In Deep: Chase & Emma (All In Book 1) by Callie Harper Page A

change, but I could see a firm, set, lock to his
jaw. Then he got pulled into conversation. Or more like swarmed by
eager women surrounding him like a school of minnows.
    The arm around my
shoulders dropped. The guys turned their attention to the other eager
women in our party. What, had Chase sent out a memo to everyone
telling them to back off? I almost got the sense that they were a
little scared of him.
    But Chase didn’t make
his way over to me. He stayed over on the other side of the room,
basking in the adoration of a million hot women. At least that was
how it looked to me. Where had all these women come from? They
weren’t his teammates. Some I recognized from the crew, an event
planner and a team apparel rep I’d never liked. She was so sales-y
all the time.
    I wasn’t the jealous
type. I swear I wasn’t. It had led to problems in the past, how
trusting and non-territorial I could be. But there stood Chase in a
sea of women all coming up with excuses to touch him. “Oh,
you’re so funny let me stroke your huge shoulder.” “Help, I’m
losing my balance on my six-inch hooker heels, let me stabilize
myself by pressing my hands and boobs against your chest”. It made me see red.
    And strike up a
conversation with his teammate, Chris. It wasn’t as if I were
actually interested, but the man was nice to look at and he sure knew
how to chat me up. He delivered line after line, telling me how
pretty I looked and asking if I knew that swimmers were famous for
their stamina. He asked what I ate to stay so fit. I gave him the
standard reply, that I aimed for fruits, veggies and lean meats but
I’d never met a hamburger and fries I didn’t like. When I asked
him the same question, he replied, “My doctor just told me I’m
vitamin deficient.”
    I fell for it. “Really?
In what?”
    “Vitamin U.”
    It did make me laugh.
He was super cheesy, but undeniably handsome. Though my awareness of
Chase never wavered, it was a bit of an escape to engage in such
mindless, easy flirtation. Time with Chase was so consuming, so
electric and charged and intense. Talking with Chris felt like
drifting lazily along a slow river compared to navigating white water
rapids.
    The margaritas went
straight to my head. They cranked up the music and a posse of us
flooded the dance floor. I hadn’t managed to get much food into my
system yet, but how was a woman supposed to sit down and calmly eat
her dinner when she needed to DANCE? I loved moving to the beat and
it had been too long since I’d been able to shake it, over a month
since I’d last gone out dancing. I wasn’t paying much attention
to the bodies around me, the occasional hand around my waist, the
admiring looks I received.
    Until Chase came up to
me. Once his hand went around my waist and we started moving
together, that was it. It was all over. He had all my attention, all
wrapped up. Were we on a crowded dance floor surrounded by other
people? It didn’t feel that way to me. I saw his eyes and his lips.
I felt his hands on me, his hips swaying with mine. His broad chest
and shoulders were close enough now that I could reach out and touch,
run a hand along the ridges of his muscles, press my body against him
in the heat and rhythm.
    When he pulled me off
the dance floor, it almost felt as if he were snapping me out of a
trance. We’d flowed so easily into the same pulse, our bodies
moving together, seamless and fluid. But I followed him out of the
crowd, down a hallway and then into a small storage room. Closing the
door behind us, he shut out the noise and people. It was just the two
of us, a light bulb overhead, and rows and rows of canned tomatoes.
    “What—?” I
started to ask before his lips met mine, hungry, and I met him with
just as much urgency, my fingers wrapped up and pulling at his hair,
my hips grinding against his.
    “Emma,” he groaned,
his hands traveling my bare back. “You’re killing me in this
shirt.” I fisted his T-shirt, wanting him