Hands Off by Lia Slater

CHAPTER ONE

    THE DINNER PARTY GUESTS were in high spirits, joking and laughing, but Naomi Hill couldn’t concentrate on a single word. Underneath the table, Jude’s thigh brushed against her leg once more. Her short dress provided no barrier from the close contact, and the soft cotton of his pants tickled and teased her bare skin.
    Even more distracting was the faint scent of his aftershave, which energized her otherwise dull senses each time he leaned over to speak.
    She sniffed in a deep breath. Spicy with hints of cinnamon and sage. A scent that was becoming more and more familiar, making her forget the past.
    Making her forget Davis.
    Naomi swallowed against the perpetual knot in her throat. Three years had passed since she’d lost her husband, her high school sweetheart. And she knew it was silly to feel guilty for being attracted to another man. Every one of her friends and family members had told her to move on. Their words were always the same.
    You’re young, only twenty-nine. You can’t grieve forever.
    Yet she couldn’t knock herself out of the slump. Not entirely.
    The one spark of hope sat beside her, provoking her, stirring emotions, enticing neglected parts of her body. Turning her on.
    Maybe “spark of hope” was an understatement. Simply sitting beside him aroused her in a way she hadn’t been in a long, long time.
    She glanced to her side to see Jude taking a long sip of champagne. The glass flute looked too dainty in his large hand, like it might shatter under his tight grip. His handsome face was somber, as usual. Brooding. His dark chestnut hair was three weeks past his scheduled haircut, an appointment he always missed. Too busy.  
    He set the flute down and gave a best-effort, tense grin as more laughter erupted at the other side of the table. The tautness of his face caused the scar on his jaw to slant downward—one of several scars Jude had acquired in his tours in the Middle East. This one had marked him after shrapnel hit him after a bombing.
    Davis, her late husband, had revealed one night as he lay in bed deteriorating from his last chemo treatment, that he’d felt ashamed of attending college while Jude left to serve the country. Four years at the University of Colorado versus four years at war.
    In the end, the two men ended up in the same place—opening and running a software company that had swiftly made them both millionaires.
    Frankly, Naomi couldn’t have been prouder of them both. She only wished—God had she wished—Davis hadn’t succumbed to such a terrible fate. He’d been her age. Young. Ready and able to take on the world.
    After Davis’s passing, Jude had sold their business for a hefty amount and half had gone to her. Then he’d quickly lost himself in a new project, one that seemed to be just as, if not more, successful. Impressive, yes.
    She stole another glimpse of him, enjoying the delightful jolt that arrowed down her center and settled between her thighs. Why hadn’t she noticed how gorgeous he was years ago? Why hadn’t she felt anything for him then?
    She knew the reasons. She’d been so in love with Davis. Her world had been wrapped up in one man.
    Which brought up other thoughts. With Jude’s darker hair, olive skin tone, and lean, muscled body, Naomi thought he couldn’t be more different in appearance than Davis’s slim, lanky frame and light blond features. Their personalities were different too. Davis had always been the life of any party, whereas Jude was more of an introvert.
    He disliked these dinner parties as much as she did. Yet he endured them just as she did. They shared the same friends, and several months after Davis’s death, Jude had made a pact with her to remain as social as much as possible—to not give in to the desire to cry, scream, or rage wholly in solitude.
    Jude had taken Davis’s death almost as badly as she had. He’d been Davis’s best friend as well as his business partner, which only heightened her guilt for