They'd begun a family immediately, neither of them had been willing to wait. Time was far too precious to them both.
And, oh, he made beautiful babies! There was Tessa, with black hair and green-gold eyes; Connor, with blond hair and dark eyes; and yet another on the way.
She pressed a palm to her abdomen, smiling. She loved being a mother. Adored being married to him. She doubted any woman had ever been more completely and unconditionally loved.
She knew her husband would never stray, so highly did he value that which he'd waited nearly six thousand years to know, so precious was it to him: love. She knew he would be there with her until the very end, that he would cherish each wrinkle, every line in her face, because in the final analysis they were not a negation of life but an affirmation of a life well lived. Proof positive of laughter and tears, of joy and grief, of passion, of living. Every facet of being human was amazing to him, each and every change of season a triumph, a taste of unbearable sweetness. Never had a man lived who savored life more.
Life was rich and full.
She couldn't have asked for more.
Well... actually... she amended with a little inner flinch, she could have.
Though most of the time she looked at Adam and just felt awed and humbled that this big, wonderful man had given up so much to love her, sometimes she hated that he didn't have a soul, and sometimes she wanted to hate God.
And she had a dream, a silly dream perhaps, but a dream to which she clung.
They would live to be a hundred, until long after their children and grandchildren were grown, and one day they would go to bed and lie down facing each other, and die like that, at the same moment, in each other's arms.
And this was her dream: that maybe, just maybe, if she loved him hard enough and true enough and deep enough, and if she held on to him tightly enough as they died, she could take him with her wherever it was that souls went. And there she would do what was in her blood, what she now knew she'd been born for; she would stand before God, a brehon, and she would argue the greatest, the most important case of her life.
And she would win.
* * *
"I don't understand, Daddy." Tessa said. "Why did the rabbit have to lose his fur to be real?"
Adam closed the book. The Velveteen Rabbit, and glanced down at his daughter.
She was tucked in bed, blankets to her chin, staring up at him. His precious Tessa, with her oodles of shiny black ringlets tumbling around her chubby angelic face, with her quick mind, and incessant curiosity, and her daddy's heart wrapped oh-so-snugly around her chubby little finger.
"Because that's part of becoming real."
"Eew. I don't want to be real. I want to be pretty like the fairy queen. Oops"— she clapped a tiny hand over her- mouth— "wasn't 'posed to say that."
In the doorway, Gabby gasped softly, and Adam glanced up immediately, arching a brow at her, a silent question in his eyes.
I've never told her anything about fairies, Gabby mouthed. Have you?
He shook his head. They'd both assumed Tessa wasn't a Sidhe-seer. Gabrielle hadn't seen a single Tuatha Dé since that day Darroc had ambushed them in Scotland five years ago, and they'd assumed Aoibheal must have stripped the Fae-vision from the O'Callaghan line.
"What fairy queen, Tessa?" Adam said softly. "It's okay, you can tell me."
Tessa eyed him doubtfully. "She said you'd get mad if you knew she came."
"I won't get mad," he assured her, smoothing her tousled ringlets.
"Promise, Daddy?"
"Promise. Cross my heart. What fairy queen, sweet?"
"Ah-veel."
Adam inhaled sharply, glancing at Gabrielle again.
"Does Aoibheal come to see you, Tessa?" Gabby said softly, moving into the room, joining Adam on the edge of Tessa's bed.
Tessa shook her head. "Not me. She comes to see Daddy. She thinks he's pretty."
Adam bit back a laugh at the look his wife shot him then, her eyes narrowed, dainty nostrils flared. She all but growled. He loved that she got a little jealous sometimes, adored her possessiveness. Suffered from his own fair share of it where his petite ka-lyrra was concerned.
"Pretty, huh?" Gabby said dryly.
"Mmm-hmm, " Tessa said, rubbing her eyes sleepily. "But I can't see it no matter how hard I try."
Okay, now, that miffed him a bit, Adam thought, disgruntled. Before Tessa had been born, he'd pored over piles of parenting books, determined to be a good father. He thought he'd been doing a fine job, but wasn't his daughter supposed to have stars in her eyes whenever she looked at him? At least until she hit her teens? (And then God help the man who tried to date his daughter!) So, he had a few tiny lines around his eyes that hadn't been there before, he was still a handsome man! "You don't think I'm pretty, eh, Tessa?" He tickled his daughter's neck, right behind her ear, where it never failed to make her limp with laughter.