Epilogue #2
Junior gagged while Lauren wheezed for breath beside him. Across from her, Taylor finally broke, joining in the laughter, and soon all of us were chuckling.
A few minutes later, we’d returned to safer topics when Walter barked. Ryan moved quickly, able to grab him before he went racing off again.
I turned to see someone amble out of the darkness, wearing a casual black suit, his hair ruffled, looking tired after a long day of travel, but no less handsome because of it.
“I thought you couldn’t make it,” Tyler said, rising from his seat.
AJ smiled. “I caught an earlier flight.”
I stood as well, watching the men embrace and press their lips together in a chaste greeting.
They rejoined the table, AJ kissing me next before plopping down on the bench seat and wrapping his arm around my waist to pull me close.
Tyler sat on his other side, drinking him in after the past few weeks apart.
Josh cleared his throat, and it was then I noticed how quiet the table was. Everyone stared at us, a mixture of expectant and impatient expressions on their faces.
“This is AJ,” Tyler said, simply, and let his friends come to their own conclusions.
No one so much as batted an eye, greeting AJ, offering to heat up a plate, pour him a drink.
I watched on, falling quiet as the tension in my shoulders finally eased.
I’d spent so much time around judgy assholes that it was second nature to look for double meanings, backhanded compliments.
There was none of that here. Instead it was just . . . easy. Nice.
I liked these people. And not just one or two of them, but all of them.
I was beyond curious about Junior’s time in the mob, wanted to know more about Lauren’s advocacy work, ask Josh how he’d gotten into hacking.
Their easy camaraderie was like a siren song, proof that healthy friend groups existed and that family didn’t only mean the one you were born into, but the one you chose as well.
By the time we left hours later, and only after promising that yes, Tyler, AJ, and I would definitely be at the next dinner, I felt like my cup was full.
New numbers had been added to my phone. Jackson was coming in next week for a consultation on a tattoo he wanted to get.
Aly had demanded I join their next impromptu cocktail night, where she, Taylor, Lauren, and Ryan got together to blow off steam and talk shit about the world.
Lauren had invited Tyler and me to Velvet to meet more people in the brat play community, which we happily accepted because we’d exhausted our online research.
They’d accepted AJ and me so easily, with open arms, so obviously happy for Tyler that it made my heart ache.
“It almost feels too good to be true,” Tyler told me on the drive to my parents’ house, AJ following just behind us. “Like I shouldn’t get to have this, be so happy, after everything I’ve done.”
My answering smile was sad. “I understand. I’ve had a lot of those same feelings myself. My therapist says it’s irrational guilt.”
Tyler nodded. “Mine, too, but I can’t shake the feeling.”
“Punishing yourself forever won’t change your past behavior,” I said.
“Just keep reminding yourself of that. For as long as it takes to alter the narrative in your brain. You did what you did because the information you were given was inaccurate, which is no fault of your own. And yeah, you acted like a giant bag of dicks for a few years, but you have the rest of your life to prove you’re not that person. ”
He shook his head, jaw tensing, a stubborn expression coming over his face.
I flicked him. “Hey. Don’t be mean to my boyfriend. That’s my job.”
This earned me an eyeroll and a muttered, “Yes, ma’am.”
“I love you,” I told him, for the very first time, knowing it would snap him out of his spiral, but also because I’d been holding the words in for a while.
Were things between us always this wonderful?
No. Tyler still had a lot of anger he was working through.
Sometimes, he fell into black moods that were hard to pull him out of.
He could be rude, fickle, and quick to temper.
But he was also becoming quick to apologize and make amends, putting in the hard work to make things better, to make himself better, and I loved that about him just as much as I loved his sly humor and barbed flirtations.
He turned his head toward me and then back to the road. “Fuck, Stella. I love you so much.”
I worried the inside of my cheek, wondering if what I was about to say might change everything. “I think I love AJ a little, too. I think I always have.”
Tyler nodded, looking like he’d seen this coming. “AJ is easy to love.”
“Do you?” I asked. “Love him, I mean.”
Tyler sighed. “I’m not sure. Up until recently, I didn’t really think I was capable of romantic love.
That my heart was too hard. But I know I love you.
And I know AJ is important to me, too. I miss him when he’s gone.
I crave our time with him. He . . . steadies me in a way you don’t.
” He shot me an apologetic look. “No offense.”
I smiled, thinking it sounded a lot like love, but if Tyler needed more time to realize it, then I’d keep my opinion to myself. “I get it,” I said instead. “And I feel the same. Do you want to ask him tonight? If he wants to join our relationship?”
“Do you think he’d go for it?” Tyler asked. “That he’ll say yes?”
“He will,” I assured him.
Several hours later, AJ proved me right.