Having agreed to Marcus’s request to stay the night, Preston lies awake beside him. He reflects on his growing attachment, acknowledging that his relationship with Marcus is no longer “just sex,” and worries that Marcus’s daisy and dagger tattoo might represent a past love. Preston is also afraid to sleep because he fears he might hurt Marcus if Marcus touches him unexpectedly. When Marcus wakes, Preston admits he struggles with insomnia. After expressing concern about Serena potentially threatening Marcus, Preston asks whether Marcus would ever share him with another sexual partner. Both admit they cannot tolerate the idea of the other being with someone else and agree that there will be no sharing. He then reveals that he has been diagnosed with antisocial personality disorder and describes having narcissistic traits, bipolar symptoms, and occasional psychotic hallucinations, fully expecting Marcus to reject him. Preston also admits that he kills people for the rush and sense of calm it gives him. Marcus remains unfazed and says he does not care that Preston kills; when Preston asks whether Marcus would kill for him, Marcus immediately says he would. He makes Preston promise to live for him. Preston agrees and, for the first time in his life, allows himself to close his eyes while being held by someone else.

While Preston sleeps, Marcus looks through his phone to better understand him, reading text conversations with friends Jude and Kane and his father, Lawrence, and secretly emailing Preston’s notes to himself. He learns that Jude and Kane closely monitor Preston’s medication and episodes of “spiraling,” while Preston has told his father that he is showing signs of psychosis and might “get rid of” (427) himself sooner than expected. Preston wakes up, surprised that he slept soundly for several hours. He later explains that his snake tattoo represents himself and his inability to “shed” his own skin, describing himself as “barely stitched together” (428). They are about to have sex when Marcus’s mother, June, a nurse, walks in on them. Unfazed, June warmly invites them to breakfast. After she leaves, Preston admits that although his mother would have accepted his sexuality, he struggles to accept it himself and does not want to come out. Marcus assures him that he does not have to, but asks Preston not to hide from him, and Preston agrees to try. Preston and June get along immediately, playfully ganging up on Marcus. June reveals that after meeting Preston as a child, Marcus talked about him repeatedly and even asked if he could marry him when he grew up. Preston tells Marcus he is jealous of his “perfect” mother, then reveals that his own mother could not protect him and that when she finally did, it was “already too late” (438).

Preston sees his therapist, Dr. Duret, after apparently choking Marcus while Preston was asleep. Afraid that he might kill Marcus, Preston has stayed away from him. He admits his feelings for Marcus are serious and expresses his terror that Marcus will leave him if he ever sees what Preston considers his “hideous side.” Dr. Duret suggests that Preston is spiraling because he is suppressing these parts of himself to become who he thinks Marcus wants him to be. During the session, Preston becomes increasingly agitated and threatens to kill Dr. Duret and others before they can abandon him. Dr. Duret says she will not stay to watch him self-destruct and walks out. Preston breaks down, begs her not to leave, and calls for his mother. 

Later, Preston returns home and sets his father’s vintage Bentley on fire. He recalls his last text exchange with Marcus, in which their argument ended with Marcus saying goodbye and blocking him. Heartbroken, Preston acknowledges that despite thoughts of killing Marcus, he would turn the violence against himself rather than hurt him. He also reveals that he recently considered jumping from his roof, having survived a previous attempt. Preston’s father, Lawrence, finds him outside in the rain. When Preston mentions seeing Dr. Duret earlier that night, Lawrence reacts with confusion and questions him about his meetings with her. Lawrence assures Preston that he would never “drop” him, even after Preston burned his car. Instead of punishing him, Lawrence tells Preston they need to visit Dr. Fenwick together and apologizes, saying that what he is about to do was, in hindsight, inevitable, which Preston interprets as a plan to have him committed to a mental institution.

Believing his father plans to have him committed, Preston hides this from his friends Jude and Kane. His mental state continues to deteriorate, and he experiences increasingly intense voices and self-destructive thoughts. Preston spends the morning at a picnic with Violet and others. He thinks about the letter revealing the truth he has been hiding from Marcus, which he wrote the previous night and gave to Hayes to deliver later that day. Preston reflects that Marcus made him feel present and real in a way he rarely experienced before and fears he will never feel that way again. During the picnic, Preston notices a bracelet on Violet’s wrist and discovers it bears the initials W.J.A.—Winston James Armstrong, Preston’s grandfather—as well as the same crescent-and-sun symbol as Preston’s ring, revealing an unexplained connection between Violet’s family and his grandfather.

The moment is interrupted when two men on motorcycles arrive and one aims a gun at Violet. Preston sees a vision of his mother beside Violet before instinctively moving Violet out of the gunman’s line of fire and taking the bullet in his chest. As Preston lies severely wounded, the noise and self-destructive voices in his head disappear, and he considers giving up his struggle to stay alive. Marcus then appears, and Preston initially believes he is another hallucination before realizing he is real. Marcus holds him and begs him not to leave, causing Preston to regret giving up and wish he had fought to remain with Marcus. Unable to tell Marcus that he loved him, Preston internally apologizes before losing consciousness.

At the hospital, Marcus waits while Preston undergoes surgery, blaming himself for failing to protect him. Jude demands that Marcus leave, but Marcus refuses and blames Jude for failing to protect Preston. When Violet arrives and reveals that Preston was shot protecting her, Marcus tells her that it should have been her, prompting Jude to attack him and the two to fight. After they are separated, the doctor emerges and announces that Preston has died. Refusing to accept Preston’s death, Marcus screams and is forcibly removed from the hospital. The narrative jumps forward to Preston’s funeral, which Marcus attends with his mother, June, and his father. He watches as Preston’s younger sister, Miley, weeps over the closed casket. 

Marcus remains unable to accept Preston’s death even as he watches him being buried. After the service, Marcus offers to cooperate with his father in exchange for the identities and locations of everyone involved in Preston’s shooting, intending to avenge his death. He threatens to turn to Serena instead if she can provide the information sooner. After Marcus walks away from his father, Hayes approaches him and delivers the letter Preston had arranged to be sent that day, telling Marcus that Preston had been happier since he began talking about him. Remembering Preston’s expression before he took the bullet, Marcus concludes that Preston intentionally accepted death and interprets his actions as suicide.

Preston writes Marcus a letter at his therapist’s suggestion, revealing details he has been unable to tell him aloud. Preston recounts a lonely childhood shaped by his parents’ unhappy marriage and eventual divorce, after which he lived with his alcoholic mother. He describes the arrival of his mother’s long-term boyfriend, Claude Lavoie, who began touching Preston in ways that frightened him before repeatedly sexually abusing him for more than a month. Fearing that speaking out would cause his mother to abandon him, Preston remained silent about the abuse. When his mother eventually discovered what was happening, she intervened, but died by suicide the following night, which Preston experienced as another abandonment. He notes that his father, Lawrence, arrived the next morning offering remorse, and that Claude subsequently disappeared, with Preston assuming his father had him killed.

Preston then discloses a second assault at boarding school at age eleven, which was interrupted by Kane and Jude. Preston killed the perpetrator with a candelabra, an act he describes as his first experience of liberation. The incident resulted in a psychological diagnosis and his father’s visible disappointment, reinforcing Preston’s belief that he has disappointed his father.

The letter also reveals that Dr. Duret, whom Preston has long treated as his therapist, is a hallucination modeled on his mother; Preston also concludes that Lenin, the man he believed his father sent to physically punish him, is likely imaginary after footage shows Preston throwing himself down the stairs during one supposed attack. Preston believes that mentioning Dr. Duret to Lawrence again has prompted his father to have him institutionalized.

Preston connects his violence, need for pain, need to project arrogance, discomfort with his own appearance, and his pattern of pushing people away before they can leave him to his past experiences. He acknowledges that his dynamic with Marcus was the first context in which sexual vulnerability and surrendering control felt healing because Preston knew he could stop it. He also admits that he repeatedly pushed Marcus away because he feared Marcus would eventually abandon him. He closes by telling Marcus he is not asking to be taken back, suggests that they become friends, and apologizes for wasting Marcus’s time.

Adrift in grief following Preston’s death, Marcus has already read Preston’s letter revealing his silent suffering and past abuse. Consumed by rage and a need for revenge, Marcus uses a list from his father to murder several people involved in the attack, including the weapons supplier, the person who deleted the security footage, and the gunman who shot Preston. The killings bring him no satisfaction. This spree culminates in him brutally killing Preston’s grandmother, Marguerite Armstrong, who ordered Violet’s killing because Violet is her husband’s illegitimate daughter. During the murders, Marcus begins to see and converse with hallucinations of Preston.

Immediately after killing Marguerite, Jude and Kane arrive and confront a blood-soaked Marcus, with Jude angry that Marcus interfered with his own revenge. Kane separates them before the confrontation escalates. In the two weeks since Preston’s death, Marcus has repeatedly called Preston’s phone just to hear his voicemail. While standing on a cliff significant to their past, Marcus considers joining Preston in death, but his hallucination of Preston tells him to “live for” him. Lawrence then arrives and confronts Marcus about his revenge killings. Marcus tells Lawrence that he and Preston were in a relationship. Lawrence argues that their relationship would not have lasted because Marcus was unequipped to recognize and respond to Preston’s worsening mental health and says that he and Marcus’s father would have separated them. Marcus insists that if Preston were alive, he would have taken him far away from everyone.

Preston dreams of his mother singing a lullaby on the night before her death, finally understanding the lyrics were a goodbye. In the dream, she tells him she is proud that he survived. He wakes in a hospital room to discover he survived the shooting and has been unconscious or not fully conscious for about two and a half weeks, and he feels grateful to be alive. His father, Lawrence, is there and reveals that Preston’s grandmother ordered the hit on Violet, who is Lawrence’s half-sister. Lawrence also tells him that his grandmother and the gunmen are dead. Lawrence reveals he faked Preston’s death to protect him; everyone, including his friends and Marcus, believes he is dead and a funeral has been held.

Lawrence expresses regret for failing Preston as a father and reveals that he knows about Preston’s self-destructive behavior and hallucinations. He also clarifies that he never intended to institutionalize Preston and had only planned for him to visit Dr. Fenwick. He explains that Preston’s mother, a victim of severe childhood abuse, carried guilt and self-loathing that, according to her suicide note, intensified after Preston was abused. When Preston blames himself for remaining silent and not fighting his abuser, Lawrence reminds him that he was a child and a victim and was not responsible for what happened to him. Lawrence also reveals that he imprisoned and tortured Preston’s abuser for years until the man eventually died from an infection. Preston admits that he never hated Lawrence and only wanted his father to stay, and Lawrence promises that he will. When Preston asks whether he will ever get better, Lawrence assures him that he already is.

While recovering in the hospital, Preston reflects on feeling closer to his father after their conversation and agrees to meet more regularly with his therapist, Dr. Fenwick, who helps him understand how his childhood trauma shaped his coping mechanisms and how he can prevent it from continuing to control his life. Preston confirms his relationship with Marcus to his father, who accepts it and promises that he and Andrew will protect him if necessary. At a party with friends, Preston learns that Marcus, not Kane and Jude, killed his grandmother, the gunman who shot him, and several others involved in the attack to avenge him. His friends also confirm that Marcus was present during the shooting and at the hospital and was not a hallucination.

Realizing that his attraction to Marcus began long before their sexual relationship, Preston goes to his house and finds him withdrawn and initially unable to believe Preston is real. Once Marcus realizes Preston is alive, he confronts him about deliberately accepting death after being shot. Preston admits that he had believed death was the easiest solution but regretted giving up while Marcus held him and wanted to live. He promises not to choose death again and commits to taking his medication, attending therapy, and communicating with Marcus rather than pushing him away. Marcus admits that he had considered following Preston in death. They tell each other that they love one another, and Marcus reveals they met as children and he has been in love with Preston since then; his daisy tattoo is for him. They reconcile with a kiss, with Preston recognizing that love with Marcus feels like safety and warmth rather than pain, and they promise not to let each other go.

Three weeks after being shot, Preston’s college hockey season is over because his recovery will keep him from playing for months. He watches his team lose to Marcus’s team after Marcus proposed that Preston move in with him if he won, though Preston admits he would have agreed regardless. Preston’s nightmares have become less frequent and intense, and he continues working on his recovery while relying on Marcus for support. Preston fears telling his best friends, Jude and Kane, about their relationship, though he has begun accepting his sexuality and considers himself “probably bi.”

Later, as Preston and Marcus kiss in the parking lot, Jude and Kane discover them. Jude reacts with anger, initially assuming Marcus forced Preston, but Preston immediately corrects him, while Kane remains calmer and reveals that he had already suspected their relationship. Preston comes out to his friends, explaining that he needed to accept his own sexuality before he could tell them about Marcus and that Marcus makes him feel safe and motivates him to get better. Kane accepts Preston’s choice, and though still hostile toward Marcus, Jude clarifies that his objection is to Marcus rather than Preston’s sexuality and agrees to tolerate him for Preston’s sake. With their relationship now revealed, Preston considers Marcus part of their family.

One year later, Marcus and Preston are living in New York after Marcus was drafted into the NHL. Preston has made substantial progress in managing his mental health; he continues seeing Dr. Fenwick, no longer hallucinates Dr. Duret or Lenin, and manages his episodes without resorting to his previous self-destructive behavior, relying on Marcus for support when needed. On Marcus’s birthday, Preston voluntarily initiates oral sex, reassuring Marcus that he trusts him and genuinely wants to do it. While their relationship remains mostly private, Preston, Kane, Jude, and members of their families are working to dismantle Vencor’s old power structure. Marcus also learns that Patient X survived and is his half-brother, Cyrus. During a visit from Preston’s younger sister, Miley, she jokingly asks to marry Marcus. A jealous Preston declares that Marcus will be his husband one day, which Marcus interprets as a proposal and Preston confirm. They become engaged and reaffirm their commitment to spending their lives together.