Hello, Darkness by Sandra Brown

cry it had brought his partners, all the hygienists, and most of the patients running down the hallway and into the treatment room where she stood screaming accusations at him.
    If she had been the twenty-five-year-old she appeared to be, instead of the minor she was, those accusations would have been dismissed. As it was, they’d been believed, and he’d been invited to leave the practice. The following morning when he arrived at the office, his partners had met him at the door with a severance agreement that included a check amounting to three months’ earnings. Under the circumstances, they considered that fair. Good-bye and good luck.
    Sanctimonious pricks.
    But the repercussions hadn’t stopped there. The girl’s parents, incensed that a normal, heterosexual male had responded to the inviting signals transmitted by their sexpot of a daughter, had filed charges of indecency with a child. As if she was a child. As if she hadn’t asked for it. As if she hadn’t liked having his hand slide between her thighs.
    He was dragged into court like a criminal and, on the advice of his inept attorney, forced to apologize to the conniving little bitch. He’d pled guilty to the humiliating allegations in order to receive a “light sentence” of mandatory counseling and probation.
    The judge’s ruling was much lighter than Toni’s, however. “This is the last time, Brad,” she’d warned.
    Since he had dodged incarceration, wouldn’t you assume a celebration was in order? Oh, no. His wife had other plans, which included beating the subject of his “addiction” to death.
    “I can’t go through another ordeal like this,” she told him. Then for hours she’d harped on his “destructive pattern of behavior.”
    Okay, there had been a few other incidents, like the one at the clinic where he’d first practiced. He had shown a dental hygienist some photographs. It was a joke, for godsake! How was he to know she was a Bible beater who probably thought babies should be born with fig leafs attached to their belly buttons. She had spread such vicious gossip about him, he’d left of his own accord. But Toni still held him responsible.
    Finally she had concluded by saying, “Let me make this even clearer, Brad. I won’t suffer through another ordeal like this. I won’t allow our children to suffer through it. I love you,” she declared tearfully. “I don’t want to divorce you. I don’t want to break up our home and family. But I will leave you if you don’t get help and control your addiction.”
    Addiction. So what if he had a strong sex drive? Was that an addiction? She’d made him sound like a pervert.
    He wasn’t a complete fool, though. He knew he had to adapt to the world in which he lived. If society was going to be puritanical, then he must adjust to the accepted rules. He must walk the straight and narrow as defined by church and state, and they were in league on this issue. One misstep beyond their silly boundaries of so-called decency, and you were not only a sinner but an outlaw.
    Even the mildest flirtation with another patient could cost him his career. It had taken him eight months to land this job in Austin, long after the severance check had been spent and the savings accounts depleted.
    This clinic wasn’t as prosperous as the previous one. His current partners weren’t as specialized and renowned as his former associates. But the job paid the mortgage. And his family liked Austin, where no one knew the reason for their move here.
    For weeks after that courtroom nightmare, Toni had flinched each time he touched her. She had continued sharing a bed with him, although he figured that pretense had been for the kids’ benefit.
    Eventually she had allowed him to hold her and kiss her, and then, after his group therapy leader had given him a gold star for the progress he’d made toward “healing,” she had resumed having sex. She had seemed reasonably content…until a few nights ago when he’d