“I want that so much. I don’t want to screw it up. I want to make everything better for them.”

“You already have, Seamus. It was your idea for us to take them in. What would’ve become of them otherwise?”

“Someone would’ve stepped up.”

“We have no way to know that for sure. They could’ve ended up wards of the state or in foster care or God knows where. Who know if they would’ve been allowed to stay together?”

Seamus shuddered at the thought of any of those scenarios.

“You saved them from an uncertain future. The reason they’re ready to go back to school so soon is because they know you’ll be here and I’ll be here, waiting for them to get home. We’re going to make this work.”

“It means so much to me that you fully embraced my desire to have them, love. At this point in your life, you probably want to be relaxing and sleeping in and doting on your grandbaby, and I’ve made you a mum to two small boys.”

“I had plenty of years to relax and sleep in before you stormed your way into my life and ruined my sleep. I’m as thrilled as you are to be able to make a difference for those little guys. Don’t think for a minute I’m not.”

He pushed himself up onto an elbow and leaned over to kiss her. “Let’s go get our boys up for school.”

Hope came awake suddenly at six o’clock, the time Ethan usually got up. For a moment, she couldn’t remember where she was, but the heavy weight of Paul’s arm around her waist and the hairy leg wedged between hers was a reminder of what’d transpired between them.

They’d been up most of the night and had ended up making love in the shower at three a.m. She’d never had shower sex before and had to say there was something to be said for the way he’d pressed her against the wall and surged into her while the water came down upon them.

Sexiest night of her life, hands down. It pained her to think of what she’d missed out on when she’d thought she was happy with Carl. But in all those years, he’d never paid the kind of attention to her that Paul had in one night.

Her eyes blurred with tears that frustrated her. What in the world did she have to be teary-eyed over when she was having such a marvelous time with a hot, sexy guy who cared about her son as much as he cared about her? Her belly tightened around the grinding sense of dread she’d carried with her since Carl was arrested, while she waited for the next disaster to strike.