“I didn’t think so either, but a very accommodating client changed his plans and made it possible for me to stop by on my way to Florida.”

“I’m sure Erin was happy to see you.”

He looked down at her, a stupid grin on his handsome face. “I think she was.”

“Did you get all your errands done, honey?”

Erin began to choke, coughing as Slim patted her back and her mother poured water from the pitcher on her dad’s bedside table.

The racket woke Tom, who also brightened when he saw Slim there. Apparently, Erin wasn’t the only one falling in love with him. “You’re back,” Tom said.

“Just for the night,” Slim said.

“Good to see you.”

“You, too. I hear you’re doing great.”

“That’s right and ready to get out of here.”

“Couple more days, Dad,” Erin said when she’d recovered from the coughing fit.

They stayed until the end of visiting hours, when Tom encouraged them all to go get a good night’s sleep. “I’m fine, and you’ll be no good to me if you get sick from exhaustion,” he said to Mary Beth, who wanted to stay.

He talked her into going home, and Erin and Slim walked her to the car.

“I’m going to stay in town tonight,” Erin said, feeling her face and ears go hot as she basically confessed to her mother that she’d be spending the night with Slim.

“I figured as much. Can I grab you a change of clothes?”

“That’d be great, thanks.”

Mary Beth hugged both of them before getting into the car.

“Okay, that was mortifying,” Erin said after her mother had driven off.

“What was?” Slim put his arm around her as they walked to the hotel.

“Telling my mom that I was staying with you tonight.”

“You’re thirty-eight, Erin.”

“So what? To her, I’m still sixteen and about to sleep with my boyfriend.”

“Did you sleep with your boyfriend at sixteen?”

She elbowed his ribs and realized he gave her cause to do that about once an hour. “You know what I mean. She’s still my mom.”

“I bet she knows we slept together at her house, too.” Since they’d traded off shifts at the hospital, Mary Beth hadn’t been home at the same time they were. “As only one bed was used.”

“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?”

“Every minute. Every single second of it.”

Erin had been referring to her discomfort over her mom knowing they were sleeping together. She suspected he meant something else altogether, and his comment brought back the giddy, breathless feeling she had experienced so often with him.

“I need to buy a toothbrush,” she said when they reached the hotel lobby. They went into the store, where she got a toothbrush, a hairbrush and a couple of bottles of water.