Page 82 of Reckless

A line of blood still burning across my arm.

My stomach twists when I remember… the text, the committee, the men on the highway.

And for the first time, none of it feels separate anymore.

Sin doesn’t sit down once. He moves through the clubhouse issuing quiet instructions, and within twenty minutes a small team is heading back out toward the highway to make certain nothing gets left behind for anyone to find. No shell casings or torn patches that could be traced or that could ever point back to this club or the two men still lying in the desert dirt.

I watch them leave, my fingers unconsciously curling around the sleeve covering the graze on my arm.

This morning I’d climbed onto Ghost’s bike thinking the worst thing waiting for me was another anonymous text message.

I don’t think that anymore.

Whatever started with those messages, it just found me on the open road.

“Your arm.” I blink and realize Dr. Chen is standing in front of me. “Can I?”

I look down at the blood that’s dried along my sleeve and nod. She gently rolls the fabric higher, and the second the cool antiseptic touches the graze, I suck in a sharp breath. “Sorry,” she says quietly.

I shake my head. “It’s fine.”

It isn’t.

Nothing feels fine.

She cleans the wound with quick hands, then presses a square of gauze over it. I watch her tape it into place, strangely fascinated by how ordinary it all looks, as if the last twenty minutes never happened.

“It’s shallow,” she says, giving the bandage one last check. “You’ll have a scar, but it’ll be a small one.”

A scar.

My fingers curl against my jeans before I realize they’re shaking again, and I press my hands flat against my thighs, willing them to stop.

They don’t.

Dr. Chen notices. “Adrenaline,” she says gently. “It’ll take a while to calm down.”

I nod because that seems easier than admitting I can still hear the gunshots every time I close my eyes. “Thank you,” I manage.

She gives me a small smile before moving on to the next brother who insists he’s ‘fine’ while bleeding on the clubhouse floor.

I stare down at the fresh bandage wrapped around my arm.

Twenty minutes ago, I didn’t think I’d need one.

I feel Ghost’s attention on me the entire time, even while he’s talking to Anchor about the phones and wallets they pulled from the SUV. I don’t need to look over to know it. I’ve learned the shape of his focus by now, the weight of it settling over a room.

It isn’t long before Sin’s voice cuts through the low hum of conversation. “Church. Now.”

The brothers start moving toward the Chapel without hesitation, the way they always do when Sin uses that tone. I stay where I am, watching them file past, expecting to be left behind the way I usually am for club business. Then Sin’s eyes land on me, and I understand before he says a single word that this meeting is about me. “Sage. You too.”

My stomach drops somewhere below my boots.

I follow him inside, taking the seat he points me toward near the head of the table, and I feel every set of eyes in the room settle on me the moment I sit down. Ghost takes the seat across from me, his expression carefully blank in the way it only gets when he’s holding something back.

Sin doesn’t waste time. “Talk to me about the photo.”

I close my eyes for half a heartbeat.