Page 31 of Billion-Dollar Baby Shock

‘I told you why I had Niko and you know why I won’t go down the road of risking him being abandoned by his mother.’

‘I’m not going anywhere, Dion. I’m not your mother.’

‘You just said you’re lonely.’

Tara gripped the coffee cup. ‘Yes, but that’s because I’m used to being around a lot of people. I have four siblings. Just because I’m lonely doesn’t mean I’m going to walk away. I know I’ll build a community here.

‘But,’ she said, ‘I think we owe it to Niko to try and see if we can make it work.’

‘And when it doesn’t? And he’s devastated?’

‘And what if it does, and he’s not devastated?’

Tara’s phone had been vibrating in her back pocket for the last few minutes and she couldn’t keep ignoring it. She took it out and looked at the screen. Thirteen missed calls. Her stomach tightened. She looked at Dion. ‘Sorry, I have to answer this. It’s my sister Mary. Something must be wrong.’

Tara put down the cup and answered, walking away a little. Then she stopped dead. ‘Okay, Mary, calm down…just tell me what happened.’

She listened to her sister, her blood running cold. ‘I’ll get a flight home as soon as I can.’

She turned around to face Dion. ‘That was my sister. My brother Daniel has just come back from backpacking in Asia, and he was taken ill. They think it’s a tropical bug. He’s in Intensive Care in a hospital in Dublin. I have to go to him.’

Dion stood up straight. ‘Of course, I’ll arrange it.’

‘Will you and Niko come with me? Please?’

He hesitated for one second and then said, ‘Of course. Let’s go.’

* * *

Dublin was humid under grey skies. Tara was in knots. Even though, since she and Dion and Niko had left Athens, her brother had apparently woken up and was responding to treatment. They’d moved him out of ICU to a less acute bed. She still needed to see him.

Dion had organised a private flight and a car had been waiting to take them straight to the hospital. They were directed to the room and Dion stayed in the waiting room with Niko while she went and had an emotional reunion with her sister Mary, who was waiting for her.

‘He’s okay, Tara, he’s out of Intensive Care. He’s awake and talking.’

Tara nodded, tears filling her eyes. She felt guilty for having left them all and having been so focused on Dion and Niko.

As if reading her mind, Mary said, ‘Do not take this on yourself. Daniel is twenty-three and he ate street-food insects on his last night in Bangkok. It’s entirely his fault.’

Tara let out a half-laugh of relief and then went in to see her brother. The doctor assured her that he would be fine, it was a tropical bug but they’d treated it in time.

After assuring herself her brother was ok, Daniel said, ‘So can I meet my nephew now? Apparently he takes after me, the lucky kid.’

Tara rolled her eyes, but went to get Dion and Niko. Mary’s eyes went wide as saucers when she saw Dion, and Tara couldn’t blame her. Here, against this very sterile backdrop, he looked almost other-worldly, in dark trousers and a long-sleeved light top.

Niko was in a pram and Tara lifted him out. Mary got teary-eyed when she saw her nephew, taking him from Tara. She looked at Dion. ‘I’m so sorry, Mr Dimitriou, about the mix-up…but now that he’s here I can’t say I’m that sorry.’

Tara gave her a dig in the ribs and Mary said, ‘ Ow , what?’

Tara just shook her head. She’d saved Mary’s skin but Dion was smiling and he said, ‘I think I’d have to agree with you.’

See? said Mary in a look to Tara. And then she was off, taking her nephew, who seemed to be completely content in his aunt’s arms, in to meet his uncle.

‘Sorry,’ Tara offered as she and Dion walked to the room. ‘My brothers and sisters are a rambunctious lot.’

* * *

Dion was still reeling from the speed at which they’d dropped everything and run to Dublin.

The whole way over on the flight, he hadn’t been able to get that last conversation with Tara out of his head.

She wanted to try and be a family. She’d admitted she was lonely but that it wouldn’t make her leave.

He’d isolated her and yet he couldn’t stay away from her.

He’d told her over and over again he didn’t want a family. He wouldn’t take the risk. The risk of harming Niko.

Or the risk of harming yourself? asked a little voice.

And now, he was dealing with double vision. Mary, Tara’s sister, shared her red hair and colouring. But she had blue eyes. Not blue-green. She’d helped herself so easily to his son, as if it were second nature to claim him. It disturbed and heartened Dion in equal measure.

He was at the door of the hospital room and looking at a young man with dark hair in the bed. Presumably Daniel. He was talking to Niko, who was still in Mary’s arms with Tara hovering nearby.

‘Hey, kiddo, welcome to the family. I’m the most fun out of everyone so just you wait until I’m on my feet again and we’ll go out on the town, okay?’

Niko babbled happily, kicking his legs and arms.

Then from behind Dion someone else slipped into the room. A younger woman, her hair more strawberry blonde than red. She stopped at the bottom of the bed and said, ‘You’re not dead? Ah, pity, I’d picked out the best suit for you to wear at your wake.’

Daniel made a face. ‘Ha-ha, Lucy, I know you’d be devastated if anything happened to me because I know you still fancy Stephen.’

‘Shut up, I do not!’

A kind of chaos ensued that Dion had no idea how to comprehend because he’d never seen anything like it before. Lucy spotted Tara and squealed and then spotted Niko and started crying, taking him into her arms and saying, ‘Oh, my God, you’re so gorgeous.’

And then she saw Dion in the doorway and went pink. Mary came and stood beside him. ‘This is Dion, our…sister’s…baby daddy.’

Lucy said, ‘I’m so sorry, I just assumed you were a doctor.’

‘Not a doctor, an industrialist, one of the most innovative in the world.’

Dion looked around to see yet another member of the family. More red hair. A slightly nerdy-looking young man in glasses. He put out a hand. ‘Oisín, I presume?’

Tara’s youngest brother flushed with pride and shook Dion’s hand. ‘Yes, although that was probably just a matter of deduction.’

‘You helped your sister hack her way into a party.’

‘Yes, I did. But it was worth it, I think?’

Dion looked at Tara, who was hugging Lucy who was still holding Niko.

He couldn’t deny it had been worth it. He was now seeing the true breadth and wealth of what he’d missed out on his whole life.

A family. Tight-knit and loving. Already forming a sort of cocoon around Niko as he was passed around and cooed over.

Dion felt as if he were behind a glass wall.

Observing this unit. Something rose within him, something he hadn’t felt in a long time.

Envy. A sense of loss. And more, as he observed his son basking in this outpouring of love and attention from his aunts and uncles. Something much darker. Guilt. Shame.

And then Niko started to grizzle. He hadn’t eaten since the plane and Dion could smell something suspicious. Mary took him back from Lucy and said, ‘I’ll change him. I think it’s the least I can do after everything.’ Tara gave her the bag of supplies and Mary took him into the bathroom.

Tara came over to Dion. ‘He’s getting cranky. He needs to be fed and probably put down for a nap. My family home isn’t far from here—we could go there, if that’s okay?’

Dion’s chest was tight. This scene represented too much. And it was washing over him and through him like a tidal wave. The thought of going to the family home was suddenly too much. He stepped back from the room. ‘You go, with Niko. Spend the night with your family. I’ll go to the hotel.’

Tara seemed to sense his reluctance. ‘If you’re sure?’

‘Will you come to my hotel in the morning? I’ll send my driver for you.’

‘Of course.’

Dion turned and walked away. But even as he walked away, he wanted to turn around and grab Niko and take him away from here. From this place where there was so much potential for pain.

But Dion kept walking, because he knew that, as of this moment, everything had changed. He couldn’t unsee what he’d just seen. And he couldn’t stop the walls he’d spent years erecting to protect himself from crumbling to pieces.