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They started yelling at each other again, and though my hallucinations of Vincent had long since fled with sleep and food, I could imagine what he would say to me right now, words he’d said to me when I was a preteen:
“If a mistake isn’t forgivable, you wouldn’t be mulling over it. Ever since you were little, you could always hold a grudge, but you know what I realized? You hold grudges because you care so much. It’s because your love runs so deep, it takes longer for the pain in it to escape.”
I swallowed the nostalgia and watched Tessie and Everett fight, telling myself to be grateful for these moments instead of the ones I knew I was missing out on without Ari.
A knock sounded on the door. I swung it open for one of the security guards.
He handed me an envelope as he spoke, “A courier dropped this off a few minutes ago. He said it had been preordered months ago and scheduled for delivery today.”
I plucked it from his hands and unsealed it as he left. Vincent’s familiar handwriting met my eyes as I slid the thick card stock out.
It’s been months…
Well?
What are you waiting for?
VINCE
ARIANA DE LUCA
Identity.
Four syllables.
A common word.
Easy enough to say.
But when it came to its definition, I spent most of my life unable to define it. I left the bureau knowing I needed to find myself if I ever wanted a life with Bastian. And I did.
I’d spent the last two months working; browsing Netflix to figure out my likes and disliked; reading more genre fiction than I ever had before, fueling the loss of Bastian with mafia romance novels; and restaurant hopping all over the boroughs.
I had a better handle on myself. That didn’t mean I didn’t miss Bastian. It just meant that, when he was ready to forgive me, I’d understand myself better.
I huffed out a breath and squeezed the aches out of the back of my neck.
Maybe fate was laughing at me because I’d struggled to find a job anywhere but here. The Dominic. The place I’d threatened to work for if Bastian refused to hire me all those months ago.
One of the servers, Carrie, raised her brows as she approached the bar.
“Dominic is in a mood.” She made Devil horns with both of her hands.
I bit back my laughter, feeling carefree.
I missed Bastian and Tessie every day, but I’d also been taking the time to discover myself. To take life one day at a time as I found out who I was outside of the FBI, trusting fate to bring me and Bastian back together again.
But I missed him.
God, I missed him.
I’d given him the file, slipping it under his penthouse house door when I knew he wouldn’t be home.
It hadn’t been a hard choice. I knew it would help him find his happy ending, and like Vince, I had faith that Fate would bring us back together again.
I wished Fate would hurry up, though, because it’d been two months, I was falling in love with who I was outside of the bureau more and more each day, but there was always the knowledge that I’d be happier with Bastian dangling above my head.
Jupiter.
