Nine
“My mother’s right,” Chase said from the driver’s side of a sleek black Porsche. Miriam was still getting used to this much finery...and getting used to learning that his family owned an oil company. Like, one of the biggies.
“Right about what?” She stopped digging through her purse for her Chapstick and regarded him.
“Right about my career. I hadn’t been thinking about it this summer.” He faced her, his expression tender, his voice low and filled with regret.
She felt the hard kick of her heart against her ribs and forced a smile. Reaching for his hand, she said, “She’s not right. She’s wrong. You’re going to be an incredible politician and no one, especially Mimi Andrix from Bigfork, Montana, is going to hold you back. The public will see us together and know what we have is real. How could anyone miss it?”
Squeezing his hand, she kept the smile on her mouth but he continued to look distraught.
“I wish that was true.” He pulled his hand away and wrapped his fingers around the steering wheel. “Unfortunately, the position I’m in with my parents owning one of the biggest oil conglomerates in the state, I’m not at liberty to push back on any of this. My responsibilities to them, my interests in politics—having a say about how the people are treated in my city—matter.”
She wanted to ask him if she also mattered, but was half afraid of the answer. It was like his mother had slapped a script in his hand. This wasn’t Miriam’s Chase. Her Chase had stripped her out of her dress and made love to her long and slow on a private jet hurtling them toward Texas. Her Chase had lain in that same bed and told her how beautiful her body was, before placing a kiss on each part he mentioned.
“You’re scaring me,” she confessed.
“We can’t know so soon.” His lowered eyebrows communicated regret at the words coming out of his mouth—words echoed from his mother, who’d said that exact phrase at dinner. “What happens from here on out, Mimi?”
She swallowed past the lump in her throat threatening to choke her. “What do you mean?”
“Do you move here from Montana? Leave your family? Marry me? What happens when I run for governor or mayor in the future? What happens when my opponent digs up proof you experimented with pot or a girlfriend in college? Or if we find out someone has photos of the night we skinny-dipped in the lake? Or made love on the shore?” he added darkly.
“I don’t care about any of that.” Her voice took on a desperate quality, but she didn’t care. In no way would she entertain this line of thought. What they’d shared in her hometown wasn’t tawdry or dirty. It was beautiful—the start of their forever. “I care about you.”
“You’ll care when the press involves your parents. Your siblings. When a smear campaign starts and—”
“You’re borrowing trouble, Chase. Right now, you’re finishing law school. You could end up working for Ferguson Oil the rest of your life.”
“And that would be okay with you?” He drilled her with a look that roiled her stomach. She’d never been a fan of the corrupt oil monopolies, but neither could she deny that she loved Chase too much to let his family ties keep her from him.
“I care about you, too,” he said, and she heard the unspoken “but” that was about to follow. “Too much to let you go down this road.” He captured her chin between his thumb and forefinger. Hot tears rolled from her eyes and scalded her cheeks. “Let’s slow down. Think things through.”
“There’s nothing to think about!” Her shout was shrill in the closed interior of the car. It was September in Texas and plenty warm. The AC blew gently against her face, chilling the trails her tears left behind.
“We didn’t think at all this summer,” he said, gaze once again on the windshield. “I didn’t think.”
The argument had escalated from there, Chase closing off and her growing more emotional. Before she knew what was happening, he was on the phone with the pilot who’d flown them in earlier that day.
“Good night, Chase,” she said now, her mind on that fated night, her voice rigid from spent grief and too many regrets to count.
There were so many things they should’ve said. So many things they shouldn’t have said. Once, she’d considered him her everything, and now he felt as remote as a desert island.
But none of that mattered anymore. He’d made his decision to toss what they had aside, and she’d boarded the plane home willingly.
Memories weighing down her limbs, she trudged to her bedroom—toward the sweet relief of an empty mattress, and away from Chase’s hurtful words—to be alone with her heart that still mourned the loss of what could’ve been.
* * *
Chase propped his hands on his hips and dropped his head back, studying the ceiling, or perhaps seeking advice from the Almighty.
“Got anything?” he asked the beamed ceilings.
No answer.
He hadn’t meant to traipse down bramble-strewn memory lane. He’d meant to tell her that now that she was here, in his house, he wanted her in his bed again. He was going to follow that up with a promise that she’d never regret saying yes.
They should at least be kissing, if not half-naked, his lips wrapped around her nipple, his fingers in her underwear.