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I might’ve become a very devoted housewife.

Now, I snort. “Don’t tell anyone. I’ve got a reputation to ruin.”

She twists in my arms and kisses me—dirt-streaked, sun-warmed,home.When she pulls back, her smile is crooked, knowing.

“You love me,” she says, like she’s daring me to deny it.

I look between her eyes slowly. “Yeah,” I whisper. “I really, really do.”

We stand there for a moment, the wind brushing through the leaves, the world blissfully, impossibly quiet.

I think, not for the first time, that I’d fight a thousand enforcers to protect this fragile peace.

Because we aren’t alone anymore, not in the ways that matter. We share a life, a future, a hope. And for someone like me—a once-aimless sword-for-hire, hardened by violence—it’s more than I ever dared to dream.