Chapter Six
How Can That Be?
Amber laughed, dabbing the tears in the corners of her eyes as she shook her dark head of hair in disbelief.
“Are you completely out of your mind?” she demanded when she caught her breath. “You brought her to the bear bar? The bear cop bar? Are you insane?”
She burst out into another round of laughter and August glared at her, waiting for her to finish with her hysterics.
“What’s the big deal? Lots of regular cops go there,” he protested in his own defense.
“Lots of cops who know about us, Auggy. Not rookies who have no idea what runs through the streets of Chicago. Are you trying to get her to run screaming from the city?”
Amber abruptly stopped laughing and stared at him.
“You really like her, huh?”
“She’s in my charge—”
“Don’t give me your BS. You brought her to the sleuth and Haden, bless his drunken, idiot soul, almost ratted you out. To a civilian. You’re not usually so careless, August. Why did you do that?”
He stared at her, a dozen excuses ready to spring from his lips, but he truly had no real reason for what he’d done. He hadn’t thought it through, certainly, but he’d wanted to bring Melissa into his fold.
But how can that be? I don’t know her. She’s a civilian, as Amber said.
“I need to meet this woman,” Amber said suddenly. “Bring her over for dinner.”
August snorted. “Bring her over for dinner?” he repeated. “Do you actually live here now?”
“August, is she a civilian? Or is she something more?”
“She’s my partner now,” he said firmly, looking away. He could feel Amber’s eyes burning into him.
“No,” she said softly. “She’s more than that. Is she your mate, August?”
“That’s impossible,” he snapped, whirling away from his sister. “She can’t be.”
“It’s the only thing that makes sense for how you’re acting,” Amber insisted.
“How can that be?” he barked back. “She’s not a shifter.”
“Maybe she is and doesn’t know it,” Amber replied quietly and August inhaled.
“She’s in her twenties, Amber. If she was a shifter, she’d know it by now.”
“No,” she countered. “Not necessarily.”
August turned to look at her again, his mind racing. He couldn’t understand why his desire to protect Melissa far outweighed anything he’d ever known. What Amber was suggesting certainly made sense—that his behavior was being governed by his primitive brain.
But only if Melissa really is my mate.
“I don’t need this right now,” he griped, refusing to think about it.
“So what are you going to do, then? See her every day and ignore the fact that you’re in love with her?”
“I can’t be in love with her,” he retorted. “That’s absurd. She’s not a shifter.”
“And yet you’re behaving like she’s your mate.”
The siblings eyed one another and August knew Amber was being the voice of reason but he couldn’t wrap his mind around what was happening.
“Amber, I don’t think she knows anything about us,” he told her urgently. “I’m not going to be the one to break it to her.”
“Someone better,” Amber scoffed. “I can’t imagine what it would be like not to know. I mean, how does that even happen?”
Suddenly, the echo of Melissa’s voice played through his mind and he realized exactly how it had.
Assuming that our theory is correct.
In his mind’s eye, he heard her plaintively explaining how her mother had shifted them around her entire childhood, running from an abusive father.
What if her mother knew all along and was trying to hide the truth from Melissa?
“Shit…” he muttered, not noticing he’d spoken aloud.
“So, you gonna invite her over for dinner?” Amber asked nonchalantly, the jeer in her voice evident.
“Shit,” he said again, this time audibly. “I guess I don’t have much of a choice, do I?”
~ ~ ~
At lunch on Wednesday, August did his best to keep his calm as he searched Melissa’s face for signs of being a shifter.
Not that I would know what to look for in a woman. If she hadn’t been raised among a sleuth, she has probably never shifted.
“Silas, you’re making me uncomfortable,” Melissa sighed and he peered at her, his mouth agape.
“Uncomfortable? How?” he demanded, his cheeks growing warm.
“You’re looking at me like I’m a specimen under a microscope or something. Is there something stuck in my teeth?”
He forced a smile and shook his head, his pulse racing.
“I need to ask you something,” he told her before he could lose his nerve. “Will you have dinner at my place tonight?”
Shock painted her face a swirl of red and white. Melissa’s front teeth closed over the curve of her bottom lip and she nodded but as she tried to speak, no words came out.
“My sister will be there,” he assured her, rushing on to make the invitation seem less bizarre, but if anything, Melissa’s face twisted into more confusion.
“Oh.”
“It’s nothing formal,” August continued. “I was just talking so much about you and she’s staying with me. I thought, since we’re partners and everything, that we could get together for…”
He stopped speaking, recognizing that he was rambling, and rolled his eyes skyward as if seeking help.
“Listen,” he exhaled. “I know it sounds weird and you don’t have to come, obviously.”
“I want to come.”
There was no hesitation in her response and August felt his heartrate speed up slightly.
“Great. I-I’ll text you the address. Like I said, it’s totally casual.”
“What can I bring?” she asked and he stifled the answer he wanted to give.
“Just yourself,” he replied softly. Their eyes met across the scarred Formica countertop and August knew then that he was in over his head.
“How does this work?” Melissa asked and he arched an eyebrow in question.
“How does what work?”
“Dating inside the office?”
He began to choke on the French fry in his mouth and Melissa gawked at him before pounding on his back with a closed fist.
It took him several minutes to regain his breath and when he did, he was met with Melissa’s confused but frosty stare.
“Did I say something wrong?” she demanded and he shook his head.
“No,” he sputtered. “It just went down the wrong tube.”
“There’s only one tube,” she countered and he had to laugh.
“Come on,” he said before she could bring up the question again. “We should get back to work.”
He grabbed his hat off the table and ambled toward the door, knowing that Melissa was right behind.
Dating. Is that what we’ll be doing?
Whatever it was, August knew one thing for certain—he had no idea what to expect.
~ ~ ~
After their shift was finished, August texted his personal number and address to Melissa.
“Eight, okay?” he told her when they parted and she nodded, a sudden wariness appearing on her face.
Is she having second thoughts?
The idea filled him with dread.
“You’re sure there’s nothing I can bring?”
“Nothing,” he insisted. “Just show up hungry.”
They parted ways but instead of returning to his car parked in the back lot, August made his way to his cubicle and sat down, looking around furtively even though he knew he wasn’t technically doing anything wrong.
Still, he felt like he was betraying Melissa’s confidence somehow as he pulled up her personal file and began to read through it.
He’d already gone through it once but that was before he’d realized how connected he was to the woman. When he’d seen it previously, his mind had not been about knowing the person behind the paper.
The information was the same as it had always been.
Graduated second in her class at the academy, stellar student, excellent shot. Psych looks good. Only child, mother deceased three years ago.
The files were ungratifying to read because they didn’t tell him what he wanted to know the most.
Who are her parents?
That was going to take more research and, glancing at his watch, August knew he had a bit of time before Amber started calling down his phone, telling him to pick up items at the grocery store on the way home.
He typed in the name he had on file for her mother.
Lisa Stark.
CODIS gave him nothing of an outstanding criminal nature but a search through MICT showed that indeed, the Starks had moved around more than any small child should.
He worked the system further back and looked into hospital records for Lisa and his brow furrowed.
There were countless visits to hospitals and while he couldn’t read the records, it was clear that Lisa had been very sick, gauging by the amount of time she’d spent in hospitals. The knowledge filled August with dread.
If she died of illness, she’s not one of us. Lisa Stark couldn’t have been a shifter.
That would certainly explain why Melissa didn’t know the truth about herself. Her mother had probably found out that her father was a shifter, something that August had already considered.
I need to find out about Melissa’s father.
“Hey, Silas! How’s it going with the newbie?”
He turned his head guiltily, his face flushing as Sergeant Walker approached, clapping his shoulder heartily. “I heard she’s already making a name for herself as a hostage negotiator.”
Sarge laughed at his own joke and August forced a smile, hoping that his superior didn’t notice the file on his screen, but it was asking too much.
“Uh oh,” Walker sighed, noting the information immediately. “Are you looking into her background already? Does she need an assessment with the shrink?”
“NO!” August growled with more ferocity than he intended. “No, she’s fine. She’s great.”
He closed the screen and shook his head.
“She mentioned being estranged from her father and I was wondering if he was one of us.”
It was a lie but it was one which would explain why he was looking through the personal files of his new partner.
“I haven’t heard if he was,” Walker offered, moving away from the desk. “Hey, you up for a drink? It’s trivia night at Barlow’s.”
“Another time,” August said, jumping up from his chair. “I’ve got dinner plans.”
Walker paused to give him a sly look over his shoulder. “Oh? Hot date?” he asked, arching an eyebrow.
“Something like that,” August managed to choke out. The sudden thought of his sergeant and all the other detectives in his squad knowing that he was interested in a rookie was overwhelming him.
You’re getting a little ahead of yourself, he scoffed. You haven’t even had a proper date with this woman and you’re already filling out HR forms about a relationship which might not even be feasible.
Yet no amount of reason could smother the excitement growing inside him as he hurried out of the precinct and got into his car.
Amber will help me make sense of this, he thought. Together we’ll show Melissa her real potential.
He wondered, then, why he couldn’t shake the sense of foreboding which seemed to shadow him all the way home.