AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“So it’s settled. We’re doing this. You’re coming on the tour with me. It’s the two of us from here on out.”
“Yeah,” I say. “We’re doing this.”
EPILOGUE
BRIAR
Five Years Later
The Greek sun dips below the horizon, casting a warm, golden glow over the quaint streets of Mykonos as Dorian and I sit at an intimate table for two on a rooftop terrace that feels like it was made just for us.
Murmurs of soft conversations and laughter surround us, mingling with the hum of gentle waves in the distance, and I bask in a moment I wish I could bottle up and keep forever.
“Six years, can you believe it?” He reaches across the table to take my hand. “Six years ago tonight, we met.”
While we both pride ourselves on not being the cheesy kind of romantics, we’d be doing ourselves a disservice by ignoring the significance of that night and the strange and crooked road that brought us back together.
We had a plan.
But fate had other plans.
“It still feels like yesterday,” I say.
“In a good way or a bad way?”
“In the best way.” I give him a wink before reaching for my wine. His mother’s engagement ring glints on my right-hand ring finger.
We’re never getting married—that much we settled on from the moment we met.
But we’re committed.
It’s he and I from here on out, come what may.
Wearing the ring on my right hand was his father’s idea, actually—one he proposed in the thumb drive video Dorian received that day at the law firm. I’ve never seen it, nor do I want to, as it’s a private father-son thing, but when Dorian gave me the dazzling pear-shaped stunner and explained what it meant to him, I couldn’t say no.
“What do you want to do next?” he asks.
“I don’t know . . . I was thinking maybe one of those boat tours. But it’s getting kind of late. By the time we get out of here, they might not be open.”
His lips turn up at one side as he sniffs a laugh. “No. I mean, what do you want to do after this? After Greece?”
Five years ago, after I quit my job, I boarded the next flight to Nashville with Dorian, tagged along for the remainder of Phantom Symphony’s worldwide tour (a definite bucket list experience), and then stood by Dorian’s side as he quit managing the band once and for all . . . nearly two years to the day he first said he would.
The day that should have marked the start of our relationship became our one-year anniversary, and we celebrated by taking a first-class flight to Italy for the sole reason that we could.
We were finally free.
“You ever feel like putting down roots?” he asks.
I lean back, cocking my head as I study a man whose dashing good looks make all the Greek statues pale in comparison.
“Why plant roots when you have wings?” I take another sip of wine.
By some miracle of God, Burke ended up paying me my million dollars all those years ago. I imagine Dorian had a little something to do with that, though he refuses to confirm or deny it. And it happened just in time. Turns out, Burke was underwater at his financial firm, hence why he needed his inheritance so desperately. As talk of his financial ineptitudes made waves in the Manhattan finance industry, his employees quit on him left and right until there was no one left, and he was forced to shutter his company.
Burke and Dorian no longer keep in touch, but last we knew, Burke was engaged to some East Coast steel heiress and working for her father. From what we’ve heard, the woman seems just as self-serving as he was—no doubt a perfect match.
Nicola and Dashiell divorced less than a year after she received her third of the Rothwell estate, though the actual divorce took two and a half years to finalize. Apparently, each of them had assets hidden from one another—as well as affairs. The instant Nicola filed, their divorce became Page Six fodder, and all their dirty laundry was aired for the entire world to see.
They say money amplifies what’s already there.
If one’s greedy or selfish, it’ll only make them greedier and more selfish.
I can truly say that money has made Dorian more generous with his time and energy, which are, after all, the only truly priceless things any of us have in this world.
“Nothing makes me happier than giving you the world,” he always tells me. “Nothing except being with the woman I love.”
“I think we just keep doing what we do best,” I say.
“We do a lot of things well together.” My sexy-as-sin, forever nonhusband winks. “You’re going to have to be more specific than that.”
“All right. I guess I’ll spell it out for you, then.” I roll my eyes, pretending to be annoyed, though I love when he gives me a hard time.
