Page 26 of One Night with the CEO

“You need to calm down and stop expecting your problems to be solved in a few sessions. You’ve been carrying around this trauma since you were a child, and it’s going to take time to unravel, especially with the complication of your mother being back in your life.”

Mia resisted the urge to growl under her breath. “I am not losing Genevieve because of my past or my mother.”

“You seem determined to reestablish your relationship with her.”

“Of course I am—I love her!”

“And yet, you told her not to wait for you.”

“Damn right I did! It wouldn’t be fair for me to ask her to put her life on hold because of my mental nonsense.”

“The way you described it, it sounded like she was offering rather than you asking.”

Mia clutched the sides of the seat to prevent herself from getting up and storming off. She had been embarrassed enough afterward the first time she did it. She did not need a rerun of that, or the questions that followed when she came back.

“Tell me what you’re feeling.”

“I’m feeling fucking annoyed, that’s what! Do you really have to take everything and throw it back at me?”

“Do you feel I’m being unfair?”

Mia didn’t have an answer to that question—at least not one she could put into words—so she settled for glaring at the corner of the desk.

“Are you sure this is really about being fair to Genevieve? Do you not think you’re afraid of being betrayed by someone close to you again?”

“I’m not afraid of Genevieve betraying me. She would never do that.”

“On a conscious level, I’m sure you’re right, but what about the unconscious? Your mom was supposed to protect you, and she abandoned you—maybe not in the literal sense, but she wasn’t there for you. That kind of thing doesn’t come without its own scars. Do you think you might be scared to commit to Genevieve because you worry your issues will cause her to abandon you too?”

“No,” Mia said stubbornly.

Patrick went quiet, leaving Mia with nothing but her thoughts. She hated when he did this. Now she had nothing to do except examine what he had said and see if there was any truth to it—and unfortunately, there did seem to be a fair amount of truth in there.

“Fine, maybe you’re right,” she grumbled after a few minutes of silence. “I don’t see how knowing that helps me, though. Aren’t you supposed to be able to work some magic to fix my brain?”

“Only you can fix your brain, Mia. I’m simply here to guide you along the process.”

“If I’m the only one who can fix my brain, then I’m fucking doomed, aren’t I?” Mia was usually politer than this, but therapy worked on her last nerve and she couldn’t help snapping. Fortunately, Patrick was unflappably calm and didn’t seem to take offense easily.

“Why are you still here, Mia? I can see you don’t like me. It’s been four sessions. What keeps you coming back?”

“It’s not that I don’t like you,” Mia said grudgingly. She actually really did like Patrick and thought in other circumstances that they could even have been friends. “It’s the therapy. I don’t like people poking around in my head.”

“It makes you feel afraid? Vulnerable?”

“I guess. But I need to do this—for Genevieve, and myself.”

“I’m glad you put yourself on that list, because therapy seldom works if you are doing it purely for another person.”

“So when is it supposed to start working?”

“You tell me. Do you feel you’ve made any progress in the time you’ve been seeing me?”

Mia forced herself to think about it rather than giving an irritable, dismissive response.

“Honestly, I think things have only gotten worse. Not that I’m blaming you for that—and maybe they would have been even worse than they are now without you—but the longer I’m away from Genevieve, the worse it is. I feel like she was the last breath I took, and every day I’m apart from her, the more and more oxygen deprived I become.”

“That doesn’t sound particularly healthy. Couples should be able to function apart, no matter how close they are.”

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