For a moment, Chase stared at the wheelchair by his bed, realizing just how easy it would be to give up and spend the rest of his life in that chair, but then he felt her shift behind him and he decided that he didn’t want easy.
He wanted more.
He wanted his life back.
Chapter 13
“How are you holding up?” Sloane asked a little while later when she should have left so that she could finish up her paperwork and return her brother’s phone call, but she just couldn’t leave him like this.
“Fine,” Chase said with his eyes closed and his jaw clenched while she gently ran her fingers through his hair.
As she lay there, looking at him and taking in the scar that ran from his temple down to his jaw, she couldn’t help but wonder what happened to him. A few times over the past month, she’d been tempted to find out, but every time that she opened her mouth to ask him or went to Google his name, she managed to stop herself before she crossed that line. She reminded herself that she didn’t need to know what happened to do her job because getting involved wasn’t going to help. The only thing that she needed to know was the extent of his injuries, his medical history, and what she needed to do to help him.
That was it.
Or at least, it should be, but she found herself wondering about him more than she should. Before she could stop herself, she stopped running her fingers through his hair so that she could trace the scar marring his handsome face. He opened his eyes and watched her as she lightly traced his scar with her fingertips.
“I should probably get going since you’re fine,” Sloane teased, loving the way that his eyes narrowed on her as he reached over, wrapped his arm around her and pulled her closer.
Blinking innocently, Sloane asked, “Is this your way of telling me that you’d like me to go?”
Jaw clenching, Chase pulled her even closer, making her bite back a smile.
“Cause you know, I could go and fold some towels or something,” she offered as he slowly pulled her the rest of the way until their bodies touched from knee to chest and her smile slowly disappeared when she realized just how good it felt to be in his arms.
“You could,” Chase said absently as he pulled her impossibly closer and she realized that she was still caressing his jaw and enjoying the feel of the light stubble scraping against her skin. She should leave, Sloane told herself, but somehow found herself still laying in his arms a minute later, cupping his jaw as he lazily ran his hand over the small of her back.
“Do you want to leave, Sloane?” he asked softly as he closed the small space between them and lightly, so lightly that she barely felt it, brushed his lips against hers.
It was the wake-up call that she needed because this couldn’t happen.
Slowly exhaling a shaky breath, she moved to sit up and put some space between them only to find herself leaning in for another kiss. With a groan, Chase deepened the kiss even as he kept it slow, moving his lips against hers as she wrapped her arm around him and held him close while she made the biggest mistake of her life.
*-*-*-*
They shouldn’t be doing this, but he knew that he’d lose his fucking mind if they stopped. She felt so fucking good in his arms, Chase realized with a groan as he brushed his lips against hers, using the move to part her lips and deepened the kiss. When he felt her tongue slide against his, Chase fisted the back of her shirt and pulled her closer as he slowly rolled over onto his back, giving her a chance to stop this before it went too far.
Ignoring the out that he was giving her, Sloane followed him, never breaking the kiss as they slowly teased, licked, and nipped, making it the most erotic kiss of his life as she settled on top of him. He’d only kissed one woman in his life, but he’d never kissed Amy the way that he was kissing her like he’d fucking die if he stopped.
Thank god, she wasn’t stopping him, Chase thought as she ripped a groan from him when she settled on top of him, making him realize that he was hard. Any