CHAPTER 9
Declan
Trenti is one of the most elite restaurants in town, custom tailoring their menu for each guest. The food is incredible, the service impeccable. I’ve been here a few times, all with big-wigs with even bigger wallets. But tonight’s a little different. I’m not here to rub elbows with a bunch of suits. I’m here to show a woman what she’s missing out on.
Candles flicker along each table in the dimly lit room. I march across the dark wood floors, following behind the hostess who pauses to give me a very long and appraising glance. Maybe it’s the Armani suit I’m wearing, or the cologne, or lack of tie that caught her interest. Either way, I don’t care. I keep my attention on the table at the far end, a smirk splaying along my lips when I catch sight of Melissa’s stunned face.
As much as I want to speak to her first, I address her father because it’s been too damn long since I’ve seen him. “Good evening, Miles,” I say, shaking his hand. “Sorry, I’m late.” To Melissa, I simply wink, trying not to laugh at the way her jaw practically smacks against the table.
She lowers the glass of water she’s holding onto the white tablecloth. “What are you doing here?” she asks slowly.
“What do you mean?” I say, keeping my grin. “I couldn’t miss your father’s coming out party.” I motion to his menu. “Ready for more than just mashed potatoes, Miles?”
He chuckles, placing his hand against his stomach to suppress the pain laughing causes. Seven inches of colon. That’s how much they removed. Two days after the surgery, he was already calling to check up on things. “I have it covered. Just get better,” I told him.
I only hope he can.
Miles confided in me that Mel visits him almost every night after work. He’s worried about her. I am, too. It’s like all this woman knows is SACU and her dad. It wouldn’t be so bad if Miles wasn’t so sick. But he is.
She keeps her chin up and I admire her for it. But if she gave me the chance, I’d like to give her more to smile about, more to enjoy in life. Except every time I ask her out, she shoots me down.
“Did they cater a menu to your needs?” I ask, pretending like I belong here as much as she does, despite the way she’s covering her face.
“Salmon stuffed with black beans, covered with a zesty diablo sauce over tortellini,” Miles says. He makes a face. “But when Melissa informed them of my recent surgery he switched it to polenta with a light mushroom sauce.” He narrows his eyes at his daughter, feigning anger he doesn’t quite manage. “She gets the good stuff. I get cornbread topped with mushrooms.”
“I’m not surprised,” I say. “That daughter of yours is too much of a rule follower for her own good.”
She ignores my reference to her “thou shall not date a co-worker” commandment. “It’ll be easier to digest.” She points at me. “And you butt out, counselor.”
“Now, Melissa,” he says, “Is this any way to talk to our guest?”
“Dad, behave. You’re already in trouble with me. Cozy dinner my Aunt Fanny,” she mumbles.
I lift my water glass and take a sip, enjoying the exchange between Melissa and her father.
“You hear how she treats me?” Miles asks. “You’d think after all those dates I gave up to take her to the movies, and door to door selling those damn cookies, she’d show me a little respect.”
She crinkles her nose, laughing, although she’s trying to sound annoyed. “You never gave up any dates. If anything, you used your sweet little innocent daughter to get them.”
“Bull shit,” Miles says.
She turns to me, pegging me with an expression that tells me she’s up to no good. “Okay, we’ll let Declan be the judge.”
I hold up a hand. “Oh, no. I’m only here for a delicious drama free meal.”
Melissa ignores me, edging her seat closer until our knees bump. If her old man wasn’t here, my hand would be finding its way on that knee. She’s in a seafoam green dress with capped sleeves and she looks fucking fantastic.
“Okay,” she says, motioning to her breasts. “You might have guessed I hit puberty a little young.”
I try not to laugh and even harder not to look. I fail on both counts. Melissa notices, her eyes widening briefly before she averts her gaze and glances at me with lowered lashes. Aw, hell, she’s sexy.
She clears her throat, edging a little further from me. “Dad was oblivious. ‘You don’t need those things’, he said when I asked him to take me bra shopping.”
“Those things?” I ask, shifting my attention to Miles.
“Declan, I was more prepared to fly a plane around the world than I was for puberty. You’ll forgive me if I wasn’t exactly jumping up and down.”
“He was mortified,” Mel agrees. “At first.”
“Oh, yeah?” I ask, catching the way Miles’s face reddens as he chuckles.
“Mmm-hmm. And I honestly felt bad for making him take me,” she admits. “But turns out, if you want to pick up women, all you have to do is take your little daughter to Victoria’s Secret and tell the horde―that’s right horde of sales associates who rush you―and all the single mothers shopping there with their daughters listening in―how you don’t know the first thing about lingerie. And how tough it is being a single dad and trying do right by your daughter―”
“She’s exaggerating,” Miles interjects, reaching for his water.
“Am I?” she asks. “How many phone numbers did you get the first time we went there?”
Miles shrugs. “Six, maybe seven.”
Melissa rolls her eyes. “More like nine. His social calendar was booked for the next month.” She veers on her dad. “By your third date, I no longer believed you were hanging pictures in your bedroom.”
“Hanging pictures?” I ask, taking another sip of water.
Mel purses her lips. “It’s how he explained all the banging coming from his bedroom.”
I almost spit out my water, making Miles crack up and hang tight to his side. “How many women were you taking home?”
He sits back in his chair, blotting the perspiration forming along his brow. As much as it appears to hurt him, he seems to welcome the laughter.
It’s probably been a long while since he had a good time.
“There weren’t that many women.” His eyes cut Mel’s way. “But enough that warranted an excuse, however pathetic.”
“He used to sneak them out in the morning before I’d see them.” She crosses her arms. “But I knew those tramps were there.”
“They weren’t tramps.” He pretends to think about it. “At least twenty-two to twenty-eight percent attended church on a regular basis.”
“Nice, Daddy,” she says, standing.
“Where are you going?” he asks.
“Ladies room. I’ll be right back.”
I stand with her, sitting only once she disappears. “So tell me, out of all those women, you never found the one? Someone who’d make a good wife and mother?” Seeing how devoted he is to Mel, it’s shocking he never married.
Miles hangs onto his smile, but it lacks enthusiasm now that Mel’s gone. “The ones who kept my interest didn’t hang around for long.”
“Why?”
“One in particular couldn’t stay. The U.S. wasn’t her home. The others wouldn’t stay because of Melissa.” He swivels the water in his glass, taking a moment to gather his words and allowing what he said to sink in. His admission is an emotional slap across the face. I barely move. Miles seems to realize, taking another moment to explain. “As with most new relationships, they expected to be the priority, and for me to devote my spare time to them. But I couldn’t, not when Melissa needed me more.”
“Because of her special needs?”
He nods. “I always thought I’d marry and have a few kids. It’s how life is, am I right? Something most people do. I never thought I’d have a child without a wife, let alone adopt one on my own. But when I met Melissa, I couldn’t bring myself to walk away. I’d handled enough cases to know what would happen to her, especially given how severely delayed and malnourished she was. She was just a kid. With no chance at surviving the system. Something inside me told me not to let her go. So I didn’t.” He lowers his glass. “It was the best decision I’ve ever made.”
He means it. I can tell. But it’s clear how much he gave up for her. “Any regrets?”
He thinks about it. “I wish I could have found the right woman, not for me necessarily, but for her. I played the role of mother and father, and for the most part I think I played it well. But there were times she needed more. If a boy hurt her, my first reaction was to threaten to pound the shit out of him.”
“That’s understandable,” I say, my anger stirring just knowing she’s been hurt.
“But that’s not what Melissa needed. She needed a protector, certainly. But she also needed someone who could let her cry and relate to the pain she was feeling. I couldn’t do that, too caught up in wanting to knock out the boy who reduced my little girl to tears.”
I think I should say something. But though I pride myself on being quick on my feet, nothing comes to mind. Maybe that’s a good thing. Maybe Miles just wants to be heard.
“She came to me the first time she had her heart broken,” he says, his stare growing distant. “He was the first boy she considered a good friend and the first she developed strong feelings toward. You can imagine how crushed she was when he asked a friend of hers to the fall dance instead of her. If that wasn’t bad enough, he admitted he couldn’t see himself with someone like her.”
“Someone like her?” I repeat. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“I don’t know,” he responds. “But that’s not the point. It’s what he said and how she took it.” He shrugs, trying to play it off as if it no longer matters even though I think it does. “I called him an asshole and told her she was too good for him.”
“It’s probably the same thing I would have done,” I say. In addition to stalking his ass and bashing his face in.
“Maybe,” he says. “But it wasn’t what she needed. She was trying to tell me she didn’t feel good enough, and that she never would. Instead of ripping into the little bastard and putting him down, I should have been building her up.” He motions to the women at the next table. “A mother would have known that.”
“I see your point,” I say. “But everything I’ve come to know about Melissa shows me you did a damn good job.”
He sighs. “Hopefully, but as a parent you always wish you could have done better, said something a little differently, tried a little harder, and opened your mind a little more. She’s my greatest gift, but one I don’t think I’ve given enough back to.”
I meet him square in the eye so that he knows that I mean what I say. “Miles, Melissa couldn’t have asked for a better mother or father than you.”
“God, I hope so,” he says, finishing off his water.
Melissa returns then, laughing when I stand. “Quit pretending to be a gentleman just because my father is here.”
“Just being myself,” I say, throwing in another wink.
“If you were, you’d already have that blonde’s phone number listed under your contacts,” she says, tilting her head to the right.
Funny, I hadn’t even noticed her looking at me. But with Mel around, I have a hard time noticing other women. Her intelligence and sexiness are more than enough to hold my attention. Considering what a whore I am, it should scare the unholy shit out of me.
“It’s still not too late to get laid, counselor,” she tells me.
True, but it’s not the blonde I want to take to bed. I don’t tell her with Miles here. But I would if we were alone.
I groan, making a face like she’s left me no choice, but to retaliate. “You’re making me pull out the big guns.” She cocks her head, unsure what I mean. I ignore her and address Miles. “Care to share any embarrassing stories involving Melissa’s ex-boyfriends? I’m sure her magnetic personality have lured plenty of boys home.”
“Declan,” she warns.
“I can’t,” Miles begins.
“Thanks, Dad,” she says.
“There’re too many to choose from,” he continues. He ignores Melissa’s gasp and begins to tell me about Rodrigo, a state senator’s son who tried to serenade her beneath her bedroom window.
“He wanted to be a professional singer,” Miles says, grimacing. “But the boy couldn’t sing. It was like a desperate cat, trying to make his way up a chimney. And you knew the little guy wasn’t going to make it.”
“He’s not joking,” Melissa admits, pouting her sweet lips. “By the second chorus I had to remove my hearing aids so I could finish my schoolwork. He couldn’t take the hint I simply wasn’t interested.”
With a sigh, she reaches for her phone.
“What are you doing?” I ask, grinning. “We’re just getting started.”
“Don’t worry, this will only take a minute,” she says, returning my smile. “Hi. It’s Melissa Fenske . . . No, nothing’s wrong. I’m having dinner with my dad and Declan. Is Curran home?”
All traces of humor immediately dissolve from my face. “Hey, Curran. Declan is here asking my father about my ex-boyfriends. But I don’t want him to feel left out, seeing how we’re only talking about me and not him. Care to share any interesting stories about his past girlfriends or hook-ups? . . . You would?” She bats my hand away when I try to reach for the phone. “Great, I’ll put you on speaker.”
She places the phone between her and her dad. “For shit’s sake,” I mutter.
Curran’s loud voice immediately fills the space between us. “Her name was Wrestling Rhonda Signaterri also known as Rhonda the Wrangler,” he begins.
No . . . not . . . Fuck.
“What an interesting nickname,” Melissa gushes. “I wonder how she acquired a name like that.”
“Wonder no more,” Curran chimes in. “So Rhonda was hot―a slutty kind of hot―but still hot. She liked to wrestle, as in got off on it. Oh, can your dad hear me?”
“Yes,” Miles answers, laughing.
“Good,” Curran says. “I don’t want him to miss a thing. Anyway, so Declan, of course, challenges her to a wrestling match, trying to get her worked up so maybe they can wrestle afterwards with their clothes off, if you know what I mean.”
“Oh, we know,” Melissa and Miles say at once, cracking up.
“Anyway, Declan wins, or so he thought. Rhonda’s breathing fast and so is he. They run back to our house knowing the house is empty and our mother is at work. But me and my brothers were curious to see if Deck gets the job done, or in this case, Rhonda done.
“We sneak back to the house only to find Declan tied Ma’s bed, spread eagle wearing nothing, but a pair of tighty whities and a grin. All our shit―our T.V., our sound system, everything is gone. Turns out while he was sleeping off the experience with Rhonda the Wrestler, her brothers Patrick the Prowler and Theodore the Thug robbed us blind.”
Melissa and Miles aren’t laughing. They’re howling, and so is Tess in the background because why not?
Curran continues. I don’t have to see him to know the son of bitch is smiling. “I don’t think we’re there two minutes before our Ma walks in. Angus, our oldest brother, tries to give Declan a running start and cuts him free. Deck barely rolls off the bed before our mother snatches him off the floor by his throat. The rest of us run for our lives. Oh, but that’s nothing. Wait till I tell you about Tina the Tramp . . .”