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Her eyes widened. “Velvet, Damen’s calling!” Panic caused Mairi to raise her voice. “I gotta go, sorry.” Ending the call after hearing Velvet say goodbye, Mairi switched to answer Damen’s, saying breathlessly, “Hello?” The sound of her voice made Mairi wince inwardly.Oh my God, she was giving herself away already!
“Are you all right, sweetheart?” Damen asked right away. The odd note in his wife’s voice had him stopping in his tracks, which caused the group of executives behind him to stop as well.
Mairi cleared her throat. “Y-yes.”
Damen frowned. Checking his watch, he saw that it was still about two hours away from Mairi’s scheduled lunch break. “Have I caught you at a bad time?”
“No, no, of course not.” In her mind, Velvet’s words started to echo.Tell him. Tell him. Tell him.
She took a deep breath.
“Mairi?” Damen’s voice was tinged with concern now.
“I love you,” Mairi blurted out and winced inwardly right after.Coward, coward, coward!
His face softened.
Behind him, the executives appeared in need of treatment for shock. The elevator’s glass doors allowed Damen to see their expressions. Everyone was clearly having a difficult time reconciling the man before them with the one who had earlier taken them to task scathingly for being complacent.
“I love you, too, sweetheart. Nala and I will be waiting for you once your classes are done.”
The mention of their daughter allowed Mairi to momentarily forget her worries. Unable to help beaming, she exclaimed, “Yay!” Her aunts had only borrowed their little girl for the weekend, but it had seemed like forever at times.
Outside, the school bell rang, indicating the end of class, and Mairi knew it was time to go.
Damen heard it as well. “You’ve another class to teach?” he asked a little gruffly. If it had been up to him, he would’ve preferred Mairi to be with him at all times.
“Yeah. Let’s talk later after work?” She got to her feet as she spoke, gathering her things from the desk.
“Ne.”
“Bye.”
When their call ended, Damen said without looking back, “You can all pick up your jaws from the floor now, gentlemen. I’m not paying any of you six figures just to catch flies.”
“Y-yes, sir.” Everyone hastily pretended to be busy.
His mind went back to his wife as he stepped inside his private elevator while everyone else used the one next to it.She was worrying about something, Damen thought. And she didn’t want him to know about it.Why?
****
“HERE SHE IS,” VILMATanner declared softly as she came back into the living room, a sleeping baby in her arms.
Norah blinked back tears furiously as she watched her sister carefully place their grandniece in her father’s arms. Sometimes, she still worried over Mairi, wondering if her tenderhearted niece had made the right choice. Sometimes, she still wondered if she herself had done the right thing, raising Mairi on a diet of fairy tales that had Greek billionaires as heroes instead of princes on horseback.
But then there were instances like now, when she’d glimpse the love softening the hard planes of Damen Leventis’ face, and her worries faded. While the corporate tycoon might never lose his ruthless streak, Norah knew that same ruthlessness would be used to protect Damen’s family against all trouble.
And trouble, as it happened, was once again brewing just around the corner, if rumors were to be believed.
Damen pressed a feather-soft kiss on his little girl’s forehead, not wanting to accidentally wake Nala up. She was her mother through and through, except for her hair, which was dark like his. Three months had already passed since her birth and yet he was still awed by her.
His daughter.
His and Mairi’s.
A miracle of love he would cherish his entire life.
“I hope she didn’t give you any headache,” Damen murmured to Mairi’s aunts even though his attention remained firmly focused on the child he cradled in his arms.