Epilogue
EPILOGUE
LUCY
FIVE MONTHS LATER
“I always make good on my promises,” I sing down at the marble headstone, trailing my fingers over the curved top.
The large bouquet of twenty-four red carnations glares up at me as I crouch and place another loose stem into the angel-shaped vase beside the inlaid portrait.
“Remind me again…” I look up at Luda. Sadness darkens her blue eyes while she strokes the grave. “Why does it have to be uneven?”
“It represents the finality of life.”
My hand traces the photo as I flit my gaze to the blue eyes staring back at me. No matter how hard I try to stop my tears from getting the better of me, it’s impossible. My hormones are raging, causing my emotions to go haywire. And being here has me on edge.
“I don’t like that. It feels wrong to mark death as the end. I don’t want this to be it… I didn’t get to say goodbye.”
“Petrushka…” she murmurs, stroking my cheek.
“It’s a silly tradition.” I jump at the sudden remark behind me, my heart beating so fast that the babies take it as a cue to have a good dance around in my belly. It’s so big that I already look ready to pop. “Death isn’t the end. It can’t be…”
“You say that now because you narrowly escaped it,” I snap at Tomasz as he crouches beside me. “Technically, you didn’t.”
“I’m here to tell the tale, and that’s all that matters, malyshka.” Warm lips press to the side of my head while his arm wraps around me. “She would be proud of you.”
“I’ve tried to do things the way she wanted me to.”
“Do you think maybe she told you those things because she simply wanted you to be happy and safe…maybe she wanted you to find who you are?”
“Well, if that’s the case…” I trace the small, gold frame around my grandma’s portrait and smile. “I am happy, even if the heartburn is killing me, and I am safe because there is nothing you won’t do to protect me.”
“Annoyingly, that’s a mutual thing.” With a hard nip to the tip of my nose, Tomasz levels me with a glare.
“You’ll have to forgive me at some point.”
“You plotted behind my back with Anton and my father. You risked your life and the life of our children?—”
“To save yours. If you died that night, there would be no legacy or legend. There would only be blood because they would’ve hunted us all down. One by one.”
Even if he can’t forgive me for going over his head that night, he can’t deny that I was right to. No matter how many times he punishes me or how brutal it is, I will never apologise. I stand by every action I took, and I would do it all over again if it meant saving him. I’m selfish enough to do whatever it takes to keep him with me.
“We’re all here…alive,” Luda says with a light squeeze to my shoulder. “That’s all that matters, luchik.”
A small smile quirks his face as he nods and stands, taking me up with him. Through the onslaught of pregnancy yuck, my heart beats for him, faster and faster the longer he holds me with a hand stroking the top of my belly. The twins kick at the contact, each jab of their feet, hands, and elbows following the trail of their daddy’s touch.
“You look green,” he chuckles.
“Heartburn and two hyperactive aliens would do that to you.” Leaning into him, I let him walk us away from the grave, towards the car waiting for us. “How did your meeting go?”
“We’re set.”
Opening the car door for me, he narrows his eyes as the dark wig blusters in the breeze. He hates it, and I know that if he could, he would rip it from my head right now.
When we’re sitting in the back of the blacked-out Maybach, he belts me in, taking the time to kiss my bump, something that always makes the butterflies inside me flutter to life. Tomasz is so much more than anything I thought I would have. Together, we have something far more precious than we deserve. But then, thrones aren’t forged from dreams. Kingdoms aren’t built on wishes and prayers. Heaven wouldn’t exist without hell, the same way that we wouldn’t be who we are without bloodshed.
“Don’t trust him,” I warn Tomasz as he sits up to look me in the eyes. “You can’t trust either of them.”
“Beautiful girl…” He grins back at me. “They hurt you with their greed. I don’t care if they’re gods or saints—we will destroy them one by one. We’re going to pick them apart piece by piece until each one of them has served penance for their sins against you.”
Without another word, he kisses me, hard and hungrily with bite and growl. And all I can do is return his affection. Because in the end, a kiss from a sinner is worth so much more than the love of a saint.
It’s brutal and relentless in its possession. Unwavering in its force. Unshakeable in its fierceness. It knows no bounds and has no limits. There are no rules. And this is all we are…
A couple of sinners lost in our kiss, ready to rule our kingdom. No matter what it takes.