Taken (A Bad Boy Romance Book 1) Read online

  “I’m not, and you know I’m not.”

  Mike shrugs his broad, rugby team shoulders. “Could’ve fooled me. I mean, I know your dad has done everything he can to keep you from going near anything that could put his little princess in harms way. But you’re not exactly a little girl anymore, are you Leila?” Mike’s eyes drop to my waist, taking things a little bit further than usual, even for him.

  I clear my throat and turn my body to the side. “Gross, Mike. Thanks for your support but I have work to do.”

  He makes a slight adjustment to his blue tie that’s peppered with tiny American flags. He scoffs again and says, “Whatever you say, Leila Crawford. Just let me know when you’re ready to grab a drink and go out with a real man.”

  I roll my eyes. He should know better, but of course he doesn’t. “How does never sound?”

  Mike shakes his head. “You and I both know it’s inevitable, for better or worse.”

  My stomach churns. Our dads are best friends, our moms are best friends… hell even our sisters are best friends. And if it were up to all of them, Mike and I would already be married by now.

  “Sounds a lot like true love,” I bite back.

  “Maybe, maybe not. But I can guarantee it’ll be one hell of a good time, Leila.”

  I rub my tired eyes. “Time to go Mike.”

  I hear him hem and haw. When I look up, he’s gone. Finally, some time to myself. I walk back towards my desk, and stare at all the paperwork I need to go through. Insurance papers, information release forms, association by-laws. I sometimes feel like I’m a fish out of water in this career. I don’t even know how I got here in the first place. It’s like I went to bed at six years old and woke up a grown woman, living in a world that I’m pretty sure I got pushed into in the first place.

  Another loud knock lands on my door. Goddamnit Mike. I walk over to the door to rip him a new asshole. With one fist clenched, and the other hand free to open the door, I swing the door open and almost scream.

  It’s him again. Brady. Wearing that perfect set of white teeth tucked within his broad, confident smile. My senses catch fire instantly.

  Please tell me he forgot his keys or his wallet or his…

  “I forgot something,” he says.

  Thank you.

  He looks around the room. Then I glance over at the two tickets that are now sitting on my desk.

  I cautiously point to them. “You… You want those back?”

  Brady chuckles and shakes his head from side to side. “Sorry Rookie, the tickets are yours. You’re coming to the show tonight.”

  What the hell is he doing here then? I panic, but not for the reason that I should be panicking. He could literally drug me to sleep, kidnap me, and lock in his basement for the rest of my life. But that’s not what scares me about Brady Stone. No, that would be much simpler.

  My heart starts to pound in my chest. Why is he here?

  “I can’t go to the show. And I don’t socialize with clients, for obvious reasons.” Brady scans my chest and directs his gaze across my stomach so fast I hardly notice it myself. But the butterflies in my belly noticed every last morsel of his glare. “You really need to leave now, Brady. I have a client coming in a couple of minutes,” I lie.

  His jaw tightens as he takes a quick step closer to me. I'm pretty sure he can see right through my lie. “You don’t have anyone else coming, Dr. Crawford. Just me.”

  Lightning jolts my spine. The only thing I know is this: This man, whoever the hell he is and wherever the hell he came from, needs to leave and he needs to leave now.

  I start to part my lips in order to act like the professional I’m striving to be by telling him that our time together is finished for the day. And maybe forever.

  I just can’t have anything complicated take place in my life right now. My whole life’s been leading up to this moment, and everyone’s watching. I’m determined to make it on my own, without any help from my dad’s fame, connections, or money.

  But it’s too late. Brady comes in hard and fast, causing my heart to almost drop down into my stomach as he pulls my body into his tightly. Fight back. Do something. Do anything, Leila.

  His warm, carnal beard rubs against the side of my tender face. He pushes his full, perfectly symmetrical lips against my mouth, and slides his tongue in between my lips before I can stop it. And now it’s too late. And it feels too good.

  I can’t help myself as I start to kiss him back. My hands push into his chest, but it’s so thick and so cut that my fingers feel like plastic Q-tips against it. Brady kicks the door shut without looking back. When I hear the door slam, I know I need a Hail Mary pass to win this game now. Last time I checked, therapists don’t make out with their clients. And if a therapist did make out with her client, she would quickly lose her license become a non-therapist. So why is my tongue pressed up against his, and why am I letting him run his hands across the back of my ass?

  And why is this most amazing experience I had in my entire life?

  He pulls me into his body tightly, and I can feel every last muscle from his abs and chest press up against my stomach and chest. My one and only client wraps his large fingers around my wrist and pulls it towards his waistline.

  I gasp for air. He just pressed my hand against the big, hard bulge in his pants. And as much as I try not to, I can’t help but moan.

  Everything is happening too damn fast for me to react with any sort of logic.

  I need to get this man away from my body and out of this office immediately.

  I hesitate, then pull my hand away from the bulge in his pants and pry my lips away from his mouth. Much to my dismay, I instantly regret my actions. But I’ll never let him to know that. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” I say, suddenly folding my arms across my chest as I play my best victim role.

  But the devilish glare in his eyes tells me he’s not all that ready to fork over an Oscar.

  “Trying to make a point,” he says. He rolls up both of his sleeves, revealing thick, muscular forearms splattered with tattoos; another reminder just how much is type is absolutely nothing like mine.

  The scariest, most delusional part? There’s a sick part of me that wants to do it all over again.

  But I can’t, not if I want to live a decent life.

  I shake my head and roll my eyes. My heart is still thumping hard in my chest, and I can feel beads of sweat form on the small of my back. “I really, really, really should not have done what I just did,” I say.

  He laughs and parts his lips. “What makes you so sure of that?”

  I hesitate for a moment, because part of me knows that he’s right. I’m not that sure. But everything I’ve ever known would tell me otherwise. For right now, I need to listen to that tried and true logic more than I need to listen to my own unreliable gut feelings. I trusted my instincts before, and look where that got me.

  My tone is laced with frustration. “I just am, okay?”

  His smile grows even wider, as if somehow he’s getting off on my self-combustion.

  “Can you please just leave now?” I plead.

  His eyes soften slightly as he stares directly into mine. I’m a torn up mess. Because on one hand I might have just made the biggest mistake a girl in my situation could make, and on the other hand I feel more alive than I’ve ever felt before.

  He grins. “I have to say, our first session was way cooler than I ever imagined.”

  I shake my head at him like he just landed in my office from another planet. “I don’t think you understand… This isn’t going to work.”

  He chuckles as he rubs the bottom of his beard, “I think it’s working just fine, Leila. See you at the show.” He turns and walks out the door before I can even exhale.

  I’m not going, I say to myself.

  Part of me thinks I should chase after them, just to tie up any misconceptions he still seems to have. There’s no chance in hell I
can continue being his therapist. And there’s no chance in hell I’m meeting him at some stupid show.

  Famous last words.

  * * *

  I love my little sister Sarah to death, but I just want to come home to an empty apartment for once. She’s been a mess lately ever since she dropped out of college. I guess that makes two of us who have been messes lately. But still, I’m her big sis, and no matter how bad things get for me I always feel the need to watch out for her.

  Even if my life is falling apart too.

  I tip toe inside our Brooklyn basement apartment. To call it an apartment is a major overstatement; it’s more like an oversized closet that probably violates every building code in the book. But apartments aren’t cheap in New York, and living in this dark cave, as sad as it is, beats the shit out of taking money from my dad.

  I walk into our apartment only to hear a lipstick commercial blaring in the background. I see an empty pint of ice cream on the floor next to the couch, then I see my sister’s pink painted toes dangling through the end of a tethered wool blanket. It’s not unusual for her to be asleep in the middle the afternoon like this. This is one diagnosis I can handle: Major Depressive Disorder.

  I feel sick every time I see her in this state, but I have my own problems going on right now. Like for example, the fact that I just went insane and grabbed my client’s erection. Yeah, I’d say that qualifies as my own set of issues these days.

  I try to make my way past the couch that Sarah is lying comatose on, but the wooden planks beneath my feet are just too damn old and too damn creaky. “You’re home?” she says with a raspy tone as she sits up from her midday sleep fest.

  I’m taken aback by her appearance. “You look like shit,” I say. Probably should’ve edited that before I said it, but seriously. Her eyes are pure bloodshot and her dark brown hair looks like an abandoned bird’s next lying sideways on the ground.

  “Thanks, I feel a lot better now that you just insulted me.”

  I glance at the digital green numbers on our cable box, then over at the empty food containers off to the side of the couch. “I’m sorry, I’m just…” I can’t finish telling her how worried I am about her, how she keeps me up at night because I’m terrified she’s going to lose all hope and try to hurt herself. Instead I grab a stray pillow off the floor and start my compulsive tidying spree. “How did the job searching go?” I ask, changing the subject.

  Sarah squints her eyes and looks off at the blue light coming from the TV. “I’ll start tomorrow. I promise. I just need to chill here for one more day,” she says.

  Same old same old. Depression will do that to someone; it’ll make them think that they’re moving forward, when they haven’t even gotten off the couch yet. But the last thing I want to do right now is to make her feel worse about herself. That’s not fair to either one of us.

  “Great, start tomorrow.”

  She sits up even straighter on the couch. “Are you mad at me?”

  I shake my head. “Honestly… no. I just wish you’d get some professional help.”

  My sister’s eyes sink down into her cheekbones. “I’m not like you. I can’t just let some total stranger pry me open and try to fix me. Face it, I’m useless.”

  I walk over to Sarah and bend down to kiss her forehead. “Will you at least try to stop saying those things about yourself? Every time you do that it’s like your stabbing yourself in the heart. You’re just reinforcing the same self-doubt over and over again.”

  My words pass in one of her ears and out the other. Her eyes widen as she points to the purple canvas bag slung over my hip. “What are those?”

  “What are what?”

  She points again, and it’s as though she’s momentarily snapped out of her self-loathing trance. “Those.”

  I look down and see the gold trimmed tickets, an instant reminder of the nightmare that ensued less than an hour ago. I knew I should’ve shredded those tickets when I had a chance. Remember the whole control switch thing? Something inside me just wouldn’t let me destroy those two tickets.

  “These? They’re called tickets.” I pull them out of the bag and hold them in front of her face as if to prove that they mean absolutely nothing to me, just two stupid pieces of paper that are about to get tossed into our blue recycling bin.

  My sister’s jaw opens as far at will go. This is the most animated I’ve seen her since the day I found out she dropped out of school. “You have backstage tickets to the Shadow Room? Tonight? Jesus, let me see those!”

  Reluctantly, I hand the tickets over to my Sarah. I don’t want to be reminded of him. But the look on my sister’s face might, and I say might with extreme caution, be the only thing worth it. I would do almost anything to protect her.

  Anything.

  Sarah stands up on the couch and starts jumping up-and-down like a 6th grade girl who just got kissed on the cheek by Justin Bieber. “Oh my God! Oh my God! You have backstage passes to see Invictus!”

  I squint my eyes. “In-what-cus?” To say that I’m out of the loop when it comes to anything that’s hip would be nothing short of a colossal misnomer.

  “Invictus,” she repeats.

  “Okay?”

  “As in the coolest band in NYC. As in the same band whose tickets sold out online within sixty seconds. It’s their last small club show before they go big time huge!”

  I gawk at my sister, mesmerized by her sudden onslaught of spunk. “I’ve never seen you so in love,” I say.

  Her cheeks flush red. “Have you seen the lead singer. He’s like a living god with tattoos!”

  I raise my eyebrows. “I just told you I never even heard of this band.” I shrug my shoulders as I look down at the tickets one last time. “They’re all yours. My clubbing days are over.”

  The last thing she needs to know right how is how I got these tickets in the first place.

  My sister clings to them as if they were her own flesh and blood. Then she looks up at me with a wicked grin. “You have to come with me! If anyone sees me there alone I’ll feel even more humiliated than I already do.”

  I shake my head from side to side as walk towards the kitchen sink. “No way. Don’t lay your guilt trip on me Sarah.”

  “Easy killer. What’s with the super drama?”

  If only you knew.

  “I’m not being dramatic. I just don’t like clubs anymore,” I lie.

  My sister gives me the look. I can fool a lot of people in this world, but not her. I shake my head, “I don’t care, I’m not going. I’ll do anything for you, but I’m not going to some shitty club tonight.”

  Then she reverts to the one tactic that always works, as sick as this sounds. She shows me her wrists, reminding me of the self-inflicted slits that cover most of this part of her body. “I need this, Layla,” she says. “Even if you don’t, I do.”

  Ugh. This isn’t fair. But she’s right, she does need this.

  Still, my stomach sinks at the thought of running into him.

  I shake my head in order to force myself out of the trance I’m in. I’ll just ignore him, I tell myself. And if he finds me and tries to talk to me, I’ll just make him wish he didn’t, that’s all.

  “I’ll go. But I’m only doing it for you, and you owe for this shit,” I say.

  Sarah’s green eyes nearly light up the room at the sound of my words. She can’t help herself from bouncing up and down on our Craigslist couch as says, “It’s not shit, but thank you! Thank you!”

  I roll my eyes, pretending to be more annoyed than I really am.

  My stomach aches, but there’s no way I can turn back now.

  Really bad move.

  I ignore the warning altogether. My sister needs my help. And besides, if I do run into Brady Stone, I can settle this situation once and for all by letting him know that everything that happened was honestly just some weird fluke and that he can never, ever, come back to my office again.

&nbs
p; Judge or no judge.

  Sounds simple enough, right?

  * * *

  I give myself a quick once over in the mirror and feel unusually satisfied with the way my skin-tight skirt and white crop top accentuates my curves and chest. I even paint my lips with the only shade of red I own.

  For my sister, I tell myself.

  Sarah barges into our closet-sized bathroom. She does her best impression of a cat meowing as she looks me over. “Who stole my boring sister and put this hot piece of ass in her place?”

  I roll my eyes. “Will you seriously knock it off?” Not that I blame her for reacting like this. I don’t get dressed up like this.

  Ever.

  My sister’s mouth is still gaped open. “You look hot, Lei. If we weren’t sisters, and if I was a lesbian…”

  I let out a long exhale as I squeeze between her and the doorframe. Sarah pinches my ass before I can make a full escape. “What’s wrong with you?” I shout back playfully.

  “Do you really want to go over all of that again?” she asks.

  I know she’s joking, but at the same time she’s not. My sister and I have literally been through hell and back. Yeah, we’re both barely holding on, but I really feel like she’s been hit the hardest. I’m struggling to make my career work. She’s struggling to stay alive.

  * * *

  As we pull up to the front of the club, I barely notice that the cabby is talking. “Let’s go women! Yous two broads ain’t the only ones with places to go tonight. Twenty-six, ladies.” The cabby reaches his weathered hand back for his money.

  I fish for some cash, but it’s too late. Sarah hands the man two twenty-dollar bills and pushes me out of the car door.

  From the outside alone, the club is a mob scene. It doesn’t take more than a few seconds to recognize that I don’t belong here. I see more tattoos, piercings, and dyed hair in that first ten seconds of being here than I’ve see in the last five years of my life. There are literally thousands of people lined up outside. Normally I’d panic, but I quickly take solace in the massive crowd knowing that it’s statistically more unlikely that I’m going to run into him.