Epilogue Richie #4
So he was talking about Lord Wolfe, then. The man too high up to touch. Or so we’d all thought. But the headline flashed back through my mind from a few weeks earlier, splashed across every news site in the country:
Lord Adrian Wolfe expelled from the House of Lords pending investigation.
“But he is no longer permitted to advise on matters relating to criminal justice. No consultations. No policy input. No… proximity to decisions. His credibility is considered exhausted.”
I finally looked at him.
Then, as if that were the end of it—and for him, it clearly was—he nodded toward the grill. “Smells wonderful.”
Before I could respond, Tristan’s mother waved from across the garden. “Charles! Look at this delightful unicorn cake!”
Charles lifted his glass in acknowledgment and drifted away, absorbed back into the noise and movement of the party.
I watched him go, then dipped into Tristan. “Translation?”
Tristan huffed a quiet laugh. “Adrian Wolfe no longer has an ear in government. No advisory roles. No consultancy work. No access.” He shrugged, almost gentle about it. “In his world, that makes him effectively unemployed. And unemployable.”
I snorted. “Shame. Maybe we’ll give him a job in our new fucking coffee shop.”
Tristan smiled. “Absolutely not. He doesn’t have the qualifications.”
I grabbed him by the back of the neck and kissed him then, hard and brief and full of relief, then turned back to the grill before I let myself think too much about how cleanly that chapter had just closed.
The day then eased smoothly into night.
Maisie loved every second of it. Even though she, sadly, didn’t get a pony.
But she did get a swing set and other such stuff I’d have to build by tomorrow no doubt.
Then Kids crashed where they stood, sugar finally spent.
Parents peeled off in twos and threes, hugs exchanged, leftovers packed into mismatched containers.
Arthur was carried inside asleep on Eloise’s shoulder, cake smudged at the corner of his mouth.
Marcus followed. By the time the garden lights flicked on and the fire pit burnt down to embers, only a handful of us were left.
I stretched out on one of the loungers on the deck, overlooking the lake.
Lennon dropped onto the one beside me with a sigh that came from the soles of his boots.
And we talked for a bit. About how far the gym had come.
The bloody coffee machine and whether I’d cave.
The stupid memories feeling less sharp now time had dulled them.
Eventually, Lennon clapped me on the shoulder and went inside, claiming exhaustion and a bed before the twins woke up again.
He and Amara stayed in one of the spare rooms. The room that was technically theirs.
They came up to visit some weekends, too.
They always had a space in my place as much as I’d always had one in theirs.
Though I’d only ever taken it when everything had gone sideways, but I knew it had been there.
Now I was returning the favour by giving them a place to get out of the city.
To have a free holiday whenever they wanted one.
Cause we were family.
And that’s what family did.
Tristan came out not long after, carrying two bottles of beer. He handed one to me, then curled in beside me, grabbing a blanket from where it was thrown over the end and draping it around us. I slung an arm around him, pulled him closer to my chest, kissed his forehead.
The lake reflected the moon, dark and steady. Somewhere in the trees, a bird rustled and settled again. The cottage creaked the way old houses do when they’re content.
“You ever think how unlikely all this is?” I took a slow sip of my beer.
Tristan smiled into my shoulder. “Constantly.”
“I didn’t think I’d get this.” I peered down at him. At this man who’d saved me. Time and again. And still did. “And I don’t mean the house. The bloody swings. The material shit. I mean…this.” I stroked my fingers down his spine. “Family.”
Tristan tipped his head back to meet my eyes. “You deserve it.”
I shook my head. “Nah. I earned it.”
He thought about that for a moment, then nodded. “That, too.”
We sat there until the bottles were empty and the night had fully closed around us.
And somewhere in that quiet, I finally understood what I’d been wrong about all along.
I’d spent most of my life believing I didn’t have a choice.
That the world had been decided for me before I’d ever been old enough to push back.
That men like him stayed rich, and men like me survived on whatever money we could scrape together, clean or dirty, because that was what our postcodes allowed.
I’d thought it was fate.
Thought it was fixed.
But Tristan showed me different.
That choice was something to fight for. To hold onto even when the world tried to tear it from your hands. That the life you built, the people who stood beside you, the ones who refused to let go…
Those were the things worth claiming.
And if I’d learnt anything through all of this, it was that sometimes the bravest thing a man could do wasn’t just survive…
It was to choose. When it would be easier not to.
When the path in front is already mapped out, already expected.
Choosing to stop. To turn. To want something different, even when you don’t know how to get there… that’s the real hard man stuff.
So now I helped offer that choice to kids standing at the mouth of the same road I’d walked down thinking it was the only one. And Tristan stood up for them in court, making sure the law gave them the space to choose a different path, too.
Turned out that the pretty poison, whatever form it took for each of us, was only lethal if you swallowed it alone. But to have someone who cared what happened to you if you did?
Yeah…that was the real high.
The End
Thank you so much for coming on this messy, addictive journey with Razor and Tristan.