He left me when I refused to end my pregnancy. Five years later, he saw my twins at a mall, and his mother’s two-million-dollar lie finally came crashing down.
She walked like a woman who had endured something painful in silence and had come out stronger than anyone expected.
Damien’s coffee slipped in his hand.
Hot liquid burned his fingers.
He barely noticed.
Because of the boys.
They looked about five years old, maybe almost six. One held Mara’s left hand, bouncing in his sneakers as he smiled at the toy store window. The other held her right hand, watching the world with a quiet seriousness Damien recognized so sharply it nearly stopped his breathing.
Their eyes were gray.
Not blue.
Not green.
Not hazel.
Gray.
His gray.
The same storm-colored eyes that had belonged to three generations of Mercer men. The same intense gaze he saw in his own reflection every morning. The boy on the left had his jawline. The boy on the right had the exact crease between his brows when he was concentrating.
