Epilogue #2
I looked down at the little piece of braided leather and stamped metal. It looked exactly like the one Dante had had made for me before, but with one very big difference.
“It’s just a bracelet this time,” I said to Caleb. “I made Dante take the tracking part back out when he gave it to me.”
Caleb smiled and I knew he got what a big step that had been for me.
He shifted Willa to one arm and then wrapped the other carefully around me. “Proud of you,” he whispered. I nodded against his neck.
He pulled back, then handed me his daughter. “Will you hold her while I go find Jace? He was getting her bottle ready but probably got sidetracked.”
“Absolutely,” I said.
“I’m going to go find your brother and Magnus and say my goodbyes,” Remy said when Caleb had left.
“Remy,” I began, but he waved me off and gave me a sad smile.
“I’m okay, Aleks. Just really tired. Work’s been busy.”
I didn’t believe him, but I was afraid to ask him the question that was lingering in the back of my mind.
Was he using again?
“He okay?” Vaughn asked as he came to my side.
“No,” I said quietly. “I don’t think he is.”
“I’m sorry,” Vaughn murmured. He kissed my temple.
“I’ll call him tomorrow,” I said. “Maybe I can convince him to come to lunch with me and talk. I don’t start back at the shop until next week, so maybe he and I can hang out a bit before then.
” I hadn’t told Remy I had decided to start seeing a therapist to deal with some of the issues from my past, but maybe I needed to do that.
And maybe he and I needed to actually start talking to each other about the things that had happened.
As far as I knew, Remy had sought help for his addiction, but he’d never gotten help for what had caused it in the first place.
Like me.
Vaughn rubbed my back. Then he was poking a finger at Willa’s tummy. “How are you, sweetie?” he asked. His deep voice made the baby sit really quietly in my hold for a moment, then she was babbling and holding out her arms.
I chuckled. “Smart girl.” I handed the baby to Vaughn, who easily took her. He began making all kinds of cooing sounds that clearly fascinated the child. Then she was grabbing his beard.
“Are we going to do this too, James?” I asked as I put my arm around him. I wasn’t ashamed to admit to him that I wanted it all. We’d gotten the first part behind us already by moving in together, but I still wanted the vows and the kids and the white picket fence.
“Yeah, Aleks, we are,” Vaughn said.
A moment later, Caleb and his boyfriend, Jace, appeared and Willa went crazy with happiness when she saw them.
And the bottle in Jace’s hand.
“Hi, my girl,” Jace said as he reached for her.
We were all admiring how quickly the baby got the nipple of the bottle in her mouth when Vaughn’s phone beeped. He looked at it, then leaned down and said to me, “Luca’s here. He’s waiting in the driveway.”
I nodded. “I’ll come with you,” I said as I took his hand. We said our goodbyes, then worked our way through the partygoers.
Things with Vaughn’s family had gone well when he’d told them he was staying with me in Seattle and taking a job with Ronan.
The men had figured as much and with the return of Gio, Luca’s life was in limbo anyway, so Con and King were still trying to figure out things when it came to what role they played in continuing to get kids out of the sex trafficking world.
I’d gotten the impression that Con was interested in working with Ronan and his men, but King wasn’t as trusting.
Lex had also become a bigger issue for the two brothers because the man was still MIA.
He’d finally talked to Con on the phone, but he’d refused to tell him or anyone where he was.
Con had actually gone to Los Angeles to look for Lex, but none of the people in Lex’s life had known where he’d gone…
he’d only told them he was taking some time for himself.
The organization he ran that helped kids rebuild their lives was being run by his assistant and his video game business was being managed by his business partner.
He’d basically walked away from it all without any kind of explanation.
I could tell it frustrated the hell out of all the brothers, but Con was taking it especially hard. King seemed to know more than he was saying, but that didn’t seem to be an unusual thing for King.
As for Gio and Luca, things were an absolute mess.
I hadn’t been there when Luca had been reunited with his son, but Vaughn had.
It was as Ronan had predicted. The boy either hadn’t recognized his father, or he’d pretended not to. When Luca had tried to touch him, Gio had lashed out at him. Then he’d gone silent.
Completely silent.
His doctor at the institute was calling it a complete break from reality and the result was that Gio didn’t do anything more than lie in bed and stare at the ceiling. Luca had finally been able to touch his child, but he may as well have been touching a corpse for all the emotion Gio had shown.
The doctor was hopeful the boy would recover, but the whole thing was devastating for Luca and his family. The reunion they’d all envisioned wasn’t to be.
Since Gio couldn’t be moved, Luca had decided to stay in Seattle for the time being to be close to his son. His business apparently had a branch in the city that he could work out of, but Vaughn had made a comment about Luca having lost all his fire.
We found Luca about a hundred yards down the driveway.
Dante and Magnus’s reception was being held at Ronan and his husband, Seth’s, house on Whidbey Island.
The driveway was lined with cars. I could see that Luca’s rental was double-parked next to another car, so I knew he wasn’t planning on staying.
And I suspected he hadn’t come closer to the house because he hadn’t wanted to intrude on the party.
When we reached Luca, Vaughn hugged him, but Luca didn’t return it. Luca looked like I’d always felt when I was feeling too raw, so I didn’t reach for him.
“How is he?” Vaughn asked.
Luca’s expression remained stiff and there was just a little bit of a shake of his head.
Which meant there’d been no change with Gio.
“I’m just heading back into the city,” Luca said after a moment. “But I wanted to drop this off for the grooms,” he added as he handed Vaughn a bottle of wine.
“Come in and give it to them yourself,” Vaughn said.
But the man shook his head. “No, I need to get back. Work,” he said. There was no emotion in his voice. He’d turned back into the man who’d come with Con to the house in Nevada that first day.
“Hey, Aleks?”
I turned to see Remy heading toward us. I could see his car keys in his hand.
“Um, your brother wanted me to let you know they’re leaving soon… something about just a quick bathroom break and then they were going to head out,” Remy said in confusion when he reached us.
Vaughn laughed next to me and I shook my head. I was about to thank Remy when I saw how he was staring at Luca.
And Luca was staring at him.
But whereas Luca was looking at Remy with a mix of curiosity and something I could only classify as attraction, Remy looked… stunned.
“Remy, this is—” I began.
“Luca,” Luca interjected as his eyes stayed on Remy. He reached out his hand. “Have we met before?” Luca asked.
It almost sounded like a come-on, but not quite. There was a genuine question there.
I was just in the process of turning to ask Remy if he was okay, because he hadn’t moved or spoken, when he suddenly swung his fist and hit Luca square in the jaw.
Luca didn’t fall, but the blow had him losing his balance and Vaughn grabbed his arm to steady him.
“Remy!” I cried in surprise.
But it was like Remy couldn’t hear me. He cradled his hand against his chest. “Stay away from me, you asshole.”
“Remy,” Vaughn began, but my friend took another step back, like he was afraid Vaughn was going to try to grab him.
“You lied to me,” Remy whispered as he stared at Luca. I could see tears swimming in his eyes. “Do you know how long I fucking waited for you to come back for me?”
Luca stiffened, then shook his head as understanding dawned. But it wasn’t until he breathed “Billy?” that the pieces clicked into place for me.
Billy.
It was the name of the boy Luca had left behind so that he could find his son.
“Oh God,” I whispered. “You’re the boy Luca—”
“Forgot,” Remy said softly. “He forgot about me… just like everyone else.”
Remy turned to walk away.
“Remy, wait, please,” Luca called, but then Remy was running down the driveway.
“Remy,” I yelled, but he ignored me too and when I tried to go after him, Vaughn grabbed my arm.
“Let him go, Aleks. You won’t be able to reach him in time.”
Vaughn was right because Remy’s little red sedan pulled out of its spot where it was parked farther down the driveway.
The front of the car hit one of the cars on the other side of the driveway as Remy tried to turn around.
The two cars scraped together, but it didn’t stop Remy.
His car tore off down the driveway and toward the road.
I pulled my phone out of my pocket and dialed.
“Pick up, pick up, pick up,” I repeated over and over.
But he didn’t.
Luca watched the car disappear, then he reached up to touch the bruise forming on his jaw.
“Luca,” Vaughn said, but Luca shook his head. “I need to get to work. Tell… tell whosever car that is” – he pointed toward the car Remy’s had hit – “that I’ll pay for the damage.”
Vaughn tried to reach for Luca, but he shook him off and went to his car. “I’m fine,” Luca murmured. “I’m fine.”
I knew he wasn’t.
Just like Remy wasn’t.
Once Luca’s car was gone, Vaughn put his arm around me.
“We should go after them,” I said. “I’m worried about Remy.”
Vaughn nodded. “Let’s go say goodbye to your brother and Magnus, then we’ll head to the city and check on him.”
By the time we got back to the house, Magnus and Dante were already in the process of saying their goodbyes to their guests. Both men looked mussed and I couldn’t help but smile. When Dante’s arms went around me, I squeezed him hard.
“Take care of yourself, irm?ozinho,” Dante murmured.
“You too, meu melhor.” I didn’t wait for Dante to interject guesses as to what he was my best of this time around. I simply told him what I’d always known he was to me. “Meu melhor tudo,” I whispered.
My best everything…
He kissed my temple, then held me for a moment longer. “I’ll see you soon, okay?”
I nodded.
“And tell that boyfriend of yours something,” he added.
“What?” I asked with dread.
“Tell him thanks for the wedding gift. Best present ever.” He kissed me again.
“Wait,” I said as I grabbed his arm. “What did he give you?” I asked.
“Ask him,” Dante said with a wink, then he took Magnus’s outstretched hand and they left.
My phone rang before I could say anything else. I sighed in relief when I saw that it was Remy.
“Remy, are you all right?” I asked. “Where are you?”
“I’m in the line for the ferry. I’m okay,” Remy said. His voice actually sounded… normal. Which I knew wasn’t possible.
“Remy, just stay there. Vaughn and I will come get you. You can come stay with us.”
“Thanks, but I’m actually going to go stay with a friend for a couple days. I already called Dom to make sure it was okay.”
Dom as in Dom Barretti, his boss.
As far as I knew, Remy had never missed even a single day of work in the two years he’d worked for Dom.
“Will you tell the person whose car I hit that I’m sorry and I’ll pay for it?”
“I’ll take care of it,” I began. “But Remy…”
“Aleks,” Remy said softly.
“Yeah?”
“I’m okay, I swear it.”
“Please come stay with us,” I repeated.
Remy sighed. “I’m going to stay with my sponsor. I’ll call you from his house tonight when I get there and let you talk to him so you know I’m okay. All right? I need… I need to be with him because he’ll know what to say to me.”
I understood what it was that he wasn’t telling me.
He was fighting the urge to get high.
“Swear to me that’s where you’re going,” I said. “Swear it to me, Remy, or I’ll camp outside your door all night.”
Remy chuckled. “I swear it, Aleks.”
I felt a little bit of relief because his laugh sounded pretty good. And he’d never lied to me before.
Because he was my friend.
“I’ll call you tonight, okay?”
“Okay,” I said with a nod. “Text me, too. Every hour.”
“Aleks…”
“Every hour, Remy.”
“Okay, fine, every hour. I have to go, the cars are being loaded onto the ferry.”
I said my goodbyes and hung up.
“Is he okay?” Vaughn asked. I hadn’t noticed him standing next to me.
“I don’t think so,” I admitted. “He says he’s going to go see his sponsor and he’ll call me tonight.”
Vaughn’s fingers went through my hair, then he pulled me close. “Let’s go to the city and check on him,” Vaughn said. “And if he’s not at his place, we’ll wait to hear from him tonight and see if we can’t get him to let us come see him.”
“We should check on Luca, too,” I said.
“Yeah,” Vaughn said. “We’ll do that too.”
I barely remembered to say my goodbyes to my family and friends. It wasn’t until Vaughn and I were walking hand in hand to our car that I recalled Dante’s parting words.
“Dante said to tell you thank you for the wedding present,” I said as I glanced at him. Vaughn’s thumb was doing that amazing thing where he rubbed it over mine. “What present? We didn’t get them anything.”
Vaughn smiled and looked at me. “Besides Magnus and Matty, what’s the most precious thing in Dante’s life?” Vaughn asked.
“Me,” I automatically said.
When Vaughn didn’t continue, I opened my mouth to ask him why that mattered. But the answer hit me all at once.
We hadn’t given Dante and Magnus a wedding present.
Vaughn had.
He’d given my brother me.
Twice.
Once two years ago and again a month ago when he’d saved my life.
But he’d saved me in so many other ways too.
“Oh,” I said with a smile.
A really big smile.
“Would you tell Dante something for me when he calls you tonight?”
“Of course,” I said. My heart felt full as I realized my brother and Vaughn were actually going to get along after all.
But that lasted all of five seconds because then Vaughn said with a wink, “Tell him mine is bigger.”
I began laughing and couldn’t stop even once we’d reached the car. Vaughn opened the door for me and pressed me back against the frame of the car. He kissed me softly, then placed a piece of butterscotch into my hand. “Let’s go check on our family and then go home, Aleks. Sound good?”
“Sounds perfect, James. It sounds absolutely perfect.”
The End
Check out the next page for a sneak peek of the first book in my new Protectors spin-off series, “The Four.” Book 1 is tentatively titled “Forgotten” and will be Luca and Remy’s story!