“You’re supposed to be smart. Everyone says you’re smart. Why would Razor be asking for you? Everyone knows to stay away from him. Everyone! And he goes and says the name of the one girl who should have the brains to stay away.”

Razor was shot. With a gun. Metal entered his body at speeds of hundreds of miles per hour. Razor said he valued life. He said he took owning a gun seriously, but obviously other people don’t share his point of view.

He could be dying and I might not ever see him again and Violet won’t answer questions, at least not directly, and her nonanswers cause bile to continually inch up my throat. “Why isn’t he in a hospital?”

I’m in my sandals and have a hard time keeping pace with Violet’s blistering speed. Because I’m wearing a skirt, the long grass swats at my legs and stings my skin.

“Because they’re fucked-up, that’s why.” Twigs crack under Violet’s feet as she glances over her shoulder at me. “Razor used to be a normal kid. Well, as normal as you get being raised by thugs, but then they messed with him.”

“Who’s they?” I stumble over a root and catch myself on the bark of a towering tree. Leaves of three on a vine. I flick my hand away.

“Who do you think? The club.” She pauses. “He’s screwed up in the head, Razor, I mean—you know that, right?”

A crow caws overhead and there’s a rush of beating wings as an entire flock of birds take flight. We’re surrounded by a green canopy, but the growth is so thick that the forest floor lacks full afternoon light. Despite the heat of the October day, goose bumps form on my arms.

“He’s been good to me,” I say.

The tough expression she wears at school dissolves, and in front of me is a girl I’m not sure many people have met. “You’re probably the only person in the world who would ever admit that.”

“If I’m not allowed at the clubhouse...” Violet explained that females aren’t allowed in there without a member sponsoring them. She also said no one under eighteen is permitted. If I could pass either of those qualifications, it wouldn’t matter because the clubhouse is on lockdown—whatever that means. “And if you hate Razor so much, then why are you doing this?”

She flinches. “I never said I hated Razor.”

“It seemed implied.” In our short time together, she’s blasphemed the Reign of Terror MC to the point I’ve been ready for her to sacrifice an animal to complete the curse.

“You don’t understand me or the Terror. Nobody understands. All this town is good for is gossip and lies.”

I agree. I don’t understand how a guy everyone is terrified of makes me feel safe. I don’t understand how a guy who stayed behind to protect me when he didn’t know me has been shot. I don’t understand how a guy who carried me out of an alley full of shattered glass is the enemy everyone is warning me about.

Violet’s mouth trembles as if whatever she’s holding in is causing her pain. “My father is dead because of the Terror. My reputation has been ruined since kindergarten. My mother is a mess, my brother has issues...my life has been damaged by the club, so excuse the shit out of me if I’m not their biggest fan.”

“Then why are you taking me here?” I ask.

“Because...” She struggles to breathe. “It’s Razor and he asked for you.”

When she exhales, it’s like she’s flipped an emotional switch from on to off. Not sure which one I prefer—the girl who felt everything or the girl who appears stone cold. “I don’t know why he asked for you, and I sure as hell don’t understand why you agreed to come with me, but some advice?”

I nod.

“Break this off with Razor, because there’s nowhere for it to go. I know who you are. Everyone at school has your number. You’re the supersmart girl who’s going to leave Snowflake for good, and I can also tell you aren’t clubhouse girl material.”

My knee bends as I shift my weight and I feel oddly overdressed in my sweater and skirt. Something about the way Violet said clubhouse girl brought up the image of less clothes and more confidence.

“Maybe Razor doesn’t want a clubhouse girl.” Whatever that means.

She laughs. Throws her head back and laughs. “As I said, you don’t understand. He won’t walk away from the club for you.”

“I’d never ask him to.”

Her eyes narrow on me as if she could choke me with her glare. “I sneaked into a party once, know what I saw? My dad doing body shots with a woman who wasn’t my mother—his wife. Women swinging their bare tits as they danced on the bar. You aren’t the kind of girl who’s going to let a strange guy do body shots off you and you sure as hell aren’t the girl who’s going to strip for shits and giggles in front of a crowd. Are you telling me you’re going to be fine being with a guy that calls that a typical Friday night?”

A lump hardens in my throat and I stagger back. No, I wouldn’t. In fact, the idea repulses me. Razor’s words haunt me... I had sex for the first time the night I patched in...

“And let’s say you can get over all that,” she continues. “I seriously doubt you’ll be okay being harassed by everyone in town and by the police. You’re going to resent every whispered rumor and judgment, which means you are going to resent everyone in the world. And then there are those dark, silent and lonely nights you wait by the phone to hear if the people you love have been shot or killed. The MC path for a woman isn’t a life—it’s a death sentence.”