by Abby Green
He opened the rest of the buttons on her nightdress, releasing her breasts into his hands, and she rose over him and took him in her hand as she guided herself onto his rigid length.
Her hands were spread on his chest as she rode him, tentatively at first and then with more confidence, biting her lip against the spasm of pleasure as he touched a point deep inside her.
He massaged her breasts, coming up to take one nipple and then the other into his mouth. That sent her into a frenzy, and her movements became less slick, more frantic, as she chased the peak that teased her...
She must have sobbed, or pleaded or something, because Nikos clamped his hands on her hips and took control, holding her still while he thrust into her over and over again until she collapsed against him and pressed her mouth to his in a desperate kiss, pleading silently for him to stop and yet never to stop.
And then it came—the moment when everything went still and taut before a quickening rush of pleasure so intense that she could only submit to its power and wait for the storm to pass.
When Maggie woke the next morning she was back in her bed, with only the vaguest memory of Nikos carrying her there. Daniel was awake and kicking his legs happily in his cot. She lay there for a moment, wondering if actually that had been a particularly intense dream last night.
But, no. Her body was tender in secret places.
She turned on her side and looked at Daniel, recalled seeing him in Nikos’s arms. Emotion gripped her again. And something almost fearful.
The force of need she felt around Nikos and the fact that it wasn’t diminishing was overwhelming. She’d heard that desire burnt itself out eventually, but this didn’t feel as if it would ever burn out. For her. But would it for Nikos?
Of course it would. It had to be a fluke that he still wanted her. Some weird aberration.
He hasn’t slept with anyone else since you.
She hated that voice in her head, making her think of things like that. Things that gave her hope. That made her wish for other things, like a proper relationship with Nikos—not separate bedrooms and moments snatched while they were on this whistlestop tour around Europe.
Once the tour was over...when things calmed down...surely then things would settle into a routine? Although Nikos and routine didn’t really go together. He seemed very much at home with this peripatetic existence, but Maggie knew she couldn’t live like this on a regular basis.
But maybe now...maybe now that he seemed to want to bond with Daniel...things could change?
Maggie laughed and Daniel gurgled. ‘Honestly—he won’t break. Just take his legs together in your hand and lift him up...good...then wipe his bottom with the baby wipe. That’s it. Make sure it’s dry and clean. Put the nappy here...’
The concentration on Nikos’s face as he mastered the art of changing a nappy was nothing short of comical. It told Maggie a lot more about him than she’d bet he would ever want anyone to know.
He placed Daniel down on the clean nappy and pulled it up between his legs, then secured it over his belly with the sticky tapes on the sides.
‘I did it!’
After about ten attempts.
Maggie didn’t say it out loud. Daniel had been amazingly patient. As if he’d sensed his father was trying to make an effort.
‘You did.’
Nikos pulled on Daniel’s Babygro and secured the buttons, then scooped up his son, carefully supporting his head, and walked out into the apartment with him.
Marianne was standing in the doorway and she sent Maggie an expressive look. Maggie returned it, with a smile and a small shrug, and followed Nikos out. The other woman had just arrived back from Paris, so hadn’t yet witnessed Nikos’s new interest in his son.
Maggie knew she shouldn’t really be surprised that someone as focused as Nikos was taking to his role as a father with an expert zeal and a speed that left her breathless. They’d arrived in London earlier that day, and on the plane over from Madrid he’d fed Daniel from a bottle. And winded him. And when Daniel had vomited down Nikos’s back he hadn’t even cared. He’d just changed his shirt.
And then, on their drive to the hotel from the airport, she’d overheard him rescheduling a meeting for later in the day so he could come with them to the apartment and spend some time with Daniel.
Nikos turned around with his big hand across Daniel’s back. ‘Hyde Park is nearby—we could go for a walk and get a coffee?’
Maggie tried to tamp down the surge of happiness. ‘Sure... If you have time?’
‘Of course I have time.’
They went out with Daniel in his compact pram. The temperatures were starting to turn cooler after the summer and there was a freshness in the air. There was also, although Maggie hated even to think it, a sense of hope.
When they’d walked through the park for a while, and found a place to sit down and have coffee—decaf for her—she said, ‘So what’s on the agenda this evening?’
He took a sip of espresso. ‘It’s the opening of a new designer store on Bond Street—one of our labels.’
He mentioned the iconic name and Maggie’s eyes widened. It was a byword in extreme luxe fashion—one of the most timeless brands in the world.
‘That’s one of yours?’
Nikos nodded. ‘It won’t be that formal an event, though. It’s just a party to welcome the new head designer.’
Immediately Maggie felt anxious. ‘What does that mean? What should I wear?’
Nikos looked wicked. ‘Something very short and very sparkly.’
CHAPTER TEN
THANKS TO THE stylist at the boutique in the London M Group hotel Maggie had been able to fulfil Nikos’s brief, and when they arrived at the event on Bond Street she was wearing a very short and sparkly green dress paired with vertiginous heels. He’d instructed her to leave her hair down.
Maggie clung to Nikos’s hand as they ran the gauntlet of photographers lining each side of the short red carpet. They were calling her name as well as Nikos’s now.
‘Maggie, love, over here!’
‘Maggie! Pose for us!’
‘Who are you wearing?’
Thankfully an award-winning actress appeared behind her and their focus shifted to her.
When they got inside the noise faded and was replaced by chatter and pulsing music. The store was cavernous—more like a gallery space than a shop.
Maggie was still clinging to Nikos’s hand. She let go, embarrassed. ‘I wasn’t expecting them to call out my name. It feels weird that they know who I am.’
He looked at her. He was darkly sophisticated tonight, in a dark blue suit and white shirt, no tie. Shirt open at the neck. ‘They just call out your name to get a reaction. You’ll get used to it.’
She didn’t really relish the thought of this kind of experience becoming a regular feature in her life. But she shelved her concerns. More than any other event they’d been to, this one was seriously star-studded. Actresses, supermodels, politicians... She’d even spotted a very popular ex-American President and his wife.
She sensed Nikos tense beside her, and then a familiar face appeared. ‘Maks!’ she said.
He bent towards her to give her a kiss on the cheek. ‘Maggie, how are you? Still putting up with my brother?’
Maggie heard the mocking tone in his voice—not unlike his brother’s. ‘Well, it has only been a couple of weeks...’
He looked from her to his brother. ‘Nikos.’
‘Maks.’
Maggie lamented the tension between the brothers. It made her heart ache to see how similar they were, to know how much they’d missed out on not growing up together.
Maks said, ‘You didn’t show for the board meeting today.’
‘I was busy.’
‘Luckily for you the wholesome pictures circulating of you and your new family seem to have done wonder
s for our stock prices.’
Maggie was confused. ‘Pictures?’
Maks took out his phone and showed her a tabloid news site. There were pictures of them in Hyde Park from only a few hours ago, underneath a headline: Reformed playboy spends afternoon with new family. How long before he gets bored?
Maggie felt sick.
Nikos said something to Maks that sounded like a snarl and took her hand, pulling her away. They moved into the crowd and Maggie desperately tried to push out of her mind the insidious suspicion that Nikos had engineered that trip to the park specifically for a photo opportunity.
She’d seen the way he looked at Daniel. The way he was bonding with him when no one was watching. She had to give him the benefit of the doubt and trust him. Give them a chance.
He stopped a waiter and asked her what she wanted to drink. She pasted a bright smile on her face. ‘Just sparkling water, please. I have to feed Daniel later.’
Nikos took champagne. ‘Okay?’ he asked.
She looked up. She longed to ask him if he’d gone out with her today knowing they’d be photographed, but at the last second she said, ‘Fine.’
After that they were sucked into a round of introductions and conversations that Maggie did her best to keep up with. But she couldn’t deny she was tired. Travelling with a small breastfeeding baby was catching up on her, and at one stage, when Nikos had been spirited away by an assistant to meet someone, she couldn’t hide a huge yawn.
‘I don’t blame you—these events bore me to tears too.’
She turned to find Maks beside her. He looked at her assessingly.
‘Nikos seems different...less distracted. Maybe you and the baby will be good for him and the business. I’m sorry I showed you those pictures, it was unecessary.’
Maggie made a face. ‘That’s ok, I probably would have seen them anyway. What about you? Do you want a family?’
Maks’s expression turned grim, the bones in his face standing out starkly. ‘No intention of it. In fact I’m glad Nikos has done us all a favour in that regard.’
Maggie said, as lightly as she could, ‘You never know. I don’t think it was Nikos’s intention either, but...’ She blushed. ‘Things happen.’ She coughed, mortified that the conversation had taken this turn.
The grim expression faded from Maks’s face and he looked at her again. ‘Did you know it’s Nikos’s birthday tomorrow?’
She shook her head, realising there was still so much she didn’t know. ‘No.’
Maks said, ‘In a funny twist of fate—or not so funny—all of us three half-brothers have birthdays in the same month. Nikos is first, then Sharif, and me at the end.’
‘And your sister Sasha? Is she here tonight?’
‘God, no—you couldn’t pay Sasha to come to an event like this. No, her birthday is in spring.’
Then Maks’s expression changed again, his eyes narrowing on someone across the room. He muttered almost to himself, ‘What the hell is she doing here?’
Then he was gone, cutting a swathe through the crowd before Maggie could see who he was talking about.
Nikos reappeared. ‘I saw you talking to Maks again—he didn’t upset you?’
‘No, actually, he was sweet.’
Nikos made a rude sound. ‘I wouldn’t have ever described Maks as sweet.’
‘He apologised for showing me the pictures.’ Maggie looked at Nikos carefully, but he showed no sign of discomfort or guilt.
‘Did you know there would be photographers in the park?’
Nikos shrugged. ‘I guess I took it for granted that they might be. Does it bother you?’
‘Of course it bothers me that we can’t go for a walk without being photographed. That’s not normal.’
He shook his head. ‘It’s normal for us now.’
Maggie felt angry at his laissez-faire attitude. She stood directly in front of him.
‘Does it have to be, though? Just because you all grew up under the glare of the media, it doesn’t mean your own child has to. I don’t want Daniel living his life in a fishbowl. He deserves as normal an existence as we can give him. Plenty of rich and famous people have families and manage to keep them out of the public eye.’
Nikos was taken aback by Maggie’s passion. She looked like a warrior mother, protecting her young. The kind of champion he’d never had.
An unexpected and unwelcome surge of emotion made him suddenly reject the thought of Daniel being subjected to what he’d experienced. ‘You’re right. There’s no reason why we can’t live differently—or at least do our best to.’
She arched a brow. ‘Even if pictures of a happy family outing are good for your stock prices?’
Nikos’s conscience pricked. He’d taken more than Maggie’s innocence.
But he forced himself to say lightly, ‘Now who’s being cynical?’
The following evening Maggie was nervous. The next day they were due to travel to the South of France and nothing had been scheduled for tonight. Except this. The thing that was making her nervous.
When Maggie heard the sound of the door she and Marianne quickly lit the candles on the cake and waited for Nikos to appear. As soon as he did they both started singing ‘Happy Birthday’—but they trailed to a halt at the look of utter horror on his face.
He looked at Maggie and she’d never seen him so haunted. ‘What the hell is this? How did you know it was my birthday?’
‘Maks told me last night,’ Maggie replied. ‘I baked you a cake.’
‘He shouldn’t have told you.’
Nikos turned and left the room and Maggie looked at Marianne, beyond bewildered.
Nikos couldn’t breathe. He pulled at his tie, opened a couple of buttons. But that tight fist was around his chest, squeezing tighter and tighter.
He rested his hands heavily on the desk, breathed as deeply as he could, exactly as his friend had told him—an ex-French Foreign Legionnaire who had looked at him one day and said, ‘How long have you been having panic attacks?’
That friend had known because he’d recognised the signs.
To Nikos’s surprise, the symptoms started to fade—far more quickly than they usually did. He straightened up and went over to the window that looked out over London.
The shock and horror of seeing that cake, lit with candles, and then Maggie and Marianne singing... It was quite literally his worst nightmare. But for a tiny, treacherous moment he’d been transported back in time to before the day had become tainted for ever.
He never mentioned his birthday. He never acknowledged it. Why the hell had Maks told her?
Because his brother didn’t know.
There was a soft knock on his study door. He tensed.
The door opened. ‘Nikos? Are you okay?’
Nikos felt conflicting things. He wanted to snarl at Maggie to leave him alone and yet he wanted her to come in, so that he could pull her close and lose himself in her scent and silky body.
He bit out, ‘I’m fine,’ and went over to his drinks cabinet to pour himself a measure of whisky.
He was aware of her coming in. Wearing jeans and a T-shirt. Hair down. She could wear a sack and he’d want her. The desire wasn’t burning out. It was burning up.
‘Nikos...?’
Even her voice was enough to distract him, make him clench down low to try and control his body’s response.
He said curtly, ‘I’m sorry. You weren’t to know.’
‘Know what?’
He turned around. ‘That I despise my birthday and any mention of it.’
She sat back against his desk as if winded. ‘Why?’
Why, indeed?
Nikos walked over to the window, his back towards Maggie. His own face was reflected to him. Distorted.
He said, ‘I never even knew it was my birthday until I
was about five and my father turned up in Athens to take me out to a restaurant. There was more cake and sweets than I’d ever seen in my life—my grandparents didn’t allow sweet things. My father encouraged me to eat my fill. I thought he had come to take me home with him. I was so happy.
‘But I’d eaten too much cake, and I started to be sick. My father was naturally disgusted and sent me home with my nanny. I was sick for a week and I thought that was why he hadn’t taken me home with him... Then, every year on my birthday he would show up and take me to a restaurant and order cake—even though I’d developed an aversion to it after my first experience.
‘I came to dread the annual event, even as I lived in hope that he would take me away with him. But he never did. He would just put me back in the car and send me back to my grandparents’ villa, to be sick for a week. That cake came to symbolise his disregard...the perpetual disappointment.
‘And then one year he took me out and told me that he was taking me away. I thought he was finally taking me home with him. I knew he had a new wife and a son and a daughter—Maks and Sasha—and I was ecstatic at the thought of siblings. I was so lonely at my grandparents’ house... But he didn’t take me to tmeet hem. He took me to boarding school. One of the most remote schools in England.
‘I never saw my grandparents again. They couldn’t have cared less. And my father didn’t visit me on my birthday any more. I discovered that my birthday is also the date of my mother’s death. She killed herself on my second birthday.’
He turned around then, to face Maggie. Her face was pale, blue eyes huge.
‘So that’s why I have an aversion to birthdays, and anything sweet.’
Maggie stood up. ‘Nikos, your father was some kind of sadist—and as for your grandparents...they didn’t deserve the title. They rejected their own daughter and then you.’ She came closer. ‘I’m sorry. If I’d known—’
‘How could you?’ His voice was harsh. He modulated it. ‘You couldn’t have known. No one knows. Not even my brothers.’
She bit her lip and pulled something out of her back pocket. An envelope.
