A knowing grin spread across her face. “Well, then I think you deserve a kiss.”
His heart felt like it stopped beating. He was sure he’d stopped breathing. And time felt like it was standing still. Krista slowly moved forward, pressing his swollen head just inside her opening as she brushed her mouth softly against his, back and forth, teasing him with each swipe of her soft lips against his as her body accepted more of him, taking him slowly, inch by inch.
He remained still, letting her run things until he felt her tongue sweep across his bottom lip. That was the sexual straw that broke the camel’s back. Covering her hips with his palms, he wrapped his large fingers around to her ass and pulled her towards him as he thrust deep inside of her.
At the intrusion, her head fell back and she cried out, begging him to keep going. Keeping one hand in place to control the movements of their connected bodies, he threaded the other in her hair, fisting it at the nape of her neck. As he did, her inner walls clenched tightly around his length.
Tugging her hair firmly, he pulled her so he could capture her mouth with his. Again, her body pulsed around his rigid column of flesh. He drove into her hot, sweet pleasure as his tongue mimicked what his body was doing. His strokes, like his kiss, were ruthless and demanding.
Soon, he felt her arms grasp securely around his neck as her body began shaking against his. He continued plunging in and out of her tight, wet sheath until her body slumped against his, her arms falling limply around his shoulders. Then, in one final surge, his body soared to a higher level of sensual sensation until he finally groaned in blissful agony, finding his release in the most intense orgasm of his life.
He had no way of knowing how long they stayed joined together, holding each other after their climaxes. After an undeterminable amount of time, he picked her up off the counter and strode purposely towards the bedroom.
She giggled. Probably because he was still hard and still buried inside her.
“What are you doing?” she asked as she happily held on for the ride.
“It’s payback time,” he said as he stepped into his room, slapping her playfully on her backside.
With a huge smile spread across her face her hands flew up in the air as she exclaimed excitedly, “Yay!”
Chase loved this girl. He had missed her more than he could ever tell her in words. So tonight, he planned on showing her.
Chapter Eighteen
“Are you sure you don’t want one of us to take you to the airport?” Haley asked as all four sisters sat in the front room helping Becca fold her clothes.
“Hey, if you want to volunteer, that’s all fine and dandy, but leave ‘us’ out of it,” Jessie said as she pulled socks from the hamper that held all of Becca’s freshly laundered clothes.
Becca smiled and shook her head as she neatly packed a stack of her pants into her suitcase. “It’s fine, really. You guys go to the parade. Have fun. Brian’s taking me. I think he needs the distraction.”
“How’s his dad doing?” Krista asked.
Her heart went out to Brian. He was probably the closest thing she had to a little brother. Growing up, Becca and Brian had been inseparable. She had been a little on the tomboy side and he hadn’t minded playing with dolls, so no matter what mood had struck, it seemed that they had always found a way to have fun.
Earlier this summer, Brian’s dad had had to undergo triple bypass surgery and Brian, who was a student at NYU film school, had come home from the Big Apple to help his mom, who was wheelchair bound, with caring for his dad and his younger siblings.
Becca shrugged. “Every time it looks like he’s on an upswing, there is another complication. It’s been really hard on Brian and his mom.”
“So is he taking a semester off?” Jessie asked as Becca folded a pair of socks.
Nodding, Becca placed them in her suitcase. “At least one. Maybe more. It all depends on how things go.”
The girls were all quiet as they each folded the pile of clean clothing in front of them. It reminded Krista of when they were younger, except no one was fighting over whose clothes were whose. That had been a big issue in a house with four girls who could all, more or less, fit into each other’s clothes.
Haley sniffed and all three of the sisters looked up to find her wiping tears from her eyes.
“What’s wrong?” Jessie asked, not so much in concern, but more in confusion.
Haley smiled through the tears that were slipping down her cheeks. “It’s just been so good to have you two here this summer. You know, The Quad Squad all together.”
Jessie groaned loudly and let her head fall back in exasperation. “Please do not call us that!”
When Becca had been in first grade, they’d all gone to Harper’s Crossing Elementary at the same time. Krista didn’t know who’d started the nickname, but needless to say, it had stuck. Haley had always liked it. She had a very nurturing soul, and anything that united her sisters together, Hales was all about. Krista had never felt strongly one way or the other, and as far as she knew, Becca felt the same as her. Jessie, on the other hand, despised it. No one knew why since Jessie’s emotions were locked up tighter than Fort Knox.
When they’d all attended high school together, the name had transformed briefly to The Bod Squad—which they all agreed they hated. Luckily though, their cousins who were still in town had squashed that very quickly.
Haley sighed in irritation. “I don’t understand why you hate it so much. I think it’s cute.”
Jessie did not answer her sister. In Jessie’s world, she only shared information on a need-to-know basis. Obviously, Jessie didn’t think they needed to know.
Krista changed the subject to something they actually did need to know. “When are you headed back to Boston, Jess?”
“I’m not,” Jessie said simply, not expanding on her statement.
“You’re not?” Haley asked, her face filled with hope and a little concern.
“No.”
After several moments of total silence, Haley broached the subject once again. “What about your MBA? Where are you going to go?”
After earning her Bachelor’s degree, Jessie had decided to stay in the Boston area while she worked towards her MBA. She hadn’t said much about her decision other than the fact that there would have been too many distractions if she moved home.
“I’m still working on my degree,” Jessie explained. “And I’m staying here.”
“Here as in this house?” Krista asked.
Krista loved her sister. She did. But when she and Haley had rented this place nine months ago, it had been just the two of them, so having only one bathroom hadn’t been that much of an inconvenience. Over the summer, sharing the sacred bathroom with three sisters instead of one had been a huge pain in the ass.
“If that’s okay,” Jessie’s said, her tone conveying that it would be insane for it not to be okay.
“Not that I’m not happy about this new development, but why?” Haley looked like she couldn’t quite believe this was actually happening.
“I got a position at SPC in Chicago. I start on Monday,” Jessie said nonchalantly, as if she hadn’t just dropped huge news on them.
SPC was a big deal. The fact that Jessie had gotten a job there was huge news.
“Do Mom and Dad know?” Haley asked.
“No. I only decided to take the offer yesterday.”
Becca’s shoulders dropped. “Man, now I really don’t want to go back to California.”
“Still worried that you’ll be missing out on something?” Krista teased her baby sister. When they were growing up, Becca had always wanted to be a part of everything. Play every game, watch every movie, and go on every shopping trip. She’d hated being left out.
“I will be missing out. It’s a totally rational reaction to have.”
“Did you learn that in a fancy psychology course at Stanford?” Krista handed Becca the shirts she’d finished folding.
“Yes. As a matter of
fact, I did,” Becca said then stuck out her tongue at Krista.
Krista laughed. In all seriousness, she was so proud of her little sister. Actually, she was proud of all her sisters. Haley’s new lingerie boutique was doing even better than anyone had projected. With the website up and running, people all over the world were able to buy Haley’s beautiful pieces.
Once, Krista had asked Haley if it was weird to think of someone in Jamaica or Iceland wearing a bra and pair of underwear she’d created. A huge smile had spread across her sister’s face and she’d said that it wasn’t weird—it was amazing.
Jessie had graduated with honors from Boston University and it seemed was now employed by one of the top cutting-edge PR and ad agencies in the country. And Becca was pre-med at Stanford.
The Sloan girls had done pretty well for themselves.
A knock sounded at the door just as Becca was zipping up her final suitcase. “That’s Brian. Time to go,” she announced as she stood.
Haley hopped up from the couch and opened the door, letting Brian in while Jessie and Becca hugged each other goodbye. Jessie, who was not one for long, drawn-out goodbyes, patted Becca twice on the back and then grabbed two of the smaller suitcases.
“I’ll help Brian take your stuff to the car.”
Brian said a quick hello and goodbye to Haley and Krista then dutifully grabbed the two larger suitcases, following Jessie back out the door.
Wrapping her arms around her sister, Krista hugged her tight. “I wish I would have seen more of you. I’ve been so busy.”
Becca’s blue eyes sparkled as she pulled away. “Especially this week. You haven’t spent a night here since Monday.”
Krista wasn’t a blusher but she felt her cheeks getting warm. It was true that she and Bear had been spending the night at Abby’s all week. Every night she’d spent there had been better than the last. All week, she’d had a really difficult time getting up for work and concentrating while she was there. All she’d wanted to do was be in bed with Chase.
The last three mornings, they’d gotten up and gone running. Which normally Krista liked doing alone. But everything just seemed better when Chase was with her. Everything was right.
“When’s Abby getting released?” Haley asked, thankfully changing the subject.
“Monday,” Krista happily reported.
A horn sounded from out front and all three of the girls looked through the large bay window in shock. Brian was not the kind of guy to honk his horn impatiently.
“Of course. Jessie,” Haley said as all three of them shook their heads at their sister, who was sticking her hand in the driver’s side window and pressing on the center of the steering wheel.
“I really do have to go,” Becca sighed begrudgingly.
Haley hugged their baby sister and Krista saw tears forming in her older sister’s eyes. “Call or text when you get home. I don’t care what time it is.”
“I will,” Becca promised. “And I’ll be back in a few months for the wedding.”
At the mention of her wedding, a huge smile spread across Haley’s face. “Okay,” she sniffed as she released Becca from her bear hug.
Both Haley and Krista watched their sister drive away through the window as Jessie walked back into the house.
“You need to tell Mom and Dad that you’re staying. And we should all go out and celebrate,” Haley said excitedly.
Jessie looked at her like she was speaking a foreign language. “Celebrate what?”
“You moving home. Your new job.”
“I’ll tell Mom and Dad at the parade today. But if we all go to dinner, it’s not going to be for my new job or that I’m moving home.” Jessie walked upstairs, indicating that the subject was closed.
“Oh shoot!” Haley jumped as she looked at her watch and headed towards the door. “I promised Em that I’d do her hair for the parade. What time are you working the booth?”
“Eleven to two,” Krista said.
“Okay. I saw the layout for the booths and I think you guys are going to be set up right in front of Tempting, so I’ll see you then.”
A melancholy feeling welled up inside of her when she found herself alone. She sat, slowly sinking down on the couch. It had only been an hour since she’d left Chase and already she was missing him like crazy. Actually, she was missing Chase and Bear, who was back at his own home since that was where Krista was spending her nights. Everything that was happening between them felt right, but neither of them had brought up the future or what either of them saw in it. Krista was pretty sure Chase—who normally liked to talk about everything—was mum on the subject for the same exact reason she was. They were too busy enjoying the present and catching up on the years they’d been apart. Once the subject of where they saw this going came up, the present could get ruined.
She was being a chickenshit and so was Chase. They needed to talk…out of bed. No matter how unappealing that sounded.
Chapter Nineteen
Chase was using the short walk with Bear from his mom’s place to the firehouse, where he was meeting Alex, to clear his head. It was a beautiful day. Perfect for the parade.
The temperature was eighty degrees. Not too hot. Not too cold. There was a gentle breeze blowing in the air, acting as nature’s house fan. He looked over at the rolling green hills, which were spotted with yellow and orange flowers, hoping that the peaceful, picturesque setting would ease some of his stress and tension.
It didn’t.
He’d just gotten off the phone with representatives at his record label, who had informed him that he had only two weeks to finish his album. Just as he was going to tell them that the album would be finished when it was finished and not a minute before, no matter what timeline they wanted, they added that he was legally obligated to deliver a completed album in the timeframe they’d laid out.
He’d called bullshit and they then forwarded him a signed (by Marcus) copy of his contract where it clearly stated what they’d just relayed to him on the conference call. When he’d hung up with the label, he immediately called Marcus, but the little prick wasn’t answering. He was such a weasel. Chase wanted to kick his own ass for letting such a conniving piece of shit have any legal access to him and his career.
When Marcus didn’t pick up, the next person Chase put a call into was his lawyer. He needed to fire Marcus and he needed to do it now. His first instinct when his soon-to-be ex-manager hadn’t answered the call was to leave some choice words for him ending in the line Donald Trump had made famous—“You’re fired.” But that would have been reacting out of emotion, and this was business. He needed to do this through the proper channels so that he didn’t end up paying that lowlife a penny more than he had to once his employment was dissolved.
Chase had heard horror stories of managers getting fired for doing shady things and the artist ending up paying out for years to come. That was not going to happen here. His lawyer assured him that since Marcus had overstepped his authority not once, but twice, he was in breach of contract, therefore Chase had grounds for termination.
All of that would have been bad enough, but Chase was also dealing with the fact that he had an album due in two weeks and he was four tracks shy of completing it. When he called Tully to bring him up to speed, his assistant said what Chase had already known—he had to go back to Austin. Tully didn’t sound any happier about it than Chase. From what Chase had gathered the few times he’d seen Tully since he’d met that waitress a week ago, the two of them were getting pretty serious, pretty fast.
Tully had even asked if they wanted to approach Sid Mane, the album’s producer and the reason that they were recording in Austin, if he would come up to Illinois. Chase had reminded Tully that Sid’s wife had just given birth to twins and there was no way Chase would ask a man to leave his wife and newborn babies. Even if that weren’t the case, for the last ten years, Sid had only recorded in his home studio. He said that that’s where he felt the magic, and Chase might not have known how
he felt about where he wanted his career to go, but he knew that if he was going to release an album, he wanted it to be the best it could be.
As he and Bear turned the corner, the firehouse came into view. Chase should have felt excited about this. Alex had asked him to ride on the firehouse’s float. Initially, even though riding on a float in the parade would have fulfilled a lifelong dream, Chase had told him no. He didn’t want to take attention away from the firefighters who risked their lives. He was just a musician, not a hero. Alex had told him that the guys were excited about it and it would really mean a lot to them. So Chase had gladly agreed to it.
When he was a kid, he’d watched the parade and wished that he was on one of those floats every year. When he was a teenager, he could have ridden on the high school’s float since he was on the track team, but his dad had said that “only sissy boys ride on floats, and if I see my only son up there, you better believe I’ll throw beer bottles at you until I knock your ass off of it.”
Chase remembered how mad he’d been at the time. Over the years, as an adult, when he’d been away and something would remind him of it, he would feel anger just below the surface. Now, after coming back home, he didn’t really have any feelings about it at all.
Honestly, Chase hadn’t realized how much power his dad still held over him. How much of his life had still been affected by the abuse, both physical and mental, his dad had subjected him to. If someone would have asked him even ten days ago if that was the case, he would have told them that Roger Malone meant nothing to him and had absolutely zero effect on his day-to-day life.
But he would have been wrong. Actually, it wasn’t so much that Roger held the power, it was the anger Chase carried around inside of him, buried deep, that held the power. But after coming home to the house he’d vowed he’d never step foot in, he realized that it was just a house. Wood, stucco, beams. Not a haunted house filled with memories of his dad—just a house. One which, after spending the week with Krista in it, also had some very good memories attached to it as well.
Crazy Love - Krista & Chase Page 18