Chapter 28 Damian
DAMIAN
The sharp trill of Jason’s phone pierces the tension. It rings once, twice, urgent and insistent, like a referee calling the end of a round.
He glares at us both before checking the screen.
“Faith.” There’s something close to panic in his face now, stripped of swagger.
He hesitates only half a second before turning and leaving, the door swinging shut behind him with more force than necessary.
I hear his voice through the door, “Baby, hey…”
Silence rushes in. I let out a breath I didn’t realize I was holding. “Saved by the bell,” I say lightly. The words land somewhere between humor and disbelief.
Perry huffs a laugh, wiping at her eyes with the heel of her palm. “Did you just propose to me in the world’s most awkward way?”
It takes me a moment to process that. I replay what I said. I hadn’t planned on it, but there it is. I laugh then, low and unfiltered. “I guess I did.”
The absurdity of it settles over us.
She studies me carefully now, not flustered, not frantic. Thoughtful. For a moment, I see the calculation behind her eyes. She bites her bottom lip the way she does before saying yes sometimes.
But she doesn’t say it now. Instead, she tilts her head and says, “You know it was at the New Year’s Eve party, right?”
I smirk faintly. “Yeah. I haven’t hooked up with anyone wearing a mask before or since, so I was smart enough to put that together. Plus, there’s the math of it all.”
She winces slightly. “No, I mean…I did it to get back at Jason and Faith. To break them up. For cheating on me. That’s the kind of person you’re proposing to, Damian.” She doesn’t look ashamed. She looks honest.
I take a breath and step closer to her, closing the distance deliberately. “I put two and two together once I knew the truth, Perry,” I say quietly. “You are smart and manipulative and so sexy that my body hurts when you’re near.”
Her lips twitch.
“Maybe you’re also a little fucked up in the head,” I add.
She laughs softly. “Yeah.”
“But I must be too,” I continue, voice dropping lower, “if all that devious cleverness turns me on, right?”
Her smile deepens. “Maybe.”
There’s something unguarded in that word. Something hopeful.
The music from the reception swells faintly through the walls again, a reminder that this is still a wedding, still a spectacle, still chaos waiting outside this door.
But in here, the air has shifted.
I look at her carefully. “I meant what I said to Jason.”
She inhales slowly, steadying herself. “I know. I can tell.”
And for the first time tonight, I’m not reacting. I’m choosing.
She doesn’t rush to answer me. That’s what I notice first. Perry is impulsive in the extreme, as evidenced by her choosing to sleep with me in her ex’s childhood bed for revenge.
Motherhood, it seems, gives her pause. So now, she inhales and actually thinks.
The lights cast a soft glare across her cheekbones, and I watch the conflict flicker through her expression.
“I want to say yes,” she admits finally.
The honesty crashes squarely into my chest. “But?”
“But,” she continues, lifting one finger as if bracing the thought in place, “the last year has taught me that saying yes to my first instincts hasn’t gone very well.”
I almost smile at that. “That’s fair.”
She steps closer, not quite touching me, but near enough that the air between us changes temperature.
“Let’s try dating out in the open first,” she says carefully.
“Let’s see what that actually looks like.
My instincts have been on the fritz for a while now.
Even though I want to say yes right the hell now, I think taking it slow is the smarter play. ”
The practicality in her tone doesn’t dull the warmth behind it. It sharpens it. She’s not rejecting me. She’s trying to make better choices with me.
I grin despite everything. “Deal.”
She exhales in visible relief.
I step closer, and this time she doesn’t hesitate. My hands find her waist naturally, fingers settling there as though they’ve known the place for years. Her hands come up to my chest, resting flat against me, steadying herself as much as anchoring me.
The kiss that follows is nothing like what happened in the bathroom earlier.
That was fury and fear and urgency. This is an agreement sealed by passion. I tilt my head slightly, giving her time to pull away if she wants to. Instead, her mouth softens against mine, and something in my chest unlocks.
I feel her breathe out into the kiss like a sigh, and I pull her closer without thinking. The fabric of her dress slides beneath my hands, smooth and structured. She fits against me in a way that feels she belongs there.
The world outside the suite might still be unraveling. But in this narrow pocket of space, everything aligns.
When I pull back, I rest my forehead lightly against hers. “So, we date openly.”
She nods once.
“And we see where it goes.”
“Yes.” Her hands slide slightly up my chest, fingers curling briefly in the lapel of my jacket. “We take this slow.”
“Slow,” I echo. I kiss her once more, slower this time.
And for the first time since she said the word father in that hallway, the future doesn’t feel like a collision. It feels like a direction.
When the kiss ends, she doesn’t step away immediately. Her hands remain lightly against my chest, fingers curled in the fabric of my jacket like she’s anchoring herself. The suite is quiet again except for the distant pulse of music and the faint hum of lights overhead.
But I can feel something shifting in her. It’s subtle. Her shoulders tighten slightly. Her jaw firms. The relief from moments ago hasn’t erased the weight of what came before. “I know I hurt you.”
“You did,” I answer.
The truth lands without cruelty. It doesn’t need to be softened.
She nods once, accepting it. “I should have told you. I should have trusted you.”
“Yes.”
Her throat works as she swallows. “I thought I was protecting myself. Maybe protecting you. I don’t know.”
“You weren’t protecting me,” I say quietly. “You were protecting yourself.”
She doesn’t argue. “I was terrified. Terrified you’d see the twins as a burden instead of…”
“Instead of mine,” I finish.
Her eyes flicker. “Yes.”
I study her carefully. “You didn’t give me the chance to make that choice.”
“I know.” The repetition isn’t defensive now. It’s remorseful.
I take a breath and let the edge drain from my voice. “I’ll get over it.”
Her head snaps up slightly. “How can you know that?”
“Because I know myself. Yes, there’s part of me that’s still mad about it, but it’s only been an hour or so. I’ll need time to get over it, and when I do, that’ll be that. And it won’t get better if you’re not in my life. You and our sons.”
The words surprise her, and if I’m honest, they surprise me too. But I know it’s true as soon as I say it.
“I don’t know how long it will take,” I continue.
“And I don’t know what it will look like.
But I’m not walking away just because you were scared.
And of course you were scared. On the scale of this, I just found out that I’m a father again.
You, on the other hand, have been facing every part of this on your own.
If I had been in your shoes, I would have been scared too. ”
Her eyes fill again, but this time she doesn’t look like she’s about to flee. “Why are you being so nice about this?”
“Because you’re human, and because I’ve made my own mistakes. We screw up, we learn, we grow. I want to move forward with you.”
She studies my face as if checking for sarcasm. “You won’t hate me forever?”
“That sounds exhausting.”
She giggles. “Yeah, it does.” Her pretty face straightens. “Part of me worried that if I told you and you forgave me, you’d resent what I did for the rest of our lives. I didn’t know if I could live with that.”
“I don’t need perfection from you, Perry. I need honesty.”
She nods quickly. “You’ll have it.”
“I need it even if we fight. Even if we don’t work out as a couple. Especially then.”
She winces slightly at that. “I don’t want to think about not working out.”
“Neither do I. But pretending that’s not a possibility would be another lie. I’ve had a marriage implode. I’m not a kid anymore. I don’t get to pretend that dating always leads to forever.”
She exhales slowly. “You’re very grown-up about this.”
“Experienced, I think.”
She searches my face again, and whatever she finds there steadies her. “And no resentment? You’re sure about that?”
“When I get over something, it’s in the past. Ask Amber. That woman has an elephant’s memory, but anytime we fought, I forgot about it the next day, because I’m not built to hang on to every little insult. While this wasn’t some petty comment, I still think maintaining anger is useless.”
Silence stretches, but it’s no longer brittle.
She steps closer again, not out of urgency this time, but out of comfort. “I’m sorry for what I did, Damian. For using you against them. For keeping it all to myself. For—”
“I know, baby. It’ll be okay.”
She looks at me carefully. “You’re serious.”
“Yes.”
“And you’re not going to wake up tomorrow and panic?”
“I’ve already panicked. I’d prefer not to repeat it.”
A faint smile touches her mouth.
“But,” I continue, because it matters, “I need one thing from you.”
Her expression shifts, attentive now. “What?”
“You don’t keep big things from me again.” The air tightens slightly around the sentence. “Even if it’s messy. Even if it’s inconvenient. Even if it scares you. You tell me.”
She holds my gaze. “And if we fight?”
“Then we fight. But that fighting doesn’t mean ending. Not unless you want it to.”
She studies me for a long moment. “You’re asking for radical honesty.”
“No. Just honesty about the big things. You get into a fender bender, you tell me. Walker beats a kid up in school, you tell me. That kind of thing. I don’t need the exact order of places you went to, or the precise number of pancakes you ate.
This isn’t about micromanaging. It’s being mature and forthright. ”
“I can do that.” She huffs a small laugh. “As long as we’re allowed to keep playing games.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Games?”
“You know,” she says, stepping closer. “Flirting. Teasing. Keeping it interesting. You don’t get to make this all serious and no spark.”
The corner of my mouth lifts. “Wouldn’t dream of it.”
“You better not.” Her hand slides up my chest again, fingers tracing the line of my jacket lapel. “We can be honest and still have fun.”
“That seems reasonable.”
“And I don’t want slow to mean boring,” she adds.
“A life with you in it could never be called boring.”
Her eyes search mine one last time, looking for any sign that I’m not as committed as I sound. She doesn’t find it.
She kisses me again. Heat flashes between us instantly, cleaner than before. Less anger. More want.
I pull her flush against me. The fabric warms under my palms. She inhales sharply when I tighten my grip just slightly. “You’re sure you want to take it slow?” I murmur against her mouth. “There are so many other things we could do.”
She smiles into the kiss. “Define slow.”
I laugh quietly and tilt my head, deepening the kiss. The suite door remains closed. The music outside swells and dips. The world continues to spin in champagne and curated joy. But here, in this overlit room that has witnessed more than it was meant to, something real is forming.
Her fingers curl at the back of my neck, tugging me closer. “If we’re doing this,” she whispers, “we’re doing it fully.”
“What do you have in mind?”
Her mouth curves against mine. And when the kiss turns heated again, it doesn’t feel like chaos. It feels like alignment.
The music outside crescendos again.
Inside, the heat rises. And this time, neither of us pulls away.