Second (Betrothed 6)

“Nothing I can’t handle.”

I grew frustrated and stepped away.

“Baby.”

I crossed my arms over my chest and kept my back to him.

“Baby.” He got out of the chair and came up behind me, his arms moving around my waist. “I want to earn more money before I can’t anymore.”

“We have plenty of money.”

“Not to maintain this lifestyle.”

I turned around. “Then we’ll downgrade. I don’t need a mansion or a nice car.”

His eyes softened slightly, as if he appreciated the fact that I cared more about his health than his bank account. “It’s just a few more years. Please give that to me.”

I dropped my gaze.

“Baby. Look at me.”

I refused.

He placed his fingers under my chin and lifted my gaze. “I have my wife back. And I have my fighting. My life is perfect right now, and it’s the first time I’ve been happy since you walked out. Let me have that a little longer. Please.”

“Why is it so important to you?” My weak voice came out as a whisper.

“I can’t explain it.” He shook his head. “It makes me feel alive.”

“And I don’t?”

“Yes…but in a different way.”

I couldn’t sleep.

I sat up in bed, with Liam dead asleep beside me, snoring lightly because he was exhausted after his fight. My back was against the propped pillows, and I looked out the frosted windows, seeing the devastating effects of this freezing winter. It was ice-cold.

I wondered if Damien was sleeping alone.

Probably not.

I’d been to the casino before, saw the women dance in cages suspended above the ceiling while the men gambled chips worth a million euro each. Damien said he was going there after the fight, probably to drink, gamble, and fuck.

I shouldn’t care.

But I would always care.

He comforted me when my own husband didn’t. He stayed by my side and made me feel so much better with just his presence. There was something about the tone of his voice, his choice of words, that made all my muscles relax from their rigid positions. My heart beat slower, and I felt warm despite the cold temperature of the underground arena. The men huddled around the ring weren’t gentlemen and didn’t care about shoving me with their enormous shoulders, but Damien kept me safe. His hand wrapped around my waist, just the way it used to when he walked me to my door.

And he erased all my problems.

I thought I could be around him and keep up a poker face, but the more I was near him, the harder it was. I wanted to be committed in my marriage, to love only my husband and no one else. But when I’d started to make progress…I saw Damien’s handsome face, and all my attempts went to shit.

Could you get over someone if you had to still see them?

Sometimes I wondered if I should quit my job, but apparently, I would still see him at the fights, so there was no escape.

I would just have to try harder.

A week had passed, and my life started to feel normal again.

Liam didn’t mention another fight, so we spent our time cooking together and talking in front of the fire. We’d share a bottle of wine, get a little drunk, and have good sex. That was one of the nicest things about Liam; he knew how to fuck. All the other men I went out with had no idea what they were doing, or they just didn’t care.

Besides Damien. He was on a whole other level. I thought the sex was good because it was so emotional, like a hurricane and a tsunami combined. A forest fire drenched in gasoline. It was passionate, so good it brought tears to my eyes from time to time. I thought it was because I was so deeply and stupidly in love…and he felt that way too. But he was just good in bed, I guess.

But the longer I wasn’t around Damien, the less I thought about him…which was nice. It was a healing process. As if I’d broken my arm, it felt better until I used it again. Then there was a setback, and I lost all that progress and had to start over. Same exact thing. But a broken arm would be much less painful than a broken heart.

I sat in the chair facing Sofia’s desk, and we discussed the weekly reports, the things that needed to be addressed for the hotel. It was my job to do paperwork in the office, but I also made my rounds around the hotel, randomly checking cleaned rooms and doing customer surveys of their experience as guests.

Sofia never asked me about Damien anymore, so our relationship seemed to be old news. That was nice because I didn’t want to talk about him anyway. “How are things with Liam?” He was my husband now, so that was the only person she should be asking about.