Copyright

Published by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in USA by Penguin Group (USA) 2016

First published in Great Britain by Harper 2016

Copyright © Roni Loren 2016

One Night Only copyright © Roni Loren 2016

Cover photograph © Shutterstock.com

Cover layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2015

Roni Loren asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780425278543

Ebook Edition © January 2016 ISBN: 9780008108250

Version: 2015-11-24

PRAISE FOR THE NOVELS OF RONI LOREN

“Hot and romantic, with an edge of suspense.”

—Shayla Black, New York Times bestselling author of Wicked for You

“Unique and emotional.”

—USA Today

“A mix of blistering (and kinky) sexuality, emotional angst, and dangerous suspense.”

—Romance Novel News

“A must-read!”

—Nocturne Reads

“[A] steamy, sexy, yet emotionally gripping story.”

—Julie Cross, New York Times bestselling author of the Tempest novels

“I dare you to even attempt to put it down.”

—Cassandra Carr, author of Burning Love

“An angsty backstory made beautiful by a hero who doesn’t know how perfect he is. Don’t miss this Ranch treat!”

—Carly Phillips, New York Times bestselling author

“Steamy, occasionally shocking, and relentlessly intense, this book isn’t for the faint of heart.”

—RT Book Reviews

“Loren does an incredible job portraying the BDSM lifestyle in a sexy and romantic way … Loren should definitely be put on the must-read list.”

—The Book Pushers

“Like a roller-coaster ride … When you hit the last page, you say, let’s ride it again.”

—Guilty Pleasures Book Reviews

“Roni Loren’s books are masterful, story-driven, sensual, and very erotic … Definitely one of my have-to-get-as-soon-as-possible series!”

—Under the Covers Book Blog

Dedication

To my family, always

The Pleasure Principle: The human instinct to seek pleasure and avoid pain.

One is very crazy when in love.

—SIGMUND FREUD

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Praise for Roni Loren

Dedication

Epigraph

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Epilogue

One Night Only

Keep Reading Loving You Easy

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Also by Roni Loren

About the Publisher

1

Then

“I’m going to wrap my fingers in your hair and slide my other hand up your thigh. You have to be quiet for me. We can’t let anyone know.”

Marin Rush paused in the dark hallway of Harker Hall, her tennis shoes going silent on the shiny linoleum and the green Exit signs humming softly in the background. She didn’t dare move. She’d been on the way to grab a soda and a snack out of the vending machine. Her caffeine supply had run low and watching participants snore in the sleep lab wasn’t exactly stimulating stuff. But that silk-smooth male voice had hit her like a thunderclap, waking up every sense that had gone dull with exhaustion.

She’d assumed she was the only one left in the psychology building at this hour besides the two study subjects in the sleep lab. It was spring break and the classrooms and labs were supposed to be locked up—all except the one she was working in. That’s what the girl she was filling in for this week had told her. But there was no mistaking the male voice as it drifted into the hallway.

“I bet you’d like being fucked up against the wall. My cock pumping in you hard and fast.”

Holy. Shit. Marin pressed her lips together. Obviously two other people thought they were alone, too. Had students snuck into the building to get it on? Or maybe it was one of the professors. Oh, God, please don’t let it be a professor. She should turn around right now and go back to Professor Roberts’s office. Last thing she needed was to see one of her teachers in some compromising position. She would die of mortification.

But instead of backing up, she found herself tilting her head to isolate where the voice was coming from, and her feet moved forward a few steps.

“Yeah, you like that. I know. I bet you’re wet for me right now just thinking about how it would feel. Maybe I should check. Keep your hands against the wall.”

A hot shiver zipped through Marin, making every part of her hyperaware.

“I’m so hard for you. Can you feel how much I want you?” That voice was like velvet against Marin’s skin. She closed her eyes, imagining the picture the stranger was painting—some hot guy behind her, pinning her to the wall, his erection rubbing against her. She’d never been in that situation, but her body sure knew how to react to the idea. Her hand drifted up to her neck and pressed against her throat, her pulse beating like hummingbird wings beneath her fingertips.

She waited with held breath to hear the woman’s response, but no voice answered the man’s question. Can you feel how much I want you? he’d asked. And hell if Marin wasn’t dying to know. She strained to hear.

“I tug your panties off and trail my hand up your thighs until I can feel your hot, slick …”

Marin braced her other hand against the wall and leaned so far forward that one more inch would’ve sent her toppling over. Your hot …

“Goddammit. Motherfucker.”

The curse snapped Marin out of the spell she’d fallen into, and she straightened instantly, her face hot and her heartbeat pounding in places it shouldn’t be. There was a groaning squeak of an office chair and another slew of colorful swearing.

Whoever had been saying the dirty things had changed his tone of voice and now sounded ten kinds of annoyed. A wadded-up ball of paper came flying out of an open doorway a few yards down. She followed the arc and watched the paper land on the floor. Only then did she notice there were three others like it already littering the hallway.

Lamplight shifted on the pale linoleum as if the person inside the office was moving around, and Marin flattened herself against the wall, trying to make herself one with it. Please don’t come out. Please don’t come out. The silent prayer whispered through her as she counted the doors between her and the mystery voice, mentally labeling each one. When she realized it was one of the offices they let the Ph.D. students use and not a professor’s, she let out a breath.

Either way, she had no intention of alerting her hall mate that he wasn’t alone. But at least she could stop worrying she’d gotten all fevered over one of her professors. Now she just had to figure out how to get past the damn door without letting him see her. She’d gotten used to skipping meals to save money since starting college a few months ago. But she wasn’t going to make it through the next two hours of data entry and sleep monitoring if she didn’t get some caffeine. No wonder none of the upperclassmen had wanted to fill in during break.

Marin’s gaze slid over to the stairwell. If she stayed on the other side of the hall in the shadows, she could probably sneak by unnoticed. She moved to the right side wall and crept forward on quiet feet. But as soon as she got within a few steps of the shaft of light coming from the occupied room, a large shadow blotted it into darkness.

She’d been so focused on that beam of light that it took her a moment to register what had happened. She froze and her gaze hopped upward, landing on the guy who filled the doorway. No, not just any guy, a very familiar guy. Tall and lean and effortlessly disheveled. Everything inside her went on alert. Oh, God, not him.

He had his hand braced on the doorjamb, and his expression was as surprised as hers probably was. “What the hell?”

“I—” She could already feel her face heating and her throat closing—some bizarre, instant response she seemed to have to this man. She’d spent way too many hours in the back of her Intro to Human Sexuality class memorizing each little detail of Donovan West. Well, his profile, really. And his walk. And the way his shoulders filled out his T-shirts. As a teaching assistant, he usually only stopped in at the beginning of class to bring Professor Paxton papers or something. But each time he walked in now, it was like some bat signal for her body to go haywire.

It’d started with the day he’d had to take over the lecture when Professor Paxton was sick. He’d talked about arousal and the physical mechanics of that process. It was technical. He’d been wearing a T-shirt that read Sometimes I Feel Like a Total Freud. It shouldn’t have been sexy. But Lord, it’d been one of the hottest experiences of her life. He’d talked with his hands a lot and had obviously been a little nervous to be in front of the class. But at the same time, he’d been so confident in the information, had answered questions with all this enthusiasm. Marin hadn’t heard a word in the rest of her classes that day for all the fantasizing she’d been doing.

But now she was staring. And blushing. And generally looking like an idiot. Yay.

She turned fully toward him and cleared her throat, trying to form some kind of non-weird response. But when her gaze quickly traveled over him again, all semblance of language left her. Oh, shit. She tried to drag her focus back to his face and cement it there. His very handsome face—a shadow of stubble, bright blue eyes, hair that fell a little too long around the ears. Lips that she’d thought way too much about. All good. All great.

But despite the nice view, she couldn’t ignore the thing in the bottom edge of her vision, the thing that had caught her attention on that quick once-over. The hard outline in his jeans screamed at her to stare—to analyze, to burn the picture into her brain. The need to look warred with embarrassment. The latter finally won and her cheeks flared even hotter. She adjusted her glasses. “Uh, yeah, hi. Sorry. I thought I was alone in the building. Didn’t mean to interrupt … whatever.”

He stared at her for a second, his brows knitting. “Interrupt?”

Goddammit, her gaze flicked there again. The view was like a siren song she couldn’t ignore. Massive erection, dead ahead! She glanced away. But not quick enough for him not to notice.

“Ah, shit.” He stepped behind the doorway and hid his bottom half. “Sorry. It’s, uh … not what it looks like.”

She snorted, an involuntary, nervous, half-choking noise that seemed to echo in the cavernous hallway. Really smooth. She tried to force some kind of wit past the awkwardness that was overtaking her. “Ohh-kay. If you say so.”

He laughed, this deep chuckle that seemed to come straight out of his chest and fill the space between them with warmth. Lord, even his laugh was sexy. So not fair.

“Well, okay, it is that. But why it’s there is just an occupational hazard.”

His laugh and easy tone settled her some. Or maybe it was the fact that he was obviously feeling awkward, too. “Occupational hazard? Must be more interesting than the sleep lab.”

He jabbed a thumb toward the office. “It is. Sexuality department. I’m working on my dissertation under Professor Paxton.”

She could tell he didn’t recognize her from class. Not surprising since she sat in the back of the large stadium-style room and tried to be as invisible as possible. Plus, she was wearing her glasses tonight. “I’m with Professor Roberts. I’m monitoring the sleep study tonight.”

“Oh, right on. I didn’t realize he’d taken on another grad student. I’m Donovan, by the way.”

I know.

“Mari.” The nickname rolled off her lips. No one called her that anymore. But she knew he probably graded her papers, and the name Marin wasn’t all that common. She forced a small smile, not correcting him that she was about as far from a grad student as she could get. She wanted to be one. Would be one day if she could figure out how to afford it. She’d managed to test out of two semesters of classes, but high IQ or not, that dream was still a long way off—a point of light at the end of a very long, twisting tunnel.

Marin shifted on her feet. “I was heading to get a Coke so that I don’t fall asleep from doing data entry and watching people snore. You need anything?”

“A Coke?” He glanced down the hall. “Don’t waste a buck fifty on the vending machine. I’ve got a mini-fridge in here. You can come in and grab whatever you want.”

Are you an option? I’d like to grab you. The errant thought made her bite her lips together so none of those words would accidentally slip out. She had no idea where this side of herself was coming from. Not that she’d really know what to do after she grabbed Donovan anyway. This was a twentysomething-year-old man, not one of the few boys she’d awkwardly made out with in high school. This was a guy who’d know how to do all those things she’d only read about in books.

“No, that’s okay, I mean …” She shifted her gaze away, willing her face not to go red again.

He caught her meaning and laughed. “Oh, right. Sorry. Yes, you should probably avoid strange men with erections who invite you inside for a drink. Good safety plan, Mari.” He lifted his hands and stepped back fully into the doorway, the pronounced outline in his pants gone. “But I promise, you’re all good now. You just caught me at an … unfortunate moment. And now I’m going to bribe you with free soda so that you don’t tell the other grads in the department about what you saw. I keep these late hours and work through holidays to avoid that kind of torture.”

He gave her a tilted smile that made something flutter in her chest. She should probably head straight back to the office she was supposed to be working in. He was older. Kind of her teacher. If he found out she was one of Pax’s students, he’d probably freak out that she’d seen him like this. But the chance to spend a few minutes with him was too tempting to pass up.

Plus, the way he was looking at her settled something inside her. Usually she shut down around guys. Being jerked around from school to school on her mom’s whims hadn’t left her with much time to develop savvy when it came to these things. But something about Donovan made her want to step forward instead of run away. “Yeah, okay. Free is good.”

“Cool.” His face brightened. Maybe he’d been as lonely and bored tonight as she had been. He bent over and picked up the papers he’d thrown into the hallway and then swept a hand in front of him. “Welcome to my personal hell. The fridge is in the back corner.”

Marin stepped in first, finding his office a sharp contrast to the sterile sleep lab. His desk was stacked with photocopied articles and books, a Red Bull sat atop one of the piles, and a microphone was set up in the middle with a line going to the laptop. Along the back wall was a worn couch with a pillow and a blanket. More books were on the floor next to the makeshift napping quarters. Controlled chaos. She carefully made her way to the fridge and grabbed a Dr Pepper.

“Did you want me to get you something?” She peered back over her shoulder.

Donovan was busy gathering a pile of papers off the one other chair in the small office. “No, I’m good. Just opened my third Red Bull. I think my blood has officially been converted to rocket fuel. Don’t light any matches.”

She smiled and stepped back toward the door. “I hear ya. Well, thanks for the drink. I’ll let you get back to—uh, whatever it was you were doing.”

He pointed to the spot he’d cleared. “Or you could stay for a sec and take a break. God knows I need one.”

She hesitated for a moment, knowing she was taking the I’m-a-fellow-grad-student charade too far, but then she thought about the endless boredom awaiting her in the sleep lab. She moved her way around the desk and sat. What could a few more minutes hurt? “Yeah, you sounded kind of pissed off when I walked by.”

He stilled, and she cringed when she realized what she’d revealed.

He lowered himself to the chair behind his desk. “You can hear me in the hallway?”

“I—Sound travels. The hall echoes.” She made some ridiculous swirling motion with her finger—as if he needed a visual interpretation of the word echo. She dropped her hand to her side and tucked it under her thigh to keep it from going rogue again.

“Good to know. So you heard …”

“Enough.”

He laughed, all easy breezy, like they were discussing what they’d had for lunch today instead of X-rated talk and random erections in an institute of higher learning. “Well, then. Guess I should probably explain what I’m doing so I don’t look like a total perv.”

“It’s fine. I mean, whatever.” She wasn’t sure if she sounded nonchalant or like she’d taken a few sucks off a helium tank. She guessed the latter.

He lifted a crumpled paper off his desk. “This is what you heard.”

She leaned forward, trying to read the crinkled handwriting.

“Scripts,” he explained. “I’m doing my dissertation on female sexual arousal in response to auditory stimuli. I’m recording scripts of fantasies that we may use in the study.”

“Your study is about dirty talk?” she asked, surprised that the university was down with that. And if he was the one doing the dirty talking, where did she sign up to volunteer?

He smirked and there was a hint of mischief in that otherwise affable expression. “Yes, I guess that’s one way to put it. If you want to be crass about it, Ms. Sleep Disorders.”

“I’m no expert, but I know what I heard.”

“Fair enough. But yeah, I’m focusing on the effect of scripted erotic talk on women who have arousal disorder. A lot of times, therapists suggest that these clients watch erotic movies to try to increase their libido. But in general, porn is produced for men. So even though that method can be somewhat effective, the films don’t really tap into women’s fantasies. They tap into men’s. Erotic books have worked pretty well. But I want to test out another method to add to the arsenal—audio. It’d be cost effective to make, wouldn’t send more money to the porn industry, and could be customized to a client’s needs. Plus, it’s easy to test in a lab.”

Marin liked that he was talking to her like a peer, and his frankness about the topic saved her some of the weirdness that would normally surface when talking about sex. Academic talk soothed her. Plus, his passion was catching. That’s what she loved about this environment. In high school, everyone acted like they were being forced to learn. She’d always been the odd one for actually enjoying school. Books and all that information had been her escape. Schools changed. The people around her changed. Books were one of the few things that stayed constant. But here at the university there were people like Donovan, people who seemed to be mainlining their education and getting high off what they learned. “So what were you so frustrated about?”

He grabbed his can of Red Bull and took a sip, keeping his eyes on her the whole time. “I’m discovering that women are complicated and that I’m having trouble thinking like one.”

“Ah. And this is shocking news?”

“Well, no. I knew it was going to be tough, but the fantasies are turning out to be harder than I thought. We did a round of romantic ones in a small trial run, and they were a major fail. Women reported enjoying listening to them but the arousal was …” He gave an arcing thumbs-down. “My friend Alexis, one of the other grads working under Pax, told me that I needed to go more primal, tap into the forbidden type of fantasies, that sweet romance makes a girl warm and fuzzy but not necessarily hot and bothered.”

Marin’s neck prickled with awareness, but she tried to keep her expression smooth. “Makes sense.”

“Does it?”

“I—uh, I mean …”

“Never mind. I retract the question.” He leaned back in his chair and ran a hand through his dark hair, making it even messier. “I met you like five minutes ago, and I’m already asking you if taboo fantasies do it for you. Sorry. Hang out in this department too long, and you lose your filter for what is acceptable in normal conversation. I spent lunch yesterday discussing nocturnal penile tumescence with a sixty-five-year-old female professor, and it wasn’t weird. This is my life.”

Marin smiled and played with the tab on the top of her soda. “I’m clearly hanging out in the wrong department. My professor just talks about sleep apnea. Though I’ve been monitoring the sleep lab and can confirm that nocturnal penile tumescence is alive and well.”

“Ha. I bet.”

She wet her lips and, feeling brave, leaned forward to grab the script he’d left on his desk. He didn’t make a move to stop her, and she squinted at the page, trying to decipher his handwriting. The fantasy looked to be one between a boss and subordinate. She saw the parts she’d heard him read aloud. I’m so hard for you. I tug your panties off.

She crossed her legs. The part he’d gotten hung up on had various crude names for the female anatomy listed and scratched out—like he couldn’t decide which one would be most effective. She didn’t have input to give him on that, but just seeing the fantasy on the page had her skin tingling with warmth, her blood stirring. She shifted in her chair. Kept reading.

“Okay, well that’s a good sign,” he said, his voice breaking through the quiet room.

Marin looked up. “What?”

He leaned his forearms against the desk, his blue eyes meeting hers. “You just made a sound.”

“I did not.”

“Yeah, you did. Like this breathy sound. And your neck is all flushed. That one’s working for you.”

She tossed the paper on his desk. “Oh my God, you really don’t have a filter.”

He smiled, something different flaring in his eyes, something that made her feel more flustered than those words on the page. “Sorry. It’s all right, though. Seriously. You already saw me with a hard-on. Now we’re even. But this is good information. I thought this one may be too geared toward the male side—a fantasy that’d appeal to me but not necessarily to a woman. You’re telling me I’m wrong.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You didn’t have to. You’re like …”

She could feel her nipples pushing against her bra, their presence obvious against her T-shirt, and fought the urge to clamp her hands over them, to hid her traitor body. She stood. “Okay, so I’m leaving now.”

“No, no, come on, wait,” he said, standing. He grabbed her hand before she could escape, and the touch radiated up her arm, trapping her breath in the back of her throat. “You can help. I’ve got a stack of these. I need to know which ones to test next week and which ones to trash. Or maybe you can offer suggestions? I promise to keep my eyes to myself. And I swear, if you help me, I’m yours for whatever you want. I can take a shift in the sleep lab for you or something.”

She stared at him. He was kidding, right? He had to be kidding.

“You want me to read through fantasies and tell you which ones turn me on?” His hand was so warm against her cold one. And she’d said the words turn me on to him. Out loud. She might just die. “Can’t you ask your friend who’s in this department to do that?”

“She’s a lesbian, so her fantasies don’t quite line up with these. I need a straight girl’s opinion. Wait—are you straight?”

She blinked. Were they actually having this conversation? “I—yes. But this is beyond embarrassing.”

“Why? Because you get turned on by fantasy stuff? It’s not embarrassing. It’s human. You’d be shocked by how many people struggle to tap into that part of themselves. That kind of responsiveness is a good thing.”

Responsiveness. Donovan West was talking about her sexual responsiveness. Hello, alternate universe. “Donovan, I don’t know …”

He let go of her hand and opened a drawer. “Here. I have an idea. I’ll give you some headphones and a thumb drive with the ones I’ve already recorded. You can take them back to your lab and listen to them while you do data entry. Then you can just tell me which ones you recommend when you’re done. You won’t have to feel self-conscious sitting with me. Plus, I need to record some more tonight, and I can’t do that if someone’s in here with me.”

He held out the earbuds and a blue thumb drive. She eyed them like they would bite her, but on those files would be Donovan’s voice in her ear, saying those explicit things, things she’d never had a guy whisper to her. Things she’d only imagined in the private quiet of her room when she gave her mind leave to go to those secret places. The temptation was a hot, pulsing thing low in her belly.

She needed to say no. Make some excuse. Stop this lie she’d started.

She took the items. “Okay.”

His eyebrows lifted. “Yeah?”

“I’m not making any promises, but I’ll let you know if I’ve listened to any before I leave tonight.”

His grin was like a physical touch to her skin. “That would be amazing. I’ll owe you big-time, Mari.”

She got caught up in that smile like a fly in a web and wanted to linger, wanted to stay there all night and listen to him talk about his research, what made him passionate, what else made him smile like that. But if she stayed, she’d only risk embarrassing herself further, or worse—get herself in trouble. Because the thing blooming inside her with him looking at her like that, like her opinion mattered, was intoxicating and potent. She wanted to cling to it, to wrap herself up in that feeling and jump into the unknown without thinking about the consequences. Something she could never do.

She lived her life carefully, always making sure to stay between the lines on the road. No alcohol. No drugs. And definitely no risky behavior with boys. She’d learned from her mother that one foot off the path, one chased whim, could lead to chaos. She knew enough about her mom’s disorder to know that those genes probably lingered in her, too, and this pulsing desire to flirt with Donovan, to push this charade further, could be a dangerous one.

She probably shouldn’t listen to the tapes at all, shouldn’t open that door. Things were safe right now, calm. She needed them to stay that way.

But Marin couldn’t bring herself to hand the flash drive back. Not yet. She didn’t want to do anything to erase that smile off of Donovan’s face.

So she mumbled a quick good-bye and headed down the hall with the thumb drive tucked in her pocket and the soda in her hand. She’d only told Donovan she’d try. She had an out. She needed to take it and focus on her job. Get those little numbers entered into the computer, get lost in the monotony, and forget about the sexy TA down the hall.

But it wasn’t more than twenty minutes after she stepped back into Professor Roberts’s lab that the temptation proved too great. Maybe she’d just listen to one, show Donovan a good faith effort, and be done. She cued up the recordings, and Donovan’s voice filtered into her head.

“I spot you first across the bar. You look beautiful, and I know you’ve come here with someone else. I can see him getting you a drink. But I can feel your eyes on me, taste your desire, and I know that tonight, it’s going to be my hands on you, my body moving over yours, and my name on your lips …”

Marin didn’t get another lick of work done that night.

2

Then

Marin rolled her shoulders before she climbed out of her car, trying to shake off the guilt. She’d picked up her little brother from art camp this afternoon, where he’d been all week, and Nate had begged her to stay home and have movie night with him and Mom. She’d missed seeing him, but this was the last night she’d get Donovan alone. On Monday, classes would start back up again. He’d find out she was a fraud. An eighteen-year-old one at that.

So Marin had promised Nate she’d have an epic Mario Brothers battle with him tomorrow and watch whatever movie he wanted afterward. He’d pouted but had made the deal when she’d added cookie-baking to sweeten the pot. Her mother had also given her the guilt routine, complaining that Marin hadn’t been home at night all week and that Marin should be more sympathetic about the breakup she’d just gone through with random-asshole-of-the-month. Her mom had tossed out the word sad, knowing that the word was one that would normally trigger Marin to do whatever it took to fix it. Her mom’s manic episodes were hard to deal with; the depressive ones were annihilating. It shredded Marin to see her mother suffer through them. And scared her.

But this time, Marin sensed her mom was saying it more to manipulate her than anything else and it had pissed her off. Normally, she could keep the frustration in check, be understanding and supportive. She knew her mom’s condition was an illness, that her mother couldn’t easily control her emotions or her actions. But in that moment, Marin had felt so damn exhausted by it all. Smothered. So she’d let the anger take over and had told her mom she had to go to work on a Saturday because the only grown-up in the house kept getting fired from jobs and they needed the money.

It’d been ugly and mean, but sometimes the pressure in the volcano was just too much. The crack had splintered and broken open. Her mother had called her selfish.

Maybe she was. Tonight she needed to be. Tomorrow she’d mend the fences, smooth things over. But this week was her break from it all, and she wasn’t going to let the last day be stolen from her.

Each night she spent in that empty psychology building with Donovan West was like this sweet, private vacation from her life. There were no heavy burdens, no household to run, no eggshells to walk on. Here she could be that girl she wanted to be—a carefree college student who spent her time researching fascinating things and crushing on a hot guy.

The escape was like a drug. Each night she would tell herself that tonight would be the last time, that she’d tell him the truth. But then she’d see him again, and all her good intentions would fall by the wayside. His research was on forbidden fantasies. But this was hers. Stolen nights alone with a man who was older, funny, brilliant. Beautiful.

Part of her felt like this was payback for spending her high school years on the sidelines, watching other girls get asked on dates, watching other people go to the dances or sneak kisses in the hallway, watching normal life go by without her. She’d always been the new girl. The quiet one. The smart one. And even when she’d been asked to parties on occasion, she’d rarely been able to go. Her mom and brother had needed her at home. If she didn’t show up, who would make sure dinner was on the table or that her brother had clean clothes for the next day? Who would make sure her mom took her meds?

This week had been a gift. She and Donovan had gotten into a routine. She’d drop off the notes she’d made about his tapes, and they’d hang out for a while. She’d learned that he expected to graduate with his doctorate next year, that he liked old movies, that he’d originally planned to study addictions but then switched after taking a class with Professor Paxton and falling in love with the field. And she’d found herself sharing stuff about herself that she never did with anyone else—that she’d lived in eight different states in ten years, that she still lived at home to help with the money because her mom was in between jobs, that she read at least three novels a week.

She liked that he didn’t pry, that he took the information she gave about herself but didn’t push for more. When she’d told him about living at home, instead of the normal nosy questions or empty sympathy, he’d simply nodded and said, “That’s cool of you to live at home and help out. Not many people would sacrifice their party years like that.”

Even without him knowing half of what she dealt with at home, the simple acknowledgment of that sacrifice had meant so much more than he’d probably realized. She was so used to people looking at her with pity—therapists, the teachers at Nate’s school, the doctors. Donovan had looked at her with respect. Maybe if he’d known about her mom’s disorder, some of that pity would’ve leaked out, but she had a feeling he wouldn’t be that way. That was the night she’d stopped seeing him as just a really hot guy and had found herself wanting him for altogether new reasons.

But their chats couldn’t last long since they both had work to do. So they’d go their separate ways. He’d give her more recordings—some based on her suggestions, some tweaked with her feedback—and she’d go to the lab.

The rest of the night would be spent wrapped up in his voice, her body growing hot and heavy, the place between her thighs left wet and wanting. She’d never felt so much sexual hunger in her life. She’d fantasized, sure. She’d had crushes on guys. She’d made out with a few when she’d had the chance—satisfying her curiosity more than her desire. But never had she been consumed by need for someone like this. On some level, she now understood why her mom so easily got herself in trouble with men. This rush was a powerful one.

Marin’s world had quickly narrowed to this one thing, this one person, during the stretch of spring break. The stress at home with her mother had faded to a hum in the background. In the mornings when she’d gotten home from the overnight shift, Marin had walked past the obsessively neat kitchen and living room, knowing it could be a sign her mother was bordering on one of her manic states. But she hadn’t let herself fall into anxiety over it like she normally did. She’d checked her mom’s pill supply to make sure she was still taking her meds, made sure food was in the fridge, called her little brother to check on how he was doing at camp, then she’d let everything fall away. She’d go to her room, slide beneath the covers, and replay the copies she’d made of Donovan’s recordings—her hands standing in for his as she brought herself relief in the tell-no-secrets dark of her room.

Then when she’d wake in the afternoon, she’d work on notes for Donovan. He liked her suggestions, and she found herself moving past editing his words and penning her own private fantasies instead, her versions of what she imagined doing with him. She now had a stack of pages with him in the starring role—pages for her eyes only that she’d keep long after this.

She knew it was ridiculous, that she was treading into obsessive territory, that it was dangerous to chase this rabbit down the hole. She’d watched her mother get fixated on projects, on jobs, on men. So many men. She knew that intensity could be an early sign of things going askew. But Marin couldn’t let herself think about it too hard. Her shoulders bowed under the pressure of always wondering if she’d have to face the same monsters her mother fought every day. It was too much to think about. Too big. This interest in Donovan didn’t have to mean that. Girls got crushes on boys. It was okay. She needed this.

Plus, she wasn’t sure when she’d get this kind of chance again. After break, life would go back to her duct-taped version of normal. So maybe it was okay to take this little risk. She was in college now. She craved the same things that other people her age did. Experience. Adventure. Fun. Sex. She knew for Donovan it was just a random meet-up with a random girl in a probably exciting day-to-day life filled with friends and dates and family. Everyone else was on break. She was there. And she was helping him. This was a one-sided fantasy. And she could deal with that.

But on this last Saturday before spring break wrapped up, the end loomed like cold, gray rain clouds, the brief vacation from her life slipping away from her. On Monday, everyone would return to campus. She’d have to go back to class. Donovan would find out who she was. She wouldn’t be some savvy fellow grad student to him. She’d just be one of the students whose paper he graded.

She’d thought about taking a chance tonight, attempting to flirt. A relationship with him wasn’t possible, but imagining things taking an R-rated turn was like staring at some ripe fruit hanging on the vine. She’d listened to the girls around her in school whisper about what they did with their boyfriends. She’d read enough romance novels to know how sexy those things could be. And now she’d spent a week listening to Donovan’s voice and the fantasies he’d penned. She’d never gotten a taste of that kind of physical connection with a guy and now she wanted a big bite.

But she’d be delusional to believe that he looked at her the same way. The guy was a man on a mission. His love was his work, and he was only interested in talking with her because she was helping with his research. She needed to keep that in her head.

She checked her phone for the time as she walked down the hall. Donovan’s door was shut. She was here early. She’d been so ready to get out of the house after the argument with her mother that she hadn’t even noticed. But seeing his door closed, it hit her that he might not even come in tonight. It was Saturday, after all, and they hadn’t made firm plans. Why had she assumed he’d be here? Just because it was a big, exciting event in her mind didn’t mean it’d even hit his radar. He was probably out on a date or at a party or having a beer with friends. Disappointment moved through her like a cold gust of wind. What if she’d gone through that whole drama at home just to sit here alone tonight?

She sighed. Par for the course. She could at least drop off her notes. And maybe he’d come in later.

She gave his door a little tap just in case and then turned the knob when there was no answer. The old heavy door creaked open, and the dark office greeted her. The scent of books and something faintly spicy filled her nose. She felt around for the light switch, but when she flipped it, nothing happened. She let out a frustrated breath and carefully made her way to the desk to find the lamp. When she grabbed hold of the chain and clicked it on, a startled noise sounded behind her.

Her hand flew to her chest and she yelped, banging into the desk and dropping her notebook and everything else she’d been carrying.

A groan. “Jesus, Mari. You scared the hell out of me.”

Marin whirled around to find Donovan stretched out on the worn couch—his dark hair a mess, his eyes puffy, and his chest … bare. Oh. My. She wet her lips, trying not to stare. But that was like expecting the clock on the wall not to tick. He looked like hell. And gorgeous. And very, very male—all sprawled out and sleep rumpled. There was no way she was going to be able to convince her eyes to focus on something else. A bomb could go off behind her and not turn her gaze. “Shit. I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you were here. I was just dropping off notes.”

He gripped the blanket that covered him from the waist down. “What time is it?”

“I’m early. It’s not quite ten.”

“Fuck.” He ran a hand over his face. “I didn’t think you were coming in tonight.”

Her gaze alighted on the folded clothes on the nearby chair, on the takeout container on top of the fridge, on the opened bottle of whiskey next to it. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you up from your … catnap?”

She didn’t mean for it to come out as a question, but what she saw said something very different from a nap caught between too many hours of research. Now the fact that he was always here, always working late when no one else was made sense.

He sat up and reached out to grab his T-shirt without meeting her eyes. He pulled it over his head, covering all that lean, sinewy muscle. “I stay overnight here sometimes. Dr. Paxton knows.”

“I—Okay.” She clamped her lips shut. She wasn’t going to be one of those people who asked questions that weren’t her place to ask. She wasn’t going to ask why he slept here even though he seemed to have money—designer jeans, fancy laptop. And she wasn’t going to ask why it looked like he’d been crying. And drinking. Alone.

Donovan pushed the blanket away, revealing a pair of wrinkled jeans and bare feet. “I didn’t think you’d be die-hard enough to work on a Saturday night. You’ve got to have some place more interesting to be.”

She backed away to the other side of the desk to give him space—to give her space. Last thing she needed was for her blushing affliction to start up. “I, uh, still have a lot of stuff to wrap up before Professor Roberts gets back.”

He frowned and slipped socks on. “I’m sorry. I’m sure helping me has put you behind. You need me to pitch in? I’m fast at data entry.”

“Uh, it’s okay. I’ll be fine. You can get some rest. I won’t bother you.”

“You’re not—” He grimaced and shook his head. “You’re not bothering me. I just—I wasn’t expecting company tonight.”

“Are you okay?” The question slipped out before she could stop it.

“I’m fine.” The words were like a whip snapped.

She winced at the stinging impact.

He blew out a breath and looked up at her, weariness in those blue eyes. “Sorry. I’m—It’s just been a shit day.”

She shifted on her feet, not sure what to do with this version of the normally upbeat guy she’d gotten to know. He looked like he could use a hug, but she didn’t like random people giving her those, so she wouldn’t assume that he’d be cool with that either. Plus, she’d probably pant or drool on him or something, being that close. “Anything I can do to help?”

“Distraction’d be good. Wanna get drunk with me?”

She glanced at the whiskey bottle. “I don’t drink.”

His brows went up. “Ever?”

“Not my thing.” No way was she testing her genes with a big heaping dose of mood-altering substances. “Maybe another kind of distraction?”

“Wanna fuck?”

The question zipped right up her spine, making her straighten and almost taking her feet out from under her. She hadn’t meant her question that way, but now she realized how what she’d said must’ve sounded. “Uh …”

Donovan turned away with a groan. “Shit. Just fucking ignore me. I might still be drunk. I didn’t mean to say that.”

Her mouth was dry, her heart knocking hard against her ribs. She ached to go to him, put her arms around him, make whatever had beat him down today go away. To say, Yes, let’s do that thing you said. Right now. But all she could do was stand like a damn statue in the half-lit room and say, “It’s all right.”

“No, it isn’t. It’s the opposite of all right.”

She should leave. Let him deal with whatever was bothering him in private. But she couldn’t make her feet move. “Tell me what’s going on.”

Donovan went about folding the blanket he’d tossed on the couch, his movements tense. One. Two. Three. He folded sharp lines into the soft quilt. She thought he was going to ignore her completely, but then finally, he spoke. “My parents were killed in a home invasion last year.”

Her heart plummeted into her stomach, making a gust of air pop out of her mouth.

“Today, the courts dropped the case against the guy who everyone thought did it.” He tossed the folded blanket onto the back of the couch with more force than necessary. “New evidence cleared him. Now there’s not a fucking lead to go on, and the case is cold. My parents are dead, my family is gone, and whoever did it is out there living his goddamned life like nothing ever happened.”

She closed her eyes, the pain in his voice seeping into her and making her hurt for him. “I’m so sorry.”

He turned around, his jaw set. “Yeah, well, life isn’t fair, right? The good guys don’t get to win just because they’re good.”

The bitterness in his voice made her want to cry for him. “Tell me what I can do to help.”

He stepped toward the desk and put his hand on the notes she’d dropped onto it when she came in. “We can not talk any more about it and work. I’ve learned it’s like running in freezing weather. You don’t feel the cold until you stop moving. As long as I keep focused on the project and keep working, I can block out the rest.” He swiped a hand over his face as if trying to erase all he’d revealed to her in the last few minutes. Mask back in place. “So I’ll go through your notes, and I have some new stuff for you. I really liked your insights on the last one. Have you ever considered switching to this department? I can tell the sleep stuff isn’t really doing it for you.”

The tone of his voice had switched to all business, the emotions packed up tight behind the safety door, padlock clicked. She knew that mode. It was that place she went when her mom had one of her episodes. Like when she’d come home one day a few years ago and all the plates had been smashed because her mom had been fired from another job. Her mom had been sitting among the mess, hands and knees cut from the jagged glass. Nate had been left at kindergarten because her mom hadn’t remembered to pick him up. Marin had been thirteen, but she’d learned that day to switch off the fear and to keep moving forward. She’d bandaged her mom up, called a neighbor to pick up Nate, and had spent the night cleaning the kitchen.

So she knew not to push Donovan for more and went along with the shift in conversation. She’d run along beside him in those subzero temperatures.

“I might consider it actually. I’ve really enjoyed digging into your research.” And that was the truth. She’d always planned to specialize since she wanted to be a researcher not a practicing clinician. But she’d had yet to find the topic that lit her up. This hadn’t just lit her up, it’d set her aflame. Sex was fascinating—this strange, foreign thing she wanted to unpack and analyze. And learning from Donovan this week about all the different avenues in the field had deepened her interest even more. When he didn’t respond, she shifted and cleared her throat. “So what have you got for me tonight?”

He sank into his chair, moving aside her notes. He wouldn’t look at her. “I’ve been working on a force scenario. Nothing violent, but it’s going pretty far in the taboo direction.”

“Force?”

He glanced up at her, his eyes clearer than they had been a moment before but still tired. “It’s a pretty popular fantasy according to research—capture fantasies, things getting a little rough—especially for women who are held back by having guilty feelings about sex. But it can be a trigger for others, so you need to tell me now if you’re uncomfortable with listening to that.”

Marin wet her lips, images of Donovan taking charge and taking over filling her head. She could still feel the anger rolling off of him and wondered if he’d come up with the fantasy because that’s what he needed right now—a little violence, someone he could exorcise those demons with, a release from all that ugly reality. “I can handle it.”

“Okay, cool.” He rocked forward in his chair and grabbed a thumb drive. “Remember, I’m looking for unedited feedback. If it sucks or is horrible, you need to tell me. Don’t coddle me just because I had a bad day.”

“I wouldn’t do that.”

He nodded. “Thanks.”

“So did it work for you?” The question jumped out before she could stop it.

He peered up at that, surprise there at first but then something else flashed in those blue eyes—wariness. “Well, I have no interest in forcing myself on anyone, if that’s what you mean.”

“That’s not what I asked.” Marin didn’t know where her boldness was coming from. Maybe knowing this was her last night with him was making her daring. Or maybe she was still thinking about the alternative he’d suggested to drinking the night away. “You want me to listen to it and tell you what I think. Obviously, I don’t want some guy to rape me.”

He coughed and ran a hand over the back of his neck. “Sorry, you’re right. I’m asking for all this personal honesty from you and you’ve given it. I’d be an asshole if I’m not willing to do the same.” He straightened the papers on his desk. “The scenario worked for me. Rape isn’t a turn-on. Obviously. But a woman consenting to playing that game, to letting it get kind of rough? That could be hot.”

Marin rolled her lips inward, need curling like vines, tangling with the images in her mind. “Yeah, I bet it would be. Cathartic, even.”

His jaw twitched, and he seemed to be thinking hard on her words. For a moment she thought maybe it would happen. Maybe he’d get up, grab her and kiss her, put his hands on her. Maybe he’d let her help him forget for a little while. Help her forget. But then he cleared his throat and rolled his desk chair forward under the desk. “Thanks, Mari.”

Any hope she had burned into a pile of ashes at her feet. Of course he wasn’t going to stroll across the room and ravage her like some old-school romance novel. He’d confided in her about his family, but that’s just because he was hurting and she was there. They were just working on a project together. Friends. Hell, not even that. She picked up her backpack and hitched it onto her shoulder. “Yeah, no problem.”

He rubbed fingers over his forehead. “And I’m sorry about what I said earlier. It was completely out of line.”

“It’s fine. Don’t worry about it.” She grabbed the thumb drive. “I’ll check in with you when I’m done.”

Donovan looked up like he was going to say something else, but then seemed to think better of it. He clamped his lips shut and nodded, effectively dismissing her.

She headed down the hallway to the sleep lab on shaky legs. When she reached the lab, she let out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. The room was empty and quiet except for the hum of the computers. Tonight there’d be no study participants on the other side of the glass, so she’d have the place to herself. She’d never been more thankful for it. She needed time to put herself back together.

She couldn’t get it out of her head about what Donovan had gone through. That sadness in his eyes when she’d first walked in. Then the swift heat that had filled her when he’d said, Wanna fuck? Right then she’d had a feeling that despite the alcohol involved, she was seeing some real part of Donovan, the unrefined part that lurked in there, the part she’d only glimpsed in some of the fantasies he’d recorded. She felt guilty about even having those kinds of feelings when he was going through such a hard thing, but her body seemed to be programmed to respond to him that way.

Marin sank into her chair and rubbed a hand over her brow. After the fight with her mom and the conversation with Donovan, she needed this night in the lab. Predictable. Safe. She could block out all the ugly stuff and just focus on his voice, on escaping into the fantasy. She turned on her terminal, slipped in the thumb drive, and put in her earbuds.

She would listen to Donovan and block out the real world for a while. The tape started.

“You don’t see me behind you. I know you know who I am, but you don’t know I’ve been watching you. You don’t know how much I think about you, about all the dirty things I want to do to you. You have no idea how badly I need you and no idea that tonight’s the night you’re going to be mine. I want to hear you beg for your pleasure and for my mercy …”

The smooth, deep voice in her ear let everything else melt away. She closed her eyes and let the words take over, sinking into the fantasy and feeling her body go warm and liquid after only a few minutes. The words were explicit, the scene intense. The man captured the woman, tied her down in his hotel room, brought her to the edge of orgasm over and over and then took her roughly from behind. But there were hints in the narrative that showed the man was taking care of the woman, that she’d consented to this earlier, that this was a taboo fantasy shared by willing lovers.

And it was so working for Marin.

She found herself squeezing her thighs together, the throbbing ache between them almost unbearable. She’d gone through this night after night listening to these tapes, but this one seemed to be pushing her buttons even harder, the taboo topic and danger of it tapping into some reckless part of her. And all the emotion from earlier with Donovan channeled into the fantasy as she pictured him in the role of the man, her in the role of the captive.

Her body thrummed as the scene unfolded in her head, every part of her going sensitive, primed. Like one touch and she’d go off. She tried to stave off the desire, clamping her hands around the arms of the chair and breathing through the rush. But finally, as the man in the tape brought the woman to another orgasm using harsh fingers and filthy words, Marin couldn’t take it anymore and parted her knees. There was so much tension in her—from the crappy day, from her conversation with Donovan, and from this unmet desire she’d been fighting with all week. She couldn’t resist anymore. She needed the oblivion, some kind of release from it all. The air of the room felt cool on her inner thighs and she pressed a hand over the throbbing part of her through her shorts, giving just enough pressure to offer some relief.

She let out a soft gasp and slowly rocked her hand against herself, the simple move sending sharp, electric currents racing through her, making everything go heavy and tight. Her breasts felt fuller, her blood hotter, her pulse louder. Guilt weighed on her. Part of her knew she shouldn’t be doing this. She didn’t deserve this pleasure tonight. But the freight train was already chugging down the hill with no brakes. She dragged her fingers over the cotton of her shorts, trying to be discreet but not gentle.

Before long, she was so swept up in it and so close to falling over the edge that she didn’t hear the knock on her door when it came. She didn’t know she was no longer alone, that someone was watching. Then the earbuds were yanked out of her ears.

She nearly leapt out of her seat. Her hand flew away from her shorts and gripped the arm of the chair. The scent of clean soap and whiskey cascaded over her. Donovan.

“Mari?”

3

Then

Marin’s fingers went white against the chair arm. Please, please, don’t let him have seen what I was doing. The prayer was desperate, yearning. “Shit. You scared me half to death.”

She couldn’t turn around. Not yet. She was afraid the desire would show all over her face. She’d been seconds from orgasm. Her body screamed in protest, air soughing through her lungs as she tried to reel it all in and look cool and collected.

“I called your name and you didn’t hear me.” His voice was there again, close, but not on a recording this time. His breath was hot against her hair as he loomed behind her.

“Did you need something?” Her voice came out way too breathless, like rubber bands had been wrapped around her windpipe.

He was quiet for a few long seconds. “Are you …”

No. No. No. Her head started to shake.

“Mari … I saw.” The words were simple. Final. A guillotine.

Hope shattered into little fragments at her feet, raining down into a pool of humiliation. She switched into offense mode.

“Look, I caught you turned on once. Now you caught me. The script works. Hurrah. Make a note. Can we be grown-ups about it now?” She hoped the words sounded confident and brash even though she was trembling inside.

He was silent behind her.

“Did. You. Need. Something?” Her question came out sharp, pointed.

“I was bringing you something to drink. You forgot to take a soda with you.”

Be a grown-up, be a grown-up. She forced herself to swivel her chair around, to look unaffected. She took the Dr Pepper from him and set it on the desk. “Thanks. You didn’t have to do that.”

His gaze rolled over her, a slow, seeking perusal. Something dark and tense glinted in his eyes. “You didn’t get to finish.”

“I’m fine,” she bit out.

“You’re out of breath and …” His focus shifted down her body. “And wet.”

She glanced down. Saw the telltale spot announcing how turned on she was through the thin cotton of her shorts. Oh, shit. Oh, God. Oh, fuck. Mortification like none she’d ever experienced bled through her. Her thighs snapped together. “Can you please not make this worse with your analytics? Just let me be embarrassed in peace.”

His blue eyes met hers, the tired resignation from earlier gone and replaced with something she’d never seen before from him—intent. “Let me help.”

“What?”

“I made you a promise to keep things professional. I’ll keep that promise if you want me to.” He reached down and took the hand she’d been using on herself in his. He traced his thumb over her fingertips, setting the sensitive pads on fire. “But I fucking want you.”

Marin’s lips parted. He could’ve punched her in the face and she would’ve been less shocked.

“This week has been like the slowest, most painful kind of torture.” His voice was like a hypnotic song as he held her gaze. “When you drop off the files at the end of the night, you’re flushed and glassy-eyed. I can see how keyed up you are. I can almost scent it in the air.” His Adam’s apple bobbed. “Do you know what that does to me? Knowing you’re turned on by my words? My fantasies? And now to walk in and see you touching yourself over them? Fuck.”

Marin was too stunned to speak.

“I get hard every time I think about you.”

And she could see that, right there in front of her. That thing between his thighs getting more and more obvious as they spoke. She swallowed, his words and the sight like a lit match to the fuel flowing through her. “Oh.”

“Yeah. Oh.” He pulled her up to her feet but didn’t break eye contact. “All the fantasies I wrote this week, guess who I was casting in the role in my head? Guess whose face I imagined? Whose body? I can’t get you out of my fucking head.”

She had no idea what to say. She could barely believe the words coming out of his mouth.

“But I’m not going to pressure you. I’m just letting you know that if you want my help. If you’d rather it be me getting you off than your fingers, you just need to say the word.”

Her head was exploding. Bombs going off. Rockets launching. Everything inside her activating at once. She tried to form some sort of cogent response. But nothing came out.

“So tell me to go away, Mari,” he said softly.

She shook her head slowly. Once. Twice.

He stepped closer. “Tell me.”

It didn’t sound like a request. It sounded like a dare.

That’s when she kissed him. She had no idea where the upswell of bravery came from, but she grabbed his face and pressed her mouth to his like she knew what the hell she was doing. He stiffened under her touch at first, his whole body going rigid, but then she let her tongue graze his lips—a plea—and he groaned into her mouth, opening to the kiss and grabbing her waist with those long-fingered hands.

The first touch of their tongues was like a lightning strike, loud and powerful and blinding. Her brain buzzed with the impact of it, and she almost lost her rhythm. But then he took control of the kiss with an urgent fervor that made her moan, like he was a dying man and she was the sole owner of the last oxygen on earth. His fingers curled into her sides and his tongue dipped deeper into her mouth, exploring and mapping and tasting. Goose bumps chased tingles over her skin and she pressed herself closer, feeling the heat of his body, the pounding of his heart, the desperation of it all.

She’d imagined this so many times—what’d he’d feel like, what he’d taste like, how’d he kiss. She’d spent hours putting those fantasies together. She hadn’t even been close to matching the reality. There was an intensity she couldn’t have conjured up in her own mind, this raging need. She half expected their clothes to light up and burn right off of their bodies. Everything was on fire. She couldn’t stop. This was like a first taste of a drug, hooking her immediately and making her crave more. Her fingers slid into his hair. That luscious thick hair that she wanted to nuzzle and tug and feel against her naked body.

She made a needy sound, one she didn’t even recognize, and the kiss went deeper, lewd in the best way. He yanked her fully against him. His erection notched right along the spot where she’d been touching a few minutes before and sparks skated over her skin. She rocked her hips, rubbing herself shamelessly against him, her body going on some version of erotic autopilot.

He groaned and backed her up against the desk. His mouth attacked her neck, planting hot, wet kisses there, sucking, nipping. “You taste so good. I’ve wanted …”

She tilted her head back, giving him better access and not caring that he didn’t finish the sentence. She knew how he felt. She wanted, too.

“Tell me to slow down, baby,” he said as he dragged the hard length of himself against her. “It’s been a fucked-up day and you feel so good. But I don’t want to push you too far.”

“I don’t want to slow down.”

He pulled back for a second and took her face in his hands, his gaze fierce. “Tell me it’s okay.”

“It’s okay. It’s so okay.”

He stared at her for a moment longer and then his hands slid back, his fingers catching in her hair, and he bent and kissed her again. She reached for him, latching on to his shirt like a desperate thing, and pulled him even closer to her. Her body was already revved up, but now she felt as if she would incinerate from the inside out if he didn’t touch her soon.

A low rumble escaped him as she grappled for him, and he slid his other hand down her hip while deepening the kiss. Her butt was pressed hard against the edge of her desk and when he gripped the back of her thigh, she damn near melted into his hold. He lifted her onto the desk, various office supply jetsam going overboard along with the soft drink, and she wrapped her legs around him. His fingers on her bare legs sent another wave of heat rippling over her.

“Donovan.” His name was a prayer between kisses. “Donovan. I need …”

“I know, baby. I know. Me, too.” He kissed her throat. “I’ll take care of you.”

His hand slid up her shirt, his hot palm finding the curve of her breast. She arched when his thumb grazed her nipple, and she grabbed for the edge of the desk, sending a canister of paper clips tumbling to the floor. “God.”

He made a hungry sound in the back of his throat as he unhooked the front latch on her bra and cupped her naked skin. “Is that what you need, beautiful? I can feel how on edge you are. It’s so fucking sexy. Your whole body is trembling.”

She arched her back, a riot of sensations tracking over her. “I’ve been listening to you talk dirty for the last twenty minutes. The last week. I can’t help it.”

“Mmm. I love that my voice got you off.” He kissed the spot beneath her ear. “And I love that you’re wet for me.”

It was like one of the fantasies on the recording times about a thousand. His breath against her ear, his hands on her, that silken voice threading through her senses. She let herself slip into the fantasy version of herself, the one who wasn’t scared, the one who knew what she wanted and could be bold about it. The one who was not a terrified virgin. “I’ve wanted this all week.” Longer.

The sound he made was one of pained restraint. He leaned back and went for the button on her shorts. “I was going to take my time with you. I was going to be slow and gentle. But I’m not sure if I have it in me tonight.”

“Sounds like one of those failed fantasies from your experiment.”

He laughed and dragged the zipper down on her shorts. “You’re right. Lose the shorts and spread your legs for me. Let me feel you.”

The words ripped over her like an electric current. She lifted her hips and shimmied her shorts down. They fell to the ground among a pile of documents and data she’d been entering. Seeing them lying there was surreal. She was on top of her desk in her panties with Donovan West. Maybe she’d fallen asleep in class and was going to wake up any minute now.

But when Donovan pushed the thin fabric of her underwear aside and stroked nimble fingers through her slick cleft, she knew she wasn’t dreaming. Her dreams had never felt like this, this whole body rush of sensation. She moaned against the touch.

“Jesus, baby, you’re soaked.” He dragged firm fingertips over her clit and she whimpered. “Have you been like this every night you’ve left me?”

She closed her eyes, embarrassment trying to take over, her cheeks going hot. “Donovan.”

“Tell me.”

She rolled her lips together and nodded.

“I’m such a stupid, stupid man. I’ve been keeping myself on a leash when we could’ve been doing this every night.”

He found her entrance and pushed a finger inside. She gasped at the intrusion. She’d done this to herself before, but feeling the rough-tipped, thick finger inside her was an entirely different experience.

He pressed his forehead to hers as he worked his finger inside her. “Relax for me, baby. You feel amazing, but you’re so tense. You don’t have to worry. I’ve got you.”

She tried to take a breath, knowing that what he was feeling wasn’t completely due to tension, but when he worked a second finger inside her and pressed his thumb to her clit, her vision blurred around the edges. “Oh, God.”

“That’s it. Trust me to make you feel good.” He leaned close to her ear. “I’m between your spread legs …”

She groaned loud. The recording voice. He was going to narrate for her. She’d never survive it.

“You’re so wet for me and my fingers are deep in your pussy. You’re clenching around me, begging for me to be inside you.”

Sweat trickled down her back. She was aflame. “Donovan.”

“My cock is hard for you, and I can’t wait to fuck you across this desk. I’ve been thinking about this moment for a week now. I’ve stroked myself to thoughts of you. I’ve come in my hands in that office down the hall while you were in here working.”

Holy shit. Visions of his fist around his cock flashed through her head like a pornographic montage.

“But I want to hear you go over first. I want you to take what you need. Come for me, Mari.”

She didn’t need the instruction. It was going to happen whether he wanted it to or not. Starbursts bloomed behind her eyelids and she fell forward, bracing herself with her head on his shoulder as the orgasm steamrolled her. She cried out, too far gone to form words.

He palmed the back of her head, holding her against him and whispering her name, as his other hand worked between her legs. She was spasming and shuddering and gasping, but she didn’t have any room for embarrassment. There was safety in his hold, freedom.

And when he finally moved a hand away and she could drag in a breath, he cupped her face and lifted it to him so that he could kiss her again. All of his need poured into it. She could feel it flowing off of him and infiltrating every part of her. And even though she’d just had the most intense orgasm of her life, greedy desire demanded more. She needed him. Wanted him inside her, taking what she’d never given to anyone else.

She broke away from the kiss, panting. “Please, Donovan.”

When his eyes met hers, there was so much heat there she was surprised he didn’t leave burn scars on her. “Turn around and bend over the desk.”

The look on her face must’ve shown her shock because he ran his thumb over her bottom lip. “If we had a bed, I’d want to watch your face when I slide into you. But right now this desk is going to be more comfortable for you this way.” He smiled, a wicked edge to it. “Plus, I’ve been imagining bending you over mine for a week now.”

A hard shudder went through her, and she turned around. He tugged down her panties, tossed them aside, and then put a hand to her back, guiding her down to the desk. The exposure made her want to take cover. She’d had guys touch her during make-out sessions but never had she been on blatant display like this. There was no place to hide. But when she heard his groan of appreciation, the fear of being seen so intimately melted away. He couldn’t fake that kind of interest.

And she knew her first time was supposed to be sweet and romantic. That’s what the books she’d read and the movies she’d watched told her. But this felt dirty and illicit in the best possible way. It’s how she’d pictured things with him. Explicit. Taboo. Daring. She’d listened to Donovan’s words at this desk, had simmered with unmet need for hours. Now he’d give her the real thing where she’d weaved so much fantasy.

She pressed her cheek to the cool surface of the desk, her heartbeat loud in her ears. Donovan coasted his hand over her hip and she froze. “Wait.”

His hand instantly stilled. “What’s wrong?”

“Condom.”

He let out a breath. “Oh, thank God. I thought you wanted me to stop. I’ve got us covered. Or me covered as the case may be.”

“Well, someone was sure of himself.”

He dipped his hands between her thighs and stroked. “No, I keep them in my wallet like a good Boy Scout. I promise this wasn’t the plan. The plan tonight was to drink the night away—not to fuck a smart, beautiful girl over her desk in the esteemed psychology department. This is a way better plan.”

She shivered, anticipation and nerves washing over her. She wished she could see him behind her. She’d imagined him naked many times, and now she wasn’t going to get the chance to see the real thing. But the second he parted her legs and nudged the head of his cock against her entrance, all other thoughts dissipated. Every molecule in her body centered on that one spot of connection.

Fear washed through her—cold and quick. This would probably hurt. She tried to brace for it.

But then he backed off and something hot and wet pressed against her instead. Her knees almost buckled. “Oh, God.”

Donovan’s mouth. Donovan’s mouth was on her. The sensation of it was like nothing she’d ever experienced—every nerve ending in her body standing at attention and then sighing all at once. Her legs quivered as his tongue moved over her, coaxing and teasing her clitoris, making her loose and languid with the pleasure of it. Making her so wet she could die. Holy fuck. This is what oral sex felt like? She’d really been missing out. After a few more glorious licks from that masterful mouth, his fingers tucked inside her again. “That’s it, beautiful. Just relax and feel everything.”

He pressed another openmouthed kiss to her flesh and then pulled away and positioned himself behind her again. Unlike before, she had trouble accessing the fear. Her body was throbbing with this distinct emptiness, this need to be filled. She didn’t care if it hurt at this point. She just wanted it to happen. But when he pushed forward with a gentleness that belied his harsh grip on her, there wasn’t the expected pain. Just pressure. Tightness. She gripped the edge of the desk as the head of his cock breached her. The stretching sensation was foreign and a little uncomfortable, but she was so slick and ready for him that it eased the way.

She was beginning to feel confident—until he reached resistance and stopped. His hold on her hips tightened. “Baby, you feel so good, but I feel like I could hurt you. Are you okay?”

She wasn’t sure. The feel of him partially inside her was making her restless and edgy, like she needed more of him. But the anxiety over what would happen if he pushed forward had her muscles coiling. She licked her lips. “I’m okay.”

He ran his hand over her side in a soothing motion. “You have to let me in. You’re tensing on me. I don’t want to hurt you.”

She took a deep breath. “I’m trying but …” Shit. Shit. Shit. “Just go for it, okay? You won’t hurt me.”

She hoped.

He seemed to hesitate for a moment but then she reached back for him, gripping his arm. “Please.”

He thrust forward and pain shot through her—one sharp, shining moment. Her teeth clacked together, but she managed to hold back the sound. He held there a moment, his length deep inside her, and she breathed through it. Soon the pain faded to a dull throb, and she was left with this new feeling of fullness. She let out a breath.

“You all right?” he asked, grit in his voice.

“Great.”

“Mari …”

She heard the question in his voice, the concern.

“Please. Don’t stop.” She rocked back against him.

He groaned and pulled back to pump inside her again. This time there was no pain, just residual tenderness and the sweet glide of his body joining with hers. She let loose a sigh. He adjusted his position behind her and reached beneath her to find her clit. His fingers against that sensitive nub made any last remnants of discomfort fade into a memory.

“Fuck, Mari. You’re …”

The words were lost in the rushing sound going through her ears. She let her grip loosen on the desk and melted into the position. Donovan was making his own noises now—these sexy grunts and groans that were the hottest soundtrack she’d ever heard. And the sound of the sex itself was driving her higher still—slick and lewd and raw. She’d imagined what this would be like, but she’d never realized how all-encompassing it was. The feel of his thighs bumping against hers, the scent of their exertion and arousal, his rough fingers stroking her soft flesh. Every part of her seemed alive with sensation, her senses dialed to eleven.

“I’m close, baby.” His voice had gone hoarse, strained.

They were the simplest and sexiest three words she’d ever heard.

His hold went to her hips and he dragged her back on his cock now, his pace hard and intense, his need overriding all else. She could feel all that anger and hurt he’d been dealing with channeling through him, the jagged edges coming out, the need to wail on something. And it was glorious, cathartic in a way she didn’t understand. She slid across the desk, a rag doll to his strength, and her mind begin to fuzz. The pressure on her clit from the edge of the desk was driving her up another mountain.

She let loose a choked cry when orgasm crashed over her again, and he yanked her roughly against him, burying himself deep over and over until he pulsed inside her, a string of curses falling off his lips as he found his release.

He called her name. She called his. And they stayed there together until finally all the starch left the two of them and he slid out, leaving her in a melted puddle on the desk.

She let herself stay there for a moment, panting and trying to get her bearings. Then, deciding she wouldn’t test her legs and attempt to stand, she eased off the desk and sank to her knees. When she managed to turn around, she found him on the floor behind her, leaning against one of the other desks, gasping for breath along with her. Sweat dotted his forehead, his hair was in more disarray than normal, and the fly of his jeans was spread open.

She couldn’t help but look. But he’d already taken care of the condom and tucked himself back into his boxers. All she could see was the trail of dark hair that led downward. Sexy. Spent. Beautiful. She wanted to lick that spot. But knew she’d never get the chance.

She couldn’t bring herself to look at his face, but she could feel the weight of his stare.

“Tell me you’re okay, Mari.” There was something hard in his voice. Almost cold.

The shift in him sent warning bells going off in her head. She reached for her panties and tugged them on, suddenly feeling self-conscious sitting here naked from the waist down. “I’m okay.”

“Look at me.”

She forced her gaze upward.

Lines appeared around his mouth. “There was blood.”

“I—” She couldn’t get any words out.

He closed his eyes and leaned his head against the side of the desk. “Please, please don’t tell me you were a virgin.”

Fire blazed over her cheeks. She looked away and grabbed for her shorts. “Okay. I won’t.”

“Fuck.” The word was harsh in the quiet room. “Why didn’t you say something? I wouldn’t have—Jesus.”

Anger and embarrassment rose up in her like a high tide, taking her under. She tugged on her shorts. “It doesn’t matter.”

“Of course it matters!” He scrubbed a hand over his face. “Christ. How can you be a virgin? The stuff you wrote into the fantasies, the stuff we talked about …”

“Nonvirgins don’t have the monopoly on dirty minds.”

“God, Mari.” He reached for her hand and tugged her toward him. Reluctantly, she let him guide her closer. He gathered her into his embrace, tucking her head beneath his chin. “That’s something you should tell a guy. I could’ve hurt you. I would never have been so rough or done it that way. Your first time should be gentle and with someone who—”

“Who what? Who loves me?” The words came out flat. “I’m not that old-fashioned.”

“I was going to say with someone who’s worth the trouble.” His tone was hollow. “Not with some guy who’s so fucked up he can’t even sleep at his own house without panicking about people breaking in. Or who has to work nonstop because he can’t fucking function otherwise. You deserve more than what I’m capable of giving you. This is all I’ve got, Mari. A hookup.”

The words sliced through her. He’d called it what it was. It wasn’t anything she didn’t know, but it stung to hear it just as well. “Believe me. I’m not expecting you to give me a ring or anything. I like you and wanted this to happen tonight. It doesn’t have to be more complicated than that.”

He blew out a long breath. “Let me at least take you out to dinner. There’s a twenty-four-hour diner right off campus. I know neither of us is going to get any more work done tonight. We can talk.”

The offer was so tempting. Everything inside her wanted to go out with Donovan, wanted to get to know him better, wanted to keep this night going. But she’d dug the hole too deep now. She’d taken the lie too far. And this was probably only a pity offer anyway—coddle the poor girl who’d lost her virginity so she didn’t freak out over her big night being only a hookup.

She closed her eyes, the reality of the situation swamping her. “I can’t.”

“Why not?”

She scooted out of his hold and stood on shaky legs. “I just can’t. I need to go.”

She hooked her bra back together beneath her shirt and grabbed her backpack.

“What?” He scrambled to his feet as he zipped up his jeans. “Mari, hold up.”

It wasn’t even her real name. How fucking pathetic had she let this become? She walked over to him and pressed the thumb drive into his hand. “Thank you. This week has been …” Everything. “Great.”

He frowned. “Please don’t leave. You don’t need to do that.”

She gave him a sad smile. “I really do.”

She walked past him and forced herself not to look back, not to let him see the truth on her face, not to let it hurt so much.

I could love you, Donovan West. Maybe she already did.

But she wasn’t Mari the grad student and this wasn’t her real life and she didn’t get to have this kind of ending.

Marin managed to walk away and make it to the car before any tears escaped. She’d known this had a time limit from the start. She’d never expected it to go this far, but she refused to regret it. She’d taken a risk and it’d been okay. She hadn’t tumbled into the mental spin her mom did when she got involved with men. She hadn’t fallen apart. And she’d never forget this week or this night.

She hated that she’d lied, but maybe she could spare Donovan ever knowing that he’d slept with an eighteen-year-old student. She could be that mystery girl he once hooked up with, and go on with his life. No harm, no foul.

They’d both survive.

By the time she parked in her driveway, she’d pulled herself together enough to make a plan. She’d drop the sexuality class and stop subbing in the sleep department. She wouldn’t see Donovan again. He’d never have to know. And she wouldn’t have to feel the loss every time she laid eyes on him.

She was feeling resolute about the plan. It would all work out. But when she walked into her house a few minutes later and saw the trail of blood on the floor and the small, crumpled body in the corner, she found out the planning was for naught.

Because her whole world was about to fall apart around her.

And she wasn’t going to have to worry about boy trouble for a very, very long time.

4

Nine years later—present day

Marin woke up to the sound of hushed voices and the envelope of the overdue electric bill stuck to her face. She lifted her head, peeling the envelope away, and blinked in the lamplight of her bedroom, trying to get her bearings. Night still hummed along outside her window, black and quiet, and her laptop was silent beside her on the bed along with the king-sized bag of M&M’s she’d polished off in her stress-induced haze. But something had woken her up. Voices. She’d heard voices.

She cringed. Hearing voices was never a good sign in this family. Now would be a really inconvenient time for a mental breakdown. But when a thump and a muffled curse sounded down the hall, she let out a breath. Nate must be home.

Marin rubbed her eyes and checked the clock. Two in the morning. Way past curfew. He was trying to sneak in. Too bad he was such a fail at stealth mode. She shoved the pile of bills to the side of her bed, knocking a stack of research articles to the floor in the process, and sat up. Her bones popped and protested as she climbed off the bed.

Ugh. She needed to stop falling asleep in weird positions. But she’d been trying to stay awake to make sure her brother got in. Now she’d have to have a talk with him about curfew. She let out a heavy sigh. Sometimes she hated having to be the grown-up. She should be the one sneaking in at two in the morning.

She pulled a sweatshirt over her tank top and headed down the hallway. Muted light spilled from beneath Nate’s doorway, and she tapped lightly on the wood. But there was no response, just this other subtle sound. She leaned forward, straining. A raspy breath, almost a choking sound. Shit. Her heart jumped into her throat. Nathan was having an asthma attack.

“Nate.” The word came out in a panic and she shoved open the door. “Are you okay?”

But she froze one step inside the room because instead of finding her younger brother struggling for breath from asthma, she found him gasping for breath from what the guy parked between his legs was doing to him.

Nate’s eyes went wide and he grabbed at his quilt, trying to yank it up over himself and his boyfriend. “Oh my God, get out!”

“Shit. Oh, shit. Sorry.” Marin swung the door shut, her heart hammering and her face going hot. She leaned against the wall in the hallway and put her hand over her eyes, trying to erase the image. But there were some things you couldn’t unsee. Her younger brother getting a blow job—yeah, that she could’ve skipped. She wanted to scrub her eyeballs with bleach.

There was rustling behind the door, hurried voices as the boys apparently got themselves together, and Marin slipped back into her room to give them space. She’d need to address this with Nathan. He knew he wasn’t supposed to have guys in his room. But she’d give him a minute to get Henry out the door and put himself back together. Hell, she needed a minute. Maybe a week. A year might be good.

But her brother didn’t give her that long. After the front door slammed shut, Nate stormed back down the hallway and pushed her door open. It hit the wall with a bang. “What the hell, Marin?”

He looked so tall in the doorway, so adult. How was this the same kid who used to make her turn on four different night-lights in his room so he could go to sleep? At seventeen, he could pass for a grown man with those long limbs and broad shoulders—but he still had those innocent green eyes. His age showed there. And right now, those eyes were burning with annoyance.

“I thought you were having an asthma attack,” she said. “I heard—”

His face flushed to his hairline.

“Well, never mind what I heard, but I thought you needed help. I wouldn’t have been checking on you at all if you had been in by curfew and not broken the rules about bringing someone into your room,” she said, forcing righteous indignation into her voice and trying to sound like she meant it.

“Okay, I broke the rules. I’m sorry. But you can’t just walk into my room. I need privacy.”

She held up a hand. “I know, I know. I’m sorry. I would’ve never walked in for any other reason.”

He blew out a breath, his eyes flicking to the piles of books and paperwork on her bed. “And you don’t need to wait up for me. I’m fine. I’m not out drinking or getting high or doing anything dangerous.”

“Just having unprotected sex in your room.”

He groaned and raked a hand over his face. “I’m not … We’re not. I haven’t. We were just fooling around. It wasn’t going to go beyond that. And if it did, believe me, I know to be safe. You’ve already made us get tested. And it’s not like I’m going to get him pregnant.”

She stared at him for a moment and then picked up a pillow to throw at him.

He caught it and grinned as he dropped it to the floor. “Look, I know if I contracted some horrible STD that the irony of that would literally make your head explode. I wouldn’t do that to you, Mar.”

Marin sighed. The irony would be deadly. She’d spent the last two years of her Ph.D. program and this past year in her postdoc position creating and testing a sex education program for gay youth. If her own brother didn’t know how to take care of his sexual health, she really would be a serious fail. “You wouldn’t have to worry about the STD because I would kill you.”

“I know. And I’m sorry you saw what you saw. But I wanted to celebrate tonight, so me and Henry went to a party. When it started getting kind of crazy, we bailed and came here instead. We weren’t doing anything we haven’t before. I just forgot how noisy … things can get.”

Marin lifted a hand. “I really don’t need to know the details. And don’t want to hear about your noises. Believe me, I heard enough.”

“Wait. Are you blushing?” He laughed. “Dude, I’m the one who got walked in on.”

“And I’m the one who had to see.”

He smirked. “Aw, Mar, how is it possible you’re such a prude? You’re like a doctor of sex, and you get all red at the thought that people are actually out there doing it. You realize how screwed up that is, right?”

“I’m not a sex doctor. I’m a researcher. And I don’t get red over people doing it. I get red at the thought of my baby brother doing it. You’re still supposed to be wearing Underoos and those caped pajamas you used to live in.”

He tucked his hands in the pockets of his jeans. “Those Superman pajamas were pretty kickass, but I’m not a kid anymore, Mar. You’re gonna have to learn to trust me at some point.”

She sighed. “I know that. Of course I know that.”

“Especially since I’m going to be living in New Orleans in the fall.”

Marin stilled, the words a record scratch to her train of thought. “What?”

His smile went wide. “See. That’s what I was celebrating. The Duplais Art College called me today. I got in.”

She blinked, the words taking a second to register. “Duplais? Are you serious? You got in?”

He nodded and rocked onto his toes, his excitement bubbling out of him. “Totally did.”

“Nate!” She hopped to her feet and went over to hug him. “They said it was next to impossible to get in there.”

He squeezed her back. “Right? But they loved that I used street art style in the portraits and that I do mixed-media stuff, said I show a lot of potential.”

Her head was whirling. “That’s amazing. I’m so freaking proud of you!”

He leaned back, his smile going goofy and lopsided, making him look like the kid she loved. “Thanks. I can’t even believe it. I’m sure I sounded like an idiot on the phone because I kept asking them to repeat themselves. It sounded too good to be true. But they said they’d send me an intro packet and email you the info about the financial package.”

She released him. “You mean the scholarship?”

He shook his head. “No, they only award four of those and I didn’t get one. But they said there’s some financial aid available.”

Marin’s stomach flipped over. She’d already looked into financial aid for Nathan. There were loans and some help, but only enough to cover a state school—and that was already going to be a stretch. The exclusive private art college in Louisiana was painfully expensive. She hadn’t worried about it too much when Nathan had said he wanted to apply there because she’d heard it was like getting into Juilliard or Harvard—near impossible. And she figured if he did manage to get in, he’d land a scholarship. But without that, there was no way. She’d been losing sleep over how she was going to pay for a state college, but now …

She needed to tell Nate that this wasn’t going to happen, needed to be honest about the reality. But seeing his face lit up like this—all that hope and promise—she couldn’t bear it. This was the kid who’d needed therapy since elementary school because of all he’d been through with their mother. A kid who still had scars on his body to remind him of it. A kid who’d been so depressed before he’d come out freshman year that she’d worried for his safety. And now he was here—proud, brilliantly talented, and confident. She couldn’t tell him his dream school wasn’t possible.

She’d barely been keeping them afloat with her modest postdoc pay, but they had made it work. Hell, she’d managed to keep a roof over their heads while she raised him, went to college, and worked night jobs for all those years. Maybe there was a way to figure this out, too.

She wouldn’t break the news to him until she’d looked at every possibility. Maybe she could get a raise, apply for additional grants to help supplement her salary. Maybe there were extra resources that she hadn’t tapped into when she’d gotten her own financial aid for school. She knew they were all long shots, but for now she was going to let him have his happy moment. She’d figure out the rest later.

She put her hands to his face, which required reaching up these days, and smiled. “I’m really proud of you, Nate. Seriously. No matter where you land, you’re going to bring beautiful things to this world.”

His smile went crooked. “Aw, don’t get sappy on me now.”

She lowered her hands and waved him off. “I can’t help it.”

But he gave her another quick hug. “Hey, this is good news for both of us. I know you’ve given up a lot all these years, having me here. Once I leave, you can get your life back, do your own thing. Act like a twenty-seven-year-old for a change. Maybe you can be the one sneaking guys in at two in the morning. Or girls. Whatever you’re into. Just don’t tell me about it.”

He scrunched his face up in a grossed-out expression.

She laughed. Her brother didn’t even know if she was gay or straight. That’s how pathetic her love life was. Nice. “I like guys, for the record. And you’re not out of the house yet, so rules still apply. Until that diploma’s in your hand, midnight curfew, understood? I don’t want to be up worrying.”

He rolled his eyes. “Yes, Marin.”

She crossed her arms over her chest. “And if you and Henry need alone time, and you swear you’re going to be safe about it, then he can be in your room. But not on a school night. And make sure you have your inhaler in there, so I don’t have to bust in and be traumatized again.”

Nathan’s eyebrows went up. “Yeah?”

“You’re almost eighteen, and you and Henry have been together awhile. I trust you to make smart decisions. I’d rather you both be in a safe place than hooking up in the corner at some drunken party.”

He looked down and rubbed the back of his head. Despite his earlier teasing about her prudishness, he was obviously just as uncomfortable discussing this with her. “All right. Cool.”

“And learn how to put on the radio and lock your damn door. I’m going to need therapy now.”

He snorted. “You and me both. Henry, too. He may never show his face around here again.”

“I’m sure he’ll get over it to see you and to eat my food.” She put her hand on his shoulder and steered him toward the door. “Now get some sleep. I’m glad you had great news to celebrate tonight. But your punishment for getting in late is that you’re making the weekly grocery run tomorrow and washing the car.”

He groaned. “I hate you.”

“Love you, too.”

He dragged his feet as he headed to his room, but then stopped in the doorway and turned back to her, his eyes serious. “Thanks, Mar.”

“For what?”

He gave a tight shrug. “You know why. For all of it. I’m not dumb. I know how bad things could’ve ended up if you hadn’t fought to keep me when everything happened with Mom. You kept it all together. My dream is happening because of you.”

Her ribs tightened, heavy weight descending on her chest. “Honey …”

“Night.” He slipped into his room and shut the door, never one to stick around when things got emotional, and left her standing there.

She stood in the hallway, tears threatening, and then slunk back in her room and fell onto the bed, the unpaid bills littered around her. She grabbed her laptop and woke up the screen. She could do this. She just needed to figure out how to make three times her salary immediately. Easy peasy.

That left winning the lottery, selling organs on the black market, and …

Hmm, maybe she could become a stripper. She glanced down at her faded, oversized sweatshirt, the empty bag of M&M’s, and the yoga pants she had yet to use for actual exercise. Yeah, probably not.

She was so damn screwed.

5

The frustrated look on Dr. Paxton’s face told Marin everything she needed to know. He was in his office, which was neat as a pin as always, but his gray hair was sticking up on one side. His hair only got like that when a study wasn’t coming together or a student had done something stupid … or he had bad news to deliver. She’d emailed him over the weekend, requesting this meeting and letting him know what was going on with Nathan. But she’d known it’d been a long shot.

When he saw her standing in the doorway, he waved her in. “Come on in, Marin. I’ve got Clint bringing us some coffee.”

She stepped inside the small but stately room and took a seat. The ceilings arched high and a tall window that looked out onto the big trees in the quad let in a flood of dappled light. It was the most coveted office in the psych building, and Professor Paxton, head of the department, said he wasn’t giving it up until they dragged his cold, dead body out of it. He also joked that Professor Englebreit in the neuropsychology department was plotting his demise to make that happen.

Marin’s office, on the other hand, was tiny and windowless. She didn’t mind it much since she spent most of her time in the university’s library or in one of the bigger labs, but some days she did feel like the walls of that tiny room were closing in on her. She’d been hoping to stay here long enough to get a tenured position at the university so that she could work her way up, maybe teach a few courses in between her research. But she may not have time for that dream to come to fruition. She needed a raise now. Not in three years.

Dr. Pax folded his hands atop his desk. They were good hands, solid ones. During her Ph.D. program and this postdoc, she’d relished those times when his big paw had landed atop her shoulder to congratulate her or to convey how pleased he was with her work. She’d never known her real father, and in a lot of ways, Dr. Pax had filled some idolized version of that role for her. A mentor. A person she’d been able to go to when all the stress of raising Nathan on her own had gotten just a little too heavy to bear. He had a therapist’s soul and a researcher’s mind. She’d learned a lot from him. She’d also learned how to read him.

“There’s no room for a raise, is there?” she asked, getting the hard part out of the way first. “I’m going to need to pick up a second job.”

He frowned. “It’s a little worse than that, I’m afraid.”

Marin tensed, but before she could say anything Dr. Pax’s student worker, Clint, tapped on the door and carried in two cups of coffee. He set one on the desk and handed Marin the other.

The paper cup seared her cold fingers. “Worse, sir?”

He sighed and leaned back in his creaking chair. “When I got your email, I decided to call and check on the grant status. I thought maybe if we had an idea how much we were going to get this year, then I could find some room to adjust your salary. But the news wasn’t good. We landed two smaller grants, but we’re not getting the Filmore this year.”

The words didn’t register in Marin’s head for a second. “Wait, what?”

He wrapped his fingers around his coffee cup but didn’t take a sip. “Apparently, they have a new board in charge of the foundation, and they didn’t think your research warranted new funds. They said they are excited about the program you’ve created but that they feel it’s ready to go. Now the challenge will be getting it into schools, not doing more research.”

“But there’s so much still to do, components we haven’t tested and—” Panic was tapping her shoulder, ready to tackle her.

“I know, Marin. I understand where you’re coming from. I always think more research can only lead to a better product. But I see their point, too. You’ve developed an amazing online program for an underserved population. The sooner we get it out there, the better. If we turn over your work to a company that can streamline the program, we can get kids access to it all the sooner. Start helping people now. And if all goes well, you’ll eventually make money on it.”

Eventually. That was the key word. Eventually didn’t help her right now. Plus, she didn’t have it in her to charge some exorbitant price to nonprofits and schools for that kind of program. She sat back in her chair and set her coffee to the side, her heart like thunder in her chest. The grant had fallen through. No more study. “But if I don’t continue that project, what does it mean for me? What am I going to do without that grant?”

Dr. Pax swiped a hand over his mustache and beard, his expression sympathetic. “Marin, without the Filmore grant, we don’t have the funds to keep you on for another year at the salary you’re at. You’d have to take a significant cut in pay, and I know that’s the opposite of what you need right now.”

Her breakfast threatened to come up. No money? There was no money. And that meant no position. She couldn’t work for less than she was already. She’d starve. Nathan would have nothing to live on. She put a hand to her forehead. “Oh, God.”

Dr. Pax leaned forward on his forearms. “Take a breath, Marin. I know this is a shock, and I’m sorry for that. But I’ve been thinking through this over the last day or two, and I may have an option that could work out for you.”

She lifted her head. “What do you mean?”

“I know you’ve expressed that you’re not interested in a clinical career. I get that research is your passion. But the truth of the matter is, you need money and clinical work is where you can find it. If you can get yourself set up in a private practice one day, you won’t ever have to have this type of conversation again.”

She blinked. “Clinical work? Like actually be a sex therapist? I don’t know how to do that. And I can’t do private practice. I’d need to get licensed and that takes at least a year of supervised work, right?”

He gave her a small smile. “You do know how to provide therapy. You’ve done an internship. Your training has given you all the tools you need.”

She shook her head. All she could think about was her disastrous internship at a local mental health center. She’d had to do it as part of her program. But she’d been awful at it—awkward and bumbling, never knowing what was the right or wrong thing to say. What if she said the wrong thing and messed someone up? What if she was as bad as some of the therapists who had failed her mom? Then, in her first week, a client had stormed out mid-session, threatening suicide. Marin had promptly had a panic attack. She’d had to pull the fire alarm to get the staff to catch up with him and stop him. It’d been a goddamned nightmare. After that, she’d asked to transfer to a school position where she’d be able to focus more on educating students on mental health topics rather than actually providing one-on-one therapy.

“I’m good in a lab. I’m not good with people.”

He chuckled. “You’re just fine with people. You work with your research volunteers well, and you’re a good listener. But you’re right, though you have the tools and the smarts, more experience is needed. You would need to work under a supervising psychologist for a year to qualify for your license. But after that, you could do what you want.”

She took in a deep breath and tried to process his words. He was trying to help. She didn’t have a lot of options right now and couldn’t dismiss one out of hand. “I don’t even know where I’d start looking. I can’t imagine those types of positions pay much before you’re licensed.”

“Typically, no. But since your brother will be attending art school in New Orleans and I figured you might be open to moving there with him, I took the liberty of reaching out to Dr. Anala Suri at The Grove, a private institute in Louisiana. She’d called me recently, letting me know that she was down one clinician in their sex therapy department and wondered if I had any recommendations. They’re a very exclusive operation and only grant interviews through direct referrals. I’ve had a couple of students do well there. So I called her yesterday and told her you might be interested.”

“Exclusive? What do you mean?” She shifted in her chair, trying to keep her nerves from showing on her face.

He considered her as he took a sip of coffee. “Expensive. And experimental. Most insurance companies won’t cover the services there because they do some cutting-edge treatments.”

She frowned. “Who can afford treatment with no insurance help?”

“The wealthy. The famous. It’s very private, tucked away right off the bayou, and clients can stay on the grounds when there for treatment or can drop in. It’s off the beaten path, but it’s popular with celebrities because they can avoid the press. Plus, from what Dr. Suri tells me, New Orleans is becoming Hollywood South with so many movies and TV shows filming there now. So there’s a need to have something high-end and private nearby.”

“There’s that high of a demand for sex therapy?”

“They don’t just do sex therapy. It’s a complete operation—rehab facility, family counseling, individual and group therapy. It would give you lots of opportunities to work with professionals from all different kinds of specialties, and the salaries they offer will knock your socks off. I’ve been tempted more than once to leave all this tenure behind and take over a department out there.”

Marin’s nerves curled in her belly. “Why haven’t you?”

He let out a soft laugh. “Because my wife would kill me if I tried to move her out of state and because I’m never giving up this office. I can’t let Dr. Englebreit win.”

She let out a little laugh even though anxiety had clamped her in its grip.

“But I think you should take the interview. Dr. Suri is tough, and she’ll demand a lot of you if she hires you, but she’s a good supervisor. She’ll challenge you.”

Marin looked away. She didn’t want to seem ungrateful. But giving therapy to a bunch of spoiled celebrities and rich people wasn’t just galaxies outside her comfort zone. It flat-out terrified her. She wasn’t equipped for that. “I’m not sure—”

“You’re a brilliant researcher, Marin. You’ve been an asset to this department, and I’ve enjoyed seeing how you’ve grown here. But I think you’re limiting yourself. You shouldn’t avoid clinical work because you’re scared to be out in the real world. I worked in the field a number of years before I came back to academia, and the experience was invaluable. You can always come back to this, but for now the higher salary could support you and give you some left over to help your brother. And once you have your clinical license, you’ll always have something to fall back on if you need it. The Grove is a big hitter to have on a resume.”

Marin swallowed hard. She hated that he’d pinpointed her apprehension so easily. That thought of being out in the real world, trying to help people with their problems, had anxiety crawling over her like swarming ants. She hadn’t been able to help her own mother, how the hell was she supposed to help anyone else? But what other options did she have? All the other local postdoc positions would be filled by now. And she didn’t want to have to move to God knows where and be even farther from Nathan to find something else. She also couldn’t go home unemployed, nearly broke, and with no prospects on the horizon. They wouldn’t last two months without her paycheck coming in.

She rubbed her hands on her slacks, her palms clammy, and looked up at Dr. Paxton. “Well, I guess I better plan a visit to the bayou.”

“Excellent.” His smile lifted the lines in his face and he gave her a nod. “I’ll tell them to give you a call and set something up.”

She blew out a breath and stood.

Dr. Paxton rose from behind his desk and stepped around it.

Marin put out her hand. “Thanks, Dr. Pax. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate you going to these lengths to help me find something. I know you didn’t have to do that.”

Dr. Paxton took her hand and instead of shaking it, stepped closer. Then the ever-professional professor pulled her into a hug. She stiffened with surprise at first but then relaxed into the gentle warmth of the gesture. She closed her eyes. He smelled like libraries and black coffee and her version of safety.

He leaned back, his hand clasped on her arm and a tenderness in his eyes, and gave her arm a gentle squeeze. “You’re going to be just fine, Marin. You’ve survived much worse than this and have landed on your feet. I have nothing but full confidence in you that you’ll make a brilliant therapist. The Grove would be lucky to have you.”

Her eyes burned, tears threatening for some reason, and she gave a quick nod. “Thank you.”

He gave her arm another pat and then stepped back. “Let me know how the interview goes, all right?”

She told him she would and headed out of the office. The hallway was buzzing with students and activity as she walked toward the quad, the familiar sounds making her want to cry even more. This wasn’t going to be her place anymore. This wasn’t her home. She’d spent so many years here, learning, growing, finding who she wanted to be. She passed the door of the sleep lab and got an old, familiar pang of sadness. She’d even lost her innocence here and had her first heartbreak.

Now she’d have to face what was outside these walls. The world. Real life. She couldn’t be a student any longer. She couldn’t hide.

She pushed out into the spring sunshine and tried not to dissolve into tears.

6

Donovan woke up with a booming headache and the cloying scent of lavender filling his head. He grimaced and rolled his face into the pillow. The smell only got stronger, confirming it wasn’t his pillow. Or his bed. Fuck.

He turned his head and forced his eyes open, the morning light piercing his brain like tiny knives. Eyelet curtains blew in the breeze of the open window, the sound of the ducks puttering around the pond nearby drifting in. Great. Not only had he fallen asleep in the wrong bed, but he was all the way across campus, late, and hungover. Dr. Suri would shit a brick if she found out. He reached for his phone, which he’d managed to leave on the side table but not set his alarm—brilliance in action—and hit the speed dial.

His assistant, Ysabel, answered on the first ring. “I’ve already rescheduled your eight o’clock and pushed the morning group back a half hour.”

Donovan let his head fall back to the pillow. “I love you, Ysa. Marry me.”

“You’re not my type. I need more boobs and less penis.”

“I could work on the first if you keep bringing in those beignets from the Morning Cup. But the penis has to stay.”

“I’m out, then. What’s your ETA?”

“An hour?”

“Be quicker. Dr. Suri called for you earlier. I told her you were on the phone. She didn’t leave a message because she was walking into a meeting, but you know she’ll call back when she gets out.”

“Shit. All right. Got it. Thanks, Best Assistant Ever.”

“Yeah, yeah. Kiss up. But you can’t keep pulling this shit. Dr. Rhodes is never late. I want that bigger office. And I don’t want him messing around on our wing.”

He grimaced. Both he and Clinton Rhodes were up for the director position for the couples counseling building. The position would mean more money, a better office, extra support staff, and more time to devote to research in addition to the therapy. Donovan had stronger experience, but Clinton knew how to put on a good show and brownnose. And he showed up on time.

Fuck.

With a sigh, he let Ysabel go and braced himself for the conversation he had waiting for him outside of this room. He rubbed a hand over his face and sat up, his head pounding with a wine hangover and the need for coffee. Might as well face the firing squad and get it done with.

He climbed out of bed, made a quick trip to the bathroom, and then searched around the bedroom for his clothes. After he’d pulled on his boxers and slacks, he found his shirt in a ball on the floor. He shook it out and saw that half the buttons were missing and there were lipstick marks where the buttons used to be. Great. Someone had been aggressive last night. He tugged it on and had to leave it hanging open.

He found his way into the kitchen. Elle was sitting at the table with a big mug of coffee and her laptop open. She was already in her physician wear—gray slacks and a black top, all very conservative and to the point. She glanced over when she saw him walk in. “Good. You’re up. I need you out of here. I have an appointment in fifteen minutes and the cleaning lady will be here any second.”

“Fine. Is there more coffee? And do you have any T-shirts that would fit me? You demolished my buttons.”

“No shirts.” She frowned. “And I’ve already drank the pot I made.”

She didn’t offer to make more. He wasn’t surprised or offended. Elle didn’t make coffee for men on principal.

He went to the cupboard to get a glass and filled it with water from the sink. “Why didn’t you wake me up? You know I didn’t plan on sleeping here.”

She barely glanced over. “I’m not your mother.”

He sipped his water, evaluating her. Her blond hair was neatly tucked into a bun, her lips pursed as she typed away on her laptop. Dr. Elle McCray was a cool fortress of impenetrability ninety-nine percent of the time. Her patients and colleagues called her the Bitch, sometimes behind her back, much of the time to her face. But you had to have an ego of steel to work in the rehab wing, and Elle did. Handling pampered celebrities detoxing from drugs was like working in a daycare half the time and a war zone the other half. Addiction had an insidious way of bringing out the worst in people and smothering the good. And Elle was like the priest in The Exorcist, helping patients tackle the demons for what they were and fighting hard for the soul choking for air beneath. You couldn’t go into that fight without a lot of armor, and Elle was armed to the teeth.

But he was beginning to wonder why Ms. Cool Customer had let him sleep over the last few times. That wasn’t what this relationship was. They both knew it.

He needed to stop drinking when he came over here. Elle had grown up in Napa and had a penchant for a good, strong cabernet, but the stuff was too easy to drink. He couldn’t let these lines get fuzzy. “Me sleeping here isn’t a good idea.”

Her jaw tightened. “You called me. You drank too much. It’s not my fault you fell asleep. I didn’t hold you down and make you stay.”

No, he was usually the one doing the holding down. That’s where they connected, despite barely being able to tolerate each other at work. Elle liked her sex like he did—unsentimental and without strings. Hate-fucking. They were good at it. They served a purpose for each other—two workaholics letting off steam. At least that’s what it was supposed to be.

“Well, I’ve got to get going. Suri is hunting me down this morning.”

Elle smirked. “Oh, poor Donovan.”

“Don’t mock. She loves you.” He dumped his glass out and set it in the sink. “Must be nice.”

She sent him an angelic smile. “I know how to play the game and follow protocol. You should learn it sometime.”

“I’ll take that into consideration, Dr. McCray.” He strolled past her and grabbed his keys off the counter. They didn’t kiss or hug. He’d tried that after their first night together, feeling like it was the right thing to do even if he hadn’t been overly inspired to do it, but she’d shrugged him off. I don’t need empty gestures, Donovan, she’d told him. Just sex.

Fine by him.

They exchanged a nod of good-bye, and he headed outside. He’d walked over to her place because it’d been a nice night, but now he regretted it. His house was on the other side of the expansive compound and making it across campus in his wrinkled clothes without being seen would be a challenge. He just had to hope that most of his co-workers were in sessions by now or at least in their offices.

The last thing he needed was Doc Suri finding out he was sleeping with a colleague. She already considered him the problem child since he liked doing things his way and couldn’t keep staff for long on his floor. He’d probably already be gone if it were solely up to her. But he was good at what he did, well-known from getting a few national TV spots when his female arousal research went viral, and the elite clientele here asked for him because of it. The Orgasm Whisperer. That’s the ridiculous name the media had given him. But it worked. The board of directors wanted him here because it brought in high-paying clients, and it let him get away with a few transgressions more than Dr. Suri would normally tolerate. But she had her limits, and he was close to pushing over them.

Donovan slipped around the north edge of the pond and avoided the tai chi class going on nearby. The ground was spongy from an overnight rain, and his dress shoes sank into the earth, making obscene sucking sounds as he skirted the edges of the surrounding trees. By the time he reached the main parking lot, his favorite shoes were a loss. Fantastic. Between his ruined shirt and muddy shoes, he was starting to resemble a hobo. But at least he was making good time and no one had seen him. The administrative building of the institute loomed in the distance, but this parking lot was quiet since this was the visitors zone and visiting hours didn’t start until ten.

He was almost home free. His house was only a few hundred yards on the other side of the trees. But when he hurried around a large pickup truck to turn onto the walking path, someone ran smack into him.

He let out an oof and automatically put up his hands to block whoever or whatever it was, but when he did so, the person who’d run into him lost her balance and went sailing backward onto her ass. Papers flew in the air. A curse flew from her.

The wet sound of her butt hitting the earth alongside the path made Donovan cringe. Only then did he take in the sight. A woman in a business suit. Short dark hair. Horrified expression. He went to her side. “Shit. Are you okay?”

Ignoring him, she peered around at the scattered papers and the mud that had splashed onto her legs and skirt. “Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me.”

He reached out his hand. “Here. Let me help you up.”

She glanced up then, annoyance in every corner of her expression, but when her gaze met his, she froze. Her lips parted for one long second and she blinked rapidly.

Donovan stilled, his hand extended, and a little jolt of awareness went through him. He wasn’t sure what it was, but something about her seemed familiar. He frowned, trying to place her. A former client, maybe? “Are you okay, miss?”

She broke the eye contact and took his offered hand. “I’ll be fine.”

He helped her to her feet, and then they both gathered her things. She pulled a tissue out of her purse and did her best to clean off some of the mud.

“Do you need me to get you anything? Paper towels?”

“It’s okay.” She glanced at him again, her gaze briefly tracking over his state, and only then did he remember how he must look. His shirt was hanging open with lipstick all over it, and he looked like he’d just rolled out of bed. Of course she didn’t want help from him. She probably knew not to trust strangers wandering the grounds of a psychiatric institution.

“Are you here for an appointment?” he asked.

She tucked the tissue in her purse and gripped her stack of papers tightly. “Yes. And I need to get going or I’m going to be late. The guard already held me up forever at the main entrance.”

He ran a hand over the back of his head, still trying to place her. She had that Demi Moore vibe, Ghost era, with her pixie cut and those big hazel eyes. Maybe that’s what was poking at his brain. Or maybe she was some B-list actress that he’d seen in a movie. Lord knows there were enough of them who came here for treatment. But she didn’t have that emaciated body that so many of the wannabe stars strived for. There were soft curves and gentle lines. His fingers flexed. “I’m really sorry about bumping into you.”

“My fault. I was looking at my phone instead of up. I—” She pressed her lips together and shifted her gaze toward the main building. Nervous. “I’ve got to go.”

“Need me to point you toward any place in particular?”

She had already started walking, her heels click, click, clicking on the pavement. She called back over her shoulder. “Nope. Thanks. I’m good.”

She had a smear of mud on the back of her skirt from the fall, but she held her head high as she walked like it didn’t bother her. Only the stiff set of her shoulders told him she was strung up tight. Huh. Maybe that’s what she was coming in for—anxiety. At least it would mean she wouldn’t be one of his clients. Thank God. Talk about awkward. Hello, doctor. Oh yes, you were the one doing the walk of shame this morning. Nice to meet you. Now I will confess my deepest, darkest secrets and trust you with my mental health.

Talk about breaking any semblance of professional credibility before even getting started.

Donovan jogged the rest of his way to his place and thanked the universe he hadn’t run into anyone he knew. Now he just needed to make sure he was at his desk before Dr. Suri tracked him down again. Small miracles. He’d take what he could get.

7

The place used to be an asylum. Considering how crazy Marin felt for even taking this interview after what had happened in the parking lot, it seemed fitting. When she’d looked up and found Donovan West holding his hand out to her, she’d tumbled back in time for a second. Everything in her had fluttered like she was still some eighteen-year-old girl with a crush.

But when he hadn’t recognized her, she’d slammed right back into reality. She was here for an interview, sitting in the mud, and the man she’d lost her virginity to didn’t even know her name. She didn’t blame him for not recognizing her. It’d been nine years. There was little left to resemble the girl she’d been. Her contacts were in, she’d chopped off her hair a few years ago, and she’d gained at least fifteen pounds since then. He looked different, too. Older. Broader. More of a man now, with his morning scruff and the faint lines of life around his eyes. And she wasn’t going to think about the bare chest beneath his shirt or the dark hair that had curled down a body he obviously took very good care of. She would not think about that at all. Especially considering the very obvious pink lipstick that had been all over his ruined shirt. Someone had apparently not lost his penchant for hookups.

That wasn’t a surprise. Perversely, she’d followed Donovan’s career for a few years after they’d slept together. It’d been her secret, masochistic indulgence. Everything had been so chaotic then. She’d had to drop out of school for almost a year, had to fight for custody of Nate, had to figure out how to support a household on her own. Looking up Donovan had given her a brief escape.

She’d watched his research get published. She’d seen the buzz that had made it all the way into the mainstream media. And she’d seen him do interviews on the talk shows. She’d been happy for him, but after a while, seeing his success had begun to sting more than comfort. The sweet, sexy guy she’d gotten to know that spring break week had changed. She could see the shift in the interviews. The limelight had made him smug. Cocky. Soon, there were rumors that he was dating actresses and Hollywood elite. The media gave him a ridiculous nickname. Marin had stopped looking.

So she had no idea why the hell he was in nowhere Louisiana now. She would’ve assumed he was still riding his sliver of fame with some private practice in L.A. But nope, he was here. Half-dressed and helping her to her feet.

Maybe he was a client here. Ha. She wouldn’t be so lucky. She should walk straight back to the rental car and get the hell out of here. She’d already ruined her outfit anyway. She was going to walk in looking ridiculous.

But she’d come this far, and she didn’t have any other options that would give her a chance at the pay she needed. She needed this. Nate needed this. She took a few more steps forward.

The chalk-white building loomed in front of her, intimidating and grand with its three-story-high Greek columns and a grove of ancient oak trees surrounding it. Gnarled branches with snaking Spanish moss seemed to hold the historic structure in their grasp. Breathtaking, really. But a pervasive sense of dread filled her. She imagined the people who were committed here back when it was an asylum had found no comfort in it either. Beauty with bite. This place seemed too grand, too ancient, too everything. She felt like an intruder at the gates.

“Need help finding something?” someone asked from off to her left.

She turned to find a tall, dark-skinned woman in a white coat sending her a polite smile. “I—”

Her smile fell when she took in Marin’s state. “Oh, Lord. What happened to you?”

Marin looked down at the splashes of mud on her skirt and her soggy papers. “I got in a fight with the lawn and lost.”

The woman gave her a sympathetic laugh. “Oh, no. That bayou mud will get you after a rainstorm. I can show you where the bathrooms are if you want to wash out your skirt and can get you some scrubs to put on in the meantime.”

“Thanks. I would, but I’m here for an interview with Dr. Suri, and I don’t want to be late.”

She cringed. “Oh, wow, yeah. Being late would be a bad idea. She’s kind of stickler for time. Just tell her what happened with the fall. Why does that kind of thing only happen on job interviews? I got a flat tire when I came for mine.”

“Guess you got the job anyway.”

“That’s because I’m so good.” The woman brushed imaginary dust from her shoulder with playful confidence. “Two years and running. Hey, maybe bad luck before the interview is a good omen.”

After the parking lot, Marin was thinking not. But she smiled anyway. “Maybe.”

The woman stepped closer, her brown eyes flashing golden in the dappled sunlight that streamed through the branches of the surrounding oak trees. She stuck out her hand. “Oriana Wallace. Addiction wing.”

She shook her hand. “Marin Rush. Interviewing for the sex therapy program.”

Her eyebrow lifted. “Wow, the X-wing, huh? Interesting stuff.”

“The X-wing?”

She shrugged. “It’s what we call it around here. You know, rated X? All the departments end up with their own code names. My area is referred to as the R and R.”

“Rest and relaxation?”

“No, rinse and repeat. My clients are the ones most likely to make repeat performances. Nature of the addiction beast, unfortunately. Come on, I’ll lead you into the gauntlet and show you the quickest way to Suri’s office. It’s easy to get lost. They had to retrofit a lot of the offices and it can make you feel like a rat in a maze. I have yet to find cheese, though.”

Marin smiled, thankful for the help and a friendly face. “That’d be great.”

Oriana led Marin up the front stairs and into the building, which had been beautifully restored to period details of the nineteenth century with its wide baseboards and Greek Revival architecture, but there was a poshness to it that she doubted had been present back when it was an asylum. Expensive-looking artwork, a lobby area with fine antique furniture, and a chandelier that sent sparkling light over the marble floors. It was a lobby meant to impress. But when they went through the double doors to get to the offices, Marin understood what Oriana had been talking about. Signs pointing every which way demarcated the offices, but it was a twisting tangle of hallways and doors. She half-expected that little kid from The Shining to roll up on his Big Wheel.

They took the elevator to the top floor and Oriana dropped her off there. She put her hand out to keep the elevator door from closing. “Dr. Suri’s office is the one at the end of the hall.”

“Thanks so much,” Marin said, her nerves bubbling up again and making her voice shake.

“No problem. Good luck with the interview. Just remember that if you managed to get an interview here, you’re already great at what you do. She only talks to the best, so be confident.”

“Ha. Sure, no problem. I’m just going to walk in with my muddy clothes and wet resume and wow her right out of her chair.”

She laughed. “How about I be confident on your behalf? When not if you get the job, you owe me a cup of coffee for being your tour guide.”

“Deal.”

She tapped the side of the elevator. “Go get ’em, doctor. Lord knows the X-wing could use some estrogen.”

“Oh?”

She smirked. “See ya.”

The elevator doors shut, leaving Marin in the hallway alone. She took a deep breath and headed toward the office, the sound of her heels echoing off the floors with an ominous reverberation. She tried not to think about how little experience she had in clinical work. She tried to forget that the man she’d tried so hard to block out of her mind was somehow tied to this place. She tried to remember why she was doing this.

This was insane.

She walked into the office and gave the secretary her name.

The woman smiled. “You can go on in, Dr. Rush. She’s waiting for you.”

Welcome to the asylum, we’re all crazy here.

8

“Do you think once a cheater, always a cheater? I mean, how am I supposed to trust him when he screwed that skinny bitch behind my back?”

Donovan hooked his ankle over his knee and leaned back in his chair, trying not to cringe at his client’s shrill tone. He should’ve had more coffee and extra aspirin before this first appointment. “I think each situation is different. Rarely are things always or never.”

Claire Daniels swept her long bangs away from her face with a huff, but tears glistened in her eyes. “This is such bullshit. I did the cover of Maxim last month. Men all over the world want me. And my jackass boyfriend fucked a wannabe catalog model.” She leaned over and yanked something out of her purse. She held up a computer printout of a redhead in a bikini. “Look at her. She looks like a boy. Who would you rather sleep with?”

Donovan frowned. The truth was he had no interest in sleeping with either. He’d rather go celibate than hook up with another actress. He’d learned that lesson the hard way. But he wasn’t going to answer that type of question in a session anyway. “Is that really what you want to know?”

Her gaze dropped down to her hands. “No.”

“What would you like to ask, then?”

She closed her eyes, and two fat tears rolled down her cheeks. The reviews of her latest movie had called her a pretty crier. Donovan hadn’t thought there was such a thing, but Claire did seem to make it look tragically elegant. She shook her head. “Am I that broken, doc? Would he rather be with someone like that because I’m just not worth the trouble?”

There it was. The real question. He was proud of her for being brave enough to voice it. In their early sessions, Claire had maintained a cool facade of the untouchable actress and had been combative when Donovan had tried to get her to open up. Finally, she was showing some trust in him. “I think we’re all broken in some way, Claire. But no, I don’t think you’re unworthy or that you deserved to be cheated on. And blaming yourself for someone else’s actions isn’t going to help. Benny strayed. You’re not responsible for his behavior.”

“But if I was giving him what he needed, if I wasn’t so fucked up …” She looked up and swiped at her tears. “What kind of woman can’t enjoy sex?”

“Lots,” he said, leaning forward and bracing his forearms on his thighs. “Especially ones who went through what you did as a teenager. Give yourself a break and some time. You’re here and working on this. That’s more than most can say. And I don’t know exactly why Benny cheated without talking to him. People stray for all kinds of reasons. Sometimes it’s a lack of impulse control, other times it’s some kind of internal issue—insecurity, fear of aging, depression. Sometimes it’s impaired judgment from drugs or alcohol. It could be a lot of different reasons.”

She looked out the window at the sprawling oak trees that stood like sentries throughout The Grove. “Because the other person is sexier?”

Donovan let out a breath. This was one of Claire’s issues. The people who watched her in movies and smiling on magazine covers would never suspect how deeply insecure she was, that she’d grown up hearing that she was ugly and dumb. It was one of the reasons she was attracted to shitty guys and jumped from relationship to relationship. She needed empty compliments filling the ever-draining well. “I think if you want to work through this with Benny, he’s going to have to come in for a few sessions with you. You two need to decide whether or not this is a deal breaker.”

She chewed her lip and looked away. “I’m not ready to leave him. I know you probably think I’m stupid. The press definitely does.”

He glanced down at his steno pad and made a note. “I think decisions in life aren’t as cut and dried as they appear from the outside looking in.”

“Have you ever been cheated on?”

Donovan’s gaze jumped back to her, his pen pressing hard into the paper.

She gave him a sheepish look and an apologetic shrug. “I heard you dated Selena St. Pierre. And she got together with Ryan Vickers right after that.”

He held back the grimace that tried to surface. He hated that clients could so easily dig into his personal life. He was supposed to be this blank slate, a sounding board, a trained ear. But people could find dirt on him if they wanted it because he’d been stupid enough to date a TV actress. He’d been stupid in general. Luckily, the only thing that had made it to press had been the breakup and the rumored infidelity, not the … aftermath.

“Claire, my personal life has no bearing on yours. And every situation is going to be different.”

“But is that why you two broke up?”

Yes. No. He’d tried the committed thing with Selena. After being in L.A. for a few years, riding the success of the arousal research and indulging in too many women who wanted their round with the Orgasm Whisperer, he’d given a relationship a shot. He’d been moving too fast for too long, trying to run from all that had happened in Texas, and was burned the fuck out. Selena was a beautiful and talented woman. They got along. And she’d had a big family and group of friends surrounding her. Part of him had been so drawn to that, that possibility of belonging somewhere after so many years on his own. He’d let himself take a breath.

It’d been a mistake.

After six months, they got engaged. She wanted the big diamond and the celebrity-grade wedding and the smiling couple cover of People. He didn’t know what he wanted, but that train had been on greased rails. He’d gone along with it until he couldn’t. When he told her he wasn’t ready to set a date, instead of just getting mad or breaking it off, she hooked up with her co-star and timed it so that Donovan would find them together. Naked bodies twined up in his bed.

She’d wanted a reaction. A big declaration. A surge of possessiveness from him.

But it hadn’t come. Instead, he’d just felt … nothing. Resigned. Like part of him had always known it would end. That Selena and her family and their group of friends were mere apparitions, players on a stage, and he was easily cut from the cast.

He’d been trying to be something he wasn’t, and they’d found him out.

She called him heartless.

She was right.

“I’m sorry. I can’t answer that.” Donovan set aside his notes and gave the clock behind Claire a pointed look. “And unfortunately, we’re out of time for today.”

She sighed and shoved the photo of the women in the bikini into her purse. “Okay.”

“This week, I want you to practice the relaxation exercises we talked about and try some self-stimulation when you feel ready.” He stood and went to the cabinet behind his desk. He pulled out a small unmarked box and walked over to hand it to her. “This is the vibrator I mentioned to you earlier. It’s a simple one meant for clitoral stimulation but has more focused power than what you’ve been trying to use. And I’ll send over the file with the audio recording to your private email.”

She stood and took the box from him. “Thank you.”

“I also want you to see if Benny would be willing to come in with you for your next session.”

She nodded. “He’s on the road right now, but I’ll let you know.”

“Great.” He opened the door to let her out. “Good work today.”

She paused before stepping out. “Thanks, Dr. West. I thought you were going to spend the whole session telling me how I needed to leave him.”

“That’s not my call to make.”

She gave a put-upon sigh. “I know I should probably cut the asshole loose, but I really have this gut feeling that he’s the one, you know? He can be so sweet when he wants to be, and I think it’s just hard for him to know he can’t magically fix me.”

Donovan gave her his sympathetic therapist smile. “Let’s get him in here and see what happens.”

She nodded, a glimmer of hope coming into her eyes, and then slipped out the door, gracing the hallway with a hip-swaying runway walk.

Donovan closed the door and shook his head.

The One. Right. It was such a crap concept. One that got a lot of people in trouble. So many of his clients had this fantastical notion about The One—this fated person who would make everything in their world click into place. The sun would look brighter. The sex would be amazing every time. Their lives would be perfect. Fa-la-fucking-la.

But it was such a damaging goal. People spent all this time trying to track down that elusive unicorn and trying to make their lovers fit into this mold of being that one imaginary person. But he’d done this long enough to know that the concept was just words in a fairy tale. The only two people he’d ever seen who had come close to the soul mate thing were his parents. And even then, there was no happily ever after. Why would fate have given his parents their one magical person only to have them murdered a few years after they found each other? It was bullshit.

Relationships were simply negotiated terms between people. Sometimes they worked. Sometimes they didn’t. Even in the early stages with Selena, he’d never thought she was some predestined soul mate. They’d gotten along. They’d had chemistry in bed. They’d fit into each other’s lives in a practical way. Then they hadn’t. It was really that simple.

When couples came in for therapy, his job was like a mediator between businesses, making sure middle ground was found, needs were met. He was good at it. But when people brought up the mystical concepts of fate and The One, he kind of wanted to throw one of his psych textbooks at them. If people were convinced it was fate, why bother with therapy? They wouldn’t hear anything he had to say that didn’t fit into the story they’d already created for themselves.

Which is why he dreaded the next session with Claire and Benny. Couples therapy drained him. Give him someone with arousal disorder or sex addiction or a fetish any day. He’d much rather tackle those issues than deal with the should-we-or-shouldn’t-we-stay-together situations.

But Zach, the guy who’d been hired to help take some of Donovan’s caseload and handle those types of marital issues, had quit two months ago when he decided Donovan was “difficult” to work with and that the clients were too intense. Really, the guy had gotten chewed up and spit out by a particularly combative couple who’d threatened to sue when they blamed his treatment plan for making the marriage worse.

Amateur mistake.

Celebrities and the wealthy were their own breed. They were used to people catering to them, and a therapist’s job was to help them see things about themselves in a way they didn’t necessarily like. It didn’t always go over well. People got pissed. They swung their power around. You couldn’t let them. Zach was the second therapist they’d lost on this floor in eight months.

Donovan hadn’t been surprised. The only way to deal with big egos was to make sure you had one, too. That’s who survived here. And Zach just didn’t have the backbone for it.

Of course, Donovan’s boss had blamed him for the loss. Apparently, she’d seen it as a failure to be an effective mentor, and it’d ended up being a mark against him for the promotion. Another point to add to her list of grievances.

So now he had double the caseload and another hill to climb in Suri’s eyes. He didn’t mind the extra work. In fact, he preferred having the floor to himself. He liked the control of that and being busy. But too many couples sessions in a week could drive him to the brink. And if he ever wanted to add research to his plate again, he would need to get promoted and have someone else on this floor to ease the workload. Another therapist would be for the best. He just dreaded the process of dealing with someone else new.

The buzzer on his office phone went off, and Ysa’s voice filled the office. “Dr. West?”

He leaned back in his chair and rubbed the spot between his eyes. “Yeah.”

“Six people confirmed for the sex addiction group this afternoon. But Karina showed up early in an outfit that was, uh … quite revealing, so I ushered her to the private room across the hall so she wouldn’t bring that distraction into group.”

Donovan looked to the ceiling. “How revealing?”

Ysa sniffed. “She sat across from me in the waiting room. I can confirm that the carpet matches the drapes.”

Donovan couldn’t stop the chuckle at his assistant’s deadpan tone. Ysa wasn’t fazed by much these days. “Call the main building and have someone bring her a pair of scrubs. Tell her she’s not allowed into group otherwise.”

“Will do. Oh, and Dr. Suri just called. She wants you in her office in ten minutes.”

Donovan sat forward, his chair squeaking in protest. “For what?”

“Didn’t say. And you know I’m not asking. She had that tone.”

He sighed. “Fantastic. I’m on my way.”

Ysabel wished him luck, and he got up to head over to the main building, hoping Suri hadn’t somehow found out that he’d shown up late again today. He greeted people as he made his way through the snaking hallways and jogged up the stairs. When he walked into the office, Agatha, Dr. Suri’s assistant, gave him a broad smile. “Long time no see, Dr. West.”

“I’ve missed your beautiful face, Aggie. But you know me, I try to avoid trips to the principal’s office.”

“Stop trying to charm an old woman. It won’t work on me.” But she gave him a wink from behind her glasses before picking up her phone. “Dr. Suri, Dr. West is here.”

Aggie nodded and hung up the phone.

“You can go on in,” she said.

“Am I in trouble?”

Aggie’s smile went sly. “Aren’t you always? But not the kind you’re thinking.”

He lifted a brow. “Now you’ve got me curious.”

“Well, you know what they say about that.”

Donovan frowned at the playful warning but walked over to the door and stepped inside of Doc Suri’s office. Suri was at her desk, intimidating despite her diminutive height and the soft bun twisted atop her head. The president in her oval office. Her gaze slid to him with dark eyes that could go warm with friendliness or singe with disapproval. Well, at least he’d heard about the first one. He had yet to truly witness such an occurrence. She stood. “Dr. West, glad you could make it over here between appointments.”

“Sure, no problem. What can I help …”

But his words drifted away from him when someone rose from the seat across from Suri’s desk.

“I wanted you to meet someone,” Dr. Suri said.

The woman whom he’d run into in the parking lot had turned toward him. She closed her eyes for the briefest of seconds, like she was pained, but then quickly hid it behind a tight, Mona Lisa smile.

Suri stepped around her desk. “Dr. West, this is Dr. Marin Rush. She’s interviewing for the open position on your floor. Since you’d be training her if she’s hired, I thought it was important for you to join in on the second part of the interview.”

“I—” The name was ringing bells in his head—thick, reverberating sounds. Marin. Marin.

“Marin, this is Donovan West.”

Marin’s lips tilted into the barest of smirks, and that’s when it came back to him, in one, scrolling memory. Late nights and long conversations. Teasing glances and longing looks. He’d kissed those lips. He’d touched this woman. But only once. Mari.

Fuck.

Mari—no, Marin—took a step forward and put out her hand formally. “Nice to meet you, Dr. West.”

He took her hand. It was chilled, delicate, but the squeeze she gave him was firm and confident. He didn’t want to let it go. “You can call me Donovan.”

“Donovan, then.”

He couldn’t read her eyes. She was giving him a professional mask. A stranger’s face. But the way she’d said his name and the slight flush in her cheeks told him she wasn’t unaffected. This was why she’d been so freaked out when they’d collided outside. She’d recognized him. Now he felt like an ass for not placing her sooner. But she looked so different. No less striking but a much more refined version of the girl he’d shared spring break with all those years ago.

Dr. Suri smiled, which lit her normally stern face with a cheerfulness he hadn’t seen before, and headed back behind her desk. “Marin attended Dallas University and worked under Dr. Paxton like you. You were probably there at the same time, though Marin just graduated last year, so I doubt you crossed paths.”

“Last year?” He frowned.

Marin smiled. “Yes, I remember hearing about your success with your research after you graduated. I was a sophomore at the time. Congratulations on that, by the way.”

Donovan blinked. “A soph—”

That would’ve meant … Ah, hell.

“Why don’t we all sit down and chat?” Dr. Suri suggested. “Marin’s research is very impressive, and she’s come to us with the highest of recommendations from Dr. Paxton.”

Donovan nodded and went to the other empty chair, his brain spinning. He’d looked for Mari after that night. Not just because he’d felt like a bastard for unceremoniously taking her virginity but also because he’d liked talking to her. He’d been so messed up back then, and she’d been this light in the dark, someone who had made him smile and want things and hope. A reprieve from the anxiety and crushing depression his parents’ murder had brought on. He’d known it was a bad idea to get involved with anyone, but he hadn’t been able to let it go that easily. He’d gone to the sleep department to find her, but no one had known a “Mary.” After a few useless attempts to track her down, he’d stopped because he’d realized then that if Mari had wanted to be found, she would’ve come to him.

Now he realized why she’d bailed. She’d lied to him. He hadn’t just taken her virginity. He’d fucked a goddamned teenager. His stomach flipped over.

Dr. Suri asked about Marin’s accomplishments. The woman had an impressive research track record for only being a year out of her program. And when she spoke about it, she was as articulate and sharp as he remembered. Her passion was evident in every word, in the bright spark that lit her eyes when she got into the data. He got that. Research used to light him up like that, too. But he had to focus.

He could deal with whatever happened between them in the past later. Right now, she was being considered for a position on his floor. He’d be responsible for her training. If he failed again, he may as well hand the director position to Dr. Rhodes. He needed to forget about who she was and look at her with critical eyes. Do a real interview.

He sat back in his chair and considered her. “Dr. Rush, it’s clear that you’ve excelled in your research and have a lot invested in it, but I haven’t heard you speak about your clinical experience besides that internship at the high school, which sounded more education focused than therapy based.”

Marin’s gaze, which had been firmly on Suri, slid his way. Her lips thinned and worry flickered on her face. She cleared her throat. “My clinical experience is limited since my research took so much of my time, but I’m well-trained, a quick study, and am eager to work in the field under a strong supervisor.”

He frowned. “No clinical internships with adults?”

She shook her head. “I worked a few weeks in a mental health center.”

He tried not to groan. The girl was as green as spring grass. No bueno. “That definitely wouldn’t have prepared you for this. Our clients have extremely high expectations and can be a lot to handle. We’ve lost two experienced therapists over the last year. The X-wing can be a gauntlet.”

She sat up straighter. “I’m not scared of a challenge.”

She was lying. He could tell. But he wasn’t going to call her on it in front of Suri. “I’m not sure this is going to be the right fit for you.”

Something fierce flashed in her eyes. “With all due respect, Dr. West, I think you’re wrong. And if you give me a chance, I can prove that to you.”

“This isn’t—”

But Suri interrupted him. “Marin, I think that’s an excellent idea, actually. I, too, am a bit concerned about your lack of field experience. But your background is impressive, and I take Dr. Paxton’s recommendations very seriously. Skills can be learned if you have a solid foundation to work with and a dedicated mentor committed to your success.” She cut a look Donovan’s way, her warning landing like a grenade in his lap. “So why don’t we start with a six-month probationary period?”

Marin’s attention swung to Dr. Suri. “Probationary?”

“Yes. We’ll set you up with temporary housing on campus. All of our therapists and doctors get the option of free housing on the grounds if they’re willing to be on call a few days a month. Are you willing to do that?”

“Yes,” Marin said without hesitation.

“And we’ll pay you as if you’re a permanent employee. But I want you to work with Dr. West for a few months. He’s right. This position has been particularly hard to find the right person for. We’ll have you shadow Donovan, gain some experience, and then we’ll reevaluate at the end of the trial period—both to see if you think it’s right for you and to determine if you’re the right fit for us.”

Donovan opened his mouth to protest.

But Dr. Suri nailed him with that gaze again. “Dr. West, I trust that you will work hard to mentor Dr. Rush and get her up to speed.”

His lips flattened. Her message clear. Her success is your success. Don’t fuck up. “Of course.”

She turned to Marin and smiled. “I guess you have an official offer then, Dr. Rush. Do you have any questions for me?”

Marin’s hands were twisting in her lap, the only sign of her nerves or excitement or whatever the hell she was feeling. He’d think it was cute if he wasn’t so annoyed at being strong-armed into this hire. “Just one. I don’t live alone. How does that work with housing?”

Donovan’s neck muscles pulled tight. She didn’t live alone. She had someone. Of course she did. Why wouldn’t she? His gaze drifted back to her hands.

No ring.

Not that it mattered. This girl was off-fucking-limits. He was going to train her. No. He was going to make sure she was the best goddamned therapist she could be. And he was going to get his promotion. End of story.

Suri waved a dismissive hand. “Not a problem. Anything else? Do you need time to think over the decision?”

Donovan knew what the answer would be. Maybe Marin had a pile of other offers on the table. People who got interviews here usually did. They only hired the best. But they were the best. When you got an offer at The Grove, you didn’t say no.

Marin smiled. “Not at all. When can I start?”

9

One month later

Marin tried to keep the giddy smile off her face as she and Nate unloaded the moving truck and carried their things into their new two-bedroom cottage. When Dr. Suri had offered her the job and told her that free housing was involved, she’d nearly spun around in a circle and broken into song.

In that moment, she hadn’t cared that this was a probationary appointment or that Donovan West was burning a hole into the side of her head and clearly didn’t want her here. She had a job, a place to stay, and would have enough money to send Nate to school as long as she got the permanent position. And there was no goddamned way she wasn’t going to. She had six months to prove herself, and she would do whatever it took to make it happen. The salary they’d offered and this house were like winning a small lottery. She wasn’t going to be rolling around in dollar bills on her bed or anything, but that ever-crushing stress of living paycheck to paycheck would go away. She’d be comfortable.

And this house … God. When they’d said they had housing, she’d expected something stark and dorm-like, but these cottages were posh. Gorgeous refinished wood floors, high ceilings, period details mixed with high-end appliances and furniture. They’d taken simple houses that had been built for staff when it was an asylum and decked them out. And the look on the outside was pure New Orleans with its pale pink clapboard and raised foundation. Marin imagined it had seen a lot in its years—survived floods and famines and hurricanes. Somehow she was comforted by that, made the place feel solid and dependable beneath her feet. And the view out the windows of the trees and gardens was stunning. It was a fairy-tale cottage. One that put every other place they’d ever lived in to shame.

But despite the nice digs, Nathan was less than thrilled about the arrangement, so Marin was trying to keep her enthusiasm in check. Nate had planned to spend his last summer before college with Henry and his high school friends, but Marin had told him that if he wanted to go to art school, this was the price. He’d have to live with her at The Grove for the summer before moving into the dorms at school. He’d agreed, but now she had a sulky, lovelorn teenager on her hands.

She understood where the angst was coming from, but he was going to have to get over it. She had her own angst to mull over. New job. New city. Donovan fucking West. She stacked a third box on a pile of two. “Lots of pretty scenery to paint around here. You can get some practice on landscapes.”

Nate didn’t look her way. “Uh-huh.”

She frowned and tried again. “What time do I need to bring you into the city for your interviews?”

At her behest, he’d applied to a few jobs. She needed him occupied. Otherwise, he’d mope all summer. But instead of applying in Bellemeade, the small town that was a few miles outside The Grove, he’d applied to places in New Orleans—art galleries, coffee shops, photography studios. It was forty-five minutes away, which she didn’t love, but she’d compromised. The kid was an artist. He craved the city. Maybe if he fell in love with New Orleans, it would ease the separation from his friends and boyfriend.

Nate shrugged. “You don’t need to bring me. I can take the bike.”

She scowled. Nate had saved up all his money from his after-school job for a used motorcycle. She hated the whole idea of it, but he’d reminded her that he’d turned eighteen last week and could make the call. She didn’t give a shit about the age thing, but he’d also reminded her that they couldn’t live on one car anymore. She’d be stranded every day when he went into the city to work. Plus, he’d need something once school started. She hadn’t been able to win against the practical argument. But she didn’t have to like it.

“Make sure you wear your helmet every time and don’t speed. And always have your inhaler with you and—”

He lifted a hand. “I got it, all right? Don’t do stupid shit that will get you killed.”

“Yes. Good advice in all situations.”

He shoved his hand in his pockets. “Do they have Internet here? I told Henry I’d Skype when we got here.”

She headed to the kitchen where her welcome packet was and pulled out the card with the Internet code. “Campus-wide wireless.”

He plucked the card from her fingers and grabbed his laptop. “I’ll be in my room.”

“Tell Henry I said hi.”

He grunted.

She rolled her eyes and went back to unpacking. But just as she opened one of the kitchen boxes, there was a light knock on the back door. She’d left only the screen door closed, so when she looked up, she saw Oriana giving her a little wave. “Welcome wagon’s here.”

Marin smiled and abandoned the box. “Come on in. It’s not locked.”

Oriana swung open the door. Today she wasn’t in her white coat but instead looked to be heading out for a summer stroll in pale yellow capris, big sunglasses, and a sleeveless white shirt. She had a potted plant in one hand and a wine bottle in the other. She lifted both toward Marin by way of greeting. “I come bearing gifts.”

“Ooh, thanks.” She took both from Oriana and gave the plant a sniff. “Mmm, basil.”

“It’s from the community garden we have near the children’s building. Basil brings good luck to a new home. And wine brings good luck to everything.” She leaned against the counter, glancing around. “You also may want to burn some sage to cleanse whatever bad energy is left from the last resident. He got fired for hooking up with a patient. Very scandalous.”

Marin lifted a brow as she brought the plant to the sunny window over the sink and set it on the sill. She put the wine on the counter. “Cleansing bad energy? A doctor who believes in superstition?”

Her lips lifted at the corner. “I grew up in New Orleans. It’s a requirement to have a healthy respect for otherworldly things. Plus, my grandmother was big into natural remedies and taught me a lot about them. Some work. Some don’t. Some have a placebo effect. But the clients here like a holistic approach, so it’s good to have some tricks up your sleeve.” She gave a wistful sigh. “I’m still waiting for that love spell to kick in with that hot orderly on the inpatient ward, though.”

Marin laughed. “I’m afraid to ask what’s involved in that.”

She sniffed. “Mostly longing looks from me as I pass him in the hallway. We’re both too smart to risk our jobs over a hot interlude in the supply closet. Though, sometimes I wonder … May be worth it.”

Marin scrubbed a hand through her hair, the humidity making it stick to her forehead. “So they’re pretty strict about interoffice stuff here, huh?”

A picture of Donovan rumpled and covered with lipstick marks ran through her mind. She had no idea where he’d been coming from that morning, but it was pretty obvious it was from some woman’s bed.

She shrugged. “I’m not going to say it never happens. With so many of us working long hours and living on-site, it can be a little like boarding school. But it’s best not to get caught. The head honchos don’t want the drama. The clients provide enough of that.”

“I’m sure.”

“Mar, have you seen the charger for my computer? I just lost the—” Nate stepped into the kitchen and stopped talking when he saw Oriana there. “Oh, sorry.”

“Nate, this is Oriana. She’s another psychologist who works here. Oriana, my brother, Nathan.”

Oriana smiled and put her hand out. “You can call me Ori.”

Nate gave her hand a quick shake. “Nice to meet you.”

Marin was pleased to see that despite his pouty mood, he hadn’t forgotten his manners. “I think the charger is in the backseat of the car.”

“Cool. Thanks.” He jogged out the back door, no doubt in a hurry to reconnect his call with Henry.

Ori watched him leave and sent Marin a questioning look. “He’s staying with you?”

“Yeah, he starts art school in New Orleans in the fall, so he’ll be here for the summer.”

“He didn’t want to stay with your family?”

“I am his family. Our mom passed away when he was nine, and no dad in the picture, so I’ve been raising him since then.”

“Wow. I’m sorry about your mom.”

“We’ve done all right.”

“Yeah, he seems like a nice kid. Good looking, too. You better keep him away from east campus. We have a residential teen program, and those girls will fall on him like starving tigers.”

Marin laughed. “He has a boyfriend, so I think he’s safe.”

“Ah, well keep him away from west campus then where the teen boys are. Same threats apply.”

Marin smirked. “Noted. Hey, you want some coffee or something? I think I can find the coffeepot.”

Ori waved a dismissive hand. “No, I’m heading into town to do some shopping. I’m on call tonight, so I have to get out while the getting’s good. I just wanted to stop by and welcome you to the insanity since I know it can be a little intimidating to start here. The place can be kind of cliquey. So know you have at least one friend already.”

Marin reached out and gave Ori’s hand a squeeze. “Thanks. That means a lot. Believe me.”

“We’ll do coffee soon. I expect sordid stories from the X-wing.”

“I’ll do my best.”

She gave one last wave and headed out the door. Marin let out a breath and sat down at the small dining table in the kitchen nook, the drive to Louisiana, the move, and all the transition over the last month catching up to her. She’d been so focused on the money and getting her and Nathan here that she hadn’t let the reality of what was in front of her sink in.

Monday she was starting a job that she had no experience in. And the person responsible for training her didn’t really want her here. Over the past few years, she’d walked into things with confidence because she could stuff her head with the knowledge she needed beforehand. She never had to be off the cuff. She had the tools in her pocket at all times when she went into a research environment. For her dissertation defense, she’d practiced so much that she could’ve recited the thick document by heart. There was no question they could’ve thrown at her that she hadn’t prepared for. But there was no armor she could walk in with Monday.

People were going to want her to fix their sex lives.

Problem was: How was she supposed to do that when hers had started and ended on the same night, at eighteen with the very man she had to report to tomorrow?

She lowered her head to the table and tapped it lightly against the wood.

Time to give a whole new meaning to the term “faking it.”

10

Donovan strode into the office on Monday morning with his second cup of coffee and his training plan already forming in his head. He’d thought long and hard about this over the weekend and had decided that he needed to get out ahead of this Marin thing right at the gate.

Dr. Suri expected him to fail. She expected him to run Marin off like he had the others. He hadn’t successfully mentored a more experienced therapist, so she’d sent him a complete newbie—a bigger challenge—to prove her point. If he couldn’t train Marin, Suri had a solid reason to tell the board why she’d gone in a different direction with the promotion. Hell, maybe it’d give her a solid reason to get rid of him altogether: Does not play well with others.

It’d be easier to defend himself if it weren’t true.

He set a steaming latte on Ysa’s desk. “Good morning, sunshine.”

“Only fifteen minutes late. That’s almost early for you.” She took the offered coffee and sipped. “Mmm, the expensive stuff. This is why I put up with you.”

“She here yet?”

Ysa tilted her head toward his closed office door. “She got here early. Brought pastries for us. I gave her a quick tour, showed her the office she’ll be using, and then set her up in yours. Try not to scare her off, all right? I think I’m going to like this one.”

“Because she brought you croissants and showed up on time?”

“That doesn’t hurt.” She sipped her latte. “I’m easily bribed. But I will deny that if you call me out on it.”

“Noted.”

“But no. I liked talking with her. Did you know she developed a sex ed program for LGBT kids?”

“Yeah, I read through her research over the weekend. Robust program. Good stuff.”

“I would’ve killed to have that around when I was in high school.” She shook her head ruefully and then shrugged. “I guess I like that she spent all that time fighting for the underdog. The clients here need someone like that.”

He smiled. “I love that you see our wealthy, celebrity clients as underdogs.”

“Hey, people here are fighting a lot of demons. That’s David against Goliath if I’ve ever heard it. Money can’t always save you from yourself.”

“Ain’t that the truth.” He tossed his coffee cup in the trash. “Hold my calls for now. I need to get Dr. Rush up to speed on a few things, and then I’ll have her shadow me for the rest of the day on my appointments. You may want to warn the clients that I’ll have a second therapist in the room today.”

“Got it.”

He rolled his shoulders, trying to loosen the tension that was grabbing hold, and pushed open the door to his office. Today was going to be about training, but he had to get something out of the way first. He stepped inside his office and shut the door behind him.

Marin looked up from her spot on the couch, her hazel eyes widening for a moment before she smoothed her expression into one of professional passivity. She had her phone in her hand and she dropped it into her bag. “Good morning, Dr. West.”

“You only have to call me that in front of clients. I think we passed the formalities stage a long time ago. Don’t you?”

She gave a curt nod. “All right. Donovan, then.”

He tried not to focus on the way her pale pink gloss slid over her lips as she smoothed it. He’d sucked that bottom lip between his teeth. Tasted it. Focus, West. “So before we get started, how about we slay the elephant and get that out of the way first?”

Her hands were in her lap and they flattened against her thighs, like she was shoring herself up, preparing for impact. “Which elephant should we tackle first?”

He leaned against the edge of his desk and crossed his arms. “What do you mean?”

“Seems we have a herd. Or is it a parade of elephants? I can never remember.” She shook her head as if admonishing herself for the tangent. “So which one are you talking about? The fact that once upon a time we slept together? Or how about that you don’t want me here? Or is it the one where I ran into you half-dressed and covered in lipstick the day I interviewed?”

He cringed. “Yeah, sorry about that last one. I feel like a dick for not realizing who you were.”

She lifted a shoulder. “It’s been a long time. I wouldn’t have expected you to recognize me. We were kids.”

He frowned. “No, you were a kid.”

She had the decency to look chagrined. “Yeah, sorry about leaving that part out.”

He sighed. “Just please, please tell me you were at least eighteen.”

“I’d turned eighteen a few months before that.”

He tilted his head back and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Somehow, that doesn’t make me feel any better. I can’t believe you were that young. You seemed so smart and … poised.”

“Poised? Ha. I hope you’re a better read of people now than you were then. I was anything but. I was kind of a disaster.”

He lowered his head and peered at her. He could still see the girl she used to be in the curves of her face, but everything was more refined now, polished—the look in her eye world-weary. “I looked for you the next week.”

Her gaze slid away, refocusing on some invisible imperfection on her slacks. “I had to drop out for that semester. Family stuff. Long story.”

“Oh.” That wasn’t what he’d expected to hear. But her shoulders had curved inward, her entire posture closing off—don’t push. If they were in a session, he’d chase that rabbit. But she wasn’t his client. She wasn’t even his friend. It wasn’t his business. He leaned back on his hands. “As for that other elephant—that I don’t want you here—you’re wrong.”

Her attention flicked up at that, a don’t-bullshit-me look on her face. “You tried to talk Dr. Suri out of hiring me. I was sitting right there.”

“I wanted a more experienced therapist, yes. But that was nothing personal. I have a busy schedule and was hoping to have someone who could hit the ground running. I know what it’s like walking out of a research environment into a clinical one. It’s not an easy transition. The lab is all about facts and numbers and structure. Therapy is almost all feel and instinct and thinking on your feet.”

She uncrossed and recrossed her legs, meeting his gaze levelly though he could sense her nerves in the way she was holding her posture so rigidly. “I’m not going to pretend this isn’t new for me or that I don’t have a lot to learn. But I promise I’m more motivated than anyone to make this work. I work hard and learn fast. You tell me what you need me to do or learn or improve, and I’m going to do it.”

Donovan ignored the ping that went through him at her words. It’d been a long time since they’d shared those few days together, but he’d never forgotten the fantasies she’d helped him with, how she’d gotten turned on by the kinky ones. How willingly she’d melted under his touch. Tell me what to do, and I’m going to do it. He could think of more than a few things to put on that list. Starting with …

Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.