An Arizona police officer has adopted a little girl who he met two years ago while comforting her during a welfare call.

Lt. Brian Zach of the Kingman Police Department was working a night shift as a police sergeant in March of 2018 when he was called to conduct a welfare check on the home of Kaila, a 2 year-old with severe injuries. Her situation immediately reminded him of a 13-month-old homicide victim that had haunted him since 2011.

“I didn’t get to save that girl,” Zach told People Magazine. “Kaila was my second chance for that.”

When Zach showed up at Kaila’s home that night, they immediately bonded.

“We colored, we snacked … she held my hand and she was just this cute little thing,” Zach said.

“She was just the cutest little girl that immediately just tugged at my heart,” he added. “She would grab my hand and put it on her lap and she would hold my hand and kind of just pet my hand.”

Zach spent five hours with Kaila that night, and afterwards, she was removed from her home by child protective services because her injuries and bruises. The abuse that Kaila was suffering at the hands of her caregivers was so bad that she had to be treated for a skull fracture, brain bleed and dislocated elbow.

While Kaila recovered in the hospital, Zach was trying to figure out a way to bring her home.

“I [came home and] told my wife about this adorable little girl that I met and I just wanted to bring her home,” he said as he laughed. “In the past 15 years, if my wife had a dollar for every time that I said that, we’d be pretty rich.”

This situation, however, turned out to be very different. When officials told Zach that they were having trouble finding somewhere to place Kaila, he immediately stepped up.

“When they remove [a child from a home], they want to place with family first,” he explained. “But if they can’t have family, they can go to a foster home. What they did in our case is they used our relationship from bonding that first night for what they call a fictive kinship.”

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Children’s Bureau states that fictive kinship involves placing children with close family friends instead of family.

Just four days after Zach and Kaila first met, she was placed in his home.

“As soon as I opened the car door, her face lit up,” he recalled. “She recognized me and she reached for me, and she made me hold her hand and walk her in the house.”

Kaila fit in from the start with Zach, his wife Cierra and their two children Raina, 19, and Trevin, 17.

The state eventually determined that Kaila should not be returned to her biological parents’ custody, which opened the door for Zach to officially adopt her.

“When her family didn’t step up or pass the qualifications for them to be a placement for her, we knew that this girl, she needed love, she needed a family,” he said.

Zach added that he was overwhelmed when the adoption became official.

“When the judge basically said ‘Congratulations,’ [I felt] this huge sigh of relief, knowing that I’ll never have that worry again about her,” Zach remembered. “She’ll always be with us, she’ll be loved, she’ll be cared for.”

These days, the police officer’s family can’t imagine life without Kaila.

“She is the wittiest, most full of character little girl you’ll ever meet,” Zach said. “She says the funniest, off-the-wall things. She’s definitely brightened up our world.”