Prologue

The game has barely started, and adrenaline's already rushing through me.

Win or lose is where I'm in my element. One-on-one, where it's just me against him. That's what I'm good at.

My character pops up on the screen a second before the green behemoth Nick created appears on the other end. We stand face-to-face while the timer counts down, and the moment it rings out, my fingers squeeze the controller.

One attack after another, I come at him full force.

"Burning through all your cooldowns right out the gate. Not smart, Sage," Nick taunts me from across the couch.

Xavier's on the other side of him smoking a joint, and my contact high has me grinning.

"Jealous you're already losing, Nick?" I fire back.

"I'm not losing to your scrawny ass."

"I'm thirteen. What's your excuse?"

Nick tenses at my comment a second before I land another solid hit that takes a third of his character's health. It's too easy when it doesn't take much to distract him.

Nick might be ten years older than me, but he's not much bigger. Which all the guys at the club know is a huge soft spot for him. And if he was a good guy, I might feel guilty about pointing it out to win a video game. But what Nick lacks in physical size, he makes up for by being the biggest asshole in the club. So he deserves it.

"I grew up playing this game." Nick slides to the left, dodging my next attack while striking me for a solid quarter of my health. "Don't know who you think you are, kid."

I grin, mashing the buttons on my controller and sending Nick flying backward. "Good luck, old man. This kid is going to kick your fucking ass."

"Fuck off." Nick grinds his teeth.

"Language." Nick's old lady schools us as she walks past us to the kitchen, but I ignore her.

Across the room, a few of the guys are spewing profanities. I'm surrounded by it, so I'm not sure why she cares.

It doesn't matter if I'm thirteen, I was born and raised in this place. Cursing is the least concerning thing I've witnessed at the Twisted Kings clubhouse. I wasn't even nine the first time I saw people fucking in front of me.

Sex, drugs, torture.

I don't even flinch anymore because I was trained not to. My dad is the vice president and I'm his prodigy. A few fucks and shits should be the least of everyone's concerns, considering what I'm subjected to.

"Sorry, Bea," Nick shouts back at his girl, not taking his eyes off the television as he gets me with a solid hit.

"Sage, Reed, get out here," Dad calls across the clubhouse. "Now."

"Fuck," I grumble, trying to finish the round, but Nick still has too much health left after he hits the button that restores half of what I just took.

"Your daddy needs you." Nick shoves my arm.

Tossing the controller on the table, I groan. I was sixty seconds away from finally kicking Nick's ass, and his smug expression as he aims for my head on the screen and takes the shot has me fuming.

Nick might be older, but it doesn't stop him from acting like more of a kid than I am.

"Next time." I grind my teeth.

"You said that last time." Nick's character stands over my body and does some stupid dance.

"Fuck you." I flip him off.

"Feel good about beating a thirteen-year-old, Nick." Xavier punches him in the arm.

But Nick just scowls. He doesn't give a shit how old I am, all he cares about is winning. Which is annoying as fuck, but also makes him a halfway decent Twisted King.

Making my way down the hallway toward the front door of the clubhouse, I find it wide open. It's warm for spring, and the heat makes its way inside. When I step out onto the porch, I find my dad waiting for me.

"What's up?" I come up beside him and he leads the way down the steps. "I was in the middle of a game."

"Kane needs you." Dad leads me over to him.

He's standing beside the main driveway in front of the clubhouse, smoking a cigarette. He hands one to Dad when we stop beside him, leaning in to say something under his breath so I can't hear it.

They're watching a car pulling up the road, and there's nothing special about it. It's on the verge of falling apart. The bumper is barely hanging on and the paint is chipping. The wheels crack over the pavement, and the right front tire looks close to blowing up.

It's a fucking death trap—and nothing like the vehicles we normally see on this stretch of road.

Sycamore Drive only has one address—the Twisted Kings clubhouse. Visitors usually show up on bikes or overfilled pickup trucks. Not beat-to-shit Hondas like the one headed straight toward us now.

Whoever is headed in our direction needs to take a trip to the shop before their car falls off its rims.

"I'm here," Reed cheers, running past me and knocking me on the shoulder as she does.

Her bright yellow dress flutters in the wind and her dark ponytail bounces from side to side.

"Watch it," I yell at my sister.

Not that she'll listen. Reed is three years younger than me and a pain in my ass. Always getting into trouble because she knows she'll get away with it. It's my responsibility to look out for her around here. And because of that, anything she does falls back on me.

Reed spins around, walking in reverse and sticking her tongue out at me like a menace. The three years between us feels like a decade-wide gap sometimes, and the older I get, the less we have in common.

It doesn't help that Dad coddles her and treats her like a spoiled princess. We might both live at the compound, but she's not living the same life as me. While Dad keeps her away from all the shit that goes down here, he puts me directly in the middle of it.

He wants Reed to get out of here and have a normal life someday. While he's preparing me to be a Twisted King like him. Eventually, I'll patch in, and she'll escape. Which is for the best. I might love my sister but she's a pain in the ass and doesn't belong in this place.

There aren't many kids that live at the Twisted Kings compound. Most of the guys don't settle down, and the ones who do eventually fuck it up. Their old ladies stick around long enough to put in some effort, but eventually end up leaving with the children.

Reed and I are the exception. We were born and raised here. Mom died of cancer shortly after Reed was born, so Dad's all we've got. And even if he's not great at many things, outside of being Kane's right-hand man, he's always loved us. He looks out for us the best he knows how, and he wants the best for us.

He's our family and this is our home.

If a motorcycle club can be considered that.

We live in a house a half mile away from the clubhouse in the section of the compound they call "the neighborhood." Club business isn't allowed there since that's where the members' families live. So it's where Reed spends most of her time.

"What is it?" I grumble, still watching the car make its way up the road. "I was winning my game."

"We have guests." Kane is the one who answers me.

Looking up, I see both he and Dad have their eyebrows pinched. Kane's posture is tense, and his fists clench as he watches the car making its way up the road. As the club's president, it's rare to see Kane show any hint of emotion, but I sense that whoever's on their way has him rattled.

Twisted Kings don't get nervous. They don't worry about shit when they're better at controlling it.

Whoever is in that car has Kane anxious.

When the car finally rolls to a stop, a woman climbs out first. She's vaguely familiar, even if I can't pinpoint why. I don't think I've seen her around here before. But the members have so many women passing through, so I could be wrong.

Her long black hair is down, and she's dressed like Kane's type. Everything she's wearing is too short or too low, showing off every inch of her pale skin. And her face is caked in so much makeup it's impossible to tell what she actually looks like beneath it.

She rounds the car, pausing and narrowing her cat eyes at Kane for a moment. Crossing her arms over her chest, I sense a silent war waging between the two of them. I'm not sure what Kane did, but she's not like the girls around here who are usually fawning over him. She's pissed.

"Talia." Kane breaks first, taking a step toward her.

"Kane." She grimaces, still maintaining her cold standoff. "I'm only doing this because you gave me no other choice."

"They're my daughters."

Daughters? Kane doesn't have daughters.

At least, not that I know of.

"Half yours, half mine," he argues, his voice dropping to that tone the guys at the club know better than to question.

"I'm not having my girls raised in this hellhole."

"And like I told you, I'm not having them staying in the city unprotected if you're jetting off across the fucking country." Kane takes another step forward, getting into Talia's space now.

The longer I stare at her, the more I realize something about her is vaguely familiar, even if I must have been really young the last time I saw her. Because I've definitely seen her face here before.

Talia has to tip her head back to look at Kane. But while I'm used to most people fearing Kane either for his title, the club, or his burly size, she doesn't so much as flinch as he stares down at her.

"It's a good job. I can't turn it down." She narrows her gaze. "It's good for me and the girls."

"And that's fine. But when they're not with you, they'll be here at the compound. Like I said, I don't care about the job. But I'm not having someone else raise my fucking kids."

"It's a quick trip—"

"Then you'll see them soon."

Talia's mouth snaps shut when he cuts her off. And even if she doesn't seem scared to stand up to Kane, she is clearly aware of the limit to his patience.

"Fine." She rolls her eyes, turning around to open the door to the backseat.

She and Kane block my view for a moment until two girls step out of the car and make their way around Talia.

They look just like their mother, with long dark hair and pale skin. Matching silver rings on their fingers. Rosy cheeks and eyes that dart around at all of us as they stand hand in hand, taking us in.

They're twins. And I almost think they're identical until I look closer and catch the clear difference.

The eyes.

One girl meets my stare, and her gaze is the ocean—a stormy bluish gray. But when I glance at the other, and the sun sweeps over her, I swear her eyes are purple.

I didn't think purple eyes could exist, but this girl with her violet eyes steals my focus.

"I'll be back in a few days." Talia hugs her daughters before climbing back in the car to leave. "Stay out of trouble, okay?"

They both nod at their mom but look nervous as Talia drives away. Their stares dart around from Kane to the rest of us, and I'm still trying to process the fact that Kane has daughters when they've never come around here before.

I've seen Kane do all sorts of things I know better than to talk about but settling down isn't one of them.

"Girls." Kane nods, offering a forced smile, but they don't return it.

They clearly know him, even if they're uncomfortable. And I'm guessing that's why Dad called Reed and me out here—to be a buffer for Kane's parental failings. As if anything can make the Twisted Kings compound less intimidating. It's all beat-up buildings, iron skulls, and weed-covered dirt.

Situated in the LA desert, it's far enough outside the city to mask what happens here.

"Sage, Reed, this is Ellie." Dad points to the blue-eyed girl, before moving to the purple-eyed one. "And this is Lyla. Kane's daughters."

"Hi." Reed jumps forward, bursting with excitement because we don't get visitors, especially girls who look right around her age. "I'm Reed. I'm so excited to have more girls here. This place is so lame."

Reed rolls her eyes, and it manages to drag a smile out of Ellie and Lyla.

"Come on. I'll show you around." Reed bounces again and they start to follow her down the road that leads to the neighborhood. "How old are you guys?"

"Ten," they both answer in unison.

"Me too," Reed cheers.

Their voices start to fade out as they walk and skip away with so much laughter; I'm not sure what to think of it. It's a rare sound in this place.

I watch the three of them disappear, digging my hands in my pockets. My sister is bad enough, but I have a feeling this newly formed preteen girl squad is going to be the death of me.

"They'll be fine," Dad says to Kane, and I look over to see them watching the girls run away.

"This is a bad idea, Hawk." Kane runs his hand through his dark hair.

"Then why'd you do it?"

"You know why." Kane glances at my dad and they share some silent understanding, even if they keep me out of it.

"They'll be good here," my dad says. "They'll be safe."

Kane nods, turning his attention to me. "I need you to look out for them, Sage. Just like you do for your sister. You know how this place can be, and these are my daughters we're talking about. Keep ‘em out of trouble."

"I will." Not that I want to.

I want to be a Twisted King, not a babysitter.

"Good." His eyes drift once more to the girls—to the three bright dresses slowly fading in the distance with their giggles. "They're little spitfires just like their mother. God help me."

As if God gives a crap about the Twisted Kings.