“Fuck,” he muttered, gently easing me to the floor.

“Did ye hear me?” Jan pounded the door.

“We’re coming, Jan.” Aidan replied gently.

We heard her harrumph followed by the sounds of her footsteps fading away from the door.

Feeling shaken that I could have lost myself so much in him that I’d forget I was at a freaking children’s hospital, I ran a trembling hand through my hair. “I can’t believe I did that here.”

“Hey.” He brushed away my hands as they were attempting to button my shirt. He buttoned it calmly for me. “We lost our heads for a moment. Don’t beat yourself up about it.”

I forced myself to meet his gaze. “Was that all it was? Us losing our heads for a moment?”

Aidan straightened my shirt and pressed a sweet kiss to my lips. “No,” he whispered across my swollen mouth. “This isn’t over, Pixie. Sylvie’s with her dad tonight so I have the place to myself. I want you there.”

My pulse skittered at the thought, excitement making my belly squeeze deep and low. “Okay.”

“No misunderstandings.” His eyes blazed with determination. “Tonight you’re in my bed. I’m going to make love to you, and fuck you and come with you until every muscle in your body aches.”

A moan of longing bubbled out of me and I bit my lip to halt its sound, but I couldn’t halt the wet between my legs.

Satisfied by my nonverbal response, he took a reluctant step back and I felt his eyes on me as I gathered my stuff, putting my clothes in my backpack. I smoothed my hands down my costume, wishing there was a mirror in here. “I don’t have stubble burn on my cheeks, do I?”

Aidan shook his head, smirking. “No. But you’ll most certainly have it between your thighs by tomorrow morning.”

Tingles exploded around my breasts and between my legs, and I felt my nipples harden into points. Heat blossomed beneath my cheeks. “Jesus,” I huffed. “I have to go out to the kids … you couldn’t have waited to say something like that to me?”

My reaction made him laugh as he pulled open the bathroom door. “No one will know you’re wet except me. Which I love, by the way.”

“How do you know I am?” I said, trying to reign in the man’s cockiness a little.

“Aren’t you?”

“I guess you’ll find out tonight for sure.”

“Pixie knows how to play,” he murmured.

I glanced at him over my shoulder as we walked out of Aly’s room and all the pain and grief I’d seen in his eyes minutes earlier was buried. It was now replaced by amusement, desire, and if I wasn’t mistaken, happiness.

I had made him happy.

I grinned at the thought. “You have no idea.”

Aidan laughed, the sound dying when we stepped out into the corridor to find Jan waiting for us. At her look of displeasure, we both fell silent, like naughty schoolchildren caught doing something very wrong.

“Never again.” She wagged her finger at us.

“Never,” we promised in unison, and meant it. What we’d done had been totally inappropriate and my only excuse was that this man had the ability to obliterate all thoughts of anything else in the world but him.

Suffice it to say, I found it extremely difficult to concentrate with the kids. It was like trying to run through knee-deep water. But try I did because my time with them was as important as the time I’d now promised to Aidan.

This was it.

This was the night everything would irrevocably change between us. I stood by the canal where a narrowboat and a barge were anchored. It was a chilly evening, announcing summer’s gradual end, and I wore a cardigan over my dress. I didn’t have anything fancy to wear, but since Aidan was attracted to me even when I was wearing a Peter Pan costume, I didn’t think it would really matter to him what I wore.

The dress was red with subtle white polka dots. It had a scalloped V-neck that hinted at cleavage, short sleeves, buttons down the front, and a baby-doll silhouette. I wore low-heeled brown leather ankle boots that had seen better days but were my favorite shoes. It was casual. Cute. Not seductive. Tonight was going to be nerve-wracking enough. I wanted to be comfortable.

Plus, I’d calculated how to get to the sexy times with Aidan as fast as possible and this dress was easily whipped off over my head.

It was around seven-thirty so the sun was still in the sky, bathing the apartments around the canal in warm orange and pink. Aidan’s building was situated near Fountainbridge Square where the two boats were moored. There was a bar there and a restaurant and shops, so it wasn’t like there weren’t people milling around. However, there was a stillness about the evening, as if everyone and everything knew something special was about to happen for me. Such whimsical thinking wasn’t like me of late, but with my heart banging away in my chest as I approached the front door to Aidan’s building, I couldn’t help feeling as if this night was just for us.

Something good and thrilling on the horizon of a bleak past we were hopefully moving away from.

To say Sylvie had been delighted when I accepted a ride home from her uncle was putting it mildly. She made it clear it was like her two best friends had decided they’d be best friends too, and all was well in her world. She chattered excitedly in the back of the Range Rover as Aidan drove me home to Sighthill. Since I’d made the decision to do this—whatever this was—I saw no reason to hide where I lived from him. He already knew I lived in Sighthill anyway.

“Has your dad got cool plans for you tonight?” I’d asked Sylvie, recognizing the street we were driving down as being a block from my own.

Sylvie had shrugged. “I suppose.”

“He’s taking her out for dinner tonight. To the Scran and Scallie. You like it there, sweetheart,” Aidan gently reminded her.

I’d wondered what was with her sudden disinterest in the idea of spending the night with her dad.

“It’s Daddy’s favorite place to eat. Not mine.”

At her uncharacteristically petulant tone, I shot Aidan a look. He’d caught it out of the corner of his eye and said, “Are you not happy because Sally is going to be there? Because I told you if you’re upset about her moving in with your dad, I can talk to him.”

Ah.

Cal had a girlfriend. I hadn’t known that. “Has Sally been around long?”

Sylvie had shrugged again so I’d looked to Aidan.

“Yeah. They’ve been dating for over a year but Sally recently moved in with him.”

“Sally’s fine,” Sylvie said.

Before I could respond, Aidan slowed the car and asked, “Is this you?”

I turned and looked out of my window up at my grim home. My apartment was part of a block of flats covered in pebble-dash render stained and gray with age. The small patches of grass outside were overgrown in parts and dying in others. A couple of my neighbors had windows that didn’t look as if they’d been cleaned from the inside for years.

This was where I lived. I wouldn’t be ashamed. Most of the people here were working hard to be able to afford their homes. I was one of them. And my little flat may not have been much but it was clean and tidy and I could afford the rent without help from anyone else.

“This is me. Thanks for the ride.”

“Anytime.” He’d given me a sexy half smile as he pulled his phone out of the holder in the center console. “Number. Please.”

He had been lucky he’d added that please, and my expression told him so, making him laugh as I put my number into his phone. When I handed it back to him, he called me. “Now you have mine too. I’ll text you,” he said, his gaze meaningful.

I’d nodded, feeling tingles in my good-for-nothing places at the thought of seeing him later in the day.

Turning back to Sylvie, I found her watching us curiously, as if she sensed something was up but was too young to really understand what.

“I’ll see you soon,” I said, reaching out for her hand.

When she’d taken it, I squeezed hers tight, and then reluctantly let go. Her shouts of goodbye to me and her exuberant waving as I walked down the path to my building had made me smile. The searing glance Aidan had given me before he drove off killed the smile as anticipation enveloped me.