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Chapter One
Constance Monroe hesitated before pushing the key in her hand into the lock.
She was reaching the point where coming home wasn't coming homeat all. Stepping through the door after a long day at work was akin to stepping through a vortex into hell, and what had once been her sanctuary was now more like a torture chamber.
Connie was slowly dying inside with every day that passed.
Squeezing her eyes closed for a moment, Connie rested her forehead against hard wood and braced herself for the heavy curtain of emotional pain to fall over her. The key notched into the lock, turning with a quiet snick. The door swung open into a shadowed hallway, and released the thundering blare of some kind of devil's rock music from the back of the house.
Disturbed, Connie thought wearily, recognising Alicia's most recent choice of expressing her pain. For the past two days, her young charge had played the same song over and over again. The song itself—Inside The Fire—had deep roots in suicide, something which worried Connie so much, sleep evaded her.
The last year had been nothing but a circus of stress. Pain, stress, grief, anxiety. It seemed every time the clock struck midnight, it found a new way to add just a fraction more pressure onto her already bowed shoulders. Only a month ago, one of her good friends whom she'd known for almost a decade, had managed to walk into his favorite BDSM club without the use of a cane. A cane he'd needed to help him recover from a bad fall during a vicious fight against two trained assassins sent to kidnap him and his sub.
The sweetest little sub who, in order to save her Dom, had committed vehicular homicide.
On top of that, Boadicea—Alicia's big sister, who had herself been through a nightmare of epic proportions—had discovered she was pregnant, with a devastatingly low chance of carrying the baby to term. Injuries incurred from a near-death beating from her parents a year ago were the suspected cause, and only God and drugs were keeping the pregnancy alive. Eighteen weeks to date.
Twenty-two weeks to go.
Connie stepped into the hallway, her work heels clicking demurely on the hardwood floor, and closed the door behind her. Let the strap of her purse slide off her shoulder, down the arm of her leather jacket, into her hand. Tired and forlorn, she kicked her shoes off where she stood and just left them, rather than tidying them to one side as she'd have done six months ago.
Several nights of no sleep, padding along the hallway every hour to check Alicia hadn't cut her wrists, was stretching Connie to her limits. She couldn't remember the last time she'd laughed, the last time her lips had curved into a smile. As a psychologist, Connie knew the signs of fatigue, of depression. She just didn't have the energy left to help herself, not when everyone else around her needed something.
She moved quietly down the hallway, passing the kitchen on her right, the dining room on her left, and paused as it split left and right. To the left was her bedroom, with her office next door. Ahead of her was the bathroom, and down the corridor to the right, Alicia's bedroom—what had once been Connie's guestroom. The music grew louder from that direction, damn near rattling the walls.
Connie knew she should go check on the girl, but Atticus had messaged her ten minutes before she arrived home to say he was leaving. He'd been on babysitting duty all afternoon so Connie could sit through her first-of-the-month staff meeting without wondering if she'd be coming home to a dead body.
Her phone trilled in her purse.
With a heavy sigh, Connie dragged herself toward her room to get changed. Thanks to the meeting, she was home almost ninety minutes later than usual, which meant her downtime before heading out to Avalon was severely limited tonight. Honestly, she was tempted to blow off her Friday night at the club, cancel the neighbor who came to keep Alicia company, and just…sleep.
It wasn't like there was anyone waiting for her at Avalon. Not anymore. Her two subs were long gone now—Kevin had made the choice to move to New York last summer after she released him from their arrangement, intent on starting a modelling career. And David, sweet David, had simply…left. Packed up his locker, handed his membership card back to Braun, and just…left.
Neither sub had asked her to explain why she was having to let them go, and that had hurt. Both her boys had been, and still were, incredibly special to her. But when she'd taken Alicia on, taken the broken girl under her wing, Connie did so with the understanding she couldn't have it all. She couldn't keep her boys happy andnurture Alicia through the trauma of everything she'd suffered through in her life.
Fuck, she'd failed at that too.
It was times like this that Connie wished she could slip back into her submissive mode. Relinquish the Mistress, set aside the Domme, and go back to being the submissive she'd been. No more pressure, no more responsibility or control. No one to coddle and love.
The trouble was everyone at Avalon knew her as Mistress Connie. She was the Domme. No one there had any idea she was a Switch, and she didn't—couldn't—face the loss of the club's respect if she submitted to another Dominant. But she couldn't stand the thought of having to find a partner for the night, expending more energy dominating him, then giving aftercare.
She just didn't have it in her. Not tonight.
Her head throbbed in time with the goddamn rock music as she closed her bedroom door and muffled it slightly. As her phone chimed again, she barely stopped herself from flinging her purse, the phone, and herself across the room into the wall. All she wanted was some peace and fucking quiet.
She took her phone out of the purse, throwing it on the king-sized bed without looking at the screen. When her purse slipped from her hands onto the floor, she kicked it toward the wardrobe angrily. Inexplicably, she felt as though she could burst into tears as emotions bubbled up inside her, the pressure expanding. With her lips trying to twist, she sat on the edge of the bed, her hands unsteady as she worked the tie free from her limp braid and shook her hair loose.
When the phone rang, she wanted to crush it into dust.
The screen flashed when she looked over at it, the handsome face of the young blonde Dom some wiseass at Avalon had dubbed the Viking Master beaming up at her. Great, just who she wanted to talk to. Not. But knowing Liam, he wouldn't take an unanswered call as a suggestion to leave her alone. The boy was sweet, but he was fucking tenacious when he got his teeth into something.
She picked the phone up, slid the green button aside, and said wearily, “What, Liam?”
“Heads up, Con. Intervention at Avalon tonight, nine p.m.” Liam said without preamble.
“Intervention? For whom?”
He snorted with laughter. “Who do you think? Anarchy decided to spray paint Just Marriedon the tailgate of Jasper's new Dodge Ram, and tied about a dozen cans to the tow bar. Jasper's threatening to take her into one of the fancy private rooms Braun's had built between barns two and three, but apparently they're all booked up.”
