Chasing What’s Mine by Ava Gray
Gemma
My stomach still feels like it’s filled with butterflies by the time I pull up at La Perla, Kate’s choice of lunch spot. It seems a ten-minute drive wasn’t nearly enough to shake my close call with Dax, and I’m not surprised. He’s easily the most intense person I’ve ever met, and my reaction to him is always just as intense. The way his eyes bore into mine and make my body feel things I had no idea I was capable of is nothing short of exhilarating. But a part of me is happy it was just a close call and no more. I can’t even think about the consequences of me kissing Dax and worse still, the news getting out that I kissed him. Aiden and Riley would love that for sure.
And as if all of that isn’t enough, another thing I just can’t shake is the thought of leaving Dax with that guy. Things looked heated between them last night, and when he showed up at the gym again today, it felt like he was in the mood to continue whatever it was. Dax has never kept his past a secret, no matter how disturbing, and I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t unsettling to see a piece of that past all up in his face.
My phone beeps, breaking through my steady breathing session in the parking lot; it was my plan to get a grip before I had to go in and face my friend. It’s a text from Kate, speak of the devil.
Am I sending out a search party?
I take one last deep breath and get out of my car. Hopefully I’ve done a good enough job that she doesn’t read everything that happened between Dax and me on my face.
“Any later, and we would have had to cancel brunch and go in for a full-on lunch,” Kate says, as I take my seat opposite her.
Thankfully she’s chosen a table away from the windows, but close to the French doors leading onto the outdoor seating area. This way we get the light summer breeze without any of the garish Vegas summer sun. It’s perfect.
“I hope you’ve gone ahead and ordered for me,” I say, pushing the menu aside. There are only so many hard choices I can take in one morning.
“Butter croissants and Ceylon tea. You’re welcome.” She looks pretty pleased with herself, but I’m more than happy to grant her that.
“What would I do without you?”
She smiles and bats her eyelashes at me, basking in the glory of her victory as a gold medalist best friend.
Having Kate in my life has saved me more times than I can count, which is why I really want to talk to her about this whole Dax thing. I trust her judgment, and I just know she’ll tell me the right thing to do. But there’s a big part of me that’s still holding onto the information, like it’s a dirty secret. I don’t know why. She knows about my childhood crush on him, and she even knows about the time I tried to kiss him through a game of Spin the Bottle. Easily one of the most humiliating experiences of my teen years, and Kate never gave me a day’s grief over it. Not about the fact that I stooped to tricking a kiss out of a boy, or that it backfired, and the bottle landed on Gladys Knight, our black Labrador who had pushed her way into the circle.
“So, Dax,” she says, and my eyes snap up to hers. My reaction tips her off, and she flashes a knowing smirk. “My powers of observation are still as sharp as ever.”
“But—how?”
She shrugs. “I know you saw him at the press party last night, and then I saw your face when you walked in here…I know you better than you know yourself, Gem.”
A feeling of relief washes me over me. At least now I don’t have to stumble around, trying to find a way to broach the topic with her.
“Something happened, didn’t it?” she asks, pressing on. “Spill it, girl, or I’m going to spontaneously combust from curiosity.”
“No, nothing happened,” I say, dropping my eyes to study the gleaming fork by my hand. “But it almost did.”
I jump as she slams her flat palms on the table, making the contents between us rattle and the other patrons look at us like we’re aliens from another planet. “I knew it! You’re more transparent than the sheer thong I had in senior year!”
“Gross,” I say, scrunching up my face. I know the thong she’s referring to and what she put it through.
“No, you’re gross. Dax Daytona? Gem, I don’t need to tell you that you dodged a bullet, right?”
“You don’t know him,” I say, immediately coming to his defence.
Her eyebrows shoot up in surprise. She picked up on my knee-jerk reaction, and now I wish I weren’t so damn transparent after all.
“I think I know enough,” she says. “We’ve been skirting around the issue of Dax for years, and all the reasons he was a bad idea before you left for college still hold true now.”
“Yeah, well, it’s not that simple for me. I can’t just look at a list of reasons and then flip a switch.” I feel lame for making the argument, but it’s true and she needs to know that. “I can’t help the way I feel about him.”
“That’s why you have me,” she says, and reaches out to take my hand across the table. “I’ll help you steer clear of him, and you can thank me in five years when you have an established career and he’s in rehab for booze and girls.”
I roll my eyes. She’s making him out to be some kind of filth magnet, which I know he isn’t. That rock star lifestyle irks me, of course, but I know it’s only a part of his work as a pro fighter. There’s more to him than that.
“What are you going to do, put me on a leash until I leave?”
“Pfft, I won’t even break a sweat,” she says. “All I have to do is make sure you steer clear of Dax until we board that plane to Hawaii in five days. Then you’ll have a killer vacation to focus on, and after that—the rest of your life.”
It sounds like she’s got it all figured out, but I’m doubtful. Especially since even now as I’m sitting here, I’m thinking about how much I want him.
“So, how do you propose I avoid someone who’s always around? He and Aiden hang out a lot, you know that.”
“A distraction,” she says, without hesitation. “We’ll go dancing tonight, and find you the hottest, buffest distraction.”
“A hook up? That’s your solution?”
“A hook up and dancing,” she says, waggling her eyebrows suggestively.
According to Kate, one shouldn’t set foot in a club before midnight. This way you’ll have more mileage in your drink tank while everyone else is well on their way to Wasted Avenue. You’ll also look better than a hundred percent of the women in there. As always, she’s not wrong. When we walk into the club, all I feel is happiness, courtesy of the illuminated cash bar, and atmosphere thanks to the techno music pumping at us from every angle.
“This is going to be like taking candy from a baby,” she says, leaning over to shout directly in my ear.
I simply nod and let Kate lead the way to the bar. After all, we didn’t come here for conversation, and the sooner we get started on the party, the sooner I’ll forget about Dax.
She orders us two tequila shots to set up the beers, which turns into two more before she’s finally ready to feel out the floor. The heavy bass thrums through me, making my body feel more alive than it’s felt in a while. I try to keep out of my head, though, as I weave through the gyrating crowd behind Kate. The light show is out of this world, like the DJ is hellbent on transporting us to another dimension. And the way I feel now, it’s working. Sweaty, amped, and protected by this bubble of dance in which there are no consequences for any actions. There’s no such thing as the outside world.
“Oh my God, you look great!” The outside world barges into my bubble in the shape of Ciara.
She hugs me tightly, and when she finally let go, I see Riley holding onto her, moving along to the music. Aiden isn’t far, slow dancing closely with his girlfriend despite the upbeat playlist. Seeing them coupled up and having fun makes me even more determined to find my distraction. I’m sure Kate will be happy about that.
“I didn’t know you guys would be here,” I say, for lack of a better thought to share.
Ciara shrugs, looking delighted to see me, Riley not so much.
“Did you forget the rest of that dress in the car?” he asks.
Ciara elbows him in the ribs. “Shut up, she looks amazing.”
Riley begins to protest, but thankfully Ciara gets hold of him and pulls him deeper into the dancefloor. She glances back over her shoulder and mouths at me to have fun. I give her a smile, but after that run-in, I’m not so sure anymore.
How am I expected to loosen up with both my brothers watching me like a hawk? The very moment I have that thought, I catch Riley watching me over Ciara’s shoulder. God, this is not how tonight’s supposed to go.
And then, as if things weren’t bad enough, my eyes fall on the one person I came here to forget. Dax. He’s close to where Aiden is slow dancing, and although he’s keeping better time to the music than my brother, I’d wager that he’s way more intimate with the group of women who have attached themselves to him. It’s like a scene out of Dirty Dancing, the way they’re all grazing up against him, and he’s having the time of his life.
Just then, Dax looks over in my direction. I don’t know what could’ve made him do that when he obviously has his hands full. But he looks. And our eyes lock, sending the music and all the people dancing to it somewhere far off into the distance.
If this really were a movie, this would be the part where he makes his way over to me and asks me to dance. I so badly want him to. I can feel every cell in my body begging for it. But then I remember Aiden and Riley, and how that’s the kind of drama I’m not in the mood for. Dax flashes me a knowing half-smile, and it takes all my willpower to tear my eyes from his.
I tug on Kate’s arm, and I feel a little bad for interrupting her. She’s already latched onto a rather hunky dance partner, and the last thing I want to be is the friend who gets in her way of a good time. But my situation has become urgent.
“Refill?” she asks, waving her beer at me.
I shake my head. I’ve barely had a few sips of my beer, and hers is already empty. Clearly, I’m failing at this whole partying thing.
“I’m going to go over there,” I say, pointing in a random direction.
She follows my finger, then looks back at me and shrugs. “Stay close,” she says, and turns back to her project for the night.
So much for my wingman.
I turn around and scan the floor. I can’t make any distinction among the dark bodies and faces moving to the music, the rhythmic beams of light making it look as though they’re all pulsating along to the thudding in my head. After a moment, my feet begin to carry me to the other side of the dancefloor. I’m painfully aware of every muscle as I try to move to some kind of beat so that I don’t look too out of place with everyone else. But in being so cerebral about it, I know for a fact that I must look like an absolute square.
I don’t let it stop me, though. For some reason, getting away from Dax has become my number one priority. My instinct is to just leave the club altogether, but I know that’ll raise too many questions and make it far too obvious. So, I keep moving, and thanks to several strangers bumping into me and brushing up against me, I soon have an ice-cold streamlet of beer trickling down between my breasts. Just great.
I glance back to try and gauge my progress as I pause to mop up the mess on my chest. There’s no sign of Kate, my brothers, or Dax. A heavy sigh of relief escapes me then. I’ve lost them. Now all I have to do is—
“Need some help with that?”
Dax’s voice in my ear is deep and loaded with suggestions that send shivers down my spine. My whole body breaks out in goosebumps despite the fact that the dancefloor feels like it’s a few feet from the earth’s core.
I turn slowly, and the look in his eyes nearly floors me. “Dax. Hi.”
It’s the lamest thing I could’ve said in the moment, so of course it’s the thing I say. I feel my cheeks grow red-hot as his eyes shift from mine to the wetness on my chest. I wish I could read them, but the lighting in here is atrocious.
I get it now—everyone grazing and grinding against each other. It’s because they’re focusing on touching and feeling to make up for the fact that they can’t really see. The way Dax is looking at me right now, standing so close, I’m overcome with the urge to touch and feel him, too.
“I didn’t think you’ve come to these kinds of places,” he says, smiling.
I’m almost certain he knows the effect he has on me. What’s more, he’s definitely enjoying it. And if I were completely honest, I’d have to admit that I’m not exactly hating it either. It feels good to know that out of all the women he has to pick from, he’s gone through the trouble of seeking me out.
“I like to dance,” I say, and take a sip of my beer. I lick my lips slowly and watch his eyes zero in on them.
It seems I’m having an effect on him, too.
“Well, then,” he says, and steps even closer to me, wrapping his one arm around my waist.
As if on cue, a slower dubstep track starts up, and I’m not sure whether it’s the bass or my heart ripping through my chest. One thing I am sure of is the warmth from his fingers at my back that is slowly snaking through me to settle in a pool of white heat between my legs.
Our bodies begin to move together, finding their own symbiotic rhythm removed from the one pumping through the club and everyone else. The dance we’re doing has nothing to do with music and everything to do with the desire we both feel for each other.
My free hand runs across his muscular arms, feeling them clench and relax as he grinds against me, until I let it rest on the Chinese symbols along his nape. His tattoos have always been sexy to me, and now that I’m up close to his ink, I’m feeling all kinds of sparks going off in my body. My lips are mere inches from his, and they tingle under his hot breath. I feel myself unraveling in his arms, a deep ache growing in my core.
But I know I’m not the only one. Dax’s hands are all over me, which isn’t helping my determination to keep it together. And when he grabs my ass, bucking his hips into me, I’m thankful for the dark and the crowd that’s hiding us from my brothers. I’m relieved for the noise, too, because that means Dax doesn’t hear the slight gasp that specific touch elicits from me.
Before I can fully recover, he guides me with purpose, so that his thigh is positioned between mine. My entire body melts into him as his strong hands move me to grind against him. All of a sudden, I’m not so determined to keep it together anymore. Why should I? We’re lost in a sea of music and motion, with no one to answer to except ourselves.
That’s why when Dax crushes his lips to mine, I open my mouth and let him kiss me. In an instant, the dam walls holding back my pent-up attraction crumble and crash through me in wave after wave of sweet desire finally fulfilled. The force of it has me reeling, my lungs aching for breath when no other part of me wants to break from him. So, I ignore my body’s cry for survival and pay attention instead to its primal response to the way his tongue hungrily explores my mouth. He tastes of whiskey, and his aromatic scent fills my nostrils as I curl my fingers in his hair. If I could drink him in, I would.
But whatever ideas I have about where this kiss could lead are suddenly dashed as Dax is wrenched from my arms. I don’t need much light to make out the tattooed face of the guy who’s got hold of him, and my heart drops to my feet. I can’t begin to think what his problem could be and why he’s so intent on provoking Dax.
I watch as Dax fights his way out of the guy’s grip, and the two exchange heated words. I can’t hear it, but the looks on their faces tell me all I need to know. This is obviously something serious enough to have this thug in Dax’s face every chance he gets, and I need to know what it is.
“You want me to go over there?” the thug bellows, his scream floating above a lull in the music.
He starts to walk off, but Dax pulls him back and without letting go of his arm, starts to say something really close to his face. I make a mental note to brush up on my lip-reading skills, because the curiosity is killing me. If the sight of that guy didn’t give me the creeps, I would’ve gone straight over there to find out what the deal is. But it does, and so I don’t.
The guy jerks out of Dax’s hold and pushes him so that he stumbles back into me.
“Dax, what’s going on?” I ask, taking the opportunity as it arises.
“Get out of here now, and take your brothers with you,” he says, practically barking at me as he shoves me back into the crowd.
It takes work not to take that personally, because yeah, I get that he’s riled up and wants me out of it, but shoving me? Seriously?
“Sorry,” I say, muttering to the girl whose toes I accidentally stepped on in all the commotion.
But she doesn’t seem to care and is staring straight over my shoulder. When I look back, I notice that it’s not just her. Everyone in our vicinity has not only noticed the confrontation but has recognized Dax as well. Soon, a series of cell phone lights start popping up all around us, like hundreds of battery-powered fireflies, with cameras aimed straight at the pair. Their excitement about filming this juicy behind-the-scenes snapshot is palpable, and I just know it’ll be trending within minutes. As limited as my knowledge about pro fighting is, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that bad press in the lead-up to a title match can really hurt Dax.
And what did he mean when he told me to take my brothers with me? Does this have something to do with them? There’s nothing I can do about Dax and the thug, who are still tiptoeing around a full-on fight, so I start weaving my way through the crowd to try and get back to Kate and the others. Maybe Aiden will be able to tell me what the hell is going on.
“Gem!” Kate grabs hold of me and gives me a shake. “Where the hell were you? I told you to stay close.”
I glance back over my shoulder, but Dax is already well-hidden by a wall of people. It’s like I’ve slipped through a wormhole, and the party on this side is still blissfully untouched.
“Is everything okay? What happened?”
It doesn’t surprise me that even in the thick of a laser-light smoke show, Kate can still instantly tell when something’s wrong with me.
“Have you seen Aiden?” I ask.
She frowns slightly, but then motions her head in the direction of the bar. “What’s going on?”
I shake my head slowly, and say, “I’m not sure yet,” as I start to navigate my way to Aiden and, hopefully, the answers.