Slay (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter, #30)

by Laurell K. Hamilton

I don’t like anyone as much as I love you. I would destroy anyone and anything that endangered you, not because I’m your Bride and you force me to care for your safety, but because I am in love with you and you’re in love with me. You’re in love with all of me. You don’t like all of the things I’ve done in my life, but as long as I don’t go back to doing them, you accept my past. You love that I’m ruthless in a fight. You love that I’m violent when it’s needed. You even let me take some of that violence into the bedroom with you and you enjoy it with me. You love all of me, because you have your own ruthlessness, your own violence. You taught me the only true gentleness I’ve ever known. You taught me that kindness isn’t weakness. I’ve learned that I’m just as manly helping Nathaniel cook dinner as I am taking him to the shooting range. You tore my life apart, then showed me I could rebuild it into something better for myself. You wanted me to be happy, even if that made you uncomfortable or unhappy yourself. If you asked me to change, you were willing to change with me and find a better way of being together; for all that and more I would put a bullet through anyone’s head. I would burn the world down if it would keep you safe and meant that we could go on loving each other one more day.”