In Deep: Chase & Emma (All In Book 1) (2 page)

Which was why I found
it strange that I hesitated before climbing onto the massage table to
ask, “How long have you been working here?” I was sure team
management had hired only the best to work with us. Three weeks
before the games began, we now needed a crew who’d be with us every
step of the way, traveling with us, managing the final countdown. But
there was something hesitant, maybe a bit shy in her manner.

“I don’t work here
in Texas,” she clarified. “I’m from Florida. Your manager hired
me for the next month.” Then she straightened up, shoulders back,
posture erect. Like something else under my towel.

“But I assure you,”
she continued. “I’m fully qualified. I’ve been a licensed
physical therapist for three years and now have my license for sports
massage therapy, too. I’ve worked with a lot of athletes. I’m
going to make sure you’re ready for the games.”

“Is that right?” I
cocked an eyebrow, feeling the impulse to tease her a little. There
was something sweet about her attempt to reassure me, as if she were
trying to reassure herself as well. I didn’t doubt her credentials.
What I doubted was my ability to stay cool, removed and professional
while she put her hands all over me.

“Absolutely.” She
nodded her head, so serious. I almost expected a military-style
salute.

“So I can just put up
my feet and relax for the next few weeks? No more workouts? You’ve
got it covered?”

Her eyes widened,
taking me seriously for a moment, before her face relaxed into a
smile. She had toffee-colored hair with all sorts of sunshiny
highlights blending in, plus golden flecks in her eyes.

“Glad to know I’m
in good hands.” I smiled back at her. “All right, then.” I
climbed up onto the table, lying on my stomach. It seemed like the
least X-rated option.

“We only have a
half-hour today, so would you like me to focus on your back and
shoulders?”

I grunted my “yes”
as she placed her hands at the center of my back, starting with slow
strokes.

“I’ll give you
medium pressure to begin, and you tell me how much more to give. I
want to get to know exactly how you like it.”

That sounded good to
me. I closed my eyes and tried to release my tension. All the
pressure, the years of training, the eyes on me, all leading up to
eight days in Rio. Nine events, five individual plus four relays. I
wouldn’t let the thought of failure enter into my mind. I could see
it all playing out exactly as planned. I ran it like a video in my
mind, before I swam, before I slept, on a constant loop, visualizing
my success. Always on, always going, always targeted toward my goal.

I groaned as she
kneaded the tired, sore muscles of my upper back. My rhomboid,
deltoid, trapezius, how well I knew them all. And she seemed to know
them intimately as well, her hands intuitively seeking out all of my
aching spots, digging in with exactly the right touch to give me
release.

“More,” I groaned,
a few times, guiding her, letting her know exactly how I wanted it.
She was good at taking direction. She seemed to know exactly what I
needed.

Over the years, I’d
actually had to send some physical therapists packing, usually due to
their annoyingly whisper-light touch, but sometimes because they
verged on re-injuring me with rough, misguided pressure. A good
physical therapist was part art, part science. They needed all the
training, the understanding of anatomy and techniques. But they also
needed the skill to read their clients, being guided by not only
verbal instructions but physical cues.

Emma fell into sync
with me instantly, seamlessly, seemingly without effort. I could feel
myself relaxing with her, giving myself over to her ministrations,
letting my mind go free as she pressed and stroked, kneaded and
coaxed the pain and tension from my overworked limbs.

“OK, that’s all we
have time for today,” she said what had to have been only five
minutes after she’d began.

“Yeah?” I asked,
uncharacteristically disoriented. I didn’t usually lose track of
time. Time, down to the fraction of a second, governed my life.

“Sorry, tomorrow we
have 45 minutes. But today I’m doing sessions with some other
members of your team.”

“No.” The word came
out before I realized what I was saying. I hadn’t planned on it,
but I knew instantly I did not want those other sessions to happen.

“What?” she asked,
glancing at me, confused. I sat up, keeping my towel wrapped around
my hips as I looked down into her eyes.

“Tell me everyone
you’re supposed to be working with.” I knew I could be
commanding. Authoritative. Type-A. Show me a top-tier athlete with a
passive personality. There weren’t many, and I certainly wasn’t
one of them.

“Um…” After a
last, hesitant glance at me, she grabbed a clipboard with her
schedule. I took it from her and looked down the roster.

Chris, I knew it. He
was supposed to be on this table next. And Matt. No goddamned way.
They were my teammates and like brothers to me, but they fucked their
way through women like it was their job. They’d get one look at
Emma and it would be all over. They’d be turning on the charm,
conning her like snake oil salesmen, doing anything and everything to
get inside her pants.

Fitted yoga pants, to
be exact, hugging her lithe, shapely legs. Her round, tight ass. Damn
it. I moved the clipboard down into a more secure location, covering
up like a high school kid with a math textbook.

“I’m going to need
you a lot more than planned.” I stood, towering over her, close
enough I could tell she’d drawn in her breath. Did I startle her?
Scare her a little? Or something else? I couldn’t read her, but I
wanted to.

“I’m going to go
make some changes to your schedule.” I strode toward the door,
waiting to put down the clipboard until I’d turned my back to her.
“I’ll be seeing you later tonight.”

“What?” I could
hear her say before the door closed behind me.

Whatever the male form
of a diva was, sure, you could call me that. But I had a lot riding
on this next month. And it wasn’t just me. My teammates were
relying on me, countless companies wanting product placements, the PR
crew working the games. Hell, millions of fans worldwide were
counting on me to win.

All eyes were on me,
the boy who’d almost drowned, now the man swimming for gold. I knew
exactly what I needed to do to reach my goal. My coaches, my
teammates, my rigorous, relentless training schedule.

And Emma. All to
myself. Any time. Morning, noon or night.

I wasn’t going to
share. She would not be working with any other members of the team. I
didn’t expect much pushback from our team managers, and definitely
not from the coaches. The fact that I’d found a physical therapist
so good I wanted her all to myself? They’d probably high five each
other. Especially since I could bankroll any additional expense. I’d
cover the cost of hiring on a replacement for the remaining team
members, no problem.

Emma was mine.

Emma

I didn’t know what,
exactly, I’d expected from meeting the famous Chase Carter, but
that wasn’t it. I stood in the therapy room re-folding towels,
waiting for my next client. The towels didn’t need rearranging, but
I needed something to do instead of pace the floor while I tried to
take stock of what had just happened.

No, Chase wasn’t warm
and fuzzy. He did not give me a big bear hug and welcome me into the
swim family. Nor did he tell me how excited he was to be working with
me. That all fit with his reputation for being cool and laser-focused
on his goal of gold.

But he hadn’t struck
me as a jerk. I hadn’t felt treated like a menial hand-servant,
beneath his notice. Instead, I’d felt as if he were intensely aware
of me, hyper-observant of everything I said and did. And he’d
seemed deeply appreciative of the work I did on him. So much so that
he wanted more time with me on his schedule.

Why did that make me
shiver with anticipation? I told myself it was just nerves. I’d
have to put that time to good use. Extracting secrets, getting into
his past, searching for the exclusive story he’d never told a soul.

But it felt like more
than that.

The way he’d looked
at me, so possessive and hungry, as if he were going to devour me. I
must have been imagining it. It was probably my nerves, struggling
with feeling duplicitous. I was who I said I was—a licensed and
experienced physical and massage therapist fully capable of working
with him over the next month. But I was also more than that.

It wasn’t as if I
were after a smear story. Tori was the one who was all about the
colorful splash. I wanted a story with depth and heart. I’d only
spent a half hour with the man, and I could already feel he had a lot
of both. The powerful charisma he radiated was almost palpable. What
made him tick? Why was he so passionately driven? Why had he kept on
with swimming, every day taking the plunge into water after almost
drowning? Now I wanted to know more than ever.

My phone blipped with a text.

Tori: How’d it go? You just met
him, right?

Oh, so now she started
paying close attention to time! I rolled my eyes, but as much as Tori
exasperated me with her typically laissez-faire, party-till-you-drop
attitude, I loved her. Together, we’d been through thick and thin.
We were both 25 now, but I still saw the scrawny nine-year-old inside
her, wide-eyed and freaked out as her parents screamed, threw things
and ultimately divorced. Technically, Tori had lived two doors down
from us in Vero Beach, but she’d pretty much moved in with us that
year and never looked back. My mom got in the habit of setting an
extra place for Tori at dinner without even asking, and the two of us
had been joined at the hip ever since.

Even if sometimes my
hip hurt from it. Like when Tori drank too much and needed a ride
from some guy’s house but didn’t know exactly where she was. Or
when she dragged me into one of her schemes, usually involving a guy
she was after, or mad at, or both. But Tori was just Tori and I
couldn’t imagine my life without her. We shared a little apartment
together, as we had for the past three years. Sometimes other
roommates got into the mix as well, but the one constant was always
Tori.

I texted her back.

Emma: I think OK. He wants more time
with me.

She sent me a few thumbs-up emojis.
Tori had never met an emoji she didn’t love. A few more popped up
on my screen, a flexed bicep muscle, a tongue lolling out of a mouth,
a guy swimming. Then she asked the question I knew she had on her
mind.

Tori: How hot is he????

A strange possessive
growl formed in my throat. Back off, Tori, my fingers twitched to
write. I didn’t want her all up in his grill.

But that made no sense.
First, he wasn’t mine to warn her away from. Second, even if Tori
wanted to jump him—and that’s exactly what I knew she would do
the second she got the chance—I shouldn’t care. Tori was just
being herself, young and fun and after a good time. She couldn’t
wait to get her hands on the international parade of hotness known as
Olympic athletes.

And holy hell was Chase
hot. I still felt all tingling and alive, the pheromones rushing
through my body. The feel of massaging his broad back, those
incredible, powerful muscles. He’d felt so good under my hands, so
warm and hard and right. I’d wanted to keep right on going, rubbing
him, giving him exactly what he needed, taking such good care of him.
Only the 30-minute timer I’d set had started flashing at me. I
usually didn’t lose track of time, but rubbing Chase I could have
gone on and on for hours.

I finally texted back with an honest
answer. She was my BFF, after all. She’d see right through me in a
heartbeat if I tried to deny it.

Emma: Off the charts

I waited for her reply,
half expecting her to tell me she was on her way to San Antonio. We
weren’t supposed to see each other again until Rio in three weeks.
She was traveling there before me as part of the PR team, but she’d
been known to make a change in plans for a hottie before. Especially
a hottie of epic proportions.

But the next text I got wasn’t
from her. It was from an unknown number.

Extra session tonight at suite 18.
7pm.

Who was it? What did they mean by an
extra session? Was someone trying to ask me if I was available at the
end of a long day of clients for another session?

Emma: Who is this?

My phone rang in my
hand and I clicked it on.

“Emma, it’s Chase.”

“Chase?” I dumbly
repeated. Obviously it was. He’d just told me that.

“Yes. I’d like
another session with you at seven tonight.”

“Um...” Flustered,
I reached for my clipboard, trailing my finger down my schedule. “I’m
not done seeing other clients until seven.”

“You’re done now.”

“Excuse me?”

“You’re only going
to be working with me from now on. I’ve spoken to the team
managers. It’s all arranged.”

“It’s…what?” I
had been hired to work with six members of the U.S. Olympic swim
team. Now I was only working with him?

“You’re good at
what you do. I’m going to need you on call over the next month.
Your compensation will remain the same, regardless of the change. We
can discuss details when I see you tonight.”

Confused, I managed an
“OK” before hanging up. So, I guess this was what people meant
when they said Chase was a classic Alpha, calling all the shots. But,
again, it wasn’t exactly rude, was it? Unexpected, but it wasn’t
as if he was giving me more work to do. In fact, I’d be paid
exactly the same amount of money but only have one client for the
whole month. Piece of cake!