“Why did you keep them?” he questioned.
I looked up at him, his navy blue tie loosened against his white shirt and heather-gray suit.
“My parents, my sister, Avery…” I began. “They died because I put them on the road that night. I took a risk I shouldn’t have for my own selfish reasons, and I deserved to remember that.”
“Did you think you would forget what you lost?”
I paused and then dropped my head, sighing. No, I will never forget. I felt the pain of their deaths every day. But back then, taking any kind of a risk made me feel like there was no control. There was no “careful.”
For so long I had felt like I was in a stalemate with Chase, waiting for something to fucking happen, and when I finally chose to give up the control and say “Fuck it, let’s see what happens,” I liked it.
But I hadn’t realized that I wasn’t just risking myself. There were others I didn’t think about.
“I deserved to be punished,” I told him.
He touched my face, meeting my eyes. “You could never have known.”
No, I couldn’t. But carelessness brings consequences. I should’ve known that.
Which accounted for my behavior of making my life afterward as controlled as possible.
“Easton, there’s no line you can walk that’s safe enough,” Tyler implored. “You didn’t do anything out of malice. Crimes deserve to be punished. Mistakes deserve to be forgiven.”
I nodded, finally understanding the truth behind his words. And I was ready.
Opening the bags, I dumped the contents into the fireplace and lit a match from up on the mantel. Leaning down, I lit the scraps on fire and stood back upright, both of us watching them turn to ash.
Taking his hand, I breathed out a sigh of relief, finally feeling better than I had since before I could remember.
“Are you ever going to be careful with me?” I asked quietly, watching the flames burn bright.
“No.”
I looked up at him, my lips curling into a small smile. “Good.”
EPILOGUE
“Chin up,” the photographer instructed, smiling behind her camera.
I tilted my head up an inch, keeping it cocked slightly to the right, my relaxed smile still plastered on my face.
The shit I do for him.
I sat on the arm of a rich, brown leather chair, my legs crossed and my arm resting on Tyler’s shoulder as he sat in the chair, both of us posing for our engagement photos.
Correction: engagement-slash-campaign publicity photo representing our perfect American family’s high moral fiber. Riiiiight.
I dropped my eyes, feeling a blush heat my cheeks, remembering all the immoral things he’d done to me last night in our bed.
“Excellent,” the photographer cooed, snapping a few more shots as she leaned down again behind her tripod.
I kept my left hand on my thigh, the round black onyx stone set in a platinum band and surrounded by freshwater pearls visible in the pictures.
Tyler had pushed for a diamond ring, wanting the best, but Jay liked my idea of environmental awareness as good publicity. So many diamonds came from war-torn countries, so I decided to go with something different.
Hell, Kate Middleton, the Duchess of Cambridge, rocked a sapphire engagement ring. The times were changing.
Actually, I just liked the pearls. It was Jay who was selling the war-torn story.
“You look incredible,” Tyler commented, his white tie matching my cream-colored dress.
“Thank you,” I whispered.
Over the past few months, we’d dived deeper and deeper into the campaign, but elections were still six months away, and I knew he was concerned that his life took too much of our time.
I looked down, running my thumb over the fff tattoo I’d gotten on the inside of my wrist when he’d proposed this past Mardi Gras at the very same annual ball where we first met the year before.
Family, fortune, and future.
He’d had the same letters tattooed, but his appeared on the outside of his wrist, right under where his watch sat.
To ensure that we never took our gifts for granted or lost track of what was truly important, we had promised each other to prioritize.
Family came first. Always first. We took care of each other and relied on each other. Without the family and without Christian, everything else would be worthless.
Fortune came next. It almost seemed shallow to have fortune before future, but we realized that fortune was more than wealth. It was health, goals, and maintaining what we had in the work we wanted to contribute to the world. Our fortune was the things for which we were thankful and the things we had to give.
Future came last. Private ambitions, plans for the years down the road, and other goals that could possibly take our attention away from each other and our jobs would be considered only if everything else was strong.
Christian had wanted to get the tattoo, too, but we’d told him that he had to wait until he turned eighteen.
And then Tyler took him to get the tattoo anyway.
That was fine. He could deal with Christian’s mother when she came home in July.
Tyler’s arm behind my back shifted, and I jerked, feeling his hand rub against my ass.
I cleared my throat, and I could feel his smile as he squeezed me.
Christian sat behind the camera, playing on his phone, while Jay stood off to my left, periodically instructing the photographer on what shots to take and what angles to shoot, as if she didn’t know already.
Walking up to me, he tried to pin something to my chest, and I knew right away that it was a flag.
I shot out my hand, shooing him away.
“Easton, really,” he chided.
“It’s tacky,” I burst out. “This is my engagement photo.”
I wasn’t turning it into a political statement. We’d already had that argument.
“Tyler.” Jay groaned. “A little help, please?”
Tyler simply shook his head, probably sick of Jay’s and my bickering.
“You’re handling the publicity,” I pointed out, glaring at Jay, “and I even let you pick the wedding date, because you whined about how good it would be for the campaign, but when you start to dress me, that’s when we have problems,” I snapped. “Capisce?”
“Everyone who’s anyone has a personal shopper, Easton,” he whined. “She can tell you which clothes are best for your coloring —”
But I yelped, cutting off Jay’s lecture, as my fiancé’s hands grabbed me and I fell into Tyler’s lap. His lips came down on mine, and I moaned, holding his face in my hands.
We pulled apart, laughing at each other, and I heard the camera click.
“Ah,” the photographer sang. “That’s the cover of New Orleans magazine.”
She looked at the screen of her digital camera, smiling.
“Now, Mr. Marek,” she instructed. “Would you stand, please, and move to your fiancée’s other side?”
Tyler rose from the chair and moved around to my left side, while I remained sitting.
She looked to me and asked, “Would you turn to him slightly and then cock your head a bit?”
I followed her directions, placing my arm around Tyler and leaning in to him as I tilted my head.
“Chin up,” she chirped, and disappeared behind her camera again.
Tyler’s scent invaded my head, and as much as I’d grown to love Christian, I was glad he was joining his friends in the country during spring break. Which started in a few days.
I still kept my apartment and would until the wedding in October, but it was getting harder and harder to stay there. Tyler and I found our time together when we could, and even though Christian wasn’t stupid – he’d caught me there early one morning, probably figuring out I had stayed the night – we did make a huge effort to not make it obvious or inappropriate.