I’m at the steakhouse fifteen minutes early, which is on time in Chase Kelly’s book.  I’ve never been late for work or a date a single time in my life; in fact, I’ve always been early, which is a point of pride for me.  And Livia walks in at seven on the dot, something that endears me to her immensely, although the moment I register that I, Officer Kelly, am charmed, my mind goes blank.

Just blank.

There is nothing but her.

She walks in on heels that make her legs a mile long, her long hair down in a tumult of soft waves.  The maître d’ helps her take off her checkered wool coat, and then I.

Am.

Speechless.

My heart hammers up in my throat as the blood pools deep in my groin.  She’s wearing a bright red dress—so fucking short that I’d be able to finger her easily if we were in a booth, which we tragically aren’t.  The red sets off the warm undertones of her bronze skin, highlights the deep brown of her eyes.  The lines of it hug the delectable curves of her tits, which are just small enough that she can get away without wearing a bra.

My cock thickens as she begins walking toward me, and I can verify that she is definitely not wearing a bra.  Oh God, what if she’s not wearing panties either?

I bite back a groan and push back my chair to greet her as she comes to our table, tugging the hem of my sweater down in one smooth move as I unfold myself to help disguise the effect her presence has on me.

As I step forward to greet her, I notice the color high in her cheeks and the way her teeth dig into the soft coral of her bottom lip.

She looks nervous.

That gives me pause.  I don’t mind a woman meeting me cold or shy or overly eager, I don’t even mind a case of the first date jitters—since first dates are pretty much all I go on, I see a lot of those.

But nervous—truly nervous—that bothers me a little.  Do I make her feel unsafe?  Is it my size?  My job?

In a split second, I change gears.  I can be patient when it comes to the Kelly Trio, and I find that the idea of wooing my nervous little librarian on date after date doesn’t sound tiresome at all…it sounds delightful, actually.  A challenge.  A test to see if I’m worthy enough to remove all traces of trepidation from her face and fill her expression with eagerness and surrender instead.

And get more time with this fierce, sweet bookworm all to myself.

I lean in to kiss her cheek, careful to angle our bodies so that I don’t press against her with six feet, two hundred pounds of hungry cop.  Instead, I anchor her with a firm hand at her elbow, pleased to feel the goose bumps that spread underneath my touch.  And then I brush my lips against her cheek, making sure she can feel them, making sure she gets just the tiniest brush of my scruff as I accidentally-on-purpose slide my jaw against hers as I pull away.

She shivers.

I look down into her eyes as I straighten up, and I’m suddenly aware that I’m supporting a lot of weight in my hand, as if her knees are weak from my kiss.

Well done, Officer Good Times!

Her eyes are wide, the pupils so blown and her irises so dark that her eyes are just huge liquid wells of want, and I feel a familiar tug in my groin knowing that I put that look there.

“I forget how big you are,” she murmurs, her head tilted up to look into my face.

I give her my biggest grin and open my mouth, but she cuts me off before I can say it, shaking her head.  “I know, I know.  I walked right into that one.”

But the ghost of a smile flits across her lips as I help her into her seat and push in her chair.

When I sit across from her and we start looking at our menus, I notice the smile has vanished and the nervous look is back, along with a determined set to her shoulders.  The combination of uneasiness and backbone intrigues and worries me at the same time.

“I don’t know what Megan told you,” I say, “but I don’t bite.”

She looks up from the menu, her teeth back to digging into the plump flesh of her bottom lip.

“Well,” I amend, staring at her mouth, “sometimes I do bite.  But only when I really, really want to.”