Epilogue
DRAVEN, THREE MONTHS LATER
Sometimes it seems like a rose will never bloom.
You watch it, for what feels like forever, willing the green bud to burst open, waiting for the flower to unfurl.
It doesn’t.
It won’t listen to your wishes, or your quiet, subtle urging, as you walk past another time, finding each stem still dotted with green bulbs.
And then you stop trying so hard. Stop trying to rush it. You forget, a little, and carry on with other things.
By the time you turn around next, it’s there: small, soft, dusty-red petals, the green coverings opened wide, letting the new buds emerge.
Then, it’s like a mad rush.
Each bloom, spilling out, the petals fragrant and intoxicating and so much reddish-pink, all there for you, because you were patient.
Walking into the Hard Spot with Max by my side tended to feel like that, every time. When had everything in my life become so rewarding? So much bounty, of friends and happiness and the man I loved more than I ever knew I was capable of loving.
Everything in bloom, no matter the season.
Tonight was no exception. I walked up to the Hard Spot with Max, marveling at how goddamn good he looked.
He was in a simple, basic light blue tank top, hugging the curves of his body.
“Little chilly out,” I said, brushing my fingers across his nipples, visibly hard through his soft shirt.
“I should have worn a hoodie,” he said.
I pinched his nipple and he retaliated, leaning in to give my cock a squeeze through my pants.
“Don’t tempt me,” I said. “I know you’d like it if I fucked you right out here in front of this bar.”
“I would love it,” he said. “I think Kane , on the other hand, would take a vodka bottle to each of our heads.”
I hummed. “No need for a hoodie, by the way. Your goosebumps are hot.”
“Your cowboy hat is hot,” he told me, touching the rim.
“You say that every time I wear it.”
“Because it’s always true.”
As Max and I walked into the lively bar, I saw more than one familiar face.
“Yo!” Andrew said from his usual place at the bar, waving over to us. “Kane is looking for you two.”
“Oh, God,” Max said. “Am I in trouble?”
“A good kind of trouble,” Andrew said. “Hey, Draven. Have you tried the new Japanese whiskey Kane imported?”
I talked with Andrew about whiskey for a while, and when Kane finally emerged from the back office of the bar, there was another familiar face next to him.
“Dom,” I said, doing a double take.
Dominic smiled at me, coming out from behind Kane and wrapping his arms around me in a hug. “Fancy seeing you here, stranger.”
“What brings you to Tennessee this time?” I asked.
“Well, when I visited last month, Kane and I got to talking about the financials here. I knew I could help him organize a few things, and I’m just about fucking sick of Montana without you there, so… I thought I’d pick up some remote work, here in Tennessee.”
“So I might be seeing more of your ugly mug around here?”
“You know my face isn’t ugly. You take that back.”
Andrew laughed, glancing over at Dom. “You certainly aren’t ugly.”
Max caught up with Dominic, too, and after a short while, the conversation turned to Lily.
“I don’t think I’m the only one wanting to get the hell out of Montana,” Dom said. “Lily and I had a brief lunch together the other day, and she told me she’s applying to places back here, too. Maybe Nashville.”
“She told me that last week, too,” Max said. “Having Lily within driving distance again would be incredible.”
I leaned in to press a kiss to Max’s temple, running a hand along the small of his back.
Every time we were together, I wanted to touch him. Couldn’t stop touching him.
I was addicted, and I didn’t want to stop.
I slowly reached a hand down to his back pocket, squeezing his ass, not giving a damn who might see.
“Hands to yourself,” a voice barked from behind us.
I turned to see Kane returning from picking up some empty pint glasses on the table.
“Going to flip my boyfriend onto the top of this bar, strip him naked, and eat his ass out ‘til he comes all over that nice, shiny bar top, Kane,” I told him, lifting an eyebrow.
“Yeah, and I’m going to sock you in the goddamned face if you even try to sit him down on top of this bar.”
“Should I fuckin’ try? Max, take your cock out.”
Kane stared daggers into my eyes. “Ever had a beer tap shoved so far in your mouth you deep throat it and choke? That’s you if you even try , Lyons.”
Kane disappeared back into the hallway and I smiled at Dominic. “Kane loves me.”
Dom raised an eyebrow. “Yeah, can really sense the brotherly love you two have going on. Is it always like that?”
I shrugged. “Sometimes. Other times we just hug and talk about the weather. Both are fine with me.”
Max was smiling, reaching out to hold my hand. “Sometimes Draven’s affection is highly aggressive. Often, I’ll wake up to him kissing all over my body. Other times, he ties my limbs to the posts on his bed?—”
“Too much information,” Dominic said.
“It makes him hard, Dom,” I said. “Trust me, he loves it.”
“I really do,” Max said, his eyes going a little dreamy.
“I don’t think these people even know what ‘too much information’ means,” Dominic said, turning to Andrew, who laughed.
“I think that’s correct.”
As I got into a conversation with Dominic and Andrew, Max disappeared for a moment, then came back to my side.
“Missed you,” I murmured near his ear.
“You better sing along,” he told me.
“What do you mean?”
And then I heard it, a moment later.
That’s where Max had gone: to the jukebox, to torment me publicly.
He’d put on a Taylor Swift song. One he knew I loved.
He smiled wide, the corners of his eyes crinkling up as the song started. “I swear, it must have been the ghost cat,” Max said. “I went up to the jukebox and it was already on the Taylor Swift section. Can’t blame me for that.”
It was “I’m Only Me When I’m With You,” and I noticed a couple of other people at the bar who must have recognized the song, too, bobbing their heads along with it.
“You’re going to regret asking me to sing along to this,” I told him.
I took a long swig of whiskey.
As the song went on, I sang more and more of it, louder and prouder.
“Sometimes we don't say a thing, just listen to the crickets sing ,” I belted out, watching Max’s smile grow wider. “ Everything I need is right here by my side. And I know everything about you.”
When the next part came, I got even louder, not caring that half the bar was looking at me now, smiling.
“I don't wanna live without you, ” I sang right at Max, as if I was at a karaoke night.
People caught on quick, clapping along as I sang at the bar. Even Kane emerged from the back, watching me with a grin on his face.
When the song came to an end, somebody had turned up the jukebox and the whole crowd was cheering me along.
“ And I'm only me, who I wanna be… I'm only me when I'm with you ,” I sang, pointing right at Max.
When the song ended and I leaned in to put a hand on each side of his face and lean in to kiss him, the whole bar went wild.
I pressed my lips to his, and I heard comments from the crowd:
“Got to get me a man like that!”
“ Ride that cowboy, Max!”
“Encore! Encore!”
We’d gotten the place riled up, and more people put on other songs now, singing along with their friends.
“You’re a sap, and I never knew you were a sap, and I love it,” Dominic told me.
I was nice and buzzed now, with my arm draped around Max’s shoulders.
“I bring it out in him,” Max said.
“That’s so true,” I agreed.
“I don’t deserve to be serenaded like that, but I’m never going to stop loving it.”
I let out a long breath, shaking my head. Dominic went off to go play pool with Andrew, and we were left alone for a moment at the bar.
“You’re so wrong, Baby Blue,” I murmured at him. “You deserve it, and you always will.”
“Too nice to me. You just trying to sweet talk me, so I’ll let you fuck me later, huh?”
“Don’t have to butter you up to get that, and you know it.”
“True.”
“I say it because I love you,” I told him, suddenly feeling a wave of emotion well up inside me. “I fucking love you. Every part of you. Every part of life with you. I didn’t think I could ever love my life.”
“Well, believe it, cowboy,” he told me.
I wanted to ask him to marry me, right then and there.
It was too soon, and I was too drunk on his love.
But I knew I was going to do it.
Maybe not tonight, maybe not even in six months.
But I was going to ask this man to marry me, no matter when it might occur. It already felt like we were bonded for life, and maybe it had felt like that since the moment we met.
How could I live without him?
What kind of life would that even be?
Until then, I’d keep doing what I always did with Max.
Loving him. Singing silly songs to him. Touching him, being with him, and reminding him that no matter how simple his world might be, it was closer to paradise than anything I’d ever known.
The person who’d slotted in with me like we were puzzle pieces, fitting together before we even realized why we fit.
Max stoked every possessive, obsessive fire inside me, but he also made me feel safe. Loved. For the first time in my life. And all of the pain that had led to this moment had made it worth it, for one reason only: he was mine .
And I belonged to him.
Every scar on my skin, and every inch of me. Every heartbeat, and every kiss.
I was in it for the ride, and so was he.
My Tennessee rose without a single thorn.
Thank you for reading!