“How is business, by the way?” Damien asks, and I toss him a look.
“I thought we agreed that once you handed the keys to the Opal Room and the Diamond Back that they were no longer your concern.”
“What happens in the clubs is no longer my concern,” Damien corrects me. “The money end of things is still my business.”
I shake my head, and Rachel bites back a giggle. I know what she’s thinking but not saying. What even is my life?
But I know what my life is. My life is a crazy story that started in a whirlwind and settled into something lovely. Like the sun after a storm. A clear night sky. Rachel had a beautiful wedding and is now the mother of a beautiful little boy. Luca and I are together with Damien, who has been nothing short of an amazing father and partner. Shortly after his bar back speech,we moved in with him, and he started Luca at a new school where Luca has thrived. He’s even skipped a grade.
As we sit around the table talking and eating with friends, Damien turns to me. “Are you alright?” he asks softly.
“I’m wonderful; why do you ask?”
“Because you never turn down a glass of wine.”
I smile at that. “I’m fine with water today. And maybe…for the next nine months.”
Everyone at the table stops.
“Oh my God,” Rachel says. “Ellie…are you…”
Damien is staring at me in shock, and for a moment, I revel in it. Then I smile, and tears fill my eyes.
“Can I tell them?” Luca asks because he is the only one who knows.
“Yes, baby. You can tell them.”
“I’m going to be a big brother!” he exclaims, shooting up from his chair, and the table erupts. Everything from when to how far along to questions about the gender and everything else.
But my attention is on Damien, who is, quite possibly for the first time ever, speechless.
“A baby…” he finally says, cupping my cheek in his hand.
“Yes. A baby.”
“My mom and my dad are having another baby!” Luca says, and that’s enough to cue the waterworks.
Damien wipes them away, and it feels like before.
Like at the gala when he appeared as a masked man rescuing me and whisking me off into the night.
As a boss who hired me before he even knew who I was as we stood in his office staring at each other, neither of us could breathe.
As a lover, that slowly peeled back my layers, all the while revealing his own.
It is us.
Me and him, our son, and our baby to be.
That’s all it’s ever been, from the first time we met, to the wedding altar, to now.
And as he kisses me again, everything else just fades away.
What to read next? You’ll loveAccidental Groom: A Silver Fox Ex Fiancé’s Dad Romance,available on Amazon. Read now!
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She walked down the aisle believing the worst —
