The Harder They Fall by Trish Jensen Page B

Item number one on his list had just been accomplished.
    He walked to the pool’s lip, rotating his arms to warm up his muscles. Gazing up, he watched Darcy set up for another dive. She raised her arms—over her head this time. Then she brought them down, bent her knees slightly, and prepared to shove off from the platform.
    That’s when she finally spotted Michael.
    Even from across the pool he saw her eyes go wide, her mouth form an “oh!” of recognition. She tried to pull back, but momentum prevented her. Her arms and legs flailed almost comically as she tried to right herself in the air. She almost made it. But not quite.
    If she’d been in a cannonball-splash competition, she’d have won.
    Michael tensed, the moments before she surfaced seeming like hours. When she finally got her head above water, she looked a little like Cousin Itt. Her hair covered her face. She dunked back down and let the water push it back, then reappeared, treading water.
    She didn’t exactly look thrilled to see him.
    “You!” she growled.
    Michael tried to appear surprised. “Darcy! Is that you?” Before she could answer, he sliced through the air and dove into the pool. Using a lazy breaststroke, he cut across the pool toward her, smiling at her. She glared at him the entire time, her hair floating around her.
    He stopped in front of her and shook his hair out of his eyes. Treading water with his legs alone, he said, “Wow, this is a nice surprise.”
    “You mean a nightmare.”
    He ignored that. “I didn’t know you swam.”
    “Why should you?”
    He ignored that, too. “You’re a terrific diver.”
    Her cheeks blushed a little. “Uh . . . thank you.” She tucked her hair behind her ear. “Well, I guess I’m tired of swim—”
    Michael reached out and wrapped his hand around her arm. Even that slight contact managed to shoot sparks through his nervous system. “Don’t go.”
    She stared down at her arm, then looked back at him. He could tell by the green light in her eyes and the parting of her lips that she felt the same sensation he did from the wet skin-on-skin contact.
    Michael was almost surprised they weren’t electrocuted.
    Some primitive impulse took his brain hostage. He widened the circumference of his undulating legs just enough to brush against hers. His eyes slid shut and he bit back a moan as he felt her silky-smooth skin.
    Darcy gasped as she felt Michael Davidson’s leg brush against hers. Something started quaking inside her. She suddenly felt as heavy as a lead weight and as light as a feather. She didn’t know if she was going to sink or float.
    The man was touching her. While he was touching her, he was gazing at her with eyes so blue it almost hurt to look into them. Water dripped down from his hair, the drops tracing the contours of his proud cheeks, his strong jaw . His lips, turned up in a slight smile, seemed hard and sexy all at once.
    God, this gorgeous enemy of a man was touching her.
    Deciding she was definitely going to sink, Darcy started churning her legs just a little more frantically. She tried to say something, but words stuck in her throat, just scant inches above where her heart had started threatening to spar with her ribs.
    “Stay,” he coaxed, his voice a little throaty. “I want to watch you swim some more. I want to watch you dive.”
    He wanted to watch her. As far as she knew, she’d never had a man want to watch her before.
    And this man who wanted to watch her was still touching her.
    She suddenly became aware that he was pulling her through the water toward him. Her legs churned just a little harder, in rhythm with her churning tummy.
    He brought her to within a few inches of him, until her breasts brushed his chest every once in a while. Darcy tried hard to remember that this man was her enemy but, as the two of them bobbed in the water, as her breasts came in occasional contact with his bare, hard chest, Darcy couldn’t think of anything, except that she