EPILOGUE
Zara
“Zara, baby, yes!”
Her head was between Alexia’s legs, and she could tell that Alexia was ready to come. She waited because she knew what Alexia would do next.
“Please,” Alexia begged, pressing Zara’s head down.
“Me too,” Zara added before she sucked again.
“No problem,” Sarah said from behind her and pushed her fingers in deeper.
Zara came first. Alexia came next. Sarah had a vibrator pressed to her clit, so she came shortly after both of them, and all of them collapsed in a mess of limbs on the massive bed, catching their breath.
“That was really good,” Alexia said at some point.
“It always is,” Sarah agreed and rolled into Zara.
Zara smiled at her before she kissed her.
Alexia moved in closer to her from the other side and pulled her onto her side. She took Zara’s leg and wrapped it over both of her own, rolling her hips into Zara.
“Again?” Zara asked, knowing the answer.
Sarah kissed her this time, and her hand went to Zara’s breast while Alexia’s hand went to her clit. Zara knew, how she always did now, that all those years ago, as much damage as it had caused in the beginning, she’d made the right decision in becoming a vampire.
“I love you,” Alexia whispered in her ear.
Zara smiled into Sarah’s kiss and then came again.
“I love you, too,” she replied when she rolled on top of Alexia. “And you,” she added to Sarah.
Sarah gave her a wink and said, “I’m going to shower. You two continue, if you want, but grab us something to eat when you’re done, maybe? I’m starving.”
“Happily,” Alexia said and pulled Zara down into her.
“She’s giving us some alone time since she and I had some this morning.
” She kissed Zara’s shoulder. “I’ll make myself scarce for a bit after we eat so you can have some time with her, too.
” She kissed Zara’s lips. “Happy ten-year anniversary, baby.”
Zara smiled at her and replied, “You too. God, I can’t believe it. Ten years?”
“Yeah, it’s crazy. Do you think it’ll feel different once we have lived out our natural lives? Like, once everyone we know dies, and we’re in that second lifetime, celebrating our fiftieth and then our hundredth anniversary.”
Zara smiled wider and said, “Probably, yes. In a good way, though. I’d love to be able to celebrate that many years with you.”
“Me too,” Alexia replied.
Zara leaned down and kissed her, thinking about how ten years ago, she’d walked out of Cassia’s house and driven away.
Amy had been in the passenger seat, Alexia and Sarah had been in the middle row of seats, and they’d had things to deal with in the back.
Zara had looked up into the rearview mirror at one point, and she’d noticed them both looking at her in a way she hadn’t seen them look at her before.
She’d smiled back at them, and when they had finished what they needed to do, Alexia and Sarah had gone to her place since neither of them had had a place to go in DC.
Amy had gone her own way, but the three of them had talked at her apartment for hours and hours, waiting for any announcement of what had gone on in that house to hit the news.
Once it had, and it had seemed like the police had concluded what they’d wanted them to think, it had been a relief for all of them, but it had been Zara who’d asked them both to go have a drink.
Drinks had led to sex. Sex had led to more dinners.
After dinners, there had been breakfasts, and they’d stayed with Zara instead of finding a place of their own.
Then, there had been texts when they would be apart for work, talking about how they missed each other.
Declarations of a desire for commitment had come after that, followed by declarations of love.
Ten years, they’d all been together, and Zara had never been happier.
Her feelings for Arwen hadn’t just evaporated, of course, but once Zara had seen her with Iro, she’d known there would be no hope for the two of them to go beyond friendship, and that had helped her process those feelings and move on.
Now, she had two beautiful women, and she loved them desperately.
“Yes! Yes!” Alexia came at Zara’s touch. “Fuck! Yes!”
In a full week of anniversary celebrations, they’d been in bed almost non-stop, sometimes making love and other times, fucking like crazy because they wanted to, but each day, they took some time to themselves, time with just one person, and there was time reserved for the three of them to be together, too.
It worked for them, and while they fought occasionally, it was never anything that seemed to get in the way.
Some days, Zara would read in a corner of the room, and when she would look up at the two of them snuggled up on their balcony overlooking the city, she’d smile because she could see Sarah laugh at something Alexia was saying, or she would watch them kiss slowly and love how they loved each other.
Other days, she would be on that balcony with one of them, doing the same thing.
She knew their paradise couldn’t last forever, and they would have to move on soon, but she took solace in the fact that they could return here one day, maybe in a few decades, and that was fine with her.
“Okay. So, we have a list to review,” Sarah announced as she came back into the bed with them.
They were all still naked and sated, at least temporarily, having had a blood bag each and enough sex to last a human for a decade, and Zara knew it was time.
“Let’s do it,” she said and kissed Sarah on the shoulder.
“We should pick a continent first, maybe,” Alexia suggested as she rested her head on Zara’s shoulder.
“You want to move to Antarctica?” Sarah teased.
“No. Well, maybe. The cold doesn’t bother us as much as it does humans.”
“Shut up.” Sarah laughed. “Not Antarctica.”
“We can go back to America, just not the East Coast. We were in New York in the beginning and, obviously, DC, so we would need to be careful.”
“Or, we could stay in Europe,” Sarah suggested.
“South America?” Zara tossed out.
“Where?”
“There’s a house in Chile or in Brazil. I think there’s a smaller one in Peru, too.”
“Yeah, it’s on the list,” Sarah confirmed, reading from her phone. “It’s a three-bedroom, so we would each get our own room.”
“But the one in Brazil has four rooms, so we could have a room for all three of us, too,” Zara noted.
“The one in Chile is in the mountains, and it’s larger. I kind of want to move that special room we have here.”
Sarah winked at both Zara and Alexia.
“Oh, that special room, huh?” Zara teased.
“Hey, you love that room, too. We used it yesterday.”
“I do love it,” Zara said. “And I think we should leave Europe for the next ten years or so; at least, to live. We can still visit if we want, but not Florence and maybe not Italy unless we’re very careful.”
“I love it here,” Alexia said, looking outside their large window.
“Me too,” Zara added.
“I know we’ve been saying ten years, and Iro told us to stick to ten, but maybe it can be more?” Sarah asked.
“We should be careful. People who knew us as humans are very much still around, and Florence is a popular vacation destination. People we knew could always come here, see us out and about, and wonder why we left or how we ended up here,” Zara reasoned.
“Later, maybe we can come back and stay a little longer.”
“So, we’re packing up and moving to… Chile?” Sarah asked.
“It’s remote,” Alexia said. “We might be able to stay for longer, and it looks beautiful.”
“So, Chile?” Zara asked to make sure everyone was on the same page.
“Yeah, let’s do it,” Sarah replied and tossed her phone onto the bed.
“In a month, we’ll be living in Chile,” Zara confirmed.
“I’m going to hop in the shower,” Alexia said and rose from the bed.
“Okay,” Zara said.
Sarah moved into Zara’s lap then and asked, “Hey, are you happy?”
She wrapped her arms around Zara’s neck.
“I am very happy,” she replied. “I never thought I’d be this happy.”
“Me neither,” Sarah said. “I can’t believe we’ve lived in a villa here for a decade.
I grew up in a small town and never even thought I’d be able to afford the tiny apartment I had in New York that I had to share with someone else.
I was in Cassia’s fancy house, but not for all that long before everything happened, and now, we’re here, and I love it here. ”
“All three of us do, but we need to be careful. We will love the new place, too.”
“I know. And all that matters anyway is that we’re all together.”
“Yes,” Zara agreed and lowered her mouth to Sarah’s waiting nipple. “Now, may I?”
Sarah gave her a nod, and Zara’s hand slipped between her thighs.
Later that night, as they all sat outside on their balcony – with her in the middle, as she usually was, her two girls next to her, heads on shoulders, a beautiful sunset in front of them overlooking an old city – Zara knew what she wanted.
“Before we leave, I want to do something.”
“What?” Alexia asked.
“I want to marry you both,” she said and shifted until she was kneeling in front of them.
“Arwen or Iro can be the officiant when they get here. It’s not legal, I know, but it’s the best we can do in our situation, and I want that.
I want to make it as official as we can because I love you both so much.
Will you marry me?” she asked and took one of Sarah’s hands in her own, followed by Alexia’s.
“Yes,” Sarah replied first.
“Yes,” Alexia said and then turned to Sarah. “Will you marry me?”
“Yes,” Sarah replied with a little laugh.
“Ten years, and I want the next hundred and the next thousand with both of you,” Zara said, kissing their hands.
When she stood, Sarah did as well and pulled her in for a kiss. Zara kissed Alexia next. Then, Zara watched them kiss each other. She smiled at them and turned around to take in the remainder of the sunset as the two women joined her; heads on shoulders once again, hands linked between them.
Arwen
“He’s agreed,” Iro said.