“A chink in your armor, oh Mistress of Real Estate!” Dax teased as he tugged arm her to get her moving again. “It gets even more interesting, because residents don’t own the land. We just lease it from the city for ninety-nine years.”
“What?” She didn’t care that she was shrieking. She loved this stuff. “Is it possible that today will turn out not to be the worst day of my life after all?” Look at her, making a joke on her jilting day. “There’s nothing like a little real estate oddity to perk a girl up when she’s left at the altar.” She pointed a finger at him. “I will be asking you more about this. But first I want to know specifically how you came to live here if there’s this weird list thing you have to get on.”
“I came out to Centre Island on a field trip when I was a kid—there’s an amusement park there. Some friends and I sneaked away from the group and found ourselves here. When I got home, I did some research—”
“You did some research. How old were you?”
“Eleven. And I put myself on the list that week.”
“Did they know you were eleven?”
He shrugged. “It took nineteen years. Nowadays, I think it’s more like twenty-five or thirty.”
“Oh my God, this is so fascinating.”
“Jeez, if I’d known that real estate would cheer you up so profoundly, we would have skipped the bar and hit some open houses.”
She clapped her hands, taking everything in. “No, this is better!”
He stopped in front of an adorable bright blue cottage surrounded by a slightly overgrown perennial garden. “This is me.” He gestured down the gravel path leading to a tiny front porch. “Welcome home, Strawberry Girl.”
Chapter Four
“Oh, this place is to die for,” Amy said, gazing around as she walked up the path. “I bet this works really well with the ladies.”
Unlocking the door and gesturing for her to precede him inside, Dax just shrugged. Didn’t bother telling her that he hardly ever brought women to this house. He had a perfectly adequate—quite luxurious, actually—condo on the other side. When you were on the island, there was literally no escape. Short of hustling a guest out the door in time for the last ferry at ten fifteen, there was no way for a night in not to turn into a sleepover. And he didn’t like having his hand forced. He’d been there once before, with Allison, and he wasn’t doing it again. Besides, all his real stuff was here, and he didn’t want people pawing through his stuff.
Like Amy was doing right now, in fact, in her annoying Amy-esque way. She had dropped her little handbag on the sofa and was trailing a hand along the mantel, looking at a framed photo he had there. “Your family?”
“Yep.” He came to stand beside her and pointed. “Mom, dad, sister.”
She rested her finger next to his, where it pointed to his sister. “Older or younger?”
“Five years older. Just turned forty.”
Dax waited for the inevitable expression of disbelief or protest that the two couldn’t possibly be related. Kat had their mother’s Chinese features while he, though he had dark coloring, had inherited their British father’s lighter skin and green eyes. When he and his sister were out, even in multicultural Toronto, no one ever believed they were siblings.
“You and she have the same smile,” Amy said.
Well, that was a new one.
“Not that you ever smile.” She moved across the room to examine some paintings hanging on the far wall. He tried not to pay attention to how her hips swayed as she padded barefoot across the room. “Do you have any nieces or nephews?”
“Kat’s eight months pregnant with her first. So, soon.”
She tapped the frame of one of the paintings and shot him a look over her shoulder. The red lipstick was faded—it had taken a beating when he’d kissed her on the boat, as evidenced by the fact that he’d had to wipe a bunch of it off his own mouth, and her hair was windblown from the crossing. It didn’t seem to matter. The disheveled look was good on her. Down, boy. She’s touching your stuff, remember?
“These don’t really seem like you.” She frowned up at the pastel abstracts.
“They aren’t.” The paintings were nice enough, but nothing he normally would have given a second glance. “A neighbor here is an artist, and we islanders are a tight-knit lot.”
“But you had to buy three?”
He shrugged. “She has twins in college.”
She recoiled as if he’d struck her. “Wow. That’s so…nice of you.”
“Anyway,” he said, waving away the compliment…or insult, or whatever it had been. “Art appreciation is not why we’re here.”
“Right.” She turned and fixed those gorgeous blue eyes on him.
He took a step back. Oh, crap. That was not what he’d meant. Nope. Not happening.
She took a step forward, catching her bottom lip with her top teeth. Oh, certain parts of him wanted to go there again, were pleading for just one more taste, but he had to be good.
She shivered. His ego hoped it wasn’t only from cold, but it also served to remind him of his original mission.
“Follow me,” he said, turning and leading the way to his bedroom. Like all the rooms in the cottage, it was tiny. A queen-size bed took up nearly all the floor space. He stopped in front of his dresser on the far side and began rummaging through it for some clothes for her. A normal person would have waited on the other side of the bed. But of course Amy wasn’t a normal person. She stayed on his heels, and as he bent to retrieve a shirt, she drew her hand down his back. Logically, he knew her hands were cold. So why did her touch feel like fire?
Ignoring the prickly sensation her proximity inspired, he cleared his throat and straightened, jammed into the tiny space between the dresser and her. She literally had him boxed in. One more step, and she would be able to feel what she did to him.
He handed her the clothing, using it like a shield between them. “You can change into this. But you should shower first, get warmed up.”
She looked at him like he was speaking a foreign language, like she wasn’t sure how to respond. He saw uncertainty in her eyes, then resolve. She bit down harder on her lip before speaking. “You’re going to keep me company, right?” Her tone, quavering and hesitant, didn’t match her bold words. Something in him wrenched to see her so vulnerable but trying to be so fearless.
“I can’t. But believe me, it’s tempting.” If she only knew how much. Not jumping her right now was turning him into a twitchy wreck.
Her face fell. He felt like a jerk. But not as much of a jerk as he would be if he went through with it.
“Wow,” she said with false bravado. “Left at the altar, and I can’t even score a pity fuck.”
“Hey, now,” he said, pushing past her but grabbing her hand to make sure she followed. It was only a few steps to the bathroom. “Every single guy in that bar was checking you out. You could have had any of them, and I guarantee pity would have been the last thing on their minds.”
“But you talked me out of it.”
“Yes.” He flipped on the bathroom light and maneuvered her so she was standing in front of him and they were both looking in the mirror. God, she was gorgeous. But with her makeup faded, she looked younger. He knew from her drunken rant about Mason that she was twenty-nine, but right now she could pass for a decade younger. He didn’t regret for one second hustling her out of that bar. To think of her at some other guy’s house being preyed upon when she was at her most vulnerable? It was inconceivable. “You’ve had quite the day. And though I understand the impulse to want to act out, I think you should give yourself some time. Make sure you’re not just trying to get back at Mason.”
“I am trying to get back at Mason. That’s exactly what I’m doing.”
“Well, you’re not doing it with me.” God, listen to him, all ethical and upstanding all of a sudden. This was not how he imagined his day ending when he popped into the office to get a little work done.
“So what was tha
t on the ferry?”
She was right. He hated being called out as a hypocrite, but there was nothing to do now but own it. “A mistake.” That crushed her a little bit. He could tell by the way she overcompensated by straightening her spine and tensing her jaw. He felt bad, but it was better to pull the Band-Aid off now. “Take a shower. A long, hot one. I’ll make us something to eat. I bet you haven’t eaten anything all day.”
She blew out a frustrated breath, and it seemed to take all the fight out of her. Nodding, she pulled back the shower curtain. Then her face lightened a bit. “I love this tub. Can I take a bath instead?”
It was an old claw-foot tub from the 1920s, the era in which the cottage had been built. “Sure. Whatever you like. I don’t have any bubble bath or any of that kind of shit, though. I’m purely a soap-and-water kind of guy.”
“Don’t need it.” She turned on the taps and grinned. “This is going to be amazing.”
He reached a hand out, seized with an almost overwhelming desire to stroke her face, but stopped short. “Good. Lie back and think about real estate.”
Thirty minutes later, he was sautéing veggies for omelets, sipping a cup of coffee, and trying very hard not to think about Miss Frostypants stretched out in his bathtub. Her long, lean legs would be longer than the tub, so she’d either have to bend them or let her ankles hang over the edge. Her head would probably loll back on the lip of the tub, exposing an elegant neck made pink from the heat. And there were no bubbles, so the water would be clear.
When Amy Morrison wasn’t sniping at him, she really was something.
His phone buzzed. Jack.
Everything ok?
It was as if Amy’s boss was the angel on Dax’s shoulder, able somehow to read his dirty mind. He sighed and typed a response.
Yep. Having a snack and then going to bed—separately.
How is she?
He stared off into space for a moment, remembering her tears at the beach. But then her geeky excitement when she found out about the ownership structure of the island.
I don’t know.
It was the truth. He jumped a little as he heard the bathroom door open, then fired off one final text before silencing his phone.
I gotta go. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.
“Something smells good,” Amy said, strolling out wearing the oversize University of Toronto Rowing Club T-shirt he’d given her—and nothing else. He eyed her legs. Apparently she’d decided just to forgo his sweatpants. The shirt was big on her, coming almost to her knees. It covered more of her than her wedding dress had, in fact. But the effect was the same as with that goddamned dress. Well, nothing for it but to man up. He gestured to the sofa in the small living room adjacent to the open kitchen. “Take a load off while I finish this.”
She obeyed, going so far as to fully stretch out. She heaved a big sigh. “What a weird day.”
Weird. Not awful or terrible or humiliating or the worst day ever. He felt an absurd rush of pride that maybe he had played a part in shifting her day from bad to merely weird.
“I’ll have to go home tomorrow. Ugh.” She let loose a yawn.
He turned away from her to pour the eggs into the pan. “You live with Mason, right?”
“Mason lives with me. It’s my house.”
“That’s the spirit.”
“But yes. Everything”—another huge yawn—“is all intertwined.”
He resisted the urge to try to troubleshoot. Surely she could stay with family members while they sorted everything out, or with Jack. Hell, she could even borrow his condo if she wanted. But he didn’t say any of that. He had learned the hard way that you could never truly solve other people’s problems for them. So he tilted the pan silently, letting the eggs set before he poured in the mushrooms and peppers he’d cooked and sprinkled some cheese on top.
When it was done, he cut the omelet in half and shook each piece onto a plate. Trying to think what to say next, he carried a plate across the living room to Amy.
Who was fast asleep on his couch.
Huffing a quiet laugh, he pulled a quilt from the back of the couch and tucked her in. After staring for a moment at the novel sight of her unmade-up face, he gave in to his previous impulse and let his palm rest on her cheek, but only for a moment, and only because she would never know the difference.
…
Amy woke to a pounding coming from outside. Or was it in her head? Though she had drunk a lot at the bar with Dax, it had been early enough that she’d pretty well sobered up by the time she fell asleep on the sofa. Still, she had a headache and mouth full of cotton.
And a gut full of dread. And weren’t there so many things to dread? Let us count the ways. There was Mason, of course. He’d need to get all his shit out of her house, but even she had to admit that would take some time. The dude had a lot of vintage records. She brightened for a moment thinking of all the space she’d get back when all his records were gone.
And her mother. Oh, God, her mother. She’d probably succumbed to a fit of the vapors after the non-wedding. But she would have woken bright-eyed, sharp-tongued, and with a martyr complex the size of Lake Ontario. She would be doing damage control, of course, trying to spin things so her Forest Hill friends didn’t think—God forbid—that her daughter had made a misstep.
She heard the shower down the hall shut off.
And of course there was Dax.
Her office enemy. Though perhaps after last night she’d have to promote him to frenemy.
She pulled the quilt he must have covered her with over her head. God, she hadn’t even been able to get Dax, Prince Among Womanizers, to sleep with her. He’d been polite, even complimentary, about his refusal, but a refusal it had been.
She felt like crying. But unlike last night, it seemed like she had some rational say in the matter, so she willed herself to wait until she got home. Or wherever she was going, because who knew if Mason was at her house? What time was it? She grabbed her phone. Dead.
The pounding escalated—it was definitely coming from outside—and she groaned as she tried to sit up.
She almost groaned again when Dax came down the hallway with a towel wrapped around his waist. His hair was wet. No, everything was wet. Gah! Water droplets clung to his sculpted shoulders and biceps and ran in little rivulets down his flat abs. She had the vague idea that Dax was into kayaking and, like, lake-y activities, but damn, who knew canoeing could get a guy so buff?
He didn’t even look at her as he strode to the patio door at the back of the kitchen, opened it, and hollered, “Gary! It’s Sunday morning! Give it a rest!”
She heard the reply from what must be the next-door neighbor. “It’s nearly Sunday afternoon, dude.”
Dax slid the door shut and then pounded his head lightly on the glass while making a strangled noise. Then he sighed, turned, and shot her a lopsided grin. “Sorry about that. That’s my mad scientist neighbor. He’s making a Rube Goldberg machine in his backyard.”
“What’s a Rube Goldberg machine?” She’d heard the phrase but didn’t know what it meant.
“It’s a crazy, elaborate contraption that does a simple task. But it does it in a really inefficient way, with a chain reaction. Think pulleys and gears, purposefully overengineered. It’s like something you’d see in an old Tom and Jerry cartoon. His is supposed to crack eggs.” He rolled his eyes. “Or something.”
She laughed in spite of herself, which in turn caused his smile to deepen into a wicked grin.
Which in turn caused her to shift uncomfortably and pull his T-shirt farther down her legs. She probably should have worn the sweatpants he gave her, but they were too big and didn’t have a tie at the waist, so she’d had to physically hold them to her body to keep them up.
“Anyway. Good morning,” he drawled.
No wonder women fell at his feet. He was like a rugged J Crew model living in a magical land of tiny houses and quirky neighbors. You couldn’t make this stuff up.
“Let
me just go get dressed, then I’ll heat up your omelet. I thought it was best to leave you to sleep last night.”
“Thanks. Do you have an iPhone charger?” She picked up her dead phone, then thought better of it. “Wait. I’m suddenly considering the possibility that it’s better not to know.”
He rummaged around in a drawer in the kitchen, then tossed her a charger and cord. “Here you go. Use at your own risk.”
She plugged in the phone, deciding to give it a little juice, just enough to do the responsible thing and text her brother that she was okay. He could transmit the message to the parentals—assuming they even cared. The rest, she would ignore for now.
Fifteen minutes later, she was seated at the café table for two that served as Dax’s dining area devouring an omelet. She followed that with everything else he offered: toast, yogurt, a banana.
“Hmmm…” he said, staring into a cabinet. “Oreos?”
“Hell, yes.”
He grinned, ripped open the package, and tossed it on the table.
“I really am starving,” she said through a mouthful of cookie. “I was too nervous to eat yesterday before the wedding.”
“And then I plied you with alcohol, cad that I am.”
“Something like that.”
They were munching in silence when another pounding started, distinct from Gary’s work.
“Dax!” came a voice from the front door as the doorknob rattled. “Why is this locked?”
“Oh, shit.” He bolted from his chair. “Do me a favor and run and get dressed—no, wait, that’s probably worse.” He threw her the quilt from the sofa and nodded at her legs with his eyebrows raised, a wordless exhortation to cover herself. “Coming!” he called in the direction of the door.
It would be Shelby. It had to be. Dax had said it was over, but she suspected that when it came to dating, Dax was the type of guy who played a little fast and loose with the truth. Why else would be so upset over the prospect of her being seen by whatever woman was at the door?
Sleeping with Her Enemy Page 4