His breakdown was over twenty years in coming, and as he collapsed into her arms and wept—for her, for him, for their Elizabeth—his one true love smoothed his back with her hand. It was all he’d wanted to hear, the confirmation that he hadn’t let her down, not in this one job she had given him.
Not in what had been his most important mission.
“You did just what I asked,” she repeated, over and over again. “You loved her as no other father could possibly have done better.”
When he finally calmed down, he lifted his head and scrubbed his face. Then he focused on his Anne.
The love she had for him was emanating from her, a sun of warmth and healing. And when she said the words, his world slid into a completeness that felt like it had been preplanned, perfectly engineered, created just for him, in spite of his lonely, mournful suffering:
“I love you, Darius.”
The shudder that went through him was gratitude and awe mixed into one. “I love you, oh, Anne… I’ve always loved you.”
“I know.”
As she rose up onto her tiptoes, he leaned down, and their lips met reverently. And then… not long thereafter, with passion.
When Darius came up for air, he couldn’t keep the smile off his face. Especially as he felt the worries and pain of the mortal coil begin to dissolve, peace fulfilling his soul after his work upon the earth was done.
Abruptly, he had to laugh at his good fortune—giggle, was more like it.
Slipping an arm around his beloved’s shoulders, feeling the warmth of her body, scenting her, he had to go there as he regarded the endless horizon: “Ah… so, what’s this place about? They have anything that resembles a bed we could use for a couple of hours. Nights? Months?”
Anne’s laughter was free and easy and like the air he’d needed when he’d been alive: necessary to him. “Yes, as a matter of fact. And so much more.”
“Oh? Tell me all about it.”
“Well.” She put her arm around his waist as they started walking off together. “There’s Milk Duds. And fettuccini alfredo—like in that old movie with Al Brooks and Meryl Streep? We’ve got milkshakes and pies and chocolate, too, all with no calories. Any film or TV show you’ve ever wanted to watch, and book you wanted to read, and place you’ve wanted to go. We have beaches and forests and deserts and mountains. Art and architecture. Fashion. We have everything you can imagine and things I can’t even describe.”
“You’re going to have to teach me all about it.”
Anne grinned up at him. “My pleasure, and it seems only fair.”
God, she was so beautiful. “How so?”
She stopped, and reached up to his face again. “Because you taught me the most important lesson of them all.”
“And what was that,” he asked tensely.
As a spear of worry went through his chest, she allayed any fear he’d ever have.
“That love conquers all.”
Darius started to smile again and so did she. And then he did the most natural thing in the world.
Or the afterlife, as it were.
He kissed his beloved mate until neither one of them could breathe, and wasn’t that just what eternity needed to be all about?
“I’m so looking forward to forever,” he murmured against her lips.
“Me, too, Darius… now that you’re by my side again. Me, too.”