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“What’s the rush?” she asked.
“I have a hell of a boner, sweetness. I need you to remedy my affliction pronto.”
Her giggles floated down the hallway and Damian smiled, barely managing to bury his guilt.
***
“Is there any way to get the house back?” Damian tapped out an anxious rhythm on his desk.
“What?” Joe shook his head as he stared at Damian in disbelief. “It’s too late. It's out of your hands. You orchestrated things so that the estate was up for grabs if Celeste Aldridge failed to pay her husband’s debts.”
“I’m well aware of how I orchestrated things, Joe,” Damian snapped. He rubbed his eyes, tiredly. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to take that tone. I’m a little on edge.”
Joe hooked an ankle over one thigh and rubbed his chin. “That is something I’ve never seen in all the years I’ve known you, Damian. What’s going on?” There was a brief hint of guilt that danced across Joe’s face—which he quickly hid.
“You can relax, Joe. This isn’t about you and my mother, traitor.”
Color flooded Joe’s face, and he turned to look out the window. “I know you feel like I betrayed you but …”
“You did. You betrayed our friendship. Imagine, I let you into my life as more than my lawyer, as a friend. I brought you around my family, and you go and start sneaking around behind my back with my mother. And everyone says I’m the asshole.”
“Damian, I’m sorry but Arlet and I were not sneaking around. We're not fucking teenagers. The woman is fifty-five, a fully developed woman who knows what she wants. I’m a divorcee with two grown children. People like us don’t need to sneak around. You need to cut your mother some slack. By the way, she’s worried that you’re still angry. You’d better call her soon.” He glared in Damian’s direction.
Damian grinned. “So that’s what it takes for you to lose your cool. Defending my mother. How sickeningly sweet.” Both men stared each other down until Damian cleared his throat. “You’re forgiven, Joe. I suppose if my mother is going to get back into the dating scene, I should be happy it’s at least with someone I trust. I gave you shit just now because of the guilty look you get whenever my mother is mentioned. It amuses me.”
“You’re a sick bastard,” Joe said, smothering a grin.
“So I’ve heard.”
“Alright, you don’t have your boxers in a twist over the issue with me and your mother, this must be about another woman.”
A frustrated hiss escaped Damian. “Yes. A little witch, and she has red hair.” Abby had to have cast some kind of spell over him. There he was, desperate to save the cursed Aldridge mansion for her sake, after it was he who ensured it would be taken away.
“I figured as much.” Joe let out a laugh, “I never thought I’d see the day that Damian Coldwell would alter his path of revenge for anything or anyone.”
He wanted to feel shame. Shame that he’d been foolish enough to let Abby get so close. But there was none. He’d enjoyed every minute he spent with her in and out of bed. She was the first woman since he was a teenager to ever hold his attention long enough for him to start developing feelings. “It’s no big deal. It isn’t like I’m not going to finish what I started, it’s just one detail that I wish to change.”
“Why do you care? The girl doesn’t even live in that house.”
“The girl’s name is Abby,” he said, causing Joe’s jaw to drop.
“I’ll be damned. How the mighty have fallen. Fine, Abby lives on her own. Why do you care what happens to the damn house?”
Damian was silent, reluctant to admit his reasons. He averted his eyes. “Her father’s office.”
“I beg your pardon?”
Squirming in his chair under Joe’s shocked look, Damian recalled Abby’s stories about sneaking into her father’s office as a child when she was supposed to be in bed. His ears practically bled each time she reminisced about Caleb, but he always listened. Her father’s office was her sanctuary, with the many books and paintings and sweet memories. When she mentioned going back to the mansion just to sit in her father’s office when she was troubled, he knew then that he’d have to try to save the damn house, even if it meant Celeste and her other daughter got to keep a roof over their heads. From what he understood, the kid, Wyatt, was away at school. Abby adored the boy so he was safe from Damian’s wrath.
“The place has sentimental value to her, Joe.”
There was a long pause as Joe carefully considered his words. He didn’t want to say the wrong thing and send Damian into a rage. The man was like a wounded predator out for the blood of anyone who got in his way. “You know, Damian, if you feel for this girl…for Abby, you could just drop the entire vendetta. You already got what you most desired, the downfall of Caleb.”
Damian scowled. He couldn’t believe Joe. Forget about revenge? He had grown up without his father because Caleb Aldridge had sent him to prison. Benjamin Coldwell was Caleb’s best friend and he’d been stabbed in the back, used as a scapegoat for crimes Caleb committed. There had been more than one corrupt businessman involved in the fraud his father went to prison for, all of whom Damian had successfully and systematically brought to their knees, all the while ensuring they knew precisely why they were losing everything they held dear. It had felt good, but he knew nothing would make him feel as good as bringing down the one who had hurt his father the most. Damian hadn’t counted on Aldridge’s guilt driving him to suicide though. He’d wanted the man to suffer for years to come. News of his death had brought about some satisfaction. If Benjamin Coldwell was rotting in a grave, Caleb Aldridge should be as well.
“There’s no way I’m going to give up, Joe. Never. Caleb may be dead, but Celeste played a part in my father’s demise. She goes down as well. Celeste and her high and mighty family.”
“Except Abby,” Joe said.
“And the kid, Wyatt.”
“You sound like an insane person, Damian. I’m starting to worry about you. This isn’t going to end well.”
“It was never intended to end well, my friend.” Damian let out a breath and continued drumming his fingers on the desk. “To hell with it. If there’s no way to save the wretched house, I suppose Abby will just have to get over it.” If he couldn’t save the mansion with a few phone calls, he certainly wasn’t going to go out of his way to keep a roof over Celeste’s head.
Joe remained silent, his expression one of concern. Damian was going down a dark path—no, he’d been on that dark path for far too long.
