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Epilogue

O NE Y EAR L ATER

“I am a freaking pioneer,” Jean said as she fished a six-pack out of the creek behind Charlie’s house.

“Out here in nature, making it work.” She pictured herself chopping wood for an imaginary stove and then cooking up biscuits.

Maybe pulling a few turnips out of the ground. “Call me Calamity Jean.”

She’d never actually eaten a turnip before, but it sounded like something a rugged frontierswoman would grow in her windswept patch of dirt. Definitely the most punk rock root vegetable.

“Do you still miss the wagon?” Charlie asked, interrupting this fantasy sequence.

He was sprawled on a blanket in the shade, next to their turnip-free picnic lunch.

With his long legs crossed at the ankle and his dark hair tousled by the breeze, he looked like a poet or a pianist—someone who should be wearing a ruffled shirt. As opposed to a budding snakeologist.

“We had some good times in that wagon.” She gave him the Groucho Marx eyebrows, even though he was already blushing.

Jean suspected she’d still be able to fluster Charlie when he was an old man.

Her mouth seemed to know exactly which of his buttons to push, in more ways than one. “But you know I love our yurt.”

It was fun to say the word and living there felt like sleepaway camp for grown-ups. Charlie’s parents had offered to build a cabin on their property to give the two of them privacy, but that would have felt too permanent. This way they had their own space without being tied down.

After the dust from the centennial settled, they’d packed their bags and flown back to Hawaii so Jean could finally introduce Charlie to her friends.

A highlight of the trip was running into Pauline in the checkout line at Foodland, where she first asked Charlie to autograph the back of her receipt and then serenaded him with her favorite Adriana tracks, lending them her own unique lyrical stylings—which didn’t stop half a dozen other shoppers from joining in.

From there, Charlie had returned to Australia to spend another month at the research station, before they reunited in California so he could start grad school that fall.

All that travel and relocation would have been outside Jean’s budget if she hadn’t scored a major art commission last summer.

She still remembered the electric thrill of opening the email and reading the words: Adriana wondered if you could sketch a few concepts for her new album cover, in the style of your tattoo?

She’d love you to include some native plants, if possible .

Fuck yeah, Jean could do that. She didn’t care if it was part of Adriana’s ongoing campaign to woo Mugsy; she’d taken the opportunity and run with it. Where Adriana led, others followed, which meant enough freelance work for Jean to pay her share of the rent and buy all the art supplies she needed.

And now Charlie was a year closer to being Dr. Pike and they were back in his old stomping grounds.

It felt surprisingly good to return to this patch of land at the edge of the Black Hills, with the red and ocher ridges rising like castle walls around the green valley.

The word “home” danced at the edge of her consciousness, but Jean wasn’t quite ready to admit that.

What she could say was that it was a great place to paint.

She was trying something new, a series of large landscapes that had already attracted interest from a gallery in Santa Fe, though they didn’t like her suggestion for an exhibition title.

That was fine—they were still Big Ass Canvases in Jean’s heart.

The other client she’d picked up this past year was Mugsy, who was busy getting her tea business off the ground.

Over time, and some killer graphic design work, including a bespoke logo and hand-lettered labels, their grudging mutual acceptance (as copresidents of the Charlie Fan Club) had grown into respect, and then friendship.

That gave Jean a lot more leeway when it came to teasing Mugsy about the mysterious benefactors who’d pushed the Mugsy’s Brewhaha Kickstarter past its fundraising goal in under thirty-six hours.

Jean wondered if one (or more!) of them might show up for the official launch party tomorrow night.

Her money was on Emma Koenig. It was the quiet ones who took you by surprise.

Then again, she hadn’t written Mugsy another hit song.

(The sultry single “Bruja’s Brew” wasn’t quite as ubiquitous as “The Lost Weekend” but it had a respectable run up the charts.) Or shared pictures of herself sipping one of Mugsy’s Mixers with her thirty-seven million followers.

Fortunately, this shindig was a more low-key affair than last summer’s centennial.

The guest list was mostly family and friends.

Charlie’s parents were flying back, fresh from a cruise around the British Isles.

In fact, their flight should be landing soon, which meant the clock was ticking.

Jean liked the elder Pikes, but not to the point where she felt comfortable getting caught cavorting with their son in broad daylight.

She collapsed on the blanket next to him, reaching for the top button of her shirt. His gaze locked onto her fingers.

“Charlie,” she said.

“Oh, sorry.” He unfastened his watch and set it aside before stripping off his T-shirt.

That wasn’t what she’d been getting at, but his instincts were on point. Someone had trained him well.

“Are we painting?” he asked as he unbuckled his belt. “Skinny-dipping?”

That was her Charlie all over: game for anything.

“Do you know what I love?” she asked.

“Me,” he said at once.

If she achieved nothing else in this lifetime, Jean could at least point to Charlie Pike’s absolute certainty that he was adored as a signature accomplishment.

“And?” she prompted, accepting the wedge of cheese he handed her.

“Art?” His voice trailed off as she unhooked her bra. “Um, nakedness? Dirty jokes? Not using an alarm clock? Surprises?”

He really did see to the depths of her soul. “I was talking about this,” she said, pulling down her shorts. Jean’s free hand framed the juicy red apple inked on her hip. It lined up perfectly with his snake—an inside joke, just for the two of them.

“It looks good enough to eat.” Charlie pressed the tip of one finger to the circle of red, eyes lighting with mischief. “ Eve .”

“You want to role-play?” She lunged at him, wrestling him onto the grass. As always, he gave new meaning to the term “pushover,” going limp so she could pin his arms above his head. Well, parts of him were limp. “Is there a serpent in this garden or are you happy to see me?”

“I’m always happy to see you. Like a snake that feels less stressed when it recognizes its own kind, because social buffering helps it relax.”

“I’ll buffer you anytime. Not that I want you to get too relaxed, if you know what I mean.”

“Jean.” His ridiculously long lashes fanned as he tried not to laugh.

“I’m putting out signals. Let’s make a mating ball, baby.” There were very few bits of snake trivia Jean couldn’t bend to her own purposes, which generally fell under one of two umbrellas: making Charlie laugh or seducing him. Ideally, she was accomplishing both at once—like right now.

“We can take a dip in the creek after. If you want.”

“Oh yeah? And then what, we run around naked until we dry off?”

Charlie shook his head. “I brought towels.”

It was an established fact that towels were their love language.

“I might have to keep you,” Jean said, as if the thought had just occurred to her. She squeezed his wrists, pressing the pads of her thumbs to the center of his palms.

“Oh no,” he said mildly. “Help.” He shifted his arms slightly, making no effort to break her hold. “Looks like you caught me.”

Jean bent low enough to whisper in his ear. “We’ll call it a win-win.”