I awoke in my own bed. Fraza and Rikku sat next to me and Didymus was on my belly. As I blinked my eyes against the sharp light of morning, Fraza looked up and smiled. “That was a big one, huh?” she asked in a soft and concerned voice.
Rikku, on the other hand, gave me an angry look. “Don’t scare me like that, it’s not nice.”
Fraza smiled at her. “Rikku, dear, why don’t you go and make some breakfast for our bad girl here, and you and Didymus can have the fish I brought over yesterday.”
The mention of the fish made Rikku perk her ears up, and even Didymus looked fairly excited about the promise of fish. I looked at Fraza. “Why did you bring fish over?” I asked her. She sighed. “You know, Tara, sometimes I think your mind is gone already but hasn’t had the decency to tell the rest of you. Yesterday was the anniversary of the day we met and made love four years ago, our full quarter,” she said. She smiled but still looked a bit sad.
I sat up straight and rubbed my head. “You’re right, hon, I totally forgot. This case is preoccupying my mind for most of the time,” I told her.
She nodded. “I know that, Tara, but why don’t you just stop? Train that girl you hired, and give the entire thing over to her,” she said. There were tears in her eyes.
“But what would I do then? What could I do if I did stopped doing this? I am a possessed person; not that many people will hire a possessed former cop, even if her name is Tara Duluc.”
She shook her head. “There is still a place for you in the bar. You could be a barmaid. You would be perfect for it; look at you, you are the prettiest girl I ever had, the best I ever fell in love with.” She sat down next to me and kissed my neck softly.
“I can’t stop, Fraza, not on this case. I need to keep doing this,” I told her.
She looked at me angrily. “Why? Why do you need to keep doing this? That little blue-eyed cunt can do it. What you do may be important, but it’s not that fucking hard to do. Every day you go out to solve cases, and I fear that this will be the one where you die, the one you won’t come back from, and a city official will bring your hat and your jacket to my door, shake my hand and tell me he is sorry.” She picked up the piece of Dragon’s horn that hung around my neck and looked at it. “You lost a friend on that one case, and I lost my mother. I don’t want to lose you also to a case, for you to be a footnote in the newspaper, ‘Murdering painter arrested after finding the body of Tara Duluc.’” She looked at me intently. “I don’t want to have to carry one of your jacket buttons on a necklace to remember you. I want my ring around your finger for you to remember what we feel,” she said.
“Why would I need a ring do that? I always remember how much I love you.”
Fraza stood up and slapped me in the face. “I am asking you to marry me, you dumb fucking bitch,” she said as tears rolled down her face.
I just sat there looking at her, her words slowly settling in my mind, Marry me.
“You want to … Me? But why?” I asked.
She shook her head, “Well, because I have been thinking about this for some time, and I want to spend the rest of my life with you, because I love you,” she replied.
I still did not fully grasp what she had asked me; not that I did not want to but I couldn’t fully yet. I looked up at her and twirled my necklace between my fingers, and then the full extent of her question hit me.
“Of course I will,” I said. I got up, walked to her and kissed her. Fraza looked at me, her eyes wet with tears as she kissed me back and placed her arms around me.
“And let’s move to the seaside like you said; leave this city, just the four of us,” she whispered.
I smiled at her. “Let’s see about that when I am done with this case,” I whispered back, then kissed her lips again. “Come on, let’s eat before Rikku finishes it all out of boredom,” Fraza said, smiling and slapping my ass with her tail as we walked through to the kitchen.  

Next Chapter: Some help from Hud