Alex stood, taking their empty plates and the empty bread basket over to her kitchen and setting them beside the sink. She began to run hot water into the sink -- with a squirt of Fairy liquid -- and while it filled up, fetched out the elaborate Belgian chocolate gâteaux.

Dense, fragrant and such a dark chocolate they were almost black, the two individual desserts looked like pure sin. It was all Alex could do, plating them, not to lick her fingers. Yum.