"Mom's okay!"
Tony almost choked in disbelief. "What?"
"I got a call from the hospital last night to say that she was there, so I practically ran there to see her, and she's okay!" Zoe's face was lit up like Tony had never seen it before. "I mean, she's a little beat up and she has to stay in hospital for a few days, but the doctors say she'll make a full recovery, and after I really thought she wasn't coming back... it's like a miracle."
"Oh my God..." said Tony. He mentally tried to form a more coherent sentence, but failed miserably. "Oh my God!" he said again instead, shaking his head and smiling like a madman, not bothering to fight the tears welling up in his eyes.
Zoe grinned widely at his reaction. "I know!"
"What, what happened, where was she? How did she get to the hospital?"
"She was in the basement of some house, she says she escaped."
"I got away from Saunders..." Remembering that day, Tony couldn't help but grin. "Yeah," he said. "She's good at that."
"Okay, I'm gonna ask you what you mean by that some other time... I'm just so happy and relieved, and Dad, you're coming home in less than a week! Everything's finally going right!"
Home...
That word hadn't held much meaning for Tony in a long time, and now... now he was about to have a wife (well, as good as) and a place to live again, and he was going to have a daughter, properly, not just have a window into her life from time to time, and he wondered how long it would take for it to not feel like a dream.
"Yeah," Tony said, and his smile was almost wider than his daughter's.
"It really is, isn't it?"