Page 50 of You Had Me at Chocolate

Gasping, Clementine said, “What happened?”

Jude grinned. “She broke her tooth and had to have emergency dental work done. She was furious with him.”

“Oh no.” Clementine clapped her hand over her mouth. “That poor woman.”

He laughed. “I know.”

“Don’t laugh.” She nudged her elbow into his side. “It’s awful.” But then she laughed, too.

“After that we brought in veto rights over all food related proposals.”

“Did they get married?”

“Apparently, yes.”

Clementine shook her head. “God… what if she’d swallowed it? Or choked on it.”

“Honestly? I think she’d have preferred that to breaking her tooth.”

And they laughed again. When it settled, Clementine glanced at the rows of chocolate dots of varying sizes and configurations. “Who’s going to eat all these dots?”

“Not you.”

“Hey,” she pouted up at him, her eyebrows beetling. “Why not?”

“I thought you were stuffed full?” he teased.

“Jude,” she tsked him then, a big smile on her face. “There is always room for chocolate. And they’re just dots.” She lifted off one of the larger dots and balanced it on her index finger. “They’ll melt on the tongue before they even make it to my stomach.”

Popping it into her mouth, Clementine shut her eyes on a sigh, her mouth moving as she obviously savored the treat and Jude wondered how she tasted right now, her tongue coated in chocolate. Sweet for sure. Addictive—definitely.

Crap… this attraction was becoming harder and harder to manage.

Then her eyelids fluttered open and their gazes locked and they stared at each other for long drawn-out moments. Her tongue flicked out to swipe along her bottom lip either from nervousness or the presence of chocolate and Jude had to bite back a groan, suppress the urge to take her mouth, sample the sweet delights of that bottom lip.

See for himself. Taste for himself.

Blood pounded through his veins, pulsing hot to his wrists and temples and abdomen, throbbing hard in his groin. And if she’d been any other woman, he’d have swooped in. But it wasn’t. It was Clementine. And he was Jude.

And they were complicated.

Clamping down hard on a body going rogue, he forced a smile to his mouth and threw some mental cold water on the moment. Drawing away a little to put as much space as possible between them considering the proximity of their hips, he said, “I got a phone call from the Realtor today.”

“Has he found you the perfect inn?”

Jude chuckled. “No. But there’s a two-bedroom rental over near the hospital that’ll become available second week in December.”

“Oh.” A tiny little V formed between her brows. “Well, that’s… great.”

She smiled but it looked forced and it didn’t sound like she thought it was great. Whatever that meant?

“Finally, your own place, right?”

“Yeah. I’ll be out of your hair in a few weeks.”

Shrugging, she said, “I liked having you in my hair.” She blinked. “I mean…” Giving a tremulous half-laugh, she shook her head. “That didn’t sound right.”

Jude grinned. “It’s okay, I know what you meant. For what it’s worth I liked being in your hair, too.”

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