Page 14 of Daddy Knows Best

T he headache wasn't just in my skull—it had colonized my entire body, setting up drum circles behind my eyes and bass lines along my spine.

I peeled my cheek off the leather couch, yesterday's mascara gluing my lashes together like some discount bondage experiment.

My mouth tasted like I'd been sucking on batteries dipped in wine.

Daylight stabbed through the windows I'd never closed, illuminating my apartment's transformation into a late-stage capitalism crime scene.

Empty bottles stood like glass soldiers on the coffee table—two wines, the vodka I'd thought was for emergencies, even the cooking sherry I'd forgotten existed.

My lingerie from yesterday—the expensive set I'd worn to seduce my therapist—clung to my body. The lace itched against skin that felt too tight, like I'd been inflated past capacity and left to slowly leak.

Three sharp raps on the door sent my heart into my throat.

The sound echoed through my apartment like gunshots, each impact making my temples throb harder. My body went rigid, fight-or-flight flooding my system with adrenaline that mixed badly with the lingering alcohol.

Debt collectors.

Already.

They'd found my address, probably bought my information from whichever algorithm tracked financial destruction in real-time. Any second they'd start yelling through the door about court orders and wage garnishment and all the legal ways they could dissect my future.

Sir Reginald bolted from behind a shipping tube, orange fur puffed to maximum volume. His hiss carried more authority than anything I could muster as he disappeared under the bed, leaving me alone with my panic.

The pounding came again. Harder this time, rattling the cheap lock.

I forced myself upright, the room tilting like a funhouse. Each step toward the door felt like walking through pudding, my bare feet catching on receipt papers and bubble wrap. My breathing went shallow, chest tight with the specific terror of consequences arriving in person.

At the door, I pressed myself against the wood, trying to become invisible through sheer will. Maybe if I didn't move, didn't breathe, they'd assume I'd died and leave me to decompose in peace among my poor choices.

"Who is it?" The words came out as a croak, barely audible.

No answer. Just the weight of someone on the other side, waiting.

My hands shook as I rose on tiptoes to look through the peephole.

The fisheye lens warped everything, but I could make out broad shoulders in a charcoal coat.

No uniform, no clipboard—just an expensive coat that didn't belong in my building's hallway with its flickering fluorescents and suspicious stains.

I backed away slowly, hand over my mouth to muffle my breathing. Professional debt collectors wore cheap suits and desperation. This was something else. Something worse. Maybe the kind of people who collected debts with baseball bats instead of phone calls.

"Emily Marie Carter."

The voice hit me like a physical blow, deep and controlled through the thin wood. My knees buckled, and I had to catch myself against the wall.

No.

It couldn't be.

He couldn't be here, at my apartment, seeing what I'd become in one day without his structure. My brain rejected the possibility even as my body recognized that particular rumble, the way he pronounced my middle name like punctuation.

"Open the door." Not a request. A command that bypassed my higher functions and went straight to the part of me that had learned to obey that voice. "Emergency clause, subsection three."

Emergency clause. The words penetrated my panic, dredging up memories of legal documents and careful boundaries.

Buried in all those forms I'd signed, something about intervention protocols.

Crisis management. The right to breach normal therapeutic boundaries if a client presented imminent danger to themselves.

My hand moved without permission, reaching for the deadbolt.

But shame froze me mid-motion. He couldn't see me like this—unwashed, half-dressed, surrounded by evidence of exactly how badly I'd spiraled without him.

The Emily he knew sat properly in chairs and tracked receipts.

Not this creature in day-old lingerie, marinating in her own poor choices.

"I'm invoking professional duty of care." His voice carried that particular note of authority that made my spine straighten even through the door. "You have thirty seconds before I contact building management."

Building management. Mrs. Myers, who already looked at me like I was three days from eviction. Who'd definitely have opinions about strange men demanding entry to apartments full of wine bottles and financial ruin.

"Emily." Softer now, but no less commanding. "Twenty seconds."

My fingers fumbled with the lock, metal slick under sweaty palms. The deadbolt turned with a click that sounded like judgment. But I couldn't make myself open it further, couldn't face what waited on the other side.

"Ten seconds."

"I'm a mess," I whispered to the door, to him, to myself.

"I know." Something in his voice cracked, just slightly. Human breaking through professional. "Open the door anyway."

Five seconds. Four. Three.

I turned the handle.

The door cracked open just enough to frame him. Rain beaded on his dark hair, caught in his beard like tiny diamonds. The charcoal coat I'd seen through the peephole hung open over a white dress shirt, no tie.

His eyes did a clinical sweep of what he could see through the gap—my smeared face, the lingerie, the war zone of my apartment visible behind me. His expression didn't change, but something tightened in his jaw.

"May I come in?" The formality of the question contrasted with how he'd commanded me to open the door.

I stepped back, pulling the door wider. The full scope of my destruction revealed itself in the gray morning light.

Empty bottles reflected like accusations.

Papers covered the floor—overdraft notices I'd printed in some masochistic impulse, receipts from my spiral, the crumpled Week Three envelope I'd thrown at the wall.

He stepped inside with careful movements, rain dripping from his coat onto my disaster of a floor. The door clicked shut behind him, sealing us into my shame.

"When did you last eat?" His voice stayed neutral, but his eyes catalogued everything—the lipstick smears on my cheek from sleeping in yesterday's face, the way I swayed slightly on my feet, how my arms wrapped around my middle like I could hold myself together through pressure alone.

"I don't—yesterday? Maybe?" Time had gone liquid since I'd destroyed everything. "Nate, I'm so sorry—"

"Stop." He held up the tablet he'd been carrying, screen already lit. "Apologies later. Facts now."

The screen showed a dashboard I didn't recognize—graphs and numbers and red flags everywhere. My name sat at the top like a diagnosis: CARTER, EMILY M. - RISK ASSESSMENT: CRITICAL.

"Your bank's fraud detection algorithm triggered an alert to my monitoring system at 2:47 this morning." He scrolled through data with practiced efficiency. "Fifteen charges across seven vendors, all flagged as unusual spending patterns. Total attempted damage: $3,726.42."

The number hit like ice water. I'd thought it was bad, but this was catastrophic. "How do you have—"

"Subsection 12-B of your treatment consent. Financial monitoring authorization for high-risk clients." He turned the tablet toward me fully. "Which you became the moment you disclosed pre-existing debt and shopping addiction patterns."

My eyes blurred trying to focus on the screen. But there, in green text that seemed too good to be real: ALL PURCHASES REVERSED. ACCOUNTS FROZEN. FRAUD PROTECTION ACTIVATED.

"I don't understand." My voice came out broken, confused.

"I invoked fiduciary emergency access at 3:15 AM.

Contacted each vendor's fraud department, confirmed unauthorized usage pattern, reversed all pending charges.

" He set the tablet on my coffee table, movements precise among the chaos.

"Your accounts are temporarily frozen but solvent.

The charges never processed. You're exactly where you were Thursday afternoon—$14. 10 remaining, no new debt."

The words didn't compute. No new debt.

He'd stopped it.

Saved me from myself in the middle of the night while I'd been passed out in my own spiral.

My knees gave out. I hit the floor hard, carpet burn on bare skin, and the tears came like a dam breaking. Ugly, body-shaking sobs that had been building since he'd pushed me off his lap. Since I'd ruined the only therapeutic relationship that had ever helped me.

"I'm sorry," I gasped between sobs. "I'm so fucking sorry. I ruined everything, and you had to—at three in the morning—I'm so sorry—"

"Enough." He shrugged off his wet coat, hanging it carefully on my door hook like this was normal. Like saving disasters was just part of his routine. "Listen very carefully, Emily."

The use of my first name made me look up through tears. He stood there in his white shirt and charcoal slacks, looking like control itself while I knelt on my floor in lingerie and shame.

"Standard therapy boundaries are paused under the emergency intervention clause.

" Each word came measured, weighted with meaning.

"You're exhibiting self-harm through compulsive spending.

Without immediate intervention, you would have caused irreversible financial damage. I'm here to stop that cycle. Now."

He moved through my apartment with purpose, not disgusted by the chaos but cataloguing it like symptoms. His hand went to his sleeve, rolling the white cotton higher with movements I'd watched so many times across his desk.

The other sleeve followed, revealing forearms I'd tried not to stare at during sessions.