His eyes went wide. “Are you kidding me? Your courage was—and is—astonishing. It would’ve been so much easier for you to follow through with your plan. Instead, you thought of what it would do to your parents, and you put them ahead of yourself. You chose to live with nearly unbearable pain. If that’s not courage, I don’t know what is.”

Moved by his emphatic words, she said, “I realized that day the grief is always going to be with me, that my life was permanently changed, and I had to find a way to live with it or it would destroy me.”

“I’m so glad you found a way.” Holding her face in his hands, he kissed her. “I’m so very glad.”

“I am, too. I would’ve hated to miss out on knowing you.”

Kissing her again, he slayed her with the tender way he held her and touched her, as if she was the most precious thing in the world to him. Wouldn’t that be something if she were?

“I have other less probing questions,” she said, looking to lighten things up again.

“Hit me.”

“What’s your Chinese order?”

“Kung pao chicken extra spicy. You?”

“Broccoli chicken with fried rice. Your Girl Scout cookie of choice?”

“Are there any others besides Thin Mints?”

“Very good answer. I buy extras and freeze them so I have them all year long.”

“I’m incredibly turned on right now.”

Erin’s laugh became a moan when he gripped her bottom and pressed his erection into her belly to show he meant it. “So Girl Scouts turn you on. Good to know.”

“Your year supply of Thin Mints turns me on. Get it right.”

She giggled at his outrage.

“What else you got?” he asked.

“What do you like on a pizza?”

“Meat. Lots of it. You?”

“I knew you were too good to be true,” she said, sighing dramatically. “I’m a veggie girl all the way.”

He crinkled up his nose. “I can’t work with that. Get off me, and let me out of this bed.”

“I can’t take care of that,” she said, moving subtly over his cock, “if I let you out of bed.”

“Good point. Please continue.”

Laughing, she said, “What’s your favorite word?”

“Clean or dirty?”

“Give me one of each.”

“Let me think… For clean, I’d say it’s delectable.”

Erin wondered if there was double meaning in his choice. “That’s a good one.”

“My favorite dirty word is, understandably, pussy.”

Erin groaned as she laughed. “Why am I not surprised, and PS, female body parts are not dirty words.”

“Would you be embarrassed if I used that word in front of your parents? For example, Erin’s pussy is delectable.”

Shrieking, she covered his mouth with her hand. “Don’t you dare do that.”