“Yeah, I can put some on if you prefer, or—”
He takes her hand and pulls her close, caressing her breast as he presses a tender kiss on her lips. “I like you like this,” he tells her. “I have condoms in my suitcase.”
“Were you planning on this happening?” she asks, smiling at the thought of him wanting her that badly.
“I always travel with them,” he says. It’s like he realizes a moment too late that he might’ve said too much. An imaginary bucket of water dumps right over her, bringing realty sharply into focus.
This is good, she thinks. A nice reminder that’ll keep her from getting too lost in the moment and thinking that this is something she can have for real.
“They’re in the small pocket,” he says, his voice low.
She goes into the closet and pulls a few out, feeling optimistic. Might as well take advantage of all that while she can. Back in the bedroom, she takes one and tosses the rest on the nightstand, ripping open the foil.
She makes a move to put it on, but Chase reaches out for her hand before she can get there.
“Amber,” he says. His voice is soft and loving, and she can’t stand the way it sounds. She knows what he’s going to say. He’s going to try and make her feel better about things, like having casual sex when he travels isn’t something he does very often.
She doesn’t want to be lied to; she knows deep down it’s the smart thing for a guy like Chase to always be prepared. She just doesn’t want to think about it anymore.
“It’s okay,” she says. She kisses him, letting it linger so she can get back in the mood. She’s so insanely attracted to him and wants him so badly that one touch of her lips to his is all it takes. “What happens in Connecticut, stays in Connecticut, right?”
She rolls the condom on, loving the way his muscles contract at her touch.
Amber holds out her hand and Chase helps her up onto the bed. She sits astride him and pushes herself up on her knees, kissing him with everything she has in her, wanting to make every moment count.
“C’mon,” she whispers against his ear as she guides him inside. “Let’s see if we can make you explode.”
Chase kisses Amber deeply, then presses his forehead against hers as she sinks down onto him. She wraps her arms around his neck, holding on for dear life as she adjusts. He’s patient, settling her into the feeling with soft, breathless kisses.
“Are you okay?” he asks.
Not even close. “Yes.” She rotates her hips a little, just to get her bearings.
Chase gasps and groans, tucking his head into the crook of her neck like he can’t take the pleasure. “You feel good,” he says, and five years with this man, knowing him like the back of her hand, allows her to hear the rising tide of emotion in his voice he’s trying like hell to hide.
He’s holding onto her so tight that she knows he’s going to leave fingerprints on her. She starts rocking back and forth, his chest hair scraping against her nipples, his mouth latched onto her skin. She’s never felt this connected to another person before, like she can breathe him into her. Like every cell in his body is a part of hers, too.
He hits so deep, every move leaves an indelible mark inside her. She wants to melt inside of him, wants to be with him always.
That’s too sentimental for a one-night stand, so she shakes her head to dislodge all these romantic thoughts that are going to do nothing but break her heart if she dwells on them. But Chase doesn’t get the message. He kisses her softly, his nose brushing against hers. He cradles her face like she’s something precious, like this means everything in the world to him instead of nothing at all.
Amber feels like she’ll be in a world of trouble if she stays in this moment one second longer than she has to, so she uses her body weight to tip them over until he’s lying on top of her. The other position was too much, too intimate.
Chase gets the message this time, kissing her recklessly as he reaches between them and finds her clit. She moans into his mouth—so close—and after a few snaps of his hips she’s coming again, holding onto him as she rides it out, completely falling apart in his arms. He threads their fingers together as he rests his elbows on the bed for leverage. His gaze meets hers, and she can’t bear the tenderness of it. She closes her eyes, needing whatever kind of break she can get from this intense connection.
“Come on, you’re almost there,” she says, hitching her legs up high on his hips, opening herself up wider to him. He drops his head onto the pillow as he sinks deeper, leaving wet, unfocused kisses wherever he can.
He moves with an unsteady rhythm, body chasing the pleasure that’s just out of reach. Amber rocks her hips a few more times, meeting Chase thrust for thrust, and with one final push, he falls apart with her name on his lips.
Chapter Twelve
Chase wakes up with Amber snuggled up against his side, her naked body flush against his. They’d made love two more times last night before they both passed out from exhaustion. Now, holding her like this, waking up with her in his arms…he feels at home in a way he never has before.
In the light of day, everything between them seems possible in a way that it never had before. It feels foolish now that he’d had concerns about making this work. They’re an amazing team at work; of course that would translate into their personal lives as well. Sex with Amber was mind-blowing and soul satisfying in a way that he didn’t know was possible.
Maybe he doesn’t have to worry about things not working out, about things between them getting messy. Maybe this is something he can have for the rest of his life.
That thought startles him. It doesn’t scare him like it would have before, it just surprises him that the want is there, that it’s so consuming and deep.
When Jason fell in love with Kaia, he saw all the ways that love changed his friend. He’d dismissed it as a possibility for himself back then, writing it off as some kind of once-in-a-lifetime fairytale bullshit. Now that he’s no longer pushing down the feelings he has for Amber in order to keep himself from acting on them? He can’t imagine a life without her.
The person he was just a year ago would laugh at the guy he is today: lying in bed with a woman and not wanting to let go, dreaming up a shared future with a house and kids someday. He’s so head-over-heels in love with Amber that it seems recklessly stupid to believe he could’ve ever walked away from this.
To think he could’ve missed out on this makes him ache.
He knows Amber had her hesitations about them too, but he hopes that last night helped ease her into the idea that they could make this work as a couple. They’ve never had a full conversation about it, since they’d been too busy trying to push down their feelings for each other, but Chase suspects that—like himself—she was worried about what adding a romantic relationship might do to their working one.
And…he’s not the most emotionally intelligent guy, but he gets the feeling that her dad’s infidelity and what recently happened to her sister has soured her on long-term romantic relationships. How could they not? He knows that his fickle past works against him if he wants to convince her that things will be different with him. Her fears are real, and he understands that this is something that words won’t be able to reassure her about.
He’s going to have to show her, every day, until she trusts that he’s not going to do to her what her father did to her mother, or what Trey did to Sasha.
He’s willing to put in the effort. He’s looking forward to putting in the effort. That’s a first for him.
Amber lets out a deep, satisfied sigh as she slides her arm across Chase’s chest. He loves the feeling of her bare skin against his, the gentle affection and reverence in her touch; he doesn’t think he’ll ever tire of it. She burrows her head against his shoulder, like it’s the only place she can find comfort. He wants to be that for her, if she’ll let him.
He senses her starting to stir and presses a soft kiss against the top of her messy hair as a loving good morning. He smil
es against the wild waves, remembering everything they did last night to mess them up. Chase lets out a soft sigh as she touches him, loving the intimacy of it, but it’s like that sound makes her realize where she is and who she’s with and her hand stops in its circuit immediately.
He can’t lie; it hurts. He’d hoped that she’d wake up to this new thing between them with the same kind of optimism he had, but he knows she always take longer to adjust to change. Add to that the insecurities he’s certain she has about infidelity, and of course she’d tense up.
He doesn’t want to fuck things up right out of the gate by pushing too hard, so even though it takes some doing, he repeats the deal that they made to each other last night.
“We’re still in Connecticut,” he whispers. “You haven’t broken any rules.”
She thinks on that for a few torture-filled moments, then lets herself hold onto him a little tighter. He’s encouraged by the fact that she wants to get a little more time together within the confines of the rule that they agreed to last night in order to make this feel safe.
“Still in Connecticut. Once we’re back in the city, this ends,” she says quietly, like she has to remind herself.
He’s going to work like hell to convince her that it doesn’t have to be that way, that her heart is safe with him wherever they are.
She turns until she’s sprawled out on her stomach and rests her chin on his chest. He reaches up and tenderly pushes some of her hair out of her eyes. She looks so cute when she’s just waking up. Her cheek is red and crinkled from being smashed up against him, and her eyes are bright behind sleepy lids.
“How’d you sleep?” he asks.
Her face flushes as she smiles. “Really well, actually. I was worn out.”
He smiles back as he playfully twirls a strand of her hair around his finger. “Me too.” He presses his lips against hers and whispers, “Morning.” Then he glides the backs of his fingers across her cheek, hoping to wake her all the way up.
The morning after always used to be awkward for Chase. He’d get out of bed first thing, make his excuses for why he couldn’t stay. He wanted to get back to his life and away from the woman he’d been with for the night as soon as humanely possible.
Now, with her, he wants to make up excuses for why he should stay. He leans down to kiss her again while he still has the chance, but she turns her head away.
“The morning breath situation here has to be awful.”
He laughs. “I could not care less.”
She reluctantly captures his lips. The kiss starts out soft and tentative, then grows deeper. Chase rolls so that he’s on top, surprising a laugh out of her. She opens her legs, cradling his body between them. It feels like coming home.
Amber wraps her hand around the length of his erection, and the feeling makes Chase groan into the crook of her neck. He feels her smile against the shell of his ear as she reaches over to the nightstand, grabs a condom, and rolls it onto him.
“We’re still in Connecticut,” she says as she guides him inside.
When Amber and Chase come downstairs for breakfast, they’re guided into a small morning room instead of the main dining room they had breakfast in yesterday.
It’s a bright room, surrounded by windows on three sides. The circular table in the middle is larger than most families have in their homes. A vase full of fresh flowers decorates the middle, and three places are set.
Pearson is sitting directly across from the entryway, newspaper in hand, with a glass of orange juice and a cup of coffee placed next to his empty plate.
Amber looks over at Chase like they’re two kids who just got sent to the principal’s office. Chase wasn’t expecting to meet like this; he’s off his game and unsure of how he should react in this situation. It might be a good thing that Pearson wants to meet him on their own, because he typically wouldn’t agree to a deal at a busy table surrounded by a ton of people.
Or, it could be a bad thing because he might not want to give them a public dressing down. After reading the room and going with his gut, he decides this is good. He hopes it is, at least. After what Amber said to him yesterday in front of everybody, he has no doubt in his mind that Pearson would return the favor if he really wanted to.
He looks up from his paper. “Good morning,” he says pleasantly enough. Moderately friendly, but not over-the-top. “Have a seat.” He gestures for Chase and Amber to sit down.
One of the kitchen staff comes out and deposits glasses of orange juice in front of them. She asks if they would like coffee, and they both decline.
“We’re having Denver omelettes this morning,” Pearson tells them, probably just to drag out the suspense.
Chase nods, not sure what kind of an appetite he’s going to have once this is all over.
Pearson puts down his paper. “I’ll start this off by saying that I don’t like being spoken to the way you spoke to me last night in my own home,” he chastises Amber. Chase reaches out under the table and takes her hand, offering her what little support he can in this situation.
“If I may,” she says, “I’d like to apologize for my outburst. I don’t apologize for what I said, because I’m not sorry for telling you and everyone else in that room what kind of man Chase is. I am sorry for the way in which I conveyed the message. I apologize for embarrassing you in front of your guests.”
Pearson leans back in his chair and lets Amber sweat it out. Little does he know this woman has nerves of steel and can’t be intimidated by a petty look.
“Apology accepted.”
Chase squeezes her fingers.
He shifts his attention to Chase. “You, on the other hand, are a bit slick. I don’t find you genuine, and while I appreciate that you get results, I don’t believe our personalities mesh well.”
Now it’s Amber’s turn to offer him some support in the form of a finger squeeze. Maybe he didn’t read the room correctly.
“But, you were right. I have been in your position before with other products that didn’t launch as planned. I’m the kind of man who is willing to admit that he might be wrong, and after Amber’s very passionate defense of you last night, I’ve decided that there’s the possibility that I might’ve badly misjudged you.
“I’d like for us to get together early this week and talk about the parameters of a deal to parter with you to patch up your security issues on the smart wearables. If this works out, we can talk about future endeavors, should the need arise.”
The weight that’s been heavy on Chase’s shoulders for the past couple of weeks finally lessens. He feels like he can breathe again. Amber’s practically breaking his fingers with excitement, but he doesn’t care.
“I think that sounds great.”
Chase and Pearson stand and shake hands. After he sits, Pearson says, “I think a tentative agreement is always best when it’s followed by a good meal. What do you think?” He waves in the kitchen staff, and they begin serving.
Turns out Chase is hungry after all.
Chapter Thirteen
After breakfast, everyone gathers out on the patio before heading off for one last round of golf to cap off the weekend. The wives are going along on this outing, even though Amber would very much enjoy skipping the physical activity and getting another massage. Her hand-eye coordination is garbage and she loves being pampered. The choice would be an easy one.
Unfortunately, since Michael was the one who invited them along, she knows it would be rude to skip out now. But, oh, it’s tempting.
Before everyone loads up into the waiting golf carts, Amber and Chase manage to sneak away without anyone noticing. Their hiding spot is, unfortunately, in a bathroom. It was the closest private place available and beggars can’t be choosers.
Chase softly closes the door behind him, and his face is absolutely ecstatic. He’s gorgeous in his joy, so magnetic that Amber has no idea what she was thinking sleeping with this man. She’s never going to be over him, no matter how hard she tries to be.
It’s not packing the same kind of heat or promise that their kisses last night did. It’s one of celebration, one with the two of them smiling against each other’s lips, holding on tight in their shared victory.
It’s the kind of kiss they’d have after every victory they shared as a team if they were actually a couple. They’re not, and Amber really needs to remember that.
Still, she can’t deny all the joyous love rattling around in her heart for this man, so she doesn’t try to. She lets herself feel it, and pours them into her kisses while she can.
“We did it,” Chase says, cradling her face tenderly in his hands.
Amber reaches up and clasps her fingers around his wrist, wanting to hold onto this feeling and this man for as long as she can.
“We did.”
“I knew you would change his mind.”
She laughs disbelievingly. “I doubt I was the one to change anything considering what I said at dinner last night. I think it’s more likely that what I said changed his mind, which was just me explaining exactly who you are. So, if anything did the trick here, it was just you being yourself.”
He beams as he leans in and kisses her again. She’s kissed countless people in her life and they were good…great even, but Chase’s kisses are different. She feels how much he cares about her, so much so that she could trick herself into believing he actually loves her, that he’s in love with her. The thought sends a warm rush through her, followed by immense panic.
She bets her parents felt like this once upon a time. Trey and Sasha, too. She knows that feelings can trick you into getting your heart broken; she’s seen it so many times. That’s why it’s better if she just locks them up and pretends they don’t exist.
One Night With The Billionaire Too Page 9