Kat smiles. “Yeah, I’d like that.”
“With modern technology,” Dad says, “you can’t hide this for long. News outlets have zoomed in on the videos to read Duke’s lips. They know that Duke and Dean were talking about a baby.”
“They don’t know he was talking about Kat,” Austin says.
“Eventually, someone will figure it out,” Kat says. “My stomach will get too big to hide it. And I’m going to be living in the same apartment as Dean.”
Kat pulls her cell phone from her pocket to read a text message. She looks up at me and mouths, Thank you. Dean must have waited to tell her I apologized.
“I’ll order the pizza,” Austin says, reaching into his pocket for his cell phone.
“I’ll get the beer.” I head toward the kitchen and mutter, “I’ll need a lot of it to watch this shit.”
“I heard you, jerk,” Kat yells from behind me.
I snicker in response. “Trav, Theo.” They look up, and I point to the kitchen. “We need to talk.”
I promised Lila I would make more of an effort, and helping Dean out with the twins seems like a good start.
Chapter Sixteen
Duke
Lila looks good today. She’s dressed in a black pencil skirt that molds to her thighs and makes her legs look much longer. Her red top scoops low enough to give me a decent view of her cleavage. She has nice tits when she shows them. Most of the time, she’s covered up like a nun.
“Isn’t that what you want for your sister? A man who loves and supports her?”
Since the start of our session, Lila has been harping on my apology to Dean. She considers it a breakthrough in my recovery as if I have an addiction. Can you be addicted to being angry? Who knows.
“Yeah,” I retort. “Of course, I want that for Kat.”
She smiles. “I’m happy with your progress, Duke.”
“Can I ask you a personal question?”
She narrows her eyes at me. “Okay, I guess.”
“Is that why you married that asshole? Because he knocked you up?”
She crosses her arms over her chest and frowns. “My personal life is none of your business, Duke.” Her anger seethes through her. “We’re here to talk about you.”
“I want to know the woman I’ve been telling all my secrets.”
“You’ve told me very little,” she snaps. “I understand that you’re upset about your sister and feel like you failed her, but there’s more to your story. You have a history of anger issues. And it’s my job to determine the source of that anger.”
I stare at her, unsure of how to respond.
She leans forward, her elbows digging into her thighs. My eyes dart to her pale skin, thinking about sliding my hands up her toned legs. Sitting across from her, especially when I’m this worked up, all I can think about is sex. I want to fuck the tension from my body.
Puck bunnies have their uses, but Lila isn’t a puck bunny, and I can’t treat her like one. I respect her too much, even though she’s getting under my skin. Fixing my jeans, I adjust myself, hoping she doesn’t notice I’m hard just thinking about her. An awkward silence fills the room. Lila sighs, her eyes fixed on me as she crosses her legs.
“Fine,” she mutters. “You want to know something about me? This is completely unprofessional and unethical…”
“Give me something, Doc. I’m over here, spilling my guts to you every week. Do you know how hard this is for me? We have more than a doctor-patient relationship, and you damn well know it.”
“Ted was my high school sweetheart,” she says with a sigh. “He was the captain of the basketball team. I was a cheerleader.”
“You don’t seem like the cheerleader type.”
She rolls her eyes. “I was back then.”
“Do you still have the uniform?”
She narrows her eyes at me. “Why?”
“Because now that I have a visual, all I can think about is you in that short skirt and tight top.”
“Duke,” she warns. “I already said too much.”
“We already crossed the line, Doc. Why not jump over it?”
She gasps, looking away from me. A minute passes before she says, “Duke, I can’t…”
“Do you think I talk to anyone who asks me about my past?” I get up from the chair, closing the distance between us. She peeks up at me, her eyes watery. “Don’t pretend like there’s nothing between us. I know you feel it. We kissed, and I haven’t stopped thinking about it since.”
“I’m trying to keep this professional. I want to wait until our time is up before we explore anything further. This is my job, my livelihood.”
“I don’t see the problem.”
She sighs. “It’s not easy for an outsider to work with professional sports teams. I’m not like you. I don’t have a famous father who can pull strings for me. It took a lot of hard work to get to this point in my career.”
Even though I should be hurt by her words, I don’t allow them to phase me. She hates herself for crossing the line with a patient. Her anger isn’t directed at me.
“Why did you become a doctor?”
“To help people,” she says without hesitation.
“No, there’s more to your story.” I lock eyes with her. “You chose psychology for a reason.”
“My mom,” she admits. “She was the reason, okay?”
“What’s wrong with her?”
“She killed herself.”
Chills roll down my arms from her confession. I understand what it's like to lose a parent.
“I’m sorry.”
She sniffs back a few tears. “She was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. For most of my childhood, she was in and out of different facilities. Her moods would spiral so out of control, she spent weeks at a time in the hospital. She had a disease. The doctors could never get her medicine right. Even when they did, she would stop taking it as soon as she felt better.”
Lila wipes the corner of her eye. “And then, the spiral would start all over again. Some people fall so deep into their depressive states that they have suicidal thoughts. My mother did anything to keep herself sane, which meant prescription and even street drugs. It was hard, my childhood, and I was the parent in our relationship. I took care of her from an early age. I tried to hide her problems for as long as I could. And maybe that was part of the problem. We were on our own, and I was so afraid social services would find out and take me away from her.”
“What did you do when she went into the hospital?”
“My aunt would take me for short periods, but she had six kids already and didn’t have enough room for me to live with her full-time. After my mom’s final stint in the hospital, a nurse started asking too many questions. I ended up living in a foster home for a while. My mom couldn’t handle life without me. The weekend I was supposed to see her for our supervised visit, she swallowed an entire bottle of Oxycodone. When she didn’t show, my social worker had the police bust down her door. They found her on the couch and pronounced her dead on arrival.”
“Shit, Lila. I’m sorry. I thought it was bad when my mom died, but you had it so much worse.”
“To answer your question, that’s how I ended up marrying that asshole. Ted was a way for me to put my old life behind me and have a real family. We went to college together. He went to law school, and I got my Ph.D.” She leans back in the chair, her arm rested on the edge. “Enough about me. I want to know more about you and your family.”
“What do you want to know?”
“Tell me about your mom,” she says.
“She passed away from cancer when I was in high school. You already know that.”
“How do you think that impacted your role in the family?”
I shrug. “I’m not sure what you mean.”
“You went from older brother to caretaker of your siblings overnight.”
“You already know this.”
“Yes,” she says, “but I’m missing something. I believe yo
ur mother’s death and your father’s abandonment is the source of your anger.”
“You don’t need a Ph.D. to figure that out.”
“What was it like when your mother was still alive?”
“Before or after she got sick?”
“After,” she says.
“Dad was out of it a long time before she died. He was around all the time when she first got sick, but after the doctors told him it was terminal, he started disappearing. At first, it was an hour or two, and then it turned into days at a time. He hired a nanny, who my mom sent home after the first day. She didn’t want anyone else to raise us.”
“And how was it after she died?”
“My dad was either on the road or not mentally available. When he was home, he was just there… until I forced him to stop acting like an asshole.”
“What did you do to change that?”
“I smashed his face in.”
“Would you say your anger started before or after your mom died?”
“After, definitely after. My dad fucking left us, okay? I had to deal with everything on my own. If Austin weren’t there to help me, I would have lost my mind. The twins never stopped running around. They were a fucking nightmare. Theo and Trav are still a pain in the ass.
“What about your sister?”
“Kat’s the only girl. I didn’t know what to do for her. I had no idea what she needed. I had to learn how to do girly shit that my mom did for her.”
“How did Austin help out?”
“Austin was better at school than me, so he helped Kat and the twins with their homework. He has a lot more patience than I do. Austin read to them and did stuff like that. He took them to their doctor’s appointments. I drove them to school and made sure they had lunch and didn’t look like slobs.”
“So, you took on the role of your father?”
“Yeah, I guess so.”
“Walk me through a typical day in your house after your mom passed away. What was it like for you?”
“I would wake the twins and Kat for school. Then, I’d make them breakfast and pack their lunches. I cooked for them until I forced my dad to hire someone. It’s not like he couldn’t afford it.”
“Okay, so after you dropped them off at school, what would you do next?”
“I went to high school with Austin. I was a junior, and Austin was a sophomore. We were both on the ice hockey team, which was hard because we had to practice with our team after school.”
“Who picked Kat and the twins up?”
“My coach knew what we were going through. He let me come late to practice with Kat and the twins.”
“And then, what? Walk me through the rest of your night.”
“I’d practice with my team, and then we’d go home and eat dinner together. We eventually got a chef who cooked for us. Between Austin and me, we became the parents to three kids that didn’t understand our mom wasn’t coming back and that our dad had left us.”
“Why do you think he did that?”
“My mom was the love of his life. He was the love of hers. Dad couldn’t deal with reality.”
“How do you feel about that kind of love?”
“I don’t want to feel that kind of pain.”
“But what if you could experience that for yourself?”
“When my mom died…” I run my hands through my hair and sigh.
Why is she asking so many questions?
The timer on her phone dings, signaling the end of our session.
“Saved by the bell,” I whisper.
“We’ll start here next time,” she says as she gets up from the armchair. “Thank you for opening up, Duke.”
She walks toward the door.
“Wait. I need to talk to you.”
Lila turns to face me. “I have another patient in ten minutes. You have to go.”
“I don’t want to wait until next week.”
“You’re only required to come once a week.”
“I was hoping to take you and Max to the D.C. Zoo. She mentioned it the last time we were together.” Standing over her, I pin her against the door with my hip pressed into her body. “I won’t be your patient much longer.” She starts to open her mouth, but I interrupt her. “Don’t give me that shit about crossing lines. We already did. You can’t take it back.” I dip my head down low enough that I can feel her breath on my lips. “I want to spend more time with you.”
“It’s not just my life we’re talking about. Max loves you. You’re the equivalent of a superhero in her mind. I’m afraid to get her hopes up. She’s already been disappointed with Ted, who’s unpredictable and flaky. I don’t want her to get too attached to you. It would kill her.”
“Max is the reason I started opening up to you,” I admit.
She nods. “I figured as much. I saw the change in you the night you met her and then again at the game. I know you don’t think you’re making much progress, but you need to look at how far you’ve come. You've held everything inside for years. Whether you realize it or not, our sessions are working. Allowing Max and me into your life is proof.”
“One date,” I say against her lips. “I’m not above begging.”
“Duke, I don’t know…”
I take her hand and hold it over my beating heart. “Can you feel that?” Lila bobs her head, and I continue, “I’ve never felt like this about another woman.”
She shakes her head. “This is crazy.”
“And I’m crazy about you.”
Lila sucks in a deep breath. Her soft expression hardens, and her tone grows serious. “Please don’t make me regret this.”
“This isn’t a hookup to me,” I confess. “You’re the real deal, Doc.”
She glances up at me. “We have to take things slow. Don’t rush me. Don’t push it. I’m not a puck bunny. I’m not going to hop into bed with you on the first date.”
A smirk tugs at the corner of my mouth. “On the second one, then?” I laugh, and she smacks me on the arm. “Duly noted.”
“You know what I mean,” she groans.
“I’ll pick you up tomorrow at eight.”
Chapter Seventeen
Delilah
Duke stands in the doorway, dressed in gray slacks and a black button-down shirt. His eyes travel down the front of my dress and linger at my breasts. I chose a strapless red dress that stops mid-thigh and scoops down in the front.
“Damn, Doc.” He puts his fingers in his mouth and whistles. “You’re either trying to kill me or test your rule about no sex on the first date.”
“Oh, this,” I say, waving my hand at my side. “It’s nothing. Just something I found in my closet.”
After I dropped Max off at her dad’s house last night, I went shopping. I bought this for Duke, but he doesn’t need to know that.
He pulls me into his chest with his big hand on my back and plants a kiss on my lips. “You look beautiful, Lila. If I wasn’t pretending to be a gentleman tonight, I’d rip this dress off you and skip dinner.”
I laugh so hard, I snort. “Good thing you’re pretending to a gentleman, then.”
When I turn around, Duke taps me on the ass, causing me to jump.
“Hey.” I rub my backside, pretending it hurt.
He shuts the door behind him and follows me into the living room. Duke slides his hand to my stomach, and the other falls to my ass, right where he smacked it. He holds me in place, and every inch of my body hums with electricity.
“You’re testing me, woman,” he says against my neck. “I think I might have a medical condition.”
I laugh. “Since when?”
“I don’t know if I can get rid of this erection any time soon… Not with you in this dress.”
“That’s not a medical condition,” I point out with laughter in my voice. “That’s your body’s natural response when excited.”
“I don’t know, Doc.” He rocks his hips into me, so I can feel his length. “I think it might get worse as the night goe
s on.”
“Duke,” I warn. “We had a deal.”
He breathes against my neck, and I fall back into him, leaning my head back on his shoulder. My nipples are painfully sore and digging through the thin fabric.
“Excited, Doc?” He laughs and then runs his finger along the side of my breast.
I want him to keep touching me. It’s been years since I last had sex. Wow, that makes me sound pathetic. I was still married for two of the three years.
“Can I tell you a secret?”
“Is it dirty?” I can hear the smirk on his lips. “I like dirty secrets.”
“No.” I hesitate for a second and then mutter, “I’ve only ever been with one man.”
He lifts his head from my neck. “You’re a good girl, huh?”
I nod. “So, it’s important to me that we take this slow. I don’t want to rush into anything until we’re both sure that this is going to work out.”
Duke turns me around until we’re facing. “I like you.” He slides his finger beneath my chin until our eyes meet. “And sex is not what’s keeping me around.”
“I know,” I say, peeking up at him. “I want it to mean something.”
“It will,” he says. “Because you mean something to me. You’re the only person alive who knows the real me, and for some reason, you’re not terrified.”
“Why would I be? The real you is pretty great. You should let more people in.”
He gives me a genuine smile that illuminates his handsome face. I reach up to touch his cheek, and he grabs my hand, holding it in place. We stay this way for a few seconds before he kisses my hand.
“My name will only hold our table for so long,” he says. “You ready to go?”
Smiling like an idiot, I grab my purse from the couch. I can’t believe I’m going on a date with Duke Baldwin. None of this feels real. I had my doubts about this date, but when we’re together, all of my concerns tend to fade away.
* * *
The hostess seats us at a table in the far corner of the restaurant, where we have less of an audience. Several people noticed Duke on our way inside. Duke is a big dude. He’s hard to miss, even in a crowded restaurant.
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