Angel's Ink

by Jocelynn Drake

  But sitting in the dark, crowded city, I felt alone and soul weary. I had killed a man. Simon and I had fought on several occasions, but I had never crossed the line I had drawn in the sand so many years ago. I had always sworn that I wouldn’t take a life. I believed my powers could be used for positive, useful purposes. Warlocks weren’t supposed to think like that. Or at least, that’s what I had been taught to believe.

  Gideon was different though. And maybe there were others out there like me who believed that our powers were something other than a god-given right to rule. Gideon had used his powers to strike fear in me, but he had done it to protect his own family. He loved. I could see when he looked at that picture of his wife and daughter that he loved them deeply. We weren’t all monsters as it seemed.

  And maybe I wasn’t alone.

  I dropped the last bit of unburned paper on the ground between my feet, allowing the fire to eat it without nipping at my fingertips. A bright light shined down the narrow alley along the side of the tattoo parlor, drawing my gaze up from the burning paper. My body tensed, but I didn’t move. No one was supposed to come down the alley. They had no business back here.

  A heavy sigh of relief hissed between my teeth as the front of Trixie’s green Prius poked around the edge of the building. I didn’t know what she was doing here, but at least I knew that I wasn’t facing more trouble. I had already had my fill this evening.

  Trixie parked her car next to mine in the empty lot behind the shop. A shocked smile quirked the corners of my mouth when I saw both Trixie and Bronx climb out of the little mint green vehicle. This was beginning to feel like an intervention. Bronx refused to ride in any car Trixie was driving, claiming the elf spent too much time multitasking while driving instead of just keeping her eyes on the road. As my friends approached where I was sitting on the second step of the staircase, I noticed that Trixie was walking around without her glamour spell. She looked beautiful. Her long blond hair was like a halo about her head, glowing in the nearby lamplight. Her green eyes were wide, scrutinizing my features as if trying to read my mood.

  I loved her. I didn’t know how long I had loved her, but it only mattered that the feeling was there in my chest, beating in time with my heart. I loved how she walked and smiled. I loved how she still loved her brother despite the fact that he was trying to destroy her life. I loved the tenderness she showed for Bronx when she drew on him each night. I loved listening to their arguments, ranging from sex to music to pizza toppings. But most of all, I loved her for standing before me with that worried look on her face when I needed her most.

  “What are you guys doing here? You’ve got the night off,” I said, forcing my stare away from Trixie’s face and over to Bronx’s ever stoic expression.

  Trixie stepped around me and walked up the stairs. To my surprise, she sat down on the third step directly behind me while putting her long legs on either side of me. I twisted around to look up at her, raising one eyebrow in question at her sudden closeness, particularly in front of Bronx. While we had always maintained a harmlessly flirtatious relationship in the shop, this was a little closer than I had been expecting.

  Leaning down, Trixie cupped my face in both of her hands and kissed me gently, stealing my breath away. Her soft lips were like feathers brushing against mine while her sweet scent danced around me. A sigh escaped me as her hands dropped down to rest on her legs and I turned back to find Bronx grinning at us like an idiot. Bronx was not the type to grin, but then Trixie and I had been dancing around each other for two years.

  “Is this the new employee reward program?” Bronx taunted. He pushed off from where he had been leaning against the side of the shop. “If so, I’m ready for mine.” As he approached, he puckered his fat lips and made some disgusting kissing noises as he drew near.

  Raising both my hands and one foot to ward him off, I laughed as I fell back into Trixie’s lap. He grabbed my wrists for a second and pretended to struggle with me before backing off again, making a disgusted sound in the back of his throat.

  “It’s about fucking time,” he muttered as he returned to his spot at the side of the building. “The way you two have been flirting with each other the past couple of years has been disgusting. Hopefully, I can stop throwing customers out the window now.”

  My brow furrowed as I stared at my old friend. “What?”

  “Every time one of Trixie’s customers made a pass at her that crossed the line, I had to toss ’em out the window to keep you from getting your hands on them,” Bronx answered with a snort. “Hell, the air crackled with magic when you were jealous and pissed. I was afraid you’d blow a hole in someone.”

  “I thought you were doing that to protect me,” Trixie said, sounding as confused as I felt.

  “Well . . . I was,” he said, fumbling for a moment before his voice firmed again. “I was protecting you both. You can’t run a respectable tattoo parlor with Gage blowing holes in anyone who takes a long look at you.”

  “Thanks,” I said with a slight chuckle. Respectable was a stretch when it came to describing the Asylum, but then I liked to think of myself as an equal opportunity tattoo artist. A frown quickly tugged at my mouth as I continued to look at him. “Then you’ve known for a while?”

  “That you were a warlock? Of course.” Bronx sniffed, crossing his arms over his chest as if he were affronted by the idea that he wasn’t smart enough to catch on to my secret. “Besides the antiglamour spell I noticed when I first walked in the door, the air tended to tingle any time you got seriously pissed.”

  I dropped my head, rubbing my face with my hands. “I’m sorry,” I murmured. I thought I had had better control. Bronx made me sound like a ticking time bomb just waiting to go off at the slightest provocation.

  Trixie’s slender arms quickly wrapped around my shoulders and neck as she leaned against me. “No, Gage, he didn’t mean it like that.”

  “I knew we were never in any danger no matter how badly you were pressed,” Bronx said in a deep voice that rumbled through me. “You were thrown through a glass case and I had to come to your rescue because I knew you wouldn’t do anything. You would never harm anyone.”

  I flinched at Bronx’s words and I knew that Trixie had felt it because her arms tightened around me as if she could absorb the pain that cut through my body at the memory of Simon’s head snapping around on his broken neck. For someone who would never harm another person, I’d proved to be quite good at it.

  Trixie laid her cheek against the side of my head. “Tell us, Gage. What happened tonight?” she whispered, but I had no doubt that Bronx had heard her.

  Wrapping one arm around her knee, I pulled her leg tighter against my body, just needing to feel her closer to me. Resting my cheek against her leg, I let my fingers trace over the soft, faded blue denim while my mind tried to put the events of the past few days in some semblance of order.

  When I started talking, I didn’t begin with Tera walking into the tattoo parlor. Instead, my first comments were about the day a guardian showed up on the doorstep of my parents’ nice suburban home to tell them that their son was a warlock. Looking back with the eyes of an adult, I could see the tension around their mouths and the fearful look in their eyes as they spoke to the guardian who was demanding custody of their seven-year-old son. It was only after living in the confines of the Ivory Towers for several years that I came to understand my parents had had no choice in giving me up. If they had said no, I would have been killed on the spot. They had prettied up the separation with tales of going on an exciting adventure so I wouldn’t be afraid.

  I brushed over years of physical and mental abuse accompanied by squalid living conditions and rushed forward to my escape. I wove a tale of intense politics and fear that saw me living with a guardian constantly looking over my shoulder in hopes of bringing me back for slaughter. I left out Gideon’s real intentions, as the warlock had a tough enough road ahead of him without anyone else knowing of his struggle.

  M
y words slowed when I finally reached the present-day events that depicted Simon as an adept puppet master while he carefully maneuvered both Tera and Sparks into play with hopes of finally destroying me. The only detail I left out of the gruesome battle between Simon and me was the presence of Lilith. She represented my own private hell, waiting for me with my soul fragment in hand when my death year finally arrived. There was nothing anyone could do to help me escape the fate I had woven for myself.

  When I stopped speaking, I noticed that my heavy breathing was the only sound in the night. There were no crickets, no swish of cars on the nearby streets. My heart pounded in my chest and my body ached from being slammed to the pavement. Most of all, I ached somewhere in my soul. Tera was dead and there had been nothing I could do to stop it. Simon was dead and I had everything to do with that.

  “Did you have any choice?” Trixie asked after a long silence. I twisted around slightly so that I could look at her over my shoulder. Her sweet face was lined with worry and I wanted to take back all my words so she wouldn’t feel that fear. But in the same thought, I knew it was better that both Bronx and Trixie knew the truth. There had been too many years of secrets and lies. A weight had been lifted from my chest when I told them my story, regardless of how ugly it was.

  Reaching down, Trixie gently ran her fingers through my short hair, soothing some of the tension from my shoulders. “You said he was going to kill you and then come hunting for us. Did he give you any choice but to kill him?”

  “No,” I admitted with a sigh. I turned back around on the stair and looked over at Bronx, who was frowning at me.

  “Then let it go,” the troll said. “You did the right thing. You saved the lives of a lot of good people, and you tried to help one person. There’s nothing wrong with that.”

  Squeezing Trixie’s knee with one hand, I smiled at the troll staring grimly at me. “Thank you,” I murmured before lowering my lips to press a kiss to Trixie’s arm where it wrapped loosely around my neck.

  I hadn’t seen my parents or siblings in nearly ten years. During that time, I had forgotten what it was like to feel the love and concern of people who knew you. Sitting in the dark behind the tattoo parlor, I knew that Trixie and Bronx would rush to my side without a moment’s hesitation if I needed them. I knew they would protect me, as I would do everything to protect them. I still loved my parents, brother, and sister, but I doubted I would ever see them again. It was for the best. I would miss them, but I knew they were safer without me around.

  And it was okay. Bronx and Trixie were my family now. Even to a small extent were Gideon and Sofie. Since coming out to sit on the steps in the dark, I had felt a nagging weight in the air. Someone was watching over me. I had felt it for years and hadn’t given it much thought. But now I knew that it was Gideon watching me, protecting me the only way he knew how.

  “Well, I’m glad that’s all over with,” Bronx said, breaking the sudden silence.

  I smiled at the troll as he shifted against the side of the shop, shoving his meaty hands into the back pockets of his brown cargo pants.

  “Yes, I think it’s time we turned our attention to more important matters,” Trixie piped up.

  I looked over my shoulder at her. “Like dealing with the Summer Court and your brother,” I suggested.

  Trixie flashed me a sour look as her voice become painfully tart. “I was thinking more like finding Bronx a girlfriend.”

  A wide smile slashed across my face as I looked back over at him. He frowned at the elf sitting behind me as she laughed lightly. Truthfully, I didn’t know anything about matchmaking or dating, and even less about the love life of trolls, but I liked seeing Bronx squirm under Trixie’s scrutiny.

  “You know he’s going to be even grumpier to work with now that we’re dating,” she teased, causing my heart to give a little flutter. It was wonderful that she was physically showing her attraction to me, but the words pinged against my heart, starting it pounding again.

  “And here I was hoping that work would become a more tolerable place now that you’re dating,” Bronx snapped. “We can finally get over all the goo-goo eyes and the mooning when the other person goes on a date.”

  Trixie gasped, trying to pretend to be insulted by his comments, but I just blushed, knowing better than to deny it. I knew I was intolerable to work with whenever she announced that she was going out on a date. I liked the thought that she might have been too, when I stepped out on the rare occasion.

  A soft meow captured everyone’s attention before Trixie could argue with Bronx. I turned around to find Sofie sitting on the steps, just above Trixie, her wide yellow eyes taking in the cozy scene.

  “Hey, Sofie!” I said.

  “You have a cat?” Trixie demanded, her face turning from the large Russian blue to me. “Since when do you have a cat?”

  “Recently,” I replied with a bit of a sigh. I had left that part out of my story as well simply because in all the chaos I had temporarily forgotten about the exiled witch.

  “She’s beautiful,” Trixie said, which earned a loud purr from Sofie. The elf leaned back and scratched Sofie behind the ear and under the chin. The witch-cat leaned into her hand, soaking up the attention as her purring grew louder.

  “Do you like cats?”

  Trixie continued to scratch the feline, rubbing along her cheek. “Oh, I’ve always loved cats.”

  My smile grew even wider as my gaze met Sofie’s and a little chuckle escaped me. “You know, I’m really glad to hear that.”

  Hell was still waiting for me. I didn’t doubt that. But as I sat on the rickety wooden stairs in the dark with my friends, I wasn’t worried. With them, I would conquer hell too.

  Acknowledgments

  I’ve delved into a new series and with that comes a round of intense research and exciting discovery. First, I want to thank Tommy and Nate at Designs by Dana for not only my own lovely ink, but also for all the wonderful information you’ve supplied. Thanks for patiently answering all my annoying questions regarding the world of tattooing as well as telling some of the most insane stories of your own experiences. I love our two M’s discussions and your ability to tell some of the most vulgar jokes I have ever heard.

  Can you thank a place? I will at least try. I want to thank the Designs by Dana shop as it served as an inspiration for the tattoo parlor that is the center of this series. If you want to walk through my world, stop by MainStrasse in Covington, Kentucky. Too many times, it proved to be my home away from home.

  As always, thanks to my amazing editor, Diana Gill, for being a guiding hand to my twisted imagination, and thanks to my tireless agent, Jennifer Schober, for being the perfect cheerleader, defender, and friend.

  About the Author

  The bestselling author of the Dark Days series and a former financial analyst, JOCELYNN DRAKE lives in Kentucky.

  www.jocelynndrake.com

  Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins authors.

  Also by Jocelynn Drake

  THE DARK DAYS NOVELS

  Nightwalker

  Dayhunter

  Dawnbreaker

  Pray for Dawn

  Wait for Dusk

  Burn the Night

  Credits

  Cover design by Richard L. Aquan

  Cover illustration © by Don Sipley

  Copyright

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  ANGEL’S INK. Copyright © 2012 by Jocelynn Drake. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompile
d, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

  FIRST EDITION

  Print book ISBN 978-0-06-211785-4

  EPub Edition OCTOBER 2012 ISBN: 9780062117861

  12 13 14 15 16 OV/RRD 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  About the Publisher

  Australia

  HarperCollins Publishers (Australia) Pty. Ltd.

  Level 13, 201 Elizabeth Street

  Sydney, NSW 2000, Australia

  http://www.harpercollins.com.au

  Canada

  HarperCollins Canada

  2 Bloor Street East - 20th Floor

  Toronto, ON, M4W, 1A8, Canada

  http://www.harpercollins.ca

  New Zealand

  HarperCollins Publishers (New Zealand) Limited

  P.O. Box 1

  Auckland, New Zealand

  http://www.harpercollins.co.nz

  United Kingdom

  HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.

  77-85 Fulham Palace Road

  London, W6 8JB, UK

  http://www.harpercollins.co.uk

  United States

  HarperCollins Publishers Inc.

  10 East 53rd Street

  New York, NY 10022

  http://www.harpercollins.com

  Table of Contents

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3