Tempted by My Best Friend’s Father

For a long moment, neither of them moved.

Serena stood in the doorway like a lighthouse against the storm, the warm gold light from inside catching in her hair, outlining the soft curves of her face, the bare stretch of her collarbone where his shirt hung off one shoulder. Her skin glowed against the darkness behind him.

And Damon—Damon looked like the night.

Rain clung to his dark coat, soaking the cuffs and collar, flattening his hair against his forehead. Shadows pooled beneath his eyes, the kind that didn't come from lack of sleep but from carrying a weight he could no longer hide.

He didn't step inside.

He didn't dare.

Not yet.

"Say it," Serena whispered.

Her voice trembled, but not from weakness.

From restraint.

From the kind of rage that comes when someone you trusted walks through fire to get to you—only to bring the smoke inside with them.

"I know who Elaine is."

Damon closed his eyes.

When he opened them again, something had shifted in his face—like a mask quietly falling away. Not in defense. Not in defeat.

But in surrender.

He stepped forward once, crossing the threshold as if entering a cathedral built of all her unspoken questions.

The door closed behind him with a click that sounded too much like a vow.

---

Inside, the room held its breath.

Serena walked ahead of him, wrapping the loose edge of the oversized shirt tighter around her. She didn't bother turning on more lights. The dim lamplight painted the space in low amber hues, turning her living room into a shadowed confession booth.

She sat on the armrest of the couch instead of the seat, posture poised, legs crossed, every inch of her body pulled tight with restraint.

He stood in the center of the room, dripping quietly onto her wooden floor, hands clenched at his sides.

"I didn't kill her," he said first.

The words hit the air like a gunshot.

Serena didn't flinch.

"I didn't ask that."

Damon met her eyes. "But you wondered it."

She didn't deny that either.

"What happened to her?"

He let out a slow breath. Not a sigh. Something more painful. As if every inhale now came at the cost of unburying another piece of himself.

"I loved Elaine once," he said. "With a kind of foolishness that felt brave at the time."

He walked to the edge of her fireplace and leaned against it, his back to her, the fire's reflection dancing along the wet leather of his coat.

"She was powerful. Brilliant. Impossible not to notice. But she had… darkness in her. Not the poetic kind. The real kind. The kind that never flinches at cruelty if it protects what's hers."

His jaw clenched.

"I ignored the signs. Told myself love was supposed to hurt sometimes. That the silence between us was just… growing pains."

Serena shifted, silent.

He turned then.

"I was wrong. The truth is—she didn't vanish. I left her."

His voice dropped low, rough with memory.

"She tried to kill someone. A woman who meant nothing to her but had once kissed me in college. Just kissed."

Serena's eyes widened.

"She drugged her. Left her outside the gates of our estate during a blizzard. If I hadn't checked the cameras…"

He didn't finish.

He didn't need to.

Serena felt her stomach twist.

"What did you do?"

"I confronted her. Told her I would report it. That she needed help. That we were done."

He walked toward her then, each step measured.

"She laughed. Said I was hers—until she said otherwise. That the world wouldn't believe a man like me over a woman like her. And she was right."

He stopped just a few feet away now, eyes dark and unreadable.

"So I staged her disappearance. Got her help. Paid off the tabloids. Planted evidence that she'd fled to Europe. Told the world she was gone."

Serena's breath left her body.

"She's alive?" she whispered.

"Yes," he said. "Somewhere in a private facility under a different name. No visitors. No questions."

The room felt suddenly too small.

She stood, arms wrapped around her middle.

"And you never told anyone?"

He shook his head.

"Because she had people. Family. Influence. I was already being watched. My father's company. My name. Everything was under scrutiny. If the truth got out, her story would be rewritten before I could blink. And that girl… she would've died for a kiss I barely remembered."

The silence that followed was no longer cold.

It was heavy.

Personal.

Serena crossed the room slowly, bare feet soundless on the floor. When she reached him, she didn't speak right away. She studied him.

His hands were shaking.

Not from fear.

But from the effort of being known.

She touched the back of his hand gently, fingers brushing over his knuckles like tracing a scar. His breath hitched.

"You were protecting someone."

He nodded once.

"Who protects you?" she asked.

He looked at her like that question hurt more than the truth.

And she realized in that moment—Damon Cross had spent years building walls, not because he was hiding something evil, but because he was trying to make sure no one else got hurt by the fallout of who he once loved.

"Why didn't you tell me?" she whispered.

His voice cracked.

"Because you already looked at me like I was something worth saving."

She didn't pull away.

She stepped closer.

And closer.

Until her hand was resting over his heart, and she could feel the stuttering thud of it beneath her palm.

"You are."

He looked down at her then, his breath uneven, as though afraid if he exhaled the moment would shatter.

But she didn't let him escape it.

"You have every reason to be broken," she said. "But all I see is a man still trying to protect something fragile in a world that only knows how to take."

Her words broke something loose in him.

Something tight.

Something bitter.

Damon didn't kiss her.

He held her.

Arms around her like she was the only thing keeping him tethered to the earth. His body trembled against hers, and she wrapped herself around him as if she could press his pain into silence.

"I don't want to lie to you anymore," he whispered against her hair.

"Then don't."

"I'm not who I used to be."

She leaned back just enough to look at him.

"Neither am I."

---

That night, they didn't make love.

Not in the traditional sense.

They undressed slowly—not for lust, but for understanding. His shirt slid from her shoulders. Her fingers unfastened the belt at his waist. There were no fireworks.

Only breath.

Only skin and honesty.

Only two people laying down their armor in a world that had taught them love came with punishment.

When they finally lay beneath the sheets, limbs tangled, foreheads pressed together, neither said a word.

Because the silence no longer hurt.

It held them.

Like a secret too sacred for sound.