The Boat Builder’s Enemy
A Steamy Enemies-to-Lovers Billionaire Romance
by Isla Wilde
📖 Free with Kindle Unlimited
Pairing: MF
Heat: 🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️ Inferno
Tropes: Enemies to Lovers, Billionaire, Age Gap, Forced Proximity, Rescue Romance, Praise Kink
He’s the one man my father hates. And the only man who can save me.
I am Cordelia Vance, the perfect daughter of Lake Joseph’s most powerful family. My life is a series of performances: the right clothes, the right parties, and soon, a marriage to a man I despise to save my father’s crumbling empire.
I was drowning in expectations until the day my boat died in the middle of a storm.
My rescuer? Silas Thorne.
He’s a wealthy boat-building tycoon, arrogant, dangerously handsome, and my father’s sworn enemy. He’s spent fifteen years plotting his revenge against my family. He should have left me to drift.
Instead, he pulled me onto his boat, took me to his private island, and showed me a life I didn’t know I was missing.
I know he’s dangerous. I know he researched my family’s downfall before we even met. But when his rough hands are on my skin, I forget about my duty. I forget about the debt. I forget that loving him is a betrayal.
My father says Silas is just using me to win their war.
Silas says he’s ready to burn the world down to keep me.
I have to choose: The family name I’ve protected my whole life, or the enemy who makes me feel alive for the first time?
You’ll love this if you enjoy:
✓ Possessive, protective heroes who fall HARD
✓ “Good girl” heroines breaking free
✓ 15-year age gap with power dynamics
✓ Private island forced proximity
✓ Family feud / forbidden love drama
✓ Explicit scenes with emotional depth
✓ Found family and earned independence
✓ Guaranteed HEA (with wedding epilogue!)
⚠️ Content Warning
This book contains explicit MF sexual content including praise kink, light D/s dynamics, exhibitionism, orgasm control, possessive/claiming themes, and detailed intimate scenes. Themes include emotionally manipulative parent, financial coercion, and references to emotional neglect/abandonment. The heroine reclaims her autonomy and the hero earns his redemption.
Reader discretion advised. This book is intended for mature audiences only.
📖 Read Chapter One Free
Chapter One: The Return
The gravel crunched beneath her tires like bones breaking.
Corrie Vance had driven this road a thousand times—up the winding private lane, past the century-old pines, toward the lake that had defined every summer of her childhood. She knew every pothole, every bend, every shadow that fell across the path at this hour of the afternoon. But today, as the trees opened up and the Lodge came into view, she felt something cold settle in her stomach.
This summer will be different, she told herself. The same thing she’d told herself on the flight from New York, in the rental car pickup line, at every red light on the two-hour drive north from Toronto. This time, I have a plan.
The plan was folded in her purse. Twelve pages, single-spaced. A complete business proposal for relaunching her sustainable fashion line—scaled down, smarter, lessons learned from every mistake. She’d rehearsed the pitch in her apartment mirror until she could deliver it without her voice shaking. She’d anticipated her father’s objections and prepared responses for each one.
She was twenty-three years old, and she was still rehearsing conversations with her father like a child preparing for a spelling bee.
The Lodge loomed against the afternoon sky, all dark cedar and stone, its reflection rippling in the lake below. Four generations of Vances had summered here. Her great-grandfather had built it in 1920, back when Muskoka was wilderness and the wealthy came north to prove they could survive without servants. Now it was just another trophy property on Lake Joseph, one of dozens owned by Toronto’s elite.
But something was wrong.
Corrie slowed the car, squinting through the windshield. The boathouse listing slightly to the left—had it always done that? Paint peeling on the eastern eaves. The dock looking weathered, a few boards clearly rotting. Small things, maybe. Things that shouldn’t matter.
Things her father would never have allowed when she was a child.
…
🔥 Want an EXCLUSIVE Bonus Chapter?
“The Anniversary” — A 4,000-word scene TOO HOT for Amazon
One year after the epilogue. Silas has planned something special for their anniversary—a return to the boat where everything started, and a night that pushes every boundary they’ve explored. Features possessive dirty talk, sensation play, and the kind of worship that leaves marks. This scene didn’t make it into the book.
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Frequently Asked Questions
Is this book part of a series?
The Boat Builder’s Enemy is the first book in The Muskoka Billionaires series. It is a complete standalone with a guaranteed HEA (including wedding epilogue!). Future books will feature connected characters from the Lake Joseph world.
How spicy is this book?
🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️ — This is a 5/5 heat level book with 9 explicit scenes throughout. Features include praise kink, possessive/claiming dynamics, exhibitionism, orgasm control, and a hero who knows exactly how to use his words.
Is there a happily ever after?
Absolutely! Corrie and Silas get their HEA with a wedding epilogue. She builds her fashion empire. He builds her a boat. They build a life together. No cliffhangers, no cheating, just a satisfying ending for readers who want the whole romance.
What’s the age gap?
Corrie is 23 and Silas is 38—a 15-year gap. The power dynamics are addressed directly in the book, with explicit consent discussions and the heroine maintaining full agency in the relationship. She chooses him; he never pressures her.
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