In Deep: Chase & Emma (All In Book 1) (13 page)

Emma: Catching up on reading the
latest issue of People magazine.

I couldn’t help it. I had to tease
him. The man was the featured cover model on practically every major
national publication. It was too weird not to mention.

Chase: Do you have a poster of me up
on your bedroom wall?

I burst out laughing. I didn’t
know why, but Chase’s humor always surprised me. It was probably
his intensity, the burning heat in those blue eyes. He didn’t look
like he had a great sense of humor. But it turned out he knew exactly
what to say to crack me up.

Emma: I was thinking I’d make a
collage. There’s plenty of photos of you to make a big one.

Chase: That is so creepy.

I pressed send on the “blow a
kiss” emoji before I’d thought it through. It was an instinct.
Tori and I communicated in large part via emojis and GIFs. She was
the best at finding hilarious ones that I could re-use. But now I’d
sent Chase a big kiss.

Chase: Wish it were in person.

I put my phone back in
my pocket. Two more days before I’d see him again. The next
facility was only a state away in Georgia. Then we’d head directly
to Rio.

I biked over to a
friend’s apartment to hang out. Another friend came over and we
made enchiladas for dinner and watched a silly Zac Efron movie.
Really, I’d watch anything with him in it as long as he removed his
shirt. Thankfully, directors seemed to understand I was not alone in
my thinking and that was exactly how he rolled for most of the movie.

Back at my parent’s
house at midnight, they were already asleep so I headed to my room. I
felt guilty about it, but I was kind of glad to avoid any late-night
heart-to-heart talks with my mom. She was so good at the laser-like
questions, piercing right to the heart of the matter. And I knew what
she’d say about my current situation. She’d like Chase all right,
hard-working, clean-living and, at least from what I’d seen so far,
really good to me. But she’d tell me to wait. Now wasn’t the
right time to start anything. I was there in a professional capacity,
hired as his physical therapist. He was about to compete in front of
the eyes of the world, going for gold on an international stage.

She wasn’t awake to
say it, but I could almost hear her voice. If there was something
real between us, why not wait two more weeks to find out? Why
jeopardize my professional reputation and his crucial, final weeks
before the most important event of his career and possibly life? We
had all the time in the world after the games. That’s what my
wonderfully rational, level-headed, middle-aged,
happily-married-to-the-same-man-for-28-years mother would say.

With a sigh, I washed
up and headed into my bedroom. It was just me, the treadmill, and the
magazines my mother had thoughtfully amassed for me, all of which
featured Chase. So, of course, I stayed up late reading stories about
him.

There weren’t many
personal details in them. There was a lot about his swim times, of
course, and references to his intriguing persona, but other than the
facts that he’d grown up in Massachusetts and he’d attended
Stanford, no one seemed to have much. They all made reference to the
fact that he’d nearly drowned at 14—human interest angle!—but
no one had captured the full story. It was all lined up for me to
come in and hit a home run.

There were a few
references to Chase as a heartbreaker. The articles made him sound
like a sought-after, elusive ladies’ man. No one could catch him,
in or out of the pool. Was I missing something? Or was that just
hype? Either way, I didn’t like the feeling that I was one in a
million, a face in the adoring, worshipping crowd. I felt so removed
from the intimacy we’d shared. And I missed him.

But then I heard from him the
following afternoon. He texted me another photo, this one a close-up
of a lobster holding a beer. Or, at least, a lobster made to look
like he was holding one, with his claw wrapped around a bottle.

Emma: Nice lobster

Chase: That’s lob-stah. I’m back
in Massachusetts.

Emma: You don’t even have an
accent.

Chase: Yes, I’m trying to work on
that and I’d appreciate your help.

And, just like that, he put a smile
back on my face. A few minutes later, it broadened even wider. I got
another photo, very much to my liking. It featured Chase shirtless,
all of his perfectly defined muscles on excellent display.

Chase: See how buff your boy is?

Wait, who’d sent that? It clearly
wasn’t Chase. I wanted to thank them. What eye candy. I clicked to
enlarge it to full screen. The wind was in Chase’s hair, his head
turned to the side with a classic strong profile as he kicked it on
what looked like a deck. Those shoulders, so broad and strong. Had I
really rested my head on them the day before yesterday?

Chase: Sorry, my buddy Liam got the
phone for a second.

Emma: Does he frequently take
shirtless photos of you?

Chase: Only when he’s trying to
piss me off. So, yes.

I loved the thought of
him goofing off with friends. He needed that, some time to relax
before the entire world turned its attention on him in the pool. I
wondered if he was seeing his family as well. He hadn’t mentioned
them, only that he was at his father’s house. I somehow got the
sense that he wasn’t that close with family.

I knew the bond I had
with my parents was much closer than most, and I felt grateful for
it. I was their only child, a fact they mentioned frequently, with
affection. And emotion, since I was headed to Rio. My mom, in
particular, warned me repeatedly about the Zika virus. She wanted
healthy grandbabies.

“Wear long-sleeved
shirts and pants,” my father advised.

“Or just stay
indoors!” my mother took it a step further.

Together, they sent me
off on Monday with so much insect repellent spray I thought I had a
bottle for every day I’d be in Brazil.

“I know this must be
a wild ride you’re on.” Mom hugged me at security, wiping a tear
away from her eye. “You’re going to do a great job.”

“Call us.” Dad
hugged me, too.

“And text!”

They waved at me as I
headed into the long line. They were both wearing matching Team USA
2016 Swimming T-shirts. No one ever accused my parents of being cool.
But they were awesome.

“Emma!” my mom
called after me. “Enjoy every second!”

§

The hotel in Atlanta
looked fancier than the one we’d stayed at in San Antonio. The
high-ceilinged lobby featured a gigantic chandelier. The marble floor
gleamed. No line to wait in, a staff member greeted me right away and
pulled up my reservation.

“Right next door to
Mr. Carter, as requested,” she informed me as she handed me my room
card.

Right next door? I had
a feeling I knew who had made that request. A shiver of anticipation
traveled down my spine. I was in for quite a week.

Chase

It was good to see Liam
and some of his buddies. They lived there year-round, not like the
wealthy seasonal residents. They were the ones who kept things
running for everyone else, firefighters and police officers and
construction workers. They were always a fun group, easy to hang
with, no heavy talk, plenty of joking around.

One of them had gotten
married recently. That surprised me, but I guess he was 27, prime
marrying time. Almost none of my teammates were married, but a lot of
them were younger than me. Some of them were teenagers. At 26, I was
still considered right in my prime for swimming, but by the next
games I wouldn’t be. That wasn’t the case for a lot of the people
I spent all day, every day with. To a lot of them, this Olympics was
their first of two or even three attempts.

To me, this was it. And
then it would be over. That was why it felt good to spend the weekend
with a bunch of people who weren’t obsessed with the Olympics. It
was a good reminder that there was a whole life outside of my small,
intense world.

I still thought about
Emma the whole time. Her laughter, her sweet shy nervousness. And
those moments when she lost her reticence under my touch. Her soft
skin and her supple, flexible limbs that I wanted wrapped around me.
I dreamed about her at night and tried not to talk too much about her
during the day. But Liam still picked up on it.

“What’s the deal
with this Emma?” he asked me Saturday night as we hung out on his
deck having some beers. Root beer where I was concerned.

“Emma who?” I
tried. He just looked at me. Damn, I hadn’t even been there 24
hours and I’d already blown my cover.

“She’s a physical
therapist, from Florida. Traveling with us for the next three weeks.
Working with me until the games are over.”

“Working with you?”
He cocked an eyebrow. I raised mine in response. “Interesting.”

Since he’d elected
himself captain of the team devoted to getting Chase involved in
things other than swimming, he liked the idea a whole lot. Which was
why he did asinine things like sneak a picture of me and text it to
Emma. And tell me how much he was looking forward to meeting her in
Rio so he could have a good chat with her. I knew what that meant. He
was issuing a warning. I needed to lock things down with her by then,
or he’d play fairy godfather and lock us together in a supply
closet. Too late, I’d already tried that move. Only I forgot to
lock the door.

I talked to my parents
over the weekend as well, but didn’t see them. Dad was in New York
where he spent a lot of time. Mom was hosting a garden party on
Sunday and had wanted me to come out to her home in Wellesley.
Neither of them still lived in the house where I’d grown up. That
had been sold after the divorce.

“Thanks, Mom, but I
can’t make it.” The last thing I wanted to do was stand around
with a bunch of her friends making small talk about my chances for
Olympic gold. Even my mom and I seemed hard-pressed to get far past
small talk together. Once we got beyond agreeing it had been a hot
July so far, yes, I was still training nearly every second of every
day and, yes, her wrist was healing nicely after a fall a couple of
months ago, we were left without much to say.

“Met anyone nice
lately?” she tried, a question I always brushed aside. I didn’t
have time to meet anyone nice. I mean, I met women all the time, but
I didn’t have the time to find out what they were like. Except this
time, I had.

“I’ll tell you
about it after the games,” I surprised her by answering.

“Really?” she
asked, clearly intrigued.

“When do you arrive
again?” I got her telling me about logistics, successfully
diverting her attention. I steadfastly refused to get involved in the
“I want to see you but I don’t want to see your father,”
discussion. I’d had enough of all of that drama. They’d have to
sort out their own shit to figure out how to be in the same place at
the same time. Their son was in the Olympics. Deal with it.

My dad just wanted to
talk to me about swim times. He considered himself quite the coach,
despite having barely spent any time in the water. He had my build—or
I guess it was more accurate to say that I had his—so he probably
could have been a top-tier swimmer had he gone for it, but he’d
done more traditional sports in school like baseball and football. In
fact, he’d fought my devotion to swimming, especially after the
accident.

“Swimmers don’t get
the girls,” he’d tried on me when I’d been a young teenager. He
was right in New England at least, where swimming was largely an
indoor, out-of-sight pursuit for the socially awkward. It wasn’t
until I went to some summer training camps and then Stanford that I
realized how huge swimming was in other parts of the country.

But now that I was at
the top of my game, my father was all about securing that number one
spot. Google “competitive” and I was pretty sure a picture of my
dad would come up. I guessed I’d inherited that from him as well.
I’d had more than one person tell me I was a real chip off the old
block. But what if I didn’t like that block too much? I didn’t
exactly walk around with a lot of adolescent angst, hating on my
father, blaming him for his imperfections. He’d given me a lot,
paying for private school, team fees, the best coaches and training
programs. I earned income from sponsorships now, but he’d given me
my start and I’d always be grateful to him for that.

But I didn’t exactly
see him enjoying life. He always seemed in a rush. He’d torn
through two marriages, saw me, his only child, only a couple times a
year, and was always talking a mile a minute into his earpiece while
simultaneously texting and emailing about confidential, high profile
deals. You know that Dickens’ story
A
Christmas Carol
? I couldn’t help but see my father like
the ghost of Christmas future. I could end up exactly like him if I
didn’t watch myself.

He didn’t have a bad
life. He was a well-educated, world-traveled man who’d amassed a
broad network and sizeable fortune through financial ventures. But to
me, his life seemed kind of empty. Most of the people around him were
either blowhards or kiss-ups, and the women he spent time with were
mainly interested in his money. It wasn’t as if I had a grand plan
for life post-Olympics, but I hoped there’d somehow be more to it.
I wanted to do something meaningful and fulfilling. I just didn’t
know what that was yet.

Over the weekend, I
talked to my coach, too. He kept in touch with me, sending texts,
calling to check in. He didn’t want anything fucking things up for
me—or him. Everything was riding on Rio.

Yeah, I knew that.
Which was why I flew into Atlanta early Monday morning, checking
myself in ahead of schedule. And making sure Emma would be staying in
a suite right next to mine. Adjoining, in fact, if she wanted to
unlock that door. Her call. And I’d do everything in my power to
persuade her to do exactly that.