In Deep: Chase & Emma (All In Book 1) (31 page)

With a whine, she did
as I said, back down on her elbows, knees even wider apart so I could
see her glistening sex. I grabbed her hips, my fingers along her ass
cheeks, pulling her apart so I could really get in there. I licked,
slowly at first, eating her pussy like the ripest, juiciest fruit I’d
ever tasted. I moaned at the succulent sweetness, so turned on by the
sounds she made, the way she white-knuckled the sheet.

When she got close, I
brought my oiled thumb over to her ass, using some of the arousal
dripping down her legs to coat her entrance. Sucking on her clit, I
pressed against her tight ring, forcing it open, my thick thumb
popping inside.

She screamed, at the
brink, tense and quivering as I licked and sucked her pussy, starting
to thrust in her ass. She loved it when I claimed her, showed her how
good I could make her feel, because she was mine, all mine.

She started bucking,
pressing against me, shuddering and groaning and I sucked hard on her
clit, pulling it in, giving it a light bite as I pushed into her
asshole.

“Yes!” she screamed
out, climaxing hard, coming in my mouth as I sucked in her luscious
wetness. I stroked her, milking the pleasure out of her, licking
every last drop as she quivered and sighed.

Kissing her ass cheek,
I praised her. “So fucking sweet, baby.”

“Oh, Chase,” she
groaned, sinking down, her face pressed to the side. I gathered her
in my arms and carried her into the bedroom. She needed a moment to
rest and catch her breath. Too bad I wasn’t going to give it to
her.

Pulling her against me,
cupping her from behind, I wrapped my hands around her. Grabbing one
of her breasts, dipping down into her slick pussy, I held her there,
sucking on her throat, licking and whispering in her ear. “You come
so pretty, Emma. I need to see it again.”

And that was how we
spent the night, pushing boundaries, sinking into each other with
passion that left both of us breathless, sweaty, panting, and
ultimately falling asleep with big, fat, satisfied smiles on our
faces.

§

Emma had never been to
New York City, so I took her there for a few days in October. The
leaves in Central Park were crisp and bright. The sun was still
strong enough for long days of walking around and sightseeing. And my
father was in town on business, so we met up with him for dinner.

Halfway through our
meal, an old friend of my father’s, Mark Fisher, joined us. He’d
known me since the day I was born, he liked telling me, and he wanted
to come congratulate the Olympic champion. We got to talking. It
turned out Mark had made tens of millions as a venture capitalist,
and now he wanted to make a difference. He had a bunch of ideas and
was especially concerned about childhood obesity and the increasing
reliance on screens for entertainment.

“Kids don’t run
around and play outdoors anymore,” he lamented. “I used to spend
all summer climbing trees and riding bikes. Now kids stay indoors
playing video games.”

I didn’t have any
answers, but I knew what he was talking about. I believed strongly in
the benefits of physical activity, exercise and athletic pursuits,
and I saw what he was saying. A lot of kids didn’t do that anymore,
especially kids whose parents couldn’t afford all mine had, with
the club and team fees, the gear, the constant driving back and forth
to practice.

We didn’t decide
anything that night, but Mark and I kept talking, texting and
emailing which then grew into scheduled phone calls. In November,
when he flew down to Vero to spend the day brainstorming, I knew we
might be on to something. I believed passionately in swimming. You
could do it from the day you entered this world until the day you
exited. It kept you healthy, didn’t impact your joints, engaged
your body and your mind. Not to mention that drowning was one of the
leading causes of death in children. I knew something about that
topic.

We started hatching the
idea for a center, called Swim For Your Life. Mark would fund the
construction and set up a generous scholarship fund for kids with
limited means. Emma and I would run it.

The center would be
open to the public, offering a recreational pool, swim lessons and a
swim team. It would have all that, plus a fitness center with, you
guessed it, physical and massage therapy. Emma was a big part of the
planning process, at the center of creating the vision and helping us
articulate not only the big ideas, but the logistical planning.

“We should offer a
camp in the summers!” She got just as excited about it as me,
brainstorming ways to keep kids active and engaged, swimming and
playing and, of course, with Emma, running. “We can have a big
field outside! With a track!”

The possibilities were
endless, as were the needs. With more and more schools strapped for
cash, cutting funding for physical education programs, kids needed a
place to go and be healthy.

In the winter months
Emma and I worked together to start making our dreams a reality. We
found a fantastic lot at an affordable price, thanks to the
comparatively reasonable real estate prices in Florida. While we got
all the engineering surveys done, the soil reports, the structural
calculations, my mom flew down for a couple weeks and worked with a
landscape architect to design the grounds. There would be flowers,
lots of them, and a vegetable garden that the kids could tend and
learn about how food grows.

Emma’s parents got in
on the fun as well. Her mom gave a lot of input into the rehab
component, especially the water therapy programs we could offer. Her
father managed commercial properties for a living, so he was a
natural to not only consult, but offer the manager position. We had
lunch one day, just the two of us, and I proposed it to him. He’d
get a raise, the opportunity to work with his daughter and full
oversight of the facilities.

“I’d be honored,”
he said, shaking my hand.

I hoped to get that
same reaction from him to a question I planned on asking sometime
over the coming year. I still felt the way about Emma that I had from
the start. She was the one for me. We hadn’t talked marriage and
kids yet. I was making myself wait, for once in my life not rush
after the goal but let it unfold, at a natural, comfortable pace. But
that was hard for me. A large part of me wanted to haul her
caveman-style down to city hall that afternoon. We could seal the
deal quick, making her mine, forever and ever.

But I knew she’d like
a wedding with her family involved. And my mom would like that, too.
Liam would want to be there and, who knew, maybe Jax and even Ian
would show up. And there were my teammates, they’d want to come,
and Emma still lived in the town where she’d grown up so she’d
have a bunch of friends and family she’d want to include. Hell,
we’d be lucky if we got away with a guest list of a few hundred.

Not that I assumed
she’d say yes, but I hoped she would. Seeing her there in meetings,
planning for our new center, I couldn’t believe how I’d hit the
jackpot. She was the real deal, so kind and nice and thoughtful. And
a naughty, hot freak in bed. I’d caught myself a unicorn. And I
planned on never letting her go.

Emma

We spent Christmas
together in Vero with my family. Chase met the whole extended Nelson
clan, complete with cousins and aunts and a pet boa constrictor named
Neil. That belonged to my Uncle Ralph.

This year, Neil didn’t
eat anything. Last year he’d disappeared for a couple hours, then
reappeared at the entryway with a suspiciously large lump in his
middle. This year, Uncle Ralph kept him closer, wearing him like a
scarf for most of the holiday.

Chase rode it out in
classic style, nodding patiently to long explanations about how to
make tuna casserole (Aunt Roberta) and showing my nine-year-old
cousin Kenny how to swim butterfly. In the kitchen of my parents’
house.

“They’re best
friends, not enemies,” Chase told him, moving his hands closer
together at the end of the swoop. He was so good with kids, charming
and funny and patient. Someday he’d make a great dad. He saw me
gazing at him, all starry eyed, and he gave me a wink.

Geez, I was so head
over heels for him. A fact I reminded myself of frequently as we flew
up to Massachusetts to spend the week after Christmas with his
parents. His father really rubbed me the wrong way. He seemed
competitive with his own son, bragging about his latest business
deal, displaying his latest girlfriend as if it were a competition,
her against me. I did not do well around people like that. The more
it felt like someone was trying to provoke a reaction, the more I
clammed right up. The few days we spent at his father’s house, I
spoke less and less, growing quiet as a mouse.

Thankfully, I wasn’t
the only one who saw it. It didn’t make me happy to see Chase upset
over his father’s behavior, but it did make it easier that he
didn’t like it either.

“I’m sorry. He
isn’t always this bad,” he assured me.

“It is not your
fault,” I reassured him. “And I’m fine.” Which was true, but
I grew more relaxed in the following days as we visited his mother.
She and I had had fun with the landscape architect, planning the
grounds for the swim center. She struck me as quiet, thoughtful, and
much more grounded than I’d originally feared when I’d seen her
in Rio. It turned out she got really tense around her ex-husband. Now
I understood why.

While we were visiting
his parents, Chase headed back to the old pool he’d trained at
while in high school. It was technically closed over the vacation
week, but they gave Chase a key. For him, anything.

One afternoon, I
accompanied him for a workout of my own. I lasted about a half hour
in the water, then took a hot tub, sauna, shower, plus blow dried my
hair and changed. When I came out, he was still swimming and went at
it for another half hour. I sat by the side on a bench and scrolled
through my Facebook and Instagram feeds on my phone. Lots of photos
of Tori, having a blast. She hadn’t slowed down a bit. We hadn’t
seen each other that much in the past few months, and, honestly, that
felt about right.

“You’re Chase’s
friend?” An older gentleman came over, introducing himself as one
of Chase’s first coaches. “I came over to say hello.” He made
his way over to the pool and Chase and he talked for a few minutes,
all smiles and laughter as they reminisced.

“He sure seems to be
doing well,” the coach commented as he passed me again on his way
out. “A kid with that kind of drive? I’ve seen it go both ways.”

We both watched Chase
fly through the water, as if he had wings in an empty pool. Not in
training for any future event, he was just enjoying himself by
pushing himself to physical exhaustion.

“Some kids?” the
coach reflected. “They push and push, but then they don’t know
what to do when it’s all over. They don’t know how to stop. But
Chase seems like one of the lucky ones.” He looked at me, kindly.
“I’m sure you’ve got a lot to do with that.”

He walked off, leaving
me to my thoughts as I watched Chase swim. Was he doing all right?
Did he miss it, training for the Olympics? Maybe he wanted to do it
again in 2020?

I’d get on that
treadmill again if he wanted, support him however he needed down that
long, arduous journey. But it would be a hard one, pushing uphill as
the years and endless hours of stress and overuse took a toll on his
body. Thirty wasn’t old in an objective sense, but for an elite
athlete it was right on the cusp, if not over the hill. I’d hate to
see Chase push and push, only to get sidelined by an injury, or make
it to the games and not be able to recapture his former glory.

Plus, a small part of
me hoped he’d be happy without it. It must be hard, having had such
an exciting, coveted prize to pursue for so long, to now wake up each
day with, simply, life. But to me what we had going on was thrilling.
The chance to do something really fun and good, running Swim For Your
Life together. It was my dream come true. But was it his?

I still had the
question on my mind as we drove back to his mother’s house, about
twenty minutes away. Snow flurries were falling, pretty from the
inside of the car but Florida girl that I was I already felt cold
before I’d even set foot in it. I put my seat warmer on high.

“You all right there,
softie?” Chase asked from the driver’s seat. “What do you have
the heater set to? 85?”

“Around that.” And
I would not apologize for it.

“Don’t let Liam
catch you doing that. He’ll never stop giving you shit about it.”

He was probably right.
I’d deal with that bridge when I had to cross it. Like tomorrow,
when we headed out to Naugatuck for Liam’s New Year’s Eve party.

“Do you miss it?” I
asked him, studying his handsome profile as he drove.

“What? Boston?” he
asked. “I haven’t lived here since I was 18. I lived in
California for four years, then Arizona. I always like visiting up
here, but it’s not a home to me like Florida is to you.”

“I don’t mean miss
Boston,” I clarified. “Though I’m glad to hear you like
Florida.” He flashed me a smile. “What I meant is swimming.
Competitively. I see you in the pool and you’re, just, larger than
life.”

“Honestly?” He
paused and I braced myself. This was it, the moment he broke it to
me. He wanted to train again for the Olympics.

“Nope,” he
answered, and I let out the breath I’d been holding. “I’ll
admit, for about a month after the games I didn’t know what to do
with myself. I didn’t know how to get through a normal day without
hours and hours of a rigorous training program. But I’m settling
into it now. I’m excited about the center we’re building. And
you’re in my life again.”