Epilogue
It’s fancy. The seats, the cabin, everything down to the fucking four-ply toilet paper in the restrooms. I don’t know what I expected from a private plane, but it sure as fuck wasn’t this much class and luxury.
My first private jet.
Isla convinced me to get a passport so we could travel, and I’m happy I listened, even though being this high in the air has me breathing through a fucking bag every thirty minutes.
Every time we pass by a rough patch of turbulence, I’m seconds away from grabbing the fucking parachutes and strapping one onto Isla, then onto myself.
I wanted to do that the moment we stepped foot on the jet, but she assured me we’d be more than okay. Apparently, it’s safer than driving.
Complete fucking horse shit if you ask me.
Being this high in the air can’t be safer than being on the ground, where gravity can’t suck you into its hell.
The cabin rattles as another bout of turbulence shakes the jet, making my knuckles blanch around the seat.
I train my focus on Isla in front of me, working away on her laptop, and just for a minute, I forget we’re thousands of feet up in the air.
The glow in her face radiates pure happiness as the tension between her brows pull them together.
She’s reading something on the screen, likely from a client or the courts.
I can recount everything from the night she told me what she wanted to do.
She had a towel over her wet hair, a toothbrush in her hand as she stood in front of the bedroom door, telling me her plan to open a legal firm dedicated solely to women in strifeful situations.
“Is flying always this…bumpy?” I ask, peeking outside the window, hoping to see some fucking land.
Her eyes beam with amusement. “My god, you’re a softie.”
“I dare you to say that to me on the ground.”
She smiles, knowing I’m going to make her pay for that remark later. Dismissing my response completely, she turns her laptop around to me, pressing play on a video. It’s an influencer, streaming live from a new children’s hospital.
“Guys, we’re here,” he says, his face not visible as he holds the phone up above the crowd gathered outside the doors.
“They’re cutting the ribbon!” he screams, and the crowd cheers as Ezra holds scissors, slicing the red ribbon in front of the entrance alongside Gordon.
Ezra’s being interviewed by news reporters from every channel.
They’re crowded and bunched up together, hoping to get even a minute of his time.
One of them asks a question, which can’t be heard from the distance.
“We are committed to bringing the community together through providing a space where families don’t have the burden of cost when caring for their children.
This is the first step of many to come to shape our futures, and our children’s futures, into a better one than we ever had.
I’d like to thank my generous donor and partner, Judge Gordon Knight, for being here with me today—”
Isla shuts the laptop. “Looks like people are believing the Casellas have turned a corner,” she scoffs, slipping the laptop back into its case.
I shrug. “He’s a good businessman, what can I say?”
“You can tell me where we’re going.” She crosses her arms, resting back in her seat, waiting for an answer. I like watching her like this, without all the answers.
“I forgot you don’t have much patience,” I say, and she makes a move to kick my foot with hers beneath the small table. I move just in time, evading her.
She narrows her eyes. “I don’t like surprises.”
“Well, you’ll like this one, I promise.”
It’s been on my list, to venture out with the money I’ve made. Investing overseas in a touristic destination would make it terribly easy to wash the money we receive under the table. Plus, it doubles as a holiday house.
Instead, house isn’t the right word because this is a resort, located on a secluded island in Greece.
“Are you finally taking me to that house in Italy you were just about to sign the contract for?” she asks with a hint of excitement.
She doesn’t know I plan to take her around the world to see it for the first time together.
Everything on this trip will be a surprise for her, whether she likes it or not.
“Something even better.”
I could get used to this. Waking up with the sun beaming through the windows, warming everything inside the room as I lay here on the bed.
It almost feels like a dream. The sheets are tangled in my legs as I roll over onto my back.
When I can’t feel Malik beside me, I open my eyes and stare up at the vines threading through the beams on the roof as the wind blows through the open windows, the curtains dancing in the warm breeze.
My gaze moves to the figure standing outside on the golden sand, staring out at the endless ocean, when something on my hand catches my attention.
It sparkles in the light, multiple rays of rainbow colours shimmering as I stare at the large pink diamond on my ring finger.
I blink once, then twice, and sit up, covering myself with the sheet.
When did he buy this?
When did he slip it on my finger without me noticing?
Wrapping the sheet around my body, I step out and around the bed, hovering beneath the large open double doors.
“You could have asked first,” I say. I can’t see his face with his back turned to me, but I just know he’s smiling, and my assumption is correct the moment he turns to look at me.
The dark messy curls in his hair sit perfectly, with the sides freshly shaved.
The private villa we’re staying in sits right on the beach, allowing a section of this side of the beach to be discreet from the rest of the guests at the resort.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen Malik so relaxed.
The black shorts rest just above his knees, his shirt nowhere to be seen, every single tattoo on display.
The one that caught me off guard was the one at the back of his neck.
I never asked because I didn’t want to know.
Everything was too much all at once, but now, I know why the skin on my neck was raised.
It’s because we shared the same ink from the same place. My father must have had it removed when I was adopted.
“I thought it was a given,” he says in a low timbre, closing the distance.
“Like I’d ever give you the opportunity to say no to me.
” The warmth in his eyes is back, the honey swimming in rivulets around his irises, hypnotic and spellbinding, when my phone rings by my bed.
I reach for it, picking it up and opening the video Astrid forwarded to our group chat with me, Astrid, Emmett, and Malik.
It’s a news report. Clicking it, I see Lloyd’s photo with a missing banner at the bottom. I don’t have to hear it to make an educated guess as to what’s happened. When I glance back up at Malik, he’s forcing a straight face, hiding that smirk behind pursed lips.
“What is it?” he asks like he doesn’t know.
Turning the phone around to him, the smile breaks free.
“Are you fucking kidding me, Malik?!”
He raises his hands in mock surrender. “It wasn’t me.”
“Yeah, right, and I’m a fucking virgin.”
His eyes go dark. “You were when you met him. He doesn’t matter anymore, Isla. It’s just me and you. It’ll always just be me and you.”
“He was a cop!”
He shakes his head, his body now close to mine, the heat from his skin radiating like the sun’s rays onto mine. “The deeper we dig into this, the more we find.”
“So you’re telling me he was involved?”
“Partially,” he murmurs, his hand closing around my throat.
“But if you want a specific confession, I can give you that too.” The sheet slips from my fingers as his hold on me tightens.
“It brought me great satisfaction watching him struggle to take his last breath. If that makes me psychotic, then I guess you can add that to the list of things people say about me. But from the moment you were mine, everyone else lost their right to have access to you in any capacity.”
“You’re insane,” I say, holding back the arousal I’m not supposed to be feeling right now.
“Insanity is the desperate urgency that grows inside me to feel your skin on mine each time I see you smile. Beautiful and entirely worth the madness.”