Page 41 of Feel Me

“Take out,” she says, munching on what sounds like potato chips. “You know I don’t cook.”

“You’ve been on your own for like ten years and are fucking engaged, and youstilldon’t know how to cook?”

“Just because I’m a woman doesn’t mean I have to learn how to cook. But I have to say, Finnie’s gotten pretty good at it. The other night he had us over for Shepard’s Pie. I’ll be honest, despite the crust being harder than a drill sergeant’s nutsack, it was pretty good.”

I hang up and call Tess.

“Can I tell you something?” I ask when she answers.

“Sure,” Tess says sounding cautious.

“Mel invited me over her place for dinner. I want to bring something other than wine. I think roses will be too much and dessert will make me look like a pussy.” If Tess wasn’t officially family, and if I wasn’t so irritated after dealing with Wren, I wouldn’t be so blunt.

I wait. When she doesn’t say anything, I ask, “So what do you think?”

“You’re going to Melissa’s for dinner?” she repeats like she can hardly believe it.

“Yeah, I?”

“I told you!” Curran barks on the other end of the line. There’s some shuffling before he starts talking into the mic. “Did you fuck her already?”

“Curran!” Tess yells back at him.

“I’m serious,” Curran says, ignoring the way Tess calls him a Neanderthal. “Cause me and a few badges in your office have a pool going?off the record of course?about whether you and Melissa are banging.”

“You andmyinvestigatorshave a bet about me and Melissa?”

“It’s a cop thing,” Curran says, ignoring how pissed I am. “Anyway, if you’ve already fucked her, I’ve already lost. But if you can hang in there a little longer?just till Thanksgiving?”

I hang up and head to the store to buy wine.

I hop up the steps of the converted row home where Mel lives. It’s nice, one apartment on each floor in one of the trendier neighborhoods in town. There’s a restaurant on the corner, and a few more about two blocks down. This is the perfect place to be young and single in Philly, but I get the feeling Mel’s not taking advantage of everything this area has to offer.

“Hi,” she says smiling when she answers the door.

“Hey,” I say, trying to keep my eyes from bulging when I see what she’s wearing.

It’s cool for late August. I wore dark jeans and a T-shirt to appear more casual, along with the damn leather jacket Wren gave me for Christmas. Mel, she’s in tiny denim shorts, a tight black T-shirt that gathers around her full breasts, and an open plaid shirt. Her hair is piled in a messy bun on top of her head with just a few strands dangling to frame her face.

She doesn’t look pretty or even cute.

She looks beautiful.

“This is what I wear when I cook,” she says, laughing and attempting tofucking apologizefor how she’s dressed. “Between the heat from the stove and oven, and how insulated the units are, it gets really hot in my kitchen.”

Oh, baby, I bet it does.

She reaches for my bottle of wine and the lame-assed apple pie I bought at the bakery. “Come on in,” she says, padding down the hall on her bare feet. “Just lock the door behind you.”

Her ass shakes as she hurries back into the kitchen. God Almighty, how in the hell am I not going to have sex with this woman? I flip the lock. I want her, there’s no doubt. But the whole drive here I’ve entertained everything that can go wrong if I spend the night.

She isn’t just my boss’s daughter, she’s mysickboss’s daughter. She’s vulnerable, and easily hurt with everything going on with her dad, exactly like Tess said.

I step into the small foyer, my eyes still very much on her ass as I shrug out of my jacket. Christ, could I be more of a prick. “Where can I put this?” I ask.

She glances over her shoulder, smiling in a way that lights up her entire face has me tripping over my own damn feet. “Closet. To your right,” she says.

I open the door to hang my jacket. About three pairs of very worn running shoes line the bottom. “You run?” I ask, shutting the door.

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