After Rebirth, I Became My Ex's Aunt-in-Law

Through the speakerphone, Kai took a dramatic breath.

”She slammed the door in my face, Damien,” Kai vented, his voice cracking with the genuine devastation of a man whose ego had just been run over by a freight train. ”Literally right in my face. It almost clipped my nose.”

Damien froze, the crystal tumbler halting halfway back down to the desk. He stared at the glowing phone in the dark, processing the words.

”What?” Damien asked, his voice flat.

”Zoe!” Kai groaned loudly, the sound of his pacing echoing through the line. ”I have been sending her gifts every single day! I am trying to get her to talk to me! I actually like her, Damien! At first, yeah, I just wanted to get her into bed, but now...”

Damien set his scotch down and rubbed his temples, a fresh wave of exhaustion settling behind his eyes. He dragged a hand down his face, dumbfounded by the absurdity of the phone call.

He had known Kai for a very long time. Kai was an unapologetic playboy asshole. He collected women like expensive watches and discarded them just as quickly. As far as Damien was concerned, Kai didn’t actually like Zoe half as much as he thinks.

Kai only wanted Zoe so badly because she had walked away first. She was done with him before he was done with her, and Kai’s massive, fragile ego simply couldn’t handle the rejection.

Kai wasn’t lovesick; he was throwing thousands of dollars at a closed door because he was obsessed with winning.

”First of all,” Damien started. ”Throwing money at women doesn’t fix everything.”

”And forget her,” he advised coldly, completely dismissing his friend’s ”heartbreak.” ”Go find some desperate gold digger to put your dick in and leave her alone.”

”The gifts obviously aren’t expensive enough,” Kai complained bitterly, blatantly ignoring Damien’s advice. ”Maybe I should buy her a helicopter?”

Damien leaned back in his leather chair, a dark scowl crossing his face as he considered the situation.

Zoe was Aria’s best friend. If Kai kept pushing, eventually won Zoe over, and then inevitably reverted to his toxic, playboy nature and broke her heart... Aria wouldn’t just murder Kai. She would undoubtedly blame him by association for unleashing the plague that was Kai Vane onto her best friend.

Damien genuinely considered blocking Kai’s number and distancing himself from the man entirely, right now, just to proactively avoid his wife’s impending wrath.

Damien had already made up his mind. ”I’m hanging up.”

”Wait!” Kai scrambled. ”You’re judging me and how I do romance! When was the last time you did something actually romantic for Aria, huh?”

Damien stiffened in his chair. ”I am perfectly attentive to my wife.”

”Oh, really?” Kai scoffed. ”Have you ever bought her a teddy bear? Have you taken her to a movie theatre?”

Damien’s jaw locked. ”I provide everything she needs. I protect her.”

”Protecting her isn’t the same as wooing her, man,” Kai mocked, hitting a nerve. ”She’s a twenty-year-old girl. She wants romance. She wants to be swept off her feet. You need to step up your game before she wakes up one day and realizes she married a brooding, emotionally constipated wall.”

The insult hung heavily in the dark, silent office.

Damien stared at his glass of scotch, the amber liquid glowing faintly in the blue light of his laptop screen.

He thought about his marriage. He thought about the blood, the bullets, the contracts, and the dynamic that had defined their entire relationship from the night she broke into his suite. He had handed her a titanium Black Card. He had destroyed lives for her. He had buried his grandfather’s pride for her. Wasn’t it enough?

But Kai was right.

Damien Sinclair didn’t know how to go on a normal date. He had zero traditional romantic game. He had no idea how to romance a twenty-year-old girl without utilizing his vast wealth or undisputed power and influence.

A rare, highly uncomfortable wave of deep, vulnerable self-doubt washed over him.

Damien took another slow sip of his scotch, the ice clinking softly.

”What do you suggest?” Damien asked quietly into the dark.

There was a loud, sudden clatter on the other end of the line, like Kai had just dropped his phone in shock.

”Wait. Are you actually asking me for advice?” Kai wheezed, utterly flabbergasted. ”You? Asking me?”

”If you make a joke out of this, I will have your tongue removed,” Damien warned, though his voice lacked its usual bite. ”Just answer the question.”

”Okay, okay,” Kai mumbled, clearly pacing again. ”You have to do something normal. Something domestic. No private jets. You need to show her you care about her interests. Build her a Lego set. Or... wait! Make her a Spotify playlist! Girls love mixtapes!”

Damien frowned, staring blankly at his phone. ”I don’t have Spotify.”

”Are you serious right now?” Kai groaned loudly. ”You don’t have Spotify? What do you listen to in the car? The sound of your own brooding thoughts?”

”I prefer silence,” Damien deadpanned.

”You are a Victorian ghost haunting a tailored suit,” Kai sighed in defeat. ”Okay, skip the playlist. What about a picnic? Central Park. Just a blanket, some sandwiches, and you two.”

”In a public park?” Damien’s anxiety instantly spiked. ”Absolutely not. The sightlines are completely unsecured. A sniper could easily set up on a dozen different rooftops bordering the green.”

”Damien! It’s a picnic, not a presidential motorcade!” Kai yelled into the phone. ”You have to drop the paranoia for like, two hours! You need to touch grass!”

Damien pinched the bridge of his nose, the migraine pulsing steadily against his temples. He was actually considering the nightmare of clearing a section of Central Park without Aria noticing when a sudden sound sliced through the dark room.

Ping.

The notification chime echoed from the speakers of his laptop.

Damien paused.

He leaned forward, tapping the trackpad to wake the screen. A high-priority email had just landed in his inbox from Ken.

”Hold on,” Damien murmured to Kai. He clicked on the email, his eyes scanning the message about Leo and Jade Evans.

Ken had managed to dig deep enough to find a hand that must’ve slipped out when they were packing the skeletons in the closet.