21. A Ride On A Stallion

When it comes to forgiveness, Krislynn was either a complete pushover or she didn’t understand the meaning of it. The trend was typical and predictable – females, children and people with sad pasts or backgrounds got their way with her while all the rest, especially good-looking guys with money and an attitude, got the very worst.

Dressed in the sleek dress she wore last night with Chase’s black suit jacket over top and one high heel in each hand, Krislynn kicked Chase’s behind with the sole of her foot the moment they both exited their hotel room. “Come on,” she giggled. “Down.”

Chase stood like a rigid wax figure a metre ahead of her inside the hotel corridor. “Screw that,” he scowled. “I’m not doing it. You can’t make me!”

Krislynn made a face at his response. “Do I have to remind you that you were the one who said it?” She asked. “You be my piglet. I’ll be your donkey. Huh?! Who was the one who said that?”

“Yeah, but I didn’t mean it literally!”

“Fine, don’t do it.” Krislynn crossed her arms in front of her and raised her shoulders in an apathetic shrug. “But I’m going to tell everybody you didn’t even last two seconds in bed.”

“No one’s going to believe you!”

“You want to gamble on it? I’m sure Michelle will have a laugh. I’ll even shout to it the paparazzi the next time I see them. The headlines will read ‘Chase Evans has lost his touch!’”

“Okay! Fine!” Chase turned around and threw her a dark glare. “But if I do this one thing for you, you have to keep your end of the promise too, okay?”

“Yeah. Yeah. I won’t bring it up anymore.”

“And you won’t spread any weird rumours.”

“I won’t.”

“And you’ll fully acknowledge that I didn’t take advantage of you last night.”

“You didn’t.”

“And you won’t put laxatives in my food or nothing as some sort of sick, twisted revenge.” Chase waited, but Krislynn remained silent. “What the hell?! Say it, damn it! Repeat it! Tell me you won’t!”

“I won’t,” she moaned. “I don’t even know why you would think that in the first place.” Not sure he fully believed her, Chase heaved a sigh. “Well, are you going to do it?” She pressed with a hopeful smile. “While there’s still no one around?”

“I can’t believe I’m going to do this.” Grunting, Chase quickly checked left and right, and after making sure the corridor was empty, reluctantly got down on his knees. “Only to the elevator,” he murmured. “Then you get off and we’ll never talk about any of this ever again.”

She laughed. “Done.”

Lowering his hands palms down onto the carpet, Chase waited until he felt Krislynn’s weight on top of his back. “This is so stupid,” he muttered, though the obscenity of the situation aroused him a little bit. “And you’re fat.”

Krislynn completely ignored him. “Giddy up,” she shouted cheerfully. “Giddy up horsey! Giddy up!”

Glad nobody was available to witness this whole charade, Chase quickly started crawling down the hallway – the faster he got to the elevator, the faster he could put this whole thing behind him. Still, try as he might, the corridor was long and the elevator was on the other end of it. Deciding that a one second break won’t hurt, he slowed down and paused after passing the halfway point just as the door he stopped in front of opened.

A pair of high heels stopped just outside the door. “Oh my god, last night was so much fun! I wonder what happened to Kris...”

A long awkward silence filled the atmosphere as both Krislynn and Chase looked up and found Michelle looking down at them with a blank expression on her face. “Yeah last night was fun,” a familiar male voice echoed from inside the room she just stepped out of. “You’re so smart for telling me to send them up into a hotel room and then leave them there. They have some messed up sexual chemistry. I bet you anything they banged.”

Seth appeared not a second after his statement, towering behind Michelle in front of the doorway. “Why are you just standing there Shell-bell? Is there...” His eyes found the image his fiancée was apparently fixated upon, and he too, stood there without movement. “What kind of sick fantasy are you guys playing out?”

Chase snorted. Then he reared back like an ill-breed stallion and dropped Krislynn on her ass before dusting himself off and swinging his arm around Seth’s neck, pulling him along as he took long strides down the corridor.  

Rubbing her behind which had just kissed the floor, Krislynn staggered to her feet with Michelle’s help and then glared into Chase’s back as he made it to the end of the hallway and then disappeared inside the elevator. The nerve of him! Why did he always have to act that way – nice and playful one moment and then cold and brutal the next!

Michelle’s devious smirk – which Krislynn was slowly getting used to – spread like strawberry jam across her face. “So how was it?” She chirped.

“Horrible!” Krislynn shouted. “He didn’t even last two seconds!”

A couple hours later, after a warm shower and a fresh change of clothes, Michelle took Krislynn out for lunch at one of her favourite spots downtown. The guys had long disappeared off elsewhere after checking out, and Krislynn had hitched a ride back to Michelle’s apartment with her where they freshened up.

“I’m so mad at you.” With her head placed on the wooden exterior of the table, Krislynn circled her arms around her stomach which gurgled and rumbled like a ship being thrown back and forth across the ocean surface. “I can’t believe you set us up.”

Michelle only laughed as she blew on her latte and then elegantly took a sip. “Sorry. Habit of mine. Besides, I had to help you get Chase into the palm of your hands before that vixen gets to him.”

With that word, Krislynn lifted her head. “You mean LaCienega?”

A nod. “Oh yeah, I haven’t told you, have I? A bunch of us are heading down to Santa Monica over the weekend. You and Chase should come. It’ll be fun. Seth rented a place for a few days and we can talk and drink all night. Besides, LaCienega is coming. I’m sure your curiosity must be killing you since you’ve heard so much about her.”

Krislynn offered a shrug. Her curiosity of LaCienega was high, but it wasn’t so much that it killed her. Either way, she still wanted to go with the train of thought being wherever LaCienega is, Jace can’t be that far off. “I’ll tell Chase about it later tonight.”

After their brief lunch together, Michelle dropped Krislynn off at Chase’s house and she immediately took the opportunity to dive into her bed. She was so tired that the exhaustion was clouding her eyes, and almost as soon as her body hit the soft sheets, she drifted into a deep sleep.

Unaware of the time, Krislynn slept right through the day until someone shook her awake sometime after seven. “Krislynn, wake up.” Massaging her eyes, she lifted her sleepy eyelids just to make out a familiar male shadow hanging over her body on top of the bed. The room was dark besides the brief light that entered the premises through the door from the hallway, and her mind instantly experienced a déjà vu.

Hands reaching up into the shadowed figure, she placed her palm onto his chest as her memory jolt back the familiar feeling of soft, masculine skin rubbing against hers throughout the night. Her pulse quickened and her cheeks flushed as if she was enticed by a spell she couldn’t break free from.

“Krislynn?” The soft voice came again. “Who the fuck do you think you’re touching?” 

Krislynn instantly sat up straight, her eyes suddenly wide and alert as she turned toward the figure in the room. “Ch- Chase?” She stammered. “What the hell do you think you’re doing in my room?!” She threw a pillow at him. “Get out creep! Turn the lights on at least!”

“I was calling you for dinner,” he shouted back. “Come down before I eat everything and throw the leftovers in the garbage!”

Krislynn hissed at him as he stomped out of her room, but then quickly washed up and met him downstairs in the dining room nonetheless. The moment her feet brought her in front of the dinner table, her mouth filled with drool as her eyes had their own visual feast of all the food on the table. “Wow! It looks so good!”

Chase glared at her when he saw her, and for a second, Krislynn wondered what his problem was until realization hit her. She was the one who owed him a shit ton of money. She was the one that was working as a maid. She was the one that was supposed to be making dinner. “Oops.”

“Oops?” His nose flared. “That’s it. You’re not eating tonight!”

“Too late.” She quickly grabbed a plate of pasta and stuffed her mouth before chewing off the head of a dinner bun when it looked impossible to take in anything more. It wasn’t before long that she choked and had to tossed down a tall glass of water to relieve herself.

“Calm down,” Chase muttered. “I was only kidding. No ones taking food off your plate.”

She coughed and swallowed another gulp of water before placing the glass aside. “I was just surprised that you can actually cook,” she murmured. “It’s insanely good.”

He smirked in delight. “Of course. I’m a man with many great attributes.”

Krislynn rolled her eyes at his arrogance. “It’s just cooking. Nothing to brag about. I’ll show you how it’s really done tomorrow night.” She wiped her mouth with her napkin. “Oh yeah. Michelle says a bunch of them are hanging out in Santa Monica and wants us to come. I can’t go unless you go though so are you going to go?”

He shrugged, stuck a piece of pasta in his mouth and politely finished before he spoke. “When? This weekend?”

“Yup. Saturday until Sunday.”

He made a face. “I’ll see if I feel like it when the time comes.”

Krislynn nodded and then stayed quiet for a moment before she couldn’t keep her mouth shut any longer. “Um... Apparently, LaCienega’s going to be there.”

An awkward pause surrounded them before Chase lowered his gaze abruptly into his food. “Yeah?” He murmured nonchalantly. “Not that I care.” Though they both knew he was lying through his teeth.