Double Dare Read Free Page A

ago his brother had gotten a job. Not to mention how awkward it would be if he decided Emmaline Sharp didn’t pass muster. He’d still have to deal with her because the job involved his brother.
    “I’m supposed to go back at three tomorrow to fill out paperwork.”
    “If it seems too good to be true, it usually is. It sounds as if she’s going to have you twiddle your thumbs for four hours a day and pay you a dollar more than minimum wage.” Another suck of air. A slow release. “No.”
    “Tobi, I really want this job.”
    He cut his brother with a glare. “Not getting on my good side with that nickname.”
    Eleven years his junior, Josh had trouble saying Tobias when he’d first started to talk. Now, at eighteen, Josh only used it when he really wanted something.
    “Tobias,” Josh emphasized the name, and several people looked to the front. “I’m going to do this job. I don’t get why it’s a problem. You had me make every table and chair in here. The shelves. Man, I still can’t get the smell of tea out my favorite jeans.”
    “I bet you also neglected to mention you’re my brother.”
    Josh looked away; his lanky frame bunched with tension. “I wanted to get a job on my own, without using your name or the business name. And I got one.”
    “I don’t know.” Tobias crossed his arms and put a smile on his face so it wouldn’t look like they were arguing.
    “She didn’t act like a con. A con would have hit on me. Heck, she’d have gotten my information the first time around.” His brother grinned. “She didn’t look like one either. Wavy hair, but she had these strange looking eyes. Almost golden. Really nice too.”
    Tobias stiffened and the bottom of his stomach filled with lead. The woman from last night had golden eyes. This was a university town, but a small one nonetheless. How many people would have that eye color?
    Despite having researched Emmaline Sharp thoroughly, she wasn’t a put-your-face-out there kind of woman. Neither was he, so he looked at her business. He had Tina and George, the faces of Caff-aholic, ask all the appropriate questions you could through e-mail. So far so good. They had a meeting today to iron out his and her cut of the profits, how much he’d take on and the percentage he’d get back because of it. Schedules of deliveries, etc. Nothing that would cost him more than it already did.
    More importantly, today’s meeting would allow him to check her out in person. Then he’d make the offer to display her desserts in both this store and the one in Heron. In the end, a trade-off that would bring in more revenue and start him off on the right foot with this branch.
    From his brother’s description, the woman he planned to go into business with and the woman from last night sounded one and the same. When she’d first run into him, all he could see in her eyes was panic and anxiety. But, if you were naked in a commercial district and the police happened to show up, well, that might be a normal reaction to an abnormal situation.
    He’d been trained to protect, instincts kicked in, and he wrapped her in his favorite leather coat and blocked her body from view. It wasn’t until her face lifted up and those honey-golden eyes silently pleaded for help that Tobias had a moment to hear and see what his brain processed. She wanted him to lie and say he was her boyfriend if the cops stopped to question them. To make sure the cops didn’t, she wanted him to kiss her.
    How could a man logically process information with a naked woman pressed against him? Those caramels eyes had flashed fear and shame, for the briefest moments, desire too. When he looked at her then it wasn’t insanity in her gaze but awareness of him.
    But then maybe he imagined that part. She did have the darkest, caramel-tipped nipples he’d ever seen. He’d acted out of character and kissed those succulent lips without stopping to consider his actions. But there were two things Tobias would never