Unbound: (InterMix) (31 page)

She nodded, blinking away tears. “I needed to hear it. More than I even realized.”
And now that she had . . . “I love you, too.”

Her words affected him as physically as a wound—emotion so intense, his eyes shut
tight, face so tense he could’ve been in pain. She held his head, stroked his hair,
and let him feel whatever this was, be it fear or relief or gratitude or something
else entirely.

With a harsh, hitching breath, his eyes opened. He kissed her, fingertips on her jaw,
then lost in her hair. When he pulled away he looked delirious—drunk on feeling.

“You . . . you know I’m terrifically fucked-up, right?” he asked.

She laughed. “Yes. I’ve come to like that about you.”

“Good. Just wanted to be sure we’re clear on that . . . Now say it again.”

“I love you.” The words were as rousing to utter as they were to hear. Like sex, the
giving and receiving of it equally thrilling.

He urged her to turn over, then draped his arm around her waist and buried his face
in her hair. “Stay the night,” he murmured. “Here. With me. And tomorrow. And the
night after.”

“I will. I’ll stay with you.”
Maybe someday,
I’ll come and stay forever.

He held her tight, lips grazing the nape of her neck as he spoke. “I can’t wait to
meet you all over again, Merry. And to let you meet me.”

She smiled and shut her eyes, wrapped her arm around his.

“And I’m so excited to make your acquaintance, Rob Rush.”

Keep reading for an excerpt from Cara McKenna’s “sweet, smoking hot”* erotic romance

AFTER HOURS

Available now from InterMix

*Beth Kery,
New York Times
bestselling author of
Because You Are Mine

The second half of my shift proved quiet, borderline boring. Having Kelly as a distraction
wouldn’t have gone astray.

As a psych professional you have to pay attention constantly, not just for signs of
danger, but while taking a zillion sets of vitals, in making notes in the right files,
doling out the right meds in the right dosages at the right times, making sure the
right patient actually swallows them . . . Nothing dynamic, but I swear the sheer
constancy
with which you have to be alert is as tiring as any physical chore. By the time dinner
hour was over and we met with the next shift for the hand-off meeting, I felt like
I must be dreaming. I staggered down the stairwell on aching feet.

I wiped my name off the duties board and ran into Jenny while I was changing.

“Got plans tonight?” she asked, dialing her combination lock.

“No, none at all. Just finish unpacking and pass out.”

“You’re more than welcome to come along to a little party across the road. Retirement
bash for one of the veteran RNs in our geriatric ward. Free eats. You know where the
transitional residence is?”

“Yeah.” I stripped off my scrubs, not feeling compelled to tell her I was in fact
living there for the time being.

“You should come. Get off campus, enjoy a drink. I’ll introduce you around to some
people from the other departments.”

I wouldn’t have minded meeting the geriatric staff. I had experience with that, after
all, and wouldn’t say no if a chance to transfer out of the locked ward should present
itself.

“Starts at seven thirty,” Jenny said. “Bring your staff ID—they’ll be rigid, what
with alcohol being served.”

“Okay. Sure.” Why the hell not? It was my birthday. There’d be drinks, maybe a cake,
and even if they weren’t in my honor, it’d be nice to do
something
special. Restraint training had been the highlight of my day, and that wouldn’t do.
Exhausted or not, I deserved a bit more. I could top getting tossed around and banged
up by Kelly Robak. Then I pictured his body, and wondered if maybe I couldn’t.

With twenty minutes to kill, I strolled through campus and crossed the road, headed
up to my little apartment and changed into the only dress I owned. Nothing glamorous,
but it gave me a bit of a figure, and that was a luxury after two days in nothing
but yellow pajamas. As I clasped a pair of earrings, I hoped there’d be wine. Against
my better judgment, I hoped there’d be Kelly as well. But he didn’t seem the type
to carouse while still basically on the institute’s grounds, nor one to cut loose
in front of colleagues and ruin his stoical façade. Though he’d allowed me a glimpse
of his after-hours self, at the bar. And surely I wasn’t so special that it’d been
some one-time peek.

On the first floor, a series of construction-paper signs pointed the way to the party,
in the large basement rec room—the unglamorous venue surely picked for its proximity
to work, and because alcohol wasn’t allowed anywhere inside Larkhaven’s gates. I didn’t
recognize anyone when I arrived, but I was pleased to spot a motley selection of beer
and wine lined up on a ping-pong table; crackers, cheese, veggies and dip, and an
uncut cake on the other side of the net.

What I wasn’t so pleased to see was a room full of scrubs. I wasn’t the only one who’d
changed, but the majority of the partygoers seemed to have come straight from a shift.
Instantly I felt dumb and overdressed, some newbie weirdo in a wrap dress and heels—no
matter how short they were—surrounded by sneakers and clogs. The folks who weren’t
dressed for work wore jeans.

“You came!”

I turned to find Jenny behind me, holding a gift bag bursting with pink tissue paper.

“Oh, hey.”

“You look great. Trying to put the rest of us to shame?”

I tailed her across the room to a table laden with flowers and presents. I eyed them
with envy. It was my birthday, after all. Standing there with no one to realize that
fact, I felt lonely, deep down to my bones.

But it wasn’t as though I were used to my birthday being special. My grandma hadn’t
been in a state to remember it in recent years, and I considered it a banner year
if my mom thought to call. Amber had offered to have me over for pizza and cupcakes,
but since I got off work so late and my nephew would already be asleep, I’d asked
for a rain check.

I followed Jenny’s lead and poured myself a cup of wine. She introduced me around,
largely to staffers my own age. I smiled a lot and forgot everyone’s names, wondering
if they’d remember mine or just think of me as That New Girl Who Didn’t Get the Dress
Code Memo.

Shyness had me drifting out of conversational orbits twenty minutes into the party,
and I was about to up my wine dosage when someone set an empty cup beside mine. I
knew it was Kelly from his oversized hand and its misleading wedding band, and my
heart thumped as I tilted my face toward his. In an instant, I was drunk.

“You look awful fancy.”

A blush warmed my cheeks and I tried to hide it by filling my cup. “I know.”

“Special occasion?”

I shrugged, looking around to indicate the party.
It’s my birthday,
I wanted to tell him.
Make a big deal of me.

“You promised me a glass of wine this morning in restraints,” he said.

“True. Though I don’t see any funnels.” I filled his cup. He tapped it to mine and
gave my body an open, brief up-and-down, at once businesslike and predatory. I took
too big a gulp and felt my face burn brighter still.

Kelly had changed, but only into jeans. “How you feeling, after this morning’s workout?”

I flexed my left shoulder and it swore in protest. “Pretty dinged up. Can’t say I’ll
be sad when your days of throwing me around are over.”

He faked a jab to his ego and gave me a wounded look, but there was mischief in his
eyes. He hadn’t missed the double entendre I’d accidentally lobbed his way. “Be grateful
there were gym mats.”

“And witnesses,” I cut back, and yeah, it sounded pretty bad—like we were agreeing
things would’ve evolved into something scandalous, had the setting been different.
Damn it.

“And Audra, barking corrections,” Kelly added.

“Yeah. That’d be a mood killer.” Oh fuck, why had I said
that
? His resulting smile was as dangerous as ever, a shot of pure, liquid stupid plunged
straight into my bloodstream.

He answered my flirtation with another assessing look. It wasn’t terribly professional,
but I was grateful for that. I’d spent my first two shifts feeling like a newbie,
a jailer, a waitress, and a wuss. Felt good to feel like a plain old woman, something
enticing enough to bring a little heat to Kelly’s cool gaze. The wine suddenly tasted
very expensive, and I decided it was everyone else’s loss, not taking the opportunity
to dress up a bit, not my folly.

A small group of people came by and we made room for them to get drinks. I wandered
toward the middle of the party with Kelly, praying no one could see the comical lust
lines vibrating from my body toward his.

He’d worked at Larkhaven for years so he knew everyone, and as long as I stuck by
him, I was never at a loss for conversation. It seemed perhaps he did shed that cold
façade alongside his gray uniform, and tonight he was as warm as I’d yet seen him.
He introduced me and goaded our colleagues into recounting old war stories—funny ones,
not scary ones. I was even invited to join Larkhaven’s softball team, though judging
by the way my coworkers put away the boxed wine, recreational drinking was the institution’s
official sport.

After an hour’s mingling I felt relaxed, even a little charming. I also felt dangerously
attracted to the man on my left. But I wouldn’t ever act on it, so what was the harm?
It’d been more than a year since I’d made out with a guy or had a date or even a crush,
and I’d forgotten how fun infatuation was. Like being continuously buzzed on champagne.
You just have to know when you’ve had enough.

By ten I was yawning uncontrollably, and as nice as it was to feel cheerful for the
first time since arriving here, it couldn’t top the promise of bed. I got to sleep
in a bit the next morning before restraints, and I could use all catch-up rest I had
coming to me.

“You want a refill?” Kelly asked me, nodding at my empty cup.

“No, I better get to bed. It’s been a long couple days.”
Walk me up,
I wanted to say. Walk me to my door, and give me a look that said he wanted to kiss
me, but not actually do it.
Send me to bed with no thoughts of attacks or paperwork or antipsychotic dosages.

But he didn’t. He drained his own cup and took mine, tossing both in a nearby garbage
can. “You’re taking all the glamour away.” He said it like I ought to feel guilty,
and gave me a final assessing glance.

“You’ll cope.” I smiled wearily and offered a wave before heading for the stairs.
I wanted so badly to turn, to see if he was watching me go. But if he wasn’t, I’d
be disappointed. And if he was, he’d know I cared.

Upstairs, I changed into pajama pants and a tee shirt and checked a voicemail from
my sister—no crisis brewing thank God, just “Happy Birthday” sung into the phone,
with Jack shrieking gleefully in the background. I hung up, smiling.

A knock at my door interrupted my search for a washcloth. Nervous, I peered through
the peephole.

Kelly, of all people.

Every ounce of my hard-earned self-possession vanished in a breath.

I swung the door in. “Um, hello.”

He took up the entire threshold, and he was holding a vase of white lilies.

Fucking hell, he was here to woo me. And I would go so,
so
easily.

I wished I hadn’t just gone from heels and a dress to bare feet and an oversized Red
Wings tee shirt.

“Happy birthday.” He held out the flowers and I accepted them.

“How did you know that?”

“Saw it on the roster this morning—the participants list for the restraints course.”
His chameleon eyes looked blue again, the pale robin’s egg shade of my walls.

“Oh. Well, thanks.” He was being so uncharacteristically sweet, I offered a dopey
smile and admitted, “I wish you’d said something earlier. I was feeling sorry for
myself all day, thinking no one knew.”

“That’s a shame. Want me to sing to you?” This was a strange hybrid version of Kelly,
a mix of the cool, civil man I passed on the ward, and the more mischievous one who’d
proclaimed himself a controlling hothead in the neon intimacy of the bar.

“That’s all right.” I put the flowers on my dresser, disreputable bits of me still
clinging to the hope that he was here to seduce me. Getting trounced by a gigantic
orderly seemed a great way to kick off my twenty-ninth year. Except for . . . well,
he was my coworker, for one. And nearly a stranger, and a bit of a chauvinist.
But only a bit,
my pussy pointed out.
And he brought me flowers.
Valid points.

I cleared my throat and nodded to the vase. “They’re lovely, thanks.”

“They’re secondhand. I nabbed them from the party.”

Aaannnd
 . . . seduction ruined. “You stole someone’s going-away flowers?”

“With permission. She had plenty more where those came from.”

Okay, so he hadn’t driven into town and back to get me a gift, but what in the fuck
did I expect? Who did I think this guy was to me?

“It’s the thought that counts,” he pointed out.

“You’re right.” I wandered to my bed and took a seat, weariness redoubled. Kelly must
have sensed it, as he said, “Excited to spend your first morning off practicing choke
holds?”

“Oh yes, thrilled. Though I’d rather do it with you than a patient.”

He crossed his arms and leaned against the door frame.

“You can come in, if you want.” I pointed to a chair that didn’t match its desk, all
the furniture secondhand, castoffs like my flowers. Like every stitch of clothing
I’d owned growing up, even the shirt I wore now, inherited from some ex-boyfriend
whose face I could barely conjure.

Kelly’s gaze flicked around the room, but after a pause he shut the door behind him
and pulled out the chair. My room was small to begin with, but stick Kelly Robak in
the middle and it seemed all at once tight and hot. My womanhood suddenly felt much
the same.

I cleared my throat.

“Seems like you’re finding your feet,” he said. I thought I could smell him, behind
the lilies, but it was probably a delusion.

“I’m starting to get the routine. I know where stuff is, know some people’s names.
Thanks, for letting me tail you at the party. It’s the least square-peggish I’ve felt
so far. Overdressed or not.”

His eyes darted around again, and not in a sexy,
Which wall shall I nail her to?
kind of way.

“Is my room creeping you out?”

“Nah, not quite. It’s just weird. It’s so much like one of the rooms from the locked
ward, but a different color and without the bars, and with like, stuff on the walls.
I keep thinking, ‘slashing hazard,’” he pointed to a framed photograph that’d been
there when I moved in. “Suicide risk.” He nodded to a belt of mine, draped around
a bedpost, then to a bottle of perfume on my dresser. “Accelerant. Search the room
for matches.”

I smirked. “You haven’t clocked out yet.”

“After four years, I never really do. Not ’til I’m through those gates and halfway
to Darren.”

What a grim thought. Happy frigging birthday.

Kelly stood and strolled around my cell, taking stock of what little there was to
note. He stopped before my bed, staring out my window with his hands clasped behind
his back. “Nice view,” he said, gaze on the dark woods.

“Even better when the sun’s out,” I said dryly.

He looked down at me and smiled—the first real smile I’d seen from him all day, even
during the party. It heated me just as it had at the bar, filled me with bad ideas.

“What?”

He took a seat beside me, dipping the mattress. “We got a little something between
us, don’t we?”