Epilogue
The wind gives me goosebumps, but the sun is bright as the impressive sailboat cuts through the deep blue waves.
It’s a calm day, so Shade tells me. Perfect for a sailing trip, so I keep the ship running parallel with the sandy and rocky coast, my eyes on the water ahead.
I point at a tall white lighthouse jutting out from the land.
Shade nods at me and yells something about the portside, but I don't move from my place at the wheel, letting Blake and Mav do whatever is supposed to be done. Shade might know how to sail, but the rest of us have barely been on a boat and pretty much have no idea what we’re doing.
I was a little shocked when he told the captain to take the night off and paid him double to leave.
I was even more shocked when the guy actually did it.
He didn’t even bat an eye, just told us to be back by noon tomorrow and then hightailed it to the marina bar with the wad of cash.
I mean, I thought they were supposed to go down with the ship…
Shade appears on deck to my right, drawing me away from my thoughts.
‘Is this okay?’ I shout to him when he’s close enough to hear me.
He nods, giving me a thumbs up. ‘Perfect. Just keep her steady and into the wind.’
I grin at him, loving the way this feels. The freedom.
At the marina early this morning, I was feeling a little apprehensive.
When I bid for this sailing experience at the Forrests’ Christmas Gala all those months ago, I sort of forgot that I’d have to come, too.
I couldn’t help but remember what happened the last time I was on a boat with the guys.
I trust them in every way now, of course, but I’ll always remember the feeling of the raft bucking, and the freezing water when I went under.
I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to enjoy the day.
It turns out that not all boats are the same. I just needed to go bigger.
Shade comes up behind me. He puts his arms around me, kissing my neck.
‘Do you like it?’ I ask.
He nods vigorously. In fact, all three of them seem to be having a great time.
I am, too, though the dark and murky water makes me shiver when I look too hard at it, when I remember the instruments down below that say how stupidly deep it is, and the thought of falling in that’s enough to make me not want to go anywhere near the side just in case I slip.
So, I stay at the wheel, pretending I’m not gripping it for dear life, and we sail up the coast for the whole day.
In the evening, we find a sheltered spot to drop anchor and moor for the night.
As the sun goes down, we sit in the dying light, eating steaks that we barbequed on deck. I shiver in the breeze although it's almost July and the weather is warm. I'm not used to the chill of being on the water.
Blake goes down below and comes back a minute later with my sweatshirt and a blanket. I give him a smile and cover myself, huddling between Mav and Shade as we sip our glasses of wine.
My phone buzzes and I dig it out of my pocket.
‘Sauvage again?’ Shade murmurs.
I nod.
Envy is selling so well with the cartel, they're constantly needing more, and it's actually taking up a lot of my time to keep up with demand.
I've finally shown the guys exactly how to make it, and that's taken away some of the stress, because I'm no longer the only chemist, but it’s only a matter of time before we’ll need to figure out a more long-term solution to increase production.
'He needs another two batches in a couple of days,' I say. ‘I made three, though, so it’s fine. We don’t need to rush back, or anything.’
I lean my head against Blake’s shoulder with a small sigh.
I don't really like the fact that we need to work with the cartel at all after everything, but that’s the deal Sauvage made for our lives. At least they took care of Andy’s body. His death hasn’t been linked to us at all, and all this is better than being married to Marcus.
He hasn’t been seen since the morning Lu and her cousin carted him away in a white van.
His black Camaro was found badly damaged halfway down a ravine just off the main road through the State Forest a few weeks ago.
A body was found inside, which turned out to be him, but it had to be identified with dental records because it had been there awhile.
I've questioned Lu about him a couple times, but she just looks at me blankly, like she doesn't even know who I'm talking about. Shade says I should stop asking her and I’ve conceded that it's probably best that I don't know what she actually did.
Shade heard from someone in his old circles that Elizabeth Banderville is living her best life now, and she goes to every party with a massive smile on her face, dancing the nights away with a perpetual Champagne flute in her hand. I’m glad it worked out for her. She did try to help me, after all.
When we're finished our wine, and the hour is late, we go down into the cabin.
'Have you had an email from the lawyers yet?' Shade asks me as he gives me a neck and shoulder massage.
I stretch under his hands. 'Not yet, but it'll be this week, I think.'
I look down at the rock on my left hand. When I was finally able to prove to Fussell & Meyer who I was, I found that even I couldn't get the money left to me by my mom’s parents if I wasn't married.
It’s a dumb rule for the modern era, but there was no way around it, so I had to get hitched. Shade, as my stepbrother, was obviously not possible for legal reasons and both Blake and Mav argued for a week over which one of them should propose to me. In the end, we flipped a coin and Mav won.
We did a small courthouse service with his brother and Lu and our guys as witnesses. And, later that same day, me and the others had our own private ceremony where they all said the same promises to me, and I to them.
My wedding band has three different colored diamonds in it and is shaped like three rings twisted together, and each of my guys wears a matching counterpart.
The money was mine within hours of providing the marriage certificate to Fussell & Meyer, all eight-hundred million of it, it turns out.
When I heard the figure, my head swam. I hadn’t expected it to be anywhere near that much, but I already knew exactly what I was going to do with it first. After paying Sauvage back the six million he paid Mariana Reyes to keep us alive, I bought out Blake's father's debt from the cartel.
He was free of them in time to graduate from Richmond U with honors, like the rest of us did.
Professor Applegate gave us our diplomas as his final act before he left the university and has since taken a job at a prestigious school in Switzerland.
He recommended the four of us for his post grad program there, so in September, that’s where we’ll be going.
We’re renting a house and Stevens has decided he wants to run it for us, saying he spent too long in the US and would rather go back to Europe for a while.
I was going to bail Shade and his businesses out of the financial trouble caused by his father, but he told me he didn't want me to. He doesn’t want any of it to survive. A clean break, he said.
I've kept up with the news of what's going on with The Heath. Turns out, Stoke had way more skeletons in his closet than anyone knew. He had ties to the peerage, and to criminal organizations. There were also old accusations of medical negligence and malpractice that could never be proven until The Heath was raided. He’s been jailed for life, and many of the Blanks, I’ve heard, too.
Under the dumpsters, three bodies were found in total.
They haven't been identified yet due to not having any dental records, but they believe that at least two were patients of Stokes.
He has never admitted anything, though. So far, three people in the UK Government resigned over the scandal of The Heath.
The current residents were taken to other institutions, psychiatric facilities not made for people like us.
Considering that all of us were at The Heath because our families didn’t want us, or couldn’t deal with us, I've decided to start my own place just outside of London. It won’t be a clinic. It’ll be a home. A nice one.
I've put up enough cash for three years, and I've already begun securing donations for the running of it. Everything in the building is new and state of the art. There will never be any corrections or punishments, and there will be programs to provide education and assistance to those who want to learn to live independently. I’m also building several apartments on site for those who want them.
Everyone who was ever a resident of The Heath has an automatic place there. Fifty of them are coming, including Colin and William. My dream of helping is finally becoming a reality.
Shade’s skillful hands keep up their movements until I can barely sit up.
I open my eyes and find my guys watching me.
‘Strip for us,’ Mav says, eyes traveling over my yellow sundress that’s been giving them glimpses of my body whenever the breeze picked up on deck all day.
I chose it on purpose.
Giving him an indulgent grin, I get to my feet slowly, glad today’s plan to make them crazy is paying off.
‘I don’t think that was part of the gift,’ I say coyly, but, feeling a lot more confident now than I used to, I do a little shimmy, letting the dress fall to the floor.
The boat pitches a bit and I stumble, breaking into laughter as I almost fall over very un-sexily. I crawl onto the bed between Blake's legs.
His arms envelop me, and I feel Mav and Shade behind me. I hear the rustling of them taking off their clothes, and I look over my shoulder to watch them, but Blake turns my head back his way and pulls me closer to kiss me.
Then a blindfold is put over my eyes, I smile. This is one of my favorite games. Just last week, they hid in the bunker, and told me to find them. Every time I did, an item of my clothing was taken off until I was lured naked into our Dark Lounge and thoroughly fucked.