Marrying the Enemy by Nicola Marsh

Author:Nicola Marsh [Marsh, Nicola]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2012-07-31T23:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER ELEVEN

JAX froze on the threshold of the Palladium.

Clammy fingers of foreboding strummed the back of his neck.

Ice trickled through his veins.

Indecision, potent and savage, strangled his resolve to stride into the ballroom and make people stand up and notice Jax Maroney was back and there wasn’t one damn thing they could do about it.

Well and good to have resolve, but acting on it with hundreds of curious, judgemental eyes locked on him? Tougher than he’d expected.

‘You’ll be fine.’ Ruby squeezed his hand, sensing his wavering, her intuition scaring him as much as the crowd.

No matter how many times he pushed her away, no matter how hard he tried to keep his distance, he kept coming back for more, drawn to her in a way that defied explanation.

He didn’t want to get close to her. Didn’t want to see the admiration in her eyes when he’d walked out of the bathroom earlier, didn’t want to see the tears when he’d given her the rose on an impulse, didn’t want her asking probing questions or being sensitive or trying to understand him.

He didn’t want to feel.

Anything.

Why couldn’t she leave him alone? Why did she have to keep digging, chipping away at his defences like a fanatical miner intent on finding gold?

When he didn’t speak, the corners of her mouth pinched with worry.

‘What’s wrong?’

Everything, he wanted to yell.

You, these people, my lousy dad, my sneaky mum, marrying you.

Everything was wrong but he’d suck it up, as he’d done before during the tough times in his life, and get on with it.

‘Nothing.’ He squared his shoulders, gripped her hand tighter. ‘Let’s give the performance of our lives.’

And they did. For the next few hours, he forced polite smiles, shook hands and waxed lyrical about everything from garden parties to the Melbourne Spring Racing Carnival.

People who’d shunned him years earlier and who’d avoided him at the Seaborn launch put on their game face and pretended to like him.

All for the sake of the stoic woman by his side.

Ruby didn’t leave him for a second, holding his hand through every introduction. She didn’t allow a lull in the conversation. She charmed her way around intrusive questions, distracting people with her natural vivacity. She deflected potentially disastrous comments with a sunny smile and quick wit that made people laugh rather than bristle.

Simply, she slayed the crowd.

And him.

The sex they’d had before coming down had been designed to distract and might have taken the edge off his perpetual hunger for her, but watching her smile and squeeze his hand or slide an arm around his waist as if it were the most natural thing in the world made him believe in the fairy tale too.

As they waltzed to ‘The Way You Look Tonight’, her tantalising body pressed close, he almost forgot why they’d married in the first place.

‘You’re awfully tense still,’ she murmured, resting her hand against his chest, directly over his impermeable heart.

‘Wouldn’t you be, surrounded by piranhas waiting for you to falter?’

‘Not really.’ She patted his chest and he could’ve sworn his heart squirmed beneath her touch.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.