Page 29 of Below Deck Billionaire
And if he’d stuck to the dare for the last two months, then he was probably more than ready to succumb to temptation. Especially after the rather prolonged tease of the week his guests were on theNerida.
But as tempted as she was to see if Theo had been papped somewhere in Athens, she did not google his name. She had to remember at the end of the day he was Theo Callisthenes, Greek tycoon/playboy who owned a superyacht and had made sleeping around an art form. And she was second stew on said yacht who, yes, had slept with him one amazing night, but who now slept below deck, in a single bunk.
And if that didn’t bring it right back to basics, she didn’t know what did.
Yes, it had been fun – incredible, actually – but they were done. Even if their chemistry still zipped and sparkled and she truly believed he felt it too, she had no desire to be a rich man’s plaything. Available at Theo’s whim like his bloody superyacht. Taking it out at his convenience then leaving it in the dock when he preferred more land-based pursuits.
Tiffany wasn’t dumb enough to set her heart on a guy who’d never been in a romantic relationship. Ever. Or who clearly had a wandering eye. She was not her mother.
So she’d kept her head down and attended to what little chores there were on the stationary boat. Occasionally she went into Athens, sometimes by herself to explore, sometimes with the others, usually for lunch somewhere. Once, she’d even met Kelsey, who was in the city overnight before she and her mother flew to London to see an eye specialist.
Her bestie had pumped her for all the juicy details about life on board theNeridawith Theo, but Tiffany had been unusually reticent about spilling any info. Largely because she didn’t want to encourage Kelsey’s fever dream about besties getting all wifed up with brothers. But also because talking about it made it a thing. And it was not a thing.
No matter how much Kelsey was rooting for it.
Mostly though, there was an enormous amount of free time. Tiffany didn’t understand why Theo didn’t just lock up the boat and call the staff back if and when he needed them, but she supposed when you had more money than God you could do that kind of thing.
She suspected it also said a lot about his life preferences. It had been evident when they’d talked about his childhood growing up around islands and fishing boats that his love for the sea was ingrained, and although she’d never seen him anywhere other than a wedding and on theNerida, she wondered if, deep down, it was a boat rather than a boardroom where he was most at home.
Not that she or anyone else was complaining. They were being paid well to keep a moored boat – that was used more by them than the owner – shipshape, so if Theo didn’t care, why should she? Especially when it gave her oodles of opportunity to work on her book.
She used the days to plot and plan and the nights to write, taking her laptop up to the sky deck in the evenings once the sun had sunk beneath the hills of Athens, taking some of the heat with it. At that time of day, the sky was lit with tangerine and pink and streaked with clouds gilded in rose-gold and, with theNeridamoored in such a way that the stern was facing the open sea, she had a front row seat to the glory.
The rest of the crew tended to go indoors after dinner, retiring to the media room to watch a movie on the big-screen television, so she usually had the deck to herself, which she loved. Up here she could sit cross-legged on a sun lounger and let the musings of the day percolate from her brain and out through her fingertips as the sky changed from dusk to twilight to night.
The recent island-hopping with Theo’s British friends had given her endless descriptive fodder for scenery, and her mind swirled with the vivid colours of her book as she rushed to get it all down. Breathing life into the watery world of Astraon – where the stars shone from the ocean floor and mermaids, not moons, controlled the tides – was exciting and exhausting in equal measure, but weaving this tale that had been living in her head since she’d been a girl also felt necessary.
And Tiffany was pleased with her progress, time flying every night as her fingers tippy-tapped over the keyboard, until the pressure of words eased and she was spent. Only then did she look up to find a hush had fallen over the marina and it was just her and the stars, although with all the light pollution from Athens, she could see precious few of them.
It was usually about now, as she was finishing up for the night, she heard Theo come on board – if he was spending the night on the yacht. He never made much noise, but it was so quiet this late she could often hear the plaintive meow of the marina cat as it prowled around. Her whole body would tense as she strained to hear his footfalls, wondering if he’d seek her out. Wondering if he even knew she was up here.
He never had – phew! – and, as far as she knew, he went straight to his suite, but just knowing he was on theNeridacaused a frisson of awareness that followed her all the way to her bunk and into her dreams.
Sighing, she closed her laptop lid and reclined on the lounge a little, adjusting the messy topknot she’d shoved her hair in earlier a little higher. She inhaled the still warm air. It smelled of salt and sea and the faintest whiff of the damp seaweed that gathered around the waterline of the harbour wall, and she felt at peace and so grateful and lucky to be able to call somewhere this beautiful home.
For now, anyway.
It was so far removed from where she came from, she had to pinch herself sometimes even if she did miss Balmain Downs where the aromas were very different. Dust and cattle. Hay and leather. Eucalyptus and petrichor. And the night skies were next level. No light pollution out there where stars hung in the outback sky like crystal diamantes dripping from chandeliers and the cloudy shimmer of the Milky Way shone vibrantly luminescent, like thousands of glow worms in the night.
But she hadn’t missed seeing her father every day. Or the tension between the two of them, never far from the surface. Or the resentment from her brothers, who she loved but who didn’t understand why she couldn’t justget over it. Get over her father making her complicit in his infidelity and forever poisoning Tiffany’s relationship with her mother. Get over letting Mikey leave without any support or safety net because he wanted to make art and love men, not wrangle cattle and eat dust all his life.
They’d hated how the strained father-daughter relationship often blew up at the worst possible time and, in the end, it had been a relief for everyone – including her – when she’d walked away.
The faint sound of footsteps and low distant murmur of a voice somewhere in the marina drifted to her on the night air, and Tiffany tuned into it for a beat or two. It grew closer and closer until she realised it was Theo on his phone, his low laughter carrying towards her like a hug on the warm air as he stepped onto the cast rail of theNerida.
With zero shame, she eavesdropped on his conversation that was now coming from below on the main deck aft. Not that she could understand a word given it was all in Greek. Well, she got ‘mama’ and ‘baba’, which she knew to be mum and dad, and occasionally he mentioned Ari, once even Kelsey, but that was the extent of what she could translate.
As much as she could tell, he didn’t seem to be moving around, his voice coming from the one direction, and Tiffany pictured him lounging against the back rail as he chatted, his legs thrust out in front, his shorts riding up a little, the dark hair of his quads and calves emphasising the superb musculature of his legs.
He really did have the most amazing legs. And chest. And ass. Not to mention that lethal weapon between his legs which he’d used to thoroughly shock and awe. Thoughts of that made her squirm in her chair, yanking her out of the trip down memory lane.
Bloody hell, woman. Do not think about Theo’s junk!
Dragging her mind out of Theo’s underwear, she tuned back into the conversation just in time to hear him say, ‘Kalinyhta,’ which Tiffany knew was goodnight.
There was silence then and she supposed he’d be heading to bed. And so should she. She’d just wait for five to make sure the coast was clear. Which sounded like a great plan until ten seconds later she heard footsteps coming up the closest stairs and she knew he was heading for the sky deck.
For a panicked moment her eyes darted around, looking for somewhere to hide. Behind the bar? In the shadows down by the jacuzzi? Under her sun lounger? Which were all crazy and also moot as he stepped onto the deck before she had a chance to move a muscle.
