The Match

“Because you’re on my service today, and this is part of it.” What a lie. I click the unlock button on the key fob in my hand to open the doors to my black Mercedes-Benz coupe and say to Ava, “Get in.”

With the door handle in my hand, I look across the roof of the sports car at her and she smiles. “Yes, sir.”

I shake my head, the corner of my mouth turning up into an arrogant smirk. “You will be the death of me, Ava. Keep calling me that.”

“Yes, sir,” she repeats.

“You are such a good girl, a good surgeon. Too bad I am going to ruin you.”

What was I thinking when I left the hospital with Ava? I could lose my job for fraternizing with an intern, let alone for taking her to lunch. Well, I guess that would be a bit extreme to fire a doctor over one lunch, but I paid for said lunch, as if it were a date.

What the hell am I doing?

Somehow, Ava is forcing me to break my rules, and I hate myself for making an exception for her because I would never do it for anyone else. So, why Ava Roberts, of all people? There’s something about her that I like that I cannot place. Maybe it’s her innocence. But how innocent is a girl who gives it up to a guy she doesn’t even know?

We fucked ten minutes after meeting. She’s too trusting of people. And I’m too easily convinced that I need more of her every time she opens her mouth. Plus, I love her mouth. I loved the way she made me feel when she was sucking my cock. I miss that

feeling. I miss being inside every part of her. But she’s off-limits.

“We’re eating here?” Ava seems surprised when I grab her food and drink and tell her to sit at the table near the window.

“I didn’t drive all the way over here so I can eat in a ninety-thousand-dollar car and ruin the upholstery.”

“For someone who had sex this weekend, you sure are grumpy.”

I set our sandwiches and coffees on the table and then pull out a chair for Ava, before taking a seat. “I’m not grouchy. If you think I’m in a mood, wait until I’m actually in one.”

Ava stares across the table at me and takes a sip from her cup, eyeing me up the entire time. “No, I don’t think I would like that very much.”

“Don’t get too comfortable with me,” I warn and mean it.

“I’m not,” she counters with a scowl on her face. “You make me nervous. Half the time I’m around you, I am completely freaked out. It’s hard to get comfortable when you make me feel like I am walking on eggshells.”

“If I’m so awful, then why did you let me fuck you. Why did you come to my apartment? Why are you having lunch with me?”

She sits back in her chair with the latte in her hand. “You want the truth?”

I nod. “Of course.”

“You’re hot. I wanted to fuck you. My thought process wasn’t very deep that night. I wasn’t going to say no to your offer. It was too hard to pass up.” She blushes, as if she’s embarrassed for saying too much. But I’m glad that she did.

“The moment I saw you I knew I had to have you.”

“How romantic,” she deadpans, taking a sip of her latte. “You said you wanted a sex-only deal, yet you broke your own rule earlier when you invited me to your office. Then, you let me scrub in with you.” She scoots her chair closer and lowers her voice, staring at me with those wide blue eyes that had sucked me in from the start. “Now, we’re at lunch together. What are we doing? Aren’t you afraid we will get caught?”

“Yes, but I didn’t care at the time I asked you to come to my office, just as I don’t care right now. As far as the hospital knows, I haven’t done anything wrong. We had sex when you were no one to me, nothing more than a meaningless hookup. But things have changed.”

She bites the corner of her lip. “How so?”

I shrug. “I don’t know. You were…I don’t know how to describe it. I love watching you work.”

“The feeling is mutual,” she says, pinning me down with her gaze. Her blue eyes are so wide and bright they practically jump off her heart-shaped face.

“I wouldn’t have left the hospital with you in broad daylight if I was worried that someone would find out,” I admit, though I hadn’t done much thinking when I dragged her out of the O.R. and to my car.

“I’m supposed to be on your service. I don’t think the hospital will approve of your style of teaching.”

“Right now, you are not on my service, you are at my service. There is a distinction, Ava.”