“Can I Sit With You?” the Maid’s Little Girl Asked — Then the Fiancée Said Something Cruel My daughter asked, “Can I sit with you?” and his fiancée laughed. I made Lily apologize to nobody.

I burst into Damian’s private study without knocking.

He was standing behind his mahogany desk, speaking rapidly into a secure phone line. When he saw my pale, tear-streaked face, he slammed the receiver down instantly.

"Elena, what is it?" he asked, closing the distance between us in three massive strides.

I collapsed against his chest, the dam breaking as I sobbed uncontrollably. It took me several minutes to catch my breath and explain the phone call from Mark.

I expected Damian to be angry. I expected him to pace the room and demand answers about my past.

Instead, he held me incredibly tight, his massive hand gently stroking the back of my hair.

"I am so sorry I brought this danger to your door," Damian whispered against my temple. "Lorenzo is trying to force my hand by using the only thing I cannot bear to lose."

I looked up at him, my eyes red and swollen.

"Mark said he has a lawyer. He wants to demand a paternity test, Damian. If he goes to the press, the scandal—"

"Do you honestly think I care about a scandal?" Damian interrupted, his dark eyes flashing with absolute conviction. "I would burn my entire company to the ground before I let that parasite anywhere near our daughter."

"But he is going to Lily's school at three," I panicked, looking at the grandfather clock. It was already one in the afternoon.

Damian’s jaw tightened into a lethal, unyielding line.

"No, he isn't," Damian said coldly.

He walked back to his desk and pressed a button on his intercom.

"Marcus," Damian ordered. "Bring the motorcade to the front doors. We are going for a ride."

Twenty minutes later, Damian and I were sitting in the back of heavily armored SUV, flanked by two more vehicles filled with Bellucci security contractors.

We did not drive to the school. We drove to a dilapidated motel on the outskirts of the city, the address pulled by Damian's terrifyingly efficient intelligence network in less than ten minutes.

Mark was leaning against a rusted sedan in the parking lot, smoking a cigarette and talking on his phone. He looked older, worn down by years of cheap liquor and bad choices.

The motorcade boxed his car in before he even realized what was happening.

Six armed men stepped out of the SUVs, forming an impenetrable wall of muscle and steel.

Damian stepped out of our vehicle, adjusting the cuffs of his bespoke suit with terrifying calmness. I stayed in the car, watching through the tinted glass as the father of my child went completely pale.

"Mark Davis," Damian said, his deep voice carrying easily across the cracked asphalt.

Mark dropped his cigarette, his arrogant bravado evaporating instantly.

"Look, Mr. Bellucci, I have a lawyer," Mark stammered, taking a step backward.

Damian did not blink. He walked up to Mark, stopping inches from the man's face.

"You do not have a lawyer. You have a death wish," Damian stated softly. "You abandoned an innocent woman and a child, and now you have decided to let my brother use you as a pawn in a war you do not understand."

Damian reached into his breast pocket and pulled out a thick envelope, tossing it onto the hood of the rusted sedan.

"There is two hundred thousand dollars in untraceable cash in that envelope, along with a forged passport," Damian commanded. "You are going to take it, you are going to get in your car, and you are going to drive south until you hit the ocean."

Mark looked at the envelope, licking his dry lips greedily.

"And if I don't?" Mark asked, a stupid, fleeting ounce of defiance in his voice.