Page 47 of Marrying the Billionaire Single Dad

I scowl, "Why the hell did you have to send her to me?"

"Why would I not?"

"You’re deflecting."

"And you’re still in mourning."

"Fuck that," I hunch my shoulders.

He pauses, "It wasn’t your fault, Damian."

"You don’t know that. If I had handled things differently, if I had made more time for my family, things would have been different."

"You can’t change the past, but you can affect the future. It’s in your hands."

"Is that why you saw fit to steer things around, so I couldn’t avoid her?"

He clicks his tongue, "You forget things so quickly."

"What do you mean?"

"Remember, I said that if Weston and Amelie decided to get married, you’d have no choice but to accept the gift I sent you."

I pause. "Motherfucker," I swear out aloud. "She’s not an inanimate object you bastard."

"But she is a gift, and she’s what you need right now."

"Oh?" I stare at his face on the screen. "The fuck you think you are, playing with our lives?"

"Someone has to, considering you don’t want to move on from where you’ve been stuck for too long."

"Jesus, Arpad." I shake my head. "This…is all wrong. You shouldn’t have done this."

"Why not?" he retorts. "You were too much of a loser to take what was right in front of you. Left to yourself, you’d have never seen her again."

"And rightly so. She deserves fucking better."

"That’s for her to decide."

"She’s better, away from me."

"That’s your decision."

"Huh?" I stare at him.

"I’ve done my part," he raises his shoulders, "the rest is up to you."

15

27thDecember

Julia

"Bastard!" It’s six pm, and once again, I stand in between the mirror and the bed in the same room as yesterday. Only he hasn’t texted me yet.

Why hasn’t he texted me, yet?

I glance down at my phone, then throw it on the bed. I will not allow him to see how anxious I am. Will not allow him to find out just how pissed off I am that he didn’t call me after yesterday. Hell, when I awoke, he was gone. Which I expected, but not even a note left behind. I’d woken up a few hours later to find I was alone and covered in the sheets. The mattress next to me was cold and uncreased so I know he never laid down beside me. He’d simply taken my orgasms—okay, so I had given them to him freely—and he’d gone. "Asshole."