Lethal Temptations (Tempted #5)(121)

I nodded as I straddled my bike and gripped the handlebars.

Time to draw that final card.

Time to start writing the next chapter.

Girl, I’m coming for you.





Bonus Epilogue



I graduated college one year to the date with a degree in social work. When I first started college I was like every other ordinary freshman, having no idea what I wanted to do and no major. College was just one big party and the thing you did to make your parents proud.

Then life happened.

Blackie happened.

Someone who had been in my life for so many years became my life. Our perfectly imperfect love started with two people chasing away the demons that dragged the other down.

For me it was my mind.

For him it was his addictions and his grief.

I was just a girl with a crush who fell in love with the bad boy and waited for him to open his eyes and see me standing before him.

He was just a man who had given up on himself, a man who resolved never to smile and enjoy life, a man who didn’t think he was worthy.

He opened his eyes and looked right through me, down to the depths of my soul. I don’t know who realized first, if it was him or me, that discovered we each held the other half of one another’s soul.

We’re not perfect.

Far from it.

And our struggles didn’t just disappear because we fell in love. I’ll always be bi-polar and he’ll always be a recovering addict. Our battles are different yet the same both result in extreme highs and desperate lows but we’re stronger than the things that try to bring us down.

Together, my maker and his addictions don’t stand a chance.

I see him smile and I can face the world, my mind is just another hurdle I can conquer and the best part of that is knowing I do the same for him. That smile is all the inspiration I need to be a survivor of mental illness and mine is all he needs to be a survivor of substance abuse.

I glanced around the room of people and smiled at them, hoping they found the smile in the world that saved them.

“Who wants to begin today?” I asked the group.

“I’d like to,” said a familiar voice, startling me and forcing me to turn my head to the door and the man standing there smiling at me.

My savior.

My Leather.

I am a social worker and I work for the Woman’s Health Center as well as Addiction Angel, a local Staten Island organization that helps addicts get into a rehabilitation program suited for them. I also volunteer one night a week at the Y.M.C.A. and run the Narcotics Anonymous group.

Blackie has attended my meetings and has spoken about his struggles as an addict, inspiring the people I work with on a daily basis.

However, I wasn’t expecting him tonight. In fact, when I left the house he kissed me goodbye and told me he was going to the clubhouse.

He walked toward the circle of people, pulled out an empty chair but didn’t sit down as he kept his eyes pinned to me.

“My name is Dominic Petra, or Blackie to some,” he said, winking at me. “And I’m a recovering addict.” He glanced around the room, looking at all the faces and recognizing the torment reflected in their eyes. “I have been sober and clean for thirty-eight months.”

A round of applause erupted from the circle as he turned his attention back to me.

“Thank you,” he said, as he pointed to me. “But I wouldn’t have been able to kick my habits and stay clean if it wasn’t for this woman right here.”

I smiled at him.

“That, right there,” he whispered, shaking his head slightly as he continued to stare at me but speak to the room of people looking at him, wishing for a sliver of hope.

“That smile,” he continued. “It’s my why, my purpose and my hope. It’s that smile that reminds me I’ve got a whole lot of life left inside of me. I don’t need drugs to numb me I’ve got something that makes me feel the good stuff I forgot existed, like love, like joy and instead of dreading the future I learned to reach for it.”

He took another step closer.

Then another.

He stood before me.

“Why would I ever want to be numb again when I’ve got someone who makes me feel like I’m on top of the world?”

I swallowed against the lump in my throat as fresh tears filled my eyes.

“Why would I send myself to hell when I have an angel who brings me to heaven?” He whispered.

Then I watched in shock as he dropped onto one knee in the middle of the circle, his lips quirked as he reached into his leather jacket.

“Why would I ever want anything other than her?”

He pulled out a tiny black velvet box and flipped the lid open.

“I wouldn’t,” he answered his own question. “I don’t want anything other than you, girl. You brought me back to life, gave me a second chance, one I didn’t think I deserved, but you insisted I did. Thank you for that. Thank you for being the angel who rescued me and showed me how to smile again. You’ve given me so much but there’s one more thing I’m going to ask of you…marry me, Lace, give me forever, let me be the one who shows you the good and the beautiful… let me give you my leather and take from you your lace.”

When you find yourself at the end of your story and you think there is nothing left, I hope you’ll think of me and Blackie and realize there’s always a chance for a rewrite.