Page 43 of Phoenix's Rising
"Daddy's home!"
The door flies open, and my three-year-old daughter barrels into my legs with the force of a tiny hurricane.
"Daddy! Daddy! You're home!"
I scoop her up, settling her on my hip as she wraps her arms around my neck. "Hey, sweetheart. Were you good for Mama today?"
"Always good," she declares with the confidence only a three-year-old can muster.
I look down at her, and my heart does what it always does when I see my daughter. It swells so big I can barely breathe. She has Ivy's auburn hair, though it's curlier. Has my dark eyes andsharp chin. She's wearing a pink dress that's already stained with what looks like paint, and there are streaks of blue in her hair.
"Art project?" I guess.
"We made a dragon!" she announces proudly. "A big blue dragon with fire and wings and it's hanging on the 'frigerator!"
"Can't wait to see it." I kiss her forehead, breathing in the scent of baby shampoo and paint. "Where's Mama?"
"Living room with Charlie. He's being fussy."
Of course he is. My one-year-old son has discovered his voice recently and likes to use it. Loudly. Frequently. Usually at three in the morning.
I carry my daughter, Rose, named after Ivy's mother, into the living room and stop in the doorway.
Ivy is on the couch, our son Charlie cradled against her chest. She's wearing yoga pants and one of my old Iron Phoenix t-shirts, her hair pulled back in a messy ponytail. There are dark circles under her eyes. Charlie was up half the night teething, but she's smiling as she rocks him gently.
She looks up when she hears us, and her whole face lights up.
"Hey," she says. "How was your day?"
"Long." I set Rose down, and she immediately runs to her toy box in the corner. "But better now."
I cross to the couch and lean down to kiss Ivy. It's meant to be quick, just a greeting, but she cups my face and deepens it slightly, and I remember all over again why I fell in love with her.
When we break apart, she's smiling. "Missed you."
"Missed you too." I settle onto the couch beside her, and Charlie immediately reaches for me with chubby hands. "Hey, little man. You giving Mama trouble again?"
Charlie babbles something incomprehensible and grabs my finger, shoving it into his mouth.
"Still teething," Ivy confirms. "He's been fussy all day. I tried the frozen washcloth, the teething rings, everything. Nothing's working."
"Want me to take him for a bit? Give you a break?"
"In a minute." She leans against me, her head on my shoulder. "Right now, I just want to sit here with my family."
My family.
The words still feel surreal sometimes.
Five years ago, I was a man who'd convinced himself he'd always be alone. That my life was too dangerous, too complicated, too violent for anyone else to share. I had my club, my brothers, my purpose, and I'd told myself that was enough.
Then Ivy knocked on my door at four in the morning, and everything changed.
Still, these last few years have been rough. The war with the Vipers was brutal and bloody, and there were moments I thought we wouldn't make it. Moments I thought I'd lose everything I'd just found.
But we survived. We won. And in the aftermath, Ivy and I built something I never dreamed possible.
She studied online while we rebuilt, earned her teaching certificate while pregnant with Rose. Started teaching second grade at Millhaven Elementary the year after Rose was born, though between two pregnancies in three years, she's spent more time at home than in the classroom.
