Page 71 of Cold Hard Truth

“You’re good for him.” Fel smiles. “I think he likes having you around.”

My stomach sinks. “I don’t know if I’m staying.”

“I get that.” She climbs off the couch, looking down at me. “But I hope you do. And I think I’m not the only one.”

Fel starts down the hallway, and I want to follow her, but my insides are cement. Ever since coming back to town, the plan was always to leave again. It’s the right thing to do.

I can’t stay.

I don’t want to—at least—I shouldn’t.

23

Sage

Lyla breaks through mydefenses.

Eight years ago, I handed that girl my soul, and she walked away with it. And ever since, I’ve had this hole inside me, gaping open while I wondered if I’d ever figure out how to fill it. Now, here she is—wielding the power to set me free or finish what she started back then.

Lyla climbs off my bike at the club, and I immediately miss her body heat against my back. She couldn’t ride with me back then because we couldn’t risk Kane reading into it, so I don’t mind the excuse to feel her against me now.

Nothing has ever felt so right.

I’ve worked my way through so many women over the years, it’s borderline sick. And not one of them filled the hole she does with one touch of her hand on my skin.

All it takes is Lyla’s warmth. Her scent. Her smile.

It doesn’t matter if we’ve barely been speaking, she puts me back together in places I wasn’t aware were shattered.

I wish I could do the same for her.

Lyla’s quiet as we approach the clubhouse, and I’d be curious to walk around her mind and see it through her eyes when she’s been gone as long as she has. We pass the spot where we were standing the first time she kissed me, and I might as well have spent the past eight years avoiding it. I swear, I can still feel her lips on mine if I focus hard enough.

The clubhouse is in the middle of repairs. Ladders rest on each side where the roofers are fixing loose shingles. I don’t come around here as often as I used to—and when I do, it’s rarely daylight, so I’m only now noticing the state of disrepair this place is in.

Walking up the steps with Lyla is like taking a walk into the past. Part of me wants to tear her away before it has a chance to destroy us all over again. Right when it feels like we’ve crossed some kind of invisible barrier.

Instead, we forge ahead. To all the things I’d rather avoid.

Once she left the clubhouse, this place became empty walls filled with ghosts. A place that haunted me; a place where I grew up. A home to all the things that probably should have meant something, but they never did.

Smoking my first joint.

Getting my first blow job.

Cutting some random guy’s finger off for information.

Things I was proud of at the time, even when all they did was punch holes through my soul.

Most of all, it reminded me of Lyla. The good times we had before it all fell apart. The bad times after.

It reminded me of my dad, sitting in his favorite recliner in the corner of the room, and laughter that’s since dulled out. It was a safe haven and not the gates to Hell back then.

Bear and Zero stand at the door when we approach. Bear nods, but Zero’s eyes are fixed on Lyla.

I’m not usually one to get jealous. Even when I was falling hard for Lyla when we were younger, and she’d flaunt herself around the guys at the club just to get under my skin, I knew she was mine and I was hers. But when Zero doesn’t take his eyes off her, I’m tempted to burn them in their sockets because, after everything she’s been through, she deserves to be looked at with a hell of a lot more respect than whatever’s running through that sick fuck’s mind.

It's official. The beast I laid to rest at twenty-one is once more finding his way out again.

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