The Skipper & the Billionaire Playboy

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Authors: Mia Caldwell
remembered her mother teaching her how to swim, and she recalled her mother used to fuss at her to eat vegetables. Her most vivid memories were of the soothing nighttime ritual of bath time, followed by combing her curly hair before confining it into two matching pigtails.
    She also recalled the first moment when she’d realized her mother wasn’t coming back, which had actually been several days after the other woman died from cancer. Her father had told her she was gone. Before her death, neither one had ever tried to hide from their little girl just how serious it was, though of course they had softened the news. Nadia had known her mother’s death was coming, but hadn’t fully understood at the time what that had meant.
    It had been a stark moment, staring at her ratted hair in the mirror and realizing her mommy would never be there again to comb it for her, that had made it sink in. It was one of the few times reserved Nadia could remember truly crying, having hidden away in her closet to sob into her pillow so as not to disturb her father, who had seemed so distant then. As an adult, she realized he must have been immersed in grieving, but as a child, he had just seemed unapproachable.
    That had been the only time she remembered not being able to go to her papa for something though. As Nadia sat on a stone bench to admire a pink and yellow blossom shooting upward nearby, she hoped she would be as good a parent someday when she had children. Not that she planned to do so anytime soon. After all, there were still qualifying events she would have to prepare for and enter to have a shot at being in the challenging team racing against the defenders for the next America’s Cup.
    Abruptly, she found herself picturing what a baby with Sawyer would look like, with golden-brown curls, light-brown eyes, and skin a perfect blend of her darker brown and his paler cream. A pang of envy during shot through her, which was disconcerting. At thirty-two, she wasn’t hearing her biological clock tick by any means, and Sawyer Sinclair was the last person she would choose as father for any future child.
    The quiet whir of Harold’s electric scooter heralded his arrival before he came into sight and forced her thoughts to veer in another direction. She was relieved to shed the morose thoughts of her parents, and idle speculation about future children, though tense about facing the older man.
    She didn’t think it was an accident he’d come across her in the garden, and she had been expecting some kind of third-degree from him since arriving at his family’s home. He wasn’t as laidback as Kiersten and Caitlin. Harold hadn’t been unkind, and she didn’t expect him to try to bribe her to leave Sawyer or something equally horrible, but she knew he was tougher to fool than his daughter and granddaughter.
    He stopped beside her, waving off his sexy blonde secretary whose heels tapped on the paver bricks as she followed a few feet behind. “Find something else to do for a while, Paige,” said Harold sternly.
    Looking unruffled, the blonde simply nodded and turned on her heels—heels that seemed ridiculously high for secretarial work—and headed back toward the house.
    He stared at her for a long moment, and she struggled to remain cool and composed. There was something piercing in his eyes that made it difficult not to shift like a guilty teenager. Finally, she decided to break the silence first. “I’ve been expecting this, Mr. Sinclair.”
    “Harold,” he said gruffly, one of his bushy eyebrows arching high on his forehead. “And expecting what, Nadia?”
    She smiled. “I’ve been expecting you to interrogate me.”
    He chuckled, and the rich, warm sound had the effect of diffusing some of her tension. “It’s hardly an interrogation, my dear. I simply want to know more about you, and how you fit into my reprobate grandson’s life.”
    She couldn’t resist the urge to fidget, his words making her question if he had

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