A/N: Well, another slow update, but at this time of year I'm doing good if I'm bringing home less than 50 pounds of papers to grade :-P School is almost over (2 more weeks!), and then I'll have more time to write--to finish this story and begin the third in the series (which will be a big, comprehensive epic like It Could Happen to You was instead of a smaller-scale Maddie/Danny tale like this one).
Anyway, some cute family moments here for you, and the re-introduction of a little drama. Mac & Stella and Aiden & Flack are still around, and coming up later, so don't worry--I haven't forgotten them!
As always, enjoy!
Danny crouched beside a pool of blood, snapping photographs before collecting a sample and packing it in his kit. He stood slowly, surveying the room where yet another New Yorker had met an untimely end, and sighed.
He raised his camera and was about to take a few more pictures when his cell phone rang. Pulling it out of his pocket, he answered smartly, "Messer."
Across the room, Stella was busy with her own camera and samples, moving carefully around the tiny apartment as she worked, paying no attention to Danny—until he hung up the phone. She glanced over at him briefly as he pocketed his cell and caught the wide grin on his face.
"Who was that?" she asked, studying him closely.
His blue eyes flashed with excitement as he answered. "Our case worker from Child Services," he told her.
"And?" Stella prompted.
Danny's smile widened. "The application was approved," he replied happily. "We can file the petition now to adopt Shayla."
"Oh Danny, that's great!" she exclaimed, hurrying over to him and throwing her arms around him. "She's really going to be yours!"
He hugged her back with a laugh. "She really is." He squeezed her tightly before releasing her, flicking his wrist into view to check his watch. "Maddie and Shayla are both in school, but if I leave now I can catch 'em at the bell." He glanced at Stella, suddenly remembering they were in the middle of an investigation, and the smile faded from his face. "Or, I could just call…"
She, in turn, took another look around the crime scene and shook her head. "We're almost done here," she reminded him. "I'll finish up and meet you back at the lab in an hour?"
"You sure?" he asked, the glimmer returning to his eyes.
"Yeah," she smiled. "This is news that should be delivered in person."
Twenty minutes later Danny burst through the door of Maddie's classroom. "Where is she?" he bellowed.
Maddie jumped nearly out of her skin and whipped around to face him, forgetting the experiment she had been setting up for her Chemistry classes. "What the hell?" she demanded breathlessly, despite the fact that she was still on school grounds. "Where's who?"
"Shayla," he replied, a huge grin spreading across his face. "Our daughter."
Maddie shook her head a little, trying to shake off the surprise and confusion as she crossed the room. "She's getting her stuff from her locker," she told him. "Danny, what's going on?"
He took a breath, deep and slow, in an attempt to calm himself down, knowing that if he didn't tell her the whole story right away he'd get so excited he'd never get it all out. When he was satisfied that he would be able to string together a few sentences, he smiled again. "I was at a crime scene with Stella, and my phone rang," he began, his voice low and steady.
Maddie suddenly knew what he was going to say, but she wanted to hear him speak the words aloud, to know that she wasn't dreaming the whole thing. "And?"
"It was Shayla's social worker," he continued. "She called me because she knew you were in school and wouldn't be answering your phone…"
"Danny!" she almost shouted, grabbing his shoulders and digging her fingers into the material of his coat. "What did she say?"
He laughed and slid his arms around her waist, his eyes twinkling down into hers. "The application was approved."
Her eyes went wide and she threw her arms around his neck, pulling him roughly against her. "Approved!" she exulted, holding him tightly. "Oh, Danny, it's really gonna happen…"
"She's gonna be safe and happy," he agreed, stroking her hair.
Maddie drew back a little, loosening her grip on her husband and smiling gently as she leaned her forehead against his. "…and ours."
He pushed a lock of hair from her face and brushed his lips contentedly over hers, pausing a moment before leaning in for a second, deeper kiss.
"I knew I should have waited," a female voice teased from the doorway.
The couple broke apart and laughed when they saw Shayla smirking at them, her arms folded across her chest.
"We were celebrating," Maddie explained, the joy evident in her voice.
The girl raised an eyebrow at her foster mother as she moved into the room. "Celebrating what?"
Maddie reached up and kissed Danny lightly, her blue eyes bright. "You tell her."
"Tell me what?" the girl asked again, her voice becoming more insistent.
"You're stuck with us, kiddo," he grinned, letting go of his wife to turn toward his foster daughter. "It's almost official now. The application for adoption was approved this afternoon…all we have to do now is file the petition in juvenile court…"
Danny kept talking, but Shayla didn't hear anything else. "Approved?" she interrupted. "The application was approved?"
"Yep," Maddie confirmed. "Home will legally be home pretty soon."
The smile on Shayla's face said it all. She ran to her parents and flung her arms around them both, bear-hugging them until it hurt, whispering one happy word.
"Home."
"There," Shayla smiled, placing the last pin in Trina Baker's hair. "Perfect."
"Can I go show Dantrell?" the younger girl asked skeptically. "I want a man's opinion."
Shayla laughed. "He's in the living room with your grandmother."
Trina hurried from the room to find her brother while Shayla began to clean up the mess they had made getting Trina ready for her first date. Hair pins, curling irons, straightening lotion, hair spray, rollers, barrettes, and ribbons were strewn around the room, accompanying the myriad of clothing articles tossed on the bed and floor. Shayla moved slowly, hanging up the discarded outfits and gathering the hair accessories together, singing softly to herself as she worked.
"Hanging By A Moment, eh?" Dantrell smiled, appearing in the doorway.
Shayla stopped and turned, slightly embarrassed that he had heard her singing. "Yeah," she replied. "It's sort of the theme song of my life right now. You know…I'm living for the only thing I know…I'm running and not quite sure where to go…And I don't know what I'm tapping into…Just hanging by a moment here with you… Kinda sums up the whole adoption process…and getting away from Antwan…and getting ready to go to college…all of that."
"I guess it does," he returned thoughtfully. "Speaking of the adoption, I heard you tell Trina that the application was approved today."
Her smile brightened instantly. "It was. All we have to do now is file the petition in court and wait for some judge to grant it."
"And then you'll be Shayla Messer," he grinned.
She stopped cleaning up and looked at him. "What?"
"You didn't know? You'll have the option to change your last name when the petition goes through," he told her. "You can stay Shayla Green if you want to, or you can take your parents' name."
"I didn't know that," she said slowly.
He moved into the room and sat down on his sister's bed. "What do you think you'll do?"
She shook her head. "I don't know," she said. "I'm not really attached to 'Green'—it's my birth mother's last name and I don't exactly have fond memories of living with her. But I don't know how Danny and Maddie would feel about me becoming a Messer, either."
"They'd be thrilled," he grinned. "But maybe you should talk to them about it."
She nodded and continued hanging up Trina's clothes. "Maybe I will."
Danny arrived home later that evening, pushing the apartment door open tiredly to find Maddie relaxing on the couch. Her brown curls were shining in the dim candlelight as they fell over her shoulders, and a contented smile was perched on her lips.
"Hey babe," she called warmly.
He moved further into the apartment, leaving his bag at the entrance and draping his coat over a chair, settling on the couch beside her. "Hey beautiful," he answered quietly.
She leaned over and kissed him gently, running a hand over his chest. He smiled softly in return, wrapping an arm around her and drawing her closer, dropping a light kiss near her ear when her lips drew away from his.
"You always know," he told her, a note of wonder in his voice.
She smiled and rested her head on his shoulder. "Know what?"
"You always know exactly what I need," he finished. "I never have to tell you when I've had a bad day, or when I want to celebrate, or when I need to be alone. You just always know."
"Because I know you," she explained with a smile. "And don't sound so amazed. You do the same thing for me, too. Whatever I need, you know it…sometimes even before I do."
That surprised him. "I do?"
"Mmhmm." She didn't say anything else, recognizing that there was something on his mind, but allowing him the time he needed to gather his thoughts.
Danny held his wife close, his free hand placed protectively on her rounded abdomen. He needed to talk to her, his partner, the love of his life—he didn't have to bear his burdens alone.
"Where's Shayla?" he asked.
"At the Bakers'," Maddie replied, "helping Trina get ready for her date."
"That's right," he remembered.
Maddie waited for a moment to see if he would continue, but this time when he remained silent she spoke up. "So do you want to talk about the trial?"
He smiled a little, marveling again at how she could almost read his thoughts. He had been worrying all week about testifying against his father and Michael Sassone, and she had known without asking. "It isn't the trial that's bothering me so much," he decided. "I think I've made my peace with that finally, but getting that phone call today from Child Services, and then from the DA about testifying tomorrow…"
His voice trailed off and she turned her head to catch a glimpse of the worry written all over his face. "Danny, honey, what is it?"
He took a deep breath and poured all his anxiety into his words. "What if the Utzielis come after Shayla? My father and Michael Sassone are probably going to prison for a very long time, but they still have allies in the family…"
"Didn't you make a deal with Mr. Utzieli?" she asked. "You testify only to what you and your father did, and to what Michael set up, but nothing about the rest of the family…and they leave us alone."
"I did," he nodded slowly. "And Mr. Utzieli is old school Mafia—he'll keep his promise. It's the rest of the family I'm worried about. They might not try anything with her, but we'll have to be careful anyway, and she won't even know why."
"She might just chalk it up to fatherly protectiveness," Maddie smiled. "Or think that you're still worried about Antwan's gang."
"Maybe," he said, his frown deepening. "But she's about to become our daughter, and she doesn't even know who she's dealing with."
Maddie laid a hand on his chest, playing absently with the buttons of his shirt. "Then maybe we should tell her."
"I don't want to put all that on her," he told her, shaking his head. "The poor kid's been through enough already…" He sighed, taking her hand in his and squeezing it. "This is the same thing I went through before I told you about my past. God! I wish I was a better man…then my family wouldn't have to suffer because of what I did…"
"Hey," she reprimanded gently. "You are a good man. Your past might be ugly, but it made you who you are now, and I love you."
Danny opened his mouth to reply, but stopped short when he heard keys rattling outside the door. A moment later it swung open and a bright-eyed Shayla tromped into the room. She dropped the bags full of date-preparation items she had dragged over to the Bakers' for Trina, then noticed the candlelight and her foster parents cuddled together on the couch.
"Am I interrupting again?" she asked, a little worried that she really was intruding this time.
Maddie released Danny and patted the couch cushion between them. "Nope. We were just talking."
Shayla moved toward the couch hesitantly. "You sure?"
"Of course," Danny answered with a smile. "How'd Trina's date go?"
"Total bust," the girl replied, plopping down between her parents. "The guy showed up half an hour late, took her to some dirt bike race at Madison Square Garden, and spilled soda on her new blouse and didn't even apologize for it."
"Some guys are jerks," he told her.
"Not everyone can be Danny," Maddie teased. "A picnic in Battery Park and a kiss on the observation deck of the Empire State Building made a pretty good evening."
Shayla smiled. "Well, I can tell Trina there really are some good ones out there." She sat for a moment in silence, the smile fading slowly from her face as she recalled the other revelation of the evening.
"What is it, sweetheart?" Danny asked.
"Dantrell mentioned to me something about being able to change my last name when the adoption petition was granted. I-I've been thinking about it all night…and I'm not sure yet…but I think I might want to do it."
"You want to be Shayla Messer?" Danny said, surprised.
She nodded, looking from one parent to the other. "You've taken such good care of me even though I'm not yours. I was just some charity case in one of Maddie's classes, but you took me in, and never treated me with anything other than love and respect. I can only hope that someday I'll grow up to be as good a person as the two of you are, and I'd be proud to have your name."
Maddie glanced over at her husband, reading the conflict of emotions playing out in his eyes.
What an amazing kid, he thought. Every father should be so lucky…I'd be honored if she had my name. But she doesn't know what kind of family the Messers really are…
His gaze met Maddie's over the top of Shayla's head and he silently asked for her help.
What do we say to her?