Page 30 of Married to the Enemy

Mia’s heart squeezed. That smile was fragile, hesitant, but real.

“Don’t worry about that nurse,” her nonna said softly. “She has no chance with Raffe.” Evangeline patted Mia’s hand with a wicked little smirk.

Mia groaned, heat rushing to her cheeks. “Nonna…”

Her grandmother just winked. Mischief twinkled in her eyes, the same spark that had survived decades of mafia politics and a miserable stint in a nursing home. “Don’t worry, dear. You’re the one he keeps looking at.”

Mia pressed her lips together, clutching her coffee. Her grandmother wasn’t wrong. And that was what terrified her most.

Mia stared at the door, her legal husband having disappeared behind it along with the disrespectful, obnoxiously pretty nurse who had smiled far too much at him. She put her travel mug filled with coffee down and selected a magazine, rolling and unrolling it mindlessly.

When she turned back to her grandmother, she tried for casual. “He’s not really mine, Nonna.”

“But you want him to be.” Evangeline teased slyly, like she was twenty years younger and still making mischief at some family gathering.

Mia’s mouth twisted. For a second, she actually considered admitting it. But then she shook her head firmly. “Nope.”

“Fibber,” Evangeline replied with a very unladylike snort that startled a guffaw from a man across the waiting room, who quickly ducked his head when Mia glared at him.

“I am not,” Mia shot back, though her smile betrayed her amusement at her grandmother’s spunk. “That man is a mystery. I don’t know why, but I think he’s lying about a lot of things.”

Evangeline arched an eyebrow, folding her hands primly in her lap and looking like the picture of elegance. Mia swallowed another chuckle, because this was the same woman who had threatened Raffe with a swift kick in the groin not five minutes ago.

“About what?” Evangeline asked, her voice deceptively casual.

Mia thought about it, her gaze drifting, again, to the door Raffe had vanished through. “Well, for one thing, I found him in a park two days ago, looking like a homeless person.” She frowned, the details tugging at her. “No. That’s not right.”

She opened the glossy magazine, pretending to scan the pages, though her attention never left that door. “He wasn’t actually homeless. He was trying to look homeless. Which makes even less sense. Why would he do that?”

Evangeline hummed thoughtfully. “Well, I think the more important aspect of the man’s character isn’t what disguise he wore, but how he treats a child he has no obligation to help.” She pursed her lips thoughtfully. “From what I gathered last night, Raffe met Freddy when he saw the boy watching a football practice. They talked, and one thing led to another, and a friendship was born.”

Mia tilted her head, absorbing that.

Her grandmother leaned forward, lowering her voice. “And consider this: he married a stranger in order to fight for the right to spend thousands of dollars on medical care for a child that isn’t his. That speaks louder than whatever secrets he’s keeping.”

Mia blinked at that, her chest tightening in a way that unsettled her.

“And,” Evangeline added, her lips curving into a mischievous smile, “you should pay more attention to the way his eyes follow you when you’re not aware.”

Mia gasped, sitting ramrod straight, her heart tripping. “He does not!”

“Oh, he does,” her grandmother insisted with a knowing chuckle. “And so do you.”

Mia’s mouth fell open. Heat rushed into her cheeks. “I don’t… I wasn’t…!”

“I saw you eyeing his butt last night.”

Mia sputtered. “I never—!”

“You did,” Evangeline cut in smoothly, her smirk growing wider.

Mia groaned and covered her face with the magazine, her laughter muffled by the pages. “You’re impossible.”

“You’re smitten,” Evangeline countered, patting her granddaughter’s hand fondly. Then she leaned back in her wheelchair, utterly satisfied with herself, like she’d just won another round of a game Mia hadn’t realized they were playing.

They sat in silence for the next thirty minutes. Both knew if they opened their mouths, the only subject that would come out was Raffe—and neither was willing to risk confessing what was written all over their faces.

Mia wanted to argue with her grandmother’s accusation, to deny it with righteous indignation. But anything she said would be a lie. Because—blast it—she had been admiring Raffe’s butt last night. And not just that. She’d noticed the breadth of his shoulders when he’d leaned over Freddy’s chair, the biceps stretching his shirt when he’d lifted the wheelchairs into the back of his pickup like they weighed nothing.