Epilogue
EPILOGUE
RIVEN
S t. Killian University looks like it belongs in a fairytale with stone turrets, ivy-covered buildings, winding courtyards, but it’s too foggy, I’ve decided. It’s quiet. Clean. Far removed from the bloodstained mess I left behind us in Castlebrook Falls.
It’s our first day in Ireland, and I can feel peace in every part of me.
For the first time in years, we’re safe. I owe Caiden Grey big for facilitating the fake names and fake passports we needed to start over. I would have just picked a place out in the middle of nowhere where we could be alone, but she deserves this. I want her to take the classes she wants, make friends and do all the things she couldn’t when she was being kept by the Kozlovs. The upside to being here is I can play hockey, get some pent up aggression out that I’ll undoubtedly have with these fucking jerk-offs looking at my girl.
I glare at two hockey guys as they walk past us on the way to the arena. Their eyes shifted to her for half a second, and that was enough for me. I pull at the tie that feels like it’s strangling me. She would pick a school with a fucking dress code. I can already feel it, my body count…the murder-y kind…is going to be astronomically higher by graduation.
And I was a fucking glorified hitman, for God’s sake.
Lakynn walks beside me, her hand curled in mine. Her expression is relaxed, soft in a way I haven’t seen since we were young. I watch her scan the towering buildings and manicured hedges like she’s trying to memorize everything. And maybe she is. She’s always been observant like that. There’s a quiet way she has about her while she studies everything in sight. She’s fucking brilliant, and I know she could have gotten into the school on her own if our situation was different.
It kills me a little how much I love her. I feel like I can’t breathe without her, and she’s right here with me.
I glance down at her legs, bare beneath the navy pleated skirt she’s wearing paired with black oxford shoes. She looks elegant, and she told me that she feels like herself here, in this place she dreamed about.
Another prick walks by and his eyes flash to her long-stemmed legs and I lose it. I spin around to stare him down as he makes his way past us. I can’t beat him to death in the quad, but he’ll be getting a visit from me. He can count on it.
“Riven!” she whispers harshly, even if that’s not my name anymore. I like that she can’t let go of it, that to her, I’m still the same boy she fell in love with. “You cannot act like that. This is not Castlebrook Falls.” She’s not mad at me, but she’s flustered, which is exactly what I want.
I glower at her, which makes her stand up on her tiptoes to stroke my cheek, to calm me down. “I don’t like the way he was looking at you.”
I reach my hand up and touch her fingers that are still on my face. My fingers play with the ring set there. That was my only stipulation to coming here. She could have anything she wanted, we could live wherever she wanted. The world is hers and I’m just along for the ride. But she’s my wife. Not my girlfriend, not my adopted sister. My goddamn wife and I put a diamond on her finger big enough that these assholes should be able to see it from far away. Mine. Do not touch any part of her. In fact, do not look at my wife.
“You’re staring again,” my girl says, her voice sing-songy because she knows nothing anyone does is going to beat the obsession I have for her out of me.
I pull her to me, dipping down for a kiss that is too steamy for an elite school like this. “I’m allowed to start and finish whatever I want. You’re my wife.”
Before she can say anything, I crash my mouth into hers without hesitation, claiming her out in the open where anyone can see. I want them all to see. Let them know she’s taken. Owned. Mine.
“I love it here,” she whispers against my lips. “It’s beautiful.”
“It’s yours,” I murmur. “Anything you want, I’ll make sure you have it, baby. Want me to scale the library tower and carve our initials in the side of it? Real big, so everyone can see.” I narrow my eyes, smirking at her because she needs to know that fucker from earlier is dead. I won’t forget. I will kill him.
She laughs, shaking her head. “God, you’re insane.”
“For you? Always.”
She laughs and tugs me by the hand as we walk the edge of the square. The stone arches of the academic buildings curve above us and ivy creeps over every edge of the courtyard walls.
I could watch her like this forever. She’s so free, so happy.
She stops just beneath the tower bell and stares up. “It looks like a castle.”
I press a kiss to the top of her head. “You’re my queen, so that tracks.”
“You’re so silly…” she cuts herself off when she notices another building on the far side. “Look at that. Let’s go inside the chapel,” she whispers, but we’re cut off by the reason we’re hanging out in the quad in the first place.
A deep voice cuts in. “You Kozlov?”
I feel Lakynn flinch at someone else saying our old name. I turn, already knowing who it is because this is Caiden’s contact in Ireland. I swear that motherfucker would know a guy on the dark side of the moon if I asked him.
This guy is American, and he looks just like Tristan Vale, the goalie from my short stint at Castlebrook University. Same build, same green eyes, same tightly wound fury underneath all that brooding.They’re identical twins, apparently, and I wouldn’t be able to tell them apart if I didn’t already know who I was coming here to meet.
I guess I won’t be sharing any rink time with this Vale because he’s got a rugby crest stitched into his shirt.
“Sebastian Vale,” he tells me, but he doesn’t offer his hand. He doesn’t need to. We both know why he’s here, and it’s not to make friends. He clearly owes Caiden, and this is the favor he’s been called in for.
I nod toward Lakynn. “My wife.” I don’t offer her new name because that’s nobody’s fucking business. I tug at my tie again, feeling myself get worked up over someone saying her name.
Sebastian’s eyes stay on me, and he nods once in her direction. Respectful. Distant.
Just how I fucking like it.
He pulls a card from his jacket and hands it over. “You know how this works. I know where you stay. If I call, you answer and I’ll return the favor.”
“Understood,” I tell him, but our conversation is cut short because a girl walks by and she looks worried, turning to look behind her at a guy following her. Sebastian curses under his breath, so I give the guy another glance. He’s dressed like me, so I assume he’s a student also.
Sebastian doesn’t utter a word of goodbye because he’s intercepting the fucker following that girl. Lakynn looks confused as Sebatian grabs the guy by the shirt collar and punches him hard enough in the face to knock him to the ground.
“Don’t fucking look at her,” is all I hear Sebastian say before he straightens his blazer and walks off in the direction where the girl disappeared.
Lakynn gasps, her fingers slip into mine. "I don’t even know what to say."
“Say I can punch people in the quad for looking at you,” I tell her teasingly. “It looks like it’s a school tradition.”
Lakynn laughs, shoving on my chest playfully. “You’re awful, Riven. I swear, I don’t know what I’m going to do with you.” She giggles when I raise my eyebrows suggestively. It’s only when we’re walking toward the chapel that she says, “Do you think Sebastian is going to be a problem? He looks unhinged.”
I shake my head. "No. He’s one of us. If Caiden trusts him, that means something. And if he’s anything like his brother, if we leave that girl alone, he won’t give us a second thought."
She smiles knowingly, snickering that I would have the nerve to clock someone else for behaving the same way I do. "Sounds like someone I know."
Lakynn looks up at me before she says, “That girl looked like she was having a rough day, and I know what that feels like. It’s a small college, maybe I’ll meet her in a class or something and we’ll become friends. I’ve never had a girl friend before, not a real one.”
I wrap my arm around her as we walk. I want that for her. I want her to have friends and all the experiences she’s ever wanted.
“Just stay out of Sebastian’s way if you do meet her. I don’t want to have to fuck him up,” I tell her jokingly, but I’m half serious.
“I saw her look our way as she went by, and she didn’t look very impressed by your friend Sebastian. I’m not so sure it’s a love match,” Lakynn says, leaning into me.
“His twin played hockey back at Castlebrook. Absolute menace. He had this girl. I didn’t pay too much attention to them, but I think she was a ballerina. I swear he’d go feral if he didn’t know where she was for ten fucking seconds.”
Lakynn raises a brow.
I bite the inside of my cheek. “Guess the guys I associate with have something in common.”
She stands on her toes and kisses my jaw. “I’d say so, husband.”
Fuck. The word sets something off inside me. I grab her waist and toss her over my shoulder taking care to make sure my hand and arm are keeping her skirt down. I don’t have time to go on a murder spree right now. I want my girl under me panting my name, taking my cock and begging me not to stop.
She squeals when I grip the back of her thigh. “Let’s go home, baby.”
“My favorite place to be,” she breathes out and I pick up my pace.
Mine too, because Lakynn has always been and will always be my home.