Total pages in book: 181
Estimated words: 181613 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 908(@200wpm)___ 726(@250wpm)___ 605(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 181613 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 908(@200wpm)___ 726(@250wpm)___ 605(@300wpm)
“God, that was—” She grins against my lips. “Insane.”
Grey raises a brow. “Insanely bad?”
She snorts. “No.”
“Good?” Apollo asks.
She grins. “Perfect.”
I grin back between sultry kisses. “Just like you.”
She kisses me back, then throws her arms around both Grey and Apollo and pulls them in for a kiss too, and we share her like she always wanted.
“I love you all,” she murmurs. “You really caught me.”
Apollo chuckles. “You’ll never outrun the three of us.”
She looks at Mavis’s grave and sighs. “Sorry you had to see that, Mav.”
We all burst out into laughter.
“Can we stay like this, together?” she asks.
I grip her chin and force her to look at me. “Baby, we’ll stay with you forever, whether you like it or not.”
She smiles and leans in against all of our foreheads. “Deal.”
EPILOGUE
Aspen
Weeks later
Levi approaches the ledge from which we all once jumped the night Mavis died, and places the bouquet of black roses he brought on the ground where we all lost her.
“I hope you found some spirit friends to haunt us,” he says, smiling briefly.
My mom wipes away her tears with her sleeve, and my dad pulls her in for a hug.
Felix nearly crushes his own fingers in the palm of his hand, blood trickling down his skin. I pluck a single flower from my bouquet and hand it to him. “Give this to her.”
He stares at me for a moment, then homes in on the flower.
“Go on,” I urge him.
Finally, he lets go of his pent-up rage and approaches the ledge where we last saw her alive.
He kneels and places it down on the ground, then says something none of us can hear, but I know he’s speaking to his daughter, however far away she may be.
Alistair places down his bouquet too, and Silas snatches a flower from mine to place down something too.
Not everyone brought something, and I don’t blame them.
The very thought of having to buy flowers for a deceased family member is too much for some to bear, even for my disheveled, unhinged family.
They may be violent and vicious, but they are family.
And families hurt together.
Lana and Kai go next, placing their giant bouquets at the ledge, after which all their kids follow with cards, flowers, and candles. Even Apollo’s family showed up to the wake.
“I’ll miss you,” Heath says, as he loses his balance and falls to his knees, crying like crazy. “You were my best friend.”
Ivy hurries to his side along with Max, and they both console him.
My mother approaches Heath and places her hand on his shoulder, squeezing softly before she sets down her flowers as well. “We all miss her.”
Tears well up in my eyes as every person in our collective families pays their respects to Mavis. This was the funeral she deserved.
I’m the last one to go, but instead of placing my flowers down on the ground, I throw them to the wind, scattering the petals like her soul got scattered in the wind.
“Fly high.”
Grey
I pluck the knife from the body and wipe it on my shirt, breathing ragged breaths.
“How many more do you need, man?” Levi asks.
“Until they’re all gone,” I say, wiping the sweat off my face.
The man in front of me is showered in holes, the bloodshed a small victory to my decrepit heart.
“That’s a high goal post, bro,” Apollo says.
“I don’t care. I’m gonna get my revenge, no matter what,” I reply, nostrils flaring. “Those fuckers killed my parents.”
“Understandable.” Levi stabs a Bonesman, who groans from the bullet hole in his chest. “So … this is what you and Aspen were doing the night I found you in Apollo’s bedroom,” Levi says, sucking in a breath through his nose. “Why didn’t you just tell us all the truth?”
“You thought I trusted you? While you were trying to kill me?” I stare him down.
He nods a few times. “Touché.”
“Grey and I first talked while I was grieving over Mavis,” Aspen explains. “We were both hurting when we found each other.”
“Well, I mean … I was stalking you for a while then,” I say, rubbing my lips together.
Levi narrows his eyes. “You stalked her?”
“Don’t act like that’s new information,” I retort. “You’re the one who chased her into the auditorium.”
“That’s different.”
“It’s not, though.”
We both stab the Bonesman a few more times as if we’re both in need of a release.
Aspen snorts. “Sounds like you two have more in common than you’d like.”
“We’re nothing alike,” Levi says.
“Good, then you can both fill a gap in her filthy little heart,” Apollo says. “Are you guys done?”
“Not nearly,” I reply, still feeling my blood boil. “I’m not satiated. I want more fucking bodies to slice up.”
“We can find more, can’t we?” Aspen asks.
“Of course. There’s a ton of Bonesmen Brotherhood locations sprawled across this city,” Apollo says, stomping on one of those fucker’s heads until it’s all blood and brains scattered on the pavement. “Maybe not tonight, though. We’ve got too many bodies to get rid of now.”