“I love you so much, Chase. What do you say? Please take me back. Let’s finish building the castle and living our fairy tale. You can teach me a lesson I’ll never forget in every single room. We’ll live slappily ever after.”
The game was over. Chase bolted off the windowsill, and she quickly sat back up in an effort to close the distance between them. He slid her by her stocking-clad thighs to the edge of the table in one motion, and his hand reached behind her neck into her hair in the next. His mouth crashed down onto hers. She cupped the sides of his face to make sure he wasn’t going anywhere. Weeks of pent-up passion exploded in one breathless kiss. When they finally came up for air, Chase set her back down on the table, his irreplaceable boyish grin having fully returned.
“You drive a hard bargain, lady. I hate to break it to you, but you just went through a lot of trouble for nothing. If you really wanted to apologize, all you had to do was call me. I’d already made peace with the fact I’d never be able to fend you off a second time.”
“I would’ve never called you again.” She smirked, using her thumb to remove her gloss off his lower lip, deliriously happy to be back in his arms. “I do have my pride, you know. I had to get in the same room with you, someplace public where I could have a few minutes to really get under your skin.”
“You’ve been under my skin from the moment I saw you. I’m not that hard to find. And Security has a standing order if they see you. That’s bringing you right to me.”
Her features flashed with mischief and no small amount of jealousy. There was only one place where sighting him with security would be guaranteed. “I was not about to go to that stadium and compete for you with a bunch of fucking kinky bitches.”
His eyes widened briefly, then narrowed meaningfully as he shook a stern finger at her. “Okay, now that one was blatant.”
She giggled and wrapped her hand around his finger, then brought him back in for another chance to smear her gloss. This time he removed it completely.
“Come on, angel,” Chase said after reluctantly pulling away. He reached out, taking her hands to help her down from the table. “Let’s bring everyone back in here and ruin their day.”
“Not everyone’s,” Amanda replied, standing up and smoothing her dress back to its proper length, “just the producer, the publisher, and the real estate agents. The lawyers will just bill us anyway. Your agent will probably consider it a happy ending, too.”
Chase chuckled while watching her shimmy her dress down. “You really were keeping a low profile. I fired Shaw the minute you left my apartment after telling me. He’s been crying breach of contract to anyone who will listen ever since. I’m going to let him whine a little longer and then pay him off.”
“Oh, I knew that. It’s what convinced me you were as miserable over our breakup as I was. He called me soon after. You should’ve heard that phone call. I told him he got off easy; I wanted to hit him with a bat. I meant your new one.”
“So sassy. God, I love you.”
He made several strides in the direction of the door, pulling her behind him before stopping short and giving a little tug on her arm. She halted and regarded him curiously. He looked deep into her eyes, and his fingers tightened around hers. He said earnestly, “Mandy, I don’t think I could live through you taking off on me again.”
She stared at him with all the love her heart could hold, awestruck once again by how readily he conveyed his vulnerability. Without hesitation, he gave her complete control over him and balanced out the power between them. Did he really believe she could survive without him for one single minute for the rest of her life? She slowly shook her head, then smiled, hoping it translated into even a fraction of what she felt for him.
“Chase, unless you’re about to tell me there’s a full-on sex tape of us out there, I vow never to leave you. I watched you be a perfect gentleman and protect me through this whole thing. I’m confident there’s nothing you can’t handle.” She took a step and then halted again. “And if there is a video of us about to go viral, it’s not my leaving you’ll have to worry about living through, it’s my staying.”
He couldn’t resist giving her one more kiss and the well-deserved swat he’d been holding back since she’d first come into the office.
Chase opened the door, expecting to find a galley of faces staring back at them. But the waiting area around the conference room was deserted. So was the hall. Amanda wasn’t really surprised. She had told her own lawyers that if there was no sound of an altercation coming from behind the closed door after three minutes, it was safe to assume it was going to end positively. She had never felt so confident in her new role as a risk-taker, and she knew exactly who to thank. They found the nearest secretary, who got all the attorneys and real estate agents out of a nearby office. They all went back into the conference room, only this time with Chase and Amanda taking seats next to each other as far from the rest of them as possible. They were the only two members on a very exclusive team. The attorneys added Amanda’s name to the house, and the real estate agents were dismissed. Then they began to go over the strategies for any and all repercussions that would follow the change in the previous game plan. When it turned into all legalese on subject matters he couldn’t care less about, Chase reached over and took a piece of paper from the pad of the lawyer across from him. He pulled a pen out of his own suit jacket pocket and began scribbling, not the least bit concerned with looking interested. When he was finished, he put the pen back in his pocket, folded up the piece of paper, and slid it in front of her.
At first she had no intention of reading it; he had seemed so impolite while he was writing it. But maybe it was something important that he wanted her to tell her own lawyers. She brought the folded paper below the table into her lap and opened it up before looking briefly down at what he wrote:
As soon as I get you alone, I don’t know what I’m going to do first, but at some point, I’ll be saying “This is going to hurt me more than it does you.”
I am so not going to mean it.
Amanda’s face remained completely impassive. She looked back up, and her attention resumed to focusing on what the attorneys were saying around her. Chase did the same, calm and composed as he ever was. Then, when both were confident they could pull it off and perfectly timed, they looked directly at each other. Her eyes widened playfully and his pupils dilated predatorily. They looked away from each other in the nick of time, preventing one from directly blowing the other’s cover. She shifted in her chair and recrossed her legs. Discreetly folding the note, she stuck it in the inside zippered compartment of her handbag.
She considered it a binding contract to her personal happy ending.
CHAPTER 18
CHASE WALKED BRISKLY in the underground parking garage with security keeping up, preoccupied and too impatient to wait for them to bring his car. The gradual buildup of tension surrounding his wedding had taken a turn toward drama, and they still had three weeks to go. It was to be a lavish winter affair, taking place in the small window of time falling between New Year’s and before they left for spring training. One for which the Coles spared no expense. Amanda insisted she not burden his only relative downtime and did her best to leave him out of the planning as much as she could. He trusted her judgment regarding cake tastings, menu planning, invitations, and flowers. He knew she could handle their wedding party getting to the size of a philharmonic orchestra with aplomb. Both Rupert and Catherine came from large families, and his mother’s invitation list was long as well. But he saw trouble on the horizon when Amanda moved back into her own place, citing some old folklore about how it would add to the proper nuptial buildup. What rubbish. It wasn’t a prizefight he had to reserve his stamina for; it was a marriage. And a month before the most important day of his life was no time for her to go all virginal on him. When she called earlier that morning to make the final decision on their honeymoon he could tell she was stressed out and scattered. But instead of being supportive, he
spat back.
“I don’t really care where we go, just make sure the room is nice because by the time this shindig is over, we’re not going to leave it.”
Amanda hung up abruptly after grouching that he sounded more like a drill sergeant giving her marching orders, and she was going to go “man up.” The whole episode left him with a rotten taste in his mouth. As he picked up his pace in the cold garage, Chase considered blowing off his lunch meeting and tracking her down. But what good would that do when his only solution would be to try convincing her to sex him up until they both felt better?
Chase didn’t notice the black sedan accelerating and coming toward him until Jack and his partner started taking affirmative action and rushing in front of him. The car’s brakes squealed, a sound made louder by the echo created in the garage, and the car fishtailed, then spun halfway around before stopping a few yards away from the trio. Even with the half-empty garage, it was still a tight maneuver.
The men stared in stunned silence as Amanda jumped out of the backseat and rushed up to them, her hand secure in the pocket of her beige trench coat. She reached out with her hand firmly ensconced within the coat, the outline of her pointer finger and thumb protruding from the top and side of the coat’s pocket as if brandishing a revolver.
“Stay back and no one gets hurt,” she ordered, jerking the hand in her pocket toward the running car. “He’s coming with me.”
Upon recognizing her, the two security guards marginally stood down. Still with their hands on their own holstered weapons, they looked briefly at each other and then at their boss, who was smiling broadly.
“Better do what she says, boys. That finger looks pretty serious,” Chase said, already moving in the direction of Amanda’s getaway car.
“That was easy,” Amanda remarked, taking her hand out of her pocket and heading back to the car. She briefly turned back to the silent guards, who had broken into small grins, even Jack, who wasn’t known for smiling. She added, “I’ll have him back in three days, make sure they clear his schedule?”
Both men gave a single nod. Amanda and Chase got into the backseat of the car.
“Hey, Ricky Bobby,” Chase said good-naturedly in reprimand to the driver as he slid into his side behind the man. “That’s my fiancé you almost smashed into another car.”
“Sorry, sir,” said the driver, a man of about thirty, who grinned sheepishly after making eye contact from the rearview mirror. “She told me to make it dramatic.”
“No surprise there,” Chase drawled as Amanda closed her car door after taking her seat beside him. He took her hand. “Okay, I’ve come along quietly. What’s this all about?”
Amanda leaned over and kissed him quickly before settling back in her seat and saying victoriously, “You’ll see.”
The car sped out of the parking garage and into city traffic. With a third person in the car, Chase and Amanda refrained from further conversation. He continued his grasp of her hand, absently playing with his ring on her finger. He leaned his head back against his headrest and closed his eyes, but couldn’t stop smiling. He had given up control without having a clue where they were going, yet he couldn’t remember ever being happier. In a matter of minutes he was sleeping.
When she woke him, the car was on a tarmac at what he assumed was Teterboro Airport. A short distance away, a Learjet was awaiting their arrival. The driver popped the trunk of the car and handed over an overstuffed backpack to Amanda before leaving.
“I do have my own plane, you know,” he told her, intercepting and taking the heavy backpack from the driver as they made their way to the stairs of the open hatchway to board.
“What kind of kidnapper would I be if I used your own stuff to kidnap you?” she asked.
They took their seats and were given glasses of champagne while the flight crew began preparing for takeoff.
“At least tell me what’s in the backpack?” he requested.
“My wedding dress,” she replied.
Chase’s eyebrows rose in response. He stared at the bulging bag that was full of satin and crinoline that the flight attendant was storing in a nearby compartment across from them. “Your Vera Wang original is in that thing?” he asked with a chuckle.
“Don’t laugh. I’ve got one your tuxes crammed in there, too. Lena handed it over to me while you were in the shower. Don’t be mad at her, I held her at finger-point, too,” Amanda fibbed. Chase’s loyal housekeeper was the only other person she’d told of her intentions. Because Lena possessed a romantic heart and had noticed the gradual buildup of agitation taking place in her boss’s demeanor, she was more than willing to help.
A picture came together in his mind of Amanda’s plan, and he wasn’t sure how to feel about it. He didn’t care about their destination, he certainly didn’t give a tinker’s damn about his wedding, and at least this time she wasn’t running away without him, but concern started overshadowing his face.
“Baby,” he said quietly, “you’re not losing it on me, are you?”
“Of course not,” Amanda reassured him. “I can’t remember ever feeling saner.”
“I think maybe it’s time you explain to me what’s going on,” he said with all the benevolent authority she had come to love.
Amanda took a deep breath, could feel herself relax in response to it. They were minutes away from being in the air. The most difficult phase of her mission was already accomplished. She had him all to herself, at least for the next three days.
“I don’t know,” she began on a sigh. “Suddenly it just all seemed so ludicrous. I think it may have started around the time World War Three broke out over the bridesmaids’ dresses. Just because Nicki thinks she looks good in everything doesn’t mean the rest of the girls do. Off-the-shoulder, sleeves or no sleeves, gowns versus short dresses—do you know how hard it is to get six women to agree on a dress? Just thinking about picking out shoes gave me a headache.”
Chase grinned, more in amusement than actual sympathy. “I can imagine.”
“Then the photographer, who I know doubled his price because it’s you, called to pitch a hissy fit because there may be other photographers there.”
“Who knew a guy could be such a diva?” he asked in commiseration, his smile widening.
“I’m opening responses to our wedding invitation from people I’ve never even heard of!” she exclaimed.
“I hear you there,” he readily agreed.
“I hate my condo now,” she continued miserably. “I only went back there because my mother sort of pressured me into it. Every night she’s calling me with some sort of lame excuse, like I don’t know she’s really doing a bed check. I think marrying off her only child is secretly making her crazy.”
Chase could see her eyes begin to well up and her voice shake. “And while I’m glad I’m making it easier on her, I don’t quite know how to tell her that waking up without you is starting every day off gloomy and depressing, no matter how wonderful the end result is supposed to be.”
Chase could feel his insides turning to mush. He was so focused on his own stranded libido, he’d never taken into account that his bride might be feeling the same way. He squeezed her hand in unspoken apology.
“Our cranky conversation this morning was the capper. I went for what felt like the umpteenth fitting of my dress. I thought it looked fine. But when the seamstress began clucking about how I’m going to need at least one more fitting because ‘most brides want to shed those extra fifteen pounds,’ something in me snapped. I couldn’t take any more.”
Chase said nothing, just slightly nodded his head and listened, waiting for her to succumb to a full crying jag. Yet he wasn’t surprised when Amanda instead straightened in her seat and shrugged. “I just thought, if I have to deny myself a decent meal for the next three weeks to fit into a dress my husband can’t wait to tear off, I’m going to blow a gasket. I told her to give me my dress right now, walked out, and, well, you know the rest.”
His laughter fil
led the plane’s cabin. In less than four hours, she had managed to raid his closet, charter a jet, kidnap him, and who knew what else. He pulled her in for a sound kiss, the only thing he could remedy on the spot. “That’s my girl.
“You still haven’t told me where we’re headed,” he said after their lips finally unlocked.
“Vegas, baby,” she proclaimed.
AMANDA HAD THOUGHT OF EVERYTHING. A stretch limousine was waiting their arrival when they landed and would be at their disposal for the duration of their stay. She secured the penthouse suite at the Bellagio, with a magnificent view of the legendary fountain below. She’d instructed the hotel’s concierge to obtain all the toiletries they would need, including his favorite cologne, her perfume, and lingerie. She saw to it that their clothes were made wrinkle-free after being intricately and strategically folded into the backpack, a feat he considered amazing in and of itself.
If anyone else had told him he was about to be married by Elvis, Chase might have been skeptical.
Instead Chase found himself standing in front of the gold-lamé-suited, pompadour-sporting, hip-swinging impersonator. Next to him was James Dean, his impersonating and impromptu best man, wearing jeans, a white T-shirt, and worn leather jacket with its collar up. Apparently, his appointed groomsman had no interest in baseball or seemed to fully embrace his rebel role. He was only slightly more enthusiastic than the real James Dean, which meant he basically acted as lively as a corpse.
The same could not be said for the maid of honor, Marilyn Monroe. She couldn’t stop giggling and sashaying in her form-fitting black dress or batting her false eyelashes. In his mind, it wouldn’t have mattered if she was the real Marilyn; there was only one woman on the planet that would ever captivate him again. And while Chase indulged her in one of his rakish smiles, as soon as he caught that first glimpse of white strapless gown at the back of the small chapel waiting for “Love Me Tender” to start playing, the blond bombshell became invisible.
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