A Test of Love: Interracial Erotic Romance (Chasing Love) (32 page)

He loved her too.

I turned to him, all the way, so that he could drink my bare body in. “Look at me.”

A mask of anger covered his usual calm face. “I’m looking.”

“Do you see this beautiful pussy?” I opened my legs and stroked my moist lips. “It’s so hungry for you.” I dipped my finger inside of me and rocked with a rhythm that surely Chase missed.

He pretended he didn’t want me. Lies. It was all lies—to himself, to me, stupid poisonous lies.

Do you see him? Do you see how beautiful he really is? I told you. I said to you the day I met this gorgeous man. I said, “That is the man I will kill for.” And you never believed me. You’re such a foolish little person.

“Wendy.” Chase took four steps my way and raised the gun so that it was level with my face. “Did you kill them?”

“Who? I’ve killed a lot, so when you ask, make sure you let me know who you’re talking to.” I stopped fingering myself and brought my fingers to my aching nipples. Shivers of pleasure ran through me as I toyed with them, the exact same way Chase used to play with those points.

Come to me, lover. If only for the last time.

It caught him off guard. The fondling cracked his mask a little. I knew if I could crack it even more, then maybe we would be fucking instead of this odd dance of death that he’d somehow initiated.

“Did you kill Yancy, Vicky, and—”

“Sure. Now fuck me.” I widened my legs some more.

“No.” With a look of disgust, he positioned the point of the gun to the middle of my forehead. “I-I just had to know.”

“Why?”

“Because I ’don’t want you to die unless you are actually guilty.”

“And what am I guilty of again?”

“Their deaths.”

“Ah, but it was all self-defense. Those women tried to ruin us.”

“Us?” He quirked his eyebrows.

How dare he?

“Us!” I screamed and jumped up. My breasts jiggled with the movement. Strands of my hair covered the floor.
I’d been pulling it out as I stood by the window and talked to you.

And you thought it was so funny when I yanked out those strands. So fucking funny? Now what do you think? Now who’s laughing?!

I chuckled. “Us, you son of a bitch. These women tried to destroy us, from the roots. And you!” I spat the last word out. Sometimes Chase needed to be disciplined. It was more of Dawn’s job. I was the one who licked his wounds. Not today, I would have to change this. And if he expected Jasmine to still be in our arrangement then maybe she would be the one to heal his injuries. I was number one now.

“Stay right there, Wendy.” He directed the gun’s target to my chest.

“Or what? You’ll shoot me.”

“Yes.”

“But you’ll shoot me regardless.” I winked at him, but remained where I was.

“Yes.”

“Could I convince you to not kill me?”

“No.”

What little hope I had vanished right there.

You knew he would kill me. . .didn’t you?

“Why, Chase? Why?”

“Because I don’t think you would stop going after Jasmine.”

I won’t.

“I’ll stop.” I tossed him a weak smile. “I’ve forgiven her now.”

He shook his head. “I’m sorry, Wendy, but I don’t believe you. I think you’ll keep going after her until she’s gone, and I can’t let that happen. I did care for you and because of that, I’m the one who will take care of you. No one else, especially not Benny.” He put his hand into his pocket, pulled out a small bottle of pills, and threw them at me.

I caught them. “What’s this?”

“Sleeping pills. You would have to take a lot of them but—”

I threw the bottle back at him. “No. If you kill me, let it be with blood pouring out of a hole in my chest, right where my heart used to be.” I punched the area between my breasts. “You devoured it. You know that, right? You stripped me away until I was nothing. Peel. Peel. I took the pain. Peel! Peel! Peel! Loving you always hurt and felt so good at the same time. I imagine your love is the feeling a mouse must feel right as he’s trapped in a snake’s mouth. It takes time, you know? Time for the mouse to be ingested. So much time. Inch by inch he’s being burned and liquefied, mashed and molded to fit this beast’s stomach—”

“Your family will be taken care of. Do you have any last wishes?”

“Make sure my father is shot and buried right next to me. That’s my wish, you son of a bitch.” My throat dried. “No one saved me when Dad took me. No one. Lucy was always lucky to have you and Dawn there. You saved her, but never did you save me.”

“I didn’t know.”

“But you took the time to know what I looked like when I was naked. You took the time to watch me give you blow job after blow job.” Tears fell from my eyes. “And then you didn’t save me once we all got together. You just took from me like all men did. It was your fantasy, buddy. Yours! Peel. Peel. Rip. Rip. All of our hearts were nothing. You tore us apart and then let that poisonous bitch in to finish the job.”

“I-I’m sorry.”

“No, you’re not. If the girls hadn’t died, you would still be hammering numbers onto doors!”

“I never wanted to hurt any of you.”

“Peel! Peel!” Saliva dripped from my lips.

“Wendy.” Chase didn’t say anything else after speaking my name. What went through his mind? Was it our love? Memories of our best moments? We’d had so many. Would he miss me once I was gone? Would he even shed a fucking tear?

Would you?

“Can we make love before you take my life?” I asked.

He cringed. “No.”

More tears spilled from my eyes. “Don’t do it, Chase. I think I want to live.”

“You can’t.”

“Because of that poisonous woman?”

He said nothing else and gripped the gun harder like he was preparing himself to shoot.

“But I love you, Chase.”

“I love Jasmine more.”

And then he pulled the trigger.

My hollow chest exploded as the bullet bit into me and chewed on flesh. It burned with each inch, stabbed with every breath, and spread even further as I choked on my own blood.

You won’t help me either? You’ll just let him kill me?

His face was the last thing I saw, his hand the last softness I experienced as he picked me up and helped me to the bed. He held me. My tears blurred my view. Pain. So much. More than I’d ever experienced. It crashed into my core and consumed my soul. There’d be no coming back from this. My heart had already been so small and crusted with darkness. Yet Chase had found my heart with no hesitation. He’d lodged a bullet into it, and then shot again.

“Chase.” Blood leaked out of my mouth. I coughed with no relief. I wagged my hands and tried to get up, fighting for that last moment.

Will you come with me? I’m scared.

“Goodbye, Wendy. I’m so sorry for all that I’ve done to you in the past.” He sighed. “May God have mercy on your soul.”

No. May God have mercy on you.

And then there was nothing, but Chase’s light breathing as he rocked me back and forth in his arms.

Epilogue

JASMINE

Two weeks later.

The line of people started at
Jasmine’s
entrance and continued two blocks away. Gabe had kept his promise and named the restaurant after me, although dropping the
hell
from the title that Chase had added weeks ago. My name hung over the restaurant in silver and violet letters with lights outlining every curve. Gabe had taken his dreams even farther and gotten rid of Lan’s old menu. In its place was high-end Mexican cuisine, dishes that would blow Oshane foodies’ minds.

I can’t believe he finally owns a restaurant.

So many wonderful savory smells drifted out of the place and filled the surrounding streets with pure awesomeness. As usual, Gabe had outdone himself—crispy tortillas flooded with lobster drizzling in a passion fruit sauce and crème fraiche, chilies filled with Gabe’s signature mole, garlic-marinated Kobe beef, traditional Mexican doughnuts with five different dipping sauces. He’d gone crazy—chipotle-braised short ribs, queso fresco with bacon, and dots of truffle oil!

Clearly, Gabe had something to prove with this restaurant, and I’d be there for him with anything he needed.

And oh, baby, the cocktails!

He’d spent even more time with the drinks—jalapeño-infused tequila, chocolate bitters floating in Kahlua and cream, and gelled-bourbon served within a closed blood orange.

“Are you still browsing over the menu?” Chase helped me out of the limo and peeked at my bare leg as it exposed itself through my dress’s split. “Did you not read that thing enough last week and the week before?”

“Oh, leave me alone. Gabe put in some additions and e-mailed the new one to me this morning.”

“I bet he did.”

“What does that mean?” I tucked the menu in my purse.

“It means Gabe is finding every excuse in the world to talk to you.”

“He’s asking me for my advice.” I got out of the limo.

“He’s still trying to court you.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“He’s still in love with you.”

“New topic.” I straightened out my dress and made sure it covered everything. Chase had been pulling the fabric up all night to caress my thighs. I’d been wet and ready for him, so bad that we almost took a detour. If it hadn’t been Jasmine’s opening night, we would have. ‘“Are you excited about the menu?”

“Sure,” he grumbled as the limo drove away.

“Which drink are you ordering? I’ plan on getting the orange, clearly. Gabe has refused to tell me how he’ even put the bourbon in gel form and gotten it into a freaking closed orange. He’s going to show me one day when the restaurant is closed.”

“I bet he will.”

“Stop that.” I plastered on a fake smile as news cameras flashed in front of us. Dawn’s death brought the media. According to the world, she and Wendy had died in a horrific plane crash. Benny handled that part and provided photos of an actual wrecked plane which he’d sent to Dawn and Wendy’s family, along with their belongings. The bodies had been said to be badly damaged in the accident. So far, neither family questioned their deaths, yet the media got excited. Not only had Chase Stone’s dear fiancé died, but now he’d been appearing a lot more in public with me, an unknown black woman who did not walk in any of his circles. News crews camped outside of my apartment all day, waiting for an interview. I’d said no comment so much that I couldn’t see those words without vomiting.

He waved away a few reporters as his main guard maneuvered us through the crowd. “Have you considered my job offer?”

“It’s not a job, Chase.”

“You would be the director of my food committee. Everything needs to be revamped. I would like that well-trained tongue sampling all of my businesses’ plates and making suggestions on how to improve them.”

“It’s not a job. It’s a bunch of chains and locks that will snare me to you, and let’s not kid ourselves. Those chains of employment will probably bind me to your dick.”

He smacked my behind. “I don’t need chains to have you on my cock,
tesoro
. There are other ways.”

“Behave. There are cameras everywhere, probably recording you spank my ass barely two weeks after the supposed love of your life died in a plane crash. Is that really how you want to be portrayed?”

“Your man only bows down to you. The rest of the world I ignore.” He brushed off his shoulder and exuded that same slick, rich boy swagger that radiated around him when I first met him.

“Just behave, please.”

“I haven’t seen you in a week.” He flashed another mocking smile for the cameras. “I won’t fucking behave tonight. You’ll be lucky if my fingers aren’t inside of you by the time the appetizers hit the table.”

A blaze of fire shot to my most intimate place. Only Chase could do that to me—make me wet with a threat lathered in lust. “We said we would take it slow.”

“No. We arrived in the States and you said you needed space.”

“And time.”

“Yes.” He sneered, but fixed his face. “That damn word again. Time.”

“It’s not that bad. I saw you last week.” I’d made him dinner at my apartment. Nothing too crazy for my baby—steak, potatoes, and cheese broccoli with a slice of cinnamon-crusted apple pie and a scoop of vanilla ice cream. Gabe had helped me hand-pick all the ingredients at his favorite gourmet shop. I’d managed not to burn anything. Many didn’t understand how I could love food so much, yet really suck in my own execution of meals. I got it. I was simply a food enthusiast, not a hopeful chef. Did people expect theater addicts to also act well or sports fans to have their own skill on the basketball court? Thankfully, the meal turned out great and Chase loved it.

God, that night was magical.

Lit candles decorated the entire dining area, lots of them. I’d put together a lovely playlist of slow Beatles’ songs. Chase damn sure deserved to be spoiled in any way possible.

After all. . .he’d killed for me.

I pushed that thought out of my mind. That had been the hardest thing to deal with as we flew back home from Italy. Chase had taken his ex-lover’s life, just so I could live without any fear of danger. He’d shot her, right in the center of her chest, two bullets to her heart, and ’hadn’t shed one tear.

Yet the plane ride home had been silent.

I’d held him the whole night in that darkened quiet. I kissed his head and made love to him, trying my best to show him with my body what I couldn’t just tell him with my words.

When we landed, he’d expected me to go back to Willow Park with him.
How could I? How could he?
Too much had happened. The history in that place was too much for anyone to deal with.
I had nightmares about that place—Dawn’s battered ghost floating through the halls, her body chewed and abused from Benny’s sick hands.

Don’t think about it.

I couldn’t go back with Chase. He begged me to move into a new place with him, but I didn’t think I was ready. I just needed time. A week or two, maybe three. Time. Just to make sure my decision wasn’t based on the shedding of Wendy’s blood or the raging hormones that heated every time he came into my space.