“Thanks, Dad,” she murmured. Joel slipped out of the room.Five minutes later, there was a knock at the door before her mother walked through it.
“Hi, sweetie,” she said.
Erin’s lips lifted, and her eyes softened. “Hi, Mom.”
Cora walked over and sat in the chair by the bed. “How are you feeling?” she asked.
“Ask me in a few hours.” She smirked.
Her mother raised her brow in confusion.
“I’m on their strongest medication, so I’m not feeling anything,” she explained.
“Oh,” Cora responded.
“Mom, I want to apologize for what I’ve put you through—”
“It’s okay, sweetie,” her mother tried to downplay it.
“It’s not.” Erin shook her head. “I threw you out of my life for over a year, and I put you in a position to have to worry about me when you had so much already on your plate. I’m sorry.”
Cora leaned forward and stretched up to cup her face in her palm. “I’ll always worry about you, even if you’re in bubble wrap and one hundred percent safe,” she said.
Erin held her mother’s hand in place with a hand over hers as she enjoyed the warmth and the feeling of safety it generated. “I love you, Mom.”
“I love you too, sweetheart.”
After her mother left, her sister appeared, and after a tearful apology and embrace, the two joked about how bad she was at being extreme. She promised Jules that she would stay away from anything that even remotely resembled danger, and the two embraced again before she left.
“Hi.”
Erin looked up, a grin already on her lips as her gaze roamed over Brian in his gray button-down and black jeans.
“Hi,” she greeted him with a tender smile.
He walked further into the room until he was by her bedside. “Your father told me about your battle scars.” He winked.
“Wow, that’s what we’re calling these?” She gestured to her chest and ankle as she chuckled.
“They are evidence of how strong you are,” he replied almost immediately.
Her heart skipped a beat at the look of adoration shining through his eyes.
“I know we exchanged some strong emotions back at the trail, and I know it might be due to an adrenaline rush, but I want you to know that I love you very much. You may not feel the same way, but I could never stop loving you. I will always be here for you in whatever capacity you need me.”
Erin placed her palm across her chest as her heart rejoiced at his words. “When I said all those things that I said to you before tonight, that was because I was too full of pain to allow any other emotion inside, but I want you to know I’m not filled with that pain anymore, and I’m seeing things more clearly,” she expressed.
“What do you mean?” Brian asked, his gaze hopeful.
“It means I love you, Brian. I always have, and I always will.”
A smile broke out on his lips that caused her heart to flutter.
“Ask me again,” she instructed him.
“Ask you what?” he asked, his brows knitted together.
“Ask me to be your wife again,” she expounded.
