Page 36 of Christmas Baby with Her Ultra-Rich Boss

‘There are already trips into space. You could do one of them.’

‘You have to be a gazillionaire to afford that.’

‘Lena, Iama gazillionaire.’

She sniggered and looked back up at the sky. ‘If we’re still together when I’m eighty, you can buy me a rocket that will take me farther than the stratosphere.’ She pointed again at the Milky Way. ‘I want to go there.’

He was glad she wasn’t looking at him and so didn’t see the shock on his face at her,If we’re still together when I’m eighty.

Lena thought they were in a relationship?

A burn set off in his head as he racked his brain to think why she would think this. Hadheled her to believe this?

Konstantinos tried to think calmly. They’d become lovers four nights ago. They’d spent every waking hour together since, working on the transition from Lena’s management to Sven’s by day, their evenings spent dining out in the complex’s restaurants and making love, and making love some more. The passion and lust between them was strong, he did not deny that—he wouldn’t want to deny that; he was having the most fantastic, hedonistic, fulfilling sex of his life; he simply could not get enough of her—but at no point in any of their myriad conversations had he even intimated that they were now in a relationship. He’d made it very clear that he did not do relationships, and he knew she understood this.

And then he remembered theifshe’d preceded her words with.Ifwe’re still together when I’m eighty.If.That implied she understood what they were currently sharing had a natural end date. It had been a flippant comment. He was reading far too much into what had been a joke.

He didn’t want to put an end date on what they currently had, was prepared to enjoy the ride for as long as it lasted, but one day it would end. He knew it. Lena knew it. And when it ended, they would raise their child with the utmost respect for each other and, who knew? Maybe when she reached eighty, he would buy her that spaceship as one good friend to the other.

Feeling more settled, he pulled her closer to him at the same moment she squealed and pointed with even more vigour at the sky.‘Look!’

Konstantinos looked. Blinked to clear his gaze. Blinked again, and then realised there was nothing wrong with his vision. The spectacle unfolding before him was no illusion.

Before his eyes the sky lit up, an arc rising of the brightest green he’d ever seen. As it rose higher and higher, more colours emerged, purples, blues, pinks, reds, undulating and streaming, the colours billowing and shifting, circling them, flashing and swaying, the entire night sky ablaze in an ethereal magic that took his breath away.

He looked at Lena. The enchantment on her face, illuminated by the dazzling light show, was a wonder in itself. And then she turned her face to his, lips pulled into the widest smile, eyes filled with joy, and the clench of his heart told him the magic she contained was more dazzling than anything nature could throw at them.

CHAPTER TWELVE

KONSTANTINOS’STWO-STOREYLONDONpenthouse blew Lena away. Never minding the panoramic skyline view, the tall sash windows, the thick carpets her toes sank into, and tasteful modern artwork throughout the three sprawling reception rooms and five humungous bedrooms; the furnishings and adornments were exactly what she would have chosen if money was no object.

Three days they’d been holed up in this penthouse. She refused to be sad that tomorrow he would finally fly off for his much-delayed trip to Australia, not when he’d put himself under three days of sufferance from a cold and stormy English winter. Not that they’d exposed themselves to the weather. They’d been far too busy christening all the rooms of the penthouse to bother with the outside world. Oh, it made her knees weak and her pelvis burn to remember the passion with which he always made love to her. And it wasn’t as if they’d be parted for long. In ten days it would be Christmas. He would fly back for her and together they would fly to Kos to spend a few days with his parents. She didn’t know what came after that for them and right then, she didn’t want to think about it and spoil the happiness alive in her heart.

Tonight they were going out for dinner in an underground cavern she remembered reading about when it opened but which she’d had no idea was actually owned by Konstantinos. She’d known his empire was big, but not until they’d been idly talking about it while sharing a bath had she realised the extent of it. Many of the most famous restaurants around the world had Konstantinos Siopis as the silent owner. No wonder he hated ready meals so much! She wondered how many of them she’d get to visit with him. This meal was part night out and part unofficial appraisal, which was fine by her. His empire wouldn’t run itself.

With the help of a personal dresser, who’d arrived at the penthouse with five assistants armed with enough designer clothing to satisfy an army of actresses at a showbiz award, Lena was dressed in the most exquisite long-sleeved deep green satin dress that flared gently at her waist and fell to midcalf. Beneath it, she wore black lace underwear and, for the first time in her life, sheer black thigh-high stockings. Lena was also the new proud possessor of a brand-new wardrobe of clothes, half of which were designed to accommodate her growing belly. She didn’t dare think how much it had cost Konstantinos, nor how much it had cost him to chauffeur the UK’s top stylist over as a surprise so she could have her hair professionally blow-dried. Since they’d become lovers, Konstantinos had treated her like a princess, and while it thrilled her to be spoilt, she couldn’t shake from her mind that he’d treated Cassia like a princess, too.In my eyes, Cassia was a princess and princesses deserved the best of everything...

Lena was acutely aware that when Konstantinos spoke about the present, it was ‘we,’ and when he spoke about the future it was ‘I,’ and always in the abstract. With Cassia, he’d planned an entire future. With Lena, he’d mentioned nothing beyond Christmas.

She chided herself for thinking about what came next again when she’d already determined not to. The future would reveal itself in its own sweet time.

Sliding her feet into a pair of black heels she suspected she wouldn’t feel safe wearing for much longer—her bump was still small but it wouldn’t be for long—she reminded herself that she was having Konstantinos’s child. He clearly had deep feelings for her. He clearly fancied the knickers off her. She had to remember he’d been single for over a decade for a reason and shake off the dread that rolled in her stomach whenever she thought about the woman who’d betrayed him with his own brother and broken his heart.

Konstantinos’s restaurant in a quaint London suburb was nothing but an old stone barn on the outside. Appearances, as he knew very well, could be deceptive. Entering through a large oak door, to the left of the flagstone-floored hallway was a wide spiral staircase that led down to the cavern itself, a vast, dark room with discreet gold uplighting designed by his clever interior design team to give a 1930s Prohibition glamour vibe. Even the Christmas tree and sophisticated decorations matched the vibe.

They were shown to their table by the newly appointed maître d’. Not only did he trip over his own feet, he then pulled Lena’s chair back with such force the leg hit the table and made the wineglasses wobble.

Konstantinos grimaced at the overly-fawning apology that followed. A maître d’ was supposed be unflappable. The general manager of the restaurant had poached him from a restaurant in Mayfair. He had to wonder if the owner of that hotel had put up any kind of fight to keep him. On this performance, he’d have been glad to be rid of him.

He noticed Lena give the blundering idiot a reassuring wink as she took her seat.

‘What did you do that for?’ he asked as soon as they were alone.

She pulled an innocent face.

‘Don’t look at me like that. I saw you wink at him.’

‘And?’

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