All Chapters of HIS SECRETARY'S SECRET : Chapter 131 - Chapter 140

Bella PovNathan had been a little warm when I picked him up on Friday afternoon and I told myself it was nothing because he had been running around at school all day. By Saturday morning his temperature was over a hundred and three and I gave him medicine and kept him in bed with water and crackers and the stuffed elephant he still carried everywhere even though he was six. By the afternoon the temperature had climbed to a hundred and four and he could barely keep his eyes open and I called his pediatrician and she told me not to wait.I was trying to find his insurance card and get him dressed and keep my hands from shaking all at the same time and somewhere in the middle of all of it I called Damian. Not because it was his custody day. Not because any protocol said I had to. Just because Nathan was sick and scared and Damian was his father and calling him was the first thing my hands did before my brain caught up with them.He answered immediately. "What's wrong," he said and hi

Bella PovTanya was already at the table when I arrived and she looked up and said "You have something to tell me" before I even sat down because she had known me for ten years and apparently my face was a reliable narrator whether I wanted it to be or not.I sat across from her and told her everything. The phone call and what Damian said word for word. The long silences and how I told him I needed a few days and how I had spent the last three nights lying awake cycling through the same arguments without landing anywhere useful.Tanya listened without interrupting. When I finished she put her fork down and said "You've been in love with him this whole time.""I know," I said."You turned down every man who asked you out for two years," she said. "You told Robert to his face that you were still in love with someone else. You called Damian first when Nathan got sick without even thinking about it and then you held his hand in the hospital for two hours." She looked at me levelly. "

Bella Pov The second date was dinner at a different place we had never been and the third was a farmers market on a Saturday morning with coffee cups and no agenda and Nathan at home with my mother. We took it slow in the deliberate way you take something slow when you know that rushing it is the one thing that could ruin it. No pressure. No physical contact beyond accidental brushing of hands. Just talking and spending time in the same space and letting whatever this was settle into what it was supposed to be.On the fourth date we sat in his car outside the restaurant for over an hour after dinner because neither of us wanted to be the one to say goodnight and we talked about things we hadn't said out loud to each other yet."Tell me about Andrew," he said. He said it like he had been holding the question for a while."He was kind," I said. "Patient. Successful. He proposed after three months.""That fast," Damian said."He said he knew what he wanted," I said. "I panicked an

Bella Pov My mother had been holding it in for two months and I knew because silence from my mother on a subject she disagreed with was never actual silence. It was pressure building. On a Sunday afternoon while Nathan was in her backyard she set her tea down on the counter with a small deliberate sound and I knew the conversation had arrived."I need to say something about Damian," she said."Mom," I said."Hear me out," she said. "You came home broken. I watched you rebuild from nothing. I watched you sleep on my couch for weeks and I watched you cry every night and I watched you build the agency and the apartment and your whole life back from zero. And now you're choosing to go back to the person who caused all of that.""He's different now," I said."You said that before," she said. "Back when you were still married. He's working on himself you said. He's in therapy you said. And then the trial happened and every detail came out in a courtroom and you had to sit there and h

Damian Pov I had been planning it for three weeks and every time I started mapping the details I went back to the one fixed point which was that it had to be simple and honest and somewhere real. The park where Bella and I had our first date ten years ago was a forty minute drive from the city but Nathan loved the open space and the duck pond and Bella had mentioned the park twice in the past year in passing like she still thought about it.I told Nathan the plan the night before. He sat very still while I explained it which was how I knew he understood it was serious."What do I do," he said."You come out from behind the tree when I get down on one knee," I said. "That's it. Just stand there.""Should I say anything," he asked."Only if you want to," I said.He considered this. "I'll decide in the moment," he said."Good plan," I said."Do I look serious enough," he asked. He tightened his arms across his chest to demonstrate his intended posture."Very serious," I said.