And I just managed to drive away without looking again at Detective Mitch Lawson, his perfect body, his great hair, his fabulous lips or his beautiful eyes.

Chapter One

Doohickey

“Hello this is Mara Hanover in unit 6C. I’ve called three times today and I really need someone to come over and look at my bathroom tap. It won’t turn off. Can you please have the maintenance guy come around? Thanks.”

I flipped my cell shut after leaving my voicemail message and stared at my bathroom faucet that hadn’t turned off after I was finished with it that morning. I called the Management Office of the complex before going to work (leaving a message). When I didn’t get a call back, I called at lunch (leaving another message). Now I was home after work and it was past office hours but someone was supposed to be on call all the time. I should have had a callback. I needed a callback. What I didn’t need was a water bill out the roof or to try to go to sleep listening to running water while thinking of my money flowing down the drain.

I sighed and kept staring at the water running full blast out of my faucet.

I was a woman who had lived alone her entire adult life. I’d once had a long-term relationship with a Five Point Five that got nowhere near living together. This was because I was a Two Point Five, he was a Five Point Five and he wanted a Nine Point Five. Therefore, we were both destined for a broken heart. He gave me mine. He later found a Six Point Five that wanted a Nine Point Five. She got herself a breast enhancement and nose job which made her a firm Seven (if you didn’t count the fact that she thought she was a Ten point Five and acted like it which really knocked her down to a Six) who broke his heart.

Regardless of the fact that I was now thirty-one and had lived alone since I was eighteen, I knew nothing about plumbing or cars. Every time something happened with my plumbing or my car, I vowed to myself that I would learn something about plumbing or cars. I would get that said something fixed and I’d totally forget my vow. Then I’d lament forgetting my vow in times like I was experiencing right now.

I walked out of my master bath, through my bedroom, down the hall into my open plan living-slash-kitchen-slash-dining area and out the front door. I crossed the breezeway and knocked on Derek and LaTanya’s door.

Derek knew something about plumbing. I knew this because of two things. First he was a man and men had a sixth plumbing sense. Second I knew this because he was a plumber.

LaTanya opened the door and her big, dark eyes widened with LaTanya Delight.

LaTanya Delight was different than anyone else’s delight and therefore deserved a capital letter. It was louder, brasher, brighter and cheerier. The look on her face communicated her joy at seeing me like she and I had been separated at birth and was right then being blissfully reunited; not like she’d just seen me the night before when she came over to watch Glee with me.

“Hey girl!” she squealed through a big smile. “Perfect timing. I’m about to mix a batch of mojitos. Get your ass in here and I’ll pour us some cocktails!”

I smiled at her but shook my head. “Can’t,” I told her. “Something’s up with my faucet, the office hasn’t returned my calls and I really need Derek to look at it. Is he around?”

I sensed movement at my side and LaTanya did too. We both looked that way to see Detective Mitch Lawson walking up the stairs carrying four plastic grocery bags.

If I was a Seven to Ten and in his zone which could mean in his life, I would lecture him about plastic grocery bags. Considering the state of the environment, no one should use plastic grocery bags, not even hot guys who could get away with practically anything. Since I was not and I didn’t know him and couldn’t know him for fear of expiring from pleasure should he, say, speak more than a few words to me, I’d never get the chance to lecture him about plastic grocery bags.

“Yo Mitch!” LaTanya greeted him loudly with Delight.

“Hey LaTanya,” Mitch greeted back then his beautiful eyes skimmed to me and his lips tipped up further, “Hey.”

“Hey,” I replied, locked my legs, ignored the whoosh I felt in my belly and looked back at LaTanya. She was checking out Detective Mitch Lawson as any woman should or she would be immediately reported to then thrown out of the Woman Club. I heard the rustling of bags but I ignored it and called her name to get her attention. When I got it, I repeated, “Is Derek around? I wouldn’t bother him but my faucet won’t turn off and I really need someone to look at it.”

“He’s not here, Mara, sorry, babe,” LaTanya replied. “You say the office hasn’t called you back?”

“No,” I told her and was about to ask her if she would send Derek over when he got home when I heard from my side:

“You want me to look at it?”

This came from Detective Mitch Lawson and I sucked in breath and twisted my neck so only my head was facing him. He was standing outside his open apartment door still carrying his bags and his eyes were on me.

My mind went blank. I lost the lock on my legs and my knees wobbled.

God, he was beautiful.

“Mara,” I heard from far away and even though I heard it and it was my name, I didn’t respond. “Mara!” I heard again. This time louder and sharper, my body jolted and I turned to LaTanya.

“What?” I asked.

“Mitch’ll look at it, that cool with you?” she asked me.

I blinked at her.

No. No it was not cool with me.

What did I do?

I couldn’t have him in my apartment walking through my bedroom to look at my faucet. That would mean he’d be in my apartment. That would mean he’d walk through my bedroom. And that would mean I’d have to speak more than one word to him.

Crap!

I looked to Detective Mitch Lawson and said the only thing I could say.

“That would be really kind.”

He stared at me a second then lifted the bags an inch and muttered, “Let me get rid of these and I’ll be over.”

I swallowed then called, “Okay,” to his closing door.

I watched his door close and then I kept watching his closed door wondering if the weird feeling I was having was just panic or a precursor to a heart attack. Then LaTanya called my name again so I looked at her.

“You okay?” she asked, studying me closely.

I had not, incidentally, shared my love for Detective Mitch Lawson with LaTanya, Derek, Brent, Bradon or anyone. This was because I thought they’d think I was a little insane (or a stalker). They often invited him to parties and such and if he came, I would usually make my excuses and leave. They’d never cottoned on. I figured mostly because he didn’t often attend their parties due to his being a police officer with long hours but also because he had his buds over for games and his babes over for other things. He wasn’t the type of man who went to g*y men’s parties or LaTanya’s cocktail extravaganzas. The ones he went to I suspected he did just to be neighborly. Though Derek, more often than not, went to his place to watch games. Usually in order to escape LaTanya’s cocktail extravaganzas which were frequent occasions.