Page 29 of Billion-Dollar Baby Shock

Tara grabbed a towel from nearby and stood up, lifting Niko out of the water and wrapping him in the towel.

‘Can I do anything?’Dion heard himself asking before he’d even intended saying anything.

Tara looked at him.‘Sure, you could put him down on his playmat and dry him off, let him kick his legs and arms a bit before we dress him again.I can clean up in here.’

‘Thea’s staff can do that.’

Tara smiled at him in a way that Dion felt was a kind of reproach.She said, ‘I’m sure Thea and her staff have enough to do.It’ll only take me a minute.’

She handed Niko over to Dion and he took him, for the first time not feeling as though he were handling an explosive object.Niko looked up at Dion and then he smiled and tapped Dion on the cheek with his pudgy hand.A swooping sensation caught at Dion in the gut.

CHAPTER SIX

Tara was stilltrembling a little after she’d cleaned the bathroom and gathered Niko’s clothes up to put in the laundry basket.She caught sight of her reflection in the mirror and groaned lightly.Her shirt was wet through and clearly showing her underwear.Her hair was up in a damp topknot after her shower.There was the faintest pink on her jaw, stubble rash from Dion’s kisses.She also had it on her thighs.She blushed.

She went to the door of the bathroom and looked into Niko’s suite.Dion was on the floor, with Niko on his back on his playmat, legs and arms kicking happily.Dion was staring at him as if he’d never seen him before, but also not doing much to interact with him.

Tara went into the room, forgetting for a moment about her déshabillé.She came down on her knees and pulled over the frame with things hanging off it that could sit over where Niko lay, allowing him to play with the various things.

She said, ‘This is a good way to let him interact with shapes and toys.’

Niko reached up and grabbed a soft toy and yanked it, making it squeak.He gurgled happily.‘He’s a contented baby.’

Dion sent her a side-eyed glance.‘Considering he’s had nannies as mothers for the first six months of his life?’

Tara flushed.‘I didn’t mean it as a dig.He’s obviously had very good care.Maria is great and I’m sure Elena was too.They just need consistency…obviously a mother is ideal but not everyone is lucky enough to have that.’

‘I had that—I can’t blame my mother for not being there initially but I’d question how good the care was.’

While Niko seemed happily content to play with the mobile, Tara asked a little hesitantly, ‘What happened after your mother left you at the orphanage?’

For a long moment he said nothing, he just kept looking at Niko.Tara was about to apologise for asking such a personal question when he looked at her and said, ‘Nothing good, that’s what happened.It was run by a particularly stern sect of nuns who viewed us as somehow defective.I ran away when I was sixteen.’

Tara said nothing.He went on, ‘I was on the streets for a while but then I went to my father and demanded he give me the money he should have been paying for basic maintenance.It wasn’t even that much, but it was enough.I knew I had to get off the streets.’

Tara’s eyes went wide.‘And he did?’

Dion nodded.‘I didn’t say it but I let him think I would go to the press and tell them who I was.It would have ruined his precious reputation and undoubtedly his marriage.Within a year I’d paid him back every cent he gave me, plus interest, because it had almost killed me to go to him, but my need to survive was greater than my pride.’

‘That took guts.’

Dion shrugged.‘It was survival, pure and simple.’

He was so proud.It was visible in the line of his noble profile.But he wasn’t too proud to demand what he was due.

Tara could imagine that he might already be regretting revealing so much and she said, ‘I should dress Niko and give him his breakfast.’

Dion reached down and scooped him up, already displaying more ease with his son.‘Let me try with the nappy.’

Tara stood up too.‘Be my guest.Everything is on the changing table.I’ll get him some clothes.’

Dion went over and laid Niko down, still kicking his legs energetically and gurgling in that baby talk.Tara busied herself picking out clothes for Niko and tried not to let the fact that Dion seemed inclined to want to be more involved make her chest swell up too much.

She came back over with the clothes just as Dion was taking out a nappy and unfolding it, and just as Niko went very still and unleashed a perfect arc of urine straight onto Dion’s lower belly.

Tara froze and looked at Dion, who had also frozen.She held her breath, terrified that this would scupper the very fragile link growing between him and Niko, but then, to her surprise, he smiled and let out a bark of laughter.Niko smiled gummily back at his father, showing the whites of his emerging first teeth.

Dion bent down towards Niko and put a hand on his belly.‘You are the only person who is allowed to display such insolence.Next time I better be quicker, hm?’