#melissapeter

ilu so much right now anon

Peter doesn't think much of Melissa at first. Because she's a nurse - we've seen the respect Peter has for medical professionals - because she's a single mom with a teenage son, because she seems tired, ordinary and pedestrian and boring, the kind of person Peter picks up to play around with, to fuck with Scott's head, to make Scott angry. To cause suffering just because he can. Peter doesn't really get enough of that on the business side of things these days - once you get a certain reputation people are afraid to step out of line; and you can't just hurt people whenever you want, you can't get a reputation for being crazy, right? - so he amuses himself where he can. He thinks Melissa is the ticket, for now (IDK how he knows Scott - maybe he's a low-level messenger boy, trying to make some money as not-illegally as he can; maybe he lifts some ketamine from Dr. Deaton's now and again; maybe Scott just knows who Peter is because Stiles's dad is a cop. "He's a criminal, Mom!" Scott hisses, and Peter raises his wine glass with a smirk. "Alleged criminal. Such an important distinction to make, don't you think?" and Melissa admonishes Scott about his manners.) 

But Melissa doesn't even accept when he first asks her out on a date.

Which. I'm sorry?

She smiles at him, pretty and sweet and just a touch apologetic, thanks but no thanks, you're not really my type, I don't think we'd suit, rushing him along and back out the hospital door before Peter knows which way is up, and he's standing there, stunned, on the sidewalk.

and lbr, Peter is contrary enough to enjoy a no. Particularly one that came in such nice packaging and left his head spinning.

Thus begins the great seduction, flowers - which immediately go to patient's rooms in the ICU - chocolates - carefully distributed among some of the children's wards and the nursing home - little things he think she'd like, which are always sent back with apologetic notes (until, maybe there's something that does catch her eye, something she really does want for herself. a little spiral charm on a thin silver chain?). and when she finally does accept - dinner! - Peter goes to pull out all the stops. The nicest restaurant in town, the nicest table. And Derek and Isaac are looking at Peter all WTF, raising their eyebrows and glancing at each other, like, what is even happening here? 

also Melissa totally hits that on their first date because hello, this was all just foreplay. Melissa has needs. 

and one night Peter goes back to Melissa's apartment, bleeding from a run-in with one of the other businessmen in town, and Melissa pulls out an alarmingly well-fitted first aid kit. because what is she, an idiot? she works at the city hospital. She knows who the Hales are. and Peter probably falls in love there, not just infatuation, not just an interest in the game, but falls in love sitting in Melissa's bathtub, blood swirling over the cheap fiberglass and down the drain, while she stitches him up in her fuzzy pjs. 

Scott hates Peter on sight, and the loathing only grows, even though Peter is totally involved in being the best stepdaddy ever. he buys him a nice new motorcycle for his sixteenth birthday, which Scott stubbornly refuses even though the one he can afford is a total piece of crap. 

"It's good that he wants to make it on his own," Peter says, diplomatic, and Melissa sighs. 

Also! Scott and Stiles meeting Derek, Peter's nephew and right hand man! Which goes about as well as can be expected, and all Hale-McCall events leave Derek twitchy and Scott sullen, because Derek doesn't really know what to do with his new pseudo-cousin - the same things that work with Cora don't work with Scott, like showing off knives, or scars. arm wrestling! - and Scott doesn't want any part of this. At all. 

"Derek can't follow me," Peter tells Melissa one night. "He doesn't --"

"He doesn't have the killer instinct," Melissa says, and Peter nods. Of course she sees it. Derek is great at what he does - looking scary, being scary, rough and angry and ready to crack a head when that's what needs to be done. But he doesn't have vision. Cora might be a suitable replacement, and Derek would be loyal to her. But Peter would be lying if he said that Scott wasn't part of Melissa's appeal. Perhaps Peter could win him over one day; Derek would be loyal to Scott too. Already is, all on his own. 

SO OKAY Melissa first starts taking over the hospital-doctor side of things, the drugs and the back-alley surgeons, all the little things Peter used to do to keep doctors, the administrators, the donors in his pockets.  And she's very good at it - the gladhanding, smoothing over all the little bumps in the road; the logistics, what goes where and with who and when. She's nice and pretty and pleasant, which is good enough for some; and when it isn't she has a stomach for blood. She doesn't skim off the top, she doesn't need any product of her own to keep her going. So while it starts there, it's certainly not where it ends. Once Scott graduates high school she quits her nursing job, marries her rich, attractive fiance, and doesn't look back.