Page 46 of Twisted Steel

“Are you coming back?”The question is too honest, too dangerous.

I answer before I can think better of it.“Yes.”

Her shoulders lower a fraction.Barely...Enough.

“Okay,” she says.

Okay.Like she trusts one word from me to be a promise.Like that doesn’t put a knife in my chest.

I walk away before I do something stupid, like touch her face in front of my President and the whole sleeping clubhouse.

Savage says nothing until we’re around the corner.

Then, low and dry, “You’re in trouble.”

I look straight ahead.“No shit.”

We enter the war room, and Saint has grainy footage frozen on the screen.A man in a hood buying the burner.Another angle outside the liquor store.A patch visible for half a second beneath his jacket.

Broken Vultures.

There will be no more guessing.No more maybe.

Saint taps the screen.“Reaper wants a response.”

“He’ll get one,” I say.

Savage stands at the head of the table.“Not from you alone.”

I stare at the screen.At the man who carried Harper’s threat.At the war already forming around her name.My fists curl, and the bandage pulls again.

Her hands.Her voice.Her door cracked open because she chose to trust the monster outside it.

“I’m not alone,” I say.

The room goes quiet, and Savage studies me.Saint does too.I don’t soften my words or dress them up as strategy.

“Harper’s under my protection,” I say.“Anyone who has a problem with that can bring it to me.”

Savage’s eyes narrow slightly.“And if the club has a problem with it?”

I meet his stare.Loyalty is a blade, but so is devotion, and I am about to find out if I can carry both without cutting my own throat.

“Then the club better decide fast,” I say, “because Reaper already made his choice.”