Startled, she said the first thing that came to mind. “I didn’t know you liked to read.”
“Well, there you go,” he mocked. “You learn something new every day.” And they were back to being adversaries again.
Stupidly disappointed, she quickly looked down at the title of his book. “You read science fiction obviously.”
He indicated her book with a derisive twist of his lips. “And you read romance.”
Thankfully her sunglasses covered her eyes. “Why not?” she said as casually as she could, not wanting him to see his comment upset her. She wouldn’t give him that power over her.
“It’s not exactly your…forte, is it?”
He was just trying to goad her. “So you don’t believe in true love, Dominic?” she challenged.
“What I believe doesn’t matter.”
“That’s not the impression I get.” This was about him believing her unfaithful, so it did matter. It affected how he was treating her. In his eyes, she was only after the good life and nothing more. He thought her a woman totally incapable of loving a man for himself alone.
Suddenly sick at heart, she closed her book and got to her feet. “I think I hear Nicole waking up.” She started to walk off, aware of his eyes following her. “Cassandra?”
She took a few more steps, then stopped to look at him.
“Bring Nicole for a dip in the pool.”
Her upset heart tilted inside her chest. She’d been putting off the moment when she had to wear her bikini in front of Dominic.
“Or are you scared of the water?” he drawled.
She had the feeling he’d guessed why she hesitated. “I love the water,” she said, keeping her voice even despite her increasingly racing heart.
A second lapsed as he stilled—and the air thickened with sensuality. “Oh, that’s right. You like to take very long and luxurious baths, don’t you?”
The sun instantly felt hotter.
She moistened her dry lips. “We’ll be back in a little while,” she said, spinning away, heart thumping, knowing that the scrap of bikini Nesta had packed for her wasn’t something she’d normally wear. Even before she’d given birth to Nicole, the bikini would have been on the smallish side, but these days her br**sts were slightly fuller, her h*ps a touch curvier.
Darn, she should have bought herself a new bikini in town this morning. It would have been the perfect opportunity to buy something a little less revealing, but just being in Dominic’s presence all morning had put a stop to rational thought.
Perhaps she could pretend it had been forgotten to be packed, after all. She pulled a face. Needless to say she could envision his reply to that.
Wear nothing.
Dominic almost expected to see his sunglasses steam up as he watched Cassandra walk away with a slight sway to her hips. He shouldn’t be thinking about her in either a luxurious bath or a bikini. He didn’t need any more of a vivid imagination right now, not when he was trying to ignore the picture of him running his hands down her slender back and over the gentle swell of those feminine hips. He was a man who couldn’t take much more of this. Of her.
Dammit, how did she do it? How did she manage to take a highly controlled man like himself and nearly send him over the edge with wanting her? How did she shoot need through every part of him as if she had the combination to his desire? And more importantly, why was he letting her get away with it?
Pushing to his feet, he stripped down to his swimming briefs and was in the water by the time she returned, walking toward him in a Pacific-blue bikini that tore his imagination to shreds.
Was she deliberately teasing him? Or was Nesta? He’d told his housekeeper to make sure Cassandra had a swimsuit to wear this weekend, but he hadn’t expected these little triangles of cloth that left a whole lot of skin bare. God, he couldn’t deny Cassandra had the body of a goddess and the perfect figure to wear such a skimpy thing. He couldn’t even tell that she’d had a baby nine months ago.
And then he saw her begin to blush. It started in her cheeks then spread downward over all that bare skin, and no doubt under the material, as well. Yet who would expect her to be so easily embarrassed? She was an enigma.
She cleared her throat. “Er…could you take Nicole for a moment?”
He heard the words, and he forced his focus to shift away from the bathing beauty…to the little beauty she carried. Cassandra had crouched down near the edge of the pool and was holding her daughter toward him.
His daughter.
All at once it hit him. He swallowed hard. So far he’d managed not to actually hold Nicole in his arms, fearful of giving himself away to Cassandra too soon. “Dominic?”
He moved forward in the water and held out his arms.
And Nicole reached out to him…his daughter reached out to him…and he slipped his hands around her little body in the sun protective swimsuit while she put her arms around his neck and held on, and heaven help him, but the lump in his throat was so darn huge, he thought he might choke. “Got her?”
He couldn’t look at Cassandra. He swallowed again before answering, “Yeah, I’ve got her.”
He held his daughter…just held her…until she gave a little wiggle and then a giggle…and his heart almost burst through his chest.
“She likes it.”
He took a breath and looked up at Cassandra’s words. Without warning, something slipped past his guard and bonded with her. It was an odd moment. For the first time he was happy he’d actually married this woman.
She stood up and went to the steps, then slid into the water like a mermaid, dipping under the surface, then coming up in front of Nicole’s face. “Boo,” she said softly so as not to frighten the little girl.
Nicole blinked, then gave a little squeal of delight and started kicking her chubby little legs, and he needed all his concentration to hold her as she splashed about.
“She’s going to be quite a handful,” he joked half to himself, but Cassandra smiled back, and for once they were in total accord with this little person linked between them. He veered away from those thoughts. Cassandra couldn’t possibly know the very strength of that link.
“Do you want me to take her? She’s probably getting heavy by now.”
He didn’t want to give up holding his daughter just yet. “No, she’s fine.”
Then Nicole demanded his attention, and he started to walk her slowly around the pool, holding her belly down in the water like she was swimming, her face above the surface. He thoroughly enjoyed playing with her.
Just then he heard Cassandra say something, and he looked up to see her sitting on the lower step of the pool. She was watching them with a soft look in her eyes.
He walked toward her through the water, having completed the circumference of the shallow end of the pool. “Sorry, what did you say?”
“I said I’m glad you’re getting to know Nicole.”
Wariness rose inside him as he remembered what he had to keep secret. He nodded. “So am I.”
Something seemed to catch at her, and she looked down at the water.
His heart thudded. “What’s the matter?”
She lifted her head, her eyes sad. “She’s so like Liam.”
The pain hit him unawares, not because Liam was dead, but because this child in his arms didn’t belong to his brother. “I’m her father,” he ached to say, with an inner pain that had started the day Nicole was born. “I’m the one who gave her life.”
Instead, he lifted Nicole out of the water and handed her over to her mother. “I’ve just remembered I have to make a call.”
She blinked, a hint of confusion in her eyes as she took hold of Nicole. “Oh, okay.”
Then he swept by her up the pool steps, picked up his trousers and shirt and strode inside before he could say something he would regret.
Cassandra wished she hadn’t said anything about Liam just now, but Dominic had been such a tower of strength for his family that she’d forgotten mention of his dead brother might sometimes overwhelm him.
Like it had overwhelmed her a moment ago.
Not for her own sake, but for Nicole’s.
Her daughter looked so like Liam at times that in spite of everything it hurt to know that he would never get to see his little girl grow up. And that Nicole would never know her father. Sadness swelled in her heart again as the sun went behind a cloud. It felt cooler now out here. Nicole gave a shiver.
She stood up. “Come on, sweetie. Let’s get into something warm.”
She made her way up the steps to the deck, then went up to her room. There was no sign of Dominic, but his bedroom door was shut and she could hear the shower running. Tension tightened inside her at the thought of all that water dripping down his tanned chest, like it had in the pool. She’d pretended not to notice, but she’d taken a few peeks when he’d been busy with Nicole.
Hurriedly, she closed her bedroom door and put Nicole on the floor, going over to the wardrobe to get some clothes. It wouldn’t do to be thinking about Dominic in the shower, not when he wouldn’t be wearing those tight swimmers like she’d seen when he’d left the water. This time he would be nak*d. Fully nak*d.
All of a sudden Nicole let out a scream, making Cassandra jump. She rushed forward, seeing her baby’s finger caught in the bottom drawer of the bureau, her heart squeezing as Nicole screamed again.
Carefully, she eased Nicole’s finger out, relieved to see no blood, then picked her up and cuddled her close. Tears streamed down the baby’s cheeks, Nicole’s lips trembling as she held on to her mother for solace.
All at once Dominic burst through the door. “What’s wrong? What’s the matter?”
Cassandra cuddled Nicole against her shoulder. “I left the bottom drawer of the bureau open a little, and she caught her finger.”
He came toward them. “Is she all right?”
She nodded, then patted the little back until the crying slowed to sobs. She eased back and picked up Nicole’s finger, inspecting it further. There was only a little bit of redness. “Let Mummy kiss it better,” she said and placed her lips against the pad of Nicole’s finger, love warming the very center of her being. “There. All better now.”
As if she were looking for the kiss, Nicole held her finger up in front of her face and frowned. She looked so adorable, with her wet cheeks and pouting lips, that Cassandra shared a smile with Dominic.
“She looks like you,” he said, and Cassandra’s heart swelled with pride.
A moment later she went to turn away when she caught sight of his chest. His bare chest. Taken off guard, her eyes followed the line of dark, silky hair growing down toward his hips, where a towel had been hurriedly thrown around him.
Her bones went soft. Oh, God, what would it be like to run her palms over him?
Would he feel warm and smooth?
Or hot and springy?
Her gaze moved upward to his face—and found him watching her with a hungry expression in his eyes. She self-consciously broke eye contact and looked away, thankful Nicole wriggled to be free at that moment.