Page 157 of Dark Witch

“Now you’ll never have to know.” She gave herself over to the kiss, and all the promises in it. “You’ll never have to do without me.” She held on, tight, tight. “We did win tonight, in so many ways. In ways he’ll never understand. We have love. He doesn’t know what it means. We have love.”

“I’m marrying a witch.” Hauling her off her feet, he circled with her. “I’m a lucky man.”

“Oh, you really, really are. When?”

“When?”

“When are we getting married?”

“Tomorrow would do me.”

Delighted, she laughed. “Not that soon. Talk about boots-first. I need a fabulous dress, and I need Nan to be here. And I haven’t met your family.”

“A lot of them are right in this house.”

“That’s true. We won’t wait too long, but long enough to do it right.”

“I have to buy you a ring. The boys were right, after all. I need to get you something shiny.”

“Absolutely.”

“And you’re right, too, it has to wait a little bit of time. At least long enough to get a booking at Ballintubber Abbey.”

“At...” Joy all but drowned her. “You’d marry me there?”

“It’s what you want, isn’t it? And by God, it seems it’s what I want as well. There, in the ancient and holy place. It’s what’s meant for us.”

He grabbed her hands, yanked them to his lips, then laughed down at her. “You’ll be mine, and I’ll be yours. That’s what I want.”

She laid her cheek on his heart. Love, she thought, given freely, taken willingly.

There was no stronger magick.

“It’s what I want,” she murmured, then smiled when she heard Alastar bugle. “He knows I’m happy.” She tipped her head back. “Let’s go tell everybody else, and pop that champagne.”

With wine and music and light, she thought. They’d come through the fire, beaten back the dark for another day.

And now, on the longest day, when the light refused to surrender, she was loved. At last.

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