Piers unbuckled his belt and slipped the leather pouch from it. Rising, he strode to the bathroom and set the coin purse on the counter, hoping there would be steaming-hot showers wherever he ended up next. After Sophie, they were what he liked best about this place.

Returning to the main room, he sat beside her again. “The gold just needs to be turned into a useable currency. You can leave without worry.”

“Leave without worry?” She frowned at him. “What if you don’t get taken? What will you do then?”

He reached for her phone. “Call you. Show me how.”

Her lips thinned. Then she took the phone from him. “Assuming I don’t get taken, either, you’ll have to dial my home number if I leave my cell phone with you.” She opened Contacts, scrolled to House, and showed him how to launch the communication. “If I don’t answer, leave a message. I’ll come back and get you. I can be back tonight.”

“Tonight is Christmas Eve. It seems special to you. You’ll spend it with your family.” He hoped.

“I don’t care if it’s the freaking apocalypse. I’ll come back for you.”

Piers’s heart swooped in his chest. “We’ll meet again, Sophronia mou. In this life, or in the next.”

She shivered at his words. “Maybe the gods will be merciful,” she whispered, her voice thick with tears.

Piers drank in the sight of her, memorizing every detail of her face. His soul recognized her as his, but what that really meant was that he was hers.

“Maybe.” It was his deepest wish. More so than even to return home. Sophie was his home now.

They reached for each other, and there were no more words. There were long kisses and tender touches. There was breath-stealing passion that might have to last them a lifetime, until they met again in the Underworld.

Piers watched the snow fall outside and waited for the call that would change everything. It wasn’t the one he’d made earlier. That had taken some trial and error, but he’d finally reached Novalight Enterprises and then the all-powerful man himself—after a long time spent persuading person after person that Mr. Novalight really wanted to talk to him.