Page 193 of What We Bury

I glance between them, at the table, at the blood drying on Sage’s glove.

“Why are we really here?”

“Knife skills,” Milo says, twirling the knife in one hand.

“Milo.”

He sets his knife down. Picks it up. Sets it down again. “She asked to come in. On Hudson.”

I frown. “And?”

“I told her no. Not Hudson. Too late. Too tight.”

“And?”

Sage interrupts. “I asked about the next one.”

Fuck.

There’s blood on her cheek. But she looks happier than I’ve ever seen her, which is the part that fucks me up.

“Does Eli know?”

“No.”

“Does Knox?”

They both shake their heads.

“Holden?”

Sage grins and shakes her head. “Just us.”

The grin worries me more than the secret. Not because she’s wrong to want this, but because for the first time since I’ve known her, she looks excited to keep something from us.

Or maybe not from us.

For herself.

Fuck.

“So we’re doing this?” I gesture at the pig, but I mean bringing in Sage.

“I’mdoing this,” Milo says. “You’re either with me or you’re not. I need someone she trusts and who isn’t going to immediately call Eli.”

And when Eli finds out—because he will, he always does—he’s going to be pissed I stood in this room and said nothing.

I look at the pig. At the blood drying on Sage’s cheek. At the fact that I’m already complicit.

If she is going to learn, she deserves to learn with someone watching her hands, someone who knows what a blade can give and what it can take.

Keeping her ignorant would just be another way of choosing for her.

Fuck it.

We’re going to pay for this. All of us.

I look at Sage again. She smiles brightly.