Double Take. Leslie Kelly

Epilogue

       Extract

       Endpage

      Prologue

      “WE’RE ASKING YOU to take an extended leave of absence.”

      Lindsey Smith flinched, even though she had expected the words. She had, in fact, steeled herself for them before she’d taken a seat across from her boss, eminent psychotherapist Walter Ross, of the Ross, Riley and Wilhelm Wellness Center. She had to wonder if the other two partners had drawn the long straws, leaving Ross to take care of “their little problem.”

      “It’s not that serious,” she argued, but in her head she was screaming, This is so serious, your reputation is crap! “It will die down.”

      “So you’ve been saying, Dr. Smith. But that was before you became the subject of a Jeopardy! question.”

      Well, in her opinion, being on Jeopardy! had been kind of awesome, though she wasn’t going to tell her employer that. “But...”

      “And today I was informed you’re the subject of a me-me.”

      “A what-what?”

      Ross pushed a sheet of paper toward her across his desk, using only the tips of his fingers, as if the paper offended him.

      She scanned the sheet. Huh. She was the one who should be offended. Her picture appeared on the page, over and over, each time with a witty—but so not funny—quip. She read, “Had an orgasm while blinking,” and, “Comes when going,” before snapping, “It’s pronounced meem.”

      “However you say the word, it reflects badly on us all.”

      “You read my dissertation before you hired me.”

      He nodded. “I know. It was fine research. Your work with patients with sexual disorders has been outstanding.”

      But not outstanding enough for them to defend her when she caught some unpleasant attention. Oh, sure, at first her bosses had enjoyed the publicity when excerpts of her dissertation on women’s ability to climax merely via mental stimulation had hit the media. But when the Today show got on it, followed by the tabloids, they’d tensed up.

      Things got worse when the internet fell on her head. “Thinkgasm,” the word she’d used to describe mind-initiated climax, had trended on Twitter and she’d become a laughingstock.

      Now, because of a game-show question and a stupid meme, they were abandoning her to deal with it on her own. During her “leave of absence,” they’d undoubtedly be watching like Big Brother to see if she could stay “clean” enough to renew their association with her sometime in the future. All because she took seriously what so many found funny: female orgasms.

      So much for being a champion for women taking control of their lives, their bodies and their sexuality. Her own life was spinning out of control, courtesy of the man in front of her and other men just like him. It infuriated her.

      If there was one thing Lindsey hated, it was being made to feel powerless to shape her own destiny. Been there, done that. She’d fought hard to make sure nobody had that kind of dominance over her. Only to come to this.

      Ross pasted on his calm, therapist smile. “It’ll be all right, Dr. Smith. Just try to stay out of the limelight, and in a couple of months we’ll revisit things. Why don’t you go away for a while? Leave Chicago. Go somewhere quiet, remote, where your name isn’t going to grab such immediate attention.”

      “Where might that be?” she asked, not hiding her sarcasm. “The dark side of the moon?”

      It seemed everybody and his uncle had heard her name, and cracked-up over the silly idea that a woman’s imaginings could be enough to give her physical, sexual pleasure. Could there be a place left in the country where she wasn’t a joke, where she could live in anonymity and protect her privacy from prying eyes and gossipy rumor mills?

      She honestly didn’t know. But considering she was temporarily unemployed, heartsick and living under a spotlight, it was time to find out.

      1

      Three Weeks Later

      THE REDHEAD in the green raincoat would be very pretty if she weren’t about to lose her lunch over the side of the ferry. Hell, not just pretty, beautiful, with those wide-set eyes, the high cheekbones, the curvaceous figure and that stunning head of long, flowing red hair.

      Right now, though, her face was about the same shade as her coat. Her mouth was a tight little knot of agony. And her hands clenched the railing as if she couldn’t decide whether to throw up or just jump overboard and put herself out of her misery.

      Eyeing her from a few feet down the railing, to which he was also clinging with only slightly less desperation, Mike Santori offered her a look of commiseration and sympathy.

      “First time heading to the island?” he asked, raising his voice to be heard over the rumble of the engine, the whipping of the wind and the spray of the water flying off the surface of Lake Michigan.

      She managed a tiny nod, groaning aloud as if even that slight movement was too much for her spinning head.

      “Maybe you should go inside.”

      “No, I need the fresh air!”

      He understood that. He, too, had to remain outside every time he made the crossing between the island and the mainland. He kept hearing that the trek to and from his new home on Wild Boar Island would get easier, that he’d even grow to like it. But so far the only improvement he’d managed was that he no longer had to curl up in the fetal position on one of the outside benches and pray. The day he actually grew to enjoy the journey was the day he started to enjoy getting his prostate checked by anybody other than an adventurous girlfriend.

      “It’s going to start raining in a minute,” he warned her, wondering if she, like him, would be glad for the rain. At least when you were shaking from being cold and drenched, you could forget your head was spinning as if somebody had attached a string to it and was using it as a yo-yo.

      “Maybe I’ll get lucky and the storm will wash me overboard so I can drown.”

      “Please don’t, then I’d have to jump in and save you, and I’ll ruin my new boots.”

      She managed a weak smile. But it quickly faded when the ferry dipped, rolling on a swell that made the rickety old boat sound as though it was going to split apart at the seams and plunge to Davy Jones’s locker. The redhead gripped even tighter, and a low groan escaped her lips. “Make it stop.”

      “We’re almost there,” he said, edging closer, feeling protective of her, this pretty stranger, the way he might have of a kid left outside in the cold.

      “What is wrong with good old-fashioned bridges?”

      “It’s twelve miles to the island.”

      “Haven’t they heard of the Donghai?”

      “What’s that?”

      “It’s a bridge that’s twenty miles long.”

      “Across Lake Michigan?”

      She rolled her eyes. He bit back a smile, glad he was distracting her.

      Another dip. Another groan. “There’s an even longer one going over Lake Pontchartrain,” she said, forcing the words out from between clenched teeth.

      That one he had heard of. “I hear they get a few more tourists to New Orleans than they do to Wild Boar Island. I don’t think tolls would pay for a bridge here.”

      That was an understatement.

      Wild