Chapter 2 Aliza
Aliza
Aliza Becker couldn’t believe that she let her best friend, Dani, drag her to this charity auction.
When Dani asked her to be her plus one to some work thing she had to go to, Aliza, of course, said yes.
She was so proud of Dani for getting her first nursing job.
She had worked so hard—they both had, even if Aliza wasn’t quite ready for her first job post-college.
She decided to go back for her graduate degree before entering the workforce, much to her father’s dismay.
He liked to call her his “Eternal college student”.
It was a joke that he found to be a whole lot funnier than she did.
The truth was, she wasn’t ready to be let loose in life quite yet, and getting her graduate degree gave her some extra time to get her shit together, if that was even possible.
She just needed to remember that celebrating Dani’s first real nursing job at the hospital was worth the pain that her sexy, but very uncomfortable heels, were causing her poor feet.
She was proud of Dani. Hell, proud didn’t even begin to cover it.
Her friend always seemed to have her life together.
That should have pissed her off or made her jealous, but it didn’t.
Dani had busted her ass in nursing school, survived brutal clinicals, and landed her dream job.
How could she be mad at that? She couldn’t.
So, she was going to stand in a room full of strangers, who looked like they donated money for fun, and watch as they bought sexy doctors and nurses from the stage.
What Dani had forgotten to mention was that the work thing that she was dragging her to was a bachelor auction.
She told her to relax—that it was for charity and it would be fun, but Aliza knew right then and there that it would be no fun.
Her friend liked to embellish the truth, and she wasn’t holding back when describing tonight’s event.
Her main problem was that she wasn’t a room-full-of-people kind of woman.
She wasn’t even a talk-to-strangers-voluntarily kind of woman.
She was the kind of person who liked to stand in the corner of the room and observe, catalogue, and keep to herself.
She planned on doing just that tonight and just hoped that the event would be over before she’d get hives and want to run right out of there.
Aliza stood in the back of the room, her arms crossed over her chest, as she watched the spectacle unfold in front of her.
Men were paraded out on stage and sold off to older women with way too much money to spend.
They raised their bidding paddles with a furious pace that had her wanting to burst out into fits of laughter.
Dani mingled with her coworkers as the far too excited host sold grown men to the highest bidder.
The whole thing was ridiculous, but every time Dani checked on her, she told her that she was having a good time.
Her friend seemed to buy her lie, but maybe she just wanted to hear her say those words so that they could stay a bit longer.
She was about to call an Uber when one of the last bachelors was called out onto the stage, and she nearly dropped her damn bidding paddle.
The women in the audience sat up a bit straighter and had their paddles at the ready.
“Up next, ladies, we have Dr. Elias Kingston.” The poor guy looked about ready to bolt, and honestly, she could relate.
She wanted to leave more than she wanted her next breath, but for some reason, she stayed glued to her spot.
The truth was, Aliza wasn’t ready to let loose in life just yet, but for some reason, staring at the sexy doctor had her reevaluating her whole life up until that point.
Everyone else around her knew exactly who they were and what they wanted from life.
But she still felt like she was assembling herself from spare parts, hoping that eventually, the pieces would click into something that would make her whole. If that was even possible.
Her attention was brought back to the present as women around her shouted out numbers and waved their paddles in the air, hoping to be able to claim their prize.
He was a prize, too. Aliza couldn’t take her eyes off the sexy doctor, and if she wasn’t mistaken, he was watching her too.
It was almost amusing to watch him up on that stage, smirking back at her, as though they were sharing a special secret.
Aliza was interested in the doctor despite herself, and that thought scared the hell out of her.
He just stood on the stage looking mildly irritated, like he’d been coerced into this against his will.
She could relate. His shoulders were broad, fitting his tall build.
The doctor was going gray gracefully, and she’d even go as far as to call him a silver fox, not that she liked that term.
She had heard women around town call her father that, and she wanted to throw up in her mouth every time they did.
The doctor’s smile was polite at first; it even seemed practiced but not forced.
And when his eyes swept the room, there was something guarded behind them.
His eyes made him seem human, and not just the piece of meat that the other women in the room seemed to believe he was.
That was what caught her attention—not his good looks, or the form-fitting tuxedo he wore, or even his impressive title.
He looked like a man who would rather be anywhere else, and that was the connection that had her raising her paddle before the auction ended.
The bidding was going fast—too fast for her to keep up.
Cards flew into the air as women shouted out numbers.
The woman standing next to her leaned in and whispered something to her friend about Doctor Daddy, and they both giggled.
Aliza grimaced at the nickname that the woman used.
His eyes locked onto hers, one corner of his mouth twitched, and Aliza felt a strange pull in her chest. It was unfamiliar territory for her, but she raised her paddle and bid on an actual person.
God, what kind of woman did that make her?
Without even fully deciding if it was a good idea or not, Aliza lifted the card that Dani had shoved into her hand earlier, “Just in case”.
She wasn’t sure if she had even said a number or what her bid was, but when the room erupted around her, she knew that she’d quickly find out how much she had spent on the sexy doctor.
Aliza froze as that realization hit her all at once. Dani’s head whipped around, her eyes wide, as she mouthed, “What did you do?” She shrugged at her friend. It was too late to take back her bid, even if she wanted to, and for some strange reason, she didn’t.
The doctor exhaled on stage, his shoulders relaxing for the first time all night, and she wondered what that was all about.
When he looked at her again, this time, his smile was real.
She swallowed hard, her pulse racing, as she tried to figure out her next move.
She thought about running out of that room and pretending that tonight never happened, but she couldn’t embarrass Dani that way.
So much for keeping her shit together and trying to figure out her life. It looked as though she had just bought herself a night that she hadn’t planned for with a man who looked capable of complicating everything that she had been so carefully avoiding.