Genetic Attraction (15 page)

“Yeah, baby, you want to believe, but you don"t.”

Roan"s indrawn breath sounded like a sob.

“Oh, baby, don"t. I love you so much, and I"m so lucky to have you. We have the best life together. It"s more than enough.”

“Don"t give up.”

“It"s more than enough.” And he slapped at another rogue tear as he pulled into the campus parking lot.

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Tara Lain

Chapter Eighteen

The gene sequences made no sense. That never happened, but here she was sitting alone in her office staring at the screen, and it might as well have been gibberish. Paralyzed. She couldn"t focus. Everything was in jeopardy. All her hard work to get to the top of her profession, to get to do the kind of research she believed in—it could all be gone. Kovak said he"d overlook her “indiscretions,” but he could change his mind on a dime. The rest of the faculty committee might decide to get rid of her. The idea hurt, but not quite as much as this fucking hole in her heart.

What would Shakti say if she could see her daughter rendered catatonic by the loss of a lover? Two, actually. Her mom would probably give a clear description of the part of his anatomy into which Kovak could insert his dick. She chuckled. It sounded bitter. Why didn"t she have her mom"s courage when she needed it?

Jesus, she had to get some work done. She opened her e-mail and noticed a confidential message from someone named Marshall Ehrlich marked high importance. Had she heard that name before? Generic e-mail address. She shrugged and hit Delete. A lot of people had weird ideas about her research.

There was a soft rap on her door jamb. She looked up expecting to see Mary, but was shocked, thrilled, crushed to see Jake. That beautiful, beloved face. She couldn"t summon her anger.

“Hi, Jake. Thought you were sick, or sick of me at least.”

He took a step into the room. “Em, I"m so, so sorry.”

“What? What for?”

“Roan told me about the pictures this morning. And then Mary just told me about the visit from Kovak. I"m sure the two things are connected.”

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“Mary knows about the pictures?”

“Yeah.” He managed a slight grin. “It seems Roan is her screen saver at home, and she follows him on every social networking site there is. You are now, officially, the coolest genetic researcher on the planet.”

She sat back in her seat. “I"m sure glad somebody thinks so.”

He perched on her guest chair. “Rough, huh?”

“Oh, Kovak was just Kovak, Jake; the disappointment is me. I caved before he even got to his threats.” She put her hand to her forehead as if to hold the thoughts at bay. “You were right. I"m not capable of loving or caring the way you deserve. I"m truly sorry.”

“Stop it, Em. This isn"t your big failure, no matter what I said.” His agitation caused the shaggy golden mop to fall over the top of his glasses, and he swiped it back. “Roan finally got me to look at my silly adolescent nonsense.” He clasped his hands tightly on the edge of the desk and stared at them, reciting like he"d practiced all the way from Connecticut. “I"m a stupid kid asking one of the world"s great scientists to give up everything she"s worked for to be with me. And I"m not even promising you marriage and family. No, you have to accept my male lover too.”

“Not exactly my idea of a hardship.”

“True.” She saw the love that suffused his face at the thought of Roan. “But as you rightfully pointed out, not the stuff of polite society either. The rest of the faculty aren"t Kovak, but they still wouldn"t be thrilled with their prize scientist flaunting her ménage à trois.”

“Is this wisdom all from Roan?”

“No, some is me. Roan still wants to believe that there"s a way to have it all.

But you and I know better, don"t we, Em?” A flash of bitterness crossed his face.

So Jake had given up. No more fighting against the tide. She shook her head.

“Yeah, we know better.”

He looked at her with great resignation. Was that really better than anger?

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Tara Lain

She sighed. “What are you going to do?”

“About what?”

“The research.”

“Oh, well, it"s important to me too.”

“You could go somewhere else, Jake. With your brilliance you can head your own team. I"ve wondered for a while why you didn"t do that.”

“Do you want me to go, Em?”

“Shit, no!”

That got him to laugh.

She held up a hand. “But I have to tell you that after Kovak gave me the ultimatum about associating with
male models
, emphasis intended, he told me I should share our little talk with you, since you were also a friend of Roan"s.” He looked startled. “No, no, he doesn"t know you"re a couple. But that"s the point—if you stay here, he can"t know. You have to hide the most important relationship in your life. It"s not fair.”

The blue eyes regarded her steadily. “
One
of the most important relationships in my life.” He stood. “And I"ll cross that bridge with the faculty council when appropriate. But for now I can"t think any more about Kovak, the shithead. I"m going to work. This is my research too, Em. I can"t leave it…or you.”

God, her heart ripped. “Maybe if I really toe the line, it will take the heat off you and Roan. Kovak will assume he"s out of our lives, and you can breathe again.”

“And you and me?”

“Friends, colleagues…like always.”

He took off his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose. “I"ll try, Em. I"ll really try.”

When he left to go to his desk, she sat staring at her computer, trying hard to concentrate. He"d been wonderful—maybe too wonderful. There was some perverse part of her that wanted him to fight and claw and spit to have her, not give up in Genetic Attraction

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resignation. But that was selfish and twisted. He had Roan. He didn"t need her, though the thought destroyed her. She told him she"d toe the line. She could do that for both of them. Then things could calm down, and no one would even think about who Jake went home to.

She rubbed the back of her neck, trying not to wish Jake was there to do it for her. She felt like she"d been beaten with a stick. The last two weeks were just too much for her. She hadn"t had this level of emotional turmoil since she was a kid, when she and her mom had taken every injustice of the world to heart and fought like tigers to change things. But now she was a scientist, not a drama queen. Maybe if she just got back into her work, things would return to normal.
Yeah, define
normal
. Henry? No, that was so not going to happen. After Jake and Roan, Henry, bless him, was a joke. He"d already gotten wind of her lack of interest from the complete ignoring she"d been doing. She"d let it stay that way.

So what did normal look like—a virtuous life of chastity, purity, and obedience? Yeah, that would happen. Not only did she love sex as Jake had said, but for the last ten days she"d had the best there was. Not just great orgasms, but the wonderful emotional connection and fulfillment that only came with real caring.

She didn"t want to live without that. But without them, her men, somehow she wasn"t really interested. She was going to have to interact with Jake every day, walk past him at his desk. God, she"d drooled over him before she knew what sex with him was like. How could she stop drooling now? He could go home to Roan.

Who could she go home to?

As if the instrument of some giant cosmic joke, her phone rang, and she picked it up automatically. “Dr. Silvay.”

“Hi,
Doctor
Silvay, this is
Doctor
Webster.”

For a moment it didn"t compute, then the light dawned. “Hi, Isaac.”

“I know I said we"d do coffee, but what say we skip the preliminaries?”

“Excuse me?”

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He chuckled, obviously having made the innuendo on purpose. “How about dinner, kiddo?”

“Oh.” Dinner? Did she want to do this? Could she? Was it leading him on?

Kovak had said someone like Isaac was appropriate for her—her age, her peer.

Obviously, what Kovak thought mattered to her, or she never would have caved.
Oh
hell, Emmaline, it’s only dinner, not a marriage proposal
. “Sure, Isaac, when?”

“Thought for a minute you"d hung up.” He chuckled again. “How about Thursday night? That"s kind of a getting-to-know-you night rather than a date night, which I sense you"d be more comfortable with. Plus, we can"t do Saturday because of Kovak"s faculty Halloween party, which I hear no one can skip.”

“Oh, yeah.”

“Not too enthused about dressing up in fancy finery for Kovak and his band of merry academics, are we?”

“Not too.”

“So, is Thursday a yes?”

“Yes.”

“I"ll pick you up at seven. Howard knows where your house is, so no directions required. Come casual.”

“Okay.”

“Hmm. Not the most voluble conversation I"ve ever had, but still satisfactory.

See you Thursday.”

* * *

By Thursday she"d started getting the rhythm of her new life—and she hated it. Jake worked hard, but he didn"t stay late with her alone if he could avoid it. A lot of work he did at home. She toiled in the lab, sometimes completely absorbed in the amazing mystery of gene coding and sequencing. But whenever her concentration slipped, she felt like someone had carved a hole in her chest, and the piece was missing. Her days were work, grab lunch, work some more, navigate the Genetic Attraction

117

expressway, work, grab dinner, work, make an attempt at sleeping and then work again. She was ready for an evening of pleasant conversation even if that hadn"t been her strong suit this week.

Skinny jeans and an oversized black turtleneck sweater fit the casual request, but she pushed the envelope with a pair of moderately high stilettos just to feel like a girl for a little while. Did she want to feel like a girl?

Right at seven, she heard the doorbell. Memories of Roan standing on her porch flooded her.
Okay, stop
. She pulled it open and practiced smiling. “Hi, Isaac.”

For a second she thought maybe the Halloween party was tonight, because this attractive academic was dressed in jeans with a big, shiny belt buckle, and cowboy boots to which he had added an unexpected crisp white shirt and a soft leather jacket. Maybe he was born in Texas or something? She decided to save comment for later.

He gave her an admiring once-over. “My, don"t you look like a rock star tonight. Must be the company you keep.”

He had to have seen the flash of pain on her face, because he was instantly apologetic. “Sorry, Em. Ready to go?”

They drove for about a half an hour until she was completely turned around and had no idea where they were. Finally, he pulled into a parking lot off a narrow road. Bright neon lights proclaimed THE COWBOY. “You are kidding me. A cowboy club? Guess I don"t have to ask about your boots after all.”

“Right here on Long Island, baby.”

“How could you know about this place? I thought you just moved here from New Jersey.”

“I did, but I"ve got a great nose for longnecks and two-step.”

“Dr. Webster, you amaze me.”

She"d never been to a western bar or club, so the noise and general level of enthusiasm took a few minutes of getting used to. Isaac found them a table well 118

Tara Lain

away from the band and behind the huge U-shaped bar crowded with talkative people, but deep conversation still wasn"t much of an option. She quickly discovered, however, that the greasy and delicious food, lessons in two-stepping, and even some general hilarity surrounding a mechanical bull were just what the doctor ordered for improving her mood. By the time they staggered out into the crisp night air, she was laughing and joking and really grateful to Isaac.

He helped her into the car and began the long ride home. After a few minutes of continued laughter over Isaac"s fall from the bull, they both quieted.

Looking out the window at the quickly passing trees, she murmured, “I had fun at that silly place. Thank you.”

“I thought you might. It"s a great place to forget your troubles.” When she didn"t reply, he went on. “When I first met you at the antique store, I saw you as a really happy woman. Got to admit, I haven"t gotten that impression since then.”

She shifted uneasily. How much did she want to say? “Yeah.”

“Does the change in status have anything to do with Roan Black and the stories I saw online earlier this week?”

“Partly.”

“Ah, I see we"ve returned to one-word interaction.”

He was so cute she had to chuckle a little. “Sorry. I"m just not real comfortable with the topic.”

“I can understand how being on the cover of
Whisper
, not to mention every gossip site I could find, might do that to a girl.”

She glanced at his profile. “You were looking, huh?”

He grinned. “Must confess, someone sent me the first link, and then I went exploring.”

“I imagine a lot of the other faculty probably did the same?”

“Well, it was another professor who sent me the link. I was pretty surprised.”

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She gave him a straight look. “Surprised to see me leaving a hotel with quote the most beautiful man in the world close quote?”

“Well, yeah.”

Well, damn. “I know, he"s too young by far, he"s too beautiful to be interested in the likes of me, he"s world-famous and—”

“No, whoa, that"s not it! Not it at all. I can totally understand why any man would be interested in you. I was
surprised
because when I first met the three of you that afternoon I thought the two men were together…a couple. I thought they were gay.”