Dr. Chase Hudson (The Surrogate Book 2) (2 page)

“Yes,” she finally admitted, snapping me
out of my image of her beneath me just before it got really obvious
where my mind was.

“Do you get turned on?” I asked, already
knowing my answer.

“Yes,” she said again, her voice barely a
whisper.

“Good,” I said, watching the top of her
head. “Ava, can you look at me?” It took her a few
seconds, but she forced her head up. “There you are,” I
said, giving her a small smile. “It's good that you get turned
on,” I explained. “This process will be much easier
because you do. Now, I'm sure you did some looking around on my
website, but would you like a bit more in-depth information on how
this works?”

“Sure,” she said in a tone that suggested
she'd rather get exfoliated by a cheese grater than have me keep
talking.

“Today we talk,” I explained, though
talking was the last thing I wanted to be doing. “If all goes
well and you are comfortable enough with the situation, we will set
up the date for your next session. Each session will gradually lead
up in intimacy. Provided things go par for the course, sex will
likely happen around the sixth session.”

She looked a mix of relieved and anxious. “Okay.
Wh... what will the first five sessions be then?”

She stammered.

Actually stammered.

And, damn if it wasn't one of the cutest things I had
ever heard.

I offered her a small smile. “The first session
is just getting comfortable with contact. At most, it would be
kissing. From there, the next session will include undressing. You
will learn to get comfortable with your nudity as well as... someone
else's.”

I almost said 'mine' and carefully skirted around it at
the last second. From the look of panic on her face, I might as well
have not even bothered. She was already thinking about it. Normally,
it would be pretty hot to realize she was thinking about me and her
naked together. But when she looked as stricken as she did right
then, yeah, there was nothing sexy about that.

“Ava, don't go there.” I reached out,
putting my hand down on her knee, trying to ground her, bring her
back to the present. “Anxiety doesn't exist in the moment. It
is only in the past and the future. So, let's not think about those
things, alright? Just be in the moment.” Her gaze went
pointedly to my knee. “This moment makes you uncomfortable,
doesn't it?” I asked, squeezing her knee slightly.

Her eyes rose from my hand on her knee to look me in
the eye. “Yes.”

“But not enough to push me away,” I
observed.

“Not yet,” she admitted and I felt myself
chuckle, letting my hand drop.

“The purpose of this is to push you out of your
comfort zone. It's important that you don't push me away with the
first twinge of anxiety. As I'm sure you learned in your previous
therapy sessions, anxiety can really only be treated with exposure to
that which makes you anxious.”

“Right.”

“So if kissing makes you anxious...” I
prompted.

“I have to let you kiss me.”

I hadn't expected her to say it. I had expected her to
hedge. Or to shut down. To slip momentarily into the mutism. At her
words, I felt my eyes slip to her lips for the barest of seconds,
thinking of them underneath mine, feeling the desire well up strong
and insistent.

I took a breath, pushing those feelings away.

“Exactly,” I said, sitting back. I needed
the space. I needed to put the professional line back into place.
“Only pull away or push me away if you can't talk yourself
down. When you get to the point where you can't take it anymore. That
being said, I am going to be communicating with you the entire time,
trying to work to dispel the fears before they become overwhelming.
The point is for you to get to the point where you can enjoy being
touched.”

As soon as the words were out of my mouth, I could see
the range of emotions overcoming her face. Most prominently, there
was panic. She was freaking out about being touched. Specifically,
about me touching her. That was to be expected, but it didn't make it
any less troubling.

“You're a very beautiful woman,” I heard
myself say, inwardly cringing at the words. It was unprofessional to
talk her up. To, essentially, hit on her. But at the same time, she
was obviously struggling with her self-esteem and I wanted to get a
clear image of how much she was suffering.

“I'm sorry?” she asked, brows drawing
together, making two small vertical lines fold above her nose. Like
she was confused. Like she thought she misheard me.

“I said you are a very beautiful woman,” I
repeated, watching as something very different from confusion take
over her features. If I wasn't mistaken, it was frustration,
bordering on anger.

“Compliments make you uncomfortable?” I
asked, already knowing the answer, but needing her to say it.

“Yes.”

“Why?” I asked, watching her squirm in her
seat, knowing she was getting close to shutting down on me. “Because
you don't believe them?” I offered her the olive branch.

“Yes,” she said, looking relieved to not
have to spell it out.

“Ava,” I said, my voice a little firm. “I
don't feed women compliments for fun. If I tell you something, I mean
it. It is an observation. You are a beautiful woman. Case closed.”
It was a fact. She was beautiful. There was no question about it. Her
being unaware of it just made her all the more attractive.

“Right,” she said in an odd tone.
Disbelieving, maybe a little annoyed.

I couldn't help it. My lips twitched then shifted up to
a smirk. She really had no idea. Her steadfast determination to not
accept a simple fact was at once frustrating and adorable. “Ava,
what do you think the main reason men compliment women is?” I
asked, letting there be a pause before going on. “To get women
into bed.” I leaned forward, my smile getting a little bigger.
“You are here to go to bed with me. Eventually. Do you really
think I need to give you compliments?”

“I guess not,” she said, but I could tell
she was only half believing me.

I fought a laugh. “Exactly. So, you're beautiful.
It's a biological fact.” As soon as I finished, I watched her
grasp at straws, trying to make herself believe that I didn't
actually think she was gorgeous, that I was just saying she had good
genes. “And I find you incredibly attractive,” I added,
watching her practically pout.

“Thanks,” she mumbled, her eyes moving from
mine.

I felt myself chuckle. I couldn't help it. “Do
you find me attractive?” I asked, expecting a pause, a mumble,
a tripping of words.

She answered immediately and clearly. “I think
the entire continental US would find you attractive.”

Oh, yeah. She was good. That was quick. To anyone else,
it would have been a satisfactory answer. But I couldn't let her get
away with it.

“That's wonderful,” I said, leaning closer,
“but I wasn't asking the entire continental US, I was asking
you.”

Her eyes slid slightly to the side, making it appear
that she was still giving contact, when, in fact, she was looking at
my earlobe. “Yes,” she admitted in a quiet voice.

She was done.

I had pushed her far enough for the intro session. If I
kept going, she would shut down and then not come back.

“Good,” I said, getting out of my chair and
moving out of the seating alcove. “So, I will see you...
Tuesday for your first session.” It was a half-declaration,
half-question, giving her the chance to object though I knew she
wouldn't.

“Okay.”

“Okay,” I repeated, opening the door and
stepping into the space, waiting for her to follow. She did, making
sure her body didn't so much as brush mine in the process. “Seven
at night work for you?”

There was the barest of pauses. “Yes.”

My hand lifted, pressing into her lower back, trying to
see her reaction as I led her into the waiting room. She tensed, but
only slightly. I let her go as soon as I walked up to the reception
desk.

“See you then, Ava.”

Something flashed across her face. It was too quickly
gone to decipher before she mumbled numbly, “Okay,” as
she went out the door.

After the Session

I should have recused myself.

I knew it the second I closed myself back up in my
office when she left.

It was unprofessional to go on, to work with a woman I
was more than professionally interested in.

Desire may have, in a way, been a part of the process.
It was supposed to be in a detached sort of way, a thing I managed to
have happen so I could help my clients. It wasn't meant to be the
point of it all.

But there was no mistaking it, I was attracted to Ava.

As in... I wanted to know what she sounded like when I
was buried deep inside her. I wanted to feel her nails in my back. I
wanted to feel her tighten around me just before her body pulsated,
grabbing my cock.

Normally, her painful shyness wouldn't be a turn on for
me. I didn't, in my personal life, seek out the wallflowers. It
wasn't that I didn't understand the male ego's urge to raise to the
challenge, to make the reserved girl want me. I got it. I understood
that. Once in a while, I felt that myself. But I also knew that when
what I was looking for was just a fuck, I wasn't going to drag a girl
like that through that kind of interaction. It would only reinforce
her idea of her own worthlessness while at the same time bolstering
her idea that men are pigs.

I didn't exactly have a type.

But whatever it was I went for... shy was not it.

Somehow, though, Ava's shyness was more than
intriguing professionally. It was fucking adorable. Sweet. It made a
unfamiliar surge of protectiveness swell up inside. There was a
strong inner voice telling me to wrap her up and shelter her from the
world.

Which was ridiculous.

Firstly because it was the absolute last thing she
needed. What she needed was someone to take her by the hand and show
her the world wasn't such a scary place.

But also, secondly, because that went against
everything I believed about women. It went against everything I
learned from the women I had dated: strong, independent, sexually
confident women. Ava should have been embracing those attributes, not
letting men protect her from them.

I sat through two more sessions that day- one housewife
who was trying to overcome her husband's infidelity. It wasn't going
well. While, professionally, I knew it was possible to come back from
that kind of betrayal, I also knew that for many (if not most) it
would never happen. There were some wounds that never healed. Or even
if they did, they healed jagged, always reminding you of the
imperfection. The next client was someone I had been seeing for
years, a middle aged man who suffered with a crippling case of OCD.
He, unlike the wife, was making slow but steady strides.

That was the job. The constant up and down. The wanting
to do more, but knowing there was only so much you could do for them
in one hour one day a week. They had to put in the work. They had to
want and try to get better.

Knowing that didn't make it easier.

I rolled my shoulders as I made my way to the car,
trying to shake off the work day, trying to clear it from my brain. I
tried not to bring that shit home with me, to let it become something
I obsessed about.

It was too easy to let that happen.

I made my way back to my apartment building, taking the
elevator up to my floor and letting myself in.

My apartment was a testament to how far I had come in
my life. From the tiny roach-infested apartment I had shared with my
struggling mother, to the over-crowded foster homes I had been
shuffled in and out of- dirty, loud, and uncomfortable as they had
all been.

It was why I worked so hard: to make a life for myself
that I could be proud of and comfortable in.

That was what my apartment meant to me. It was a nice
place in a nice neighborhood with more space than I actually needed
and professionally decorated. It was all dark wood floors and a deep
cappuccino brown walls in the open floor plan living/dining/kitchen
area. I walked over toward the windows, flipping open my stereo
system and clicking through my play lists. I found one called “smoky
blues” and heard Muddy Waters' voice fill the room. I walked
over to the bar, pouring myself scotch neat and considering it for a
moment before throwing it back.

Yeah. So I should have recused myself.

But I wasn't going to.

Partly because of selfish reasons.

But also because I could genuinely help her. I knew I
could.

She deserved that. She deserved to have a normal life,
a healthy sex life.

I squashed the tiny twinge of jealousy I felt at the
idea of another man touching her. Because it was ridiculous.
Absolutely insane. That was the point of surrogacy, to get her
comfortable with herself and her desires so she could go on and use
that in her daily life. She could go on and enjoy sex. With other
men.