Page 83 of Wild Hearts

I wanted to be with him.

On Christmas Eve, Dakota and Walker met me at my office to help load my car with gifts and donations.

There were people who had lost more than her. Who didn't have the basic necessities. I hoped she saw that she wasn't the only one going through something big and scary.

We stopped at the first house, and I knocked on the door. Walker and Addison held the bags containing the gifts. This foster family had nine kids, ranging from eight to eighteen. The mother was a teacher, and the father some kind of software engineer. They did this because they loved helping others and always took in the older kids who were harder to place.

They were adopting each child one by one too, which warmed my heart. They didn't have a lot of money with that many kids, but they made it work.

Meghan opened the door. "Addison. The kids will be so excited you're here."

We spent a lot of time talking on the phone about how much she spent on groceries and how crazy her household was, butthe love was always apparent with her. She hugged me. "Come in. Come in."

Walker and Addison set the bags in front of the tree, and the kids piled into the room, sitting on the floor and every available surface.

"Dakota, do you want to hand them out?"

"Sure." She reached into the bag and called out the name for the first present, then continued until they were gone. Then we watched while they opened the presents.

I knew that Meghan would buy her own presents for them on Christmas. But these were things they needed like clothes and books. She saved all year to buy the other things they wanted, like brand-name sneakers and electronics.

When the kids were busy with the presents, I handed Meghan a Christmas card. Inside was a gift card for a local big-box store where she could buy food, clothes, and any other items.

She covered my hand with hers. "I know what's in here, and you shouldn't spend so much."

"I don't have a family of my own. Let me do this."

Her eyes filled with tears. Then she nodded toward Dakota and Walker. "You will soon, won't you?"

"I don't know."

"They're here for you now and having a great time." Then she lowered her voice. "Didn't you date Walker in school?"

"Yeah, but Dakota just lost her mother. They're going through a lot."

She patted my hand. "And you'll be there for them."

"I will."

"You're a good woman. You deserve everything."

"Thank you, Meghan." We turned our attention to the kids. The youngest, Bennett, was playing with a new toy, and Dakota got on the floor to play with him.

"If you need a sitter, Dakota has been watching her little cousin, Joey. She adores kids."

Meghan waved a hand at the older kids. "We have plenty of built-in babysitters here."

Megan ran a smooth household. Everyone pitched in, whether it was helping a younger child with homework or cooking a meal. She wanted the kids to care about one another and to be independent.

Eventually, I gathered our things. "We'd better get to the next house. Have a good Christmas."

Meghan hugged me, and we said our goodbyes. On the way, Walker said, "You're close to your charges."

"Meghan's one of my favorites. She's a school teacher and doesn't have much, but she's opened her house to those kids, and now she's adopting them. She's a dream foster parent. We spend a lot of time talking on the phone about how she feeds all of them. She's always telling me how many cartons of eggs she's buying because they eat an incredible amount of food."

"Thank you for letting me come. It was fun to hand out presents. I felt like Santa," Dakota said from the back seat.

"You're welcome to work with my office on any of the charity drives we have going on. I'll let you know when the next one is."

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