“Then I want Patrick taking you to and from —”
But I got in his face and scowled at him as he tried to tell me what to do.
“All right,” he bit out. “You’re right. It just doesn’t make it any easier.”
I grabbed his lips, nibbling and kissing softly.
“Really?” I cooed. “Could you say that again?”
He chuckled. “Say what?”
“The part about me being right,” I shot back.
“I didn’t say that,” he growled into my mouth as I began grinding on him.
I moaned, feeling his tongue flick my upper lip and then catch my bottom lip between his teeth.
“I love you, Mr. Marek,” I teased, closing my eyes and kissing him back.
The wet heat of his mouth as I plunged my tongue inside sent me reeling, and I ground myself against him faster.
He whipped off the sheet and reached between us, grabbing his cock.
“Do you feel safe?” he asked me again. “I just need to make sure you’re okay.”
I arched my neck back and lifted up, positioning his cock at my entrance and slowly sitting back down, sliding him inside of me.
Smirking, I started moving up and down his dick. “My OCD hasn’t kicked in, if that’s what you’re wondering.”
He gripped my hips, dragging his bottom lip between his teeth as he felt me from the inside. “I kind of miss it,” he breathed out. “It was cute.”
I smiled, rolling my hips faster and harder.
“I’m all for eight orgasms tonight if you want,” I told him. “Do you have Viagra?”
“Viagra?” He scowled and shot up, rolling me over onto my back and breathing against my lips as he ground between my hips. “You’re going to pay for that.”
After school the next day, Christian attended soccer practice, and Tyler took me to my apartment. The last time I had been there had been only a little more than a day ago, before the interview and before my brother’s confession.
Tyler hadn’t wanted me to deal with returning this morning before school for fresh clothes, so he had called a shop and had Patrick pick me up a new outfit.
But I needed to come back today. To rid myself of bad memories and move on.
Coming back downstairs, I met Tyler, who waited in the living room in front of the fireplace. Holding the ziplock bags in my hands, I stared at the letters, seeing my former coach’s writing peeking out from the mess of torn paper.
“They’re all the letters that Chase wrote me,” I told him. “His obsessions, threats…” I trailed off. “I had never seen them before my parents died, and it was only afterward that I realized the full extent of how he threatened me and my family.”
“Why did you keep them?” he questioned.
I looked up at him, his navy blue tie loosened against his white shirt and heather-gray suit.
“My parents, my sister, Avery…” I began. “They died because I put them on the road that night. I took a risk I shouldn’t have for my own selfish reasons, and I deserved to remember that.”
“Did you think you would forget what you lost?”
I paused and then dropped my head, sighing. No, I will never forget. I felt the pain of their deaths every day. But back then, taking any kind of a risk made me feel like there was no control. There was no “careful.”
For so long I had felt like I was in a stalemate with Chase, waiting for something to fucking happen, and when I finally chose to give up the control and say “Fuck it, let’s see what happens,” I liked it.
But I hadn’t realized that I wasn’t just risking myself. There were others I didn’t think about.
“I deserved to be punished,” I told him.
He touched my face, meeting my eyes. “You could never have known.”
No, I couldn’t. But carelessness brings consequences. I should’ve known that.
Which accounted for my behavior of making my life afterward as controlled as possible.
“Easton, there’s no line you can walk that’s safe enough,” Tyler implored. “You didn’t do anything out of malice. Crimes deserve to be punished. Mistakes deserve to be forgiven.”
I nodded, finally understanding the truth behind his words. And I was ready.
Opening the bags, I dumped the contents into the fireplace and lit a match from up on the mantel. Leaning down, I lit the scraps on fire and stood back upright, both of us watching them turn to ash.
Taking his hand, I breathed out a sigh of relief, finally feeling better than I had since before I could remember.
“Are you ever going to be careful with me?” I asked quietly, watching the flames burn bright.
“No.”
I looked up at him, my lips curling into a small smile. “Good.”
EPILOGUE
“Chin up,” the photographer instructed, smiling behind her camera.
I tilted my head up an inch, keeping it cocked slightly to the right, my relaxed smile still plastered on my face.
The shit I do for him.
I sat on the arm of a rich, brown leather chair, my legs crossed and my arm resting on Tyler’s shoulder as he sat in the chair, both of us posing for our engagement photos.
Correction: engagement-slash-campaign publicity photo representing our perfect American family’s high moral fiber. Riiiiight.
I dropped my eyes, feeling a blush heat my cheeks, remembering all the immoral things he’d done to me last night in our bed.
“Excellent,” the photographer cooed, snapping a few more shots as she leaned down again behind her tripod.
I kept my left hand on my thigh, the round black onyx stone set in a platinum band and surrounded by freshwater pearls visible in the pictures.