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We aren’t together – haven’t been for a while – but Stacey is my girl. Mine.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry. You’re okay. You’re safe with me,” he says softly as he strokes my hair, letting me cry into his chest. “I found you, little one.”
“You are also my priority. I would have always hunted for you to the ends of the fucking earth, little one.
My girl. Even when faced with the worst kind of horror, she fucking fought. I didn’t think it was possible to love her more than I already do, but I do.
“I’ll fall to my knees and beg for forgiveness the next time I see her.”
“Do you always do that?” he asks. I tilt my head. “Do what?” “Ignore your own demons to cater to everyone else’s? From what I’ve witnessed, you seem to run after those around you, be there for them, centre yourself in their trauma, and no one seems to do the same for you.”
Stacey Rhodes. My girl. My anchor that sank to the bottom of the ocean without me.
“Send me the location and I’ll come. Just… get this over with.”
“I’ll leave your hearing, so I can tell you when I win her back, so you can hear her moaning my fucking name. When I marry her. When she births my fucking children. And guess what? I’ll have all of that. You won’t. Because Stacey Rhodes has been mine since the day I fucking met her.”
“Don’t be afraid of me, Freckles,” he calls, spitting out blood that’s leaked into his mouth. “This is for us.”
“I hate you, Chris. And if by some miracle you make it to heaven, I hope my mother kicks your ass. If not…” I lean forward to whisper in his ear as the gurgling stops. “I’ll see you in hell.”
Tobias leans down and picks up the severed foot. “Think fast,” he says as he throws it at Barry’s face. He catches it automatically, then jumps back and drops it on the ground. “What the shit?”
The last thing I hear are whispered words in Russian. “Moya vechnost.”
My eternity
“Because you’re going to be my wife. You’ve already taken my heart, my body, and my butchered soul, so you’ll take my fucking last name too.”
“You are everything your mother is, and she’s exceptional. It’s a shame who the father is though.”
“Now, about that home. White picket fence or brown?”
“Your little girl will be proud of you,” she says, and it stabs me right in the heart. “Both of you.”
“I’ll love you for the rest of my life. I love you more than fucking anything, but I need you to walk to the porch.”
“So beautiful, even when you cry, my Freckles. You’re amazing, do you know that? I was lucky to have you for even a short space of time. There aren’t any threats left. No Chris, no Bernadette. You can dance and sing and live.”
“Then I guess we’re both dying. Because there isn’t a life for me without you.”
“See you on the outside, Freckles.”
“I love you,” I tell her. “I’m so proud of you. Thank you for giving me everything I’ve ever wanted. You. A son. A daughter. A life with you.”
Kade Mitchell and Stacey Rhodes – the fifteen-year-olds who met by the pool twenty years ago – finally get to have their forever.
