---

---

A year later — two, perhaps — she had a child.

Sebastian held the baby on the day they brought her home and looked at her with the expression of a man who had not been prepared for this particular variety of feeling.

"She has your stubbornness already," he said. "I can tell from the way she's holding her fists."

"Give her here," Eliana said.

He transferred the baby carefully, and came to sit beside her on the bed, close enough that their shoulders were touching.