Page 87 of Alive At Night

We danced through the next song without talking. I pulled Juniper in close enough that eventually she rested her head against my chest, similar to last night. I tried really hard to think of something to say that would fix those thoughts in her brain, but I realized my words didn’t matter.

It was my actions.

They’d caused it—or had a hand in causing how she was feeling.

So they were going to fix it.

* * *

“So Nessa saidyou are not, in fact, dating Juniper.”

Grayson dropped those words into my lap as soon as I returned to my seat. Juniper had gone off with Nessa, sidling up to the bar to get another one of those purple concoctions.

I shook my head. “It’s complicated.”

“Didn’t look that complicated just now,” he said, leaning back in his chair. “Or when you stormed over to the bathroom earlier.”

“Gray…”

I couldn’t do this right now. Everything was a mess, and I couldn’t wrap my head around any of it.

He made a show of settling further into his chair. “Tell me how it’s complicated, Jules.”

We were really going to do this, huh?

I glanced over toward Juniper. She was smiling now, pulled into a conversation with Nessa as they stood near the bar with their drinks. Sure enough, one of those lavender lemonades was in her hand. She turned as she talked, leaving me with a view of her backside and a reminder of how fucking tight that dress was.

I couldn’t do this anymore.

“I’ve spent years fighting my attraction to this woman,” I admitted.

Grayson didn’t react except for a tiny twitch of his upper lip. “I know.”

Fuck him.

“I’ve watched you fight it on more than one occasion,” he added.

I sighed. “I thought I wassupposedto fight it, to give her the cold shoulder. It became ingrained in me, even though she made it impossible at every turn. When we were young, I resented that she acted like she was a part of our family because I never saw her as a sibling like my sisters did. I saw her as—fuck. But now…”

“But now…?” Grayson prompted when I couldn’t finish the sentence.

That was the whole problem, wasn’t it? I had no clue how to finish that sentence.

“And now, nothing,” I sighed. “She still knows exactly how to drive me up a wall—”

“Maybe you should driveherup a wall,” Gray muttered.

“And she’s still Gemma’s best friend,” I continued, ignoring him. Mostly because I couldn’t allow my brain to linger on his words. “Actually, she’s friends withallmy sisters. My parents think of her as their sixth daughter, for fuck’s sake.”

My asshole best friend seemed to think that was funny. “Maybe because they knew one day she would be,” he said with a smile.

“Shut up, man.” I glared at him. “Our history is complicated, and our present is even more intertwined. We’re colleagues, and I’ve put so much into getting this job. You don’t get it.”

“You’re right.” He shrugged. “I don’t. Because to me, it seems like you’re currently taking the advice you gave me a long time ago.”

“What’s that?”

Grayson’s devilish grin widened. “You’re running laps on a practice field to prove you’re worth something so she’ll give you playing time in the game.”

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