he was going to introduce himself to his son. Now that he knew Dylan was his, he could see all the similarities between them. When he’d looked at the boy’s picture earlier, he’d noticed something. Now he understood. He’d seen himself in the boy. The pictures looked extremely similar to the few pictures his parents had taken of him as a child. Fascinating, he thought with a strange feeling in his gut.
Chapter 3
The big, yellow bus came barreling down the rural road and it suddenly occurred to Damien that he needed to get more security out here for his son and his future wife. He had a lot of enemies. He hadn’t done anything illegal while building his empire, but he’d stomped on a lot of people’s toes. He found a company’s weakness and went in for the kill, giving no mercy when he went after something. Adriana had her own security detail and she spent most of her time on one of his estates where there was additional physical security. Jemma’s home was wide open, no one around for miles. Someone could easily come in and hurt her and he wouldn’t even know about it, possibly for hours.
But right now, his son was bouncing off of the school bus, obviously having had a great day at school. He waved to the bus driver and, with a skip and a hop, he jumped off of the bus onto the ground. “Hi mom!” he said, wrapping his arms around her legs as a hug.
Dylan then looked up at the strange man, ignoring the bus as it continued down the road. “You’re still here?”
“Yes. I’m still here,” Damien replied with amusement.
“Cool!” he said and turned back to his mom. “Ms. Williams said I could start multiplation,” he announced, slaughtering the word.
“Multiplication?” Jemma clarified, taking his hand and walking with him back down the driveway.
“Yeah. Whatever. It’s an easier way to count numbers,” he explained. “I can do it in groups.”
“You’re right! It is easier.”
Dylan took out a paper which had the multiplication tables listed. “I’ve already memorized everything through fives,” he announced. “It’s fun.”
Jemma glanced at Damien over Dylan’s head, seeing the pride in his eyes. “I thought so as well,” Damien said.
Dylan looked up at the tall man, impressed. “Do you know all of your multiplication tables?” he asked, slowing down to pronounce the word correctly.
“Yes. And I can even show you how it can be used in real life.”
Dylan’s eyes widened. “Cool!” He looked up at his mom with a huge grin on his face. “Did you feed the puppies?” he asked.
Jemma felt bad, having forgotten to feed the small animals after lunch. She’d been too caught up in a sexual encounter with a dark eyed devil. She looked at Damien again, blushing. “Um, nope. I know how much you like to feed them so I waited.”
Damien raised one eyebrow, letting her know that he knew her statement was a complete fabrication. But Dylan was thrilled. They’d reached the end of the driveway by that point and he dumped his book bag onto the ground and raced into the barn, excited to have an excuse to play with the puppies before he started his homework. “I’ll be in to do my chores soon,” he called out.
Damien and Jemma followed him inside the barn, laughing at how all the puppies had pounced on Dylan as soon as he’d stepped into their stall with the bag of food. Dylan was giggling and trying to push them off of his head and legs, but he loved all the attention and the puppy-kisses. The puppies ate their food, then tussled with one another, but after several minutes, their full bellies lulled them to sleep. Almost as a unit, the puppies sort of plopped down, falling asleep even if one of them happened to be on top of another.
“So what did you do today?” he asked his mom as he hefted one sleeping puppy onto his lap. He looked up, feeling secure now that he was touching a puppy.
“You’re not getting out of your chores,” she admonished, trying to keep the laughter out of her voice. “Finish up your chores then come inside. We need to talk to you.”
Dylan sighed and peeled the puppy away, carefully placing the animal with the others to stay warm. He gave Momma Dog a scratch behind her ears and stood up.
“We can go inside now,” she said. “He has to clean out three empty stalls and put out new