Mandy. And her baby. The realization didn’t surprise him at all. The knowledge had been creeping in for days. He cared about Mandy, he worried about her and the baby, he wanted to protect them. “A family. I would want a family.” But he was broken, inside, and couldn’t expect any woman to take that on.

“Your mother asks my mother about you all the time, you know. She wants to know if I’ve seen you, how you’re doing, if you’re dating. I tell my mom I don’t know, because I don’t. I don’t know you. Maybe that’s a good place to start—talk to the people who actually still like you.”

Damien snorted, feeling something deep inside of him that was almost like hope. It was such an alien feeling he wasn’t sure he understood it right. But Rob made sense. He didn’t know how to lay Jessica to rest, but he could reach out to the people he loved, let them know he did care, that he would try to dig inside and find the parts of him he’d thought were gone. Parts that Mandy had proven still existed.

“Are you going to charge me for this psychobabble?” But he slapped Rob on the back to show he was kidding.

Rob gave a grin, but his eyes were searching. “No, but you have to buy lunch.”

“I can do that. And Rob, you pushed your luck with calling Jessica a bitch, but I’m still talking to you. And thanks for still talking to me after all these years.”

That was as gushy as he was willing to get, but Rob seemed to get the message.

He picked up his chopsticks again. “That’s what friends are for.”

Damien decided it felt good to have a friend again. And maybe, if he couldn’t offer Mandy a real relationship, he could be her friend.

Chapter 17

If Damien sent her one more link on the benefits of breastfeeding, Mandy was going to shove a breast pump up his nose.

This was not how she had envisioned the first two weeks back to work after Punta Cana. Frankly, she had been concerned that Damien would be overtly sexual to her, shooting her hot glances and brushing body parts along hers so that she was in a constant state of arousal.

She had worried that if he was suggestive in any way to her, she would crumble like a cookie and leap into bed with him, forgetting all her concerns.

She needn’t have worried.

Damien was being as sexual as a bath mat.