In Deep: Chase & Emma (All In Book 1) Read Online Free Page A

heading toward the kitchen. “Water?
Pellegrino? I’ve got some sports drinks, too.”
    I smiled, in spite of
my nerves. It was kind of nice to not have to explain myself. I’d
never been a big drinker, and after my last boyfriend’s tendency to
get stumble-down drunk more nights than not, I’d cut way back. But
I wouldn’t have to explain that to Chase the uber-athlete, now
would I?
    “I’ll have some
water, thanks.” I followed him into the kitchen. He handed me a
glass, then started fixing himself a whole wheat bagel with peanut
butter. His short brown hair looked a bit wet. I bet it usually was.
I wanted to run my hands through it.
    “Want one?” he
gestured to the bagel, an overflowing gooey, sticky mess.
    “Thanks, I just ate.”
    “So did I.” He gave
me a goofy smile I couldn’t help but return.
    “Hard to get enough
calories?” I asked, understanding. I’d worked with athletes
before, though none of his caliber. Even for top-tier athletes, his
workouts were legendary, five or six hours a day of swimming over two
separate sessions. He probably had to take in around 8,000 calories
every day.
    “Never enough,” he
agreed, giving me a hungry look. Insatiable, huh? I took a sip of my
water and looked down.
    “Why did you become a
massage therapist, too?” He gazed at me with those bright blue
eyes, his head tilted slightly with curiosity. “In addition to
being a physical therapist?”
    “Well,” I
reflected, “probably because of my mom.”
    “Is she one?”
    “No, she’s a nurse.
But she works in this great senior facility with a lot of different
physical and massage therapists and I guess I grew up understanding
how much they could both help people.”
    “You like to help
people?”
    That struck me as a
strange question. I looked at him, and he shrugged, munching on the
last bites of his bagel. “Not everyone does,” he clarified.
    “I think it’s
more…” I struggled with the right words to express something I
wasn’t sure I ever had before. “So many people walk around in
constant pain. My mom used to be one of them.”
    Without realizing I was
doing it, I started telling him all about it, how my mom had
developed rheumatoid arthritis at the early age of 40 with crippling
pain every morning. Eighty-five pounds overweight and sedentary,
she’d had high blood pressure and faced a scary downhill slide into
her future.
    “So she changed.” I
brightened up at the memory. I’d only been 11 at the time, but I
could still remember how she’d started walking in the mornings,
lifting first two-pound then five-pound weights as she hustled around
before breakfast. She’d met with a nutritionist, physical and
massage therapists and low and behold she’d made that illusive,
long-term lasting whole-scale change.
    “It’s so
inspiring,” I gushed, thinking about how healthy she was now in her
50s. She and my father went biking and swimming together almost every
day, enjoying life like they never had before. “Pain is so
debilitating for so many people. I like doing what I can to lift it.”
    “You’re a good
person.” He made the statement as if it were a done deal, the final
decision on the subject. I looked up and met his eyes. Not a hint of
a smile, he wasn’t teasing. He really thought I was a good person.
    “Um, thanks.” I
tucked a strand of hair behind my ear and left the kitchen. I didn’t
usually start talking about myself and my family with someone I
didn’t even know, let alone someone who was supposed to be my
client for the next month. But all of this was new. I’d never had
just one person I was working with at a time before, for an entire
month. As we practically lived together in hotels.
    “So, the on-call
thing?” I started. “Can we talk about what you have in mind for
the next month? Just working with you?”
    “It’s simple.” He
walked into the living room over to the massage table. “I’m going
to be pushing myself to the limit over the next