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“You’re perceptive in ways that I’m not. You can read…everything.” He blinks a few times as if to say,and?“Did you know?”
He looks down at the empty glass in front of him, refusing to meet my eyes. “Know what?”
I huff because I know he knows what I’m asking. “That he was cheating on me, Damian. Cheating on me with god knows how many women for a fucking year?!” He doesn’t respond.
“Answer me and don’t lie to me.”
He pours himself a glass and fills it much higher than he did mine. The liquid is almost to the brim. He looks down at it for a long beat like he regrets pouring such a full glass before his blue eyes meet mine. “I didn’t know.”
“I’m sensing a but…”
He takes a long sip of his drink before he speaks. “I never thought he was good enough for you,” he tells me. “There were times he looked at you and I sensed his mind was somewhere else. There’s a look in a man’s eyes when he truly loves the woman he’s looking at, and…I didn’t see that when he looked at you.”
My mouth drops open. “What! How could you say—” I start when he holds his hand up.
“To be fair, there’s a look a woman has when she’s truly in love and you didn’t have it either.”
“Excuse me?”
“You cared about Paxton and probably even loved him, but…you wouldn’t have married him.”
“How do you know?”
He shrugs. “Instincts.”
“And you couldn’t have told me this…a long time ago?”
“I can’t force my thoughts on you. You have to figure things like this out for yourself. But believe me, I didn’t know he was cheating on you.” He cocks his head to the side. “I promise.”
“A year, he told me. He’s fucked countless women over the past year. He couldn’t even give me an exact number.”
“Asshole,” he grits out.
I hold my glass up. “Cheers to that,” I scoff before taking a long sip. “Probably cheated on me with supermodels and A-list movie stars and pop stars and women so much prettier than me.” I move off the stool towards one of my living rooms that’s just off the kitchen and drop to the couch sliding my four-inch heels off in the process. Damian follows and sits in the adjacent loveseat.
“You can’t possibly think that.”
I lean my head against the back of the couch and stare up at the ceiling as defeat washes over me. “Oh, I do.”
“Who’s prettier than you?” I lift my head slowly and look at Damian and can’t stop the heat from shooting up my body and rushing to my cheeks.
“You’re sweet.” I smile.
“Shay, he’s an idiot and he knows it. You are…perfect.”
He’s never said anything remotely like that to me before and I briefly wonder if it’s brought on by the alcohol that he never consumes around me. My cheeks are still hot and a tingling feeling dances up my bare legs. I cross one leg over another and it draws his attention to them. I watch as his eyes trace up my legs quickly and suddenly, I’m hyper-aware of how short my dress is. I’m still covered, but I need to be mindful of how I shift while I’m seated.
I don’t know how to respond to his comment, but something he said earlier intrigues me. “How do you know what a woman looks like when she’s in love? You said I didn’t look at him a certain way.”
He takes a sip of his drink and leans back in his chair, his large body making the loveseat seem much smaller than usual. He spreads his legs slightly and the movement draws my attention to his groin, but I look away instantly. “I was in a relationship,” he starts. “Years ago.”
This is the first we’ve ever really talked about his past. I don’t really know much about Damian other than what was in his background checks and the little pieces of information he’s given me over the years. For the most part, he’s a mystery to me. The idea of learning something new is as intoxicating as the drink in front of me. I nod wanting him to go on.
He shrugs. “It didn’t work out.”
I blink.That’s it?“Well obviously.” I giggle. “I think I would know if you had a girlfriend or a wife after five years. What happened? How long were you together?”
“You ask a lot of questions.” A smirk pulls at his lips and my eyes drop to them, tracing them like he’d just done to my legs. I’ve always had a thing for a man with a nice smile, nice lips, facial hair, and if he has a dimple, I’m a goner. Damian doesn’t have dimples but a man that has three out of four is still sexy as hell in my book.
