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About sleeping beside him.

About waking up to find him watching me, like Aerosmith’s “I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing” was playing in his head.

I'd dated men who'd looked at me with lust. Men who'd looked at me like I was a business acquisition. Men who'd looked at me and seen dollar signs.

But Damon?

He'd looked at me like I was the best part of his morning. And that was dangerous. Because I'd liked it.

I'd liked waking up in his bed. I'd liked finding him in the kitchen making breakfast. I'd even liked the way he'd bossed me around about eating.

Which was deeply concerning.

I was used to being the one in charge. I didn’t take orders. Especially not from a man who looked that good without a shirt.

My phone buzzed in my lap. I snatched it up. It was an email from accounting.

“Waiting for a message from your cowboy?” Julissa asked.

Yes. “No.”

My cousin smiled widely. “Liar.”

“I'm waiting for a quarterly financial report.”

Her nose scrunched. “That's significantly less sexy.”

“You haven't seen our profit margins.”

She laughed. I didn't. Because I was waiting for a message from Damon.

More specifically, I was waiting for confirmation that my mother hadn't figured out our entire relationship was a sham and buried his body somewhere along the Pacific Coast Highway.

Claudia Parsons had a gift. She could read people. Not in the vague, mystical, your aura is troubled, way she liked to advertise.

No. My mother could spot someone's weakness in under thirty seconds and figure out how to exploit it in half that time. She was a human lie detector with questionable ethics and excellent accessories.

Just ask Abraham St. Claire.

He'd paid for my education. He'd hired me after college. He'd given me opportunities I hadn't earned and responsibilities I hadn't been qualified to handle.

All because my mother had convinced him I was his illegitimate daughter.

He'd never demanded a DNA test. Why would he? A test might have exposed an affair and destroyed his marriage.

My mother had known that. She'd counted on it. And she'd used his fear to secure my future.

After Abraham, died, she'd finally told me the truth. Casually. Like she'd been confessing to using a coupon that had expired.

When I'd demanded to know how she could justify manipulating a man for decades, she'd shrugged and said, “Any man who doesn't know whether he's fathered a child outside his marriage deserves what he gets.”

I'd told her it was wrong.

She'd asked how the weather was up on my high horse.

Then she'd reminded me that I'd never had to raise a child alone without an education, money, or family support. And that I had a Harvard degree, courtesy of the man I'd called my father.

That conversation had changed something between us.