Elizabeth started to feel a little anxious, left at home and not knowing where Mom and Matt were. Particularly in an emergency. Matt was a little unpredictable in emergencies. He got flustered easily sometimes, but he did always work very hard to fix things. Sometimes he could be focused and organized and decisive. And sometimes he could be reduced to bumbling confusion. There was no way of knowing which version of Matt might appear.

And so she was quite surprised when the garage door opened about an hour later with Mom holding an empty baby carrier and Matt behind her holding an actual baby.

"Oh my god!" she exclaimed, genuinely not knowing what else to say. "What…?"

Matt looked to Margaret, who gave him an encouraging smile. "Come up to the bedroom with me," he said to Elizabeth. "I'll explain."

Elizabeth didn't really like the sound of that. What on earth did he need to explain? "Matt, whose baby is that?" she asked, following him up the stairs. The baby was sleeping, so she kept her voice low, practically hissing at him.

"That's what I need to explain," he answered cryptically, his voice also low. The baby slept peacefully in his arms, as she had since he'd finished feeding her earlier. He'd cradled her close like this ever since, not putting her down for a moment. He never wanted to let her go.

They went into their bedroom and closed the door. Matt sat down on the bed with the baby and Elizabeth sat beside him. She gazed down at the sleeping infant swaddled in Matt's arms in a pink blanket with a little white hat on her head. Elizabeth felt her heart melt. "She's beautiful," she whispered, reaching out to lightly trace over the baby's little button nose.

"Yes, she is," Matt agreed with a smile.

"What's her name?" she asked, her whole focus still on that beautiful little girl.

Matt hesitated for a moment. "Well, I guess that's part of it…"

Elizabeth frowned and looked up, searching his face for explanation. "Alright. From the beginning," she instructed.

He hesitated again. "Here, hold her," he insisted. He wanted Elizabeth to be holding the baby as he explained. It would be right somehow, he thought. And as much as he didn't want to let that little girl go, he felt suddenly quite compelled that Elizabeth should hold her.

Unfortunately, Elizabeth didn't have a lot of experience holding babies. Working with them wasn't really the same thing. And it had been a long time since she'd done that. Although Matt had even less experience than she did. He barely touched his niece and nephew when they were little. But they hadn't been in Exeter much when the kids were babies.

Elizabeth did her best to not wake the baby as she took her from Matt. As soon as she was settled and the baby slept on undisturbed, a warm feeling in her chest spread all over her as she looked down at the little pink angel in her arms.

"She was abandoned at your mother's office," Matt began. Rather bluntly, but that couldn't quite be helped.

"What!?" Elizabeth was horrified at the very thought of such an awful thing.

"Not for too long," Matt assured her. "And your mother had an idea of whose baby it was. The baby's absolutely fine, and I fed her, and she's been sleeping ever since."

Elizabeth grinned, unable to help interrupting. "You fed her?"

He smiled back, feeling his face get a little warm. "Your mother showed me how. She mixed the formula and prepared the bottle and such, but yes, I fed her. It was quite nice actually."

For some reason, Elizabeth wanted to cry at that. The image in her head of Matt holding this tiny baby and giving her a bottle was just the sweetest thing in the world.

Matt continued, "While I fed her, your mum was able to get in touch with the birth mother. She's only eighteen and her family is difficult and she...well, she doesn't want the baby."

"How could anyone not want their baby? Especially one so perfect?" Elizabeth wondered aloud. Her eyes stung with tears, and she wasn't quite sure where they came from. A second ago she was overwhelmed with affection for her darling husband being so gentle with a baby and now she had an ache in her stomach at the thought of a person not wanting their baby. This baby, especially. Somehow, somewhere deep in her heart, Elizabeth felt like this baby was special.

Matt's voice interrupted her thoughts. "I think…" He trailed off, unsure how his idea would be received, suddenly worried Elizabeth might get upset. It was an absolutely mad thing to even contemplate. He hardly knew how to explain it.

But then his beautiful, wonderful wife looked up at him with a sparkle in her eyes that somehow made him fall in love with her all over again. "Can we keep her?" she asked, her voice barely above a whisper, as though speaking the words too loudly would jinx them.

In that moment, Matt started to laugh. Or cry. Both, possibly. "I was going to ask you the same thing," he said. It was miraculous and somehow perfect that they'd both had the same marvelous idea.

Elizabeth smiled again. "As soon as I looked at her, something...I don't know," she said. She was still somewhat awed by the whole thing. It didn't feel real. It all felt like some dream, too wonderful to be possible. And yet it felt like the rightest thing in all the world.

"I know exactly what you mean," Matt said. "Just wait till she wakes up. She was crying when we found her, and I picked her up and she looked at me when I first held her and, I don't know, I felt like she was ours already. Like we've been waiting all this time for her."

That was exactly how she felt. This deep feeling inside her, that's what this was. It was as though this was their baby, and they'd all been waiting for each other all this time. She looked down at that perfect little girl and a tear fell from Elizabeth's face and landed on the baby's blanket. Elizabeth shifted her slightly in her arms so she could reach up with one hand to wipe her eyes. "Matt, what's her name?" she asked.

"Apparently she doesn't have one," he said. "She's just been called Baby Girl Smith. But I think we should call her Annie."

"Annie?"

"Her birth mother's name. And that's just it...she wants to sign away parental rights. She wants the baby to be adopted. She told your mother over the phone. She begged her to find someone to adopt the baby. And Elizabeth, I think it's us. And if we can finally have our child, I think she should be named for the person who brought her into the world and who's giving us this gift," Matt said.

Elizabeth thought briefly about how good Matt was with words and if only he could manage to get some of them onto a page to write his book. But that wasn't important right now. What mattered right now was that Matt was absolutely right. "Annie," Elizabeth whispered. As soon as she said it aloud, she knew that was perfect. The baby in her arms was Annie. Their Annie. She bent down and pressed a soft kiss to the baby's forehead.

At that, little Annie started to stir. She wiggled a little and her lashes fluttered as she opened her eyes. And as Elizabeth looked into those bright baby blue eyes, she knew. She found her daughter. And she had become a mother.