I Fell In Love With The Devil

Epilogue

The evenings were beginning to cool and the leaves of the trees in the street had begun their annual colour changing routine. I hugged the warm mug close to my chest and hugged my knees up against my chest. The fairy lights twinkled above my head and a warm fire crackled in the firepit. I picked a marshmallow from my hot chocolate and popped it in my mouth. It melted on my tongue. I surveyed the scene unfolding around me. Gazza was turning sausages on the BBQ with a beer in hand. Matthew and Scarlett had disappeared somewhere within the last few minutes. Jake had arrived with a girl in tow, her ombre bob, silver eyes and freckled nose made her look cute but gorgeous. I could see why the tips of Jake's ears went pink and a blush dusted his cheeks every time he looked at her. I hadn't been introduced yet but she seemed like my kinda girl. David had only just appeared with a tray of various meats in one hand and an esky in the other.

'Where'd you win that one from?' Gazza yelled.

'The pub. Where else?' David grinned.

'Dunno, looks kinda gourmet to me.'

'It's roadkill gourmet then. It's fucking good though.'

'I'll take your word for it.'

There were others mingling in Levi's backyard that I hadn't met yet, mostly invited by Gazza, Matthew and David. Scarlett and I had gone to the nearest Kmart and bought as many strings of fairy lights as we could find on the shelves and now everything that wasn't a person was bedazzled in the delicate glow they cast on the yard. The door opened and a high pitched squeal escaped from the mouth of someone I knew extremely well. I whipped my head around and beamed at Holly who was hopping from foot to foot in excitement biting her lip. I placed my cup on the armrest of the couch and sprinted over to wrap my arms tightly around her neck. 'I can't believe you're here,' I whispered loudly.

'I'd look like a real bitchy friend if I didn't visit your new house.'

'It's not new and it ain't mine.'

'New to me and you're dating the dude so it also belongs to you.'

'The dude. Nice.'

Holly spun around to see Levi for the first time in person, leaning his muscular frame against the doorframe.

'He's even hotter in person,' she muttered.

'And has better hearing than expected, too,' he chuckled. 'But I appreciate the compliment.'

'He's a bastard beneath all the eye candy,' I whispered loudly so that he would hear.

'But he's a bastard you like enough to live with so I can't be too bad.'

'Have you seen her ex's? They ain't exactly nice people,' Holly remarked.

Levi's face soured at the mention of my ex's, one, in particular, was probably coming to mind more so than previous ones.

'We try to avoid such topics here,' I muttered. 'He gets kinda cranky then he becomes a pain in my ass for the next week. Anyway, is Eli here too?'

'I hope you don't plan on cheating on me with the dude,' Eli appeared behind Levi with an amused smirk on his face.

'Never,' Holly batted her eyelashes and winked in an exaggerated fashion at Levi who winked back with equal obviousness. Levi and Eli strolled out into the backyard, each taking a girl's hand. Levi guided us over to the firepit where he let go of my hand so I could collect my hot chocolate and introduced Holly and Eli to some other agents. 

Holly and Eli both knew about what Levi and his friend's jobs were and what had happened three months ago with Theodore who was now in a maximum-security prison in the middle of nowhere, the location Levi still hadn't told me. Which I was fine with, I'd prefer to believe that there was no way Theodore was ever going to ruin my life again. Doctors had found weird drugs in his system that had one: turned him psychotic and two: made him follow instructions. I'd overlooked those facts multiple times and completely ignored the topic or what was said when it came up which was rare. I'd read the documents the doctors and prison boss had sent us about Theodore's condition now that he was in some rehab stage to get him off the drugs. Levi had called him once during the three months and almost immediately hung up and slammed the phone down. He hadn't talked for a full hour and I'd found him in the gym with bloody knuckles beating the shit out of the punching bag. I'd taken him away from the punching bag and dragged him for a walk/jog to the beach instead where we had sat and he had spilled everything he'd been bottling up inside for the previous hours. Theodore had screamed at Levi to never ring him again because they weren't brothers anymore, that they had never been. Later on that night, we received an apology call from the prison boss who said that they'd cut down his dose of the drugs and he was in a terrible condition for the first week after his dose was reduced which explained the screaming and made Levi feel better. I'd been offered a job with the agency but I told them I'd wait a while before I took it. I'd been seeing one of the agency's best psychiatrists to help me get over my experience and I was making progress but she and I both believed I wasn't ready to take on the field job just yet. I rang Holly weekly to give her the rundown of my week or we sat in silence because neither one or both of us had it in us to talk about the day or week. I had been in hospital for three weeks before I'd been released and Levi another two weeks after that. Matthew and Jake had healed well after their misfortunes when escaping Prada. Jake's pinkie was still missing the top half and he said that he preferred it that way. He could now say a crocodile bit it off to get more girls when at a party and relay some made up narrow croc escape while on holiday in the Northern Territory. 

I felt the cushion on the seat move and I glanced over at Holly who smiled sadly at me.

'What?' I asked.

'Those scars,' she was looking pointedly at the scars visible through the slit in the skirt I was wearing.

'Come with me,' I gripped her hand and pulled her after me into the house and up to the bedroom. 'Since you're my bestest of best friends, I think you deserve to see them all.'

She sat dutifully on the bed and I turned around to take off my shirt so she could see the long scars on my back from the whip, the scars from the glass shards and the brand on my shoulder. I spun around so she could see all the dotted scars on my arm from the glass and the heart on my cheek which I had asked to be made as least visible as possible. I lifted my skirt up so the mess of scars on my thigh was visible and so was the continued line of scars from the glass shards. I looked up to see Holly crying.

'Oh, Holly, please don't cry. You'll make me cry.'

She stood up and hugged me so tightly that I thought she'd squeeze the breath out of me. 'Thank you for showing me,' she whispered. 'You're a lucky girl and you deserve all the happiness this life has for you. Starting with that piece of meat downstairs.'

I sniffled and looked at the mirror on the other side of the room. 'Oh, God,' I muttered. 'My mascara's running.'

'I told you to wear water-proof mascara but you didn't listen. I knew we'd be water fountains.'

'Shut up,' I snapped then sniffled. 'I love you.'

'Love ya too, girl.'

Levi and I were the last to go to bed. We'd spent the majority of the last two hours helping the drunken guests find their assigned rooms or couches, stealing kisses whenever we passed each other in the hallways, guest or no guest in tow. Once we'd finally managed that we'd gone straight to Levi's bedroom.

I was curled against his side, placing kisses on his insane abs.

'I can see Holly and Eli fitting in nicely,' he murmured into the dark.

'I have a great taste in friends.'

'But terrible taste in boys.'

'You do realise you'd be in that category.'

'Nah, I'm a man.' He flexed one arm to prove his point.

'It looks pretty flimsy to me,' I shrugged and rolled over. His hands grabbed my waist and hauled me onto his lap. I looked up through my lashes at Levi's face illuminated by the moon.

'Flimsy huh?'

'I'm pretty sure that's what I said, correct me if I'm mistaken,' I smirked.

'When are angels ever in the wrong?' Levi inquired.

'Since when do devils ask such questions?'

'Since they start dating pure angels,' he purred.

'I'm far from fucking pure,' I retorted.

'Your mouth is filthy, no wonder you ended up with a devil.'

I leaned in and placed a kiss over Levi's heart. I had well and truly fallen in love with a devil who had the heart of an angel.