by Stacey Kade
Her hands skim over my biceps. “That’s … yeah.” Her touch has rendered me basically incoherent, and she knows it, by the mischievous look in her eye when she smiles at me.
Then she presses her mouth to mine again, her tongue sliding hesitantly between my lips, and I’m the one groaning now.
Pulling my hands from her hair, I move them to her hips and tug her closer, until she’s half in my lap, and then she throws her leg over both of mine.
Her heat is radiating against my hip, and it’s hard not to rock against her. To pull her fully on top of me until we’re lined up and rubbing against each other. Those tiny boxer sleep shorts she’s wearing wouldn’t be much between us and neither are my shorts.
It’s instinct and that desire to feel her moving against me that has me shifting, turning toward her and pulling us up higher on the bed.
The motion settles me between her legs and brings her breasts against my chest. She wraps her arms around my neck, pulling me tighter.
I press my hands against the bed to support my weight, but when I start to lower my arms to bring us both to the mattress, she stiffens suddenly and pushes her hands against my chest. “No. Wait.”
Breathless, I pull back.
She pushes herself upright and away from me, shoving her hair back, which is messy from my hands in it.
“Too much, too fast,” I say. “I’m sor—”
“Don’t,” she says quickly, her breathing still uneven. “Don’t apologize. Please.” Her eyes beg me not to make a big deal out of it. “You didn’t do anything wrong. It’s just me.” She gives a rueful eye roll. “It’s like there’s a level in my head, you know, with the bubble?”
I know what she’s talking about; my grandfather had one in his wood workshop in the barn.
“Only in my head, the center is green, and the bubble tipped from the green to red. I’m not sure I can do … that. You on top of me.” She flinches.
“Maybe that’s enough for tonight,” I say, backing toward the edge of the bed.
“Maybe,” Amanda admits reluctantly. But she won’t look at me, her gaze focused at some undefined point on the dresser instead. “I was just hoping…”
Her sadness and disappointment pull at me. “Hey,” I say gently. I move to kneel on the floor in front of the dresser, so she’ll look at me. “This kind of stuff is going to take time, figuring out what you like. What’s okay for you.”
She opens her mouth to object.
“Not just for you, either,” I add. “Everyone.” I hesitate, not sure how much she wants to hear, but oh, what the hell.
“I’ve been with a few girls, women,” I begin.
“A few?” Amanda smirks.
I hold my hands up. “I’m not trying to brag here, just make a point,” I say. “None of them have been exactly the same, the things they liked, the things they didn’t. It’s just more complicated for you is all.”
She nods, still looking too solemn and down on herself.
“But I could brag, if I wanted,” I say, more to get her reaction than anything.
Amanda scowls at me.
I hold her gaze steadily. “I promise you, before we’re done, you’re going to know exactly what you love, exactly what you want. And you’ll be asking me for it.”
Her mouth opens slightly, and heat flickers in her gaze again, pushing back the fear and discouragement.
Mission accomplished.
“Okay?” I ask, standing up.
“Yeah,” she says, watching me move with a hunger that sends pride streaking through me.
“I’ll see you in the morning,” I say, turning toward the door. I’m already looking forward to it, to more time with her. My head is full of Amanda—her courage, how she smiles at me, the calm, reasoned way she talks, and that soft noise she made when I kissed her and how I might get her to do that again. All of that should probably scare the hell out of me, but it doesn’t.
“Chase?”
I glance back at her.
“Thanks,” she says with a shy smile.
And then, I remember all that I’ve done to use her and her name. All that I’m still doing, technically, and guilt slams into me hard.
“Don’t. I’m not a saint, and this isn’t an act of charity.” It comes out sounding harsher than I mean it to, so I try to smile. “I like you, remember?”
She plays with the edge of the comforter, and I expect her to object but she just nods.
Once I’m back in my room, I discover my phone has vibrated halfway across the coffee table, thanks to the texts from Elise that fill the screen. At a glance, each one is angrier and pushier than the last.
But her plan is already working, as she has so frequently pointed out. And with the email from Rick in my inbox, I know she’s right.
It doesn’t have to go any further. Who cares if people think Amanda and I are made up? It’s probably better, given what just happened, if they do.
And if Elise gets pissed, what can she really do? She’ll find a way to take it out on me, I’m sure. But she won’t go public with what we did because that would only hurt her career. Make her look bad, too. Worse, maybe, even than me. I was just the pretty face following her orders, or that’s how it’ll seem anyway. Because that’s always what people think of me, and she knows it.
I tap my phone against my palm, thinking of Amanda and that smile. The kind of guy she thinks I am. The person I want to be. After a second of hesitation, I click on the latest text from Elise and without reading it, I type, No, I’m done. We’re done.
Then I delete all the apps and Elise’s ridiculous drafts before I can second-guess myself, and I put in a call to the front desk to have new room keys sent up.
For a moment, it’s like I’m free-falling with the ground rushing up at me. But the weight on my shoulders is gone.
19
Amanda
“Amanda?” Chase’s voice intrudes, softer than normal.
I hear him, but I can’t see him. I’m in the middle of a crowd, and I’m lost or I’ve lost someone. I’m not sure which. And it doesn’t seem to matter against the rising tide of panic in my gut. People are shoving against me, their elbows in my sides, their shoulders pressed in my face, until I feel like I can’t breathe.
I rise up on my tiptoes, looking for him. But all the faces around me keep blurring together, making it impossible to tell who’s who. Choking back terror, I turn …
“Amanda?” Chase asks again. “You awake?”
I open my mouth to call his name, but before I can speak, there’s the lurch and spin of a new reality settling into place.
Suddenly I’m awake in the dark, lying down, staring up at the ceiling. My body aches with the heaviness of sleep, both the recent exit from it and the lack of enough.
“Amanda?”
It’s a familiar scenario. Chase waking me up after one of Jakes’s visits, wanting to talk, trying to convince me to fight, to keep hoping.
But no, something is different. The pillow behind me smells strongly of a pleasant detergent, and … Jakes is dead. I’m not in the basement. Not anymore. Never again.
Struggling to orient myself, I blink a few times and my hand automatically moves to my wrist, confirming the presence of the scar, before I recognize that I’m in a hotel. In a big double bed, lying on crisp white sheets.
You’re okay. The confirmation rushes relief over me in a wave.
The Chase Henry talking to me is real, the one staying next door, not residing in my head. The same one who made a stunning and still unbelievable promise to me last night, a promise that kept me awake for hours from equal parts anticipation and anxiety.
He’s in the doorway to his room, backlit into shadow.
“Chase?” I ask, my voice croaky.
“I’m sorry; I knocked. A few times,” he says, hovering behind the door.
I sit up and fumble to turn on the bedside lamp. Only the faintest hint of gray light emerges from beneath the curtains. “What’s wrong? What t
ime is it? I…” I squint at him. “What are you wearing?”
He grins at me from beneath a baseball hat and aviators. “Standard celebrity disguise.”
I grab the glass I filled with water before bed and take a swallow. My throat is dry from the nightmare or dream, whatever it was.
“I don’t think you’re disguising much,” I point out. If anything, he’s calling attention to the fact that he’s trying to hide, and besides which, that jawline is kind of unmistakable. Strong, a little stubbly at the moment, and kind of delicious, like maybe you want to bite it a little. Not hard, just a nibble …
Or maybe that’s just me.
Chase shrugs, taking off his sunglasses and hooking them in the collar of his gray T-shirt. “Doesn’t matter. It’s mostly a precaution. We’re going out the kitchen exit anyway.” He’s filled with an excited energy I’ve never seen from him before. Though I would never have described him as slow, exactly—weighed down, maybe—there’s a spark to him this morning, a new urgency that I don’t …
Crap. “Did I oversleep?” I shove my hair out of my face and throw back the covers, scrambling out of bed and barely noticing his appreciative look in my haste.
“Go to the set without me,” I say, searching for my jeans. They have to be around here somewhere. “You can’t be late.” I finally locate my jeans on the back of the rolling leather chair and grab them.
“No, no.” Chase holds his hands up in a placating gesture. “It’s still early. Do you have anything to cover your hair?”
“My fleece has a hood,” I say, confused. “What is this about?” I’m never my best in the mornings, but that is especially true after two successive nights with little sleep.
“It’s a surprise,” he says, rocking back on his heels with a very self-satisfied grin.
I stop, with one leg in my jeans. “You do realize why that might not be reassuring to someone like me.”
He frowns. “It’s a good surprise,” he offers.
“Uh-huh,” I say, unconvinced. “Good” is a matter of opinion.
“Do you like bagels?” he asks.
“What?” I blink at him, not sure if this conversation is really this all over the place or if it’s just me. “Yeah, I guess.”
“Good. Come on.” He waves me forward. “I have food.”
I fold my arms over my chest. “No,” I say flatly. I’m a ridiculous figure, I’m sure, with bedhead, sleep lines on my face, and, knowing my luck, that white crusty stuff from toothpaste dried on my lips. So attractive, he’ll be revoking any and all promises made in my direction. “Not until you tell me what’s going on.”
Chase pauses. “You trust me with your body but not in general.” It’s not a critical statement, but a statement nonetheless. Like he’s still trying to figure me out.
My face burns like it’s on fire, and I’m not sure whether it’s the idea of trusting him with my body, which sends another surge of heat through me, or being caught in the loophole I was kind of hoping he wouldn’t notice.
“It’s outside, no one knows we’re going, we’ll have it entirely to ourselves,” he adds, his eyes softening.
From anyone else that might have sounded like a threat of the no-one-can-hear-you-scream variety, but it’s the reassurance I need. Fewer people means fewer variables to try to predict, fewer surprises of the negative variety. Plus, I want to trust him, which makes it easier.
“Okay,” I say slowly. “Do I have time to actually get dressed? As in, not wearing my pajamas under my clothes?”
He nods. “Yeah, we have a few minutes before the cab gets here. Can’t take the car or the photographers will follow us.”
“But why?” I can’t be more coherent than that.
Fortunately, he seems to understand what I’m asking. “I’m working this whole week. If we want any time together, we have to be creative with timing.”
“You know you don’t have to…” I pause, flustered. He said he liked me last night, but this is different. I don’t want him pretending to feel more than he does.
“I mean, the courting”—I roll my eyes at myself and the old-fashioned word that popped out of my mouth—“that part is not what I was asking for last night.” I squirm inwardly at the mention of the previous evening. My bravery at the time now feels like brazen stupidity.
Chase cocks his head to the side, his eyebrows rising. “So maybe you should ask for more.”
“I don’t—”
“Amanda, it’ll be fun. And I want to have fun with you, if that’s okay,” he says patiently.
I open my mouth.
He holds up his hands in surrender. “If you need a reason to justify it, then think about it this way: spending time together helps us get more comfortable with each other.” He gives me a heated look that suggests he would like to be very, very comfortable with me. I can almost feel his hands on my skin again, and it sends an instant bolt of lust through me.
With that, he leaves my room, closing the door after him.
I kick my one leg out of my jeans and stand there for a second, just trying to collect myself.
Then, scrubbing my hands over my face, I head to the bathroom.
Five minutes later, after I’m dressed and my teeth are brushed, I stick my head in his room and find he’s busy packing up food from a room service tray on his dining table.
When he sees me, he holds out a plastic-wrapped bagel, a tiny cup of cream cheese, and a plastic knife. “To go,” he says.
I step deeper into the room and take them, stuffing the sealed cream cheese and knife in the pocket of my fleece and holding on to the bagel, for lack of anywhere else to put it. It’s too big for my other pocket.
“You know this is alarming,” I say in a grumpy voice, picking at the edge of the plastic wrap. I think the bagel is a blueberry one. He was paying attention at dinner last night.
When he doesn’t respond, I look up to see him stopped in the process of stuffing napkins in his coat pocket, wearing a stricken expression.
“I mean,” I say quickly, “you’re entirely too peppy for oh-God-thirty in the morning.”
He relaxes. “Morning person,” he says with an unapologetic smile. “Rancher DNA, I guess.”
I grunt in response.
He wraps my free hand around a paper to-go cup of coffee. “Do you need cream or sugar? Or ketchup?” He waggles the packet at me. “I wanted to be prepared.”
I glare at him. “I wish I knew what you’re prepared for.”
“You,” he says simply, and warmth spreads through my chest. “But beyond that, you’ll have to see.”
He grabs his cup of coffee and then scoops up his key card and phone, putting them both in the pocket of his jeans.
“Ready?” he asks, putting his sunglasses on and gesturing for me to lead the way to the hall door.
“I don’t know, am I?” I ask pointedly. I’m not scared, exactly, but I can feel that nervous ball of tension in my stomach, the one that always forms when I’m not sure what’s going to happen.
He pauses. “Is this really okay, Amanda?”
I swallow the impulse to answer automatically and make myself really think about it. Right now, it’s just the sensation of mild anxiety. The potential for panic is there—it’s always there—but it’s actually manageable right now. “Yeah,” I say, a little surprised.
Chase grins at me. “Good.” Then he reaches around me and pulls open the door with his free hand, which is good because I don’t have one to spare. “Are you always this grumpy in the morning?” he teases.
I stick my tongue out at him. “Only when someone wakes me from a dead sleep to be annoyingly vague,” I say.
“Noted.”
Out in the hall, it’s a little brighter, the window at the far end letting in the dull gray pre-dawn light.
But there’s a strange smoky smell, covering the scent of new carpet and cleaning supplies that I’ve come to expect over the last day and a half.
I wrinkle my nose. It’s not
cigarettes, which is good, because that smell sends me over the edge sometimes, but it’s definitely something charred. And it’s close. I turn, looking for the source.
As Chase exits behind me, pulling the door closed, I find what I’m looking for.
A blackened square of something rests on the carpeting in front of his door, between Chase and me. I must have narrowly avoided stepping on it when I walked out.
I point at it. “What is that? Did room service really screw up your toast?”
He frowns, nudging it with the edge of his boot to flip it over, then kneeling down for a closer look. “No,” he says flatly. “It’s a picture. What’s left of one, anyway.”
When I bend down to see for myself, I pick out my own features first, then his, though there’s not much left of either. It has to be from yesterday.
That is seriously creepy. I shiver. “Someone wanted you to see this?”
He sighs and stands. “Yeah. Elise is big on symbols. I burned her, she…” He lifts his shoulders. “You get the idea.”
“Elise. The publicist you fired?” I ask.
“Yeah.” He steps over the burned picture and leads the way down the hall toward the service elevators.
I follow, taking an extra step to stay at his side. “She’s still hanging around?” I ask. “That’s kind of stalker-y, isn’t it?”
“You’d think,” he says grimly.
I wait for him to expand on that, but he’s silent as we take the elevator down. It’s hard to read his expression behind his sunglasses, but his enthusiastic spark seems to have dimmed slightly.
Oookay, definitely something strange there, but considering the end of their relationship likely consisted of a personal element as well, maybe it’s not that weird.
I mean, probably not any weirder than burning pictures of them together or driving by his house at night or any of the other slightly crazy ex behaviors you hear about on Jerry Springer, right? As usual, my experience is limited to what I’ve witnessed thirdhand.
And if Chase isn’t worried, or at least not talking about calling the police, then it must not be that big of a deal.
Besides which, it’s not really my business. He’s not my boyfriend.