Epilogue
Ash
Her soft hand grips mine, that pretty face of hers scrunching into a grimace.
After all she’s gone through, who would have thought a tattoo would make her squirm.
I have to bury my teeth into my bottom lip to hide my grin.
“Hold still,” Roxy huffs, gripping my angel’s leg with one hand while tattooing with her other.
“It feels funny,” Maddy frowns, but when her eyes slide to mine, her lashes flutter at me, a small smile curving on her face. “Don’t laugh!”
This time, I can’t contain my laugh. She’s just too fucking perfect and adorable. “Angel,” I sigh, squeezing her hand reassuringly. “You do realise where she’s tattooing you is over two very deep knife wounds? This is nothing compared to that.”
I immediately regret bringing it up.
Angry, red fury slides down my spine at the memory from just months ago. One that still keeps me up at night and pulls me into fits of rage that I barely get out of.
“Ow!” She squeals, and I realise I’m squeezing her hand too hard. My smile turns sheepish.
“Maybe if you let it heal more, it wouldn’t hurt so bad,” Roxy gives my angel a look, her blue eyes blinking knowingly.
My angel gives her a smile that doesn’t quite reach her eyes. It makes my teeth grit.
“I couldn’t wait any longer,” she murmurs, turning her attention back onto me.
My brave girl.
These past months have been… hard.
While I battle the images of her tied and taken from me that haunt me, she battles, well… where do I even start.
Surviving her father and his business.
Surviving the realisation that all her work she did was just feeling his abhorrent business.
Surviving being tortured and stolen, left to die in an underground pit.
Killing her father and leaving her life as she knew it.
Surviving me…
“Ash!” Maddy warns, and I have to beg the muscles in my hand to relax.
“Sorry,” I whisper, leaning towards her and pressing a soft kiss to her temple. “I’m feeling murderous.”
Her friend turns hard eyes on me. “Not in here, you’re not.”
Roxy. The one person who I can’t threaten with pain and fear. Maddy’s best friend.
The person I have to share my angel’s heart with. My angel made me swear to not bring up any Devils business around her, or anything crime related. Little Roxy has a past.
And you’d better believe I’ve dug up every little bit of it.
Especially with the way my brother’s are sniffing around her.
So far, she doesn’t pose a threat to my angel. So I’ll follow the rules… For now.
I raise my hands in defeat, grinning back at her glare.
I can’t really blame her from wanting nothing to do with the criminal activities of Havenport Harbour.
Especially now.
My Angelis a Devil through and through, yet, that very fact is being debated by groups all over the country.
Some have the audacity to say she isn’t, and still believe I broke the grey zone rules.
Which means a war that no one is prepared for. War, that will see more deaths and more blood than the history of the truce.
There is no pretending that dark times aren’t coming to Havenport Harbour and the Devils.
No pretending that because we won the battle, we will win the war.
The thought has me sliding my hands through Maddy’s blonde hair, and leaning in to inhale her perfect scent. I’ll never get enough of her.
She’s my everything. Now, I have everything to lose.
Her dark eyes hold mine, and I don’t dare look away.
Her light shines so bright, it’s blinding. Even through all this darkness, her light never dims.
It grows stronger by the day. Through the rubble of her life, she’s picking up the pieces, brick by brick. My sweet girl has even started her own charity, one that actually gives the profit to the ones who need it the most.
It might seem wrong, a Devil who causes mayhem and sin, to be with an Angel. Luckily, I don’t fucking care.
Her light matches my darkness. My darkness loves her light.
She is my redemption. I am her salvation. The angel to my devil.
“Alright,” Roxy grins, her painted lips curving into something satisfied. “All done.”
Maddy nervously glances down at her thigh, and I follow, looking down at her once scared thigh. The scars are still there. Red and angry.
My heart beats a possessive tune. One scar now looks like a pitch fork, a forked tail wrapping around it. The other boasts angel wings, with a broken halo above it.
It’s us.
“I love it,” she whispers, her voice thick. She blinks up at me. “What do you think?”
“It’s perfect, baby.”
It’s everything I need to remind me what I’m fighting for.
What the future pain will be for.
Because there will be pain. There will be sin.
For her, for my family. For them.