Chasing Allie (Breaking Away Series #2) (6 page)

He groans. “I’m going to start over. I’m hitting rewind on this conversation. Scratch Frenchie and David.” He drags me to the Ferris wheel on the other side of the pier, fingers laced with mine. Chase is running and I keep up with him, his words looping through my mind. 

Love.

Love love love
.

Chase buys two tickets and we climb on. He sits next to me and takes both my hands in his, resting the pile of our four hands in his lap. The grain of the denim of his jeans brushes against my fingers. I feel like I’m memorizing everything. Like I have to. 

The Ferris wheel lurches and we fly up, my stomach dropping. As the wheel moves us higher into the sky it suddenly stops. I look down. A new group of people is boarding.

When I look back at Chase his eyes are glowing with intensity. “Allie,” he says, his voice grainy and serious. “I meant what I said. I love you. I know it’s so early, but when you know—you know. I can’t stop thinking about you. Hell, my goddamned body can’t stop wanting you. Every time you laugh I want to see you laugh again a thousand times more.”

I can’t stop watching him.

We lurch again and this time, I lose my balance, falling hard against him. His arms are right there, steadying me, warm and hard at the same time. His palms slide up from my shoulders and cradle my face. 

“You make me want to show you my heart, Allie. No woman has ever done that before.” The lights from the roller coaster blink as the cars shoot along on the tracks, riders screaming with glee. A seagull flock squawks and cries out as a child runs through them in the distance. Chase’s warm breath tickles my nose. His words caress my soul.

“I love you,” he says simply. As if he has cut open his chest and wants me to see his vulnerable heart beating there, a rhythm just for me.

I inhale. I exhale. I do it again. Time disappears and space becomes so much bigger than I knew. The whole world is vast and complex. Love is simple and small.

It lives here in the space between us.

I cross that space and we kiss, our lips telling each other stories, our tongues making plans, our fingers holding on for dear life. In the kiss I tell Chase my entire history and in his groan of desire he tells me everything I need to know.

The Ferris wheel jolts again and our teeth bang together. Chase bites my tongue and I laugh. He cringes and his eyes go troubled. We disentangle our mingled flesh and he looks at me uncertainly.

I know why.

“I love you, Chase Halloway,” I whisper. Then I shout, “I love you, too!”

“I love you, Allie!” he cries out. 

“Get a room!” someone screams back. I blush, my hands halting against his. This time, when he looks at me, his eyes are dark and full of something much deeper.

And no longer uncertain.

The kiss Chase gives me as the Ferris wheel begins its slow loop, without stops, is one long, deep
I love you
. He buries his hands in my hair, and my palm cups the back of his neck. He pulls me closer, one hand under my shirt, splayed against my back and pushing me to him. It’s as if he wants to be so close to me that we’re one person. One body. 

One heart.

The wind begins to whip my hair in pinwheels around us, the sky dark enough that the lights of the pier’s amusements shine brightly. The music fades and then gets louder as we pass closer to the ground in our car. Chase’s hands are all over me now, his mouth insistent and demanding, the connection between us no longer one that binds.

Now it’s one that needs. He needs me, and the urgency of his caresses, his groans, his hands and lips and tongue make me hot and wet.

I want more. More than I’ve ever had in my entire life.

And it’s all happening because I chose to break away from an oppression I didn’t really understand.

“You are so...oh, man, Allie,” Chase says as he clears his throat. We fly past the roller coaster again and we’re pitched toward the ocean, red lights from a huge ship way off in the distance catching my eye. I’m panting now and so is Chase. His thick, muscled leg is between my knees, his torso pressed into me. We’re about as close to each other as you can get in public.

We’re also perched a few stories above the ground and falling, fast.

Falling in love.

“I don’t have the words to say how I feel, Chase,” I admit. My skin is on fire and every part of me feels itchy with compulsion. I need to touch him, need to taste him, need to feel naked and alive against his body.

He moves my hand to his lap and—oh, yeah. He feels the same, all right.

“How close is Marissa’s place?” he murmurs against my earlobe before he nips it with his teeth, making me yip.

“I don’t know,” I confess. “She said it’s maybe twenty minutes from here?”

He sighs and sits down all the way, pulling me to him tightly. The loss of his heat against mine makes me want him even more.

“I can wait.” He growls and licks my neck.

I can’t stop giggling. “What’s that for?”

“For being so tasty.”

“I taste like sweat and dirt.”

“Mmmmm.”

I reach over and lick his neck, too.

“Lower,” he says in a dark voice.

I pull back and give him an impish look. “Later.”

The wheel in the sky keeps looping and we laugh and cuddle until the machine stops, tumbling us out into the beautiful California night.

C
HAPTER
E
IGHT

“A
LLLIIIIEEEE!
” Marissa screams as she runs down the stairs to the entrance of her apartment building. The sound is so high-pitched it could shatter glass. She thumps down the stairs and hugs me so hard I fall backward a bit, into Chase’s front, and he has to hold us both up. 

Marissa looks more like our dad. Not that I’d know; I only remember him from pictures. He took off when we were five and two years old, and we haven’t seen him since. For all we know he’s dead. He left a bit of his DNA around, though, and that’s all that matters. While I look like my mother’s mini-me, Marissa is half a foot taller, with short honey-brown hair and almond-shaped green eyes.

She hugs me, shaking me from side to side, like a favorite stuffed animal you hug until they pop a stitch.

“I can’t believe you’re here!” she screams. Marissa pauses and looks me up and down. “You’ve been to the ocean already,” she declares.

“Yes!” I say, breathless from having half my ribs crushed. I’m still aching from my bicycle accident, and her hug takes more out of me than I expected. “Chase took me to the Santa Monica Pier.”

“Chase!” she shouts, grabbing him for a hug. He looks completely nonplussed and just stands there, arms pinned at his sides as my sister mauls him in a completely platonic way. She’d never try to steal a boyfriend from me. She’s just a hugger.

Chase clearly
isn’t
. She can feel him freeze and she gives me a wide-eyed, questioning look. 

“Nice to meet you,” he says stiffly.

Marissa pulls away and sort of pats his chest, like she’s smoothing an angry cat’s fur. “So nice to meet you, Chase,” she says as she backs away. Her eyes move back to me and she beckons. “Come on up, both of you!”

The building is run-down and shabby, with a wrought iron railing for the outdoor walkway along the front doors of a bunch of apartments. Salt in the air has corroded the railings and the stucco outside of the building is flaking everywhere. The exterior is painted flamingo pink, but the chipped chunks have grey underneath.

It looks like a piece of rotting salmon.

I don’t care, as long as there’s a bed, a sister, and some peace inside.

Chase’s phone buzzes as we walk up the stairs.

“You need to answer that?” I ask.

“Nope.”

“Who keeps calling?”

“No one important.” He shuts down whenever the phone buzzes and I begin my questions. I shut up. Obviously he doesn’t want to talk about it. And that’s fine. I hate having our happy bubble invaded by real life. Jeff kept tight control over the phone he let me use, so I don’t have one on me. He has it, back home. Along with my ballerina music box. 

A pang of longing hits me. Not for Jeff. Not for home.

For my mom.

I make a mental note to tell Marissa about how I felt her presence back at the beach. For now, though, time is taken up with Chase’s awkwardness, the newness of seeing Marissa again after such a long stretch, and settling in for some rest and talk as we visit.

“Arlen’s out of town on a shoot,” Marissa explains as she takes us down the hallway and opens one of the doors. The room is super simple. Double futon on the floor, tie-dyed comforter, two pillows with bright red pillowcases on them. A set of speakers on a small end table. A dresser.  

It’s like a minimalist’s refuge.

And it’s perfect.

“He said it was fine if you have his room,” Marissa adds. My heart skips a beat. Chase’s eyes comb over the space but he says nothing. His nostrils move a little and his lip twitches. Is that a slight flush I see at his neck?  

“Just don’t stain the sheets!” a man’s deep, joking voice calls out from a long hallway.

Marissa blushes and sighs. Chase’s jaw goes tight with anger. The owner of the voice appears and is wearing...a dress. 

No—a
kilt
. A Scottish kilt. 

“Hi,” says the man. He’s nearly seven feet tall and has longer hair than I do, but his is a bright, coppery orange. It’s pulled back in a braid at the nape of his neck and tied with a royal-blue ribbon. Thick auburn eyebrows frame bright blue eyes, and he’s wearing a loose beard that looks a little too manicured to be wild.

He’s slick, like his chest is covered in oil, and he’s wearing a plaid kilt. Nothing else. 

“Angus McMurphy,” Marissa says by way of introduction, but she’s practically gagging with laughter. 

The man bursts out laughing, deep, low belly laughs that I can’t help but imitate. “Actually,” he says, giving Marissa a snarky glance, “that’s my stage name. My real name is Morty Cohen.”

Mine and Chase’s eyebrows shoot up.

“You look like a Highlander,” I retort.

“If there were Jewish Highlanders back in the day, I’m descended from them.”

“And in case you’re wondering,” Marissa adds, “the carpet matches the drapes.”

I look around at the windows in the apartment, then the threadbare carpet. The drapes are off-white and the carpet’s a mixture of beige and red. “No, they don’t.”

Chase, Marissa and Angus...er, Morty, all erupt into laughter.

“What did I say that’s so funny?” I ask, confused as all get-out. 

Marissa puts an arm around my shoulder and gently steers me away from the men, who are now shaking hands and introducing themselves. “I mean his pubic hair is bright red, too.”

My turn to blush. “How do you know that?”

Marissa gives me a wide smile. “He’s my friend with benefits.”

“Boy, have you changed.”

“
I
didn’t change,” she says, shaking her head. “L.A. changed me. Where we come from is the armpit of the world, Allie. Now that you’ve escaped, you get to see how real people live.”

“They live by talking about their private parts all the time?”

“No,” says Morty from behind, making me jump. “Some of us live by
displaying
our private parts all the time.” He goes to lift the kilt, but Chase’s hand shoots out fast, gripping Morty’s wrist in a vise.

“Cool it, man,” Chase says, teeth clenched. He’s completely unfazed that Morty is a foot taller and outweighs Chase by a solid fifty pounds. 

“It’s all good,” Morty explains, gently lifting the kilt. Chase inserts himself between me and Morty, obviously blocking my view. “G-string. For the parties.” 

“Parties?” I squeak.

“Bachelorette parties. I strip at them.” He does a grinding motion with his pelvis. Chase shakes his head slowly, washing his mouth with his hand, trying to cover up a grin. It’s like he can’t decide whether to be pissed or amused. 

“Got a lot of bad wee lassies out there?” Chase asks him. I think amusement is winning. 

“Aye,” Morty says in a Scottish accent. “They need their wee asses spanked for being so bad.”

I sigh and look at Marissa. “And are you a stripper, too? Is this the kind of work I’m going to get out here?”

Morty gives me an obvious once-over. “You’ve got the bod for it—”

Chase literally growls at him. It’s like my boyfriend has become a wolf. Now he’s back to being pissed. 

“Down, boy,” Marissa murmurs. Fortunately, Chase doesn’t hear her, because he’s moved closer to the highlander and looks like he’s about to wrestle him to the ground and beat the shit out of him.

Chase is not making a good first impression.

“Dude,” Morty says, holding his hands up in surrender. “I don’t want your girlfriend.” He looks at me with a sad smile. “No offense.”

“None taken,” I reply.

“I’m just saying that if she wanted to work as a stripper, she’s got the—”

“She doesn’t.” Chase’s hands are fisted and ready to fly. I reach out for his arm. It’s corded steel covered in skin.

“Morty was just trying to help,” Marissa says. She looks at Chase like he’s an alien. “You can tone down the whole overprotective boyfriend act.”

“It’s not an act,” Chase and I say in unison. He glares at me but puts his arm around my waist.

Morty makes a derisive sound in the back of his throat. “No shit.”

“Look,” I say, wondering how everything could become so tense so quickly. “I think we got off on the wrong foot. Chase is just really worried about me because—” He shoots me a look of warning, then cuts his eyes over to Marissa. Then Morty.

Oh. Right. It’s not like I can try to explain that my stepdad sold my virginity to a Mexican drug lord and make it sound remotely sane, can I? And especially when we’ve only been here for ten minutes.

“What happened to your face!” Marissa shouts as she turns on a light in the room and gets a good look at me.

Morty gives Chase a look that could kill. “Overprotective boyfriend, huh? Just what kind of ‘overprotective’ are you, you slimy piece of—”

“Hold on!” Chase bellows back. “I didn’t do that to her! I would never lay a hand on Allie!”