Page 12 of Marrying the Enemy

When she’d left the party last night, Dom’s blood had turned to acid as he wondered whether that stick puppet of an attorney was making her shatter. He hadn’t slept and blamed her for that, too.

Now he’d arrived for a buffet brunch and beach activities. He was pretending not to notice Eve as she came out of the pool. Her wide-brimmed hat and retro sunglasses hid most of her face, but her lithe figure was on full display in a red one-piece with waist cutouts. Her nipples hardened despite the full sun of midmorning. Water beaded against her golden skin. Her legs were still a mile and a half each way, accentuated by the high cut of her suit and the heeled sandals she stepped into. She accepted a towel from that toothpaste ad of a boyfriend.

“—need a special permit because they limit access. If we want to see it, we have to go tomorrow.”

Dom dragged his gaze off the pert cheeks of Evie’s ass where the V of her suit left a portion of the pale globes bare and looked to the pretty face tilted up to his.

“They’re expecting a storm, though,” Cat continued. “We have to be off the island by two. My brother will take us on his sailboat.”

“Okay.” Dom wished he’d brought his own yacht or at least rented one. He had a speedboat operator at his beck and call, but anything larger had seemed superfluous when he had the penthouse in his new, five-star hotel on the mainland—the one he’d scooped away from Eve’s brother.

Dom’s battle with Nico for key properties was coming out in his favor almost exclusively these days. When he’d taken over WBE, it had been struggling, but he’d shored up its cash position and had a sizable cushion these days, one that allowed him to enter bidding wars that forced Visconti Group to either back off or pay through the nose for what they wanted.

Dom had a strong feeling that financial pressure was the reason Eve was here with Logan Offerman, second son of a multimedia tycoon.

“The kids will be aboard,” Cat added with an appealing expression.

Dom made himself pay attention to what she was saying. Spending time with Cat and her family was the point of his being here. His middle sister had set him up with Cat, urging him to be her date to this wedding since he was planning a trip to Australia anyway.

Dom was trying, genuinely trying, to like her. Cat was everything he ought to look for in a life partner—well-mannered, well-connected and well-off. Children liked her. So did his sister and, seemingly, everyone else.

“Oh!”

The startled pitch in Eve’s voice snapped Dom’s head around while his muscles bunched in readiness to attack.

She wasn’t being assaulted, though. Her hat had blown off. It rolled toward him and fetched up against his feet.

She chased it with long strides of those forever legs and halted when he straightened to offer it to her.

They both wore sunglasses, but he knew they looked straight into each other’s eyes. He felt the clash all the way into his chest. Lower.

She had shrugged on a cover-up of eyelet lace. Belting it had probably been the reason she’d failed to catch her hat.

“Thank you.” She swallowed as she took it, then pressed something that looked like a natural smile onto her face as she said to Cat, “I apologize for interrupting.”

“No problem. I’m Catherine. Cat.” She offered her hand. “Have you met Dom?”

“I haven’t. Eve. Nice to meet you both.” She briefly shook Cat’s hand, aimed a polite smile vaguely but not quite in his direction and said, “I won’t keep you. Excuse me.”

Dom bit back a hoot of laughter. They hadn’t met? Wow.

Eve set her hat on her head and walked away with long, unhurried strides that made his blood itch.

“The animosity is real,” Cat said in an undertone of amusement. “She didn’t even shake your hand.”

He had noticed. His palm felt scorched yet empty.

“Shall we get out on the Jet Skis before they’re gone?” Dom suggested. He was too much of a workaholic to get much pleasure from such a pointless activity, but the greater goal was to get to know Cat. He was testing the waters, so to speak, considering whether to pursue a more formal arrangement.

He followed Cat toward the rental shack on the wharf, fighting the urge to look back at Eve.

He lost.

CHAPTER FIVE

EVE HAD TO hand it to Logan. He’d taught her to carry a sensible assortment of items when leaving for a day hike—most of which turned out to be unnecessary today. They arrived with the rest of the guests at one of the uninhabited islands to find the groom’s family had installed a pop-up store and takeaway shack on the beach.

The shack was on pontoons so it could be floated back to whence it had come, once the day was over. Its large wooden awning was levered up with poles to shade the order window. Racks of sarongs, beach towels, flip-flops and sunhats stood nearby.

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