Ride

by Harper Dallas

  Instead of taking the stairs up to the roof terrace I head out to the street. I don’t want to be caught in any more conversations. At least out here I should have some peace. A bouncer opens the door for me, checking my wristband before he lets me slip out.

  The early summer night envelops me like warm water, caressing my bare legs and sending a shiver down my spine. I’m not sure where to go. To one side of me there’s the cordoned-off smoking area—full, as it always is. Basically every European boarder I know smokes like a chimney, and there are plenty of them here tonight.

  I ignore them. I lean back against the wall on the other side of the door, reaching into my purse for my cell.

  “Brooke.”

  Chase has always had a way of sneaking up on me, and just like always it makes my heart skip a beat.

  He looks stunning. He looks like a mess. Beneath his still-crisp shirt his body is wound taut. His hair is ruffled from the agitated run of his fingers. Though he’s only jogged across the street his shoulders rise over a heaving breath, as if he needs strength to speak to me.

  When Chase settles a step away from me it’s after one heartbeat’s surge forward, as if he doesn’t know where he can stand.

  “I have to talk to you.” His voice is low, rough with urgency. “I know I don’t deserve it. I know you should tell me to fuck off. But please.” Tension grits his jaw, his eyes ticking between mine. “Listen to me.”

  Surprise makes me stupid. Surprise and vertigo. A chasm has opened before me, and I tremble at the edge of the drop. I clutch tighter to my purse, searching for my voice and finding the stupidest comment imaginable.

  “Why are you here? You’re meant to be in Alaska.”

  Chase’s dismisses the idea with a jerk of his head. “I don’t give a shit about it. It doesn’t matter.”

  Alaska. The place Chase loves more than anything. And now the very suggestion of it makes a frown tug deep into his forehead.

  He’s a mess. Cool, calm, collected Chase Austin is a wreck. In his dress shirt he stands and shakes with tension, his hands curling to useless fists.

  “I’m here because I didn’t want to ruin your party,” Chase forces on. The words are breaking free of his control, coming quicker. Rougher. In the deep of his throat they crack. “Because I couldn’t leave without—because every day that you’ve been gone I’ve been going fucking crazy. Because I have to see you. Because I’ve been waiting for three hours just to see you come out of that door. Because—Brooke.”

  His hands grab mine, and it doesn’t matter that it’s hard enough to hurt. The night pulses in time with my heartbeat, and between us the air sparks with potential. In his grip my skin comes alive, thrilling at his touch.

  We’ve never been able to resist each other’s gravity. It draws us in until we’re pressed together, Chase curled over me and my face arched to his. The tug is so strong that it takes even my breath.

  “I’m sorry.” There’s a flaw in Chase’s voice. A hurt. Against me his heart thuds wild. “I fucked up so bad. I hurt you. When you were in that hospital I lost it. Because I should have kept you safe. Because I let you down, like I let—like I let—”

  A shudder passes through him, his chest caving on a deep breath. Those bright blue eyes close, as if he can’t face the words.

  “Like I let Felicity down.”

  A sound of wordless hurt cracks in my mouth. It aches, thinking of how I felt when Chase didn’t come for me. How he must have felt not to come.

  The world might only have seen Chase’s blood in my photo, but I know now that he was bleeding long before then.

  “I’m sorry.” Words are too small. They whisper out of me, weak in front of all that loss. I can only shake my head, pressing closer to him so that against my bare legs I feel the fabric of his pants. “I’m so sorry.”

  Chase lets out a dark chuckle, rough with self-hatred. “What a catch, huh? Killed his kid sister. Ruined his parents’ marriage. Let you down when you needed him.”

  “Chase.” I squeeze his fingers, trying to press all of my surety into him. “You didn’t—”

  “No. I want to say this.” Chase’s hands twist free of mine and find my hips again, the way they always have, and there his fingers cling. Tight, as if he’s worried I’ll run.

  I’ve run from him before. Maybe I didn’t physically leave. But I kept him out. I ignored the questions in his eyes.

  This time I’m not going anywhere. This time I look up at him, and stay.

  “Ever since I met you, it’s only been you. There’s been no one else. No one. Because I can’t stop thinking about you. Not just because you’re ridiculously hot. Not because of how much I want to fuck you.” Chase’s words are forceful, the tightening grip of his fingers at my hips pressing his urgency into my skin. “Because of how you love the mountains. How driven you are. Your passion. Because you deserved that award tonight and because everything about you blows me away.”

  He looks at me, and I look at him. Without our shields. Without barriers between us. So that in all the world we are together, listening to the words that tear out of Chase. All these bloody, hurting truths, staining the night red with honesty.

  “I’m so fucking afraid of failing you. I am so afraid of you being hurt. The idea of not being able to protect you …” He swallows over the things he can’t even say, and for a moment he dips close as if he needs to kiss me. I would kiss him. But the words continue, this on-and-on flow. All the things we said we’d never do.

  Risking fucking it up.

  My hands have found him. One at his cheek, to feel the flop of his ruffled hair and the bristle of his stubble. My thumb strokes the corner of his mouth. The other cups at his side, claiming the heat of his scar-flawed skin beneath that perfect fabric. His dark, despairing laugh shakes with desperation under my fingers.

  “The mountains don’t frighten me. Death doesn’t frighten me. But you fucking terrify me, Brooke Larson. I am so fucking afraid.”

  When did I begin to cry? All those hot salt tears that Chase clumsily kisses away, too much force in the press of his face. As if he wants to climb inside of me. As if no closeness could be enough.

  When he rests his forehead against mine he whispers into the place between our bodies. It’s so much honesty that the night could break with it. A confession, hurting and desperate. A bloody gift laid at my feet.

  “I love you, Brooke. The only thing that frightens me more than the idea of losing you is never having you at all.”

  How long have I known it? This truth that is so easy to say, finally, after all our lying silences.

  “I love you, too.”

  A shudder goes through Chase’s body. Low in his throat he makes a sound of relief.

  His hands find mine again. “Come with me tonight.”

  Across his forehead a strand of his hair has fallen. Someone should brush it away.

  This time, I do.

  “Yes,” I whisper. “Yes.”

  32

  Last time Chase drove me to the airport we’d just slept together for the first time. Everything was new and unsure and glowing.

  Now everything is right, and still it glows.

  Chase waits for me as I get my coat and text Alex to check she can get back to our hotel okay. When I come outside he sees my eyes go to the keys he’s tossing in his hand.

  “I didn’t drink.”

  I shouldn’t even have had to question it. Not after all he’s said. Of all the people in the world, Chase would never do anything to risk my safety.

  We don’t talk on the way to the car. Everything has a faint air of unreality. The night seems to reverberate with the echo of everything that went before, bursting with aftershocks. Below the street lamps each pool of light is numinous.

  The car is ridiculous. I shouldn’t be surprised. I tell myself that money doesn’t matter to me … But I feel a thrill, stopping beside this ridiculous sports car. Even I recognize the logo on the hood.

  Chase opens my doo
r, and once we’re settled he pulls into the after-dark streets. His hand moves just as smoothly as before on the gearstick, each fluid change punctuated with the stretched brush of his fingertips over my bare leg. There’s no heat in his touch. Only a soft-sweet treasuring.

  This is a different kind of silence from what we’ve had before. Now the words have been spoken. Now we are really here, really honest, for the very first time.

  Between the bursts of street-lamp glow Chase looks at me, as if to check that I’m still there, and he smiles.

  Of course he has the nicest hotel in the city. At any other time I might wonder at it—the concierge’s uniform, the marble foyer, the huge jungles of flowers. Now though it doesn’t matter. Chase’s arm slips about my waist, his hand wrapping at my hip in claim, and I lean into the solidity of his body. It feels so right to be here with him. To allow him to lead me away from the main elevator bank to another door, his hand sliding to a gentle guide at the small of my back.

  He has to let go once we’re inside. I don’t understand why until I see him pull a key card from his pocket.

  There aren’t any floor buttons.

  “You’re kidding me.”

  Chase chuckles as he swipes the card. “Ouch. I only got it to impress you.”

  For a second I believe him, and then I see his grin spread. It feels so natural to poke at his ribs with my elbow, back to playing again. “How cocky do you have to be to spend a squillion dollars when the girl hasn’t even said yes yet?”

  Chase hums his amusement. “Pretty cocky.” The elevator shifts slightly beneath our feet as we begin to rise toward the penthouse, but it’s not that which has him rocking toward me. One step covers the space between us, his hands sliding down my sides as he pins me to the wall. His voice teases warm at my ear. “I do like to have the very best.” He punctuates the words with a squeeze of my ass. “But I did hope you’d enjoy it.”

  My heartbeat speeds in my chest. He’s so close, all the heavy heat of him, and beneath my hands the muscled planes of his shoulders shift as his fingers trail back up the outside of my thigh. My skin tingles, a thrill that gathers between my legs.

  “I’m sure I’m going to enjoy it.”

  A low growl hums through Chase’s body. The slide of his fingers over the lace between my legs makes me shiver.

  “You have no idea …”

  But I do. I can feel his growing hardness pressed to my thigh and the greedy wander of his hands over my ass. I know exactly what Chase wants and how much he wants it.

  The door has opened. Chase lingers the wet of his mouth at my neck before with an impatient grunt he tugs at my hand. “Come on.”

  I’ve never been in a penthouse suite before. Everything is glass and sky, gleaming chrome and polished wood. It takes my breath away.

  Not so much as the press of Chase to my back, his hands ripping at my jacket. As his mouth latches to a greedy suck of the tender skin at my neck I feel my spine reflexively arch, pressing my ass to his denim-trapped cock.

  “You are so fucking beautiful.” His whisper slides hot into my ear, punctuated by a nip that makes me mewl. “You know that, don’t you, Brooke? So beautiful.”

  His broad hands have slipped down to push aside my dress and bra, his fingers finding my nipples to pinch them to hardness. I’m going to fall. My purse drops from my hands. I’m suddenly so wet, desperate for the feel of him. “Chase …”

  “Fuck.”

  Chase’s hands are gone. I can hear the pop of shirt buttons in his hurry and the click-slither of his belt being tugged free.

  “I need to be inside of you. I need—”

  We’re a tangle of limbs and fabric, stumbling toward the wall. A doorway. Chase pushes me roughly forward even as his hands keep tight grip on my hips and his tongue demands the opening of my mouth. Little stumbles punctuate each shoe he toes off. We’re in another room—there’s a huge bed—though Chase catches me from falling onto it. He pushes strength to his arms, leaving me standing breathless as he looks at me.

  It’s not the greediness of before. Not only that. His eyes sweep slow and treasuring over me, and when he reaches to trail his fingers over my arms the touch is soft and slow, as if he counts every freckle.

  “Brooke …”

  He doesn’t need to say it. When his eyes meet mine, I know.

  It’s for him that I tug my dress up and over my head. For his hungry, watchful eyes I let my bra drop to the floor and then bend to tug down my panties.

  Chase looks at my naked body as if he’s never seen anything so beautiful.

  Then we’re falling. Chase’s mouth burns over my skin as he braces himself above me on the bed, devouring my body. He sucks at my breasts, teasing his teeth over their sensitive tips, the sharpness of his nips making me whimper. The muscles over his shoulders and back surge smoothly beneath his skin as he walks himself lower on hands and knees, his tongue sliding down to twirl about my navel.

  “I need you.” My breath burns in my chest, and still Chase’s mouth trails lower. “Chase, please.”

  Chase hums into the slickness between my legs, the tip of his tongue swiping over my clit. Pleasure coils low in my belly, my back arching from the bed. I need him, so badly that my voice cracks with it. “Please.”

  Chase’s growl is all animal. My animal. He’s rough as he shoves back upward, shucking free his pants and boxer shorts. His hands find my wrists, slamming my arms back over my head to pin them at the pillows.

  Spread for him—held for him—a whimper escapes my lips, and I fall into all that blue.

  Chase pants, hot breaths heavy. Between my thighs his hips twitch, instinct fighting against intellect. His eyes flick to the bedside table before finding mine again. “I need to—”

  I shake my head. “I’m on the pill.”

  A gusted exhale escapes Chase’s lips, something shuddering over his muscles. The grip of his hands loosens. “I’m clean,” is sure—and then his cuff tightens, as if he pulls himself back. “You shouldn’t trust some guy …”

  I coil my legs about his hips and tug. “You’re not some guy.” My lips are dry under the damp of my tongue. “You’re you. You’re what I want.” I swallow, my eyes ticking between his to see if he likes this. If it’s what he wants. “I want you to come inside of me.”

  Chase’s groan is the sexiest thing I’ve ever heard.

  I’m so wet for him. He slides into me easily, one steady thrust that buries him fully inside, and as my mouth opens to cry out in fullness his lips press to mine. His kiss is a slow claim, opening me as surely as the slink of his hips. With nothing between us I can feel the silky heat of his cock, each thrust that heightens my pleasure.

  He works me slowly, the inexorable ram of his hips unstoppable and unending, and as he coaxes me to quivering Chase looks at me. Always at me. As he rolls my nipple between the catch of his fingers. As he slides his hand lower to strum insistent at my clit, urging me toward a shivering, crying orgasm that’s only made better by the on-and-on thrust of him into me.

  And then he does it again.

  Only after does he lose that perfect control. His grab at my legs is demanding, manhandling them up to sling over his shoulders. In the tilt of my hips he buries himself, so deep that I cry out, and a grin touches the edge of Chase’s panting lips as he does it again, and again.

  It’s so good. It’s so much. As Chase loses himself the sweat begins to dampen his hair and glisten over his skin, his perfect muscles pounding just there.

  “Come.” Chase kisses the word with a lick at my ear, leaning close so that I’m bent and fully open to him. “Come with me.”

  I said I would, and I do.

  I’m woken by the sunlight streaming through the floor-to-ceiling windows. We’re so high up that outside is only sky.

  We.

  Chase hasn’t gone. He’s here beside me, lying on his front, his face softened with sleep. His near arm drapes heavy over my chest, all those tattoos stark against the silky sheets. A
t my side his fingers curl, the softest of holds.

  He looks so peaceful. At least until a grin spreads over his lips.

  “I can feel you watching me.”

  “How?!”

  A laugh rumbles through Chase’s chest, the lateral banding of his muscle rippling over his ribs. “Super powers.” One of his eyes cracks open. At my side his fingers trace gently over tender skin. It takes a moment for his grin to fade to something softer. “I’m not going anywhere, Brooke.”

  The hesitancy in Chase’s voice catches me, a frisson running up my spine as I fall into his eyes.

  “I’m not very good at this.” Chase’s sleep-fuzzed smile has a rueful edge. “I wasn’t lying when I said I didn’t date. I’ve never actually … Nothing serious. Not since Felicity died.” His eyes check mine for judgment. “But I want to learn. For you.”

  I’m embarrassed. I’m happy. I’m so happy it’s making me embarrassed. I can feel the blush spread over my cheeks, and though I try to hide it by rolling onto my side for a better nuzzle Chase isn’t fooled. His kiss to my forehead is tender, his lips lingering at my skin.

  “I guess it’s too bad,” he murmurs in a tease. “You’re stuck with me.”

  Happiness blossoms like a flower in my chest, and this time I manage to share it, even if it’s only a whisper. “I’m glad.”

  When you first meet Chase, he seems so hard. So cold. So perfectly self-contained. But I can see it now. I’m allowed to see it. That edge of vulnerability to him. The real person beneath all the shields and all the bullshit. The man who needs my reassurance, just like I need his.

  The moment is too delicate to last for long. Chase groans, lethargic with sleep as he rolls properly onto his side. “I’m starving. You want to have the first shower?”

  I don’t want to go. I want to stay with him in this bed forever. But—I’m not going anywhere.

  This time, I’ll trust him that it’s true.

  Chase gives me a slap on the ass as I wriggle out of the bed. “Looking delightful as always.”

  I roll my eyes, but I’m smiling wide. Warmth spreads through me as I pad through to the en suite bathroom. Like everything else, it’s amazing. My entire bedroom back home is smaller than this gleaming expanse of creamy stone. Underfloor heating warms my toes as I click the door shut behind me.