A Hidden Heir To Redeem Him (Feuding Billionaire Brothers Book 1)

by Dani Collins

  Surely recognizing his own stumbles would have been a first step? Acknowledgment and remorse might have gone a long way with his sons.

  “I judged you as spoiled,” she admitted. “Earlier, when I said you had the luxury of turning your back on him. That wasn’t fair, was it?”

  “I gave up on fair when I realized what a perverted version of it I was living.”

  “Is that why you began to rebel?”

  “Yes.” Cruel satisfaction laced his tone. “My mother had been renting me out to modeling gigs from birth. One day I threw a tantrum. I’d seen her do it a thousand times and I had genuine, pent-up anger. At thirteen, who doesn’t? Mostly, I was emulating her, though. It was still an incredible feeling. By acting as though I had lost control, I gained it. Everyone began promising me all sorts of things. I refused to work again until the money I earned went into my own account, not my mother’s. She nearly disowned me. Went to my father, of course.”

  “What did Niko do?”

  “He said if I wanted to work, I should work for him. Javiero and I had been dragged into the office every school break for years. That experience taught me the importance of hiring a decent manager and paying attention to what people did with my money, so it wasn’t wasted, I suppose. But having my own money allowed me to tell Niko to go to hell. I said the same thing every time we spoke until the night before I met you in Venice.”

  At which point he had married into the family of Niko’s business rivals, firmly building a wall between himself and his father that had never been dismantled.

  Kiara knew Scarlett had been in touch with Val a handful of times in the past year, letting him know Niko’s health was failing. Val had rebuffed every invitation to visit Niko.

  “You don’t have any regret that you didn’t reconcile with him?” she asked gently.

  “None,” he confirmed flatly.

  “Even though he was not fully to blame? Your mother... I’m sorry, but she seems like she bears some responsibility. How did you maintain a relationship with her all this time, but not him?”

  He took a moment to consider his reply, which left her suspecting his answer was incomplete.

  “Until today, she believed I was still her golden ticket to at least half of my father’s fortune. That kept her on her best behavior. All bets are off now, though, especially once you and I marry. She will become our worst nightmare.”

  “And I could share my daughter with a stranger whom I barely trust? Gosh, how can I resist?”

  “You can’t. We both speak sarcasm. We’re practically soul mates.”

  His remark was pure mockery, but her heart thunked in her chest and sat there reverberating at the thought of finding The One. She took a fresh helping from the platter to hide any secretive yearnings he might glimpse in her eyes. She did sometimes wish for a true, intimate connection with someone, even though—

  “Marriage has never been a particular goal of mine,” she stated truthfully. “Growing up, I watched the pretty, bubbly girls get attention from boys and wondered what that was like, but the few times I went on a date, I was always waiting for it to be over so I could get back to my sketch pad. That made me realize I wasn’t cut out for serious, intimate relationships.”

  “Is that how you’re feeling right now?” he asked drily.

  “Is this a date?” A funny tingle curled through her, as if this was the sort of banter a couple might share on a date. A good one.

  “If you have to ask, I’ll have to try harder.” The rakish sweep of his gaze as it struck her lips and throat and breasts was pure, carnal invitation.

  She couldn’t match his level of nonchalance. Her heart was skipping again so she settled on telling the truth.

  “I’m a certified workaholic,” she admitted. “I always feel compelled to be making progress with my art if I’m not with Aurelia, but she is my highest priority. That makes this conversation a priority.” She swirled a toasted pita bite through some dip. “So this isn’t a date. It’s a working lunch.” Afternoon tea, given the hour, but whatever.

  “We’re getting married. That usually starts with a date.”

  And ends with...

  She had to fight to swallow her bite of pita.

  “I didn’t expect you to propose,” she said in a small sidestep, rather than confronting his assertion head-on.

  “How did you expect me to react?”

  “Angry about the money,” she admitted honestly. “I thought you’d want to fight for it. It’s a lot of money,” she added when his expression twisted with annoyed aversion. “Or I thought you would be angry that I’d had her after all and would tell us to have a nice life.”

  “I am angry. There will be no more keeping secrets from me once we’re married. Anything you need, I will provide. My father’s money can be dumped in the sea for all I care. This is a clean break from him. Understand?”

  So implacable. She didn’t dare point out she’d heard an eerily similar command in Niko’s tone as he’d extracted her promise to keep Aurelia’s existence from Val.

  With her eyes on her plate, she said, “Look, it means a lot to me that you want to meet her, but marriage—”

  “Kiara,” he cut in. “I am the last man to buckle to convention. Marriage is an idiotic social construct that serves no sensible purpose that I can fathom. But it means something to the rest of the world. Being illegitimate was not fun for me. There were people who made sure I suffered for something that was not my fault. I won’t sentence my own child to that experience when it’s such an easy fix. Claiming Aurelia as my heir is not enough. You and I have to marry.”

  Her heart somersaulted. She understood his motives better now. In fact, she felt even guiltier for not telling him about Aurelia sooner. But marriage?

  “Is it enough for you that she merely knows who I am?” Val challenged softly. “Where was your father when your mother died? Why were you orphaned?”

  And here it came. Intellectually, she knew everyone was equal and he was hardly in a place to judge, but that didn’t stop others from judging. It didn’t stop her from feeling the hollowness of absence.

  “I don’t know anything about my father,” she admitted, locking down her insides so she betrayed no emotion. This was purely a fact about her personal history, she reminded herself. “Maybe my mother would have talked about him once I got older, but she only said he was someone she loved and thought would come back but didn’t. After I lost her, I told people I was an orphan so I didn’t have to reveal that they hadn’t been married. I was never persecuted for it, though.”

  No, people had expressed pity or maybe puzzlement that it was possible for a person to exist with absolutely no one in their life. She’d felt her father’s nonexistence in other, subtler ways, though. At times she had thought that at least if she had carried his name, it would have been something. Some tiny connection.

  “I could see my way to marrying as a formality, for Aurelia’s sake,” she allowed carefully. “Perhaps divorce after a year or so?”

  “No,” he rejected swiftly, cheeks hollow. “I already have one divorce behind me. I didn’t think it would bother me, but the stench of failure is intolerable. More important, I don’t want to repeat history. I don’t want Aurelia torn between warring houses. I won’t give you the chance to pit her against me.”

  “The fact you think I would do that is reason enough we shouldn’t marry,” she said, spine stiffening. “I don’t want to live with someone who doesn’t trust or respect me.” She let a beat pass, then batted her lashes. “Do you?”

  His mouth twitched. He looked off into the distance, faint humor lingering in his profile. “You’re entertaining, at least.”

  “I’m actually very boring. Reclusive. I don’t bother with current events or pop culture. I don’t care what’s trending. If I read, it’s romance—not your top pick, I’m guessing. Same goes
for movies. My ability to hold court at a dinner party is limited to describing my process, which I hate talking about for fear I’ll jinx it. In fact, if you’re serious about marriage, brace yourself for two topics of conversation: if the weather supports my plein air aspirations, and how you’re coming along with Aurelia’s homework, because I had enough trouble at school that I’m calling it right now as your bailiwick.”

  “Dinner parties are overrated.” He lounged easily in his chair, unruffled by her outburst. “Homework I can handle. The talk will be you. I’d suggest anywhere except the dinner table, but I’ll leave that up to you. See? Progress. I travel a lot. I assume that appeals. You went to Venice to fill the creative well, didn’t you?”

  He remembered her saying that? She had been shocked he’d even remembered her name today, let alone the things they’d talked about.

  “If my showing goes well, I’ll need fresh inspiration,” she said, tentatively letting herself consider what marriage to him might look like. “I suppose we could travel with you until Aurelia starts school.”

  “What difference will that make? She’ll be at boarding school.”

  “You’re adorable when you’re wrong.” She stabbed a meatball, but paused to see how he reacted, prepared to fight to the death on this one. “Aurelia will attend day school. I haven’t decided where.”

  “You’re sexy when you’re aggressive.” He stole her fork and ate the meatball off the tines, chewed and swallowed. “Which I like. And you know that.”

  Ride me. Kiara had known how sex worked in a theoretical sense, but she hadn’t realized she could take charge of the act and revel in having all the control.

  A rush of sensual heat arrived with the memory of undulating on him while the bed creaked. They had already made love twice by then and her body had been tender, but her growing confidence had had her nipping at him. Squeezing him. Pleading, Once more, until he’d dragged her atop him.

  Ride me, he had urged. So I don’t hurt you.

  She had nearly killed both of them, determined to wring every last ounce of pleasure from the experience. When she had come down from the profound fulfillment that had swept over both of them, she’d been sprawled weakly across him, their heartbeats—

  “What’s on your mind, darling?” he asked in a tone of exaggerated intimacy.

  He knew exactly where her thoughts had gone. He’d sent her there on purpose, probably to disarm her after she’d asserted herself.

  Her flush of sensual tingles turned to a stinging heat of mortification.

  “Why was I even there that night?” The question had haunted her for three years. “Online it says you hated modeling and quit as soon as you had capital to pursue other things.” Green energy and tech initially, but these days he had fingers in pies from hotels to broadcasting. “Why did you offer to sit for me?”

  “I wanted you to come to my room,” he said as if that was obvious.

  “But why? Because even when I thought you’d paid me for sex, it didn’t make sense that you would ask me. There were far more experienced professionals if that’s what you wanted, and fine.” She held up a hand. “That’s not what it was, but the sort of women you’re usually seen with are CEOs and socialites, not impoverished art students with zero sophistication and a stone’s worth of excess weight.”

  “Which one of us are you insulting?” He angled his head in forewarning.

  “I know what I am, Val. I didn’t like being an ugly duckling as a child, but I’m fine with turning into a plain duck as a woman, not a graceful swan—which is your usual type. There were women flirting with you in the restaurant that night so why take me back to your room? Was it the thrill of picking up a virgin?”

  “What?” The crack of his voice was loud enough to turn heads at the tables that had begun filling up. He gave an annoyed glance around, then asked her more quietly, but with equal intensity, “How the hell was I supposed to know that?”

  “I thought it was dead obvious.” Granted, the act hadn’t really hurt. She’d been incredibly aroused, and the sting of penetration had been more a moment of heightened stimulation than anything else.

  “You were on the pill,” he reminded under his breath. “That led me to believe—Are you being straight with me right now?”

  She shrugged. “Why would I lie?”

  “I don’t know,” he growled and rose to throw down some bills. “We’re not continuing this discussion here.”

  “Can we go to the hospital?”

  “So Javiero and I can compare notes on how we wound up in the same situation? No.”

  “There’s a park next to it. It’s nice this time of day. Quiet. I really want to check in on Scarlett.”

  He relented and ten minutes later his driver let them out to walk through wrought iron gates into a small sanctuary where families could wheel relatives for a breath of fresh air.

  The area was abandoned at the moment since the shadow of the building had moved, but there were still a few patches of shade beneath some trees, and a light breeze picked up the mist off the fountain, offering respite from the heat of the sinking sun.

  Kiara had come here at different times with Niko but didn’t have a tiny hand clinging to her fingers today while little feet walked the rim of the pool. She felt bereft without her girl and gave a sigh of melancholy as she watched water overflow the center vase and fall in a curtain around it.

  “Did you—” he began, then ran his hand down his face. His voice tightened as he tried again. “When I invited you to my room and made it clear I would undress, I interpreted that to mean you were up for more than modeling. I said we would see where the rest of the night took us.”

  “I knew what I was signing up for.” She ducked her head with awkward shyness. “I wasn’t that inexperienced.”

  “But you let me seduce you, even though you’d never made love before. Why?” He was back to suspicion, not that she’d imagined she had won him over in any way, but the wall of hostility had returned to his expression and made her heart dip.

  “I was flattered,” she admitted baldly. “I don’t get attention from handsome, sexy men and—”

  “Stop talking about yourself like you’re not attractive.”

  She closed her eyes. “Please don’t think I’m fishing for reassurance. I am genuinely happy with looking average and normal. I like food and see no point in sweating at the gym when I’d rather be painting. The life of a supermodel seems vastly overrated.”

  “It is,” he said flatly. “Most thin people I know have eating disorders. My mother is a raving lunatic because she’s in a constant low blood sugar psychosis.”

  “And you?” She opened her eyes wide with false innocence. “Is this charm you exhibit natural or is there a similar underlying issue?”

  He dipped his chin and glowered a silent warning.

  This was why she used a canvas as a shield against life. Even when she did try to stand up for herself, she wound up getting knocked into the dirt with a wordless glance.

  “I do hate modeling,” he stated. “When I realized you were sketching me, I assumed you knew who I was and almost walked away, but your intensity made me curious. I wanted to see how it turned out, so I asked you to dinner.”

  Actually, after standing motionless for twenty minutes, he had walked over and said, Models are entitled to compensation. Buy me dinner.

  He had wound up paying, thankfully, because he had chosen one of those expensive outdoor cafés where they charged more for the table than the food.

  His gaze drifted over her features the way it had that night, in a way that made things shift inside her, so she felt very feminine and shy. Pretty and aware. Sexy.

  “You should have told me you’d never made love.”

  “Would you still have wanted to?”

  “Yes.” His response was so unapologetic, she choked on a laugh
. “But not three times. Did I hurt you?”

  Childbirth hadn’t exactly been a picnic, but that wasn’t what he meant.

  “A little. I mean...” She wrinkled her nose and looked toward the fountain, cheeks stinging with self-consciousness. “Can we settle on, it was a perfectly nice experience until I thought you had paid me for it?”

  “Perfectly nice,” he drawled. “Two words that have never been applied to me.”

  This was the man who had made her laugh and feel talented and more exciting than she had ever aspired to be. He stole her breath, this gleaming god of a man, tall and wide-shouldered, virile and angular and watching her with a knowing smirk.

  “This, Kiara.” His voice became graveled and intimate, swirling a buzzing heat through her like the richest red wine. For one second she felt as though they were perfectly aligned. Equal and opposite. Yin and yang. “This is why I asked you to my room that night.”

  “What is it?” she asked with bewilderment. Soul mates, she wondered with a depth of yearning so sharp it stole her breath.

  “Chemistry,” he said, snapping their connection as he frowned. “Have you had other lovers?” His tone suggested he already knew the answer and didn’t like it.

  She folded her arms and lined her toes up with a seam in the paving stones beneath her feet. “I haven’t had time to set up my online dating profile.”

  Thunderstruck silence followed, then, “So me. That night. That’s all the experience you have. And today you kissed me like—” He waved off in the direction of his hotel then took two steps away and turned his back on her. One hand hung off his hip, the other squeezed the back of his neck. “A decent man would not take advantage of you by seducing you again. I am not a decent man, Kiara. You know that, don’t you? I will use this attraction to get you into my bed, put a ring on it and that will be the end of it.”