Chapter 3: Damien Douglas

Damien had gone straight to his company after speaking with Jeremy. Indeed he needed a reliable secretary and knowing how forthright Jeremy was, he had assumed that his daughter would be reliable as well, in cases involving finance, expedition and proper keeping of financial records. He hoped she would be hardworking as well. She should be if she found the time to cook and come serve it to her father in the office.

But she was too fiery for his liking. She was already blaming him for the little accident that took place on the road when she had not exactly been watching where she stepped.

He had to admit though that her fiery attitude was very attractive with her pale gold hair and blue eyes that reminded him of the sea or the sky.

He cautioned himself. He had to stop thinking about her facial and physical attributes and concentrate on other matters .

It was not as though he was starved sexually. He had alot of lady friends who knew what the score was.

He recalled a good friend of his, Ryan who had once asked him if he could not just choose one of his lady friends to get married to.

'I do not believe in love and least of all in marriage', he had told Ryan. 'Love and marriage are all overrated'.

Damien could speak that way to Ryan, who was twice divorced and having problems with his third marriage and surprisingly still believed in love and marriage

'It is sad that a young man like you do not believe in love. You will just die a lonely man'.

Damien felt that it was better to be lonely than experience again what he had experienced in the past. It had nearly killed him.

'Have you ever been in love?' Ryan had asked him.

'Once or twice but we found out that it was not the real thing and parted ways', Damien replied.

This led him to recalling the past that he wished to forget. He was never going to forgive his brother - his elder brother who could do no wrong while he was the black sheep of the family, the younger son of the Duke of Davenport.

Carole was a beautiful girl and he had fallen head over hills in love with her as soon as he set eyes on her. He had been in college then.

A sizzling relationship had endued and they both promised to get married. They had no misgivings that their marriage would be accepted by both families since Damien was going to be considered a good match for Carole's family and his family would accept her being from an aristocratic family as well, though not titled.

He had taken her to see his elder brother with whom he had no secrets and they had taken to each other.

But later, they always had rows. He did not like this.

His brother Dominic, and Carole were the two people he loved most in the world and he wanted them to accept each other. After all, he was going to get married to Carol and she would see his brother often. The earlier their rows stopped, the better.

'Carole...', he started.

'Yes, love?'

'You know that I love you. My love for you cannot be mistaken'.

She nodded and kissed him. 'And I adore you too'.

'But you will have to love my brother as well. He is the only brother I have and I love him very much', Damien said. 'You cannot hate him and live me, I would feel uncomfortable and sad. You two should get along, please'.

Carole had looked at him and an expression he could not decipher crossed her face.

'Okay, if you feel so strongly about it. Then I shall try to be civil' at least to your elder brother but he can be irritating at times'.

'Tolerate his irritating behaviour for my sake and thanks for promising to do as I asked' he said and they had kissed passionately.

The marriage preparations started and everybody was wishing them well. His brother did alot to ensure that the day went smoothly or so he thought.

Gifts started coming in with best marriage wishes.

On the day of the wedding, Damien had never been as happy as he was, he quickly got ready. His brother was going to be his best man but he was no where to be found and he could not be reached on the phone.

He went ahead to the church to wait for him there, he did not want to keep his bride waiting. He wanted to get there before her and watch her come into the church and be handed to him at the altar by her father. Some business or the other must have held Dominic his brother down but Damien was sure he was going to get to the wedding as soon as he could extract himself from whatever was keeping him.

He even thought to himself that a girl might be responsible and amusedly thought that it would be very great if he came to the altar with the girl as his own bride so that both brothers could get married at the same time on the same day.

They waited, both his brother and Carole did not come. The priest was getting impatient. The wedding was supposed to be over by then.

What could have happened? Could they have been involved in an automobile accident?

Damien was bothered, he started pacing. His father tried to calm him down but he was restless.

Carole's parents were there as well, so what was keeping her? She could also not be reVhed on the phone and the telephone in their house was answered by the maid who told them that Miss Lawson had long gone out.

Damien broke out in cold sweat. She may have had an accident of some sort. Or maybe she was robbed?

They were still contemplating all this when someone came with the news that Dominic had just wedded Carole.

Damien could not believe his ears. He grabbed the messenger by the collar of his shirt and asked him to explain what he meant.

'Your highness, your brother has just got wedded to Miss Carole Lawson in St Marie's church. They are back now. They asked to bring you the good news so that you will not get to bothered waiting for them'.

If he were a woman, Damien was sure that he would have collapsed right there on the floor of the church but as the people who had come to witness the wedding started talking all at once, he walked in a blinding rage and hurt out of the church after his brother and his supposed bride.

His father tried to stop him. 'Take it easy. It is better that it happened now than later.' He continued, 'Carole is still married into the family and to your elder brother. I'm not saying what he did was right', he said quickly when he saw the fury on his son's face. 'But there are many very beautiful damsels over the city and outside. You could have your pick of anyone of them and marry'.

Damien wringed his hands away from his father's grip and went after his brother and Carole.