Page 48 of Bewitched by the Fruit Bat King (The Bewitching Hour #3)

Epilogue: Partners in All Things

Willow

T he summer evening settled over Haven's Cross with golden warmth, transforming the ordinary into something magical. Even my small balcony garden seemed to shimmer in the late sunlight, plants stretching toward the fading rays with unusual enthusiasm.

"They still respond to you differently," Kane observed, leaning against the doorframe between my kitchen and the balcony. He balanced two glasses of his signature moonwater cocktails in one hand with the easy grace that came naturally to him, even before centuries of practice.

"Us," I corrected, accepting the offered drink. "They respond to us."

Six months had passed since we broke Hazel's curse with willing tears and genuine sacrifice. Six months of rebuilding, adapting, and creating something entirely new from the fractured pieces of two ancient legacies.

My apartment above Floramancy had become our primary home—a choice that had surprised both of us initially. Kane Drake, with his palatial penthouse and exquisite taste, choosing to spend most nights in my modest two-bedroom apartment with its creaky floors and temperamental plumbing.

"The West Coast delegation arrives tomorrow," Kane said, settling into the chair beside me, his long legs stretched out comfortably. "Ariana confirmed their flight lands at noon."

I nodded, taking a sip of the perfectly balanced cocktail. "Are they still skeptical about the blood substitutes?"

"Skeptical is putting it mildly," he replied with a wry smile. "Hosokawa called it 'botanical vampire blasphemy' in his last email. But they're coming. That's the important part."

The West Coast vampire collective had been the most resistant to Kane's revolutionary changes.

While the Haven's Cross vampires had adapted relatively quickly to the new reality after the curse breaking, other territories had been slower to accept the transformation in vampire politics and nutrition.

"They'll change their minds once they see the results," I said confidently. "The Seattle trials showed a ninety-three percent satisfaction rate with the new formula."

Kane's hand found mine in the space between our chairs, his thumb tracing absent patterns on my skin. The familiar warmth of the mate bond hummed between us, no longer the disorienting force it had once been but something comfortable and strengthening.

"It's not just the substitutes they're coming to evaluate," he reminded me. "It's us. This partnership. The integration of Floramancy and Drake Orchards."

Drake it had freed us both from centuries of inherited distrust and competition.

"I should call him tonight, then," I said, already reaching for my phone.

Kane covered my hand with his, stopping the movement. "Later," he said, his voice dropping to that particular tone that still sent delightful shivers down my spine. "Right now, I have other priorities."

I raised an eyebrow, fighting a smile. "More important than revolutionary vampire nutrition?"

"Much more important," he assured me, setting aside his own glass and drawing me from my chair into his lap with effortless strength. "Scientific breakthroughs come and go. This—" he brushed his lips against my temple, "—is eternal."

The mate bond hummed in agreement, strengthening as it always did with proximity and intent. Unlike the initial chaotic force it had been, our connection had matured into something deeper and more nuanced—less overwhelming but more profound.

"Eternal is a very long time, Mr. Drake," I teased, settling more comfortably against him. "You might get bored with a simple botanist."

His arms tightened around me. "Never," he said with unexpected fierceness. "Even if we had a thousand years, it wouldn't be enough."

The sincerity in his voice touched something deep within me. For all his business acumen and political maneuvering, Kane was still capable of disarming honesty that cut through everything else.

"I was joking," I said more softly, resting my hand against his chest where his heart beat with its unnaturally slow rhythm. "I know."

"Do you?" he asked, searching my eyes. "Do you really know what you mean to me, Willow? What this partnership has given me?"

I thought about the changes in him over the past six months—the gradual softening of his rigid control, the increased willingness to share not just power but vulnerability, the way he'd integrated into my much simpler life while still maintaining the parts of his that mattered.

"I think I do," I answered honestly. "It's the same thing you've given me. A future that's better because it's shared."

Something in his expression shifted, tension I hadn't even noticed releasing. "Yes," he said simply. "Exactly that."

The sun had nearly set now, painting Haven's Cross in deepening shades of purple and blue. Below, my shop was closed for the evening, though the sanctuary in the back still hummed with activity as Martin oversaw the evening treatments for those vampires still adjusting to the new blood substitutes.

Tomorrow would bring challenges—skeptical vampire delegates, business negotiations, carefully calibrated demonstrations of our botanical breakthroughs. We would face them as we'd faced everything since breaking the curse: together, as equal partners with complementary strengths.

But tonight was just for us—the simple pleasure of togetherness on my modest balcony, with plants that responded to our combined presence and the promise of something that might actually be eternal stretching before us.

"I have something for you," Kane said suddenly, shifting me slightly so he could reach into his pocket. "I was going to wait until after the delegation left, but... now seems right."

He withdrew a small box—not the velvet jewelry case I momentarily expected, but something older and more worn, crafted from dark wood with intricate botanical carvings across its surface.

"This belonged to my mother," he explained, placing it carefully in my hands.

I opened it with appropriate reverence, gasping softly at what lay inside. Nestled on a bed of preserved moss was a seed—unusual in size and appearance, with a pearlescent shell that seemed to shift colors in the fading light.

"From her personal garden," Kane continued. "A hybrid she was working on when she died. Part bloodroot, part something else she never named in her journals. It's the last one."

The significance of this gift wasn't lost on me. Kane, who had spent centuries collecting and preserving his family's legacy, was entrusting me with something irreplaceable.

"Kane, I can't—"

"You can," he interrupted gently. "You're the only one who should. Whatever it grows into, it should be nurtured by both bloodlines. That's what she would have wanted, I think."

I closed the box carefully, holding it against my heart. "We'll plant it together," I promised. "In the special section of the greenhouse."

His smile was answer enough, warm and genuine in a way that still seemed miraculous after the cold, controlled vampire king I'd first encountered.

"Partners in all things," he murmured, drawing me back against him.

"Partners in all things," I agreed, the mate bond humming in perfect harmony between us.

Tomorrow would bring vampire politics and business negotiations. The night after that, we'd return to his penthouse for some event or another requiring Kane's expensive suits and my increasingly elegant wardrobe. The perfect balance we'd struck between my simpler life and his more complicated one.

But right now, on this ordinary balcony as twilight settled over Haven's Cross, we were simply Kane and Willow—no longer Drake and Florence, no longer vampire and witch, no longer king and commoner.

Just partners, in all the ways that mattered.

And that, more than broken curses or botanical breakthroughs, was the true miracle we'd created together.