AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Savannah
Several Months Earlier…
“Idon’t think I ever really thanked you for everything you did for Torie after she was kidnapped,” Chase Durand said to me as we sat in the kitchen of a very extravagant Las Vegas suite.
It was the venue where his sister Torie’s wedding reception had been held earlier.
I wasn’t sure exactly how Chase and I had ended up alone, sharing a much-too- cozy espresso moment at the kitchen table after all of the other wedding guests were gone.
Maybe…it was because I loved a really good latte, and Chase was fond of espresso?
Okay…maybe not.
Yeah, that explanation would work for whyChasewas still here after every single guest had left.
Me?
If I was being completely honest, I knew I’d finally been unable to resist spending a little more time with Chase Durand, even though I absolutely knew that giving in to that impulse was dangerous.
And incredibly stupid.
Chase had always treated me like a second little sister, no different than he treated my best friend, Torie.
Unfortunately, I couldn’t quite look at him as an honorary big brother anymore, and that scared the shit out of me.
This encounter was a little too intimate now that we were adults.
I knew I should be leaving this place like I was evacuating for some sort of dire emergency. I’d avoided spending time alone in Chase’s company for the last decade because I was attracted to him. I was always afraid someone would notice that my thoughts about him were far from brotherly.
I’d be totally mortified if Torie found out that I secretly drooled over her older brother. I’d be even more horrified if Chase discovered how I really felt about him.
Of course, he’d never know. It’s not like I wore my heart on my sleeve. I hid that information like it was a matter of national security.
I was an investigative journalist. I knew exactly how to bury my emotions so deeply that no one could ever see them. If I didn’t, I’d completely lose my mind in my line of work.
I have to compartmentalize and just pretend that this is no more than a conversation between old family friends.
Which was exactly what was happening. Well, for Chase, anyway.
Irritated with myself for being so flustered over being alone with him, I answered, “Torie is my best friend. I’d do anything for her. I always wished I could have done more. I think Cooper Montgomery is the best thing that ever happened to her. They seemed so happy to be getting married today. He’s helped her through a few of her lingering issues from her kidnapping that I never even knew about.”
I chose my words carefully. There were things that Chase didn’t know, and possibly never would, about Torie’s kidnapping. There were incidents that Torie hadn’t wanted to reveal to her two older brothers because they already foolishly blamed themselves for what had happened to her.
Chase shot me a doubtful expression as he replied, “Don’t belittle the importance of you being there for her when she really needed you, Vanna,” he insisted. “You put your own career on hold to help her through her recovery.”
“Maybe I needed some time off, too,” I suggested, uncomfortable with being thanked for something that had been necessary and not at all an inconvenience at the time.
I loved Torie like a sister. There was nowhere else I’d wanted to be when she was hurting that badly.
Frankly, that time off I’d spent with Toriehadbenefited me as well. I’d never realized how emotionally exhausted I was from chasing story after story for so many years. Every one of those assignments had been soul sucking because I didn’t exactly report on uplifting international events.
He lifted an eyebrow as he asked gruffly, “Did you need time off?”
I squirmed in my seat as he waited patiently for my answer.
His beautiful gray eyes studied me like he was interested in nothing elseexceptmy answer.
Shit!I’d always felt like Chase could see right through me and into the dark pit of emotions I didn’t want to acknowledge. That was one of the things that made him so dangerous, yet so damn alluring. He had the ability to make a person feel like they were the most important person in the world to him simply because he really…listened.
