CHAPTER THREE

‘BA-BA-BA-BA-BA...'

Erin smiled at Ashling, who was cooing and babbling to herself in the bath as Erin washed her. Ashling loved water.

A small plastic duck went flying. Erin caught it and handed it back so she could throw it again. But her mind kept looping around and around Ajax's final devastating pronouncement after their meeting the other day.

He didn't want anything to do with his daughter.

Erin felt guilty. Had she pushed him into a corner where he'd felt he had no choice except to push his daughter away?

Obviously losing his son had had a huge effect on him. More than Erin had appreciated. She got it. The thought of anything happening to Ashling made her feel dizzy with fear. But to let that inhibit any future relationship with a child...? Erin couldn't understand that.

Maybe it wasn't just grief for his son. Maybe Ajax had realised that he really didn't want children. After all, it wasn't as if Ashling had been planned—as he'd pointed out.

Erin deftly plucked her out of the bath and dried her, dressing her in her nightclothes before giving her her evening milk. Ashling was tired. They'd been in the park for the afternoon with Erin's father. She went down with only the smallest objection, falling asleep in spite of herself.

Erin traced her daughter's plump cheek and then let herself out of the room. Evenings like this were rare, and she was grateful after the turbulence of the last week.

Erin hadn't yet had the heart to tell her father that Ajax had rejected his daughter at the first opportunity. He was just happy that Ajax now knew.

Even though Erin was desperately disappointed with Ajax's reaction, on some deep level it didn't surprise her. After all, she knew well the capacity of a parent to leave their child.

When Erin's mother had left her, she'd also walked away from her husband—Erin's father. He'd confided in Erin that he'd wanted a family and that her mother had not. But when she'd fallen pregnant with Erin, her father had hoped for the best—only to watch in despair as his highly intelligent and academic wife had become more and more suffocated by the domesticity of having a child.

Eventually she'd left, choosing herself and her academic career over being a mother and a wife, scoring a deep wound inside Erin.

It was only since she'd had Ashling that Erin had felt that wound start to heal. But along with that had come more pain. Because now that she knew what it was to be a mother, and to feel that ever-expanding humbling love, she understood even less how her mother could have abandoned her the way she had.

How cruel was it that she'd unconsciously chosen a man who had the same ability to walk away from a child as her own mother? She smiled at herself humourlessly. No doubt a psychotherapist would tell her she was still playing out her childhood trauma, and looking for someone to heal that wound. Well, she'd failed at the first hurdle.

The DNA test results had been delivered to Erin by courier that morning, confirming what she already knew. Ajax Nikolau was Ashling's father. He would have received the results by now too, and it obviously hadn't precipitated a change of heart as she'd heard nothing from him.

Her daughter was destined to grow up—as Erin had—without the love and presence of one of her parents. It would be up to Erin and her father to shower Ashling with all the love and confidence-building support they could.

Erin woke the next morning not to her daughter's unintelligible babble, but to her phone ringing on her nightstand. She looked at the clock. It was early. She saw the name Ajax and came instantly awake, sitting up in the bed.

‘Hello?' Her voice was rough with sleep.

Ajax was terse and to the point. ‘Something has happened. We need to talk. Can you arrange for the baby to be looked after? I'll send a car for you in an hour.'

Erin struggled to take in what he was saying. Luckily her father lived only around the corner, and he was always up early.

She responded, ‘I... Yes, I guess so. I'll let you know if there's—'

But Ajax had terminated the call. Erin looked at her phone in astonishment.

How rude.

An hour later her father was pushing Ashling out through the main door of the building in her pram. Erin said a hurried goodbye and went to the blacked-out SUV waiting for her by the kerb. The driver was holding open the back door, and as she approached he said, ‘Good morning, Miss Murphy. I'm to take you straight to Mr Nikolau.'

The streets of Manhattan at this hour were still relatively quiet. Erin wondered what on earth was going on to make Ajax behave in such an urgent manner.

She wouldn't have to wait long to find out.

The car pulled up outside his building and she got out. An assistant led her into the elevator. The same elevator where she and he had combusted. Her cheeks started to burn, but luckily the serious assistant wasn't looking at her.

The elevator opened straight into Ajax's apartment, as it had done both times she'd been there. Morning light flooded the luxurious space. It still looked unlived-in. She couldn't imagine letting Ashling crawl around on these undoubtedly priceless carpets, leaving sticky handprints everywhere.

And then suddenly he was there. In dark trousers and a light shirt. Top button open. Hair a little messy, as if he'd been running a hand through it. Jaw dark with stubble. He hadn't shaved yet.

It made Erin think of that last morning, when she'd woken to find him dressed and looking at her with a grim expression. Shaved jaw. Making her feel very disheveled.

‘I'm sorry I couldn't come to you. I've been tied up here with calls and I had to speak to you as soon as possible to get ahead of everything.'

Erin's brain still felt a little sluggish. ‘Ahead of...what?'

‘Come with me,' Ajax said as he turned around again, and then he asked, ‘Do you want coffee? Anything to eat?'

‘Coffee would be great.'

It might help her wake up and not feel as if she was dreaming. Another assistant said she'd bring it through, and Erin barely had time to say how she liked it before Ajax was disappearing down a corridor.

She hurried after him, deliberately ignoring the door that she knew led into his bedroom.

She found herself following him into a large corner room that turned out to be a home office. There were books on shelves, multiple computers, screens showing various images and information. A TV built into the wooden panelling was showing a news channel on mute.

The assistant materialised with Erin's coffee. She took it gratefully and noticed that she closed the door behind her.

Ajax's scent had caught at her as soon as she'd seen him. Woody and earthy, with something that was deeper...spicy. Uniquely him. Very male. Every nerve-ending in her body was humming with awareness, in spite of her best efforts to remain immune.

Erin took a quick gulp of coffee in a bid to be more alert. Even though she knew any desire he'd had for her had died, she wasn't sure she could trust that she wouldn't betray herself, alone in a room with him. Their history in that regard hadn't exactly been without incident.

She took a moment to acknowledge that she felt very underdressed. Ajax and his assistants looked as if they'd been up for hours. She'd just thrown on a pair of sweatpants and a matching top after a quick shower before she'd woken Ashling. She'd let her hair dry naturally, and could imagine it was sticking out all over the place.

Ajax was looking at a screen, and then he stood up straight. ‘You need to see this,' he said.

Erin felt a clench of trepidation at the expression on his face. She put her cup down on the table and went around the other side of the desk to stand beside him.

It took her a moment to take in what she was seeing. A slew of lurid headlines and...

She bent to look closer and put her hand up to her mouth. There was a picture of her, with Ashling in her buggy, and it looked as if it had been taken yesterday, when they'd been coming back from the park. There was even a picture of her kissing her father goodbye.

The headlines were all a variation on Who is Nikolau's mystery baby-mama? Baby joy for tragic Nikolau! Second chance for happiness! Will Nikolau put a ring on it?

Erin stood up straight again. For a moment she felt dizzy. ‘What...what is this?'

‘This,' said Ajax, sounding as grim as he looked, ‘is the result of someone on my team leaking news for personal gain.'

Erin backed away until she came up against a hard surface. She went around the desk again, wanting to get away from the pictures and the headlines. For someone who'd never merited so much as a blip of a mention anywhere outside of academic notices, and who had no social media, this evidence of invasion into her privacy felt like a physical violation.

She could almost feel the colour leaching from her face.

Ajax looked at her and came around the desk to take her arm. ‘Sit down.'

She did. Her legs were wobbly. He handed her some water. She took a sip. Put the glass down. Tried to get her head to function. Ajax was pacing.

She said, ‘I hadn't even thought that far ahead...to the public knowing about you and the baby...but obviously it would have happened at some point.'

Or maybe not, she rebuked herself.

Hadn't he said he wanted nothing to do with her? Maybe he would have denied being her father. It was the way it sometimes happened in celebrity circles, and then there was always a very public spat to force acknowledgement...

‘Erin?'

Ajax was looking at her. She said, ‘What did you say?'

‘That I'm sorry. I never intended it to come out like this. I was planning on announcing it far more discreetly and ensuring that you would both be well protected from the inevitable ensuing interest.'

The relief that he had intended to acknowledge his daughter, even if he still couldn't seem to bring himself to use her name, was almost as destabilising as seeing those headlines.

He continued, ‘But now it's out, and any attempt to control it will be like trying to put out a raging wildfire. By now there will be people in every newsroom tasked with finding out who you are and your entire life history.'

That didn't bother Erin too much.

She shrugged. ‘They won't find anything of interest.'

Her most outrageous behaviour had been in an elevator with this man. Her cheeks started to burn again. She took another quick sip of water.

As if she hadn't spoken, Ajax was saying, ‘You'll be hounded. You'll have to leave your apartment and go somewhere else.'

Erin did mind that. ‘We can't just leave. Everything we need is there. And my father is just around the corner.'

Ajax looked at her. ‘Your father won't escape their scrutiny either.'

‘He's a professor of advanced mathematics,' Erin offered dryly. ‘I'm sure they'll lose interest quickly. Surely if we hole up for a day or two they'll lose interest?'

And then, even as she said that, she thought of the intense interest Ajax attracted whenever he appeared in public. The constant speculation if he was pictured with anyone. She'd been one of those people poring over his image recently, wondering who his date was, if it was serious.

He shook his head. ‘It'll take longer than a couple of days. The photographers who took those pictures yesterday won't be so discreet from now on. They're probably gathering outside your building right now.'

Erin shivered at the thought of being at the centre of such scrutiny.

‘And it's not just you. It's the baby.'

Something cold went down Erin's spine. ‘What do you mean?'

‘Now that it's out who she is, she's a target.'

‘Why?'

But even as she asked, Erin knew. She was the secret daughter of one of the richest men in the world.

Ajax was pacing again, saying almost to himself, ‘If I'd had time I would have made sure you were protected, but now...' He turned around. ‘I'm due to go to Greece today for a month. A mixture of work and social events.'

Erin frowned. ‘Why are you telling me this?'

‘Because there's only one solution, to contain this story and make sure you're both safe. You and the baby are coming to Greece with me.'