CHASE (The Heartbreak Club Book 1)

by Elle Harte

  I couldn’t think.

  The sight of her with those people in that place, it kept coming back to me and I couldn’t stop the anxiety. “Kira—”

  She pulled away and looked at me. “You have to trust me,” she said and I could see the sincerity in her eyes, and in her voice. “This won’t happen again. I’m sorry.” And then she hugged me once more, this time for long.

  “I’m trusting you, Kira.”

  “I won’t give you a reason to regret it,” she said. “There’s just some stuff going on. But I know this isn’t the way to deal with it.”

  “Why can’t you talk to me?”

  “Because I get judgmental looks from everyone, I don’t want it from you.”

  “What if I promise not to get judgmental?”

  She hesitated. “I miss him, Chase. I miss Sean, and it’s the only reason I keep sleeping with him and not because I’m this Zen person who can handle sleeping with their ex.”

  “Kira, you’re human. You’re allowed to be sentimental.”

  “He doesn’t give a shit about me.”

  “That’s because he never actually lost you.”

  She went silent. “So what, I should cut him off to get him back? Isn’t that manipulative?”

  “You and Blayne are the last people I’d expect to be manipulative. My point is that you need to cut him out because that’s the only way you’ll both get some perspective. Maybe you never let yourself get over him.”

  She stared at me. “You miss her so much, why don’t you just go and tell her that?”

  “I can’t do that.”

  “Why? Because then you wouldn’t be such a guy?”

  I couldn’t stop laughing. “Shut up. You’re making too much sense. It’s not like you.”

  “Can we go get breakfast?” she said. “I’m starving.”

  I stood. “Of course.”

  She rushed to the bathroom.

  “Where do you want to go?”

  Blayne

  Every solution breeds new problems.

  Training was finally over, and we were getting some work done. It wasn’t easy and there were things that kept bothering me. Someone’s attitude, some task that I couldn’t manage to finish, lack of creativity when there was dire need for it—yes, it was hardly perfect. But no matter how bad it got, I would just come back the next day more pumped than before. Being a paralegal was as close to my dream of becoming a lawyer as I could get. There was nothing more satisfying.

  Immersing myself in work was fulfilling in a different kind of way. I knew it was a temporary position, and it wasn’t even going to last long, so I gave it my all because I really wanted things to work out. There were also plenty of late nights and frustrating moments where nothing would go right but because I was really happy with the job overall, I let it all slide.

  I was even better friends with Alex and Tristan and they actually did turn out to be good people, even though they were as judgmental about everyone still as they were the first day I met them. I think it was self-defense mechanism—they judged people before others could judge them.

  Chase was just the high-profile CEO we barely got to see. Sometimes we crossed paths in the elevator or walking toward our floor. A man in his position could have made my life miserable, considering he was my employer and the way things had ended between us, but he was professional despite everything that happened. In fact, he didn’t even look too concerned or interested in me anymore. So basically, he wasn’t hiding a grudge and he wasn’t trying to flirt with me: both good things and more than I could hope for because I was still trying to stay away from men in general.

  It was Sunday and we were at a breakfast place on our street that Chloe loves so much. I was outside, trying to search for my phone in my purse which was never easy, as I’ve mentioned before. I had to call to Tristan and when Tristan was waiting for someone’s call and they didn’t call, he got ugly. And he tended to get annoyed which meant I would have to spend the next two days trying to get him to like me again, and I was not looking forward to that at all. But my phone had suddenly become some invisible object that may or may not exist.

  “Blayne,” someone said so I looked up. I was staring right down at this person’s face, the clueless face, and hazel eyes. I couldn’t even find words to respond with, I was just standing there, speechless.

  “Blayne? You okay?”

  “What are you doing here, Nick?” I finally managed to find my voice. And with that, my anger was riled back up again.

  “You wouldn’t talk to me,” Nick said. “What was I supposed to do?”

  “Stay the fuck away, Nick! That’s what!”

  He grabbed my arm in an obvious effort to threaten me. “Don’t do this,” he said. “Don’t make this a whole public insult thing. I just need to talk.”

  I tried to break free but his grip on my arm was vicious. “Nick!” I yelled. “Let go of me.”

  “Not until you agree to come with me,” he said, fingers digging deeper into my skin. “Come on Blayne, don’t be a bitch.”

  I was about to say something rude when our conversation was interrupted. “She asked you to leave her alone,” said a familiar voice.

  I turned to see the speaker, and ended up being just as confused as Nick, because it was Chase Cooper, standing there, wearing casual clothes that I had never seen on him before. There was a girl standing right next to him, and I knew I had seen her somewhere but I couldn’t remember.

  “Who the hell are you?” Nick said to Cooper. Nick looked furious, but Chase wasn’t about to let this go either. “I’m a friend of Chloe’s,” he said to Nick. “And next time, I’m not going to ask you to let go of her.”

  “This is none of your business Chloe’s friend,” Nick said, to my utter disappointment. “I suggest you let her deal with her own problems. She’s my fiancée. I just want to talk to her.”

  “Nick I told you before, I don’t want to talk to you. Now let me go, please!”

  But Nick’s gaze wasn’t on me anymore. He was eyeing Chase with contempt. Chase didn’t even flinch. “You heard her,” he said. The threat was there in his voice, even though he wasn’t saying it. We all heard it and Nick must have heard it too. Which was probably why he let go of me. I guess he must have decided it wasn’t worth taking the risk of being punched in public and losing the fight. “Blayne I will see you,” Nick said, and that was supposed to be some kind of threat but I couldn’t care less.

  He was gone.

  “Thanks,” I said to Chase, as soon as Nick left. “He’s not usually like this. I don’t know what’s going on with him.”

  “That’s alright,” Chase said. “Guess he’s having trouble getting over you.”

  I had no idea what I was supposed to say, so I did the next best thing. “Thanks,” I said. “For telling him you were Chloe’s friend and not being weird about it.”

  “No problem,” he said.

  “You’re here,” I said. “In these parts?”

  He grinned. “This is my friend Kira,” he pointed to the girl and the girl gave a nod of his head, and a smile. And that was when I remembered. She was the same girl I’d seen kissing Chase at the club. She also looked sheepish. “I don’t think we’ve been properly introduced,” she said. “I’m Kira and Chase and I have been friends since we were in college.”

  “Nice to meet you, Kira,” I wanted to be as polite as possible. “Does Chase make out with all of his college friends?”

  That sounded rude and intrusive. I shouldn’t have said that. Kira shook her head. “What you saw that night at the club, wasn’t us making out,” she said. “I was transferring the E I was holding in my mouth, and I realize now that probably sounds worse, but we’re not together. If we were trust me, I’d be shouting it from the rooftops instead of hiding it.”

  “Full disclosure,” Kira said. “We did go out once. Felt like we owed it to each other to try and see if we have chemistry, but we were terrible at it. Chase can confirm it. I just did
n’t want there to be any bad blood between us.”

  For some reason, I trusted her. She didn’t know a reason to lie to me.

  Then, we were all just standing in awkward silence. It seemed like it would never end, when Chase filled it with words. “I should probably go inside,” he said and I started smiling like an idiot, I was overdoing it, I knew it.

  “Sure, yeah!” I stammered.

  “I’ll see you around,” he said, and I’m pretty sure his eyes said things that his words didn’t say. Kitten.

  “Yes,” I managed.

  And then he was gone, disappearing inside the crowd of people in the breakfast place along with Kira, and I was left standing outside, with my mouth hanging open, something that had started to happen rather frequently in Chase’s presence or every time I so much as thought about him. You’re mine, Kitten.

  “What the hell was that all about?” Chloe asked, jolting me out of my fantasy state.

  “Nothing,” I said, going toward a booth with her.

  I felt tired even though it was just morning and I had woken up less than an hour ago. I was tired because I wanted this thing with Nick to go away. But the way Nick had behaved today it was more than a little obvious that he wasn’t about to just sit back and wait for his heart to move on.

  And of course there was this other inconvenience—Chase Cooper. What the hell was I doing getting all excited over him? He was my boss, this could get complicated!

  But I couldn’t help that every time I saw him I felt something, deep down inside me, an urge, a thirst, a craving if you could call it that—something that I’d never felt before and it was annoying the way every time Chase was around, it resurfaced. I needed to make more of an effort to kill that silly feeling.

  Chase

  “What was that about?” Kira asked when we found a table.

  “What?”

  “Blayne,” Kira said, and he looked at me in a strange way. “You like her, don’t you?”

  “What? That’s absurd!”

  “No, it’s not,” she was adamant. “You were threatening the guy like he had really pissed you off and I don’t remember you standing up for people at your workplace before.”

  “That guy was being an asshole.”

  “To her. I noticed.”

  “Kira, could you shut up about this?”

  Kira grinned. “No.”

  Even Kira’s teasing couldn’t get me to relax. That guy, Nick, sounded like trouble. I couldn’t help but think what would happen if he tried to do the same to her when she was unprotected. I should get her to file a restraining order, really make sure he stays out of her life.

  “What would you like to have, sir?”

  Blayne

  You will be an inspiration to others.

  The next day at work I was back to avoiding Nick’s calls. This time around there were more texts, stupid, annoying, threatening and he still kept trying to call. I had to leave my phone aside and forget it even existed in order to distract myself.

  But he had been at it since the previous night. Why couldn’t he just give up? Couldn’t he see I was not the same person who had been staying with him all those years? He probably didn’t realize that moving on had changed me in ways that he couldn’t imagine, and made me understand how stupid I had been and I was not about to repeat that stupidity.

  Of course, there was no way I could have explained that to him. I just hoped that soon enough he would find someone else to follow around, and charm into a life with him and I would be history. Until then, I was going to have to accept this frustration and annoyance as part of my life.

  In an effort to forget about the incident I didn’t even tell Tristan and Alex about what happened outside the breakfast place, even though I had gotten into the habit of discussing things with them the minute they happened. Sometimes they knew things before Chloe did because we worked together and they were always nearby. Perhaps I should have called in sick; I was too distracted to work. But calling in sick at a job you’ve just begun, it was the worst way to handle things. So here I was, trying to focus on the task at hand, but unable to concentrate, hoping that people won’t notice. When the beautiful young brunette came toward my desk I thought that I must surely be in trouble.

  “Mr. Cooper would like to see you in his office,” she said in her usual professional monotone. I recognized her as Chase’s assistant, the gorgeous woman everyone thought he was sleeping with. Actually, most people thought Cooper was having sex with every female he could get his hands on. Somehow it didn’t seem like a fair judgment of him, but what did I care. So what if he was the man-whore everyone kept talking about? It wasn’t my problem. You really believe that, Kitten?

  “Mr. Cooper?” I repeated, just to be sure. That had never happened before, he had never called me into his office, and in fact he hardly ever met people there. If Cooper had to meet someone it was usually in the conference room. Most people knew to stay away when he was locked up in that office of his, because half the time he was in it, he wasn’t a very pleasant person.

  Naturally, I was concerned that it might be my turn this time, and that he would be rude to me as well. On a day like today, that would be awful. But the assistant didn’t even respond to my question, she just turned and went back to her desk, leaving me no option but to do as I was asked.

  When I stepped into his office, Chase was immersed in some files on his desk. There was a pen in his hand and he was actually writing with it, instead of having someone do it for him.

  “Hi,” I said, wondering if that was an appropriate greeting for the boss.

  Chase glanced up from his papers.

  “Please sit,” he said, in a tone that meant business.

  My legs started shaking uncontrollably for no reason at all. My fingers started fidgeting and I had to stop myself. Chase closed the file and his attention was on me, his eyes calculating, watching my every move. “How’s work?”

  Small talk? Seriously?

  “Work is great,” I stammered, as if I could say anything else considering how new I was and how that was never the right response to your employer’s generic questioning. He was probably just trying to be nice. Besides, there was nothing major to complain about.

  “Are you sure?” he said. “Because I doubt any kind of job can be termed as great.”

  My mind went haywire. Was everything okay? Why was he asking me about work? Did he know something I didn’t? Had someone said something about me? Registered a complaint perhaps? What if that was true? What if he had called me in here to tell me my assistance was no longer required? What if he really didn’t like getting involved with the whole thing with Nick yesterday? I mean, that had to be pretty unprofessional right?

  “What I mean is,” I began. “Things are good. I think I’m getting along well…unless you’ve heard something?”

  He looked at me for a second, not getting what I was trying to say at first, but then he understood. “No,” he said. “Nothing like that! I’m sorry…there’s nothing to be afraid of. You’re fine…we’re happy with your performance. Really, there is nothing to worry about.”

  Relief swept through me.

  “Glad to hear it,” I said.

  “I just wanted to make sure you were okay,” Chase said. “I hope that man didn’t bother you again.”

  Oh, I thought.

  That man, I thought.

  “No,” I said. “I’m fine. It’s fine…I mean Nick, he’s not dangerous. He was just irritated and I know he went overboard, but I know him. He’s not going to hurt me, at least not in the way you think.”

  Chase didn’t seem convinced.

  “Look I can get you help,” he said. “A lawyer… security detail, anything you need. I can talk to some friends of mine at the precinct if you want.”

  “No! That’s fine. Really.”

  “Okay but if it ever gets out of hand, you will tell me right? You have no idea what people are capable of.”

  I wondered if that was supp
osed to mean something to me. Also, I had to wonder for just a moment whether Chase was speaking about himself, telling me in a subtle way that I should be careful. Well, he had nothing to worry about.

  “I will, thank you,” I said. “But there’s nothing to worry about.”

  He didn’t look convinced. “One of my friends,” Chase said. “She was like a sister to me. She used to be in a difficult relationship. The guy started giving her trouble when they separated. I just felt maybe you might be in trouble too.”

  Why was he trying to explain this?

  “I’m sorry about your friend,” I said.

  “Nothing to be sorry about,” he said. “She married this amazing guy last year. They have a baby on the way. She’s never been happier. She always said the divorce was the best thing to happen to her.”

  “That’s crap,” I said, realizing too late what I had just done. But the words spilled from my mouth, I wasn’t thinking. They just freaking spilled!

  So now I felt even more awkward than before.

  “What?” he said, incredulous.

  But since I had already started this thing, there was nothing to do but try and explain what I was going to say. “I just mean…there’s nothing good about a divorce or a separation. It breaks your heart. You’re hurt that the other person would choose someone else or some other dream, over you. It’s always going through your mind, the fact that they did nothing to protect you or your feelings. That they acted so selfishly and didn’t care for one second what it did to you. So yes, you might find someone else and you might move on, and you might actually be happy, but really, you’re just still going to have to go through this…this period of torture, where you don’t even know what you’re doing because you always had life planned out some other way, you know?”

  I said and stopped, wondering if I went too far but Chase looked like he was smiling just a little. “You’re right,” he said. “About all of it. There’s really nothing that can nullify that, and you certainly can’t try to fill the hole created by them with someone else.”