Page 9 of Billion-Dollar Baby Shock

Tara waited until the taxi was gone and Dionysios’s car had disappeared into the grounds. She crossed the road to the high wall. No way was she getting in via the security guard, not once Dionysios knew who was there. And she had no idea who she could pretend to be.

She started to look at the wall and could see that it wasn’t perfectly even.

It wasn’t meant to be. She spotted a couple of bricks where she might gain a foothold.

The handles of the carry-all bag were long enough to put over her head and go under one arm.

She set to climbing the wall but realised pretty quickly that she’d have to do it barefoot.

She slipped off the wedges, left them in the grass and tried again, and, forcing herself not to think about what she was doing, and focusing on climbing, she managed to get to the top and swing her legs over.

She was sweating but euphoric. Now all she had to do was drop the nine feet or so into what looked like impenetrable bushes and she’d be in.

She groaned softly. What was she doing? But she’d come too far to stop now so she turned around and started to scale her way down the other side of the wall, finding small footholds until she could jump down into the tiny space between the bush and the wall.

She sidled along between the bush and the wall until she saw a gap.

Breathing a sigh of relief, she made her way through the tangle of leaves, wincing a little as her feet crunched on earth and branches, until finally she popped out onto a lush smooth lawn and could see the imposing shape of a majestic villa in the distance.

Breathing a sigh of relief, she took a step forward and stopped suddenly, her knee lifted in the air, when she heard a soft but menacing growl and a voice said something in Greek.

She looked to her right and saw a man dressed in a security uniform holding a big dog on a lead. The dog wasn’t growling now, and was clearly under control, but Tara wasn’t taking any chances. She put her foot down and smiled weakly. She’d just ruined any chance of Dionysios taking her seriously.

But to her surprise, when the guard indicated for her to precede him, it wasn’t back to the main gate and out onto the road, it was up towards the villa.

All the way to the front door. Which was open.

And filled with the sight of Dionysios Dimitriou.

But he wasn’t alone. He was holding a baby in his arms.

The most adorably cherubic baby she’d ever seen. Thick glossy dark hair. Olive skin. Light eyes. Huge eyes. Green-blue. Her eyes. Something inside her melted and dissolved into a pool of what she could only describe as love at first sight. She didn’t need a DNA test to tell her they were related.

Her son looked at her and she looked at him but then he opened his mouth and screamed. She noticed then that his eyes were red and his cheeks were red.

She looked up into a set of much darker eyes. Angry eyes. Not golden any more. He said over the squalls of the baby, ‘I thought I told you I didn’t want to see you again.’

‘We need to talk about this.’ Tara gestured at her son, who was becoming inconsolable. Sobs coming in gasping gulps.

‘What’s wrong with him?’ she asked.

Dionysios jiggled him inexpertly in his arm and Tara had to curb the urge to reach out.

Looking extremely reluctant, he finally said, ‘My day nanny, Elena, just walked out, a family crisis. It’s a feast day and so the rest of my staff have a day off, including my housekeeper.

The night nanny won’t be here until five p.m.’

Two nannies! She pushed that aside for now and looked at the baby. ‘He’s teething, his cheeks are red.’ A smell hit her nostrils and she wrinkled her nose. ‘And he needs a nappy change. When was he last fed?’

Dionysios stared back at her nonplussed.

She guessed in a second that he didn’t know the answers to any of what she’d just said and also she’d wager that he’d never changed a nappy.

Anger rose and a strong maternal instinct to pluck her baby out of his arms. She forced herself to say calmly, ‘You look like you need help.’

The baby’s screams went up a notch as if in agreement. Dionysios didn’t move though. Concerned for her son, Tara said, ‘You can’t claim that I orchestrated this! At least let me help settle him. He’s upset!’

‘Do you know what to do?’

‘I have four younger siblings and I used to help out in a nursery to make extra money. I think I know more than you do right now.’

Still looking very reluctant, Dionysios eventually stood back and said, ‘Fine, come in.’

Tara stepped into the cool marble interior of the villa’s reception hall. She only remembered then she was in bare feet. She looked down and back up to see Dionysios staring at her feet too. Weakly she explained, ‘I had to take the shoes off to climb the wall.’

The bag was still across her body and she lifted it off.

He arched a brow. ‘You couldn’t have just asked Security to contact me?’

Tara arched a brow back. ‘And you would have just let me in?’

He scowled and then he said, ‘You can leave your things on the chair,’ before handing her the baby.

Tara did as he instructed and lifted the baby into her chest. He was heavy, solid.

The surprise of being handed over to someone else made him stop crying for a few seconds, but she could see that he was working up to a new round of crying if she didn’t move fast.

‘Where’s the nursery?’

‘This way.’ Dionysios led her out of the entrance hall and up a central staircase to the first floor.

Tara’s bare feet sank into the plush carpet.

He walked down a long corridor to a door at the end and opened it to reveal a lovely suite of rooms, kitted out for a baby.

She could see instantly that no expense had been spared.

She saw the changing table and went over and laid him down and thought of something. ‘What’s his name?’

‘Nikolau… Niko for short.’

The baby was looking up at Tara, her own eyes mirrored back to her. A gush of emotion filled her chest as she said, ‘Hi, Niko…it’s nice to meet you.’ She stroked a finger down one chubby cheek and he kicked his legs and smiled.

But then she could see him register his hunger, wet nappy, tiredness or any other manner of things again and his little face scrunched up before he let out a renewed massive wail.

Tara deftly started taking off his clothes to get to the nappy and said to Dionysios, ‘Can you get him a bottle? I’m sure the nanny will have left some pre-prepared.’

Dionysios started to walk from the room and Tara called out, ‘Make sure it’s warm.’

He nodded and kept going. Tara busied herself changing her son and tried not to let that fact— her son!

—overwhelm her too much. She managed to find clean clothes—there were enough clothes for ten babies.

She also found a teething ring and when she gave it to him he promptly put it straight in his mouth, confirming her suspicion.

She was just picking him up again—freshly changed and dressed—when she heard a sound behind her and turned to see a slightly flustered-looking Dionysios holding a bottle of milk. He said, ‘I think this is it. They were in the fridge.’

Tara took it. ‘I’ll give him a feed and see if he’ll go down afterwards. I think he’s tired.’

She saw a rocking chair and went and sat down, positioning Niko in the crook of her arm.

She tested the milk’s temperature and it was fine.

As soon as she put the teat into Niko’s mouth his little hands grabbed the bottle and he drank as if he hadn’t been fed in hours, eyes glued to hers as if she held all the secrets in the universe.

In that moment she was barely aware of the powerful figure of the man in the doorway watching them both warily.

She was enraptured with her son and knew there and then that she would lay down her life for him.

* * *

Dion looked at the woman in the rocking chair with the baby in her arm, feeding him, little pudgy legs kicking happily, hands clamped on the bottle.

The jarring juxtaposition of what he and she had been doing just hours ago and what he was looking at right now was too much for him to try and unpick.

It made him feel very off-centre. As did their intense absorption in each other—his son and this woman.

Ridiculously it made him feel excluded in a way that he hadn’t felt before when the nannies had tended to Niko.

Maybe she’s telling the truth?

No, Dion assured himself. He was too cynical to be taken in so easily.

She was an opportunist who had somehow found out what the press didn’t even know yet. That he’d had a son. And she was using the information to get something out of him.

But he couldn’t deny, as peace reigned again and the only sound that could be heard was the rhythmic sucking of the baby on the bottle, that he needed her for now.

Dion left the charming but disturbing tableau and went back down to the kitchen, making himself a strong coffee.

It had been mayhem as soon as he’d arrived at the villa, with the nanny crying and all but shoving his son into his arms saying something about her mother in hospital.

Dion hadn’t even had time to offer assistance before she’d been gone.

He had to admit uncomfortably that he hadn’t quite given due thought to the reality of having a baby in the house.

Elena had travelled to the States with him to collect Nikolau after he’d been born, and he’d been so tiny that Dion had been justifiably terrified of doing anything to harm him—so he’d been quite happy to let the nanny take charge.

And since then, not much had changed. He’d held his son but as soon as he felt that little body tensing, or squirming and stiffening and arching away from him as if he knew instinctively that Dion couldn’t provide what he needed, a kind of terror would take over and he’d hand him back.