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?”