Hostiles (BWWM) 2/3

Brown Eyes

"Dionysius Plutarch..." Zafira stumbles in awe, staring him up and down, the dark purple tones of his suit offset against the olive tinted skin

"When is the baby due?" he teases darkly and she frowns at him insolently, as if he hadn't just read that she owned shares in this establishment too, as if she hadn't helped Makenna conspire against him!

"I suppose there's nothing to give you any manners, not even money." She decides shaking her head at him and turning to Makenna as if waiting for some explanation as to why he was here

"It's funny you should mention money because I was just explaining to Kennie here..." Dio starts, just to be interrupted by a voice that was neither his, Zafira's or Makenna's

"mana...is there a baby?" a little voice whispers audibly into the tense air

Having nothing particularly nice to say to Zafira, Dionysius turns a glare to the source of the voice.

"Oh no sweetie...it's just banter" Makenna softly says, scratching the soft curly hairs on the head of a little boy quite impractically trying to hide behind the skirt of her dress.

He was glaring at a child! He had to look again to make sure because he hadn't seen anywhere the child could have possibly appeared from. His gaze falls on the funny looking bag Zafira was carrying in her hand as it occurs to him that it was quite clearly a child's backpack, and then his gaze turns back to the little child enjoying a head massage from Makenna Lewasi as he curiously studies him. 

Dionysius looks down at rich brown eyes as chocolate as Makenna's, his heart skipping a beat and then going on commercial break as he tries to wonder about the child's age. He notes the toffee skin that would be between the olive of his skin and the cocoa berry of hers and the features that are somehow hers. The kid had basically decided her face was precisely what he wanted for himself and he wore it with a moving beauty. Dionysius looks back up at the wench who had left him heartbroken in the middle of the night, confirming the shape of her eyes on the little boy. She tears her gaze away from him, as if in some sort of deep panic, forcing him to turn to Zafira, who quickly crouches down to the little boy who was four or three? Dionysius didn't know much about kids but the feeling in his gut was tumultuous at best. 

"Hey... why don't you get mama's bag from the office and we can head off? You know where she keeps it, right?" Zafira says to the little one, who nods excitedly at this new set of instructions.

Dionysius' hand had already dropped from Makenna's waist, and the jovial little shout of "I'll get it for ye mama!" aimed at Makenna jolts Dio a step back away from her.

He watches the boy prance expertly through the display shelf and behind the counter, running as fast as his little chubby legs will take him to the back office. The boy was little, the boy had called her mama, the boy was running to the back of the shop to grab her bag. He definitely knew his way around this boutique. Feeling about ready to faint now, Dionysius calculates the facts set out before him. She had been pregnant! She had a son! He grips onto the nearest display shelf, stifling a tremble as he looks hungrily from Makenna to Zafira for an answer to a question he couldn't bring himself to ask.

"EXPLAIN!"

His voice is stern and clear, hiding the dimensions of his utter shock. He is a bit surprised by his own voice, but turns his glare from the display shelf to the two women standing before him, Zafira with her hands crossed, Makenna with a look of utter confusion in her eyes

"First of all, lower your voice, you know what a child is and how they come to be, you were just asking me about being pregnant two seconds ago and if there's anyone who has any explaining to do it should be YOU! What are you doing here?!" Zafira whisper-hisses at him

"He...owns 57% of this now." Makenna absently stutters, her voice soft, as if she too was invested in not letting their son hear this conversation, her face contorted into a kind of unreadable pain or embarrassment?

Their son!

Dionyz almost faints from the very idea of it. He'd admitted it to himself before she could!

"Why?!" Zafira hisses at him, as if it was outrageous that he would seek to grab the business his former fiancée had built for herself the same way she had attempted to sink his by fucking one of his board members and then running off... while pregnant... with their son?

"Is he mine?!" he whisper-hisses at the woman who had absolutely derailed his revenge plan with this curveball

Now he too was invested in keeping this conversation out of the little boy's ears!

"Spare us the theatrics! You've caused enough pain and damage in our lives. Feck off and stay there!" Zafira protectively hisses at him just as the little boy runs back in with a shiny pink leather bag almost half his size in his hand, a satisfied grin on his face, a grin just like his father's.

"Found it manna." the boy chimes happily, presenting the bag to Makenna with his beautiful face lifted up to her in utter adoration, something Dionysius can recall feeling for the woman who was dramatically accepting the bag from her "little hero."

"Just in time too. We were just closing up shop for the day sir. Sorry we didn't have what you were looking for but there's other stores down the street that might interest you." Zafira announces, staring Dionysius dead in his eye as she speaks

He'd say something back if there wasn't a pair of innocent brown eyes aimed curiously at him, if he doesn't imagine with pristine clarity the owner of those eyes saying "Found it for you daddy!" with the exact excitement and adoration that phrase had been aimed at Makenna. His gaze falls on the beautiful little boy's face, as if to confirm that he is real and he is staring at him in awe and curiosity. Does he sense it? Does he feel it? Is some part of his DNA recognizing where half of him probably came from? He lifts his gaze to the stunning Makena Lewasi as if to confirm the dimensions of her divinely beautiful face on the little boy's.

What?

Was he going to apologize and give her back her little boutique and ask if she would allow him into his son's life? Could he bust a wide grin open and pretend this had all been a joke and he didn't mean to take over her business in a hostile manner, storm into her boutique and demand that she fuck him like she did one of his board members? 

"Have a great day sir!" Zafira chimes

And though he wants to say I'll be back for you, in a villainous way to Makenna, a loving way to their son and a murderous way to Zafira, he simply nods his head and walks out of the shop. His chauffeur is waiting at the doorstep and he slides into the car numbly, trying to make sense of the world around him. The car smoothly picks up speed as he tries to piece himself back together.

He shifts the deep silence as he turns to the woman settled in the seat opposite him. Sasha stares back, curiosity almost blinding her now. She hadn't heard anything but she had seen some of it and read the body language in that little boutique as best as she could from her position in the car. 

"The shop owner, in the pink, what they've been up to in the last five years, photos, anything you can give me by dinner tonight." He instructs

Sasha hadn't seen the boss many times but he looked dangerous, almost feral as he sat there, instructing her to do what she had already set the networks up to do out of sheer curiosity. She knew when she was in too deep but there was something off about this entire job and she was in the business of getting answers. Two stunning women, a child and a little boutique in Edinburgh had brought Dionysius Plutarch out of his office. She'd be a proper nutter to ignore all the delicious warning signs that there was way more to this than a mere cut and dry acquisition. 

"Myrtle."

he says almost as a curse under his breath: the car system beeps, awakening the direct line to his assistant. 

"Sir?" a familiar voice warmly says

"whoever the lawyers on this side are, they'll be dining with me this evening." He instructs