by Whitley Cox
I cocked my head at her like the curious kitten I felt like, unsure what I’d just gotten myself into but not altogether terrified. “Why does Ta— Mr. McAllister think I need a shrink?”
“I’m not a shrink,” she said with an amused eye roll. “I’m a clinical counselor who happens to specialize in family, relationship, sex and meta-psychotherapy. I also teach yoga. We’re all multi-taskers here. One of the doctors on site is also a personal trainer, and I think the other one is a lifeguard. My husband is the executive chef in the Tiki Lounge.”
I’m not sure why she said that last bit. Perhaps it was to quell the subconscious worry that perhaps Dr. Sheffield and Tate were lovers, or at the very least, itch scratchers. It wasn’t until she said anything that I realized that had been precisely what I’d been thinking. And why wouldn’t I? She was gorgeous.
My fingers left the knob, and I took a couple of steps deeper into the room. She held out her hand, offering the couch again, like one might offer up a scrap of food to a mangy and snarling dog, with equal parts kindness and hesitation. If she was too forceful, I’d bite off her hand and run away; too gentle, and I wouldn’t take her seriously. This woman knew exactly what she was doing. With a resigned sigh, I ate up the rest of the distance and slumped into the couch cushions.
“I’m not sure what Tate thinks I need help with. I’m perfectly fine. Unless he thinks I’m crazy?”
Dr. Sheffield smiled a small smile and jotted something down on her notepad.
“I’m not crazy, you know? At least I don’t think I am. Heartbroken? Yes. Lost? Yeah, probably. Contemplating a career change? You betcha. Unhappy? Well, up until recently, that too had been a big ol’ yes.”
“Oh?” Her eyes lit up, and for the first time since I’d arrived, I noticed a hint of copper glimmering just around the pupil. I’d never seen such interesting or beautiful brown eyes. They were like shimmering cocoa truffles with flecks of gold leaf. “And why are you all of sudden happy? What has changed?”
“Don’t get carried away with that admission there, doc.”
“All right, then, so why don’t we talk about why you’re heartbroken and lost, rather than why you’re happy. It seems you’d prefer not to focus on the good things.”
Well, that was like a cold slap in the face.
I toed at a piece of fluff on the harsh white tile, deliberately avoiding her gaze. “My mom was sixteen when she had me. She did her best. But as soon as I turned eighteen, I got the hell out of there and only go back twice a year. I hired a speech coach to help me lose the drawl and have spent the last fourteen years trying to reinvent myself, distance myself from that town, that life, that . . . stigma. I don’t know my father, and you mind-meddlers would probably say I have daddy issues. I might in fact. Xavier seems to think I do.”
“Who is Xavier?”
“My ex. He dumped me about three weeks ago, in a room full of people with his mistress sitting on his lap.” I couldn’t stop the derisive snort that burst through my nose.
Dr. Sheffield lifted one perfectly spa-threaded eyebrow. “And how did that make you feel?”
“Do you provide counseling for all the staff too?” I asked.
Her lip twitched. “Yes.”
“Figures.”
The eyebrow ascended again. “Figures?”
“He’s fucking perfect, isn’t he? A modern-day Robin Hood. Only he’s not stealing from the rich, he’s just giving them something highly prized for an exorbitant price. Then turning around and giving back to the less fortunate, those that need it the most. Does the man have a flaw?”
“Mr. McAllister?”
“Of course, Mr. McAllister. Do you call him Tate?”
She shook her head. “Not very often, no.”
“Why?”
“Because as staff we’ve drawn a clear line—”
“Yeah, yeah, I’ve heard that spiel before. Don’t want to muddy the water. So does Tate . . . Mr. McAllister have any friends?”
“I can’t answer that.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
Her lips pursed into a perfect little pale pink rosebud.
“Does he come to see you for sessions?”
“I can’t answer that, either.”
I exhaled through my nose and eyed her with building frustration. “So, what’s wrong with me?”
A sculpted shoulder bobbed ever so slightly, making the waves of her hair glimmer and shine in the light that burst through the big north-facing window. It would appear the rains had fled and the clouds had parted, because outside it was beautifully bright. The sun was peeking in through gauzy drapes, while a fan in the corner made them move ever so slightly. I suppose an open window would defeat the privacy aspect of this session, even though at that moment I was feeling rather suffocated and would have liked some fresh air.
“Let me ask you something, Miss Ryan. Think of a time when you were most happy. When was the time you were at your happiest? Close your eyes.” I did as I was told. “All right now, focus.”
“Okay.” Still skeptical but willing to give it a whirl.
“Do you have that moment?”
As soon as I closed my eyes, Tate’s face popped up. We were out on the boat, hiking, wandering through the orchard picking fruit, sitting at the Tiki Lounge eating dinner, on my veranda laughing and clinking our breakfast mimosa glasses. Every moment that had any kind of happiness in it was full of Tate. I couldn’t find a moment in the last week, month . . . year where I had felt even as remotely happy as I did in these last few days.
“Do you have that moment?” she asked again.
I nodded. “Yes.”
“Good. Now hold on to it. You don’t have to tell me when it was, but just think. How can you get back to that moment, that feeling? Who were you with? What were you doing? If being happy is what you’re after, do the things that make you happy, be with people that make you happy.”
I swallowed, and the feeling of a warm tear trickling down my cheek made my whole chest shake. The thought of having to leave all this happiness in just a few days made my heart hurt. I wanted to feel this way forever.
“You can open your eyes, Miss Ryan.”
Licking my lips and trying to discreetly sweep my finger beneath my eye to catch the stray drop, I fixed her with a look that was equal parts confusion and frustration. How dare she make me identify what made me happy when that happiness was fleeting? When there wasn’t anything I could do to hang on to it? I couldn’t afford to stay here more than the week and a half I was slotted, and even though Tate had said I was more than just a piece of ass, he sure as hell wasn’t in love with me and about to ask me to stay. That was pure insanity.
“Now, how do you feel?”
“Pissed!” I said, trying hard to pop her head off with my mind power.
“Wonderful,” she cheered, uncrossing and re-crossing her legs. “Let’s explore that, shall we?”
Since the good doctor’s time was fixed into the price of the hotel stay and she didn’t have any appointments or a yoga session after me, we ended up talking for nearly two hours. I spilled my guts. All about Xavier, my seemingly endless stream of Mr. Wrongs before him, all crappy guys who treated me like an afterthought or not a thought at all, and my aloofness toward it all. My dead fish exterior that bored men and inevitably caused them to break it off in search of someone more adventurous and alive. Because when I dug down deep, really, really deep, Xavier wasn’t the first man to call me boring or dull. An ice queen or dead fish or some variation of the insult.
Of course, this all stemmed from my lack of a father figure, or so the good doctor had me deduce. Apparently, I’d put up these giant walls around myself and donned this “I don’t need a man” attitude that could be seen from space. And that wall, inevitably, pushed all the men in my life away. They felt neither needed nor wanted, because I was too afraid of getting attached to someone only to have them leave me later on.
For so long I’d tried to leave the life I’d
been brought up in behind, and I’d ultimately succeeded. No more drawl. My driver’s license said “Resident of New York.” And when I HAD to go home, no one recognized me anymore when I walked through the lone and rundown grocery store. I’d achieved what I set out to do, and that was exorcise Mississippi from my veins, my soul, my life. I lost the glasses, grew my hair out, lost twenty pounds, started using top-shelf moisturizers and wrinkle creams. I had a standing appointment at the salon every eight weeks for a trim and every five weeks with my eye-brow threader. I’d dabbled with Botox and fillers for a while but realized I didn’t need them, though Xavier seemed to think I needed to start getting them again. But I wasn’t a fan. I changed everything about myself thinking that it would make me happy. Make me whole. When instead it had turned me into this sad, empty, emotionless robot. Prim and cold and incapable of forging warm and serious relationships because I was terrified that the “true” me, the “real” me, the Parker Ryan from Bumpkinville, Mississippi, would be found out and be looked down on. I’d gone and taken up with the likes of Xavier Rollins, a man so snobby, so conceited, with his head so far and so firmly embedded up his own ass, that I’d forsaken and forgotten all the good parts of myself in the process. I had become a snob just like Xavier, looking down on my past life, on my mother, on my family, and in turn, on myself; forsaking fun, adventure and excitement because it wasn’t “cool.”
By the end of the session I was a sobbing mess, clutching tissues in both hands as I cried through my explanations, rehashing every single relationship I’d ever had—down to my eighth-grade boyfriend, Beau, and how he’d humiliated me at our school dance by sneaking off with my best friend, Shelly, to go and make out behind the stage. It may have even been as early on as that moment that I removed my emotions from the equation and went into a relationship guarded. I’d cried for hours over Beau, but after seeing the mascara stains on my pillowcase, I’d vowed never to let a man make me feel that way again. I didn’t need their love or attention to be whole, to be successful, to be happy. What I’d needed was to get the hell out of Mississippi, and start a new life. And I’d done just that. Only I’d done so at the cost of my own soul. Because as successful as I was, as far as I’d come in the last fourteen years, I was neither whole nor happy, and none of that had been because of a man.
I left Dr. Sheffield’s office feeling better. I still didn’t think it was possible to obtain the happiness I felt with Tate and hold on to it for more than my allotted time on the island, but during our discussion, without giving away the identity of the man I was smitten with, I decided that I was going to take this time as the respite from seriousness that I needed. I was going to go with the flow (something I’d never done) and live each day on its own and to its fullest, with zero expectation or plan. Besides, Tate had everything planned; he expected me to just submit, sit back and enjoy. I could do that. I would do that.
A quick stop in the lobby washroom had me splashing cold water on my face and regaining my composure. It had been a very revealing two hours, but a good two hours. I hadn’t expected to see a therapist while on vacation, but Tate seemed to know exactly what I needed; he’d been on the money every day so far.
“Do you know where Mr. McAllister is?” I asked Janessa at the front desk, after making sure my eyes no longer looked like two red-rimmed orbs of sadness.
“I believe he is upstairs in his office, Miss Ryan.” She smiled. “Would you like me to call and check?”
I nodded. “Yes, please.”
The queen of discretion and poise, Janessa called upstairs and spoke with Tate, and whether she knew of more than just a professional relationship she didn’t let on, but she also didn’t disclose as to why she was calling. My arrival at his door would be a secret. How had she known that’s what I’d wanted but was too afraid to ask for?
“He’s up there, Miss Ryan.” Her face didn’t give away anything. If I lived here, I’d try my damndest to befriend that woman. She was spectacular.
I gave her a quick nod of my own, then pushed the button for the elevator. “Thanks, Janessa. I’m going to head on up then.”
“You’re welcome, Miss.” Then finally, after she’d made sure no other staff member, guest or otherwise saw her, she gave me the most indiscernible wink. But I caught it. She put her head back down and started to tap away on the keyboard. Son of a gun, she knew!
In no time, I was standing in front of his office door. Feelings of nostalgia ran through me without restraint as thoughts from the last time I’d prepared myself to tap my knuckles to the smooth teak took my whole body by storm. It’d only been a few days, but already so much had changed. I knocked quickly and then waited.
“Come in,” he called from inside, the shuffling of papers muffled through the door.
Hesitantly, I opened it, poking my head around the corner. “You busy?”
At the sound of my voice, his head snapped up from where he’d been glowering at a document on his desk. The smile on his face made my skin tingle. Even the ends of my hair felt the spark. He was up and out of his chair and, in less than six strides, across the room and pulling me into the depths of his office.
“So, how was it?”
I gave him a sideways look. “You mean my therapy session? You shanghaied me into seeing a shrink while I’m on vacation!” But I couldn’t hide my smile, and my need for his touch wouldn’t allow me to pull away from his embrace.
“You’re not on vacation, you’re working,” he said with a wily grin, tugging me against his warm, hard frame. My whole body ignited. A needy heat pooled between my legs, want amplified by emotion, and right now I was a rollercoaster of emotions.
“You know what I mean,” I finally said, letting him tug me over to the couch, but I resisted that and instead steered him back over to his desk chair, pushing him into the body-hugging leather, hearing it whoosh out air and the springs slightly groan as they took his weight.
“Are you mad at me?” he asked, his eyes wary as he attempted to figure out what I was up to.
“I was,” I started, sinking to my knees in front of him and wedging my way between his thighs. I started to unbutton his dress shirt, letting each morsel of sun-kissed skin reveal itself. Faint threads of dark hair came into view as I released each opalescent button, defining the valley that led to his taut stomach and down into the waist of his slacks. “But in the end I gave in and we talked.”
“Good. And how do you feel now?”
“I still have some thinking to do, lots and lots of thinking, but I also feel better. Dr. Sheffield offered for me to come back again before I leave. If I have the time, I might take her up on it. Otherwise maybe I’ll look into counseling when I get back to New York.”
“Wha—” His Adam’s apple heaved thick and heavy in his throat as I snaked my hand into the front of his trousers. “What did you guys discuss?”
I fished around inside his pants and pulled out his erection. A delicious bead of pre-cum glistened on the head like a pearl.
“Unless you’re willing to tell me what you and the good doctor talk about, my lips are sealed . . . besides when I do this, of course.” I dipped my head low and let him bottom out in my throat.
“Sh-she told you I got to see her?” he stammered, his hands making their way into my hair.
I popped up and off his cock and gave him a sinister grin of triumph. “No, but you just did.” Then I bent my head again and went to task, making the most of my time on Moorea, of the moment, of paradise . . . of Tate.
Chapter Nine
The following day we went for an afternoon-long bike ride around the island. Not one to just jump on a ten-speed and zip in and out of traffic like a New York messenger boy, I was quickly sucking wind on the first big hill.
It was nearly dinnertime, and although we’d stopped and grabbed lunch at a cute little restaurant in one of the many quaint villages, all the activity of the day and the sun overhead had drained me of my energy. But it’d also left me with a ravenous hunger,
and my belly grumbled loud and demanding with each pedal of the bike.
“How much further back to the hotel?” I wheezed, feeling the heat from the afternoon on my shoulders and kicking myself I hadn’t packed my sunscreen to slather on another layer. I’d never been very good with directions, and my bearings were completely off. I knew we’d cycled almost completely full-circle, or at least I thought we had, so I figured we’d be coming up on the hotel any moment. My rumbling stomach certainly hoped so.
“We’re not going back to the hotel just yet,” Tate said with a grin over his shoulder, having pedaled around the island with the ease and familiarity of a seasoned cyclist.
I’m not even sure the man had broken a sweat. Did he swim a hundred laps every morning and then head out and bike around the island every day, too? I mean, you can’t be a slouch to get a body like that, but come on!
My expression betrayed me, and he started to laugh. “It’s not much further, babe. We’re meeting Justin, Kendra and the girls for dinner at a restaurant up ahead in another little village.”
I perked right up and put the pedal to the metal to catch up with him. “Oh, that sounds like fun.”
He nodded. “Yeah, it should be. They do traditional Polynesian dances as dinner entertainment here.”
I caught up to him and fell in line, the two us pedaling side by side down the road. I resisted the urge to reach out and hold his hand. It would have been cute, and made one heck of a picture if there was anyone behind us with a camera, but undoubtedly awkward as hell.
“So, what’s Kendra and Justin’s deal?” I asked, bending down to grab my water bottle from the holder on the frame of my bike.
Tate shrugged. “I’ve known James since high school. He’s a year or two older than me, and he introduced me to Justin. The three of us hung out in college. But then James and I had a falling out one year when he caught me sneaking out of his sister’s bedroom one night when we were all home for Christmas. Amy was eighteen, and I was twenty-one, but James only saw red, no numbers, and he hauled off and decked me. We lost touch, but Justin and I always remained friendly, although he sided with James, as the two are as close as brothers.”