Chapter 24
CHAPTER 24
CHASE
I was furious. At myself, at Caroline, at my father, and especially at my stepbrother who was nowhere to be found, the fucking coward. I made myself calm down and rejoin the party like nothing was wrong, but my chest was a burning ball of rage, and for the first time in my life, I felt like I could hit someone.
Maybe I will keep trying to find Gerry ? —
The thought died in my head the moment I saw her at the top of the staircase.
Caroline glided down the stairs like one of her beloved Ziegfeld Girls . I stopped pretending to listen to Roberton and openly stared as Caroline worked her way around the room, offering guests champagne. The gold material of her dress split over her leg with every step, slipping across her thigh like an expensive sheet. She flirted outrageously and basked in the admiration she received, all the while pointedly ignoring me.
I’d hurt her feelings, and instead of finishing our discussion and letting me apologize, she wanted to twist the screws. The brat .
Finally, she turned to where I stood by the fireplace, talking to Roberton and someone else whose name I hadn’t paid attention to. The way Caroline’s hips swayed as she sashayed in our direction, set on vengeance, had my cock thickening. And she knew it.
I regretted what I’d said earlier, but it would have been a shame to miss seeing her work like this. Even though I preferred the real Caroline to whomever this coy iteration was, she was undeniably mouthwatering in all forms, and it was a pleasure to watch her flex her skills in front of me.
Even if it was to spite me.
In fact, especially then.
I’d never thought of myself as the kind of man to enjoy being baited, but with Caroline, I couldn’t get enough. It got my blood rushing and my imagination firing with all the different ways I could bring her in line. Ways we’d both enjoy.
Roberton noticed my preoccupation and looked from me to Floss rapidly, trying to peel the truth from my face. I tried to stay expressionless, but he knew me too well.
I had been looking forward to introducing Caroline to Roberton. She would have liked him. Everyone did. Rob was attractive, nice, and good at talking. His demeanor, paired with the fact he went into real estate after college, made him exactly the kind of son my dad had wanted. That should’ve made me hate him, but it was too hard to hate Rob.
He stepped in Caroline’s path, and she whispered something to him that he had to lean down to hear. The smell of roses was always strongest at her neck. Rob would be breathing her in right now.
My feet were taking me towards them before I’d made the conscious decision to move.
“You look beautiful, Caroline,” I said when I reached her. “I’m sorry for?—”
She raked her eyes over me then tossed her hair in blatant rejection, turning her attention to anyone but me.
“I’m Rob.” My former friend smiled at her .
“Hello Rob.” She fluttered her eyelashes at him. “I’m Summer, Summer Holliday.” Then my tiny vixen giggled as if it were the very first time the absurdity of this name had occurred to her.
“Caroline—”
“Summer,” she corrected me, but that was her only acknowledgment. “Are you thirsty, Rob?” She held out her champagne bottle.
“Parched.”
“Would you like to help me with a trick I’ve been practicing?”
I didn’t even feel bad about the jealousy flooding through me. It was like a flame burning through wax, the sun tracking through the sky, or rain in April: it was inevitable. No, necessary. When it came to her, I couldn’t be calm and I didn’t want to be.
Rob grinned. “Sure. Unless— Chase, my man, would you rather…?”
“No,” I said through my teeth. It was supposed to be a smile, but it must have been a poor approximation, because Rob’s grin widened.
“You’re sure, Chase? Really sure? You’re seeing this smokeshow here and you don’t want to trade places with me?”
“No.”
“Can you step back?” Caroline hissed at me, dropping her character for a second. She gave my chest a little push, then turned, once again the consummate professional. “I need space,” she told the enthralled crowd.
The evening had been full of performances—earlier in the night I’d seen a man light a candelabra by spitting fire—so this shouldn’t have been any different, but it was. Caroline’s Summer character was so magnetic she could have whistled ‘O Canada’ and people would have been impressed.
It was unexpectedly exhilarating to be in a performer’s shadow like this. For once, having a crowd’s focused attention wasn’t stressing me out. People were looking near me, but not at me. Caroline was a lightning rod in a storm—who would want to look at me when they could look at her ?
To Rob, she purred, “On your knees please, handsome.”
He did, such were the lengths he would go to get a reaction from me.
“Bring it on,” he said to Caroline. “Is it like the dentist, do I open wide?”
“Oh yes. You’ll want every drop.” She was still doing her low, sultry voice, but somehow the whole room could hear her. It was incredible. She was incredible. “Put your tongue out, handsome. In case I gush.”
The point she was making was clear: Caroline had never used this kind of calculated sensuality on me. Part of me felt pride, but shame was quick to follow. Correlation was not causation—would that ever sink through my head? I wrote about it enough. Banking that thought for a later time, preferably when the woman I was head over heels for wasn’t about to seduce another man in front of me, I braced myself.
Caroline bit the edge of one long glove and turned slowly in a circle, peeling the shiny fabric off with her teeth. As she revolved, her hips swung like a metronome.
If she’d done that when we were alone, my erection would have split my pants. As it was, in a public context, I wasn’t thinking like that. Or rather, I was, but I was working very hard not to let the situation in my pants become an obvious spectacle. Casually, I tugged my jacket down a bit and hoped for the best.
Summer held the rapt attention of the crowd as she nibbled the tip of each finger and then tossed the limp fabric over her shoulder. With the hand still gloved, she brought the champagne to her lips and took a pull straight from the bottle. I watched her throat, and she didn’t swallow at all. She was pretending.
Would she swallow if ? —
I shook off the thought. She was punishing me, not performing for me. I had to be a polite audience member even if it killed me.
Caroline/Summer let a droplet of champagne slide down the corner of her mouth and splash onto her breast. “Oops.” She scooped the liquid up and sucked her finger dry in a way that was simultaneously obscene and guileless.
I stood to attention—in more ways than one—as she brought the bottle over the shoulder of her bare arm, almost like an archer would pull a bow. Her fingertips were level with Rob’s mouth, where he knelt at her side. She wiggled her fingers at him, and he obligingly stuck out his tongue.
Then she tipped the bottle.
Sticky, sweet champagne streamed down her extended arm, and she dangled her fingers over Rob’s tongue so lush droplets fell from her body into his waiting mouth.
Her crowd cheered. The sound made my skin prickle, but when I glanced around, not a single person was looking at me, because Summer held them captivated.
Rivulets of the expensive liquid wound messily down her arm, still she kept pouring. Rob approached the task with the same vigor he had keg stands at college, gulping down as much as she poured. The pair of them made a hell of a scene: the goddess and her supplicant.
After what felt like a lifetime, the bottle emptied. Caroline licked up the full length of her arm then sucked her sticky fingers into her mouth.
“Mmm,” her hum of satisfaction was obscenely muffled.
When she pulled her fingers out of her mouth with a wet pop, I wasn’t the only one who groaned.
Enthusiastically, the crowd broke into applause. It was late in the evening, and her trick wasn’t on par with a flaming candelabra, but it was sexy and people were horny. Me most of all. Still, when Rob stood up and took a bow of his own, I clapped like I ought. Rob came over to me and tried to say something, but I clapped louder so I couldn’t hear him.
Earlier tonight, I’d accused Caroline of putting on a performance to entrap me. Now, having seen her perform, the difference was obvious. She’d lied about who she was, and she’d been in cahoots with Gerry. But whatever it was between us had been real.
As my scammer basked in her due, I knew I should back away and give her the space she’d asked for. But I’d watched her face in the mirror at my apartment when pleasure had overwhelmed her. Then, her responses had been unpracticed, ferocious. Real . More than I needed air, honesty, or to confront my arrogant stepbrother, I needed to see those expressions again, and I needed to be the reason for them.
I moved toward her like a man possessed, and people got out of my way.