The tattoo sits on her inner wrist where her pulse beats strongest. Where life flows. Where veins run closest to the surface.
I think of the massive piece sprawlin’ across my back—the war between realms, the fallen angels hunting demons, the judgment and fire. The final panel on my lower back shows an angel with burned wings standing before a sealed gateway. Behind him, smoke rises. Ahead, emptiness.
My body tells a story of violence and vengeance, of holy war and fallen grace.
And now Savannah carries a chapter of that same story on her skin. Not as victim. Not as trophy. But as willing participant in our shared mythology.
The music changes, somethin’ low and heavy with bass that vibrates through the floorboards. Savannah looks up at me, eyes clear despite the whiskey and whatever drugs still linger in her system. "Dance with me," she says.
I take her hand, careful of the fresh ink, and lead her to the small space where couples sway in the half-dark. I pull her against me, one hand on the small of her back, the other tangled in her hair.
Our bodies move together like we've practiced this a thousand times. Maybe we have, in dreams or past lives or the spaces between heartbeats.
We wrap this party up the same way we started it.
There’s something holy in symmetry like that.
My ribs protest with each breath. My face throbs where Cash's fists connected. But these pains feel almost holy now—stigmata earned in service of something greater than myself.
On my spine, a blindfolded angel holds a demon by the throat in eternal judgment. Barbed vines twist through the demon's ribs, pulled from the ground below. The angel has no weapon—only judgment.
Yet here, in this moment, there is no judgment—only acceptance as complete as the ink that covers me from neck to waist.
Savannah presses her forehead against my chest, right over the infected brand. "I love you," she whispers, so soft only I can hear.
"Mine," I say into her hair.
I hold her closer, our hips moving in slow circles as the bass thumps like a heartbeat around us. I wonder if this is what peace feels like—not the absence of war, but the absolute certainty of which side you're fighting for.
The alarm rips through the clubhouse like a knife, shrill and demandin’.
The transformation is instant—almost beautiful in its precision.
Music cuts off mid-beat.
Laughter dies in throats.
Weapons materialize from hidden holsters and beneath tables.
I watch my brothers shift from celebration to defense. The way they move reminds me of the war inked across my back—my personal apocalypse rendered in black and gray. The descent of armored angels, wings unfurled, weapons drawn. Divine wrath made flesh.
My body responds before my mind catches up, muscle memory taking over. The lover recedes, the fighter emerges. This change isn't new. It's as familiar as breathing, as inevitable as the flames that lick up my ribcage in layered grayscale, consuming everything soft.
"Three at the gate," Roach calls out, hunched over a security monitor. "Luxury ride. Ashby logo on the car."
Diesel appears at my side, shotgun in hand. "You expecting company?"
He knows I'm not. But something cold slides down my spine as I move toward the monitor. The camera feed shows a black Range Rover idling at our gate. Two figures visible through the windshield.
"Fuck me," I mutter, leaning closer. "It's Colt."
But it's notjustColt.
The passenger seat holds someone I haven't seen in three years.
“Destiny,” I say. “My sister.”
But there's somethin’—someone—small in her arms.
