Page 74 of Alive At Night

Waiting to see why he was looking at me like that.

Waiting for…something.

But that was all he said.

CHAPTERSEVENTEEN

juniper

IWOKE WITH A very stiff neck, courtesy of Julian’s hard body.

And I was sweaty. God, I hated being sweaty. Honestly, it was challenging to tell if the sweat was coming from me or if it was coming from Julian, but it was there. Oh, it was there, causing my cheek to stick to his chest. My palms, too, were damp as they dragged down his stomach over slick abs.

To clarify,Ihated feeling sweaty. But experiencing Julian as a sweaty mess? That maybe wasn’t so bad.

In peeling open my eyes, I found minimal sun filtering through the hotel room curtains, which meant the heat in the room was caused by…something else. It wasn’t exactly a mystery. Last night, the way Julian’s body had pressed next to mine was soothing. This morning, it was sending my hormones into overdrive. He was very much everywhere right now. I could feel himeverywhere.

Suddenly, the massive body that was both beneath and beside me shifted, and his grip wrapped around my wrist.

That was the moment I realized my fingers had been absentmindedly tracing muscles that were awfully close to the waistband of Julian’s pajama bottoms. It was also the moment I realized that his hand, the one that had been in my hair when I fell asleep, was tightly gripping my hip.

“Careful with that hand there, Lily.”

His voice was raspy and guttural, only making this entire situation worse.

Why did he have to be so…so hot? Literally, of course. It was roasting beneath these sheets.

“I wasn’t trying…I’m sorry.”

I couldn’t come up with a good explanation for what I’d been doing.

Julian’s low chuckle rumbled beneath me, an earthquake to all my senses. He still held my wrist, plucked between his fingers, and used his hold to carefully return my hand to his chest. His skin felt feverishly hot, and I tried to pull my touch away and sit up. But Julian’s grip was unrelenting, and I ended up smashed against his chest again.

“Go back to sleep,” he grunted.

“I’m hot, Julian.”

“I know you are.” He cleared his throat. “Peel back the top layer, then. We still have two hours until our reservation.”

“Our reservation?” I tried sitting up again, and this time, Julian let me, heaving a big, resigned sigh. It was the sigh of a man who knew he wasn’t getting back to sleep.

He rubbed a hand over his face before answering. “Yes, I made a reservation for brunch.”

“When?”

“It’s for eleven o’clock.”

I squeezed my eyes shut for a second, hoping if I just couldn’tseeJulian and how he was stretching his arms behind his head leisurely while lying half-naked in bed next to me, I could think clearly.

It was a lot to ask.

“No, when did you make a reservation?” I clarified, opening my eyes again.

“Oh.” Julian’s head tilted thoughtfully. “On Wednesday, I think. It was after you gave me the itinerary for the weekend, and I noticed there was nothing scheduled this morning until the ceremony.”

“Yeah, that was purposeful.” This morning had been set aside for mental preparation. And physical, of course. But mostly mental. “I need to get ready.”

“I’m not letting you obsess and worry about this wedding for eight hours. You don’t need that long to get ready, Daisy. But you do need to eat.”

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