Page 9 of Hold Me Down (KRK Security #4)

Unsure how to decide between the therapists from the list Kalei had sent him, Travis ultimately chose the one whose office was closest to home. He figured a fifteen minute walk would do him good, both before and after the session.

Doctor Anika Kumar might have looked like a nice person, but she was still a therapist, and thus, Travis couldn't help but catalogue her as dangerous—at least for the time being.

"You mentioned in your intake form that you've been sent to mandatory therapy by your boss.

It's always harder to build trust in a situation like that, in comparison to a case of someone making the decision on their own," she said now, as if reading his mind, which only confirmed that he needed to be careful.

"But I'm hopeful that we can come to an agreement about working together on a subject you find important and worthy of exploration. "

"It's not that I don't want to work on myself.

" Travis glanced around the room. A lot of natural light coming from the top to bottom windows and two very comfortable small couches facing each other made it feel inviting while remaining neutral.

It was sparsely decorated, with only one art piece of a handwritten text half-hidden under the brush of gold paint and two plants on the opposite sides of the wall he was facing. "I simply wouldn't do so like this."

"And how would you do it, if it was up to you?"

Travis frowned, staring at one of the plants.

"The usual way—which is physical exercise, I guess." And sex, but he wasn't going to tell her that. "We spend a lot of time training anyway, and spending more time at the company gym wouldn't be a problem."

"Did you try that, before?"

"Of course." He looked at her then. "Like I said, I'm not against bettering myself, and I'm aware there are certain things I need to change."

"So since working out has helped you before, you figured it would help you with the current issue, is that correct?"

"Yes. And it's been helping with the current issue as well."

He tried to hold back on the snarking front, but she probably wasn't fooled.

"It's normal and expected that we fall back on what has worked for us in the past when facing any new problem that arises.

Each person has their own methods of dealing with stress—there are some common ones, of course, but there isn't one that fits everybody, which is why we sometimes need time to figure out what works for us.

And once we find it, it's great, we think we have it, we've cracked the code.

But then, sometimes things happen, and our usual ways of dealing with stress don't work as well as they used to. "

"That's the thing, though." He scratched his jaw and tried not to think about the notepad in her lap. "Nothing's happened. Not at work, not outside of it, nothing."

"Is there a chance that you're so used to your job being stressful that you might not have noticed a particular thing becoming more aggravating?"

He'd dismissed that option before, when he tried to figure it out on his own, but he decided to give it a try again, not wanting her to think he was a jerk who didn't listen.

"It doesn't seem to be the case, no," he finally told her after sorting through the memories of various assignments once more.

"Despite how it may look on the outside, my job isn't all that dangerous.

I'd say 99% of the time, we're as safe as an average person, and I can't think of anything in recent months that would fall into that 1%. "

The most recent dangerous thing he could remember was Eddie's kidnapping, but that had been almost a year ago, and Travis only heard the whole story after the fact, when he could already see for himself that Eddie was safe and sound.

As he told that to the therapist, she nodded. "And when do you think your symptoms first appeared?"

Travis grimaced at the word 'symptoms', but he tried to school his face quickly.

"Four months ago or so? I'm not sure." He shifted in his seat. "I didn't notice anything back then, but Kalei—my boss—first noticed something was different around four months ago."

"And what did he notice, exactly?"

"I was jumpier, easier to get riled up, and I took longer to cool off. I also went a bit too hard on the competitiveness front."

There had been a few sparring sessions after which his colleagues had given him looks, until finally Ian had called him out on it when they were alone in the locker room. But it was too late—Kalei had noticed, too, and Travis ended up in his office, getting a second wake-up call of that week.

"What did you chalk it up to, back then?"

Travis shrugged. "Nothing. I thought it wasn't caused by anything in particular, just a bug up my ass or something." He paused, catching up to what he'd said. "Sorry."

"I heard worse," she offered dryly. "But it wasn't just that, I gather."

"I started paying closer attention to how I'm feeling during training and that helped, since I usually manage to avoid getting that worked up again. But every once in a while, something flips, and the adrenaline takes over. I'm not excusing myself," he added quickly, "but that's how it feels."

"So you found something that helps in most cases, but not all."

"Yeah. Yes."

"Okay, that seems to cover the work part of your life, then—at least for now. What about the rest of it?"

"What do you mean?"

"You've already said there wasn't anything big happening that you could pinpoint as the reason for your increased stress responses.

However, it doesn't have to be big. Sometimes, it's the thing that seems pretty small from the outside that disrupts a person's life on a deeper level.

It can also be a positive change, actually, something we look forward to, like a job change or the start of a relationship.

The difference between old and new is a stressor in itself. "

"I had neither."

She nodded, clearly unbothered by the lack of cooperation on his part—although he didn't do it on purpose. He honestly didn't know what the hell was wrong with him.

"Let's try something, then. Tell me how your usual week went, let's say, six months ago. Where were you when you woke up, where were you when you fell asleep, and what was happening in between. Were you working every day, were you hanging out with the same people, stuff like that."

Frowning, Travis did his best to paint her an accurate portrait of his daily life.

He woke up at home and got ready for the day.

He went for a run when he had a day off but skipped it if he'd be heading into the office, aware he'd get his exercise at work since they needed to put in at least two hours in the gym there unless they were out on an assignment.

He drove with his partner and returned home with him as well, because they lived together.

If their assignment didn't run late into the night, they usually watched something on TV before bed. Rinse and repeat.

"No evening outings or regular social engagements outside of that?"

Her tone was measured, blank, like there was no wrong answer, which he appreciated.

"No, I'm not really that sociable of a person.

We're a pretty close-knit group at work, but we hang out at the office and at our biweekly basketball games, so we don't need anything more.

Or I don't, at least. Every couple of months, Kalei organizes a BBQ at his house for the whole company, and some people bring their partners to that. It can get pretty big, but it's fun."

"Okay, we covered your regular week from six months ago. Can you describe a week from four months ago, maybe four and a half?"

Travis shook his head, ready to tell her that it was the exact same—his life was the same six months ago, four months ago, and today, and he liked that, because he really liked his life overall—but then he quickly did the math and realized she was asking him about late January.

He closed his mouth with an audible click of his teeth.

Fuck . This was stupid.

It couldn't be connected, and yet, he was hesitating to tell her about it for some reason.

She waited for a minute, and then, when Travis was still fighting with himself, she gave a little push.

"I can see you thought of something. No matter how big or small it was, I believe it could be beneficial to what we're discussing, but if it turns out unrelated, then that's okay, too. We'll keep looking."

He did not want to do this.

He'd felt stupid even coming here, and he'd felt stupid talking to her, trying to explain himself, and now she was pushing him over nothing.

Because it had to be nothing, otherwise… Otherwise he would be really fucking embarrassed.

"Something was different. However, it wasn't me, and it only lasted for a few weeks, so I don't think…" he drifted off, but she shook her head.

"No matter how big or small," she repeated. "Oftentimes, we don't see a connection until we reflect on things from a different point of view. Even if the thing itself, whatever it was, is not the reason we're looking for, it may give us a starting point."

Travis stared at the window for another minute, fighting his every instinct until he finally opened his mouth.

"It's about my partner, Dave. At the start of the year, he had this idea that maybe he'd want to be in a relationship after all and figured he might try dating."

"So the two of you weren't—" she paused, and he sighed.

"We're more than work partners, but we're not… We're not in a relationship. In a romantic sense."

"But you have sex with each other?"

Huh . Travis didn't expect her to ask outright.

On the other hand, he had nothing to be ashamed of.

"Yes. I guess you could call us friends with benefits.

We've known each other half our lives and we've done most things together—military, the deployment, our current job.

We've also lived together for most of that time.

And since neither of us was interested in a long-term romantic relationship, it was easy to… fall into things."

"I see." She somehow managed to convey the same measured tone with no judgment in two words, which was honestly impressive.

"So your partner, the man you're spending most of your time with, at work and outside of it, decided at the beginning of the year that he was going to start dating, even though you felt until then that neither of you wanted that? "

"Yeah."

"Were you surprised when he told you?"

Travis shifted in his seat.

"Of course. I mean, it wasn't even that he met someone and fell for him, which would be…" He cleared his throat. "It would be one thing. But Dave seemed to simply decide that he should try that. He also asked me if I ever considered changing my stance on commitment, too."

"And what did you tell him?"

"That I didn't. I'm honestly content with my life, and I see no point in changing anything. I thought he was, too."

"So Dave telling you he was considering a change made you think that he wasn't content with how his life was going?"

"I guess."

"That sounds like a startling thing to hear."

He looked at her then. "Does it?"

"Of course. You two are very close in various ways, and you thought you had similar outlooks on life.

When a person changes, or at least considers a change, that can throw off people close to them.

They may start thinking, what now, what does it mean for me, or for us…

And since they face changes simply because someone else has changed, now they're forced to figure things out for themselves, too.

It can bring up a lot of different emotions—as well as stress. "

"It wasn't that stressful, it was just… different.

" Travis frowned at the window again, thinking back to that time.

"With him going on dates, we spent more time separately than we usually do, which was weird.

But I wasn't begrudging him that, or anything.

He clearly needed to get something out of his system.

While I don't quite get it, I don't have to understand every last bit of him. "

He wanted to—he wanted to know everything there was to know about Dave—but somehow, it had been hard to talk about anything back then.

"Did you stop sleeping together during that time?"

"No. He didn't get far enough with anyone to even consider going exclusive, so we never stopped. We definitely had less sex than usual, though, simply by the fact that we were spending less time together in general."

"And did you mind him sleeping with other people?"

"He actually never got to that point with anyone, either." Travis scratched his jaw. "There was a bunch of first dates, but only a handful of second ones, from what I gathered."

"And then?"

"And then, a few weeks after he started the whole thing, he told me it was a mistake. He wasn't getting what he thought he would out of it, so he figured there was no point in trying any longer."

"Mmm," she offered, writing something down.

Travis had no idea what it meant, but before he could ask, she glanced at the clock and nodded.

"I would say we've done some great work today. I think we're getting somewhere, even if it may not feel like it for you just yet. How about we set up our next appointment for Thursday at the same time?"

He found himself nodding, equally confused and intrigued. Exhausted, too.

He didn't feel like they'd uncovered anything important, but who was he to judge?

He only cared for the end result, after all. He needed to fix it, whatever it was, and get back to work.