Page 11 of Treat

She passed him a fork. “Okay.”

She told herself not to watch him eat. Surely she wasn’t so hard up she had to watch the man eat. To make sure she didn’t, she turned back to the stove and started on another omelet for herself.

Neither spoke for a few moments, the dog’s hopeful panting accompanied by the clink of his fork against his plate and the sizzle of eggs in the pan. When Brynn reached for the pile of shredded cheese to add to the eggs, Tilly let out a plaintive whine.

“Not on your life,” Brynn told her firmly. “Not after what happened last time.”

“Last time?” Jude echoed behind her.

“Her owners told me not to let her have people food, but I left a sandwich unattended,” she explained, glancing back. He’d finished the omelet and was watching her, blue eyes laser-focused. Her heart seemed to leap into her throat. “Let’s just say there was extensive mopping and a thorough bath. For both of us.”

“Puked it up, huh?” he asked with a sympathetic wince.

“No, we visited a town a little south of Puke Up,” she said drily.

The sympathy turned to horror. “Oh, God.”

“Repeat that about a dozen times, throw in a few f-bombs, and you’ll be where I was,” she informed him and slid her omelet on a plate.

She shredded some basil onto the gently steaming eggs and with no good reason not to, circled the counter to take the seat next to him. Tilly followed, wiggling her way under the stool so as not to miss any falling scraps, and Brynn picked up her fork.

“You never answered my question,” Jude asked after she’d taken her first bite.

She swallowed. “Which question was that?”

“How long have you been living in my apartment?”

Her appetite was gone, but she forked up another bite anyway. It might be her last hot meal for a while. “A couple of weeks.”

His expression was unreadable. “Do you have somewhere to go tonight?”

The eggs were like sawdust on her tongue while shame burned her cheeks and fear turned her stomach to ice. “No.”

“Okay,” he said and nodded once. “You’ll stay here.”

3

Brynn bobbled her fork. “What?”

“You’ll stay here,” he repeated and raised one tawny eyebrow. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

She wasn’t sure how she was looking at him—probably like he’d lost all reason. Because he clearly had. “I can’t stay here.”

“Why not?” he asked. “There’s plenty of room, and not to put too fine a point on it, you’vebeenstaying here.”

“When you were on vacation,” she pointed out. “You’re home now, and I’ll be in your way.”

He shrugged. “I’m going to be working on getting into shape for the season, so I won’t be around much.”

She tried not to do it, she really did, but her eyes seemed to be taking direction from her brain without her input. Before she could stop them, they were skimming over his body—strong shoulders and firm pecs and bulging biceps and corded forearms. His shorts weren’t as tight as last night’s blue boxers and covered him almost to his knees, but she had very clear memories of his thighs.

“How much more in shape can you be?” she blurted out and immediately blushed.

“You’d be surprised,” he said drily.

She didn’t know what to say to that, and she was still thinking about his thighs, so she forced herself back to the topic at hand.

“Well, you can’t work out all the time,” she said, poking at her food. “And when you get home, you’re going to want to relax. You can’t do that with me here.”

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