Epilogue
MAC
FIVE MONTHS LATER
“Get your ass over here!” I shout. But Sage only laughs, taking his sweet-ass time.
I’ve been tied to this bed alone for four minutes now.
My wrists are strapped down with rope that Sage looped around the headboard.
My patience is wearing thin. My sanity left after he edged me then climbed off the bed to go answer the front door.
I mean, who the fuck cares who knocked? But he left me here. I heard him chatting away with Luna like his tongue wasn’t just exploring my ass.
My wrists burn as I try to twist and free myself from the ropes, the rough fiber digging into the already tender skin. I release a growl of frustration when I accomplish nothing, flopping back down onto the bed.
“Sage!” I scream. He’s finally walking back to the room. I hear the door close and his footsteps stomping down the short hall. Then he’s there, dominating the doorway and stealing all my frustration with a cocky smile.
“Yes, darling?” he jokes, loving every second of my torture. My cock loves it, too; it leaks against my abs, fully onboard with anything Sage decides to do.
Our first night in the trailer, Sage fucked me.
He was gentle and loving until he was fully sated.
Then I demanded he fuck me harder, and it unleashed whatever was holding him back.
He tore my ass up. Leaving me a useless lump on the mattress.
Boneless and sated in a way that’s never happened when I bottom. But of course, it did with him.
He climbs onto the bed, kneeling at my feet. I’m quick to spread my legs, inviting him in. He smiles and looks down at me with so much love, admiration, and lust, I have to swallow down my rising emotions.
“So fucking perfect,” he says in a deep, gravelly voice.
His finger slowly trails up my calf, my thigh, up to my cock, then back down again.
Goosebumps trail behind his touch. I buck against the bed, lifting my hips and silently begging for more.
His gentle touches drive me mad. His rough ones, too.
Pretty much anytime Sage touches me, my brain shuts off.
Turning me into a lustful whore willing to die at the altar of my sex god.
“Sage! For fuck’s sake,” I grumble when his hand ghosts over my cock once more. His laugh unleashes bats in my belly, and I swoon. His laugh always makes me stupid, driving me to do dumb shit just to hear it again. That won’t ever change.
“What do you want?” he asks, finally wrapping his hand fully around my cock.
“Jesus. Fuck. Anything. Fuck me. Use me. I don’t care just fuckkkking do something,” I moan in the middle, making my words slurred and unintelligible, but he gets the gist. He climbs further up on the bed, right where I want him.
I wrap my legs around his hips to trap him here.
I’ll kill the next person who interrupts us.
“Use you, huh?” he asks, cocking his brow up. Anyone else, I’d punch for trying to be that cocky, but for him I melt. He pulls off the shorts he put on to answer the door, kicking them back off the end of the bed in one fluid motion.
“Sage,” I warn. I totally top from the bottom, trying to regain control of a situation I’m already lost to. He leans down and kisses me.
But he pulls back too soon, ending the kiss before I’m ready. I chase after his lips but drop back down when I see the lube in his hand. Oh, fuck yeah. Finally.
He prepped me for what felt like hours. Bringing me close to the edge, only to back off and switch shit up. It was amazing, but frustrating to say the least.
After applying a good amount of lube to his dick, he tosses the bottle to the side, and it lands on the floor with a thud.
“I got you, baby.” he lines himself up with my hole, slowly pressing forward until he breaches that tight ring of muscles. We both let out a moan at the feeling of him finally inside of me.
He stops me from forcing more of him inside by pushing my hips down onto the bed. I growl, and he laughs. Only slightly less awe inspiring than normal. But then he’s finally moving. Filling me with every inch of his long cock. I see stars, and my brain flatlines.
Finally.
My life has always been shit. Hard and punishing. I learned tough lessons too soon that were unclear and painful. But since I was ten years old, I had my person.
An angry boy with something to prove. He stormed into my life and changed everything. Home was still a black shadow. My parents were still addicts who forgot I existed until it suited them. But this one boy was always on my side.
The world was suddenly full of possibilities. The world wasn’t as harsh and unforgiving. Not with this beautiful, angry boy.
Those possibilities went up in smoke that night Dave found me with Sawyer. Fear and regret were my only companions until that one late-night call. That one choked sob on the other end of the line. My world flipped again.
No longer alone. No longer living a dreary half-life of what ifs and could haves. He was back. He was back, and the world had color again.
Even now, I sometimes catch myself scared.
Not of my parents, not of being forced to run from the one boy I’ve ever loved, but fear of waking up and finding this was all a dream.
A slideshow of one last what if. I’d be catapulted back in time.
Wake up alone, bloody and broken without Sage to hold my hand.
But it’s not a dream, I’m not hallucinating. I may wake up back in the trailer where it all began, but nothing is the same. My life might be shit. Might work too hard and get nowhere. Might be broke, paying off hospital bills for the stubborn man who thinks I’ll let him do it on his own.
But none of that matters. Not really. What fucking matters is him. It’s always been him. The angry boy with so much to prove. Always dreaming of a life that’s bigger. Where the walls around him aren’t encased in cheap metal. Where his neighbor isn’t the dick who fed my mom’s addictions.
One day I’ll get him out of this park. One day he won’t come home from work covered in dirt working a job he hates, only for the money he earned to be gone.
He’s changed so much in the last few months. Less angry, less ready to burn from the inside out. I’d like to say that’s because of me. That our newly redefined relationship helped calm him. But I can’t take all the credit.
Something shifted inside him. He let go. He grew. He doesn’t go stiff when we pass his old lot anymore. Doesn’t freeze up when his mom is mentioned. His eyes no longer glaze over when he catches sight of one of Mom’s blankets.
His old trailer has been deconstructed. The burnt husk was taken away in the back of a dump truck. Grass grows where the earth used to be black. The lot is healing from the trauma Karen caused.
Karen’s tried to reach me a few times since that first call.
I never answer. Block every number. I always thought I’d want closure, explanations, apologies, some sort of redemption arc.
But that’s not how life works. Even if she said she was sorry, even if she’s changed, it wouldn’t alter anything.
I’ve changed, though. I no longer need her empty promises.
It feels silly that I ever thought I did. Ever hoped I would get it.
What’s happened is done. I’m done looking into the past. Done trying to smooth edges and blunt the sword that used to hang over my head.
Karen pleaded guilty to arson, waving her right to a trial. Maybe that was her one gift to me. Just letting it all be over without having to rise and stand before her. More likely, she knew she was fucked, and a trial wouldn’t change her outcome.
She was convicted of arson, destruction of private property, and a whole laundry list of drug charges. She won’t walk free for a long time. I’d like to say I hope she gets herself sorted, uses her time wisely.
But I haven’t changed that much. I hope she fucking rots. I hope every day is agonizing and terrifying, showing her the consequences both her and Dave were so fond of.
I shut the door on Karen, instead refocusing on the scene before me. My sore ass plops down on the lawn chair June left for us. It’s old and sags so low my ass hits the ground, but it was free, and it’s comfortable. I settle back, careful not to tip the whole thing backwards.
The park is alive. Everyone is taking advantage of the last few days before winter takes over. The setting sun brings with it a deep chill. It pebbles my flushed skin, and I should have brought a goddamn hoodie.
“Here.” Sage waves his black hoodie in my face. Dick is always saving my ass, even if the hoodie reeks of smoke.
Yeah, he’s back to smoking. A habit I hate but find myself admiring the view of when he does it. Something about the bad-boy image just gets me. He doesn’t do it often. Just after sex or a bad day.
“Take it, asshole,” he grumbles, dropping the fabric in my lap with an annoyed sigh. I can’t take my eyes off him. A Carhart jacket we found at Goodwill for six bucks fits him perfectly. He rolls his eyes and zips up his jacket, joining me in the other chair.
“Aw thanks, baby.” I wink and pull the hoodie over my head, already feeling better with the thin layer protecting me from the rising chill.
Sage leans back in his chair, arms flailing out when it almost tips back too far. I laugh and say some snarky shit that earns me another eye roll.
Shrieked laughter pulls our focus, and we both look out. Kids are playing in the old lot, chasing each other and screaming. A boy slams into another, and they both land in a heap of joy.
I catch Sage’s smile from the corner of my eye. He’s probably thinking what I am. About all the times we laughed at that lot. I’m glad Karen couldn’t take that when her flames took the trailer.
“Hey,” Sage says, tipping his chin up to the back of the park. A shadow sits on a fallen log, wearing a thin hoodie that won’t do shit to keep him warm. The boy I saw take June’s left-out sandwich watches the other kids, arms crossed over his narrow chest, a deep scowl directed at the others’ fun.
We aren’t the only ones watching him. I spot June on her porch, surrounded by the other ladies, watching him with a sad expression. The same expression she used to direct at me. Not anymore, though. Now she looks at me with pride. I’ve done nothing to earn her pride, but I eat it up anyways.
A thought hits me. An idea so bright I sit forward, looking back and forth between June and the broken boy on the log. Memories of the past mix with hopes for the future.
“I have an idea,” I tell Sage, still watching the boy.
“Oh God,” he groans. I hear the telltale sound of a lighter, but I pay him no mind. Not when my mind is spinning, trying to connect the dots. Forming a plan on how to make this idea a reality.
“You in?” I ask, looking back at him. Smoke slowly curls out from his lips, swirling up and disappearing into the darkening sky. He looks apprehensive, his eyes pinging around, trying to connect his own dots.
“Is it illegal? Painful? Or expensive?” he asks, taking another hit of his smoke. The ember burns bright and lights his brown eyes in a golden hue.
Nope. It’s none of those things. It’s productive, helpful, and will give at least one kid something I wouldn’t be alive without.
I want to do what June has always done. What so many others did when Sage and I needed help. But I chose not to tell him that. Like always, I’ll drag him behind me to act out my plans.
“Scared?” I tease, the beginning of so many ideas playing out to perfection. He scoffs and exhales more smoke. His eyes are endless pools of love when he glares at me just like he used to.
“Prove it.”