Secret Billionaire’s Contract Bride: Marrying My Enemy’s Lover

Chapter 23

POV: *Damon*

I’d first met Adelaide when I was six. And since that day, I threw myself

into her trap.

I’d run out of another one of my father’s lessons, hiding in the gardens between our houses. She’d crawled into a hole between the massive shrubs, ending up on our side of the spacious gardens.

She had wide, pretty eyes and long silky hair pulled into a single braid. Even covered in mud with twigs sticking in her hair, I remember I thought she was cute. She bent down to my eye level as I sat curled up with my back to one of the shrubs.

“Why are you crying?” she asked, so innocently.

I glared at her, my eyes perfectly dry.

“Leave me alone,” I spat.

“How rude,” her red cheeks puffed up with air as she placed her hands on her hips. “I’m only trying to help. That’s not very nice.”

“So?” I looked away, sulking. I didn’t want her help.

“Are you hurt?” she asked, her face crumbling up as if she was in pain. I was startled at the time to see tiny diamond-like tears fill the corners of her eyes. Was she crying for me?

She reached up one of her hands to touch my bruised and battered cheek, and I flinched away on impulse.

“I’m sorry,” she said, mournfully.

I stared at her, confused and wary of the strange girl who had appeared out of nowhere. Her eyes lit up all of a sudden, and she grinned. Her grin alone was enough to make me feel at ease with her.

“I know! My mama used to do this to me when I got hurt,” she told me, proudly before leaning forward and placing a tender kiss on my cheek.

“Pain, pain, go away!” she recited, throwing her hands into the air like it was a magic spell.

I grabbed the cheek she had kissed, stunned to my core as I stared at her.

Chapter 23

My cheeks began to warm-growing hotter and hotter.

“What’s your name?” I demanded, scrubbing her kiss off my check in my embarrassment. “You shouldn’t be here.”

She beamed, seemingly not caring about my threat. Even then she had the most beautiful smile.

“My name’s Addeway,” she said, her tongue slipping at the end. She frowned, repeating the word, but she was missing her two front teeth and she kept whistling out the end of her name.

She looked adorable, all frustrated as she kept trying to say her name and failing.

“Okay. Addeway,” I raised an eyebrow at her, trying hard not to smile.

“No, Adellay!”

“Sure thing, Addellay.”

shouted, her cheeks red with

burst into laughter, raising my head to the sky as I laughed for the first time in what felt like forever. My chest felt light and warm, and she pouted, crossing

she said and stuck

“Adelaide!”

stiffened as we heard the harsh sound of

Get back to your

fell as

gonna be mad at me,” she said

her to have to go through that. I could see the fear hidden in her eyes. I glanced at the mud on the ground and grabbed a handful before splattering it all

in her eyes so reminiscent of

told her. “I messed it up anyway so tell him I

Chapter 23

did it all.”

brightly. “You are nice!” she cried, jumping

Beneath the mud, she

through the hedge wall and to her own. house. I waved back at her, watching her go until she was

high

I did. I could never forget

in the house full of shadows. Every

pain, go away. I could even hear it in her voice. It always

because every time I got hurt and

bright, streaming

soft chill of the morning breeze blew through the open bay window,

the sunrise, my hands brushing through her hair in a soothing motion. It was so soft, and I loved waking up next to

phone began to buzz on the nightstand. I grabbed it quickly to keep it from making

not to wake the sleeping woman in my bed. Adelaide was still asleep from the long, wonderful night

like to work with you,” the representative

Chapter 23

can come to sign the contract on Monday.”

to working with you on this deal,”

Jian,” he

I tossed it onto the nightstand, not paying it any more mind.

dollar contract was mine. We

down at her, bare beneath the white sheets that covered her, a soft and innocent look on her face. I was reminded of how young she

long hair, pressing a soft kiss to the ends of it and drinking in the smell of her shampoo,

she could never know how long I had loved her, how strongly I had ached for

in my

she shifted, her hands reaching out for me. She grabbed onto the nearest pillow, cuddling into it with a sigh.

glanced at the ring on her finger-her engagement ring. I couldn’t wait for the moment when I could put my mother’s ring on her finger-to

my sweet angel would be

Only one week?

calendar hanging on the wall and groaned. Neither of

reached for my phone, already calling the number I knew could

Lacey’s mumbled voice came through

Chapter 23