Free Breaking His Rules (Feeling the Heat #4) by Alison Packard Page B

that you and Melissa are discussing her training but, come on. Do you expect us to swallow that? How many of your other clients do you meet with outside the gym...on a regular basis?”
    “A few.” Jake went on the defensive and decided not to mention he was escorting Melissa to her cousin’s wedding. He could only imagine what kind of comments
that
would incur. “I conduct a mini-boot camp at the park, remember?”
    “That’s different.” Angie smiled. “Why don’t you admit it, Jake? You like Melissa. It’s been obvious to us for months.”
    “I like all my clients,” he said, and just like when he was a kid, he crossed his fingers underneath the table. A few of his clients were difficult and almost obsessive about attaining the perfect body—tolerating them was the most he could hope for.
    “Yet here you are with Melissa, not any of them,” J.T. said, with a flourish of his hand. His shit-eating grin faltered as he stared past Jake. “Son of a bitch. I can’t believe him.”
    “What?” Jake turned in the direction of J.T.’s livid stare to see Trey Gentry had waylaid Melissa on her return trip to their booth and had his hand on her forearm. Jake’s blood began to boil as Gentry pulled Melissa closer to his barstool and whispered into her ear.
    “I think he’s trying to pick her up,” Angie commented, with amusement. “I doubt he’ll be successful.”
    “I don’t know about that,” J.T. said. “According to clubhouse gossip, he’s got a pretty decent track record.”
    “He’s not her type,” Angie said confidently.
    Something completely foreign to Jake hit him as Gentry began to caress Melissa’s bare forearm with his fingers and stared brazenly at her breasts. A cold hard knot formed in his stomach and more than anything he wanted to walk over to Gentry and break his fucking arm. Not a good idea. Breaking the throwing arm of one of the Blaze’s star pitchers could land him in jail, not to mention the Blaze would probably ban him from Blaze Field for life.
    “See. I told you,” Angie said as Melissa jerked her arm from Gentry’s grasp and headed for the booth. When she slid onto the seat beside him, her cheeks were flushed a vivid shade of pink.
    “Are you okay?” Angie asked as Melissa picked up her iced tea and took a long sip.
    “What did Gentry say to you?” Jake asked.
    “Nothing important.” She turned to him, and because he’d been on the receiving end of her smiles on many occasions, it wasn’t hard to see the one she was giving him right now was as phony as a six-dollar bill. She set her glass on the table and looked at Angie. “How’s Jordan?”
    As Angie filled Melissa in on the baby, Jake tried to make sense of his reaction to seeing Gentry hitting on Melissa. The pitcher was a well-known womanizer, but the truth was he’d been just as irritated when Mark flirted with Melissa during the game. When the hell had jealousy become one of his character traits?
    After dinner, both Angie and J.T. slid out of the booth to use the restroom, finally giving him the opportunity to satisfy his curiosity. “Okay. They’re gone. What did Gentry say to you?”
    Melissa averted her eyes. “I’d rather not say. It was rather crude.”
    “Crude?” Jake’s gut tightened. “Did he proposition you?”
    “In a manner of speaking.”
    “Either he did, or he didn’t. You can tell me, Melissa. I doubt it would shock me.”
    “Then that makes one of us.” She let out a sigh and turned to him. Her cheeks were again stained with pink. “His exact words were ‘You have amazing tits. I’d like to fuck them.’”
    Fury sizzled in Jake’s brain and judging by Melissa’s alarmed expression, it showed on his face.
    “Jake.” She shifted in the booth and put her hand on his arm. “Please don’t do anything. I took care of it.”
    Under the table, he clenched his fists and tried to remain calm. “What did you do?” he said, keeping his voice low.
    “I told him he was an ass