EPILOGUE
Seven months later
The curtain hadn’t even risen yet, and already my hands were shaking.
Backstage smelled like dust, old velvet, and hairspray—the scent I’d grown to love.
Actors whispered lines under their breath around me while stagehands moved props in practiced silence.
Somewhere beyond the curtain, the audience buzzed with anticipation, hundreds of conversations blending into one restless hum.
Opening night.
My opening night.
I stood in the wings dressed as Hero, pale blue gown brushing the floor, fingers twisting together so tightly my rings dug into my skin.
Across from me, Beatrice was pacing dramatically while Benedick stretched like he was preparing for battle instead of Shakespeare.
We’d started to call each other by our character names, so we didn’t fuck up on stage and accidentally use our real names.
I’d started to do it in my own head too.
I was so nervous. How had I ever thought I could do this?
I couldn’t do this. It was ridiculous. Stand up in front of a whole audience and play a girl who is wrongly accused of loose behaviour.
The character that strove to make the audience question their own flawed ideals of purity and reputation.
The one who kept her dignity despite many around her treating her poorly.
It was too on the nose. Nope.
I was almost hyperventilating by the time Aisha found me and pulled me into a hug.
“You’re going to be amazing, just breathe.”
“I can’t do this. This is all my fault. Why did I think I could do this? You told me I could. It’s your fault. You convinced me.”
Aisha laughed. “Wow, that was a fast turnaround.”
“Help!”
“Here, I’ve got just the thing. I was prepared for this.” She pulled her phone out of her pocket and pressed play on a voicemail.
“Heathen, don’t tell me you’re bottling it now, just before the curtain rises?”
Brody’s warm, goading tone came to me, and my tension immediately faded. With the universe’s worst timing, Brody had an important meeting in Tokyo today, one that couldn’t be moved, and would, therefore, miss the opening night of the play.
I felt relieved and oddly disappointed at the same time. He wouldn’t be here to see me fuck up, on one hand, but on the other hand, he wouldn’t be here to pick up the pieces either.
“Now, I’m recording this from a skyscraper in Shibuya, planning on all the places I’d take you here one day, about to sign the biggest deal in Sinclair Industries history, and the only place I want to be is in the audience, watching my heathen do what she does best… raise hell.”
I gripped the phone tighter, as if his confident tone could somehow suffuse my body.
“Don’t forget who you are, Selena Carmichael. Break a leg, and show them.”
The voicemail ended, and Aisha tugged the cell out of my hand as I gripped onto it.
“Just once more,” I begged.
“Nope, we are out of time. Break a leg, you’re going to be amazing. I’ll see you on stage!” she said with an infectious enthusiasm. She rushed away and, halfway across the stage, turned back to toss over her shoulder.
“Remember it’s meant to be fun!”
Right. Fun. I almost forgot.
While I was waiting for my cue, I peeked around the edge of the curtain, eyeing the audience. There was a sea of faces. It was nearly enough to put me back into a state of terror, but then a large rectangle caught my eye.
What? No way. Who brought a placard to a real play?
My friends, that’s who.
Winter was holding on to the end of the rectangular sign, sitting beside Beckett, with Eve on the other side. Asher was on Winter’s left, with Cayden, Lily, Marcus, Ari and… Cal , making up the rest of the row. My throat got tight, strangling the emotion threatening to burst out.
There was an empty seat beside Cal and as I watched, a dark shadow made its way along the busy row towards it.
I knew that build. I knew that walk.
Brody. He’d come, somehow. He was here.
Brody sank into the seat beside his brother, promptly picked a placard off the floor and held it on his knee.
Hero’s biggest fan
The bold lettering had an arrow pointing upwards to Brody.
“Selena, you’re up in two minutes,” someone from the stage crew whispered to me.
“Ok, I’m coming.”
I straightened up and let the curtain fall.
Everyone was here. They’d shown up for me. I needed to show up for them.
Maybe everyone really did get a second chance, after all. I put my shoulders back, let my mind slip into the role of Hero, and raised my chin.
It was time.
The applause was still ringing in my ears when I made it into the sanctuary of my green room. My cheeks hurt from smiling, and my eyes were still wet from a particularly emotional speech near the end of the play.
I leaned against the door and let out a deep breath.
“I thought you were never going to get here. Your adoring fans must have waylaid you,” Brody’s deep voice spoke from behind the dressing curtain at the side of the room.
I flew across the room and pushed it back.
He was lounging in the big leather armchair in the corner next to the clothes rail.
I fell into his arms, and they came up to embrace me tightly.
“You’re here! You’re really here.”
“I’m really here, and you were really amazing. I’m not joking, just stunning.”
“I can’t believe you made it,” I breathed in the smell of him. I’d missed him for nearly a week since he’d been gone.
“I can’t believe you thought for a second that I would miss it.”
“I listened to your voicemail just before going on. I thought you’d just left it.”
“I left it yesterday. I made sure to move things around so I could get here in time. I have to warn you, I’m fucking knackered, I barely know what time it is, and I haven’t slept in forty-eight hours. But most importantly,” he cupped my face. “I’m so proud of you.”
“Really?” I asked, preening under his admiring look.
He nodded. “You have something special. A rare talent. You have to pursue this if you enjoy it.”
“I do… but what about the family reputation?” I reminded him.
“I told you, thespians get a pass. It’s a lofty, artistic profession, and it suits you.”
“You suit me,” I murmured.
“Fucking right, I do. Nothing’s felt right this week without being near you.”
“Ditto,” I murmured, and pushed myself into his arms even further.
He shifted to pull me onto the seat astride him.
His dick lay between my thighs, pushing hard into my stomach.
“I thought you were really tired,” I reminded him, rocking against him.
“I’ll never be too tired for this.” He’d worked his hand under my skirt and was stroking my panties.
With his other hand, he undid his belt and tugged the zipper down.
His dick sprang out, happy to be freed. Without words, he urged me to rise up and then sink down on him.
I managed the very top and then froze, while his hand moved to my clit and rubbed it, helping to ease his way.
Slowly but surely, I sank until my ass met his thighs.
“There you go,” he murmured. “That’s where you’re supposed to be, right here.”
He rocked me gently, without urgency, and reached for something in the pocket of his jacket, hanging near the chair.
“I picked up a little something for you.”
He pulled a ring box from the jacket, and I froze.
He opened it slowly, and the diamond inside glittered madly. It was massive, well, as massive as a restrained upper crust type like Brody would go for.
He watched my face. “Do you like it?”
“Do I like it? Would any sane person ever say no to that?”
“No, but this is you we are talking about,” he teased, raising his hips to nudge me with his dick inside me as I slapped his shoulder.
“You’re such an asshole,”
“And you’re such a heathen, and I want to make sure everyone knows that you’re mine.”
He picked up the pace, fucking me gently. I stared at the ring in the box, and then narrowed my eyes at him.
“Oh, so this is a gift for you?” I asked.
He chuckled. “You get to wear a pretty rock, and I get to make sure that no one looks at my property.”
I reached behind me and grabbed his balls and tugged them.
“Call me your property again, and I’ll have to keep these in my purse for safekeeping.”
He laughed and took the ring from the velvet box.
“Ok, ok. Forget property and ownership and any of that bullshit. Wear this, and marry me. So, everyone can see you are mine, like I’m yours.”
I laughed, and then groaned. His hand had returned to my clit, rubbing at it furiously, making me climb and climb, heading for an explosion.
“Are you mine?” I wondered, rising up more firmly now and slamming back down. Brody’s neck was turning red, his careful self-control crumbling, and I loved to see it. Only I got him to lose his legendary cool.
“Irrevocably. Undeniably. Should I go on?”
He fucked me harder, making me cry out. I bent over him, pleasure hitting like a wave. I contracted all over, and Brody used the moment to slip the ring onto my finger and then hold it to his lips, kissing it in place.
As I floated down, still impaled on his hard-on, he kissed me.
“It suits you. Never take it off.”
“I’m not changing my name, you know. When I become a big Broadway star, I’m keeping my name.” I collapsed forward and fell into his arms. He pulled me against his chest, rocking me slowly on his hardness.
“Deal,” he said quickly. “I don’t need to take your last name, or your dreams, and ambitions. I don’t want to take anything from you, sweetheart. I just want your time, as long as you can spare for me, for as long as we both shall live.”
“Ok,” I whispered against his neck.
He stilled completely. “Ok?”
I nodded. “Ok.”
“Ok, you’ll wear the ring?”
“Ok, I’ll marry you.”
A grin spread across his lips. Then he leaned in and kissed me hard, thrusting his hips again and making me more than aware that he was still hard.
“I hope you slept well while I was gone, because you won’t be sleeping again for a while,” he warned me, and abruptly stood up, walking over to the dressing table with the lights around it and setting me on the edge.
There, he was still deep inside, but he could look down at me spread before him, and control the pace.
And I could let him, because I wasn’t scared anymore. Bit by bit, day by day, I took back the pieces of myself that I’d misplaced and fitted them together.
“That’s big talk, bellend. Let’s see you back it up,” I challenged him.
He laughed.
“With pleasure.”
It’s always the quiet ones… check out Cal’s story in the next Hellion’s story!
Thanks so much for reading!