Page 56 of Tiny's Testament
Me? I’m pacing the oil-stained concrete, pretending I’m just working.
Pretending her eyes didn’t look at me like she was measuring the distance between who I am and who I was.
The lie I fed the club earlier still tastes like metal. Hellhounds didn’t just tag that warehouse, they wereclaiming it, and I covered it. I covered them.
I told myself it was to protect the club. Truth is, I did it because I’m terrified they’ll look at me and see what I used to be.
Footsteps crunch outside, soft but certain, and my chest tightens. She’s here.
Syvannah steps into the garage, framed by the open door and the wash of moonlight behind her. She’s wearing leggings and a loose top, charcoal smudged along her wrist like she’d been drawing again. Her long, soft hair glows in the low light. But her eyes look like she came here to set something down or burn something up. I can’t tell which.
“Hey,” I say quietly.
She doesn’t answer. She just closes the door behind her, like she wants the world shut out before this conversation kills us both.
Her voice comes out tight. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Hook, line, and sinker. My heart drops into my boots. “Tell you what?” I ask, even though I know exactly what the hell she means.
She steps closer, fists trembling. “Don’t play dumb, Tiny. Not with me. All day, you’ve been pulling back. You won’t look at me. You won’t talk. And then Pearl.”
Fury sparks up my spine. “Pearl said something to you?”
“More than said.” Syvannah laughs, bitter. “She practically gift-wrapped the truth, or what she thinks is the truth.”
“What did she tell you?”
“That you’re still loyal to another patch,” Syvannah whispers.
The words hit harder than any fist ever has. It takes everything in me not to smash something, preferably Pearl’s skull.
Instead, I breathe slowly. Controlled. “She’s lying.”
Syvannah shakes her head. “Then why won’t you tell me what’s going on? Why do you look at me like I’m made of glass one second, and like I’m going to breakyouthe next?” She closes the distance between us, standing toe to toe. “Do you still have ties to them? The Hellhounds?”
The past slams into me. Creed’s hand on my shoulder, the smoke, the oath burned into the back of my skull.
I swallow hard. “It’s not that simple.”
“Then make it simple,” she whispers. “For me.”
I look away. Which is the wrong move.
“That’s what I thought,” she says softly. Brokenly. Her voice is a cut I can’t dodge.
“Syvannah.” I plead, wishing to God or any superhuman being to help me make this right without putting her in danger.
“Do you love them more than you trust me?” Her throat works. “Do you love them more than you trust yourself?”
That one lands straight in the old scar tissue. I drag a hand through my hair. “You don’t understand the kind of men they are.”
Her chin trembles, but her voice stays steady. “Then tell me.”
I don’t answer.
Syvannah inhales sharply, like my quiet is confirmation. “You know what?” Her voice cracks on the edges. “I survived men like that. Men who break you down so slowly you think the pieces are your fault.”
“And now,” she continues, “I’m looking at you and seeing the same secrets. The same shadows. The same silence.”
