Page 142 of Against The Tide

Her smile grows bigger. “You did.”

“And I’m going to teach your sisters too. Let’s face it, your mom is still too scared to saddle up, so…”

“I know all of that, it’s just that…I don’t know. I told you it was stupid.”

“Your feelings are never stupid, Iris. It’s understandable that you feel isolated because we don’t have the same name. You’re not the only person to ever feel that way, but here’s the thing…” I wrap my arm around her and pull her into me. “Where do you belong? Where do you feel like you belong? Where’s your home? Where do you feel the most loved?”

“Here.”

“And who makes you feel that way?”

“You and Mom.”

“Why do you think that?”

“Because…” Her voice wavers as she hugs me tighter. “You’re my family.”

“You don’t need to be Iris Reynolds to be family. You don’t need to have my name for me to be your dad. You’re always going to be my first baby girl. No matter what.”

I knew today was going to be hard for her. I think in a lot of ways it’s harder than when we brought the girls home and she had to adapt to sharing Avery with them. In many ways, this little old soul championed me from the moment we met. Sometimes I think that if it wasn’t for her unwavering and unrelenting love of me, her mom’s heart would’ve been a lot harder to conquer.

“Look at me, champ.” Pulling back, I brush the tendrils of hair that have escaped her ponytail from her face. “You don’t need to have my name for me to love you, but if you want it, I would be so proud for you to have it.”

Her eyes widen when I pull the envelope Avery handed me from the pocket of my shorts. Over the last couple of years, Avery and I had this conversation every now and again. After the twins were born, it seemed like the right thing to do, the last piece of the puzzle to our future. Iris and I might not share the same genetics, but she’s as much mine as the two little girls who do.

Taking the envelope from me, she opens it with bated breath. I notice the way she’s picked at her baby blue nails and her thumb is bitten raw at the sides from her anxious gnawing. We’ve had the adoption papers for a few weeks, but we wanted to wait till today to make it special for everyone. Now I wish we hadn’t waited.

“What do you want, baby girl?”

Her audible swallow is followed by a shaky breath as she replies, “What do you want, Doc?”

“I want you to be happy. Whether you’re a Reynolds or a Henderson or anything else.”

“I’m not…not happy.” She smiles. “But…” She swallows again, and this time tears don’t just fill her eyes, they pour in hiccups and sobs that have me pulling her onto my lap and suffocating her with my tight embrace.

“You wanna be a Reynolds?”

“Yes,” she sniffs.

“You realize that Rowan will expect you to call him Uncle Rowan all the time…and Caleb will tease you and prank you as much as he does Scout?”

“Yes.”

“And Callie will keep trying to make you a girly girl.”

A long chuckle bursts from her before her sobs become so hard that she’s trembling.

“Those better be happy tears, Iris Elizabeth Reynolds.”

“Mhhhmmm.” She nods, kneeling up on my lap to bury her face in the crook of my neck.

“I love you, champ.”

“More than my last bite of cake.” She squeezes harder, and I don’t just wish Avery and I had given her the papers sooner, I wish we’d done it after that first conversation we had about me adopting her.

“More than my last crumb of pie.”

“Forever and ever.”