Page 27 of Billion-Dollar Baby Shock

She reached up and pressed her mouth to his, infusing her kiss with all the things she couldn’t say, that he didn’t want to hear. It turned molten in seconds, an urgency gripping them as they made their way to the bedroom, shedding clothes as they went.

By the time they reached Dion’s bed, Tara’s hair was completely undone and falling around her shoulders. The sneakers had been kicked off. Dion was wearing just his trousers, chest bare. They were both breathing harshly.

And then it became something else. Slow and languorous, as Dion made her turn around and pulled down the zip, baring her back.

The dress loosened around her chest and then fell.

Tara shimmied her hips to make it fall to the floor.

She pulled down her underwear and stepped out of it.

Naked, she turned again and faced Dion. She put her hands to his trousers and undid them, pulling down the zip, her knuckles brushing his erection.

She saw how his cheeks flared with colour.

She pulled his trousers down and he stepped out of them, and his underwear. Now he was naked too. There was something very elemental about facing him like this with nothing in between.

Acting on an instinct as old as time, Tara dropped to her knees before Dion. She desperately wanted to do something for him but also push him to the edge of his control. He reached out a hand saying, ‘Tara, you don’t—’

But he stopped talking when she took him in her hand, circling the hard length of him, squeezing gently, moving her hand up and down. She was fascinated by the steely strength encased in delicate silken flesh.

Then she leant forward and put her mouth around his flesh and heard his sharp indrawn breath. His hand came to her head, fingers tangling in her hair, as if he wanted to pull her back but couldn’t.

She was sure her touch had to be gauche, inexpert, but Dion’s hips were jerking and suddenly she was being hauled up in front of him and he was wild-eyed. ‘I need…to be inside you. Now.’

Tara lay down on the bed, beyond excited by Dion’s desperate intensity.

He pushed her legs apart and came between them and then he was thrusting deep inside her, taking her breath away and making her back arch, hands gripping the cover.

He found her hands and caught them, putting them up and over her head, catching them with one of his.

He pulled her closer with his other arm and kept up a remorseless steady and devastating rhythm that had her arching higher against him, wrapping her legs around his waist, begging, pleading for him to take mercy on her.

He bent his head and found her breast and sucked her nipple deep into his mouth and that sent her soaring higher than she’d ever been before.

Waves of pleasure wracking her body as Dion found his own release and slumped over her, head buried in her neck.

* * *

‘I think you should go back to Athens. I’ll be stuck in meetings until late this evening.’

Dion had said that to Tara just hours before, when she’d found him, much like the previous morning, dressed and ready for work. None of the signs of the previous night on him, whereas Tara felt as if she wore his lovemaking like a brand. Permanently altered.

She’d woken during the night, curled into Dion, his arm around her. She’d revelled in that for a moment before extricating herself and picking up her things and going back to her bedroom. She didn’t want to wake again as she had the previous morning.

She hadn’t argued with him about leaving Paris. In a way she’d welcomed the bursting of the bubble. Not that Dion hadn’t already burst it a little with his reminding her not to read anything into… anything .

And, as his driver pulled up to the Athens villa now, she couldn’t wait to see Niko. She had to remember that Niko was the centre of all of this. Niko would endure, Tara and Dion wouldn’t.

Dion wasn’t losing sight of what was important to him. She shouldn’t either. The only problem was that, for Tara, what she’d believed to be important to her had undergone a seismic change since coming to Athens mere days ago.

Far from wanting to spend the next few years carving out a career and enjoying her independence, she now still yearned for a career, but also to create a family with the man she loved, and her son.

She wanted it all, and she didn’t need anyone to point out that having it all was about as impossible as finding a way into Dion’s well-guarded heart.

* * *

A day later, when Dion returned to the villa, he didn’t like to admit to the level of anticipation he felt. And it wasn’t just about Niko. He realised that he’d never had a sense of coming home before. To someone.

Since Tara had returned to Athens, she’d been sending Dion pictures and videos of Niko. Now, he felt as if he’d been away for a month and was vowing never to go away for longer than twenty-four hours again.

The car pulled to a stop outside the main steps and the door opened as Dion got out of the car. Tara appeared with Niko in her arms and Niko squealed and put out his arms when he saw Dion.

This image tore something apart inside Dion. It made him think of how, when he’d woken up yesterday morning, he’d been alone in his bed. Tara had gone back to her bedroom. And relief had been the last thing he’d felt. He’d wanted her there, close.

Need warred with the urge not only to self-protect but also to protect Niko. He closed off the part of himself that wanted to melt into this image and take it at face value.

He couldn’t keep letting Tara cloud his brain.

He forced himself to move and went over and lifted Niko into his arms, holding him close. It felt like second nature now to hold his son.

‘Hi,’ she said.

Dion looked at her and steeled himself against the reaction that it was becoming harder and harder to believe might fade. Damn her. She shouldn’t even be affecting him, dressed in cut-off shorts and a sleeveless shirt tied at her waist. Hair up. Bare feet. No make-up.

He had to start setting the boundaries.

* * *

‘Dion? Are you okay?’

Tara’s heart was still thumping to see Dion.

It felt as if she hadn’t seen him in a week.

But it had been only the previous day. She’d been so happy just now to see him returning.

Her heart expanding in her chest. A big silly grin on her face.

But he’d just looked at her and then he’d come and plucked Niko out of her arms and was holding him now as if she might try to take him back.

He blinked and the intensity in his face cleared. ‘I’m fine, but we do need to talk.’

He went inside, still holding Niko. Tara followed, her insides going into freefall. Was it happening already? Dion had had enough and this…was over? As she followed him and Niko back inside, she felt like an interloper, for the first time since she’d scaled that wall to get onto his property.

‘Thea has prepared some food, if you’re hungry?’

He turned to face her. ‘I ate on the plane. Can you meet me in my office in an hour? I’ll stay with Niko for a bit.’

Tara swallowed. ‘Sure, no problem.’

An hour later, Maria was putting Niko down for the evening and then she was heading home. Tara couldn’t put off the moment any longer. She went and knocked on Dion’s door, feeling as though they were right back where they’d started when she was coming for the DNA test results.

‘Come in.’

Tara took a breath and pushed the door open. Dion was behind his desk. He looked up. ‘Please, sit.’

Tara did, perching on the edge of a chair across from him. He looked serious but a piece of hair was flopping onto his forehead and Tara wanted to go and push it back, sit in his lap—

He stood up. ‘So, I think it’s time to talk about making arrangements.’

‘Arrangements,’ Tara echoed faintly.

He nodded and went over to the huge window, his back to her. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Arrangements for a more permanent solution.’

‘I…’ Tara wasn’t sure what to say. ‘What do you mean exactly?’

He turned around. ‘Well, it’s not as if this was ever more than a temporary situation, was it?’

Tara felt winded. Was he as brutal with all of his lovers? ‘No, I knew that.’ But she’d hoped…

‘You can’t stay here. It won’t be good for Niko. He’ll get used to you.’

Tara stood up, fire in her belly. ‘I won’t be cast out of Niko’s life.’ Or yours, wailed a little voice.

‘You won’t be cast out of Niko’s life, but you will be at a more appropriate…distance.’

Tara frowned as something became more clear. ‘You’re talking about living arrangements.’

Dion looked at her. ‘Yes, of course.’

Tara sat back down, legs suddenly wobbly. She hated herself for asking, but she said, ‘And what about…us?’

‘We’ll continue to see each other until such time as the desire fades.’

Tara felt light-headed. It wasn’t over. Yet. Desperate to feel some kind of control in this situation when she felt very much adrift on the currents of Dion’s whims, she lifted her chin and said, ‘What if I’m already over it?’

He stalked over to her before she could take another breath and pulled her up out of the chair, close to his body. She felt his heat and strength and her insides predictably melted into a pool of lust. She was so not over it.

‘You’re saying you don’t want me any more?’

Her gaze roved over his face, the lean lines, the intense expression. She wanted to make him laugh. She loved him. She reached up and touched his face, tracing his hard jaw.

She shook her head. ‘No, I was just…saying nonsense.’

He speared a hand in her hair and pulled her head back. His gaze went to her mouth and lingered there. He said something in Greek. Tara imagined he was cursing her for this crackling chemistry between them. Well, tough. It wasn’t her fault that it wasn’t burning out.

He lowered his head and took her mouth in an open kiss, explicit, immediately sexual, and she welcomed it, meeting him with equal hunger and passion.