Bet Me; Chapter 10; Suggestions, Confessions & Videotape
A/N: Sorry for the long wait on this one. Elena was really...being difficult, and then after the finale, even when my hope had returned, I needed some time. Thankfully Elena and I both got out stuff together, and here we are.
Thanks to my fabulous beta readers Bex and Lauren. <3
Chapter 10 - Suggestions, Confessions & Videotape
“Do you know what this is?” Von Gruber asked them as he returned with the video.
Von Gruber didn’t wait for either of them to answer. He put the video into the machine and turned on the TV, before handing the remote to Damon.
“I’m going to leave you for several minutes. I’d like you to watch this before I get back.”
Damon had a vision of Elena bolting off the couch as soon as Von Gruber left the room, but instead she stayed seated beside him.
“Do you think this is…?” she trailed off.
“I don’t know,” Damon said. “I think we should probably watch it and find out.”
Damon pressed play on the remote and their bedroom flashed up on the screen right away. Even though the lights were obviously out, the camera had clearly been able to pick up its surroundings in the dark. Damon could see everything thanks to the dull green glow the camera had recorded with. He could see the bed, and he could see the two of them in it. Fortunately, he couldn’t see much else because of how they had been lying together. He could just see the back of his head, and the vague movement underneath the quilt as he had stroked Elena last night. That was all.
“Turn it off,” Elena told him, reaching for the remote control, and knocking the volume button as she did so.
He hardened immediately as he heard her moans; remembering how turned on she’d been last night. Her gasp next to him reminded him of the noise she’d made when he’d first touched her through her shorts.
“Damon.”
Damon sat absolutely still as he listened to Elena climax in front of him, before he came to his senses and hit the stop button. Von Gruber walked in just as he put the remote down.
“Have you finished?” Von Gruber asked, as he walked back across the room towards them.
Elena couldn’t look at Von Gruber as he sat down in front of them. She was just too disgusted; disgusted that Von Gruber had probably watched her getting off, disgusted that she had been so carried away last night, that she’d let that happen, and disgusted that watching the video had reignited the arousal she’d felt in bed with Damon last night.
“I’m unsure exactly how this video is supposed to help you improve my marriage,” Damon said to Von Gruber as he handed the remote back to him.
Damon was doing his best to remind himself he needed to keep his cool here; but he couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt this angry. He knew that Elena had been terrified of something like this happening, and while what had happened last night had hardly been all his fault, he was feeling guilty anyway. He wanted to hit Von Gruber for making them watch what should never have been seen by anyone.
“I suggested you should abstain,” Von Gruber told him, smiling in his usual cold way. “I never tried to deceive you about the way we monitor your interactions.”
“I forgot,” Elena said to their therapist. “I forgot the camera was there.”
“Clearly you were carried away,” Von Gruber said, pressing play on the remote.
The three of them watched the television to see Elena jump out of the bed, and dive into the bathroom.
“In fact you’re so carried away, that you leave the bed without saying a word, and shut the bathroom door behind you. Why?”
“I was embarrassed,” Elena told him, as if the answer was obvious.
“And watching this helps, how?” Damon asked Von Gruber.
“Embarrassed?” Von Gruber repeated, ignoring Damon. “Why?”
“What happened should have been private…between my husband and I. It was a private moment.”
“That should have been kept private,” Damon added.
“Damon, it’s easy to see you’re shocked at her disappearance, and then angry that she has deserted you.”
Damon went to speak, but then he stopped. Anything he might say could be used by Von Gruber to prove whatever point it was the man was trying to make. There wasn’t a damn thing he could say to make what happened look any better, or that wouldn’t delay this conversation being over and done with.
“I’m curious to know if this has happened before.” Von Gruber said to them.
“If what has happened before?” they asked together.
“If,” he said, looking at Elena, “you disappear half way through marital relations on a regular basis.”
“No,” Elena exclaimed, horrified. “I was running from the cameras.”
“Yet you shut the door on your husband, without asking him to join you, or any thought toward him at all.”
“That’s not true,” she said.
Von Gruber fast forwarded the tape, before showing Elena return to the bed alone.
“And when he comes in after you, you leave him in the bathroom, and choose to come to bed on your own.”
She couldn’t have made it look any worse if she had tried, Elena thought. She looked like some bitch who was hot one minute and frigid the next.
“I wanted a shower,” Damon explained, coming to her defence.
“Alone?” Von Gruber asked. “After such an intimate moment? I should tell you that problems which are swept under the rug are never resolved.”
Von Gruber then proceeded to fast forward to the moment in time that Damon returned to the bed.
“When you do come to bed,” Von Gruber said, “you don’t touch each other. There is a distance between the two of you. Elena, it’s clear you want physical intimacy and connection with your husband, but you won’t allow it because of the emotional distance you’re trying to keep between you at all times. Damon, you allow her to keep this distance, which makes you just as responsible. Do you know the best way to achieve intimacy quickly, from an emotional and physical standpoint?” Von Gruber asked them. “Sex.”
Elena felt her body temperature rise, and her heart beat so fast, she was certain she could hear it.
“That’s all well and good,” Damon said, trying to ignore the fact that his body was telling him it was the best idea it had ever heard, “but you told us to abstain for three days.”
Von Gruber leaned forward. “In light of the events of last evening, I no longer think abstinence is beneficial for either of you.”
Damon didn’t want to abstain either. Everything at this damn retreat seemed to come back to sex. It was just a matter of time before he snapped and lost complete control; Elena too, though she wasn’t ready to admit it. This intimacy issue was starting to get out of hand. It was too much of a distraction. They were going to have to do something about it, but since Elena didn’t see sex as an option, he had no idea what.
Elena was doing her best not to hit the panic button right now. Their therapist wouldn’t suggest she start sleeping with her husband while he had cameras up in their room. Or maybe he would. It was Von Gruber - their perverted marriage therapist. She could only hope he meant to take them down, and having the cameras out of their studio was certainly a good thing. This was an opportunity to get them removed.
“The cameras in our room make me feel nervous,” she told him. “Will you take them down, so I can be intimate with my husband?”
Damon felt like he was going to explode with excitement, until he realized Elena didn’t mean for them to have sex. She was just trying to get rid of the cameras. It was a good idea. He might have thought about it himself had he not been so focused on “intimacy.”
“I’ll turn them off between nine thirty and eleven thirty this evening,” Von Gruber told them.
“And we’re just supposed to believe you?” Elena asked.
“Why would I lie?” Von Gruber asked.
“I don’t know why you’d lie,” Damon said, “but we’re not going to risk you recording something like this again.”
“I suggest you take the risk,” Von Gruber said to Damon before turning to Elena. “And I suggest you get over your nerves.”
Elena could practically hear the threat behind his words. What would Von Gruber do to them if they didn’t go along with him? What would he do to her if she couldn’t seem to get over her nerves? Any resistance might be seen as a reason for Von Gruber to use methods Elena didn’t want to have any part of. She could feel Damon’s agitation beside her, and without thinking, she squeezed his hand.
She had no faith Von Gruber would turn those cameras off. She could feel panic rising up inside her again, but she pushed it back down. She needed to stop thinking like a victim. She needed to think like a journalist. Time would be better spent thinking about what she could do to nail this therapist’s ass to the wall, rather than worrying. Besides, all this talk about cameras was giving her ideas.
Von Gruber seemed to be particular about recording everything. He was probably recording his sessions, she thought - including this one. And if he was recording his sessions, then who knows what else he was recording. Von Gruber could very well have evidence of what he was doing, lying around. Suddenly she couldn’t wait to tell Damon what she was thinking. They just had to get out of here first.
“I’ll do my best,” she told him, “to get over my nerves.”
“Excellent,” Von Gruber told her.
Damon wondered what the hell Elena was thinking. There was no way Von Gruber was going to turn those cameras off. Their therapist was going to be watching them. He was going to expect to see them having sex; and she’d just told Von Gruber that it was fine! That she was going to get over her nerves. He wanted to shake some sense into her. She had no idea what she’d just agreed to. He was doing his best to keep his hands off her, but she was persistently making it difficult. Did she think he had the control of a saint? She was wrong. So wrong.
“Now, I want the two of you to resume the soul gazing position you were in earlier this morning.”
Elena had been hoping Von Gruber would let them go now. She’d forgotten Von Gruber had said they would be soul gazing in their one-on-one sessions. The soul gazing position had been far too intense when she’d sat with Damon this morning. Now that she’d talked about high school, watched a video of them being intimate with each other, and been told they were expected to have sex tonight, Elena didn’t relish the idea of sitting there and looking Damon in the eye for an extended period of time. She wanted to protest, but Von Gruber would just interrogate her if she did. He seemed to jump on everything.
Von Gruber put two cushions on the floor in the centre of the room, and motioned for the two of them to sit down on the floor. She sat down on one of the cushions, and Damon sat down in front of her. Just like this morning, the jolt she felt when she met Damon’s eyes was fierce. This wasn’t real, that was what Katherine had told Damon. It was what Damon believed. She had to find a way to believe that too.
“I want you to hold hands and look at one another. Concentrate on your breathing,” Von Gruber told them. “The man you’re married to sits before you, Elena. Do you love him?”
“Yes,” Elena said, immediately uncomfortable and wishing Brady was there to interrupt them this time. Shouldn’t soul gazing be done silently?
“And you’re attracted to him?”
She looked at Von Gruber, but he motioned for her to look back at Damon.
“Are you attracted to your husband, Elena?”
Elena stared at the man in front of her as he stared back. It was all it took for arousal to kick in all over again.
“Yes.”
“You want to be physically intimate with him? Emotionally and physically connected to him?”
She was far too aware of the way her nipples were pressed against the lace of her bra; of the damp heat between her legs, and the way her cheeks felt as if they were burning. She could scarcely breathe as she watched Damon’s eyes darken. She wondered briefly if there had been something in the water Von Gruber had given her, but how would she ever know? Desire seemed to be her permanent natural response to Damon at the moment, and knowing that Damon was feeling the same way she was, made the strength of the attraction even greater.
“Yes,” she whispered.
“You find pleasure in his touch?”
Hadn’t watching the video been enough proof that she did? Why was Von Gruber making her answer these questions? What was he trying to achieve?
“Do you find pleasure in his touch, Elena?” Von Gruber repeated.
“Yes.”
“You enjoy the how it feels when you’re with him?”
“Yes.”
“Then why did you stop things last night?”
“The cameras.”
“You won’t let them stop you next time, will you?”
If she were honest it hadn’t just been the cameras that had stopped her. She’d stopped for her own emotional well-being, but she knew what she was supposed to say here.
“No.”
“No?”
“I won’t let them stop me.”
“For the sake of your marriage, the next time he touches you like that, you won’t stop until both of you are satisfied,” Von Gruber told her firmly.
It wasn’t a question, Elena thought. Everything Von Gruber had said up till now had been a question, but that…that sounded like…an order. Was Von Gruber trying to hypnotize her? She wasn’t sure. She didn’t feel the usual relaxation that was supposed to accompany hypnotherapy. She blinked, and wriggled slightly. She still felt in control of her body. She felt in control of her mind. Maybe Von Gruber thought he was hypnotizing her, but it wasn’t working; on her anyway. Damon looked like he was more than a little affected by what Von Gruber was saying.
“You won’t stop, Elena. Tell him.”
“I won’t stop,” she told Damon.
His eyes were almost black from desire now, and she felt a corresponding need swirling low in her belly.
“You won’t stop until you’re both satisfied. Tell him.”
“I won’t stop until we’re both satisfied,” she said breathlessly.
“Good. That’s the end of our session today. Have a good evening,” Von Gruber told them, ushering them out the door so fast Elena didn’t even have time to blink.
***
As soon as they walked out of the building Elena felt herself being grabbed, and pinned against the nearest tree by Damon. She swallowed as she looked up at him. His fury was obvious from the way he was glaring at her, but so was his arousal.
“What the hell were you thinking?” he asked her.
“I-”
“Do you have any idea what you’ve just agreed to? Telling Von Gruber we’d go through with this two hour sex window?"
“What was I supposed to say, Damon?”
“How about, ‘no’? Or even better, ‘I’m not doing anything until you take those cameras down.’”
“He’s dangerous. I thought it was better to go along with it, rather than risk whatever else he might have tried to do to us if we’d resisted.”
Whatever Von Gruber could do to them wasn’t half as bad as what she’d just done to them, Damon thought. He’d just spent the last part of their session, locked in some intense eye contact with her, while she’d told Von Gruber how much she enjoyed him touching her; how she wouldn’t stop if he touched her again. He’d sat there, rock-hard, trying to stop himself from taking her on the floor of their therapist’s office. And now that he had her pinned against the tree, his body’s reaction to her was almost impossible to ignore.
“I don’t care,” he told her angrily, releasing her. “It was stupid, and reckless.”
“It would have been just as stupid and reckless to say no.”
“It would have been the better choice.”
“Better than what, Damon? Being drugged? Being hypnotized?”
“Better than putting us in the situation we’re in now.”
“I don’t understand. We had no other choice. We have to go along with this. We have to pretend-”
“Pretend what, Elena? You want us pretend we’re having sex for the cameras?”
Elena had never heard Damon sound so angry before. She was about to tell him no, but caught herself in time. It was the answer to their problems. After everything that had happened last night, and her inability to stop things before they went too far, it would be flirting with danger; but they had no other choice. Von Gruber was going to be watching those cameras between nine-thirty and eleven-thirty pm. If their therapist thought he was watching them have sex, he would stop talking about fixing their intimacy issues. He would stop focusing on these types of ‘problems’, and it would get him off their backs. No aphrodisiac necessary. No hypnotherapy required.
“I think it’s our only way out of this, Damon. He’s going to expect to see something. He won’t stop until he believes we’re doing what he wants us to do.”
“It won’t work, Elena,” he told her.
“Why not?”
Damon stared at the woman in front of him. Why not? Was she serious? She had no freaking clue, did she? That was about to change. He let the anger be his guide as he gave into the desire he’d been feeling all day. She squeaked with surprise as his mouth descended on hers hungrily, but he ignored it. She’d been crazy to agree to Von Gruber. He would never get through a session of pretending to be with this woman without it turning into the real thing. The session with Von Gruber had had him far too worked up already. Trying to fake some kind of sex session was just the stupidest idea he’d ever heard.
He pressed himself against her, letting her feel how much he wanted her; he needed her. He couldn’t hold back any longer; or suppress what he’d been feeling all day. Neither of them would get through this week without surrendering to the attraction between them. No matter what Elena wanted, this thing was bigger than the two of them. Even now, she should be pushing him away. She should be telling him to stop; but she wasn’t. She was pulling him against her. She was seeking his tongue with hers. She didn’t seem worried about the fact that his arousal was pressed against her. In fact now she was actually moving her hips against his. She was going to make sure he had no control left, he thought, pulling his mouth away from hers.
“We’re not in control of this,” he said to her. “We’ll never be able to do it.”
“You stopped,” she told him breathlessly. “You were still in control.”
“You were testing me?” he asked.
It might have been easier to lie, Elena thought, but there was enough happening here at the retreat to screw with their minds. She’d been keeping the truth to herself about all that she was feeling, hoping that she could conceal her vulnerabilities; but lying about what was going on between them wasn’t going to work. She saw that now. If he thought she was in control, when she wasn’t, he wouldn’t fight so hard to keep what he was experiencing under control. They were going to have to be honest. She was going to have to be honest.
It went against every one of her instincts to trust the man she was competing against - the one who had hurt her severely, but she had to take this chance. They couldn’t go on the way they had been for the past day. They wouldn’t make it through this week without something changing drastically between them. If she couldn’t trust anyone or anything here, she would go insane.
Hesitation and doubt stole in automatically, but she pushed them away again. He’d been angry at her when they’d come out of Von Gruber’s office. He’d been angry because she’d agreed to their therapist’s suggestion, and he didn’t know how he was going to stop. She knew he didn’t want to stop. He was only trying to because she’d told him she didn’t want them to sleep together. She’d asked him to keep his distance and he’d done everything he could do to respect her wishes. That meant something. So, tell him the truth.
“You kissed me,” she said to him. “I wasn’t testing you.”
“You weren’t?”
“No. I wasn’t in control?”
He stared at her for a moment before asking. “What were your feelings towards me, Gilbert? Back in high school?”
Damon hadn’t meant to be so blunt with his question. He’d planned to ask her later, maybe after they were more relaxed - during a walk, or after dinner; but it was too late to take it back now. And he really wanted to know. Her confession of not being in control during their kiss had made him feel so much need for her, he had no idea what to do with it; how to control it - manage it. He watched a whole range of emotions flicker across her face, but the one that stayed absolutely scared the crap out of him - vulnerability.
“It was nothing,” she said to him. “Just some stupid school girl crush.”
“Crush?” he repeated.
She nodded. “I got over it after prom.”
“You wanted to go to prom with me?”
“Every girl wanted to go to prom with you, Damon.”
“I don’t care about every other girl right now,” he told her. “I just want to know if you did.”
She shrugged, as if the answer was neither here, nor there, but Damon knew that this answer was just as important as the rest of the information she’d just hit him with. Sure they’d discussed prom on Friday, and he’d realized he’d made an error believing she was some kind of snob, but this gave prom night a whole different meaning. It was right there in his head again; the image of her face as she realized his invitation to prom had been a joke - the tears he’d thought he’d imagined as she stood before him. He felt his heart lurch in his chest as she finally answered his question.
“Yes.”
“Yes?” he repeated.
“Yes, I wanted to go to prom with you, Damon.”