Page 5 of Ruthless Savage

I settle on the lower bunk. It’s nice being alone. My cellmate was stabbed and is still in the hospital.

As soon as I glance down at the letter and see her handwriting, my breaths grow shallower.

Her emerald-green eyes appear as though before me, and I start to read her prose, unable to stop my pulse from drumming.

Dear Devlin,

I keep writing, yet you never write back. I know you’re getting my letters. I won’t stop writing them. Not until the moment you’re free.

I know you said you forgive me, but I don’t forgive myself. And every day you’re gone, I play that night in my head, wishing I’d done things differently.

I regret it. What I did to you was wrong. I’m not making excuses, but you know how strict my father has always been with me. I was always treated differently than all my siblings. And I hated that. Still do. I’m eighteen, and still nothing changes. I’m forever a child in his eyes.

It’s like he’s waiting to marry me off. And the day he announces that I’ve been arranged to marry someone is the day I die.

I know it’s coming soon. I don’t want to marry someone my father chooses, but I can’t tell him that. He sees me as a girl who obeys him, who does what’s best for the family. But I don’t want to, Devlin. I want to be free. Want to do what I want. And what I want, what I’ve always wanted, is you.

Why can’t you be the one to marry me? My father adores you. He still does. I know he does. He would accept you as my husband, even with the age difference. He knows you’d lay down your life for me. That’s what he wants in the end. Someone to protect me. And you’ve always protected me.

I know you feel something for me too. I’m not imagining it. How long will you spend denying that there’s something between us?

Please, Devlin. I need you. I don’t want to be anyone else’s wife but yours.

Love,

Eriu

My heart bloody well stops beating. With a fingertip, I trace the trinity knot she has drawn with utter perfection. She signs her name next to it in every letter, like she’s tellin’ me that we’re bound for eternity.

She’s right about one thing. She was always treated differently.

But that’s because she’s innocent in every sense of the word.

There’s more to her, though. Eriu is a woman of many talents, and I long to know everything I can about her. Yet I can’t. She’s not meant to be mine, no matter how badly I want her to be.

With a roar, I crumple the letter in my palm.

The thought of her marrying someone else sends me over the edge.

If I was a good man, worthy of her, maybe I would ask her father for her hand.

But I’m not that man, and the sooner she comes to terms with that, the better it’ll be for the both of us.

CHAPTER 2

DEVLIN

Days later, inside my cell, I stare up at the poorly painted white ceiling, drips frozen in time as though long forgotten.

The air is thick with the smell of sweat and disinfectant, fluxed into something putrid.

It’s not the first time I’ve smelled it. Been to jail back in Ireland. I was stuck alone in a tiny cell for a few days for a fight. Nothing stayed on my record, though. Being part of a gang and having connections helped.

My brother was the only one who cared I was even there. He was all I had.

I was eighteen, and my parents had lost hope of me becoming someone by that point. To them, I was nothing but a lost cause, always feckin’ off, embarrassing them. Mother used to tell me a fella like me would never find anyone but a floozie to love him.

Maybe she was right.

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