Chapter One
The sand was still warm under her toes as Lauren Stanton started the short walk back to her house, perched just a few hundred feet from where the brilliant blue ocean kissed the shore. This was the part of her day she loved best; her walk on the beach. She tried to go as early as possible, when the sun was still high in the sky, the sky bright blue and dotted with cotton candy clouds. Her dog—a gorgeous, strawberry-blonde golden retriever named Emma—would splash around in the water while Lauren enjoyed the view and occasionally threw her favorite tennis ball, laughing at Emma’s puppy-like demeanor as she shot off like a cannon after the toy.
When it looked like the sun was about to start its descent, Lauren pushed herself to her feet and grabbed her flip flops at her side, brushing the sand off of her backside and whistling for Emma to heel. And, like the good girl she was, the golden would race back to stand at her feet, tail wagging as her belly dripped salty sea water and her smiling mouth held tightly to her ball. Then they walked together to the back steps of Lauren’s beach house, Emma bumping her head against her best friend’s hip for scratches behind the ear.
Like every other day, Lauren took her time on the walk back, luxuriating in the warmth of the sand under her feet, the grittiness as it smoothed her heels and slid up into the cracks between her toes, the spray as she kicked it with every single step she took. There was a strange sense of safety in these tiny grains of sand. For a couple of hours every day, it was like the beach erased every single scar on her body, forming her into a new person.
It usually only lasted until she returned home, however; when she had to get back to work.
Lauren spent her mornings in the town of Slightuckett, RI, far from the city she used to know—or any cities, really—and acted as one of the only doctors within a five-mile radius. She treated citizens of all ages, and was well-known here, even after only a couple of years where most of the town people had lived here all their lives.
She would see her patients in line at the grocery store and ask about how their children or spouses were feeling. She knew everybody by name and they knew her as “Dr. Stanton.” A few lucky ones got to know her as Lauren. But nobody knew about her past, which she kept close to her chest, hidden away deep inside her, behind polite smiles and chitchat.
Her clinic opened at half-past six AM and Lauren often found herself working the early morning shift, which she didn’t mind in the least. She was the only person, doctor or nurse, that didn’t have children to take care of in the early mornings—unless you counted Emma, who had to be fed and walked before sunrise—or a spouse to spend those last moments of nightlight with before the sun broke through and forced them both from the warmth of their bed.
Very few patients came in during the opening hours, anyway. The ones that did usually needed a dose of medication that they weren’t allowed to keep in their own home and had to be administered by Lauren or whatever nurse was unlucky enough to be scheduled at the same time. The real rush began at ten, when parents came in with flu-stricken children, or tiny babies and toddlers that needed their checkups. There were a few regulars that showed up; seniors with arthritis or respiratory issues; college students coming in for free condoms or to receive their monthly notes for birth control, or just to take advantage of their school-paid insurance plans, which allowed visits every two weeks for anything they needed, at no extra cost to them.
By the time Lauren’s shift was over, at two in the afternoon, she could feel the blisters on her feet, the scars burning under her clothing, injuries that had long faded giving her aches like they’d been left there last week. The office was a ten-minute walk from her beach house and the beach was less than two more, but the second Lauren stepped foot on the warm, early afternoon sand, she felt the stress melt away. The tension was always gone from her shoulders by the first time she threw Emma’s ball in the direction of the ocean.
Today had been no different, of course, but Lauren couldn’t help but feel as if something was…missing. She tried to shake the feeling off as she ascended the steps to her cozy beach house. It was tinier than most that lined the coast, but that was just fine with her. Perfect, actually. Why buy a house with all that space when you didn’t need it?
Her current home had everything she needed and nothing more; a bedroom with a balcony overlooking the ocean, a kitchen just big enough to fit all her utensils, pots, pans, and appliances, with an attached dining room, a sitting room with a fireplace and bookshelves built into the walls, and a fence around the front of the property, keeping trespassers out. Even better, Lauren could see anybody approaching her house from the windows in her sitting room. The view was clear enough that anybody who so much as turned the corner was visible to her, nearly any time of day.
As she reached the deck behind her house, Lauren tossed her flip flops under her patio table and stretched her limbs, smiling contently as the light ocean breeze and the sound of waves lapping against the shore. She was done treating patients for the day, but a pile of paperwork awaited her on the table, held down by a couple of heavy medical journals she often took home with her from work. This is where she came after her beach walks; an attempt to balance her work life and her after-hours relaxation.
Before, when she was still living in an apartment and dragging herself through the door at all hours of the night, she might have poured herself a glass or two of wine while she pored over the papers at her kitchen table, her feet propped up as her eyes and pen scanned over words that she was too tired to read.
But that was before Slightuckett; before working at the clinic and living among people who all knew her name and smiled as they passed her on the street; before Emma; before…it.
Lauren shuddered and it wasn’t because of the wind on the bare skin of her arms. She shook any thoughts of cities and concrete and dim streetlights out of her mind as she sat down with Emma at her feet, nibbling on her toy. There was a cooler next to the table and Lauren reached inside for a bottle of water, cracking it open and taking a long, refreshing sip.
She hadn’t had wine in nearly three years now. Nor had she had anything else with the ability to make her lower her defenses. And, she’d vowed, she never would again.
Emma nuzzled her ankle and Lauren reached down, scratching that spot behind her ear that made the retriever arch into her touch, her tail thumping on the hardwood floor of the deck. She’d gotten Emma not long after she arrived in Rhode Island, from the daughter of one of her deceased patients.
Mrs. Pollack had been sick with Dementia for a long time, her mind deteriorating to the point that she was never allowed to be left alone. The last time she’d come to see Lauren, she hadn’t even known who her daughter, Claire, was. Nor did she have any idea who Lauren was. Every few minutes, she asked who they were and where she was, not recognizing her surroundings in the slightest. Claire Johnson had held her hand as tightly as possible as she continued to remind her mother, over and over again, that they were at the doctor.
Lauren heard the words, “Am I sick?” more times than she’d been able to count that last day. Most Dementia patients didn’t last longer than half a decade, but Mrs. Pollack had started showing symptoms over a decade ago and had gotten into drug trials from the get-go. Her daughter had done everything she could to keep her mother healthy. She took her for walks around their neighborhood, telling her stories of when she was a child, hoping to keep her mother’s memory fresh, but soon even the most advanced and hopeful of medications stopped working.
Emma was a rescue from the local shelter, and a last-ditch attempt at keeping her mother happy and alive. Claire had heard that dogs had some kind of inexplicable healing power and she’d taken Mrs. Pollack to the pound, hoping that the karma of saving the life of one of those dogs would outweigh the Dementia that had by then firmly set into her mother’s mind. Mrs. Pollack had fallen in love with Emma from the first second she saw the young dog, smiling up at her from inside a cramped cage, her brown eyes big and hopeful, her tongue lolling out of her mouth.
For three years, Emma was Mrs. Pollack’s companion. She kept her company on the days that Claire couldn’t stay home to watch her, kept her calm when she didn’t recognize her nurses, kept her healthy for longer than any doctor—Lauren included—could have predicted. Mrs. Pollack lived a year longer than anybody thought she would.
After her funeral, which Lauren attended out of respect for the sweet old lady, Claire had approached with Emma on a leash, tears in her eyes.
“I can’t keep her,” she said, looking down at the dog, whose tail no longer wagged. “Just looking at her reminds me of my mother and she’s…” She trailed off, her voice choking as she dabbed her eyes with a tissue. “She misses my mother, too. She looks out the window all day long, as if Mom’s just at the doctor’s, about to come home any minute. She won’t eat or sleep or…” She took another deep breath. “The vet said that a change of scenery might be best for her, but I don’t want to take her to the pound, you know?” Lauren nodded in understanding. “So I was wondering if you might possibly have any room for her in your life.”
A year earlier, Lauren might have said no. She worked long hours in a hospital and could barely remember to buy food for herself, let alone do it for a pet. Any pet that she owned when living in her cramped little apartment in New York would have been miserable, no doubt about it.
But one look into Emma’s eyes and she was a goner. The poor girl had no idea what was going on; all she knew was that her best friend had gone somewhere and wasn’t likely to come back. All she knew was that she was sad and Mrs. Pollack wasn’t there to comfort her.
Lauren had taken the leash and, from that day on, Emma was hers. She has never regretted that decision. Not once.
Especially not as Emma laps at her fingers and nudges her leg, before settling her warm, furry chin on Lauren’s foot underneath the table. The weight of her friend’s head is a comfort as Lauren started in on her paperwork, drowning out the world as she focused on the words on the page.
It was the familiar roar of an engine that had her falling out of her chair, the paper in her hand crumpling as her fingers squeezed around it. Her arms raised above her head as she fell into a fetal position on the ground and her heart pounded a punishing rhythm against her ribcage as she tried to make herself as small as possible, her knees pressed firmly to her chest. Beside her, Emma jumped to alert immediately and began to sniff around, looking for the threat to her master’s safety that had affected her so.
When the obedient dog found nothing in sight, she began to bark, which startled Lauren even further, causing her to curl into an even tighter ball before she looked up at her dog, who was facing away from her and clawing at the sliding glass doors that led into their house.
“Emma, no,” Lauren hissed, her eyes beginning to scan the beach for any signs of a familiar nightmare.
But he couldn’t have actually found her. Could he? They promised her she’d be safe. That so long as she stayed hidden, nobody would ever harm her, ever again. Least of all, him.
But who were any of them kidding? There was no safe place from somebody like that. Not after he’d done what he did to her. It was bound to happen sooner or later, wasn’t it?
Lauren’s eyes scanned the inside of the house, which was beginning to darken as the sun set behind her. From the deck, she could see clear to the front door (another great thing about this place); all three locks were in place and there was no other way to reach her unless you went through one of the other properties and walked the quarter-mile through the sand dunes.
Still, the roar of the engine—which was beginning to sound like the growl of a dying creature—gave her pause before she stood. She brushed off her bruised knees, slipped into her flip flops, and reached for the door, sliding it open and stepping into the cool house. She still had the crumpled form in her hand and she gave thanks that she’d placed the medical journals back on the ones that she hadn’t started to fill out yet, lest they all get lost in the wind.
Lauren crept through her own home, turning on each light as she went, Emma dutifully at her heel, keeping the slow pace with her master, until they arrived at the front door. Lauren undid the locks like second nature, without even thinking about it, and tugged the door open slowly. She listened for his voice and tried not to breathe too loudly, as if he’d even be able to hear her over the roar of that engine.
The curses she heard, in a deep, gruff voice both relaxed and startled her.
It wasn’t him, but upon closer inspection, the man sitting outside on the pavement—albeit ruggedly handsome—didn’t look too friendly, either. His Harley sat two feet in front of him, on its side, the engine still running. And dying. He was looking at it with an angry expression on his face, but made no move to get up. She wondered if he even could.
Before Lauren could decide whether to call an ambulance or go out and help him herself, Emma had slipped by her and hopped down the three steps from the porch to the pavement, barking as she ran right toward him. The man seemed startled for half a second as the unfamiliar animal came toward him, before his face fell and he gave the retriever a frown.
“Scram!” he growled, but Emma didn’t pause. Not even as Lauren called for her to return.
It seemed that her pet had made the decision for her. Lauren checked the pocket of her scrub bottoms, relieved to find her house key in the left one, and locked her door before running out to help the biker. She was a doctor, after all, and as such she had taken an oath to help those in need.
She checked her right pocket to find that her pepper spray was there in case she needed it.
“Sir?” she called out as she came closer to the man, who was waving his hand at Emma, still trying to shoo her away as she continued to bark. “Sir, are you alright?” He glanced up at her, a glare set firmly on his face.
“This your dog?” he asked, gruffly. “Can you get it away from me?”
“Emma, heel!” Lauren demanded. This time, the golden retriever obeyed, trotting over to sit obediently at Lauren’s side, panting and looking up at her as if waiting for her next command. “Stay,” Lauren said, patting her head. She looked back at the biker splayed on the ground. “Are you okay?” she asked again. “I’m a doctor; I can help.”
From the way he held himself, even on the ground like that, she could tell from first glance that he had no internal injuries, but that didn’t rule out something just as serious. A concussion or some kind of sprain or broken bone. There had to be some reason he was still sitting there, after all. She scanned his body for signs of blood or protruding bone. In doing so, she couldn’t help but be impressed by his physique.
He was relatively young, his dark hair reaching his shoulders in a tangle of curls and waves. His jaw was angled and dotted with stubble that went beyond a simple five-o’clock shadow. His eyes were a startling shade of blue that looked almost like ice as he glowered up at her, through a mask of stone. His body was muscular and she could see tattoos on his ripped forearms. The patterns snaked up his arms like vines and disappeared under the tight shirt he wore beneath his leather vest. There were more on his neck that reached to just under his ears. His jeans were dark and ripped at the knees. There were a few scrapes where his skin was exposed, but not much else that Lauren could see without searching further.
Despite being a licensed doctor for nearly a decade and having seen several naked bodies, the thought of seeing his caused her heart to flutter. She cleared her throat and moved closer, crouching down in front of him.
“Mind if I check you over for injuries?” she asked, her fingers already itching to touch him. She berated herself internally; this was no time to act—or think—unprofessionally. The man was silent, but he nodded, giving her the permission she needed to finally place her hands on his body.
His shoulders were as strong and broad as they looked from afar. Lauren ran her hands over them, applying light pressure. “Let me know if anything aches,” she said, softly, checking his rotator cuffs. The man gave a curt nod and she watched his face for any sign of a grimace, but he betrayed nothing. Not until her hands had moved down to his chest, moving gently over his ribcage.
When she pressed against his stomach, he hissed and recoiled, his arms curling around his midsection. Lauren nodded. Broken ribs; at least two. Her hands returned to his body, sliding down until she reached his legs, trying to force back the flush that she knew was appearing on her cheeks. She ran her hands over one thigh, skating around his knee, which she could feel was just slightly swollen—though he refused to react this time, when she pressed on it to make sure that there was no dislocation of the joint or rip in the tendons holding it together—and then down to his ankle, encased in a leather biker boot, which probably saved him from breaking both the foot and ankle.
His other leg was almost identical, but there was less swelling in the knee.
“You might have a few broken ribs,” she informed him, “and your knee is swelling up a bit, but you seem fine otherwise.” She stood and offered her hand. “Can you stand?”
Ignoring the offered hand, the man attempted to shove himself up with his hands behind his back, but all it seemed to get him was another sharp pain in the side and a twisted wrist, which was a bit bruised. Lauren sighed and rolled her eyes, offering her hand more insistently this time.
“Swallow your pride, will ya?” she huffed. “I’m a doctor; it’s okay to ask for help from a doctor, don’t you think?”
The man sighed, but reached up, wrapping his large fingers (again, Lauren had to fight her natural reaction to shudder as heat pooled low in her belly) around hers, allowing her to help him to his feet. Even holding one knee gingerly and hunched over slightly with the pain of his injured ribs, the man loomed over her, tall and muscular and so handsome it should have been illegal. Lauren almost forgot to breathe as she stared up at him, and it was all she could do to keep her mouth from gaping open.
“You gonna tell me your name or…?” the man started, suddenly gazing down at her. And damn it if his look wasn’t just as alluring as the rest of him.
Lauren squared her shoulders even as she still held his hand (or, rather, he still held hers, as it was his fingers wrapped around her much smaller ones). “You first,” she said, putting as much authority in the words as possible. He still had that look on his face—the kind that might have infuriated her on any other man, but only lit a fire deep in her belly now.
“Marc,” he said, shaking her hand. “Marc Kelly. Now yours?”
“Lauren Stanton,” she replied. “M.D.”
“Impressive,” he said. “Surgeon.”
“No.” She pulled her hand out of his grip. “Lift your shirt?”
His thick eyebrows reached for his hairline. “Excuse me?” he wondered.
“I just have to check on your ribs,” she said. “If they’re broken, we should get you to a hospital right away.”
“Y’all have a hospital in this podunk town?” Marc snorted, but he lifted his shirt, anyway. Lauren couldn’t help the brief press of her lips as she took in the dragon tattoos that covered his muscular chest. The bruising wasn’t as bad as she’d thought it would be and thankfully it looked as if there was no internal bleeding, but it hadn’t been that long since the accident. The Harley’s engine was still revving in the background. She ignored it as she looked toward the sky and pressed her hand to the bruises, hearing him hiss, but feeling no evidence of broken bones. If anything, they were just badly bruised.
It was nothing to be too concerned about, so long as he didn’t do any strenuous activity for a couple of days.
“You can put your shirt down,” she instructed, trying not to let her own disappointment show as he followed her orders. “Your ribs look…” amazing, fantastic, mouthwatering, “fine. There’s some pretty nasty bruising on your chest, but otherwise you’re okay.”
“You mean except for my knee?”
“Your knee is also pretty banged up,” Lauren admitted. “But I think it just needs some ice and rest to bring down the swelling. If you want, I can give you a ride to Joe’s Auto Shop; it should still be open for another hour or so. He can fix up your bike and give you a ride to wherever you’re staying for the night.”
“I haven’t quite figured that out yet,” Marc informed her. “I’ve been riding around looking for a hotel or an inn for the last half hour.”
“Oh, well, you won’t find either in Slightuckett,” Lauren said, walking over to his bike, which was leaking oil. She found the keys and pulled them out, stopping the engine completely. It puttered to a stop and went still. The silence surrounded them, leaving only the sound of waves and the ocean breeze in the distance. “No Bed & Breakfast, either.”
“Guess I need to figure out something else.” Marc Kelly said, frowning down at her.
“There’s a city nearby that I can drive you to. Your bike probably won’t be ready to ride until tomorrow, anyway. There are a few hotels scattered near the beach.”
“I don’t do cities,” Marc replied, in a firm, gruff tone of voice. “I’m tryin’ to stay more, uh, local.”
Lauren furrowed her brow in suspicion. “Are you on the run from the cops or something? Because, you know, the whole ‘doctor/patient confidentiality’ thing doesn’t extend to criminal activity. And there’s a police station right down the street.” She reached into her right pocket, clutching the pepper spray in case he tried something. Instead, Marc shook his head.
“All my warrants have been cleared,” he said, firmly. “I haven’t seen the inside of a jail cell in years. Besides, those were all minor offences; never longer than a year.”
“That is really not a comforting thought,” Lauren admitted. “But fine. Let’s say I believe you. What are you really running from, if not the law?”
“A few old friends of mine,” he said limping toward her house.
For a tense moment, Lauren was certain that he was going to attempt a break-in, but all he did was plop himself down on the top step, extending his leg and holding his ribs. His motorcycle remained in the street, just slightly off to the side. “We had a bit of a disagreement over a certain…female.” He stared off in the distance. “She couldn’t resist getting a piece of this.” He ran one of his hands down his body, coming to rest on a very suggestive place on his person. It took everything in her for Lauren not to follow the line of his fingers, keeping her eyes on his face as she painted on a bored expression.
“Why would they care who you slept with?” Lauren asked, moving to the sidewalk, but no further. Emma moved with her, staying obediently at her side. “Was she married to one of your ‘friends’ or something?”
“Close,” Marc said. “She was the daughter of one of my friends.” He answered without hesitation, as if the memory of her face was flashing behind his eyes. “Veronica was her name. She was quite the sight.” He made a motion with his hands, like outlining her figure. “Wide hips, thick thighs, big…” he motioned to his chest, giving Lauren the gist of it. His eyes quickly raked up and down Lauren’s body and, suddenly, she felt as if she were under a microscope—but not unpleasantly so.
It was a strange feeling; to feel a man’s eyes on her body like that and actually like it for the first time in years.
Still, she tried to act unaffected by his gaze.
“We should get on the road,” she said. “Joe’s is across town and we have to show up at least a half hour from closing if we want him to send out a tow truck for your bike. Let me just put Emma away and I’ll help you to my car.”
“Emma?” Marc looked down at the dog at Lauren’s heel. “What kind of name is that for a dog?”
“A fine one,” Lauren defended. “Besides, I didn’t name her; she’s a rescue. Emma, come!”
The retriever trotted after Lauren and kept her body between her master’s and this strange man’s the entire way, even as they ascended the steps to the front door. Lauren’s hand continued to clutch the pepper spray, even though she knew the chances of Marc overpowering her with his injuries were significantly less than if he were in perfect health and mobility. But she wasn’t about to let her guard down around a stranger.
Never again.
Lauren slipped inside after Emma and shut the door after her, sliding the chain into its slot, just in case the biker got any funny ideas. She made her way into the kitchen next, refilling Emma’s food and water bowls and setting them on the floor, before grabbing an ice pack from the freezer and wrapping it in a paper towel.
On her way out, she grabbed her car keys and gave Emma a pat on the head. “Go eat,” she ordered, and the dog was all too happy to follow that command, happily attacking her food bowls with puppylike gusto.
Lauren slipped back outside, leaving all the lights on to keep up the façade that she was still home, and flipped the switch on her porch light, before hopping down the steps and offering her hand, once again, to Marc Kelly. He took it and allowed her to pull him up before he let go and limped in the direction of her Jeep in the driveway.
The Jeep was old and beat up, but it was as reliable a car as Lauren had ever had. And she’d gotten it cheap, from a friend; there’d been only 40,000 miles on it and the engine was in near-perfect condition. She’d driven it from New York to Rhode Island in the dead heat of summer without breaking down once. And, in the tiny town of Slightuckett, she didn’t have much need to drive it, anyway, so it stayed in good condition.
She used the remote to unlock the car and opened the passenger-side door for Marc.
“Thanks, but I’m fully capable of opening a car door,” he said, as he took hold of the door and motioned for her to go around to the other side oft he jeep. Climbing in and stretching out his legs, sighing in relief as he relaxed into the leather seat. “Nice interior.”
Lauren rolled her eyes, but couldn’t help the way her lips curled up in an amused grin as she left him to shut the door and ran around to the driver’s side. She climbed into the seat and clipped on her seatbelt, glancing sideways at her passenger and pausing just before she pressed the key into the ignition.
She cleared her throat and Marc turned to her with a raised brow. “What?” he asked, at her expectant look. She glanced down pointedly, then back up at him and his other brow raised. “Really?” he said, evenly looking into her eyes, one eyebrow raised.
Lauren furrowed her brow in confusion for half a second, before her face suddenly flamed up and she shook her head, frantically. “What? No!” she exclaimed. “I meant...ugh! Seatbelt!” she exclaimed. “Put your seatbelt on!”
“What are you, a cop?” Marc huffed. Even in the darkness of the car as day turned to dusk, she could see a mischievous twinkle in his ice blue eyes.
“No,” she retorted. “But I am a doctor. I trained as a trauma surgeon for five years; saw plenty of car accidents in that time. Most of them were caused by idiots who couldn’t bother to strap themselves in.”
There was a moment of silence as Marc clicked his seatbelt on.
“I thought you said you weren’t a surgeon.”
Lauren paused, her hand on the key, which she’d inserted into the ignition. She hadn’t meant to reveal that much. She never revealed that much to anybody; not if she could help it. She took a deep breath and swallowed down the fear.
“I’m not,” she said, as the engine roared to life and she backed out of her driveway, not saying another word on the subject. When she saw Marc’s mouth open in her peripheral vision, she reached for the radio, turning it on and turning up the volume to drown out his voice as she made her way to Joe’s Auto.
Thankfully, he seemed to get the message. The rest of the ride was punctuated only by the voices of pop singers on her radio.