“Come again?” Chasin’s gaze left my tattoo, and when I lifted my head, our eyes locked.
His eyes were blazing. And not in the sexy, hungry way I’d seen. No, stupid me had told him the truth and made his eyes burn so bright I was afraid the scorch would blister and scar.
“‘But it’s not me.’ You said that to me right before you left.”
“Baby.” Two tortured syllables.
In for a penny, in for a pound.
“I got it so I’d never forget I’d given up.”
“Given up what?”
“My dream.” My eyes drifted closed, shutting out Chasin. I didn’t want to witness his disappointment when he figured out I wasn’t the woman he thought I was. “I’m an imposter. Everything’s fake. I walk in a room and I hold my breath, waiting for everyone to finally realize I don’t belong. I go to award shows and I’m filled with panic because one day someone’s gonna point at me and ask what I’m doing there. So I try to fade away, blend in. I do everything I can to hide. But deep down I want someone to see me.
“Then I met you and I thought finally, fucking finally, someone sees me. Just me, the real me. I’ve never been lucky, not in my whole life. But spending the weekend with you, I thought I was the luckiest girl in the world. I thought I’d found the man who would see me. But I was wrong and that was the final break that crushed my dream. If you couldn’t see me, then I knew no one ever would. So I gave up my dream and got the tattoo so I wouldn’t ever forget how bad it hurt.”
My heart was pounding so hard against my ribs I shook to the beat. I wanted to run and hide and pretend I hadn’t laid myself bare.
Why had I laid myself bare?
Why couldn’t I have made up a lie?
It would’ve been easy, he would never have known. Until he heard the song. But I could’ve trashed that, too. It’s not like he would’ve ever remembered what he’d said to me.
“But it’s not me who’s gonna fuck you,” he whispered.
Welp, there it was, my life sucked. I couldn’t even get lucky and have Chasin have a shitty memory. Nope, he had to remember the exact words he said to me.
Though, it made my decision to tell the truth the right one.
“Open your eyes, Evie.” Another deceptively soft demand.
Slowly, my lids opened, and when he came into focus, what I found was so painful I wanted to screw my eyes closed and never open them again.
“I fucked up,” he admitted. “I knew it, but I didn’t know how bad. I’m so fuckin’ sorry, Evie. You’re right, I didn’t see you. But you’re also wrong. I did more than just see you, I felt you. Two days, that’s what we shared. And in those two days, I fell for you. You were sleeping in my arms and I was imagining our future. I was living a fantasy that had long ago died. Never thought I’d find a woman who was worth the effort for me to find a way to get over the baggage my twat of a mother left me with. But there I was, lying in bed with you wrapped around me and I knew I had to find a way to unload it. Be the man you deserved. In two days, I fell in love with you and it took me two seconds to throw it away and kill your dream. I’m a complete dick.”
Chasin stopped speaking. My mind raced, unable to process half of what he said because the only thing that was bouncing around in my head was that he’d fallen in love with me. But I wasn’t sure if that was still the case, and life had taught me never to assume. The people who said they loved you could walk away at any moment.
So I was holding my breath, not wanting to breathe and lose this moment.
His hand on my face slid back into my hair, and with a gentle tug, he held me captive.
“I’m not letting you go.”
I nodded the best I could.
“I’m gonna give you your dream back.”
I sucked in a breath that sounded like a hiss and Chasin continued to rock my world.
“I see you, Genevieve. I see Vivi, too. And I know this is not gonna make sense right now, but one day you’ll get this. You are two different people, but you’re not. You’re Vivi Rush, sassy, talented, confident. You strut your fine ass across that stage like you own it, and, woman, you own that shit. You belong. All of that is inside of you. But not everyone gets to see the other side. The funny, sweet, loyal, loving Genevieve. That doesn’t mean you’re two people. What it means is, the ones who are close to you and get all of you are damn lucky. Who you let in, who you keep out, that choice is yours. But believe this—all that’s you is so fucking beautiful, it’s blinding. I want every part of you and I’m not stopping until I’ve earned it.”
Earned it.
You are two different people, but you’re not.
He got it.
Someone finally fucking got it.
I wanted to shout with joy, jump up and down in glee.
Finally.
“So, what now?” I asked, and licked my dry lips.
“Now I earn your forgiveness.”
“But I already forgive you,” I told him.
This time it was Chasin’s lids that fluttered closed for a moment. When they reopened, he looked torn, conflict dancing in his eyes. The room was still charged and I struggled to understand why he looked like he was warring with himself.
Moments later when I found out, I went back to my earlier refrain—I should’ve lied.
17
Shame was a word that Chasin wasn’t accustomed to. And now that he’d felt it, knew the taste of it, the weight, he knew he despised the feeling.
But there was no other emotion he could assign to what he’d done. Guilt wasn’t strong enough.
Shame.
Deep-seated shame had taken over.
And since she’d been honest with him, he now owed it to her to be the same.
“I heard you singing,” he confessed.
“Singing?”
Chasin was uncertain if she’d take his eavesdropping as a betrayal or an invasion of privacy. Neither of those would work in his favor but he needed to tell her the truth.
“At your uncle’s. You were in the room where you kept your guitars. The door was closed but when I was passing by, I heard. And I admit, I stopped to listen.”
A cute crease formed above her brow and her nose scrunched. The good news was, so far she didn’t look pissed, but he still hadn’t told her what she was singing.
“I heard the song.”
“What song?”
“Somebody’s gonna treat you right. But it’s not me. Somebody’s gonna hold you tight. But it’s not me.”
“Okay. I get it.” She held up her hand to halt Chasin from repeating the rest of the song he remembered. “So, you know I wrote a song about how I was feeling. Are you mad?”
Was he mad?
Fuck, yeah, he was mad—at himself for being such a monumental prick.
“Babe, what I’m saying is, I knew about the song before I asked about your tattoo. And I remembered saying that to you. Not at first, but after I saw the tatt, then heard you singing. And the more I thought about that night and how fucking stupid I was, the more I put two and two together.”
“Then why’d you ask?”
“Because I want to know what the tatt means to you.”
The longer the silence stretched, the more the stiffness in Genevieve grew and the more worried Chasin became. He was figuring out how to word his next explanation in a way that wouldn’t piss her off, when she beat him to it.
Though Genevieve wasn’t worried about pissing him off, when she broke the silence, that was exactly what she did.
“What you meant to say was, you wanted to know if I’d open up and tell you.”
“I wanted to know what the tatt meant to you,” he repeated.
“Right. I don’t believe you. I think you were testing me.”
“Testing you?” Now Chasin was more than pissed, he was angry.
“Yep. Did I pass?”
Anger slid out and fury slipped in.
“Tell me, Genevieve, what was I testing you about exactly?”
“To see if I’d be honest,” she said without hesitation.
Chasin’s brows shot up before they bunched and he tried to control his temper.
“Wrong. Not even close. As a matter of fact, you’re so far off base it isn’t even funny. Whatever this new bullshit is, it’s total shit. Which makes me wonder if this is one of your creative ways to keep me from getting close. I’m a man, Evie, all man, not some pussy who doesn’t have the balls to straight out ask for the information he wants. I wanted something from you, I asked, you told me, and the only thing I felt was honor and relief. Honor that you’d trust me enough to be honest and tell me, and relieved I didn’t have to pry to get it.”
Chasin still hadn’t released her hair that was wound around his fingers, and she hadn’t moved her palm resting on his chest, the closeness meant they both felt the growing tension. As pissed as he was—and he was fucking furious—she was trying to come up with something new to shove between them, he couldn’t ignore her nearness or the building need.
Every day it’d been getting harder and harder to keep his distance. To let her settle in, and give her some space as long as she wasn’t pulling away.
“I’m not gonna let you do it,” he told her.
“Do what?” There was a bite to her tone that any other time, Chasin would’ve enjoyed working out the attitude in a wholly different way. One that would be far more satisfying than the use of words.
“I’m not gonna let you give me a piece of you only to have you take it back, twist it, and put up a new barrier. I appreciate your honesty. So I’m gonna return the favor, whether you’re ready to hear it or not; I see you, Evie, down to your soul, I see you. I see all of your insecurities. You’re shit scared and you’re runnin’. But you don’t fool me. You want me to break down your walls…no, you need me to break them down for you, because you’ve built them so high and so strong you can’t do it yourself. You’re testing me, and, honey, I’m all right with that. The way I treated you, I deserve it. But mark this, I will pass. But while you’re testing me, you won’t be giving me pieces of you only to take them back. Once you give them, they’re mine.”
Chasin hadn’t taken his eyes from hers, so he saw it—fear, uncertainty, doubt, hesitation, and finally recognition. She knew he was right, she was so used to hiding, he was going to have to pull her out from behind the fortress she’d constructed. He was also right that she wanted him to. If she didn’t, she wouldn’t have been staring off into space when he’d walked into the kitchen wondering what had changed.
“Where are you with Bobby?” he asked.
“Huh?”
“You two work out your shit?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s good.” Chasin nodded and went on. “Do you need to call your manager back?”
“I should, but I don’t want to.”
“Why are you putting it off?”
The guys had looked into Melissa Roberts and her management agency and hadn’t found anything. The woman herself was squeaky clean and her staff, though not squeaky due to a few moving violations and one DUI, were clean. None of them had anything that would hint at violent or obsessive behavior.
Genevieve was quiet, and when her gaze dropped, Chasin prompted, “Babe?”
“She wants this record out by the end of the year. I don’t like to be rushed, she knows I write when I have something to write about. So she’s pushin’ for me to shop for songs to move the album forward. Which she knows I won’t do, so it’s annoying.”
Chasin sensed there was more, but when she didn’t immediately go on, he asked, “Shop for songs?”
“Record a song someone else wrote,” she explained.
“So, other than her pushing you, what else is holding you back?”
“Why do you think there’s something else?”
Chasin didn’t stop the chuckle that bubbled up. “Babe. You’re transparent. Something else is bugging you. I told you and Bobby we already ran her and her staff. You can—”
“It’s not that,” Genevieve cut him off. “I’m just not sure…”
Out of the corner of his eye, Chasin caught Weston’s approach. He kept his gaze where it was but called out to his friend, “What do you need, Weston?”
“Sorry to interrupt. But I need a word.”
Knowing that his teammate wouldn’t interrupt if it wasn’t crucial, Chasin combed his fingers through Genevieve’s silky, brown locks and let his hand fall to her hip. With a firm press of his lips to her forehead, he whispered, “Give me a minute and we’ll finish our conversation. Weston wouldn’t’ve driven out here if it wasn’t important.”
“It’s okay. You’re busy and—”
“Evie, honey, look at me.” Chasin waited until her eyes came back to him. “I’m never too busy. We’ll finish up.”
Chasin released her and turned toward the living room just as Bobby was coming down the stairs, phone in hand. “What’s going on?”
Weston’s eyes slid through the room, taking in the women but settling on Chasin.
Shit motherfucker. Something new. It took Chasin a split second to come to a conclusion and answer his friend’s unspoken question.
He didn’t want anything hidden from Genevieve so he asked, “What’d you find?”
“Another delivery,” Weston announced.
The man wasn’t prone to dramatics. If Weston was hesitating, it was bad.
“And?”
“It was left at the uncle’s house. No postmark. I took it to the office. Jameson and Alec are processing it. Jonny will be in later to pick it up and officially log it.”
“What is it?”
Weston’s body went stiff before he pulled his cell out of his back pocket, tapped the screen a few times, then held it out. Chasin didn’t waste any time moving across the room to take the phone. And when he looked down at the screen, he realized his mistake. He should’ve taken a moment to prepare but he hadn’t, and his reaction was anything but the calm he wanted to continue giving Genevieve.
“What the fuck?” he thundered and swiped the screen.
If the first snapshot of this sick fuck’s latest offering didn’t piss him off, the next picture did.
“He’s taking pictures of her,” Chasin growled. He swiped again and there was a third picture of Genevieve outside her uncle’s house. He immediately recognized the shorts and t-shirt she had on. “These were taken the day we moved her to the farm.”
Chasin heard Genevieve whimper, but he was so lost in his fury he couldn’t offer her the emotional support she needed. Not when he didn’t have a lock on his anger. He needed a minute to process what he was seeing and calm himself down.
Not wanting to see the rest, but knowing he needed to, his thumb moved across the screen and his breath caught. The two of them were in profile. He had Genevieve’s back pressed against the passenger side door of his Charger, one hand on her face, the other on her waist. Her face was tipped up, his was tipped down, they both had on sunglasses.
Chasin remembered every word of that conversation. She was scared and he was reassuring her. They looked like two lovers caught in an intimate moment. And if some dick hadn’t taken the picture, he’d want that shit printed and framed. Genevieve looked hot with her long brown hair flowing over her shoulder, some of the shiny locks brushing her bare arm, some of it resting on her breast. The t-shirt was tight, and molded to her body, leaving nothing to the imagination. Her shorts were the same—tight and damn sexy. The only thing the picture didn’t capture was her cowboy boots. Never in his life did Chasin think he’d find worn-out, beat-up boots sexy, but damn if on Genevieve they weren’t hot as fuck.
His eyes dropped to the bottom of the screen and his fingers enlarged the image, moving the picture around until he read the message. Bold block letters written in red marker, the words looked angry—probably because the person who wrote them was angry.
Unhinged.
Lunatic.
“Anything else besides these?” Ch
asin asked.
“Nope. But Holden’s moving in. Extra firepower in the house. Just to be safe.”
“What’s happening?” Genevieve asked.
Chasin’s thumb tapped the screen a few times, and without remorse, he deleted the death threat before turning to the side, finding Genevieve had moved closer.
“Come here, Evie.” He waited for her to step closer, then showed her the picture of her walking out of her uncle’s house. The one of her standing on the pathway to the driveway, only she wasn’t looking at the cars, she was gazing out over the water. It was his second favorite, she looked absolutely beautiful. But again, knowing that some deranged, sick-as-fuck dick took the picture made his stomach roil.
When she’d seen all there was to see, Genevieve’s head tipped back and she looked at Chasin. “He knows where I’m at.”
There was nothing to say to that. Indeed, the asshole knew where she was.
“He found me,” she whispered.
“Baby, I told you we knew he was gonna come here,” he reminded her gently. “It took Micky all of a five-minute internet search to find your connection to not only Kent County but that house. She didn’t even need to use any of her fancy hacking skills. Everything is fine. As a matter of fact, this is good, we want him close. You and Bobby are protected, he’s not going to touch either of you. But he’s gonna try, which means we’re gonna catch him. Trust us.”
“Then why is Holden moving into the house?”
“Precaution,” Weston cut in.
It wasn’t a lie, but Chasin still felt like shit for keeping something from her. The death threat wasn’t against Genevieve or Bobby.
The warning had been for Chasin.
Tell him to go or he dies.
A simple and to the point message—one that didn’t worry or intimidate Chasin.
“I’m headed back to the office. I’ll call you when we have more.”
Chasin heard the front door open, then close, but didn’t take his eyes off the trembling woman at his side as Bobby walked in.
“Evie.”
“I hate this,” she hissed. “I hate him.”
Bobby’s phone rang and Genevieve’s gaze cut to her friend before slicing back to him. “Why me? I don’t understand.”
Chasin's Surrender (Gemini Group Book 5) Page 14