Serving Pleasure by Alisha Rai Page A

parents were poster children for a happy marriage, the best role models he could have had. He’d always been blithe about the fact that someday he would have a relationship like theirs. Now, though…
    He studiously avoided looking out his window. He knew Rana’s blinds would be shut, as they had been for the past week. A couple of times, he had thought he heard her car in the driveway, and he’d had to bitterly argue with himself not to go out and drool all over her like an overeager puppy.
    One night only, Cinderella. Now you’re done.
    They weren’t soul mates like his parents were. Silly to imagine her sitting next to him with her hand on his leg.
    “If you came home, I could trim your hair for you,” his mother said.
    His shoulders tensed. She’d cut his hair once, because he’d hoped he’d at least be able to tolerate and trust the woman who had birthed him. He hadn’t had a panic attack, but he’d still had to drug himself for the experience. It was far easier to hack it off himself when it grew to an unmanageable length. “I’m not taking an international flight for a haircut, Mum.”
    His father cleared his throat. “We miss you.”
    The weight of his guilt pressed down on him. “I know. But I— This place is starting to grow on me.”
    His mother’s lips tightened, and he didn’t miss Papa bolstering her by wrapping his arm around her waist. “The weather’s nicer, eh?” his father joked, but there was a deep sadness in his eyes.
    “Yeah.” That was the excuse he’d given: he needed to get away before the chill of England worked its way through his bones.
    It wasn’t all a lie. He’d always preferred warm climates. Florida had been the warmest place farthest away from everyone who knew him.
    “If you want nicer weather, why don’t you go to Oahu? It’s paradise,” his mother asked, a trace of desperation in her voice.
    He was shaking his head before she stopped speaking. This was an old argument. “No. I don’t want to go to Hawaii.” Both sides of his family were huge, but the maternal branch had some sense of typical British reserve—not much, but some. His father’s people, on the other hand, were so loud and boisterous, Micah could barely think when he was around them.
    They would take care of him, of course. Of that he had no doubt. He could imagine his closest cousin Noah throwing a beefy arm around his neck and dragging him—on his paternal side, Micah was considered small—into his favorite bar. This is my cousin. Don’t make fun of his accent, he’s got an English mother. Micah, come meet this girl.
    His aunts would shove food in front of him and demand he eat every bite, and he’d spend long, lazy days basking in the sun, with toddlers running around and over him while every adult and contemporary smothered him with pampering. He’d want for nothing.
    Except uninterrupted time to himself.
    Micah shuddered. He deeply loved every member of his extended clan. But he couldn’t imagine being the center of attention amongst a giant group of people who were aware of what had happened to him and genuinely cared for him. They would watch him the way his parents and former friends watched him. With worry and wariness that racked him with guilt and inadequacy.
    His father pursed his lips, but his mother sighed. “How’s therapy?”
    He didn’t hesitate with his standard response. “Great.” He wasn’t lying. The two appointments he’d kept since he’d moved had been unobjectionable.
    It wasn’t that he didn’t like the American doctor. Dr. Kim had a gentle manner about him. Micah’s old psychologist had been one of the best in London, but his reserved and clinical attitude had made Micah dread visiting him. Kim, with his messy hair and worn office, was a vast improvement.
    That didn’t mean he wanted to go.
    Micah controlled his instinctive grimace. He’d never been the most verbose of men. He had always just done things, accomplished things. Before he became