Page 61 of Sunrise

Sophie: Yeah, just exhausted.

Guilt gnaws at me like always. I have members to meet and lessons to teach. With the reputation and clientele I’ve built at the club, I make more money there than I do at my regular job. I’m coming to a crossroads of some kind and will have to choose which direction to proceed in. Living the way I currently am is not sustainable.

Once I get home and shower, I feel slightly better. It’s almost midnight now. My house is so quiet you can hear a pin drop. The neighborhood is asleep, and the crickets are chirping. It’s so peaceful, I almost feel safe. Dressed in my favorite oversized t-shirt and pajama pants, I pour a glass of wine and sit out on my back patio to decompress.

It feels wrong to be here. Selfish, even. Monarch members are expecting me and I’m letting them down.

What am I even doing anymore?

Rubbing my temples does little to ease my brewing headache. My eyes itch and burn. I’m melting down, big time. Pulling out my cell, I text Vault.

Sophie: Not coming in tonight.

He’ll worry if he doesn’t see me soon. Sometimes I think we’re two ghosts haunting that place, only he stays hidden all the time and I don’t.

Vault: What’s wrong?

Sophie: Nothing. Just tired.

He must be too. The man lives off energy drinks and forty minutes of sleep. I don’t know how he hasn’t keeled over by now. And there’s this stupid egotistical part of me that wonders if he’s there all the time because I’m there all the time. That’s silly, right? But he practically lives at the club, and it didn’t use to be that way.

I know he keeps cameras on me all the time. Hell, sometimes I perform better imagining he’s watching. Great, now I feel bad that I’m not there because what if that’s the only reason he’s working tonight?

Knock it off, Soph. It’s not that deep.

He doesn’t respond again, so I guess that’s the end of our communication.

Time for bed.

I diligently double check to make sure everything is locked up tight. This may be a low crime area, but my brain is trained to be extra cautious. Peeking out the front window, I see someone jogging across the street in a light-up vest. Closing the blinds and curtains, I finally head up to my room and lock that door, too.

I never feel safe.

That’s the one thing from mybeforethat stuck with meafter. If I’m not surrounded by people, I scare easily. For me, there is no safer place than the Monarch Club. Not only is it under heavy surveillance, but the guys in charge would kill for me. Probably. Maybe. Either way, they’d do more than what the security officer at my day job would do.

Fuck, my eyes burn. And I can’t get comfortable.Why won’t my pillow conform to my head right? And what’s with this blanket?

My cell rings.

Snagging the damn thing, I answer without looking at the caller ID. “This better be good, because it’s in the middle of the fucking night.”

“Do you want me to come over?”

I freeze at Vault’s voice. He’s never asked to come to my house before. Why now?

“You’re at work,” I remind him.

“It’s a relatively quiet night and we have plenty of staff on hand as it is. They don’t need me.”

Ryker recently hired more security so Dmitri could spend quality time with his girl, Daelyn.

“Do you want me to come over?” he repeats.

If I let him in, it’s another violation of my rules. No subs are allowed at my house.Ever. But Vault’s more than a sub. He’s…

“If you want,” I answer.

“That’s not what I asked,” he practically growls in frustration. “Do you want me to come over?”

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