serious about this. 'Angel, what are you talking about?' he whispers. 'Kill them? They're your pare--'
'I said fucking kill them!' I say, choking out a sob, letting all of the pain out that has been festering over the years. 'They ruined my life, Sebastian! They abandoned me when I needed them most! They gave me life, and then they took everything for me. I almost
'Angel, are you sure?' Sebastian whispers. 'I'll do anything for you. You know that. But they're your parents. You don’t kill your parents, even if they ruined your life. You just don't.'
My hand starts shaking now. 'I don't care!' I scream through the tears, because before I know what's happening, the rage has surged back. 'I don't care whether it's wrong! I just want to be fucking happy for once in my life, Sebastian. Is that too much to ask? And I can't ever be happy with them'--I choke out another sob, staring at them both--'with them still in my life. Kill them, Sebastian. Just please, end this for me.'
Sebastian holds me tight, his muscle tensing as they wrap around my body, but he doesn't protest either. He holds me, just holds me, in the cold wind in the dead of the night, and his body warms every part of me.
'Okay,' he breathes into my ear. 'Anything for you, my angel.'
Then, he pushes back and turns around, loading his gun and approaching my parents.
'Crystal!' Mom shrieks desperately as she sees what's happening. The fear is palpable in her eyes, but I know longer even care. They're dead to me, even if they aren't quite dead yet. 'Crystal, don't do this!' she shrieks. 'Crystal, please!'
But I'm not listening. Or looking. I just start walking away, plugging my ears, even as I hear Sebastian grunt as he pulls the trigger, even as the gunshot rips through the air, even as I hear them scream one final time.
The last shard of my past is ripped out of my side, and now I'm a new person, ready to take on the world.
Epilogue
What am I supposed to say about me and Sebastian? That we're married now? Because… we aren't. That we have tons of kids? Because… we don't. That we have tons of friends and family who love us, or will soon? Because… we just won't.
But that doesn't matter. Not really. Being married with kids and a happy, perfect family is not who Sebastian and I are, or will ever be. We're criminals in love, and nothing is ever going to change that. Nothing is going to split us apart, either, however. Sebastian and I are meant to be together. We complete each other, heal each other in ways no one else can. He is mine and I am his, and with him is right where I want to be.
No more secrets.
No more lies.
It's just Sebastian and me and our love for one another.
After that night, Sebastian and I fled the country. We left for an isolated house in Maine, and we've lived there ever since. We've found a way to put back together the shards of what we once were. We ended everything, and now we've disappeared to the rest of the world, slipped between the cracks, gone where no one else can find us. We're living in hiding and have been for ten years now, but it's not like we're ever going to get caught. No one is going to find us here, if the police are even still looking for us. And we're together. Together, forever.
Sebastian serves me a glass of wine as we sit at the small wooden table in the hut in Maine, smiling at one another. A few candles are positioned in the middle of the table, and a small fire burns in the corner of the room, making me feel so warm despite the snow falling outside.
'I propose a toast,' Sebastian says to me, deep blue eyes trained on mine. He's wearing a t-shirt and baggy shorts, his dark hair a disheveled mess of curls across his head from the sex we had earlier. He's so much more relaxed than he used to be, so much less angry. We have nothing to fear anymore. We have nothing to hide. We just have each other, and I couldn't have asked for anything else.
He keeps smiling at me--a small smile, but so real and strong and beautiful. He smiles with such genuine happiness, it makes my heart feel warm. 'A toast to ten years of living with you. And let me tell you, angel, they've been the best damn ten years of my life.'
I raise my glass of red wine and clink it to his, grinning. A small radio is positioned in the corner of the room, and quiet melodies escape from it, mixing with the fire from the corner. Everything is so perfect here. So empty and cozy and just… just painless. It's perfect, really. A life with the man I love. After so many years of suffering, I've finally found happiness.
'To the shards of the people we once were,' I say, raising my glass again. 'And to each other, for putting them back together.'
'To our shards,' Sebastian repeats, clinking his glass against mine. He takes a sip and smiles at me again. The reflections of the flames dance on his face, more carefree than ever, and as I sit there, I find myself staring at him, just staring at him, and sighing because my life has turned out more perfect than I could ever imagine.
To Sebastian.
To love.
To happy endings, even in the gravest situations.
'I can’t believe how lucky I am to have you,' I whisper after a minute, meeting his gaze. His blue eyes burn into mine, but not so much in a fiery way anymore. If anything, his eyes are warm,
'I think the same thing about you every single fucking day, angel,' he breathes, reaching out to touch his thumb to my bottom lip. I let him hold it there, as he looks at me and smiles harder, and then he reaches across the table and gives me a long, gentle kiss, so perfect I find myself not wanting it to end.
'I love you, angel,' he whispers, moving his lips against mine, his rough skin brushing against the side of my face. 'I love you so much.'
'I love you too, Sebastian,' I whisper, kissing him back gently, and I mean it more than I've ever meant anything in the world.
I love him.
And as I sit here, with the classical music playing somewhere in the corner of the room, with the wind and snow howling outside, with us, tucked away in our warm little hut, off in the middle of nowhere where no one can find us, I know I really, really do love him.
We kiss for a few minutes, and I just relax, loving the feel of his lips on mine, the warmth and the tingles his touch gives me. Everything else fades away when Sebastian is kissing me, and nothing matters, nothing but him.
Finally, after a while, he pulls back. I breathe slowly, not taking my eyes off of his. I know by the flicker of a smile across his lips as our eyes lock that this is just the beginning of the foreplay.
And I would rather have it no other way.
I reach out to kiss him some more, to press my lips to his, when suddenly something hits me. I stop, and then I frown at him.
'What's your real name, Sebastian?' I say after a minute, curiosity getting the best of me. 'I've never asked you before, and I realize it's the one thing about you I still don't know. But you can tell me now, right? You can trust me.'
Sebastian stops then, winces internally, but in a sweet kind of way. 'Angel, trust me, it is as embarrassing as hell,' he says, his eyes narrowing in that playful, challenge kind of way.
'Tell me,' I say, smiling at him. 'I'm sure it's not that bad.'
He sighs and takes a sip of his wine, watching me closely. Then he says, 'My name is Richard. Richard Passini.' He winces as soon as he says it, a little blush creeping across his face.
I laugh despite myself, because there is something truly amusing about a man as strong as Sebastian still mortified over a bad name, even since childhood. 'That is a horrible name,' I say to him, grinning. 'No wonder you
