Married to the Enemy - Excerpt
Passion and Promise
Was this what a family felt like?
The smell of onions and garlic filled the kitchen, sharp and savory, the kind of scent that clung to skin and hair and made the whole house feel warmer. Raffe hunched over the cutting board, forcing his focus on the knife, on the steady rhythm of chopping, on anything except the sound of Mia’s light footsteps coming down the hall.
She appeared with a basket of clothes fresh from the dryer, her cheeks still pink from the heat of the laundry room. The basket balanced against her hip, and she set it on the island opposite him. She hummed under her breath as she pulled out a sweatshirt, then a pair of jeans, folding them neatly into stacks.
Raffe cleared his throat, shifted his grip on the knife. Focus. Onions, peppers, garlic. Not her.
But he couldn’t stop his eyes from sliding over when she plucked out something smaller—tiny lace-trimmed panties, delicate as a whisper. She folded them quickly, trying for casual, but her cheeks flushed faintly as she tucked them under her stack of leggings and jeans.
Raffe’s knife hit the board with a harder thud than intended.
“Anyway,” Mia continued breezily, as if nothing had happened, “I’ve been looking at this new camera lens online. It’s not cheap, but it would be perfect for capturing detail in low light. The kind of detail you need when you’re trying to…” She trailed off, fishing out another piece of clothing.
This time it was a thong. Barely a strip of fabric, and for one insane heartbeat, Raffe pictured—
He swore under his breath, nearly chopping into his own thumb.
Mia stuffed the thong beneath a sweatshirt, her voice still soft and casual. “I’m not saying I’ll buy it right away, but maybe by next month. There’s this old cathedral in Florence I’ve always wanted to shoot, and the shadows in the arches…”
Raffe forced his gaze down, chopping too fast, too rough, the knife clattering against the board. He caught only fragments of her words. Lens. Shadows. Florence. All he could think of was her bare feet on the cool tile, the sweet smell of laundry mixed with the bite of onions, and those damn scraps of fabric that passed as underwear.
And then she did it. She picked up his boxers, folded them neatly, humming under her breath as if she hadn’t just set his blood pressure rocketing.
That was when the knife slipped.
“Damn!” He jerked his hand back, a line of red beading along the side of his finger.
“Raffe!” Mia was at his side instantly, dropping his folded clothes back onto the basket. She grabbed his wrist before he could pull away, her dark eyes flashing up to his. “You should be more careful.”
“I’m fine,” he grumbled, though he didn’t move. Couldn’t.
She tugged him to the sink, running the cut under cold water, then pulled a clean towel from a drawer. Her touch was tender, practiced, as if she’d done this a thousand times before for someone else. But her silence now, after all her cheerful chatter, made the room feel charged.
The world narrowed to the brush of her fingers against his skin, the way her hair slipped forward over her cheek as she bent close. He could smell her shampoo, something light and floral, battling against the garlic and peppers.
She wrapped the towel around his finger, then lifted her gaze to his. For one suspended heartbeat, neither of them breathed.
Raffe leaned in, just slightly, his hand still in hers, her lips parted as if she was waiting—
