Czytaj książkę: «Indecent»
Lucky wore nothing but an apron
The shoulder straps barely covered her breasts. Her fiery red hair framed her face in a riot of sexy curls. She’d brought a large metal spatula with her from the kitchen, and the way she held it seemed to indicate that if the need arose, she could use it for something other than turning food.
Colin’s throat tightened as she leaned against the doorjamb, causing one of the straps to move so that her nipple peeked out. He stared at her intently. “Come here.”
Her green eyes twinkled at him naughtily. “I would, but I’m afraid I might burn something.”
“Baby, the only thing burning is me sitting here looking at you looking like that.”
She slapped the spatula into her opposite palm, her gaze traveling in a leisurely way over his nude body where he sat on the bed. The action made him entertain all sorts of ideas about what she could do with the utensil.
“Over easy or sunny-side up?”
Colin allowed his mouth to curve into a slow, suggestive smile. “Any way I can get you.”
Dear Reader,
In our first SLEEPING WITH SECRETS title, Forbidden, you met Leah Dubois Burger and bad-boy-to-the-bone J. T. West. And their relationship was really, really hot! But if you thought that was intense, just wait until you feel the chemistry between Colin McKenna and Lucky Clayborn!
In Indecent, sexy psychologist Colin refuses to take on provocative Lucky as a patient, namely because he wants to have sex with her in the worst way…. Unfortunately, it’s also in a way that’s dangerous to his career. You see, this isn’t the first time he’s dealt with a patient’s desire, and that episode is the reason he now handles only group appointments. But all too easily Lucky turns the tables on him, making him feel as if he’s the one needing help. And with Lucky, he is….
Colin and Lucky’s story is so unlike anything we’ve written before. We hope it proves to be one of those one-sitting reads for you! We’d love to hear what you think. Write to us at P.O. Box 12271, Toledo, OH 43612, or at karayianni@aol.com. And be sure to visit us on the Web at www.BlazeAuthors.com and www.ToriCarrington.com.
Here’s wishing you love and hot, memorable reading,
Lori & Tony Karayianni
aka Tori Carrington
Indecent
Tori Carrington
MILLS & BOON
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We wholeheartedly dedicate this book to Susan Till, who reads between the lines and knows what we want to say even when we don’t. Thanks for making us look so good!
Contents
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
Epilogue
1
GOING WITHOUT sex wasn’t Colin McKenna’s idea of a good time. Which meant he’d had a pretty lousy time of it for the past three months.
His athletic shoes clapped against the cement walkway paralleling the Maumee River, his cadence even, the sound of his breathing filling his ears. To his right, the sun was just beginning to break the horizon causing the temperature to rise on the clear June day. He’d run this route along the river ever since buying his downtown penthouse condo last year. But in the past three months the route had lengthened and lengthened along with his rising level of sexual frustration.
Another man might take things into hand, literally.
Colin preferred running.
His lungs began burning, protesting the pressure he was putting on them. He grudgingly slowed his paced then came to a stop, panting as he turned toward the sun’s rays and squinted out over the river to the East Side and International Park. He’d grown up here in Toledo, Ohio, though a long way from downtown in the suburb of Sylvania. But he hadn’t hesitated when a block of newly renovated condos had gone up for sale in an old department store building, putting him in the heart of the midsize city that was an intriguing mix of old and new.
He took several deep breaths, each slower than the one before, as he brought his pulse rate under control. As a psychiatrist, he knew the power of mind over body. It was of some interest, then, that his body was increasingly overruling his mind’s need for control.
He’d never paid much attention to the importance of sex in his life until he’d been falsely accused of indecent behavior by one of his patients three months ago. That was when his attorney had suggested he go without until the case was either dropped or settled in order to create a picture of himself as a model, upstanding citizen. Not that he hadn’t been that before, but he realized he had been a serial dater.
The case was also the reason why he no longer counseled patients one-on-one but rather took only group and couples sessions.
Three hours, a shower and two such therapy sessions later, Colin sat back in his office chair, listening as the married couple before him bickered about the price of their last meal out. Actually it didn’t matter what the topic was, the couple would argue about it. How they’d managed to keep from killing each other much less stay married for the past ten years was beyond him.
Give up and head for divorce court now, he wanted to say, but didn’t.
He glanced at his watch. Only five more minutes in the session to go.
Colin didn’t think he’d last two.
He absently rubbed the back of his neck. There were times when being a couples therapist was just as bad as going without sex, if only because his experiences over the past ninety days seriously undermined his belief in the institution of marriage. There were two types of couples—married and unmarried—that came to counseling. With the first type, the union was beyond repair and they were looking for him to work miracles on it and with the second type the participants were genuinely interested in putting their individual needs aside for the greater good of the union.
More often than not he saw the former. And the extent of his job was to play referee. One of his three partners at the Sylvania Mental Wellness Clinic had offered to get him scorecards for sessions like the one he was currently in the middle of or, better yet, a scoreboard and a buzzer to indicate when one of the spouses had entered foul territory.
In the case of the Hansens he would have ruled a TKO three sessions ago. Significant, considering this was their fourth session.
“Jocelyn,” Colin said quietly, watching as the woman’s face grew redder and spittle formed at the corners of her mouth. Normally an attractive woman, she looked like evil incarnate as she lit into her husband with all the finesse of a pro.
“…and if you think I’m just going to roll over and play patsy, you’ve got another think coming. I already have three kids. I don’t need another. I work a full-time job, same as you, and if I’m too tired for sex every now and again…”
“Jocelyn,” Colin said again, never having had to raise his voice during a session before but afraid this time might prove the exception.
Her husband, Larry, was shaking his head, his own color growing darker. “Shut up, Jos.”
The room fell silent.
Colin blinked. It was the first time Larry had said something of that nature before. Normally quiet, he nodded and probably didn’t pay attention to half of what was being said by either his wife or Colin. Not that Colin could blame him. Jocelyn didn’t so much as speak with you as she spoke at you.
Colin took in Jocelyn’s shocked appearance, spotting all the signs of a major outburst on the rise. He rubbed his thumb and forefinger against his closed eyelids. That was it. He was never getting married.
A brief knock on the door, then it opened. Colin frowned. The temporary receptionist that an employment agency had provided to fill in for their regular receptionist was not the brightest bulb in the string.
He squinted at the female figure that had come to a halt just inside his door. Definitely not the mousy temp he’d expected to see. Long, long legs encased in sheer black stockings. A short, short skirt that hugged her curvy hips in all the right places. A tight, tight white tank top that looked small enough to fit a six-year-old. Flame-red hair fell to the middle of her back and would no doubt tickle the dimples at the curve of her bottom when she was stripped down to her bare, creamy skin.
Mary Magdalene and the Virgin Mary all wrapped up in one provocative package.
His body was making it all too clear it didn’t like his self-imposed temporary celibacy.
His mind told him to hold up on the decision never to marry.
“Ooops. Sorry,” the walking advertisement for everything a man ever wanted in a woman said, then twisted her full lips. “Wrong room.”
Colin lifted his pencil and pointed over his shoulder. “Rest rooms are the next door up.”
She seemed to take her time as she sized him up, then smiled. “Thanks.”
Such a simple word.
Such an unexpected reaction as his groin and his throat tightened farther.
The door closed and Colin reluctantly returned his attention to Jocelyn and Larry. Only Larry was still looking at the closed door, his tongue nearly lolling out of the side of his mouth. Meanwhile Jocelyn looked an inch away from smacking her hand against his chin and shearing his tongue in half with the help of his own teeth.
“My, look at that,” Colin said before round ten of the Hansens’ weekly boxing match could begin. “Our time is up.”
He rose to his feet and put his notepad on the chair behind him. “I think we’ve made some good progress today,” he lied. “Same time next week?”
Jocelyn was still glaring at her husband while Larry shook Colin’s hand and thanked him. Before they were even through the exit door on the other side of the office, Jocelyn had already begun her next verbal attack. Colin closed the door, hoping they didn’t get into an accident on the way home. Not that he was particularly concerned about their well-being. Rather he was more worried about the unsuspecting drivers around them. Never mind the three children that waited at home.
As an only child of older parents, his upbringing differed greatly from what he guessed the Hansen children endured. Discussions at the McKenna dinner table had tended to evolve around page three of The Wall Street Journal or a novel one of them had recently read rather than whether his father’s inappropriate appreciation of a woman’s physical assets had been a shade beyond decent.
He edged around his desk and sat down. He wasn’t cut out for this couples-counseling gig. He fared a little better at group therapy sessions—like the addictive personality disorder one that was on tap next, and the monthly sessions he sat in on at a local runaway shelter—but still he preferred the one-on-one approach that allowed him to make significant progress in a patient’s psychological development.
He made notes on the Hansens, put the file aside, then pulled the five other files for the group he was due to meet in ten minutes. He fingered through them. He was familiar with four of the members, but the fifth was new. He opened the file on one Lucky Clayborn and sat back in his chair. Court-ordered therapy for two D.U.I.’s in a year and a half.
He pinched the bridge of his nose, silently praying that Lucky Clayborn wasn’t the woman who had walked in during his previous session.
Unfortunately, the way his luck was running he fully expected that the sexpot and the drunk driver were one and the same.
FEW THINGS were hotter than a gorgeous guy who had no idea how appealing he was.
Lucky Clayborn sat back in the soft leather chair, her gaze focused on sexy Dr. Colin McKenna while he listened to one of the other group members.
As accidental as it may have appeared, her walking into his office during his previous session had been anything but. After getting no farther than Step Two in the Twelve Step Program on three previous occasions, she’d been curious as to what the court-approved Dr. Colin McKenna was all about. She wasn’t an alcoholic, her court-appointed attorney had pointed out to the court during her last time in front of the judge. And while her word against the arresting officer’s the second time around hadn’t held much sway, she hadn’t been drinking when she’d been charged with the last count—she’d been on cold medication. But it seemed ever since the lowering of the legal intoxication limit, a generous tablespoon of cold medicine before you got behind the wheel was enough to set off the Breathalyzer.
And if every now and again she liked to blur the edges of her life with alcohol, that was between her and the vodka bottle.
The problem was she hadn’t gotten through the Twelve Step Program because she had, admittedly, been uncooperative. So the judge had restricted her driving privileges for six months and ordered her to six weeks of counseling (as an aside she’d also suggested Lucky stay away from any cold medications that contained alcohol).
So Lucky had wanted to get a look at the guy who had the power to have her license taken away altogether.
And she’d liked what she’d seen.
She slowly recrossed her legs, watching the sexy doc’s gaze slide to watch the movement even as he focused on the other patient’s progress report.
“Miss Clayborn?” he said a moment later, startling her. “Would you like to go next?”
Go where? She almost asked.
Then she realized she was being asked to introduce herself.
She glanced over the four other group members—two men and two women—who had all shared their stories. Two admitted alcohol was their stimulent of choice while the other two claimed prescription drugs were to blame for their addictions.
She quietly cleared her throat then crossed her legs again. “I’m Lucky Clayborn and I’m here to get help for my habit of taking cold medication when I’m sick then getting behind the wheel of a car and going to work.”
There was a heartbeat of silence, then one of the women laughed, the other three members smiled and Dr. Colin merely continued gazing at her with those rich dark-brown eyes without blinking.
“Cold medication was to blame for both counts?” he asked without consulting notes or a file or even looking away from her.
For the first time in a long time, Lucky broke a challenging gaze. “You’ve done your homework,” she said quietly. “I’m impressed.”
“And you’re avoiding my question.”
She folded her hands in her lap, trying to ignore how damp her palms were. “No. No, cold medication wasn’t to blame for both counts.”
She looked for something else to focus on rather than his face and found his hands an intriguing substitute. They were large and thick and it was all too easy to imagine them covering her breasts, her taut nipples between his thumbs and index fingers. Her gaze wandered up his perfectly starched white shirt and boring tie, resting briefly on the enticing, cleanly shaven stretch of his neck before lingering on his mouth.
After his bedroom eyes and thick, dark-blond hair, his mouth was by far his most appealing feature. She enjoyed watching his well-defined lips move when he said something in his deep baritone, then smiled. And he would undoubtedly know just what to do with his mouth when words were no longer the order of the day. Yes…Dr. Colin McKenna would definitely know how to kiss a woman. A man as attractive as he was not wearing a wedding ring—if she were married to him she’d probably solder it to his finger—didn’t get far without tasting his share of women. And though she wasn’t getting exactly the response she wanted from him with her leg-crossing, she did recognize the flare of attraction in his eyes before he covered it up and moved on to the next topic.
The problem was, he wasn’t moving the topic anywhere at the moment. He’d stayed silent after her last comment, obviously expecting her to go on.
Lucky swallowed hard and shrugged. “That’s it.”
He squinted, as if trying to get a handle on her. She could have told him not to waste his time. There was no handle to find. If there was, she would have found it a long, long time ago and maybe wouldn’t have to depend on that vodka bottle to help her get by every now and again when the shadows of the past grew long and her ability to battle them short.
Finally, Colin turned his attention to the man to his right.
Lucky shifted, though this time it had nothing to do with getting the sexy doc’s attention. Rather she was slightly relieved that she no longer drew his attention. Of course she couldn’t be sure if the tension filling her stomach had to do with his question or her insane attraction to him.
But she was sure she was going to find out….
2
COLIN COULDN’T REMEMBER a time when his tie had felt tighter.
“Thank you, Dr. McKenna,” Doris Borgdoff said as she passed him on her way out the door. Forty-five years old, mother of two grown boys, secretary at Owen-Illinois, he found it interesting that she still had trouble meeting his eyes when she spoke. “I got a lot out of today’s session.”
Colin forced a smile and said something he hoped was acceptable as his gaze shifted to the final member of the group. The reason for the peculiar tightness of his throat. The sole participant who had not participated, but who had accomplished what she’d set out to do, which was to drive him to distraction.
Sexy Lucky Clayborn glided, rather than walked, to stand in front of him and he was aware of every inch of her shapely legs, her lithe body, her full breasts under her thin shirt.
She smiled up at him, a seductive mixture of fearless feline and mesmerizing minx. He wasn’t even aware that she’d slid her hand against the door to close it until he heard the soft click of the catch hit home, essentially leaving them alone in his office.
“I was hoping to have a word…alone with you for a minute,” she said quietly, her deep-green-eyed gaze trapping his.
Colin’s tie was no longer tight, it was choking him. Everything that was male in him responded to everything that was female in her. A kind of primal reaction that elevated his heart rate and made him all too aware of how long he’d gone without sex.
And how much he wanted to have sex with her.
During the session he’d been overly aware of every move Lucky had made, the sound of her bare thighs sliding together as she crossed and recrossed her legs seeming to grow louder until he’d sworn he could smell the musk of her sex and had imagined what kind of underwear she had or didn’t have on. His gaze dropped to her plump lips, devoid of anything but a hint of gloss and moisture from where she’d just licked them.
Dear God, she was a patient. And he’d had attractive patients before. Even attractive patients that had come on to him.
But no one had made his groin ache the way Lucky Clayborn did.
He broke eye contact and moved to stand behind his desk. The more distance between them the better. “What is it, Miss Clayborn?” he asked, pleased that his voice still sounded like his voice.
She stood still for a long moment, apparently considering his movements, then she crossed to the desk—behind, not in front—and smoothly sat on top of it, giving him a peek of hot-pink panties under the short black skirt.
“You call all the other patients by their first name,” she didn’t say so much as purr. “Why not me?”
She sat not a foot away from where he stood and he was certain now that he could smell her unique musk. An intriguing mix of ginger and one-hundred-percent turned-on woman.
“You’re new,” he managed to push past his tight throat. “I generally address new patients by their proper names until a doctor-patient relationship has had a chance to develop.”
“Mmm.” She slowly scooted over until she sat in front of him.
Despite his best intentions, Colin’s gaze dropped to her sleek thighs, watching as her skirt hitched up a little farther. His mouth watered with the desire to put his tongue right there where a lone mole sat an inch or so away from the pink edge of her panties.
“Miss Clayborn,” he said, trying to keep things light though he felt anything but. He met her gaze, noting the widening of her pupils, the unmistakable desire to be kissed tinting her alluring features. “It’s my duty to remind you that as long as you’re my patient, there can be nothing of a personal nature between us.”
The way she was sitting directly in front of him, with her legs slightly spread, it would be all too easy to slide between those supple thighs, put his arms around her curvy body, then claim that decadent mouth of hers with a kiss that he knew would lead to so much more.
And boy did he want that. He wanted that bad.
She gave him a sexy half smile that suggested she knew exactly what he was thinking. “Shame,” she whispered, though she stayed right where she was.
“Mmm,” he admitted.
He forced his gaze away from her face, and his thoughts away from the voice that urged him to kiss her. Just once. Just touch his tongue to hers to see if she tasted as good as she looked. Slide his fingers up to see if her panties were damp.
“You didn’t participate in the session much,” he said, focusing on his Medical College of Ohio degree and his Ohio license to practice which hung in customized frames on the far wall. He’d worked hard to obtain both and wasn’t about to throw them away because of one electrifying temptress. “I can’t force you to, but you understand that I’m to submit progress reports to the court.”
That seemed to urge her into action. She slowly slid from the desk, putting her luscious body flush up against his.
Making her all the more irresistible.
Colin froze, trying not to notice the way her hips pressed against his, the graze of her hardened nipples against his chest through her shirt and his. His erection pulsed and twitched. There was no doubt she was aware of his aroused state. Their physical closeness allowed for few secrets.
He didn’t dare move. To do so would be to tip his hand, to let her know she had control. And he couldn’t give that to her. To do so would be to undermine their professional affiliation.
To do so would be to lose control, period. Not just over his desires, but over his entire life. Because to kiss Lucky, with those false charges hanging over his head, would be akin to kissing his career goodbye.
“Well, we all do what we have to in the end, don’t we?” she finally said.
She stepped away, but not before brushing against him in a way that made him grit his back teeth to keep from shuddering with need.
She smiled at him, picked up her purse from the desk, then let herself out the exit door.
Colin swallowed hard, and he was pretty sure sweat dotted his brow as he collapsed into his desk chair and made a mental note to himself never again to be alone in a room with Miss Lucky Clayborn.
LUCKY WAS LATE for work. Again.
Of course, it hadn’t helped that she’d lingered at Dr. Colin McKenna’s office after the group session, acting on an explosive attraction she hadn’t felt in a long, long time.
She knew enough about men to know that not many of them had the strength to do what the sexy doc had. Oh, yes, involvement with her would very surely put his career in jeopardy. But she’d seen the fiery attraction in his eyes. Had felt his erection, long and thick, pressing against her sex. And she’d known he had read her own signals clearly. Not that she’d been subtle about it. No, subtle would have been easy to ignore for a man like Colin McKenna. So she’d laid it out there for him…literally.
And he’d had the strength to refuse her when another guy would have shoved up her skirt and taken her right then and there on the desk.
A shiver ran the length of her spine as she rushed inside Harry’s Sports Bar.
Lucky waved a quick hello to the head cashier as she hurried back to the employee lockers just to the right of the kitchen and then shoved her purse inside the one marked with her name. She was aware that a couple of the male waiters stood in the corner watching her strip down to her bra and shimmy into her Harry’s T-shirt and apron. She barely glanced their way as she closed her tank inside the locker then twirled the attached combination lock.
“You’re late.”
The manager’s name was Harry, although he wasn’t the Harry on the sign, no matter how much he liked to pretend he was, especially when introducing himself to customers. “Hi, I’m Harry. Are you enjoying your meal?” he would say, leaving them to think he was the Harry of note.
He was somewhere in his mid-forties, was at least that many pounds overweight, and more often than not could do with a shower.
Lucky caught the way he stared at her breasts under the tight T-shirt and put her hand on her hip. “I told you I had an appointment.”
“You also told me you’d make it here on time,” he said to her breasts.
Since she’d landed the job four months ago, Harry had come on to her no fewer than ten times, usually when she worked closing and after all the staff had shared a wind-down beer. Now she usually opted for the earlier shifts even though the tips were better later, her patience for his unwanted attention wearing thin.
As she looked at him now, she suspected the same could be said for Harry. He looked a broken plate away from firing her and hiring another waitress that might be more open to his advances, despite the wedding ring on his left hand that he tried to hide with his class ring.
“I’m sorry. The session ran over,” Lucky said then reached around him to pick up a tray so she could bus a table in her station nearby.
He caught her arm when she tried to pass. “Consider this your second warning, Lucky.” He smiled at her in a way that made her skin crawl. “I don’t think I need to tell you there won’t be a third.”
“Understood,” she said as Connie, another waitress, came up on Harry from behind. Since Connie had been there over a year, she was apparently more open to Harry’s attentions.
She was glad when Harry moved his gaze from her breasts to Connie’s, and she left to go clear the table and take an order from a couple of guys who were sliding into a booth near one of the big-screen televisions on the back wall.
Lucky had been waitressing since she was seventeen and the job was second nature to her. She liked the noisy atmosphere, the nonstop movement, the odd hours. If every now and again her feet felt swollen a point beyond pain and her back ached, she just treated herself to a long, hot bath and a day spent reading then rushed right back into the fray. She’d never given much consideration to doing anything else. She liked her life the way it was. Uncomplicated. Routine. Familiar. With a little spice like the delectable Dr. Colin McKenna thrown in to liven things up from time to time.
Just thinking of him made her smile.
“What’ll it be?” she asked the next table as she straightened the condiment caddy and took out her order pad.
She was doing pretty much the same thing an hour later when two men walked in and took a booth in the next station. She usually gave customers only a cursory glance, but one of the two warranted a double take. Simply because he was one unmistakable Dr. Colin McKenna.
Lucky stood staring in his direction. Of all the gin joints in all the towns in the world…of course, he would have chosen Connie’s station to sit in.
“Are you going to take our order or not?” the guy in the booth next to her asked.
“Not,” she said, walking away.
COLIN ACCEPTED a menu from the girl who had seated him and his best friend, Will Sexton, then stared at the five big-screen televisions on the walls tuned in to different sporting events. He raised a brow at an archery competition then settled his gaze on Will.
“Come here a lot?” he asked.
Will and he had roomed together in college and had remained best friends ever since. While he’d gone the psychiatric route, Will was now a surgeon at St. Vincent-Mercy’s Trauma I Center.
“Don’t you?” Will asked in his thick British accent, cocking a grin at him. “Reminds me of the pubs back home.”
Colin highly doubted that, but didn’t say anything. Mirroring their choice in careers, Colin liked things quiet and subdued while Will’s motto was the more chaotic the better. At least in most things. When it came to their sex lives Colin usually liked things a little more wild, while Will had always chosen the sorority girls with the pink ribbons in their hair. Even now he was dating a sweet little resident who planned to go into pediatrics.
Of course, Colin’s preference had made turning down Lucky Clayborn in his office earlier all the more difficult.
Merely thinking of the hot, seductive woman made him tug at his collar, something he was free to do now that she was no longer in front of him.
“Welcome to Harry’s, gentlemen. Can I get you something from the bar?”
Colin looked up and nearly choked for the second time that day when he found himself staring at none other than the woman in question.
As soon as he had verified that not only wasn’t she a figment of his imagination, but that she was a waitress, he noticed that Lucky didn’t look anywhere near surprised. In fact, her predatory smile told him she’d probably spotted him the moment he’d walked in.
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