Page 61 of The Dark Before Light

His voice bounces around the club. Laughter sounds. Even Dominic chuckles before he climbs the stairs and disappears into the shadows. After confirming that my mic is back on, Nate follows him.

For the next forty-five minutes, Nate moves through the audience. There are questions that fill the air with more laughter, others that demand silence and a careful response. Most aren’t even questions about kink. A woman asks what to do if she and her partner have different love languages, and a man asks for advice because his husband is resistant to couples counseling. Some voices are nervous or desperate. Others witty or dry. All are honest and vulnerable, and together they abolish the last of my doubts about coming back.

My conviction grows that this is what I’m meant to be doing. Small groups, large scale, it doesn’t really matter. There’s nothing that feels as profound and meaningful to me as a community coming together. Learning about themselves and each other.

Eventually, Nate announces that the next question will be the last.

There’s a moment of silence, then:

“How would you counsel someone who’s falling for their therapist?”

As the deep, musical voice fills the club, the blood drains from my head. I reach for the nearby podium, my fingernails digging into the wood so hard it splinters. A sliver pierces the skin beneath my thumbnail—a lightning strike to my senses that focuses me and clears the ringing from my ears.

In the absence of shock, rage floods every inch of my body and mind. This can’t be happening. He can’t be here.

It’s too much.

“We’re ending here today,” I say tightly. “Thank you, everyone.”

I rip off my microphone and stalk up the stairs into the crowd. The look on my face works better than a flamethrower, clearing an immediate path from the Epicenter to my target: a tall man wearing fake glasses and a baseball hat.

Ignoring Nate’s shocked face and Sven’s grimace, I grab Kieran’s arm.

“Come on, Clark Kent,” I snarl, then drag him across the club through the archway leading to the playrooms.

Chapter 18

Talia

“What are you doing here?”

Kieran’s gaze moves away from a row of dildos displayed in a plexiglass drawer. I brought him to the least extreme of the playrooms, but it’s still Crossroads. The space radiates eroticism from every inch. If I’d been thinking straight, I would have taken him to one of the offices.

His eyebrows lift. “Is the silent treatment over, then?”

My teeth clench. I’m too spun up to even attempt understanding why I’m so angry. All I know is that I feel like everything’s falling apart.

Like I’m falling apart.

When I can unhinge my jaw, I spit out, “It took me a minute to remember how to speak without screaming.”

His lips thin, eyes sparkling.

“If you laugh right now, I swear to God I’ll lose my mind. And take off those stupid glasses.”

I regret the demand when the undiluted force of his blue eyes hits me. “Better?”

“No,” I snap. “Now answer my question. Why are you here? More specifically, what did you hope to accomplish by inserting yourself into my private life and derailing the entire evening for me?”

He winces. “Ouch.”

My anger softens the tiniest bit. “Dammit, Kieran. Why?”

He walks to the wide, padded bench in the middle of the room and sits. From his grave expression, he’s finally realized how close I am to strangling him.

“Remember what I said about why I haven’t dated anyone?”

My heart skips a beat. “Yes, of course.”

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