"As the mate of my warrior," she corrected, smiling at him with love shining brightly in her eyes. "I can 't have it any other way."

Dante swallowed on a throat gone dry. He didn't deserve her. After all they'd been through, after all his ceaseless running, his heart had finally found its home. With Tess. With his beloved.

"What do you think?" she asked him. "Can you live with that?" "Eternally," Dante vowed, then pulled her back down onto the bed with him and sealed their pact with a passionate, endless kiss.

THE END