“Calm down!” I told her squeezing her around the middle, but it fell on deaf ears.
“Dude, we don’t talk to women like that.” Hunter reminded his cousin slapping him in the back of the head.
“She’s not a woman, she’s a hell-beast!” Damien yelled, half struggling in Hunter’s grasp. God only knew what set these two off this time.
“Tell me how you really feel, pig-fucker!” Kristen just kept going, and I was partially afraid she was going to hit me with her flailing arms.
“I’m not the one fucking a cop!” Damien yelled. Jesus, he really was caught up on Kristen seeing Evan right now. This was bad.
Real bad.
“Cool your jets! Both of you! I’m tired of two of my best friends acting like idiots!” Taylor picked up the garden hose and aimed true spraying all of us with water that quickly turned from hot to freezing cold in seconds. .
“Arrrgh!” She shot each of us full blast with water until they stopped fighting, either too exhausted or too wet to keep going any longer. Unfortunately, both Hunter and I ended up as casualties.
“Done?” she asked, squirting us all again for good measure. Damien held his hands up and stalked off, ripping his T-shirt off that clung to his body.
“Sorry, babe.” Taylor dropped the hose and hugged Hunter, kissing him and soaking herself against his waterlogged clothes. He shook his head, mumbling it wasn’t the first time she’d shot him with a hose, and he proceeded to take his shirt off too. I guess this BBQ was officially a skins versus shirts affair.
“Wow, that was different.” Winnie stood there, taking it all in. I wasn’t even sure she’d met my parents yet and this day was only getting better.
A naughty idea formed in my head because when in Rome... “Come here,” I said, walking up to her arms out wide.
“Oh no, you keep that over there, Doctor.” She wagged her finger at me. God, I wanted to bite the tip of it for starters. “I’m not doing another sans clothing episode with you.” She laughed dodging and suddenly I laughed stalking her around a patio table. We all had a little crazy going on, so I decided to join in ripping my shirt off and chasing after her too.
10
Winnie
Chase soaking wet, no shirt, and taking rapidly increasing steps toward me as I backed away was a sight to see. The good doctor had muscles and definition outlined in the afternoon sun and water glistening down to his flat stomach into shorts that hung low on his hips. I had seen his chest earlier, but something about the context of now, the picnic, and the people watching us magnified my response a hundred times. Dry Chase was amazing, wet Chase left me thirsty and desperate to control myself from reaching over to lick his skin.
I was afraid I might trip on my clumsy ass again, but he kept smiling like a goofball. “What? Shit. No! Chase! Stop it!” I hissed at him as chased me around the backyard while I squealed like a farm animal. Exhilaration coursed through me, and I wasn’t sure if I should let him catch me or not. My shoes prevented me from running full out, and he seemed more bent on stalking me than he did catching me at the moment.
“Come here.” He taunted with his arms open as I was dodging him around a picnic table filled with food. His wet hair curled over his forehead and the urge to push it back distracted me just enough that he caught me. Arms looped around my middle and his bare chest and wet shorts seeped through the back of my sundress.
“Chase!” He was laughing against me and the rumble made me squirm against him suggestively, forgetting how recently I met him.
“Careful, Win.” The playfulness changed, and I felt his fingers graze my sides close enough to the side boob, but far enough away to remain respectable in broad daylight at a family gathering.
“Chase…” This time saying his name was less censure and more invitation when I laid my head against his shoulder, forgetting we were at his parents’ house amid guests in the backyard. His friends seemed to be gone, caught up in their own whirlwinds while a game of badminton was played by some younger cousins across the yard.
“You know, Son, if you had run like that in football practice, you might have gotten somewhere.” We both jerked apart hearing the comment from behind us, and Chase tensed against me.
“Good to see you too, Dad. Come on, I’ll get us some towels.” The coldness between father and son was chilling to any observer. Chase didn’t bother with an introduction as he dragged me toward the house, an unrelenting grip on my hand. I could barely keep up with him, but I was leery of saying anything from the scowl marring his beautiful face. Instead, I squeezed his hand back to let him know I understood.
Chase took me inside to the mud room, pulling towels down from a shelf. He wrapped one around me and used another one to dry off his bare chest and hair.
“Thanks,” I told him as I brushed the water from my arms. My dress was soaked as were his shorts. I wasn’t sure what we were going to do when a chill from the cranked air conditioning gave me a shudder.
“You want to talk about what happened out there?” I asked.
“I’m, uh, sorry about that.” He looked sheepish and my big mouth followed asking him another probing question.
“About which part?” He stood close, maybe too close, and the mud room quickly heated up with the two of us breathing out of breath.
“I’ll start with my sister, Kristen, her strange relationship with Damien none of us can figure out, and my dad being a jerk.”
“Wow, and I haven’t met your mom yet.” My hand traced a path down his chest distracting us both.