Page 9 of Alive At Night

I snatched the pink box from her before she dropped it, hoping an extra hand might also help her find her balance.

“I know you want this desk,” I said, gritting my teeth in frustration. “But if you’re trying to steal it from me, this is not the way to do it.”

“I’m not trying to steal your desk,” she huffed. Her hand landed on my thigh, the quick touch burning through my pants as she pushed off me. Once she was back on two feet, I breathed a sigh of relief. I saw Juniper do the same, except the burst of oxygen did nothing to tame the blush on her cheeks. “I just—I just wasn’t paying attention, Julian.”

“Clearly.”

I crossed one leg over the other, and Juniper grabbed her box back out of my hands.

“What’s that?” I asked.

She flicked the top of the box open and grabbed a plastic plate from her desk. Wordlessly, she began plucking donuts out of the box and arranging them on the platter. I watched her chest rise and fall with quicker-than-normal breaths as she ignored me and fussed with her donuts instead.

“I thought we’ve been over this, Rosie.”

Juniper surveyed her donuts without responding. Satisfied that they hadn’t been damaged in the process, her cheeks indented with a tiny smile before she licked some powder off her finger.

She made a little noise of satisfaction, and I shifted in my desk chair.

I cleared my throat. “You can’t bribe your coworkers into liking you.”

“It’s called being nice,” Juniper said, words clipped. Her smile faded as it landed on me. “We’ve already been over that, too.”

I suppressed a sigh. God, she was a suck-up. For all her hollering about how she’d gotten here on hard work alone, she sure liked to do a lot of kissing ass and not a whole lot of anything else.

“You were so worried about yournicelittle donuts that you just sat on me, Lily.”

“That was an accident,” she sniffed, her attention shifting back to the donuts. “Cameron told me that the Happy Hole was his favorite.”

“The Happy Hole?” I repeated, disbelieving that any self-respecting establishment would name themselves that.

“They selldonuts, Julian.”

“I gathered that,” I said dryly, glancing at the pile of donuts again.

To my increasing frustration, Juniper had been assigned to the same case Cameron was working on. And now she kept acting like they were friends or whatever.

They were not friends. And they definitely weren’tmorethan friends. Cameron just had a sweet tooth.

“You bought two dozen donuts just because Cameron said he liked—” I scrunched my nose in distaste. “The Happy Hole? Don’t you think you’re coming on a little strong?”

That must have struck a nerve because Juniper made a whole show of ignoring the question. She tucked a wavy piece of hair into the elaborate pearl barrette on the side of her head before smoothing her skirt—black with small, white polka dots. As I watched her, I realized the dots were exactly the size of the pearls she wore as accessories.

Jesus Christ, Juniper.

I had a utilitarian outlook on clothes, which was one reason that I often missed the days of throwing on something comfortable to help my dad in the shop.

“I’m not coming on to him, Julian. Despite your continued belief that I have a one-track mind.” She tutted. “I think that says more about you than me.”

I pushed the barb aside becauseIwasn’t going to be the naive one in this situation.

“Look,” Juniper continued, “I know you’re upset because they didn’t putyouon Cameron’s case.”

“I’m not upset,” I countered. “We’re not kids, Daisy. This isn’t some competition.”

She raised a brow at me. “Says the man who’s calling me by my childhood nicknames.”

With a grunt of annoyance, I swiveled back toward my desk. Unable to focus on the case notes I needed to read through, I stared at the cityscape instead. The sun was high; soon, I would be heading out for lunch with one of my visiting college buddies.

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