“Okay.”
She turns, and I stop her.
Unbuckling the watch that has weighed me down all of these years. The ever-present reminder that I wouldn’t become like him.
I don’t need it anymore. Because I know that I will never be like him.
I protect the people I love.
And sometimes, that means getting a little bloody.
“Take this too,” I tell her. “And get rid of it.”
She doesn’t know. She can’t know, but somehow, she does. She reaches up to touch my face one more time.
“You are a good man, Rory.”
She gives both the blokes one last and final glance, and then nods, leaving me to it.
Forty-Two
Scarlett
All my yesterdaysmean nothing if my tomorrows aren’t with you.
Peace is a foreign thing.
A feeling I can’t recall ever knowing.
But that’s the only word I can think of to describe the calm that’s washed over me since we’ve come back to Boston.
Rory’s been busy, cleaning up the loose ends of the mess we’ve made. I’d like to believe that’s why he’s been gone so much, sneaking in late at night when he thinks I’m asleep.
He’s giving me space, and I was grateful for it, at first.
But now I’m ready to talk.
I’ve been served up a big old slice of humble pie, and I realized in the end that I did need saving. Just once.
And Rory is the only one who I ever would have allowed to do it.
He is my rock.
The thing I’ve always come back to when I felt so unsteady in this world. I’ve used him as a shelter from the storm and a target for my misplaced anger and as a balm to my chaos. I’ve hurt him and loved him and hated him and wanted him. I’ve pushed him away relentlessly, and I have no right to ask him for a second chance.
But I want more.
I’m ready for more.
When peace exists within you, everything else becomes clear.
I am still his Satan. At my core, I’m probably always going to be a little evil. But Scarlett 2.0 is done with the games and the lies. And I want to prove to him that we make a good team. The best team. And that we should be fucking shit up together for the rest of our days.
But since he snuck out on me this morning, I’m sitting alone in his house with Whiskey. Again. And that little orange fucker is giving me the stink eye and I remind him that I’m the one who brought him here.
I’m going a little stir crazy.
So I decide to go visit Mack.
