Chapter 42
KADENCE
“Tell me, what are your coping mechanisms now?” Dr. Williams asked at our weekly session.
I wasn’t in the mood to talk about my feelings after the disaster at the club on Friday. Blaize rejected me. I offered myself to her, and she said no. I was angry, but it was more at myself than anything. Desperation was not pretty, nor was it how I wanted people to perceive me.
“Uhm, I don’t have any.”
Her brow arched. “Let’s try this. What did you enjoy before other than sex?”
“Dancing and track. I was on the track team in middle school, but stopped when I got to high school. I took up dancing because it was fun, and a lot of the people I was with enjoyed the entertainment.”
She scribbled more notes in her journal.
I wanted to be a fly on the wall and see what she wrote within those pages, because my life was a fucking disaster.
The trauma dump our first day was enough to fill an entire journal.
I’d always been anti-therapy, but damn, was it nice to spill my guts to someone without being judged.
“Do you dance at the club? Don’t you work at the local strip club?”
“Hades, yeah. I’m bartending. I tried waitressing, but I was triggered by a man who touched me and called me a whore.”
“Have you thought about dancing?”
My brows furrowed. “I don’t know. I parade around in lingerie, but I don’t know if I am confident enough to strip in front of a crowd.”
“Not stripping. Erotic dancing. I’ve heard rumors and stories from other patients about Hades. It’s not just stripping. It’s in my professional opinion that dancing might help. You enjoyed it when you were younger, and adding it into your daily life may help heal a part of yourself.”
I thought about it for a moment. Whenever I danced, electric energy surged through me, igniting every nerve.
I wasn’t just a person; I became a vessel of expression, telling a story that words couldn’t capture.
In high school, I used it to escape. Dancing was freeing.
When I told a guy I was talking to that I like dancing, he wanted me to dance for him and strip, of course.
At some point, I stopped doing it as much because meeting Dom derailed everything—my mental stability and my life.
I could dance. It was what Everly did on stage, and it wowed the crowd, especially when you were with a partner.
Her show brought the house down. Doubt hit me, but I pushed it aside.
Hades had made me feel more confident and sexy, so fuck it.
Dancing could also be a fuck you to Blaize and everyone else in my life who made me feel bad about myself.
Everyone else could admire my body and shower me with praises if she refused. “I think you’re right.”
“What’s on your mind?” she asked after a moment. I arched my brow, giving her a confused look. “Kadence, I’ve been a doctor for many years, seen various patients, and learned the signs. Something is wrong.”
I sighed. Of course, my shrink would see the signs. Oh, well. At least I could get real advice. Annika would just tell me to jump Blaize’s bones the first chance I got. “Uhm, I think I’m getting feelings for my boss.”
“Tell me about her.”
Like the first time we met, I word vomited to her, only this time it was about the infuriating woman I was falling in love with.
Was it really love if I barely knew her?
She was hot, intimidating, and screamed dominant.
Blaize was not the picturesque of niceties when we met, and she accused me of sleeping with Hawke more than once.
I couldn't explain it. Love was something I seldom experienced. I fell in love, but I never had the world-burning desire that came from being loved back. My heart raced at the thought of her, sending electricity through me. The moments we’d had, even though they got ruined because of her ill will towards me, seemed to make time stand still.
I almost had a full conversation with her at the bar that night, and she showed me the smallest ounce of vulnerability.
It didn’t last long, but I saw a part of her that was real.
Or maybe I was just crazy. I’d always been told I had a wild imagination, and maybe this was something I was imagining. A future with a woman who hated me, and I still couldn’t fathom why.
“Are you scared of falling in love with her?”
I leaned on my elbows. “The last person I was in love with ruined my life…Y’know, I loved Disney movies as a child.
The idea of falling in love and living happily ever after, but I don’t think that’s in my future.
I’ll always be used and desired for my body, but I’ll never be admired for the depth of my soul or the love in my heart. ”
“Everyone is worthy of love, Kadence. Regardless of their past or imperfections. Everything you went through does not define the woman you are becoming. Never let someone make you feel like nothing.”
I bit the inside of my cheek, feeling tears in my eyes, but I forced them back. “I know. I don’t know what it is about her, but I’m drawn to her like a moth to a flame.”
“Then follow your heart's desire and don’t be afraid.”
After another twenty minutes of talking about my fears with Dr. Williams, I finally left with a new perspective.
Blaize wanted me just like I wanted her, and even if we only had one night together, I was going to get her to cave.
I no longer wanted to be terrified of the feelings in my chest. Would I fall to my knees and confess my undying love to that woman? Absolutely not.
But will I hide myself to spare her? No. I was going to make Blaize mine one way or another.