CHAPTER SIXTEEN

ICANCELBUSINESS trips and make video calls instead. Even then I've cleared my schedule more than I ever have. I don't want to leave them. Not for fear she'll walk out on me. She's slept in my bed every night since I brought her here. She can't get enough of me and I'm the same for her. I don't dwell on that fact too long. It'll ebb. These things always do.

So I'll just enjoy the fact we now have a nanny for night time. Even so I'm trying not to be too demanding so Talia can catch up on some of the sleep she's been short of for months. But actually, despite my best intentions, she thwarts me—she's demanding and playful. I relish the challenge of keeping up with her. Her unexplored passionate side has been fully revealed and it's a seemingly bottomless well of want.

I go to Lukas in the mornings. I love ‘talking' with him first thing. I scoop him up and change him and bring him to Talia. His smiles have developed to laughter and babbling. I don't recognise my own spontaneity. Since when do I work from home? Since when do I delegate meetings? But I'm a father playing catch-up with his firstborn. I don't want to leave them for hours at a time and go to work. I've lost so much time I don't want to miss a moment more.

I know Talia feels as though she doesn't fit. I know she has a fear of loss. But I can protect her here in my home and there's one more thing I can do to cement her security. I work with the lawyers via video link then take the paperwork to her at lunch.

‘What's this?' She's instantly wary, which makes me tense up totally.

‘It's Lukas's reissued birth certificate,' I say. ‘Your contract. Plus some other papers.'

‘My contract? For what? I don't need a contract.'

I glare at her. ‘Can you give me just five minutes before interrupting with your rejection?'

She shoots me a mulish look. ‘I don't understand what you're doing. Or why this is even necessary.'

‘So that no matter what happens to me, or what happens between us, you and Lukas will have a home. Always.'

‘I thought we'd agreed on that already,' she says shortly. ‘I trust you.'

My heart stalls. ‘Right.' I clear my throat. ‘This is just the documentation to prove it.' And then some, actually, but I'm a bit thrown.

‘What about this?' She points to one of the papers.

‘My life insurance policy. It'll be worth it for you if I die.'

Her flushed cheeks are leeched of colour in a second. ‘You think I'd want Lukas to lose a parent?'

‘Talia...' I feel terrible. I just hit her with casually cruel words. My parents were so good at it. Knowing where and how to strike to inflict maximum emotional damage. I'm screwing up already. I could hurt her. Hurt Lukas. I don't ever want to. In part that's why it's important to me to get this paperwork squared away. So that if—when—things go south between us, everything is still sorted for Lukas. And her.

‘I'm sorry,' I mutter. ‘That was insensitive.'

She looks troubled more than hurt. ‘You realise he needs you, not your money.'

I stare at her.

‘You're worth far more than any amount of money,' she adds as if I haven't grasped it already.

I feel awkwardness heat my face.

‘And I don't want your money.'

Yeah, I've got that message, actually. She's already given back the money that I put in her account. I understand why she did it. If our positions were reversed I'd have done the same. Even so, it annoys me immensely.

‘You never have to worry about not having a home. Or not having enough ever again. You never have to worry about this being taken away from you or having to just up and leave.'

Her face pales and I know I've hurt her by reminding her of the past, but the point is she's through that now. ‘You know it's nothing to me.' And there are no conditions.

‘It's not nothing. You can't do things like this for everyone or you won't be a billionaire for very much longer.'

‘You're not everyone,' I mutter through gritted teeth. ‘You're the mother of my child.'

She stiffens, and somehow I feel as if I've said the wrong thing.

‘I don't want a massive disparity between his parents' lives,' I try to explain, but I'm making it worse. ‘I don't want him subjected to bitter comparisons—'

‘You mean when we live separately.'

I hesitate. We haven't talked about the future and it feels like boggy ground to cover now. I don't want to go there. I don't want to think on it. Not yet. We're still letting that chemistry run. ‘You let me give Ava money.'

‘Yes, and that benefitted me. That was enough,' she says passionately. ‘This, for Lukas, I understand. That you want to make his future secure no matter what. But this isn't what I want from you.'

There's suddenly an undercurrent between us that I'm wary of exploring.

What does she want? What does she really want from me?

I don't want to know. It's safer to retreat.

‘If you don't want to touch the money, then don't,' I grit. ‘Earn your own and save my unwanted amount for Lukas.'

‘I will,' she says firmly. ‘I'll do exactly that.'

‘Great.'

She turns away from me. I'm not sure if I've angered or pleased her. I shake my head as I walk away. I really need to get to the office and get myself back on track.

I last less than three hours at the office. It's too soon to be there, right? I need to make sure they're okay. Talia's not in the main house and for a moment panic flares before my groundsman quietly tells me she's at the pool house.

There I stop in the doorway, stunned at the scene. Those boxes are open but things are not organised. There are beans and froth and coffee grounds everywhere. A million lattes are scattered over the bench, each with intricate designs on the top. There's music quietly playing and randomly she's in a bikini. The whole thing makes me smile. My heart sings. My body has its usual reaction—on steroids. But as much as I ache for her right now I don't want to interrupt her and take her from her happy place. I step back but she catches sight of me.

‘Hey.' Her smile is huge.

It's all the invitation I need. I step forward, warmth flowing through me already. ‘What are you doing?' Duh. As if it isn't obvious.

‘Making use of Lukas's nap time,' she says. ‘We had a swim earlier hence...' She glances down at the bikini she's wearing. ‘I got this from that drawerful in the wet room. They're all new. All sizes catered to.' She pauses. ‘For your guests?'

I shrug but the possessive thread in her question makes me even hotter. ‘Did Lukas enjoy the water?'

‘Loved it until he got completely over-tired. The nanny took him inside.'

I wish I'd been here to play in the pool with them both. ‘And you decided to do some content creation. In your bikini.'

‘Of course,' she answers, with a nonchalance that's undermined by her sparkling gaze. ‘You said this was my kitchen to do whatever I wanted in.'

‘You're saying you're the boss in here?'

‘Yes.' She caresses me, tugging at my suit. ‘You're a little overdressed for such a warm day.'

Oh, another invitation I cannot resist. ‘You think? What would you advise me to do?'

Her smile is positively wicked. ‘I think you should strip.'

I laugh at the eagerness in her expression. ‘You want me to dance for you.'

The tip of her tongue touches her lip. ‘Would you?'

Her playfulness delights me. This is Talia at her best—confident and relaxed, doing what she loves and teasing me too boot. So of course—despite my inner awkwardness—I begin. But the way she watches, the way she breathes—any last inhibition vanishes. I'm confident in my body but this is next level. This is about seeing her glaze over.

Her hands are at my waist. Firm hands. She pushes and I let her spin me so I'm the one with my back to the kitchen counter. She steps forward and pushes me another pace so the wood is flush against my butt. She takes my hands and spreads my arms, placing my palms down on the counter behind me.

She's fast. And she's breathless. It's an effort for her to unzip my trousers. I grip the counter to stop myself taking hold of her. Taking over. That she's initiated this makes me harder than ever. Like that night in the gondola, when she was shy but forward, curious as hell. I ache to hear her little laugh again but I'm helpless to do anything now—I'm utterly in thrall to her next movement.

‘What do you think you're doing?' I gasp.

‘What do you think I'm doing?'

‘Control freak,' I mutter. ‘Always needing to be in charge.'

‘And there's you, always needing to know every last little thing.'

Our lips brush but she pulls away playfully quick. Her breasts almost touch my chest. Desire whispers between us, a dangerous thread that's about to ignite.

She works down my chest. Licks my abs. Lust clouds her eyes as she takes me in hand and I get how much she wants this. I'm so damn grateful because I want it too. More than anything. I lose everything in this heat between us. I forget the impossible issues. The old anger that underlies my very existence. There's just this. I shake with sheer delight in a single stroke of her tongue and the playful scrape of her teeth devastates me. And when I see her eyes I really start to lose it. She's got this dreamy look and her cheeks are flushed and I realise she's loving doing this to me as much as I love being on the end of her dangerously provocative mouth. I want to stroke her. To make her come with me. I don't want to be alone in this—

‘Dain...'she sighs. It's the sound of desire.

Yeah, I'm not alone. I gasp as I realise how aroused she is. I thread my fingers through her hair and she takes me deep into the back of her throat. I can't hold back. Her hand tightens and her mouth—her hot, wet mouth—pulls. I babble her name over and over, begging her to finish me—

It tears through me in a white-hot convulsion. She holds me through it, taking everything I release into her, until I sag back against the counter. Reduced to nothing. Barely able to stand. I blink hazily and watch my vixen rise to her feet in front of me. I'm all but catatonic as she licks her lips. Her eyes now sparkle and her cheeks are flushed. And then she laughs.

The resurgence of energy is instant and stunning. I was wiped out only moments ago but now I want to reduce her to the same incoherent, slick mess of arousal that she made me. I touch her with as much tenderness as I can muster and discover she's already there.

‘Oh, you enjoyed me,' I growl with voracious delight.

Her eyes glaze. ‘Yes.'

Sex usually brings me emotional oblivion. But this isn't oblivion. I'm here with her—more present than I've ever been in my life. I want to see her. Taste her. Please her to the point where she can't speak any more. Where she can't deny me anything.

‘My turn,' I rumble.

She yelps as I lift her onto the counter. And then she laughs. She lets me have her body. In this realm she grants me permission for everything.

And I take it.