Double Dare by Melissa Whittle

he tested the flow of water and began to draw dishwater.
    “You don’t have to do that,” she said behind him.
    “I don’t have to, no, but I asked for more of your dessert and you’re obliging. It’s the least I could.”
    She blew out a breath. “Anyway, as you know I started Sweet Tooth five years ago. I’m currently in the black.” At the end of her statement, he’d already made it through a fourth of the dishes. “Your efficiency intimidates me.”
    “A wasted moment is one you can’t get back.” He wiped down a dish. “After seeing you in the kitchen…” He dried his hands on the towel neatly folded on the edge of the sink. “Tasting your food. Seeing your friends. I still can’t understand what you did last night.”
    Her back was to him as she stirred caramel in a large pot. “Do you love your brother?” she asked over her shoulder.
    He straightened; the question surprised him. “Yes.”
    “Will you do anything to make him happy?”
    He quit his job so that he’d actually be alive long enough to see his brother grow up. “Yes.”
    She smiled. “Even if that means running down the street naked?”
    Tobias doubted a situation would ever come up where being in the buff would be required to make his brother happy. But he understood. “I see your point.”
    More pieces of her began to fit together. He sighed with annoyance and finished the rest of the dishes. A puzzle was why he’d been drawn to investigation. He wanted to know all her pieces and how they fit and that explained the tug in his gut when it came to Emmaline.
    He pushed off the edge of the sink’s counter and went back to the barstool. If she hadn’t spent the last twenty minutes getting ready to serve him another Late Night, Tobias would have asked for a rain check and gotten out of there.
    Her scent crept up on him, soft and tempting. The thoughts he suppressed filled his mind. Supple thighs. Silken skin. Emmaline came into his view, fully clothed. Thank God.
    “Are you going to tell me your story? Fair play and all.” She blushed at the unspoken implications.
    He reached up and rubbed a thumb over her heated cheek. His hand froze. The intimate touch crossed a line. Tobias drew back his hand. At her shaky release of breath, he silently cursed at himself.
    “I quit my last job.” He wasted no emotion on the words. “I put together a business plan, scared up some silent partners, opened the first Caff-aholic, and then Josh was accepted here.”
    Gabriella. His lover. The face of his former partner kept battering at the wall he put up. “The money they gave me and what I made is enough to keep me afloat for two years.” He shut down the memories with another breath. “Your friend, Abigail, I’ll probably need her services. I plan to go up to the college and leave some fliers, but that’s all I have so far. I was well known in Heron. Word of mouth is God.”
    “It is, but res ipsa loquitur . Your coffee, definitely, speaks for itself.”
    Digging in his back pocket for his wallet, Tobias pulled out a business card. Clumsy fingers stumbled over the cheap paper. He should have taken the cards out a year ago. He wasn’t a homicide detective anymore. She wasn’t a witness or a victim’s family member. He flipped the card around.
    “Do you have a pen?”
    She went to another drawer, rummaged around and then was back. He took the pen and wrote down his cell phone number.
    She stuffed the card into the apron’s pocket, but didn’t step away. “I’ll give it to her.”
    Tobias took in her scent, her demeanor and still couldn’t pin her down. “What do you have to gain by this?
    “My first impression of you is from the e-mails. Tina and George were warm but professional. You know what you’re doing and you know what you want. Your coffee was unbelievably good, and that takes passion. I need more exposure and you’re offering it. Despite the circumstances, you helped me when you didn’t even know who I was. We’re