Exposed Exposed (Dom Nation #1) - E. Davies Page 0,7

Slate said. His gaze was creeping up, on my cup now. I wrapped my hand around it and gradually raised it to my mouth to see what he’d do, but his gaze only tracked the object as far as my chest and then stayed there.

Oh, you’ve been hurt. Did someone leave you without aftercare? Push a boundary? Didn’t any of the DMs spot it? A flash of anger rolled through me. Who was working tonight? I didn’t care how long we’d been friends; I’d have words for them.

But, as was my habit in life, I hid every trace of my rage and concern. Subs picked up energy like that and grew nervous. So did others, in business or in friendships. I was the strong one, the in-control one. It wouldn’t do to lose it, even for a moment.

“Do you want to talk about it?” I asked.

And finally, like a flash, his eyes raised and his gaze met mine. Pierced me to the spot, a storm whipping through the burning, pale, icy blue. Like he was judging whether he could lay his trust in me.

I stayed calm—didn’t flinch, didn’t look away, didn’t even blink.

Seconds passed, but they might as well have been centuries. My world spun around and around again, orienting itself around this boy’s next words. All of a sudden, he was the sun and I the planet blessed with his warmth, or cursed with his distance.

Which would it be?

Slate tore his gaze from me, and I felt empty, abruptly wobbling out of my orbit, crashing toward… I didn’t know what. My grip tightened around his hand as I fought back the dizzying wave.

Instead, he watched the table again. “It started off nice. They let me in despite being…” Slate waved a hand up and down at himself.

I didn’t understand the gesture. Did he show up in street clothes? Did someone loan him gear? Oh, God. I hope he hasn’t run away with it if so. Although I tilted my head, Slate had moved on, not waiting for my answer.

I didn’t want to interrupt the flow now that he was talking. I’d revisit this later.

“I got a drink. That was fine.” Slate sounded like he was replaying it all in his head.

This was the part of the movie where they tricked you into thinking it was all going to be okay. I drew a measured breath so I didn’t slide to the edge of my seat.

What he needed was calm, so I was calmer than a mountain, absorbing and not reflecting what he gave me.

“Someone talked to me on the dance floor. I think he was hitting on me. Seb.”

Shit. Not Seb.

I’d known him for four years, since my twenty-first birthday when he’d watched me handle a sub with precision and delicacy and the cold brutality I was known for back then. He’d helped me grow warmer. Just a little, anyway.

I knew him well. I’d watched him at work with men of all kinds. I counted him one of my close friends. But if he’d scared this boy, I’d move heaven and earth for justice.

My heart pounded despite my outward calm.

Even so, Slate drew a quick breath and looked up at me, suddenly gripping my hand tightly. Like he’d sensed the fury under my skin—the fury so few had ever seen, much less felt.

“It wasn’t him,” he rushed to reassure me. “It was…”

Then he went silent, pulling back a little. His neck went stiff, and he pressed his lips together. It was like a ghost had slid into the seat beside him and put a finger on his lips.

And I knew.

I don’t know how I knew—I just did. There were hundreds of men who came regularly or semi-regularly, and hundreds more who came as tourists, either once in a while or once and never again.

Some of them, I got along with. Others… by unspoken agreement, approaching them felt like oil and water forced through the same tap, so we kept apart. A few made me uneasy, their tastes so far from mine—but anyone who broke the rules, the DMs knew that the owner, Brighton, would throw them out at a moment’s notice.

There was only one Dom who came every weekend who made my skin crawl.

Isaac.

There was no real reason why. He was glib and clever, cheerful to everyone, even welcoming to newbies. He’d never broken a rule or intruded on another’s scene.

But some primal instinct—an unnameable chill on the back of my neck—had always been aware of him when he