Page 101 of Dr. Bad Boy

I haven’t planned anything for tonight, obviously. And at any moment, there’s a chance my pager could go off, so I can’t do anything that’s too involved.

A cane. Her ass. The arm of the sofa.

I tell her what I’m thinking and she gives me a look I can’t decipher. “What if I say I just want to go upstairs and go to sleep?”

I frown. “Do you?”

“Answer the question, Max.”

“Pretty sure that’s not how this works, kitten. I ask, you answer. Do you not want me to cane your ass tonight?” I move closer, crowding her back against the wall. “Don’t tell me you want to be a boring vanilla couple now.”

She’s staring at my chest. “I don’t know what I want. And I don’t know what you want, either.”

“I want you, bent over the arm of the sofa. I want to make you scream. I want to make you wet. Then I want to fuck you until I stop worrying. I want to check out for the night. Is that so wrong?”

She shakes her head. “No. I’m sorry.”

“Then get your pretty little ass downstairs and wait for me. Naked.”

She shakes her head again. “I can’t.”

“What do you mean?” I stare at her, and for the first time since dinner started, she looks me right in the eye.

“Red.”

36

Violet

Idon’t waitfor Max to respond. Nothing he can say will change the fact that I need to not be here right now, before I spit out news he doesn’t want to hear. I move past him, collecting my stuff, and let myself into the garage.

The whole time, his gaze is on me. Hot, heavy, oppressive. Concerned, too, but only in so far as he had a shitty day and I was going to make that better.

Well, fuck you, Max Donovan. I didn’t have the greatest day, either. And yes, something’s wrong, but no, I can’t even begin to tell you about it.

Not yet.

But once I get my thoughts together, he’ll hear about. I shake my head, angry and pissed at him for being selfish and me for not saying anything…but I couldn’t.

And just like that, the anger slides into a cold, hard numbness as I back out of his driveway. I’m stoic as I navigate my way onto the main thoroughfare and ease into traffic.

But when I see the first Christmas lights decorating downtown, I burst into tears.

Ithinkabout calling in sick the next day, but it’s a grey, gloomy Thursday, and I’d rather try to lose myself in work than sit at home and feel sorry for myself.

I’ve fallen in love with a man who doesn’t want the same things as me. It’s such a classic trap. What was I thinking?

I wasn’t.

We were just having fun.

And now I’m an after-school special. Safe sex, kids. It’s no joke.

My stomach turns over when I think too hard about that, about how fragile that brief happiness was. How insanely, deliriously happy I was…and how it was all a sham.

I’m steaming mad by the time I hit the office. Whipping through the different emotional reactions, apparently. I snap at Hannah, then apologize. She offers to get me coffee, and when I slump in my chair, adds a muffin to the deal.

“I should go and get you a muffin,” I mumble, embarrassed.

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