Off the clock.
Roni Loren.
To my family, always.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.
There are so many people behind the scenes that help these books happen. I could never thank them enough.
Donnie, for your love and laughter and unflagging support.
Kidlet, for being awesome.
Mom, for listening to me ramble about writing problems even though most of the time I"m probably not making any sense at all.
De, for always having full confidence in me no matter what.
Julie Cross, Dawn Alexander, and Jamie Wesley, for being my "friends at the office" while I was writing this book. Thank you for the venting sessions, the celebrating, and the gossiping.
My agent, Sara Megibow, for always championing my books and for doing power reads when I"m having book panic attacks.
My editor, Kate Seaver, for being such a pleasure to work with and for loving these books.
Taylor Lunsford, for beta reading, being honest, and for saying, "What about Eli?" when I was brainstorming the short story.
And always, always, to my readers, for being fearless romantics, for reading my books, and for being the awesome people that you are.
Thank you!.
The Pleasure Principle: The human instinct to seek pleasure and avoid pain.
One is very crazy when in love.
-SIGMUND FREUD.
1.
Then.
"I"m going to wrap my fingers in your hair and slide my other hand up your thigh. You have to be quiet for me. We can"t let anyone know."
Marin Rush paused in the dark hallway of Harker Hall, her tennis shoes going silent on the s.h.i.+ny linoleum and the green Exit signs humming softly in the background. She didn"t dare move. She"d been on the way to grab a soda and a snack out of the vending machine. Her caffeine supply had run low and watching partic.i.p.ants snore in the sleep lab wasn"t exactly stimulating stuff. But that silk-smooth male voice had hit her like a thunderclap, waking up every sense that had gone dull with exhaustion.
She"d a.s.sumed she was the only one left in the psychology building at this hour besides the two study subjects in the sleep lab. It was spring break and the cla.s.srooms and labs were supposed to be locked up-all except the one she was working in. That"s what the girl she was filling in for this week had told her. But there was no mistaking the male voice as it drifted into the hallway.
"I bet you"d like being f.u.c.ked up against the wall. My c.o.c.k pumping in you hard and fast."
Holy. s.h.i.+t. Marin pressed her lips together. Obviously two other people thought they were alone, too. Had students snuck into the building to get it on? Or maybe it was one of the professors. Oh, G.o.d, please don"t let it be a professor. She should turn around right now and go back to Professor Roberts"s office. Last thing she needed was to see one of her teachers in some compromising position. She would die of mortification.
But instead of backing up, she found herself tilting her head to isolate where the voice was coming from, and her feet moved forward a few steps.
"Yeah, you like that. I know. I bet you"re wet for me right now just thinking about how it would feel. Maybe I should check. Keep your hands against the wall."
A hot s.h.i.+ver zipped through Marin, making every part of her hyperaware.
"I"m so hard for you. Can you feel how much I want you?" That voice was like velvet against Marin"s skin. She closed her eyes, imagining the picture the stranger was painting-some hot guy behind her, pinning her to the wall, his erection rubbing against her. She"d never been in that situation, but her body sure knew how to react to the idea. Her hand drifted up to her neck and pressed against her throat, her pulse beating like hummingbird wings beneath her fingertips.
She waited with held breath to hear the woman"s response, but no voice answered the man"s question. Can you feel how much I want you? he"d asked. And h.e.l.l if Marin wasn"t dying to know. She strained to hear.
"I tug your panties off and trail my hand up your thighs until I can feel your hot, slick . . ."
Marin braced her other hand against the wall and leaned so far forward that one more inch would"ve sent her toppling over. Your hot . . .
"G.o.ddammit. Motherf.u.c.ker."
The curse snapped Marin out of the spell she"d fallen into, and she straightened instantly, her face hot and her heartbeat pounding in places it shouldn"t be. There was a groaning squeak of an office chair and another slew of colorful swearing.
Whoever had been saying the dirty things had changed his tone of voice and now sounded ten kinds of annoyed. A wadded-up ball of paper came flying out of an open doorway a few yards down. She followed the arc and watched the paper land on the floor. Only then did she notice there were three others like it already littering the hallway.
Lamplight s.h.i.+fted on the pale linoleum as if the person inside the office was moving around, and Marin flattened herself against the wall, trying to make herself one with it. Please don"t come out. Please don"t come out. The silent prayer whispered through her as she counted the doors between her and the mystery voice, mentally labeling each one. When she realized it was one of the offices they let the Ph.D. students use and not a professor"s, she let out a breath.
Either way, she had no intention of alerting her hall mate that he wasn"t alone. But at least she could stop worrying she"d gotten all fevered over one of her professors. Now she just had to figure out how to get past the d.a.m.n door without letting him see her. She"d gotten used to skipping meals to save money since starting college a few months ago. But she wasn"t going to make it through the next two hours of data entry and sleep monitoring if she didn"t get some caffeine. No wonder none of the uppercla.s.smen had wanted to fill in during break.
Marin"s gaze slid over to the stairwell. If she stayed on the other side of the hall in the shadows, she could probably sneak by unnoticed. She moved to the right side wall and crept forward on quiet feet. But as soon as she got within a few steps of the shaft of light coming from the occupied room, a large shadow blotted it into darkness.
She"d been so focused on that beam of light that it took her a moment to register what had happened. She froze and her gaze hopped upward, landing on the guy who filled the doorway. No, not just any guy, a very familiar guy. Tall and lean and effortlessly disheveled. Everything inside her went on alert. Oh, G.o.d, not him.
He had his hand braced on the doorjamb, and his expression was as surprised as hers probably was. "What the h.e.l.l?"
"I-" She could already feel her face heating and her throat closing-some bizarre, instant response she seemed to have to this man. She"d spent way too many hours in the back of her Intro to Human s.e.xuality cla.s.s memorizing each little detail of Donovan West. Well, his profile, really. And his walk. And the way his shoulders filled out his T-s.h.i.+rts. As a teaching a.s.sistant, he usually only stopped in at the beginning of cla.s.s to bring Professor Paxton papers or something. But each time he walked in now, it was like some bat signal for her body to go haywire.
It"d started with the day he"d had to take over the lecture when Professor Paxton was sick. He"d talked about arousal and the physical mechanics of that process. It was technical. He"d been wearing a T-s.h.i.+rt that read Sometimes I Feel Like a Total Freud. It shouldn"t have been s.e.xy. But Lord, it"d been one of the hottest experiences of her life. He"d talked with his hands a lot and had obviously been a little nervous to be in front of the cla.s.s. But at the same time, he"d been so confident in the information, had answered questions with all this enthusiasm. Marin hadn"t heard a word in the rest of her cla.s.ses that day for all the fantasizing she"d been doing.
But now she was staring. And blus.h.i.+ng. And generally looking like an idiot. Yay.
She turned fully toward him and cleared her throat, trying to form some kind of non-weird response. But when her gaze quickly traveled over him again, all semblance of language left her. Oh, s.h.i.+t. She tried to drag her focus back to his face and cement it there. His very handsome face-a shadow of stubble, bright blue eyes, hair that fell a little too long around the ears. Lips that she"d thought way too much about. All good. All great.
But despite the nice view, she couldn"t ignore the thing in the bottom edge of her vision, the thing that had caught her attention on that quick once-over. The hard outline in his jeans screamed at her to stare-to a.n.a.lyze, to burn the picture into her brain. The need to look warred with embarra.s.sment. The latter finally won and her cheeks flared even hotter. She adjusted her gla.s.ses. "Uh, yeah, hi. Sorry. I thought I was alone in the building. Didn"t mean to interrupt . . . whatever."
He stared at her for a second, his brows knitting. "Interrupt?"
G.o.ddammit, her gaze flicked there again. The view was like a siren song she couldn"t ignore. Ma.s.sive erection, dead ahead! She glanced away. But not quick enough for him not to notice.
"Ah, s.h.i.+t." He stepped behind the doorway and hid his bottom half. "Sorry. It"s, uh . . . not what it looks like."
She snorted, an involuntary, nervous, half-choking noise that seemed to echo in the cavernous hallway. Really smooth. She tried to force some kind of wit past the awkwardness that was overtaking her. "Ohh-kay. If you say so."
He laughed, this deep chuckle that seemed to come straight out of his chest and fill the s.p.a.ce between them with warmth. Lord, even his laugh was s.e.xy. So not fair.
"Well, okay, it is that. But why it"s there is just an occupational hazard."
His laugh and easy tone settled her some. Or maybe it was the fact that he was obviously feeling awkward, too. "Occupational hazard? Must be more interesting than the sleep lab."
He jabbed a thumb toward the office. "It is. s.e.xuality department. I"m working on my dissertation under Professor Paxton."
She could tell he didn"t recognize her from cla.s.s. Not surprising since she sat in the back of the large stadium-style room and tried to be as invisible as possible. Plus, she was wearing her gla.s.ses tonight. "I"m with Professor Roberts. I"m monitoring the sleep study tonight."
"Oh, right on. I didn"t realize he"d taken on another grad student. I"m Donovan, by the way."
I know.
"Mari." The nickname rolled off her lips. No one called her that anymore. But she knew he probably graded her papers, and the name Marin wasn"t all that common. She forced a small smile, not correcting him that she was about as far from a grad student as she could get. She wanted to be one. Would be one day if she could figure out how to afford it. She"d managed to test out of two semesters of cla.s.ses, but high IQ or not, that dream was still a long way off-a point of light at the end of a very long, twisting tunnel.
Marin s.h.i.+fted on her feet. "I was heading to get a c.o.ke so that I don"t fall asleep from doing data entry and watching people snore. You need anything?"
"A c.o.ke?" He glanced down the hall. "Don"t waste a buck fifty on the vending machine. I"ve got a mini-fridge in here. You can come in and grab whatever you want."
Are you an option? I"d like to grab you. The errant thought made her bite her lips together so none of those words would accidentally slip out. She had no idea where this side of herself was coming from. Not that she"d really know what to do after she grabbed Donovan anyway. This was a twentysomething-year-old man, not one of the few boys she"d awkwardly made out with in high school. This was a guy who"d know how to do all those things she"d only read about in books.
"No, that"s okay, I mean . . ." She s.h.i.+fted her gaze away, willing her face not to go red again.
He caught her meaning and laughed. "Oh, right. Sorry. Yes, you should probably avoid strange men with erections who invite you inside for a drink. Good safety plan, Mari." He lifted his hands and stepped back fully into the doorway, the p.r.o.nounced outline in his pants gone. "But I promise, you"re all good now. You just caught me at an . . . unfortunate moment. And now I"m going to bribe you with free soda so that you don"t tell the other grads in the department about what you saw. I keep these late hours and work through holidays to avoid that kind of torture."
He gave her a tilted smile that made something flutter in her chest. She should probably head straight back to the office she was supposed to be working in. He was older. Kind of her teacher. If he found out she was one of Pax"s students, he"d probably freak out that she"d seen him like this. But the chance to spend a few minutes with him was too tempting to pa.s.s up.
Plus, the way he was looking at her settled something inside her. Usually she shut down around guys. Being jerked around from school to school on her mom"s whims hadn"t left her with much time to develop savvy when it came to these things. But something about Donovan made her want to step forward instead of run away. "Yeah, okay. Free is good."
"Cool." His face brightened. Maybe he"d been as lonely and bored tonight as she had been. He bent over and picked up the papers he"d thrown into the hallway and then swept a hand in front of him. "Welcome to my personal h.e.l.l. The fridge is in the back corner."
Marin stepped in first, finding his office a sharp contrast to the sterile sleep lab. His desk was stacked with photocopied articles and books, a Red Bull sat atop one of the piles, and a microphone was set up in the middle with a line going to the laptop. Along the back wall was a worn couch with a pillow and a blanket. More books were on the floor next to the makes.h.i.+ft napping quarters. Controlled chaos. She carefully made her way to the fridge and grabbed a Dr Pepper.
"Did you want me to get you something?" She peered back over her shoulder.
Donovan was busy gathering a pile of papers off the one other chair in the small office. "No, I"m good. Just opened my third Red Bull. I think my blood has officially been converted to rocket fuel. Don"t light any matches."
She smiled and stepped back toward the door. "I hear ya. Well, thanks for the drink. I"ll let you get back to-uh, whatever it was you were doing."
He pointed to the spot he"d cleared. "Or you could stay for a sec and take a break. G.o.d knows I need one."
She hesitated for a moment, knowing she was taking the I"m-a-fellow-grad-student charade too far, but then she thought about the endless boredom awaiting her in the sleep lab. She moved her way around the desk and sat. What could a few more minutes hurt? "Yeah, you sounded kind of p.i.s.sed off when I walked by."
He stilled, and she cringed when she realized what she"d revealed.
He lowered himself to the chair behind his desk. "You can hear me in the hallway?"
"I- Sound travels. The hall echoes." She made some ridiculous swirling motion with her finger-as if he needed a visual interpretation of the word echo. She dropped her hand to her side and tucked it under her thigh to keep it from going rogue again.
"Good to know. So you heard . . ."
"Enough."
He laughed, all easy breezy, like they were discussing what they"d had for lunch today instead of X-rated talk and random erections in an inst.i.tute of higher learning. "Well, then. Guess I should probably explain what I"m doing so I don"t look like a total perv."
"It"s fine. I mean, whatever." She wasn"t sure if she sounded nonchalant or like she"d taken a few sucks off a helium tank. She guessed the latter.
He lifted a crumpled paper off his desk. "This is what you heard."
She leaned forward, trying to read the crinkled handwriting.
"Scripts," he explained. "I"m doing my dissertation on female s.e.xual arousal in response to auditory stimuli. I"m recording scripts of fantasies that we may use in the study."
"Your study is about dirty talk?" she asked, surprised that the university was down with that. And if he was the one doing the dirty talking, where did she sign up to volunteer?
He smirked and there was a hint of mischief in that otherwise affable expression. "Yes, I guess that"s one way to put it. If you want to be cra.s.s about it, Ms. Sleep Disorders."
"I"m no expert, but I know what I heard."
"Fair enough. But yeah, I"m focusing on the effect of scripted erotic talk on women who have arousal disorder. A lot of times, therapists suggest that these clients watch erotic movies to try to increase their libido. But in general, p.o.r.n is produced for men. So even though that method can be somewhat effective, the films don"t really tap into women"s fantasies. They tap into men"s. Erotic books have worked pretty well. But I want to test out another method to add to the a.r.s.enal-audio. It"d be cost effective to make, wouldn"t send more money to the p.o.r.n industry, and could be customized to a client"s needs. Plus, it"s easy to test in a lab."
Marin liked that he was talking to her like a peer, and his frankness about the topic saved her some of the weirdness that would normally surface when talking about s.e.x. Academic talk soothed her. Plus, his pa.s.sion was catching. That"s what she loved about this environment. In high school, everyone acted like they were being forced to learn. She"d always been the odd one for actually enjoying school. Books and all that information had been her escape. Schools changed. The people around her changed. Books were one of the few things that stayed constant. But here at the university there were people like Donovan, people who seemed to be mainlining their education and getting high off what they learned. "So what were you so frustrated about?"
He grabbed his can of Red Bull and took a sip, keeping his eyes on her the whole time. "I"m discovering that women are complicated and that I"m having trouble thinking like one."
"Ah. And this is shocking news?"
"Well, no. I knew it was going to be tough, but the fantasies are turning out to be harder than I thought. We did a round of romantic ones in a small trial run, and they were a major fail. Women reported enjoying listening to them but the arousal was . . ." He gave an arcing thumbs-down. "My friend Alexis, one of the other grads working under Pax, told me that I needed to go more primal, tap into the forbidden type of fantasies, that sweet romance makes a girl warm and fuzzy but not necessarily hot and bothered."
Marin"s neck p.r.i.c.kled with awareness, but she tried to keep her expression smooth. "Makes sense."
"Does it?"
"I-uh, I mean . . ."
"Never mind. I retract the question." He leaned back in his chair and ran a hand through his dark hair, making it even messier. "I met you like five minutes ago, and I"m already asking you if taboo fantasies do it for you. Sorry. Hang out in this department too long, and you lose your filter for what is acceptable in normal conversation. I spent lunch yesterday discussing nocturnal penile tumescence with a sixty-five-year-old female professor, and it wasn"t weird. This is my life."