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“You know, it does all the time, though,” he marveled at his friend’s skills. “Even though he has a criminal record.”
“You’re friends with a criminal?” I wasn’t one to
judge, but, really?
“I’m not just friends with him. I’d lay down my life for him.”
OK. That was intense. It wasn’t the first time I’d taken note of that characteristic in him. It did make me wonder, though. It was clear with Chase, if you were in, you were in. But how did that work on the other side? What if someone did something that pissed him off? Were they out forever?
Back at the house, a bunch of his teammates were still up with a few friends, sitting around watching TV. We said our hellos, but then headed back into his bedroom. We hadn’t seen nearly enough of each other over the past few days.
He locked the door behind us, backing me up against the far wall, pressing me against it with hot kisses. “You’re driving me crazy in this dress.” He licked kisses down my throat, to my cleavage, unzipping my dress to get more access. It fell to the floor and he wasted no time in pulling off my panties and reaching up to find me slick and waiting.
“I want you so much,” he whispered into my ear, moving against me, touching me as only he knew how, coaxing desire from inside me deep. “I hated seeing you surrounded by those men tonight at the club,” he grit out.
“You know nothing was going on.” I kissed his throat, his shoulders, his perfectly chiseled chest. I missed touching him so much. I hadn’t even been able to work on him as often as I wanted over the past couple of days—less workouts, more team meetings, more PR obligations had meant so much less time together. He stepped out of his jeans and briefs and brought his thick cock into the palm of his hand as he pulled on a condom. Then he returned to me, kissing, pinning me against the wall.
“But I want everyone to know,” he told me, speaking the words low and hot into my ear. “You’re mine.” He drove into me in one swift, full thrust. I gasped, my eyes wide he stretched and filled me so much. I moved to grab onto his shoulders, but he took my wrists and brought them up above my head where he could pin them in one of his large hands against the wall.
“Mine,” he repeated, taking me hard and rough against the wall, grasping my ass as he held me and fucked me. I wrapped my legs around his waist and surrendered to it, the feel of complete possession. He looked down at me, predatory, commanding, hard and driving, claiming me. And as he clasped my wrists and held me firm against the wall, he drove into me again and again, ruthless, demanding everything from me. I started to moan, loudly, but he covered it with a quick, deep kiss.
“You need to keep it quiet, my beauty,” he reminded me. We had company, right outside the door. “Can you keep quiet when you come?” Now his voice sounded wicked, teasing, as he brought his finger to my clit, pushing against it as he thrust. I was so wet. He slid in deep, the friction between us so intense I didn’t know if I could keep quiet. I whimpered, closing my eyes, trying to silence myself as the storm built inside me
“It’s hard, isn’t it,” he tormented me, stroking and fucking me until I shuddered and panted, barely able to stand up I could feel my orgasm coming on so strong. “You want to scream, don’t you, baby?”
I whimpered again, struggling, about to come.
“I’ll cover your mouth so you can scream my name.” With his hands firmly around my wrists and clamped down over my mouth, I came so hard I nearly blacked out, feeling so commanded, so dominated and yet so cared for and satisfied I couldn’t even think straight. When I felt him come, too, thrusting into me so strong and long and deep, another shudder tremored up through my body, my pussy clenching around his cock.
“Ah, Emma.” He said my name like I was a goddess and he was worshipping at my altar. I’d never felt so possessed before, so swept away, so out of control. It was exhilarating and terrifying all at once.
§
The following day was the opening ceremonies of the games. I watched it on a huge screen at a bar with the whole swim team crew. Tori had invited me to go out with some of the friends she made through her PR role, but I wanted to be with the swim people. We’d grown close in the past three weeks, on such an emotional roller coaster, and it was fun to be with Megan and the others when Chase and his teammates came on the jumbotron.
I couldn’t believe it when I saw him up on the big screen. It felt crazy, like watching someone you knew walking on the moon, doing something that looked both so familiar and so unbelievable all at once. Chase looked happy, waving and smiling. I couldn’t imagine what a rush he was feeling and I wished I could be there with him, by his side. I saw him hold up his phone and snap a photo of the crowd. Then my phone blipped with a text.
There it was, his photo of the crowd in the Olympic stadium. And his message.
Chase: Wish you were here with me.
He got back to the hotel room late that night and he had to wake up early, what with the Olympic Games and all. I was freaking out, not handling it at all well. Honestly, I thought it might be better for him if he stayed away from me. But he wanted to spend the night together before his first events. I was so nervous I practically balled up like a cat at the edge of the bed, perched and ready to spring. But Chase, the true athlete, fell right to sleep, getting his required rest before his first competitive events.
The next morning at the swim arena, I worked on his shoulders and quads briefly while his head coach talked to him non-stop. We managed a quick moment to ourselves with a kiss and my wish for good luck, and then I was spat out into the stands where thankfully Megan and Tori were waiting for me. I purposely didn’t sit anywhere near his parents. The TV cameras kept flashing over to them. Chase told me they were sitting together, even though he wondered if they might need some kind of a guard to keep them from doing harm to each other. Apparently the divorce proceedings still rankled, 12 years later.
They looked terrifying to me, like a Ralph Lauren ad. His mom wore a stiff navy blazer and a patterned scarf. I bet she’d take one look at me, Florida girl in my flip-flops and athletic tank and shorts, and turn her nose right up.
Add it to the list of reasons I was glad that the press hadn’t identified me as Chase’s girlfriend. I already felt like I’d swallowed a bird. Not a small one, either, like a large angry turkey flapping around in my stomach. It wasn’t a good feeling. All I’d need to push me right over the edge was a camera focused in on me.
Chase was swimming the 400 Individual Medley first, a killer event with all four strokes. The moment he walked onto the pool deck, I lost my mind, starting to stand up, then sitting down again, my hand halfway inside my mouth as I chewed on it nervously, screaming his name along with the crowd around me.
Out by the blocks, many of the other swimmers wore earbuds to drown out the noise and keep them focused. Not Chase. He didn’t need it. He created a world of his own, impervious to his surroundings as he shook his limbs loose.
“Stretch your quads!” I yelled from up in the stands, as if he could hear me. There was no way he could, but as if we were telepathically connected—or maybe he’d rehearsed his pre-swim routine a hundred thousand million times—he stretched his quads.
I couldn’t watch. I had to watch. He dove in with a powerful, masterful swoosh and led right out of the gate. Butterfly was his standout stroke, where he looked like a wild, swooping animal closing in on its prey. I’d seen him swim many times before, but it still stopped my heart, made me clutch my hands together in prayer and scream until I had no voice left. He swam with such power and fluid grace, defying all laws of gravity as he seemed to literally fly out over the water.
In backstroke he still held the lead, but then came breaststroke. There was a Brit next to him, pulling up, then ahead. No! I wanted to leap down into the pool and throw myself onto him, holding him back. But that probably wouldn’t count as sportsmanlike behavior. Plus, they’d all just probably have to swim the event again and my heart definitely couldn’t take it.
So I watched, and screamed, balancing on my tiptoes as they all flip-turned, Chase no longer in the lead until the final lap of freestyle.
“Go for it!” I screamed. Megan and Tori both clung to me, all of us lo
sing our minds as Chase started to even up, then pull ahead in the final stretch. When he touched, we were half watching him, half watching the scoreboard. He did it! He came in first! Gold!
Screaming, crying, jumping up and down, someone draped an American flag around our shoulders and we held it up, doing a dance. I felt elated, overwhelmed, thrilled.
And he still had eight more final events to go. Another one that afternoon. It was too much! It wasn’t fair to make him swim two 400-meter events on the same day! Were they trying to torture Chase? No human could do that. I needed to lodge a complaint with the organizing committee. Or start taking high quantities of Valium.
Chase might be the one exerting himself full-throttle in the pool. But it looked like I would be the one who might not survive the Olympics.
CHAPTER 16
Chase
Yesterday I won gold in the 400 IM and the 400 Free. Today I had the free relay, and I had to rely on my teammates to bring it home. I knew they could do it, and they did, pushing themselves to the limit and beyond, each of us becoming better than we could on our own as we pushed together as a team. We won gold. That made three.
My mother and father were there to cheer me on, and as far as I could tell they were managing to keep it together. I knew they hated each other with a passion. I also knew I couldn’t change or fix things between them. I’d learned that lesson long ago. All I could do was take notes for my own life. Don’t hold on to grudges. Don’t stay angry. It never did any good.
Monday I had the freestyle finals and then Tuesday Liam would arrive for my remaining five. I was looking forward to seeing him and introducing him to Emma. I knew they’d get along.
What Emma didn’t know was what was happening on Wednesday. I still had events all the way through Saturday, and I was flying out some other people as my special guests: her parents. Whereas my mom and dad were a source of stress and tension, requiring management, wrangling and peacekeeping, her parents seemed to really make her happy. And I loved making Emma happy.
