Shane (Mallick Brothers 1)

“Oh,” she said, her smile slow and almost a little blinding. It was a smile of a woman who had known darkness and found her way to the light. Women like that, they smiled like the sun. One day, I hoped to smile that way too. “Then it’s even more awesome that you used that word,” she said, ripping the metal handles off the to-go cartons and sticking them all in the microwave together. “So. What are you wearing tonight?”

“I hadn’t really gotten that far yet.”

“Good. I figured as much. See, the thing is, I like clothes. And I really like going-out clothes. With three little kids, I don’t get out much anymore. I think it makes all my old going-out clothes sad. So I figured I would bring them over here and you could show them a night out on the town.”

I smiled at that, not quite sure what ‘going-out’ clothes meant to Fee because she was standing in my kitchen in a tight red snakeskin miniskirt, a black tank top that was wrapped around her chest and stomach like a bandage, and black stiletto sandals that had to have been at least five inches. I had never seen the woman looking anything less than like she stepped out of a fashion magazine. “I think your clothes might be a little tight and short on me,” I confessed. Though we were somewhat similar in the hip, boob, and ass department, I was taller and just a smidge wider.

“Even better,” she declared as the microwave beeped. “So,” she started, back to me as she looked around in my cabinets for plates which she found and started heaping food onto. “What happened in the place with no cameras? Do I need to have anything professionally cleaned?”

I snorted at that, shaking my head. “We haven’t had sex.”

“Yet.”

Yeah, well, I couldn’t argue with that. The way things were going, I was pretty sure Shane and I were going to do it eventually. Hell, maybe sometime during our date.

“Yet,” I agreed, taking my plate and following Fee who had, in just five minutes, seemed to make herself completely at home in my apartment. She pushed some clothes out of the way and sat up at the top of my bed, legs cocked to the side so she could balance her plate on them, and looking around.

“It’s not as bad as I thought it would be from the outside,” she said, gesturing with her fork. “I know Shane says he has reasons to keep it all crackhead-chic but I don’t think it would kill him to slap a coat of pain on the insides at least.” She turned to me then, green eyes a little more intense. “You don’t really live here, do you?”

Not quite understanding, I gave her a confused smile. “Of course I live here. I have burns from that freaking radiator that turns itself on whenever it damn well pleases to prove it.”

“No, I mean… you crash here,” she explained. “You have your clothes and a couple kitchen essentials here, but that’s it. You don’t live here. When I first moved to New York when I was younger, I lived in a building like this- shitty neighborhood, shitty fellow tenants, shitty super who never kept the place up. But I lived there. My apartment was like my own little slice of sanctuary. It barely even looks like you plan on staying here through the weekend.”

Well, she had a point there. I had tried to not get attached, to put down roots. I didn’t want to feel the pain if or when I had to yank them back out again. “This was a necessary evil,” I hedged. “When I first moved here, I barely had a couple pennies to rub together. This fit my budget.”

“So you’re waiting to level up,” she said, nodding. “Makes sense. You have that ‘I can handle myself’ vibe, but no sane woman wants to live in this neighborhood if she doesn’t have to.”

“I’ve lived in some crummy areas before, but not one where I can literally see prostitutes on a corner.”

Fee laughed. “If you give it some time, you’ll get used to the strange power dynamic in Navesink Bank. You didn’t seem to miss a step when you heard what the Mallick family business is.”

“Did you freak?”

“Ah, no,” she said, twirling some noodles onto her fork. “I met Hunter when he was actively trying to get out of the family business. He just wanted to do the tattoo thing. But even if that was still his life, I don’t think it would have stopped me honestly. There was just something there, you know? I have a dark past and he met me during a pretty gray part of it. He saw me in some pretty unpleasant situations and it didn’t seem to bother him. I never had someone see all my ugly and be able to take it. It didn’t push him away. And I think that acceptance of it helped me to overcome it. Love can be funny that way. I never thought I would be that chick,” she said, shaking her head at herself.