Page 127 of Cold Hard Truth

“Welcome back.” He smiles at me, his gaze sagging with exhaustion. “How you feeling?”

“Like I’ve been shot.”

Blaze laughs, even if Sage glares at my joke. Blaze’s cut is stained in blood, but he wears it proudly, the same way Sage hasn’t changed either.

“Can I get a second?” Blaze asks Sage.

Sage looks at me, and I pat his hand. “I’m okay.”

“No.” He shakes his head. “Whatever you need to say to me you can say to Lyla.”

Blaze walks in, crossing his arms over his chest and facing the bed. “You sure?”

He nods.

“All right.” Blaze scratches his head and looks Sage over. “Steel’s headed back to Vegas. He needs to put everyone’sloyalty in check and make sure there aren’t any straggling traitors. But there’s still a lot of work to be done.”

“Like a ceremony, I assume.” Sage glances at Blaze’s blood-splattered VP patch. “It’s gonna be Prez, right?”

Blaze nods, before glancing at me. It’s not his fault my father is dead, and that he’s taking the role he’s earned with that tragedy, but it doesn’t mean he wanted it to happen the way it did.

He looks back at Sage. “Things are chaos around here. Half the council died in the explosion, not to mention the number of members it took out. This mess is worse than when we took down Satan’s Reapers. I need people I can trust by my side.”

“Tell me you didn’t come in here to ask me what I think you’re about to.”

Blaze steps forward, taking his knife out of his pocket. He flips it open and works at the stitches on his patch, slowly slicing it off his cut. After breaking the final stitch, he tosses the vice-president patch onto the bed.

“Just think about it.” Blaze points at it with his knife. “We could build something different. Something like it used to be. Something better than this.”

“I’m not even patched.”

“You’re more of a Twisted King than half the fuckers here. Plus, I trust you. Just”—he tips his knife—“think about it.”

Blaze nods at me before turning and leaving the room, and when I look at Sage, he’s staring at the patch on the bed.

Picking it up, I trace the letters, remembering when his dad used to wear this title.

“Don’t worry, I’m not doing it.” Sage takes the patch from my hands and sets it on the table beside the bed.

“Why not?”

“Why not?” he repeats. “Look at you, Lyla. I’ve almost lost you twice to all this shit. The first time I didn’t see you for eight years, and the second time stopped your fucking heart. I’m not doing it again.”

“So it’s because of me?”

“No.” He rakes his hand through his hair. “But it’s not who I am.”

“But what if it is?” I challenge him. “What if this is exactly who you’re meant to be. You heard Blaze, you could make a difference. You could make this place better.”

“You don’t even want this,” he reminds me.

“I know.” I pick at my fingernail. “I didn’t. But—”

“Don’t say it,” he cuts me off.

“What?”

“Destiny.” He narrows his gaze.

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