Epilogue

The night owl in me had always dreaded spring. My camera craved the light, but my soul preferred the gloomy dark of the colder months, the clouds, and the shadows, the wind and the rain. It suited my mood, it suited me—at least I'd thought so until my first Christmas with Kim passed, spring crept up on us, and I realised what I'd been missing. I saw the early morning sun in his face, captured it, with my eyes, then my lens, and from that moment, I knew for sure that life had never been better.

Corny?

Maybe, but it was true. Being with Kim challenged me in ways I'd never imagined, but it was the making of me.

I loved him.

Awake, asleep, always.

But perhaps never more than when I woke in the morning to find him still sleeping. It was a damn shame I was rarely up before him, and this morning was no exception. Gentle, stroking fingers on my cheek roused me, and I opened my eyes to Kim's sleepy grin, his rumpled hair, and hooded lids.

I touched his face, addicted to his unshaven jaw. But addiction remained a tainted word in our house, and the reason Kim was awake so early didn't escape me. He kissed me, the sweep of his tongue and the scrape of his teeth a promise of what would come later, and then he slid from the bed—his bed, this morning—and padded, naked, to the bathroom.

Bewitched, I watched him go, admiring the sensual sway of his slender hips, but I caught my imagination before it could call him back to bed. This morning wasn't about me, or even about us.

This morning was Kim's.

I got up and tidied the living space of the trailer. Then I threw on some clothes and ventured outside. The chickens—larger in number now—were our responsibility this week. I let them out and collected the eggs, and I was drinking dandelion tea and cooking breakfast on the outside stove when Kim slid his arms around me a little while later.

"Make a hippie of you yet, eh?"

It was a joke that never got old for Kim, and my brothers, who found it hilarious that I was living the very life I'd resisted all these years. "Piss off and get the plates."

Kim obeyed, and I loaded us up with omelettes and tomatoes spiked with Kim's home-grown chillies. It was probably the nicest thing I'd cooked him so far, and the thought spawned a heat in my belly that warmed my bones. Was this how it felt to be truly happy? God, I hoped so. "Do you know how many are coming this morning?"

"Not a clue. Reckon no one does until they walk up that path."

I swallowed the last of my breakfast and considered the theory. Weather allowing, Kim had been hosting a weekly Blood Rush sponsored AA meeting at the commune for three months now, and speculating what had brought attendees to Blackbeard's Junkyard had become one of my favourite hobbies.

After breakfast, I set out the Blood Rush mugs and filled the tea urns, and then I made myself scarce, leaving Kim to his people. I shut myself away in the trailer and worked for an hour, completing more in my snatched time on Kim's patchy internet connection than I ever did at my place where I had all day to get shit done.

The irony of my newfound focus wasn't lost on me, but I didn't dwell on it. Instead, when my hour ran down, I closed my laptop and ventured outside. The meeting was just breaking up, so I drifted to the tea station and set out the cakes Laura had sent over. Kim joined me, and I took a moment to squeeze his hand over the jam tarts. "All right?"

"Aye-aye. It was a good one today. Some folk have made real progress."

I smiled. Though I knew little of what went on in the meetings, the positive effect they had on Kim was undeniable. Addiction was a lonely illness, even for Kim, who had a wider support network than most, and the camaraderie this band of misfit addicts shared made every morning I spent pouring tea worth a thousand that I'd spent alone.

The gathering drew to a natural end. Kim drove a few elderly attendees back into town while I cleared up with the help of a couple of church volunteers. We were finishing up when a car pulled onto the muddy track that led to the commune. It was too soon to be Kim, unless he'd forgotten something, and the rest of the commune's residents rarely had visitors, so I tucked the tea urn away in the shed and set off through the orchard to meet whoever it was.

I expected the postman and the box of acrylic paints Kim had ordered the day before. My dad hopping out of the red and yellow van, less so. "What the fuck are you doing?"

My dad grinned from beneath his multicoloured flat cap. "I was on my way to ask Kim if he wanted to come to the seed fair with me. Fred gave me a lift."

Of course he had. Where else but Porth Ewan did the friendly postman pick up hitchhikers? "The seed fair in Porth Luck?"

"That's the one. I thought he might like to get some ideas for the raspberry crop."

"He doesn't have a raspberry crop. There's no room." A sad fact, but a true one. The commune was at capacity, and there was no space for new crops without sacrificing existing ones.

"Ah, well," my dad said. "I've got some ideas about that too, if you'll come for your dinner tonight."

I raised a questioning eyebrow, but my dad just shrugged and smiled a smile I'd come to recognise as a sign that he was up to something. "We can't come until late," I said. "Kim's got ink appointments until seven."

"I thought he wasn't tattooing anymore?"

"He finishes today."

"That's fine, son. Laura's at her bridge club until the evening."

The conspiratorial grin remained, but he was saved from further questioning by Kim coming home because he had absolutely forgotten something, and it turned out that he'd planned on visiting the seed fair anyway.

"You don't want to come?" he said to me.

I shook my head. I'd embraced every aspect of life with Kim except his obsession with tramping about in the mud, nursing seedlings into adulthood. Fuck that. My father could have him, even if it meant sacrificing an afternoon I'd counted on spending in bed.

My dad retreated to Kim's car. When he was out of sight, I grabbed Kim and pushed him against the most solid part of the fence. I kissed him, shoving my hands into his messy hair, twisting my fingers to give him the tiny shot of pain that riled him up so much.

His reaction didn't disappoint. He spun us around and took control, and it wasn't long before I forgot all about my father waiting by Red's hot-pink Ford KA. That's right—Kim still drove the most ridiculous car in the world.

He broke away, his heart hammering against my chest, his dick digging into my thigh. "I can stay, if you want? I'm sure your dad won't mind."

"I think he would, actually. Gaz reckons he likes you better than the rest of us."

"If that was true, it would only be because you lot don't take him seriously. You don't know how lucky you are to have a dad who cares beyond the fact that you're still breathing."

Kim spoke with humour, but his words hit home. I'd only met his father once, and the contrast with my own had been like night and day. Billy Penrose was a gruff seaman, grey and weathered, and though his love for his only son had been obvious, it had been hard to see how a man as vibrant as Kim had come from someone who had so little time for him.

I'd never met his mother, but then, he hadn't met mine, and I couldn't see that changing.

Kim left, and after gathering my laptop and laundry together, I went home—to my rented flat—and kicked about until it felt like a reasonable hour to test a newfound friendship I'd come to rely on.

Calum met me at the Sea Bell, and we sat outside nursing pints and forging our bond—because Calum was the only soul on earth who loved someone as much as I loved Kim.

"How are the meetings going?" Calum asked over our second round.

"Good, I think." I shot an ironic glance at the pint in my hand. "He still gets excited about them, so I guess it's working for him."

"No wobbles?"

"Not that I've seen." Which scared the shit out of me when I spent too long thinking about it. I'd missed it last time—in a big way. That couldn't happen again. "The counselling is helping with that, though. And the painting."

Which led me to the other reason I'd asked Calum to meet me. I opened my laptop on the table and pulled up the folder of images I'd shot of him the previous week. Kim called Calum an angel in a bear suit, and when I'd reviewed the photos last night, I'd finally understood why. Because beneath the dark beard, broad shoulders, and brooding gaze, Calum was the sweetest bloke I'd ever met, and somehow, the images I'd shot over a couple of pints and the weathered exterior wall of the Sea Bell, had managed to capture it.

Not that Calum seemed impressed. He winced and pushed the laptop away. "What the fuck are you showing me those for?"

"Because Kim wants to paint them, well . . . paint you, as it happens, so I said I'd ask you first."

Calum sighed. "Paint them?"

"For the new workshop. We thought of a name."

"Go on."

"So you know what the commune is called, right?"

"Right . . ." Suspicion laced Calum's gaze, and I didn't blame him. Kim and Brix had worked on the much-needed expansion of Kim's workshop together, and we'd learned fast that their combined humour was about as juvenile as it came. "Let me guess: they want to paint my face as a pirate and call the place Blackbeard's Junkyard?"

"Blackheart's Drunk Beard, actually."

"Seriously?"

I laughed. "No, but they do want to use your face as a template."

Calum's face folded into as close to a scowl as it ever got. "Brix kept that quiet."

I sympathised, I really did, but Kim and Brix's vision for the new workshop was epic, and Calum's face would make it perfect…if one of us could persuade him he really was that hot.

Taking a chance, I chose silence as my weapon. And it worked. A moment of mutiny passed, then Calum sighed again, drawing the laptop closer. "Okay . . . hit me. How do they want to do this?"

* * *

Later that day, I met Kim at the gates to Belly Acre Farm. Kim and the mischievous grin that usually spelt trouble or sex.

Or both. "What are you up to?"

"Me?"

"Yeah." I punctuated my words with a kiss. "You look like you've put a bramble bush on my dinner chair."

"Don't judge me by your brother's behaviour. I've just had a good day. That's all."

I felt bad then, and made up for it by groping him. As you do . . . as we did, frequently. But, alas, our time together hadn't yet come, and so I tore myself away and preceded him inside. Laura waited for us and dispatched Kim to help my dad bring in the first of the spring greens.

"What did you do that for? I haven't seen him all day."

"And I haven't seen you all week, so suck it up, young man, and cut those spuds for me. Besides, I want to talk to you about something before your dad comes in."

"Okaaay." I drew a pile of potatoes towards me and set about cutting them into rough cubes. "Why do I not like the sound of that?"

"Because you still carry that city way of seeing the negative in everything." Laura slid a mug of tea across the table. "But you might be right in this case, so get those spuds done while I talk, eh?"

Laura weathered my glare as she took her place at the table and folded her hands around her teacup. "Your dad and I have been talking about your grandfather's house."

"Haven Cottage?" I pictured the old fisherman's house where my paternal grandfather had lived out his last years. "I thought you were going to rent it out? Cash in on the sea views and all that?"

"We did. In fact, we even started renovating it last summer, but you know how those things go around here."

Easily distractedwould be written on the tombstone of every member of my Porth Ewan family, so I could well imagine what had happened to the cottage project. And I had a horrible feeling that I knew where this was going. Laura and my dad had made no secret of the fact that Kim's participation in the barn enterprise had been the catalyst to getting it finished. "Ma, Kim doesn't have time to design and build new furniture for the cottage. He's too busy with the workshop expansion."

"Oh, I know that, honey. We were actually thinking that you and Kim would buy Haven Cottage from us."

"Buy it?"

"Yes, to live in . . . together. You can't traipse between your lonely flat and his caravan forever."

"No?"

"No, Jasper, you can't. I know you're happier than you've ever been, and no one is enjoying that more than your father and I, but life is for living . . . for moving forward, and you two need a home of your own."

She had a point, but I wasn't in the business of conceding so easily. "What makes you think we have the money to buy a beachfront property?"

"Common sense, dear. You still have the funds from your flat in London, don't you?"

I did, but that wasn't the point. Kim had just sunk all his capital into expanding the workshop, and there was no way on earth that he'd agree to live in a house I'd paid for. "Thanks, ma, but no thanks."

"I had a feeling you might say that. Would it help if I told you the price we're asking? Don't forget that the place was wrack and ruin when we bought it, so anything we get for it is pure profit?—"

"Ma."

But it was no good. She named her price anyway, and the figure was low enough to thoroughly distract me from my dad and Gaz's rowdy entrance.

Perhaps I was more Manning than I cared to admit.

Kim noticed my preoccupation during dinner. He elbowed me a few times when people spoke and I failed to answer. Only the buzz of my phone saved me from explaining myself there and then.

I stepped outside. "Hello?"

A throaty chuckle set my nerves alight.

"Red?"

"It's me. How's it going, handsome?"

I smiled up at the inky night sky. Red was tearing up America with her band, and we didn't hear from her often, but her sporadic phone calls always put a smile on our faces. "All good in this hood. Want me to get Kim?"

"Not today. It's you I wanted to speak to."

"It is?" That was unusual. Our conversations were mostly short-lived, a stopgap until Kim came to the phone. Which begged the question of why she'd called me in the first place. "What's up?"

"I'm having a baby."

"Oh." That stopped me in my tracks. "Are you okay? I didn't know you were with anyone."

"I'm not. It's…an arrangement. I'm going to be a surrogate for some friends of mine."

"Oh."

"That all you have to say?"

"Um…" Like that was much better.

Lena laughed again. "You're my test run. I'm thinking of telling Kim tomorrow, unless you want to do the honours for me. What mood is he in?"

"A good one."

"So you'll do it for me?"

"For fuck's sake. Really? Why can't you do it yourself?"

"Because I'm catching a flight first thing in the morning, and him not knowing is giving me hives."

Didn't really answer my question, but the line broke up before she could speak again. Then she was gone, leaving me holding her grenade. If that was even what it was. Kim loved Lena, and he always would, but it wasn't the same as the love he'd gifted me.

I knew that.

I knew it.

And I knew in my heart that his reaction to her baby plans would be the same as mine: fond bewilderment and affection for a woman who never lived a day in her life the way anyone expected her to.

It all clicked into place. I tipped my head back, absorbing the starlight, then I went back inside.

Kim glanced my way, but my dad claimed his attention before I could fill him in. He took us into his office and laid out his offer in much the same way Laura had but with added emotional blackmail. "We need to sell it to repair the roof on this place, but it would mean the world to us to keep it in the family."

"Let Gaz buy it, then," I grumbled. "Alan Sugar the Second, isn't he?"

"Your brothers already have homes."

"So do we."

"Jasper."

"Dad." The echo of my conversation with Laura grated on me, and I was irritated that Kim was here to witness it. "Just leave it, okay?"

"Jas." Kim took my hand. "Hear the man out."

I glanced at him in surprise. Setting aside the financial issues, buying the cottage would eventually mean moving out of the commune, and it hadn't occurred to me that Kim would ever want to do that.

Still, I held my tongue as my dad explained his grand plan to Kim, and this time, the penny change he and Laura wanted for the cottage hit home for real.

Kim too, if his adorably surprised expression was anything to go by. "That ain't how much a cottage by the sea is worth."

"It's what it's worth to us," my dad said. "Besides, we've given both our other children property of their own. It's only Jasper who's never let us help him."

I folded my arms. "That's because I don't need your help, not because I'm ungrateful."

"We know that, son. That's why we're asking a fair price."

Fairin whose world was apparently subjective. But the discussion was over, at least for now. My dad opened a drawer in his desk and retrieved a set of keys. He tossed them to Kim. "Go take a look. See if you can't convince my son to live a little more than he has already."

Nice. I took a breath to retaliate, but Kim hustled me out. "Don't be a dick to your dad. You're lucky to have him, remember?"

Our conversation that morning flooded back to me, and I was shamed enough to think about retracing my steps, but Kim was already walking to his car.

I followed him and got in the passenger side. He gunned the comically tiny engine and peeled out of the farmyard. "If you're worried about the money, don't be. I can afford half of that price."

"Really?"

"Yeah."

I wasn't convinced, but the money was only half my concern. "What about the commune?"

"What about it? Me and Lena settled there because I'd forgotten how to live like a normal person . . . how to own things, build things, and love anything that wasn't her. But that was a long time ago. Life has changed for me, I've changed. And I want a future with you."

"What about the meetings?"

"We can host them anywhere. It ain't about the location."

I chewed on my lip and mulled over Kim's words as he drove towards the sea. I waited for him to ask for directions to Haven Cottage, but of course, he never did. Why would he, when Porth Ewan boys knew everything about everything?

He pulled up outside a few minutes later. "Sulk all you want. I'm going inside."

Sulk? Me? Was he having a fucking laugh? But as the urge to stay in the car remained strong . . . perhaps he was right. I was sulking, but why?

Who the hell knew? And who cared, when Kim was inside a deserted cottage without me?

I got out of the car and followed him inside. Knowing my family's goldfish-like attention span, I expected to find the place derelict, but I was mistaken. The interior of the cottage had fresh new plaster, shiny wood floorboards, and crooked polished beams that fairy tales were made of. An open fireplace was the crowning jewel of the lower floor, and there was even a bed and a claw-foot bathtub upstairs.

Kim was sold, I could tell.

"Red's having a baby," I blurted.

He turned around, his expression unreadable. "What?"

"Surrogate. For some friends of hers. She's flying somewhere to go to do whatever she's going to do to make that happen tomorrow."

"How do you know that?"

"She called me."

"During dinner?"

"Yeah."

Silence. My heart began a slow, painful descent into my stomach.

"Why did she call you?"

"I don't know."

"Liar."

I moved closer. "She wanted to know how you were before she told you."

"How I am?" Dangerous humour glittered in Kim's convoluted gaze. "Jesus. You two think I can't handle reality without hurling myself off the wagon? That ain't fair, Jas. You can't shelter me from the truth."

"I'm not. I'm telling you, aren't I?"

"Yeah, while you look at me like I'm an unexploded bomb. Do you really think I'm selfish enough to have my life with you and deny her the same happiness in whatever the fuck she wants to do with hers?"

"Are you happy?"

It wasn't what I'd meant to say, but whatever my intended words had been evaporated as Kim seized me by the shoulders. He pushed me hard onto the plastic-covered bed, his face a potent mix of fury and amusement. "You don't get it, do you? You have no idea how much you mean to me, even after all this time."

I had a fair idea, but I wasn't going to interrupt him while he was digging his cock into me the way he was right now. I wound my arms around his neck and pressed myself against him. "I know you love me, and I know you love her too."

"It's not the same."

"I know."

"Then how many times are we going to have this fucking conversation?"

Kim punctuated his words with a grow and flipped me onto my stomach. A thrill shot through my veins, and I shivered, my eyelids already fluttering as sensation consumed me. Time hadn't dulled the electricity between us. If anything, it had deepened, solidified, and he could bring me to my knees with the intent behind his stormy gaze.

And his intent was clear now—he was going to fuck me, and I was going to let him . . . more than that. I'd beg him if he kept me waiting.

But we weren't playing that game today—the game where he tied me with no tangible binds and drove me slowly mad with his sensuous tongue. No. This wasn't about making me crazy with need, desperate for any part of him he'd give me. This was about him, and me, us, and everything in between.

He shoved my jeans away and unbuttoned his own, and then with a slick of the lube we always carried, slid into me in a smooth motion that made my toes curl.

I groaned, arching my spine as the sensation of taking him bareback overwhelmed me. We'd stopped using condoms a while ago, but the ridged heat of his hard dick never got old. Each time was like the first as Kim gripped the tops of my thighs, my hips, my back, and nailed me with sharp, hard thrusts that left me in no doubt of how he felt.

If there had ever been any.

Has there?I couldn't be sure. There'd always be a place for Red—for Lena—in our world, but the part of Kim I'd believed would always belong to her, was now, unmistakably, mine.

And I was his.

Kim unravelled, my name falling from his lips as he came hard.

I wasn't far behind. And my climax was harsh, painful in all the right ways, and it wasn't until I crumpled face-first into the plastic sheeting below me that I remembered we weren't at home in my flat.

"Fuck." I laughed, giddy and high. "That didn't take long."

Kim collapsed on top of me. "Long to what? Convince you that you're stuck with me whether you like it or not?"

"I do like it." I rolled us so we could face each other. "I meant that it didn't take long to break this place in."

Kim's intense gaze brightened. "Does that mean we're doing it? Buying it from your 'rents?"

"If you want to."

"What do you want?"

"I want to be where you are . . . and I want a reliable internet connection, a desk, and a bed that doesn't turn me into a ninety-year-old man overnight." Kim could sleep on a pile of rocks and still bounce out of bed in the morning. Me? Damn. The sofa bed in the trailer was just about killing me--don't care. I'd fucking die for him. "And I want you to be happy."

"I am happy."

"I know you are, but I want you to believe you deserve it, even when things go wrong."

Kim pulled his jeans up and sat down. "You know me so well."

"Do I?"

"Yeah. I've never been able to articulate how this—" he stopped and rubbed his chest "—thing, this addiction, makes me feel, even in meetings where I know people will get it if I can just get the words out. But you get it without me saying a fucking thing. You get me, even if addiction makes no sense to you."

Emotion burned my eyes. "Things don't have to make sense to matter. You matter. We both do."

"Then we both deserve to be happy, right?"

"Right."

"So let's do this. We can build something amazing here, I know we can."

"We can?—"

Kim's bone-crushing embrace was instant and wonderful. I fell headfirst into it, losing myself in all that was him. All that was us. Our journey had barely begun, and we couldn't predict the good or the bad, but together, we were ready for anything.

* * *