Page 37 of Redline Baby

Past sixty.

Past eighty.

Past a hundred.

Past the point where there's a recovery window.

I know exactly where that line is.

I've known where it is my whole life.

I cross it on purpose.

And it works.

It always works.

The noise floods in and takes everything.

I am gloriously, mercifully empty.

The first curve comes up, and I know it.

I know this road.

A long left-hander I've carved a hundred times, sweeping out past a tree line, and I take it without lifting, leaning the bike farther and farther until the peg's a breath from the asphalt, the horizon tilting, my knee dropping toward the deck.

I push the lean past comfortable.

Past sensible.

The tires load up, the suspension compresses, the whole machine humming right at the edge of its grip—

And at the apex, the rear tire skips.

A patch of loose gravel.

A faint, gritty stutter under me.

The back end steps out half a foot in a quick lateral kick that would put most people in the hospital.

My body handles it before my brain even registers the slide. I ease the throttle a fraction, steer into the slide, let the bike walk and catch itself. The rubber bites again.

The line comes back.

Reflex.

I don't slow down. That's the part I'll think about later. If there is a later.

I felt the warning and rolled straight through it.

The next curve comes up faster than the last, and it's sharper, a tighter radius dropping right, and I'm carrying too much speed into it. I tip the bike in. And there, spread wide across the inside of the lane where I need the rubber to be, is gravel. Not a stray patch this time. Not a stutter. A full scatter of it.

The front wheel hits it at speed.

There's no warning.

No stutter, no chirp, no half-second of feel to work with.