“I was trying to be careful,” he said. “But I couldn’t, like, avoid everything. I couldn’t put it all in a sterile room and have it happen like that.”
“Okay,” I replied, taking a deep breath. We were on the freeway, driving away, and I was feeling a little bit better. “So what happened?”
“I told them I wanted out. I mean, I got them a little bit drunk first.”
“A smart idea.”
He nodded, looking away from me. “They told me that they didn’t appreciate it, and they didn’t understand what had happened,” he said. “They kept pushing me for a reason, and I told them I didn’t want anything else to do with it. They asked me how I was going to make money, and I told them I didn’t know, but that wasn’t what mattered to me right now.”
“So what did they say?”
He shrugged his shoulders. “It was a little weird,” he said. “I don’t know, they kept saying that if I wanted to get out, I needed a good reason. They grilled me about it, but told me that if it was a good enough reason, they would let me leave.”
“So what did you tell them?”
He started to snicker again. “I told him there was a girl.”
“Oh?” I said, side-eyeing him. There was no traffic anymore, and the trip, which felt like it had taken at least an hour earlier, felt like it was taking way shorter than it had before, and my anxiety was getting a little bit better as we got further away from where his neighborhood was.
“They asked me if it was serious,” he said. “They said that if you were just some piece of ass I was hitting—”
“They sound like lovely people—”
“Then it was pointless for me to try to leave,” he said. “So I had to tell them it was very serious, and then they sang songs, congratulated me, and told me to invite them to the wedding.”
I looked at him for a second too long. “And you told them it was going to happen—”
“Not any time soon,” he replied. “But yeah. I did tell them I wanted this to happen.”
I took the exit, taking my foot off the accelerator as I turned off the freeway. “Wait,” I said. “What?”
“Well,” he said. “Of course you would have to agree first.”
“Are you proposing?”
“Yes,” he said. “If you’ll say yes?”
I laughed, despite myself. “How about a ring?”
“The lady has expensive taste,” he said.
“The lady doesn’t want to be proposed to in a runaway car,” I said.
“But it is dangerous,” he said. “And kind of sexy.”
“Oh, shut up,” I said, biting my lower lip, my heart doing flips in my chest. It might have been ridiculous, but he was right. I did want it.
I did want him.
And there was something kind of sexy about this, really, whether I wanted there to be or not.
EPILOGUE
2022
I watched as Jody walked into our house. He wasn’t wearing a shirt, and I loved staring at him shirtless, at the way he looked when there was sweat glistening on him. It was unseasonably warm and it made perfect sense that he was sweating, moving as if he was in slow motion toward me.
I threw him a towel and he caught it with ease. He laughed. “I didn’t ask for this.”
“I know,” I said. “But you wanted it, right?”
He nodded as he began to dry his hair. “Yes,” he said. “I wanted it.”
“Well, there you go,” I replied.
“You don’t have work this weekend, right?”
I shook my head. “No,” I replied. “I told you, I blocked it all off for you.”
He smiled as he walked over to where I was, sitting on the couch next to me, putting one sweaty arm around my neck. I squirmed, giggling. “Have a shower first, damn!”
“You don’t think this is sexy?”
“It is,” I said. “But I just got dressed and—”
“We can fix that,” he said, kissing me on the lips.
I giggled, looking at the digital clock over the mantelpiece, next to the television. “No,” I said. “No, we can’t. Don’t you have somewhere to be in like, half an hour?”
“The wildlife conservation effort can lead itself,” he said. “If they knew the hottie I have at home, they would not mind.”
“I think they would,” I said. “You are their golden boy. Criminal-turned-environmentalist, regulation hottie, and I’m sure they like looking at you picking up trash when you lean down and show them that ass.”
“Are you objectifying me?”
I laughed, throwing my head back. “Do you mind?”
“Oh, yes,” he said. “I thought you liked me because of my intellect.”
I shrugged my shoulders. “I mean, it was, I guess, sort of sexy that you finished your degree in a couple of years.”
“Sort of sexy? Trying to seduce you was the only reason I did that.”
I laughed as he kissed me on the lips again, and I snuggled into him, my head on his shoulder. “Have you worried about it at all?”
“What?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “Your past, I guess, catching up to you.”
“No,” he replied, after a little while. “My past is mostly in prison, and luckily, it had nothing to do with me.”
“I still can’t believe they didn’t call you to testify,” I said.
“They just had enough evidence on the homeowner’s security system, I guess,” he said. “What better than a video, showing clear faces?”
I nodded, sighing a little. “I’m
