptop never even looked for it. Owen stopped walking.
Tilted his head. Closed his eyes for half a second.
And he knew. He walked toward the bike.
Hands in his pockets. Slow.
Like he had nowhere to be. Garrett spotted him from 15 feet away.
"The hell are you looking at?"
"Your bike. I think I know what's wrong with it."
Garrett looked at Owen's shoes. Looked at his stained shirt.
Looked at his skinny arms. Then he laughed.
Not a real laugh. A laugh designed to humiliate.
"You hear that, boys? This little piece of garbage thinks he knows what's wrong."
The crowd rippled. Someone yelled,
"Go home, kid."
Someone else,
"Wrong neighborhood, bro."
A biker, thick beard, neck tattoos, arms like concrete pillars, walked up and flicked Owen's ear. Hard enough to sting.
"You lost, little boy? Daycare's down the street."
Another one grabbed Owen's backpack and ripped it off his shoulders. Unzipped it.
Dumped everything on the asphalt. A crushed sandwich.
A water bottle. The library book.
Fundamentals of Internal Combustion Engines. The biker picked up the book.
Read the title out loud in a mocking voice. The crowd howled.
He dropped it in a puddle of oil and stomped on it.
"That's where your education belongs, in the dirt, just like you."
Owen bent down, picked up the book, wiped the oil off with his sleeve, put it back in his bag. Garrett watched all of this with his arms crossed.
"You done, or you need another lesson in where you belong?"
Owen zipped his bag, stood up straight. Those same quiet eyes.
"I can fix it."
Garrett moved fast, got right in Owen's face. So close Owen could smell the whiskey, the tobacco, the engine grease baked into his skin.
"Listen carefully, boy."
"You see these hands?"
Scarred knuckles, prison ink.
"These hands have hurt people."
"You see these brothers?"
He swept his arm across 15 Hells Angels.
"They've done worse."