Page 161 of Alive At Night

“I hate you,” Juniper snapped as soon as the meeting ended. She clicked her computer shut before spinning in her chair to attack me with her glare. But it immediately shifted into something different when she moved too quickly. Her lips zipped closed as she withheld a groan, and I felt my dick stir in my pants at even the slightest sound of her arousal.

“You did so well, baby,” I said, ignoring her comment. She didn’t hate me; she hated what I could do to her so easily. But moving forward, I vowed to only ever use that power to make her feel good, and she was about to find out. “I’m so proud of you.”

“I—what?”

She hadn’t been expecting that, and the fire drained away from her glare. I could almost see how she warmed from the inside out, melting beautifully at my praise.

“It used to irritate me so much, how perfect you are,” I explained. “But that was only because I couldn’t have you. So now I love that I can sit back and watch you be amazing while getting to appreciate it.”

“Julian…I—appreciate?”

Her jumble of words was adorable, but I just nodded. And when it was clear that Juni was still struggling to fully understand everything I was saying, I lowered my voice and continued.

“I appreciate every bit of you, Juniper.”

My eyes stayed glued to hers, despite wanting to sweep them over the rest of her. Juni, on the other hand, let her gaze lower until I felt her stare acutely on my growing erection. And damn, did that ever bring out the smugness in her.

“Who would haveeverthought that Julian Briggs likes telling me how good I am.”

I leaned forward with a whisper. “And who would haveeverthought that Juniper St. James likes hearing it so goddamn much.”

She glanced away, all shy-like, and I knew we understood each other perfectly. But she was dead wrong if she thought we were done with this conversation. Standing, I locked our office door, thankful that there weren’t any windows looking in. I strode to where Juni sat at her desk. When she kept her eyes averted, I slid my hand up her throat until my thumb landed on her jawline and had the power to turn her face back toward me.

“It’s okay to admit to liking it, Juni. I have a lot of things that I could admit to.”

That piqued her interest. “Such as?”

The tips of my fingers pressed right against Juni’s pulse, and I felt it speed up as she waited for me to answer. I loved that, that reaction. I loved it so much that I couldn’t help but draw out my response even more, watching the anticipation light a match in her waiting gaze.

I swiped my thumb up to her lip, tugging it down slowly. “When we started working together, sometimes you’d open this beautiful mouth and snap my name, and I wondered how many other ways I could get you to say it.”

Her breath hitched. And then…a whisper. “Julian.”

“Yeah, baby, like that. It sounds so good when you say my name.” The corners of my lip curled up. “But it sounds even better when you scream it.”

Her pulse was sprinting now, that little beat in her neck thrashing out of control. “What else? What else can you admit?”

I paused, thinking. There were so many things.

“I’d look for you in the stands at my football games in high school,” I admitted, suddenly wanting to spill every little secret I possessed about her.

Juniper’s eyes rounded, growing in size. “Really? I’d hide from you in the stands at your football games in high school.”

“Why?”

“I didn’t want you to know I cared about you.”

“You cared about me?” The thought mademypulse pick up.

She nodded slowly, holding my gaze. “I’d have to disguise my worry every time you were tackled so Gemma wouldn’t notice.”

“I was tackled a lot. Our offensive line sucked.”

“I was worried a lot.”

She said it like it was simple. It was anything but.

“I worried about you all through college, too,” she added. “I used to be embarrassed about how I cared, about how much I thought about you when I was so sure you never thought of me. I was…”

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