Time Out of Mind (Suncoast Society #43)

Time Out of Mind (Suncoast Society #43)

Tymber Dalton




Chapter One


I hate LA.

Over the Pacific Ocean, a haze bled out toward the western horizon, blocking a clear view of it. It didn’t help any that the sun rising behind him struggled to make its way through wildfire smoke from the latest natural disaster.

As Doyle stood on Huntington Beach early that Thursday morning and worked through his usual tai chi form, he ignored everyone around him. He’d been living in LA for five years now, transplanted from Sarasota, looking for a new start.

Then again, that was the same reason a lot of people arrived in this town. Although he wasn’t interested in acting or being in front of a camera.

And, mostly, he was still looking.

Oh, for the most part, he had that new start professionally. He’d moved out here to work for a private addiction treatment facility as one of their counselors, until a lucky accidental encounter with the business manager of a Hollywood A-list actor ended up with him doing a four-month, all-expenses-paid stint as a private sober companion during their overseas movie shoot.

At twice the salary he would have made working for the facility full-time for a year. He still worked for the facility part-time when between private SC assignments, as he was now, short hiatuses that rarely lasted longer than a month.

He’d quickly found himself in great demand for his SC services. Someone with his particular training, as well as his unique… personality type, and his growing reputation for extreme discretion and carefully protected anonymity, meant he could practically write his own paychecks.

The bigger the star, the bigger the check.

Or, in some cases, the bigger the potential scandal, the bigger the check.

Frequently, studios’ insurance companies wouldn’t cover an actor who had a troubled history with substance abuse.

That’s where he came in. He was there to ensure the actor stayed clean and sober, made their call times, and didn’t get into trouble. He was their handler and silent shadow, allowed full access to everywhere on the set and off it that his client went. If they didn’t stick to that deal, their insurance could be pulled, it could void their contract, and possibly cost them a penalty.

It didn’t hurt that Doyle was a recovering alcoholic himself, even though he’d drunk his way into recovery by the time he was nineteen and hadn’t touched it since. He knew the drill. He understood.

It especially didn’t hurt that a majority of the celebrities he dealt with were, at heart, spoiled, narcissistic submissive little weenies who needed a calm, firm hand at the helm.

That’s where being a Dom came in handy.





When Doyle finished, he walked back to his tiny rented apartment a few blocks from the beach. This was his little bit of zen before he started his day, and a rare treat to be able to get to the beach and not have to do it indoors while working somewhere on location.

The Pacific Ocean was nothing like the Gulf of Mexico, unfortunately. Even the water here was different, cold on the warmest of days. Couldn’t just jump in and paddle around and not freeze your balls off.

Or if you did, you had to worry if there was a great white waiting out there to take a test taste of your drumstick.

I wonder if sharks think people taste like chicken?

Born and raised in Florida, he’d always felt like a fish out of water here. It’d started out more feeling like an outsider, and he thought as he met people that would change.

It didn’t.

He didn’t fit in with the social circles, he didn’t fit in even with his own peers, for the most part. He’d left his friends back in Florida, and while he kept in touch with them privately via Facebook and e-mail, most of them were kinky.

Now, he kept to himself and had made a couple of acquaintances in the local kinky community, but due to his work he had to keep an extremely low profile. It wouldn’t do to have his clients’ trust in him ruined.

He truly missed Florida, but after his divorce, he thought the opportunity to have a clean break would be even better if he’d made it a literal one and not just a metaphorical one. He’d made that decision after bumbling around a little and failing to find his focus, his center.

Not to mention a couple of short-lived relationships.

Plus the money had been damned good. He’d received the job lead at the rehab center from a former college buddy and had decided to go for it.

After showering and fixing himself a breakfast smoothie, he dressed and headed down to his car to make the drive south. While many Angelenos were heading into the city proper for work, he was actually driving away from it.

“The Compound,” as it was unofficially dubbed by the staff, was located south of Laguna Beach. The five acres were probably worth what someone could buy a subdivision-worth of land in Sarasota County for.

Maybe in south or east Sarasota County.

And it was one of the best-kept secrets in the area. Not one of those stupid wink-wink, the paparazzi knows you’re there before you even finish your intake forms kind of places, either.

Cash-only, for starters, which helped protect their clients’ privacy from paper trails. No insurance accepted, because the people coming to them could afford to pay out-of-pocket.

Rigorous background checks for all staff, right down to the maintenance crew. They had the best-paid housekeepers anywhere.

Only certain clients were accepted. They couldn’t be raging public Dumpster fires, meaning their addiction had either been caught early, or had been kept quiet enough not to draw excess attention to it. The clients couldn’t be violent, or up on charges for serious crimes, or embroiled in a nasty divorce being fought as much in the press as it was in the courts. They couldn’t have a criminal history other than minor traffic infractions, or charges from an extremely short list of misdemeanors that weren’t violent in nature.