Not You It's Me (Boston Love #1) - Julie Johnson Page 0,101
at me, concern filling his eyes. “Afraid it’s worse than that, sunshine.”
“Worse than Vanessa?” I ask, doubting that’s even possible. “Have you met the woman?”
His mouth tugs up at one side but his eyes don’t change. “Unfortunately, yes. But this is still worse.”
“Who could possibly be worse than Vanessa?”
He hesitates a beat.
“Chase.”
His arm squeezes tighter around my waist, as if to steady me for the impact of his words. As if he knows whatever he’s about to say will rock me.
“It’s Phoebe.”
I stare at him blankly.
“Phoebe West,” he clarifies.
It takes me a minute to put it together. When I do, my heart sinks into my stomach like a ball of lead. “Phoebe West as in…”
“Your sister.”
Shit.
***
“She’s here. My half-sister who I’ve never met, who doesn’t even know I exist, is here.”
Chase stares at me as I pace in small circles around the coat-check room, where he dragged me as soon as he realized I was falling apart in the middle of the gala.
“Not only is she here, she’s here with Brett. Psychotic, creep-tastic Brett. As his date.”
Chase doesn’t speak, doesn’t move, doesn’t even try to touch me. He just watches me from his spot by the door with careful eyes, waiting for me to work though this.
“Which means Brett knows. I don’t know how he knows, but he knows. Ralph got to him. Or he got to Ralph. Somebody got to someone. A meeting of the mentally-unstable minds, if you will. Either way, he knows.”
Chase’s expression doesn’t waver as my voice goes up an octave, getting even more hysterical.
“We know that he knows. And as soon as we go out there and face him, he’ll know that we know.” I try to breathe deeply, but can’t manage it. “What we don’t know is if she knows. You know?”
“Gemma.”
“She probably doesn’t know — not about me, not that her date is crazier than that put-the-lotion-on-its-skin dude in The Silence of the Lambs. She’s probably just a pawn, right? A threat. That’s Brett’s style. Find out about my hidden half sister and dangle her in front of me at a major, publicized event, so I’m constantly waiting for the shoe to drop. It’s psychological warfare.”
“Gemma, breathe.”
“I can’t breathe!” I stop circling, coming to face him with my hands on my hips and tears pricking at my eyes. “My sister is out there. My sister.”
“Gemma.”
“What?”
He reaches out, grabs me by the hand, and tugs me to him. The sudden move sends me stumbling into his chest, the hard landing almost enough to knock the wind from my lungs, but I don’t care. Because suddenly Chase is kissing me and, when he does, the rest of the world fades away, until thoughts of crazy relatives intent on destroying us, and nasty socialites who think we’re wrong for each other, and even the small parts in my own mind that question what on earth we’re doing here fade away.
He kisses me until I start to disappear. Not all of me — just the part that’s never had a safe place to land, never trusted anyone, not fully, because I learned early that everyone disappoints you eventually. The part that thought relationships like this were nothing more than Hallmark propaganda, that never thought I’d find someone who could wrap his arms around me and, with just one touch, make everything in my world seem right. The part that doubted a man like this — a feeling like this — even existed.
His hands slide into the hair at my temples, pulling me closer, deepening the kiss. Giving me what I need — not empty words, not paltry reassurances that everything will be okay, not promises of something he can’t guarantee.
He knows that, given the chance, I’ll rant and rave without stopping for breath, working myself up to new heights of anxiety. And, because he knows this, he doesn’t try to talk me off the cliff. He just grabs me and pulls me from the edge, with open-mouthed kisses and lingering touches and whispered words I barely hear. Because he knows it’s what I need.
He knows me.
It’s a sudden thought, and a surprising one, that this man, who I’ve known such a short time, could understand my inner workings better than anyone I’ve ever met. It seems ridiculous, at first. Yet, as the thought settles in a corner in the back of my mind… I see the indisputable truth in it.
And as his hands slip under the hem of my dress, as my arms wind around his shoulders,