also can’t tell you everything right now. I know that sounds self-destructive, and hell, maybe it is. I just hope you trust me enough to stand beside me on this.”
More blind trust. Same tired old line…
She straddles my waist and shoves her face close to mine. “I love you, Julian Bale. Did you hear me? I. Love. You. I’m not a fan. I’m not in love with a fantasy. I’m in love with the real man right here.”
“Phoebe—”
She holds a finger to my lips, then trails it down my chest. “I said I love you. I’m always behind you…except… Well…”
I raise an eyebrow, and her small chuckle sizzles my already frayed nerves. Leaning closer, she brushes her soft lips against mine.
“Except for when you’re behind me.”
I feel my cheeks burn. Son of a bitch—am I blushing? Oh hell no… Julian Bale does not fucking blush.
I clear my throat and look away. Fuck off blush. Fuck the fuck off… “Yeah, I guess that was the opposite of romantic, huh?”
“I don’t believe it,” she says, not bothering to hide the amusement in her voice. “Julian James Bale, are you… Is that… Are you blushing?”
“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?”
Grinning, she sits up a little straighter—a little fucking prouder. “You have no idea how much.”
Riddled with embarrassment, I watch her out of the corner of my eye. The smile on her lips and the gleam in her eye both equal disaster for me.
“Well, you get your laughs now while you can, Miss Ryan. The next time won’t be so damn funny.”
“Bale, nothing about what happened was funny.” She brushes at a piece of damp hair stuck to the back of my neck. “To tell you the truth, I needed this. I haven’t felt close to you lately.”
“And now?”
“And now I feel like we can fix anything, or talk about anything.” Her smile slips. “Is there anything you want to tell me, Julian?”
“Phoebe…don’t.”
“Come on... A few weeks ago, after the blow up with Ryker, you said our discussion wasn’t over. In fact, you said we were both going to”—furrowing her eyebrows, she lowers her voice in, what I assume is supposed to be, a male tone—“spill some truth—no lame-ass excuses.”
“I never said that.”
“You most certainly did.”
“Well, I didn’t say it like that.”
“No, you said it with smart-ass undertones.”
I hold my hands up in surrender. “Fine. First of all, I never called bullshit on your story at the time, but you know how ridiculous that was, right?”
“You didn’t exactly give me time to think on my feet.”
“Just clearing that up. Don’t insult my intelligence like that again,” I warn. “Besides, Ryker can’t lie for shit. He sang like a fucking canary the next day.”
“Traitor. I’m totally kicking his ass.”
“You’re not going to like what I have to say next, so please just listen to me until I’m finished.”
“If you think—”
I cut her off with a swift palm over her mouth. “See? That’s what I’m taking about. I said to wait until I’m finished. Do you listen when I talk, or are you always formulating a rebuttal?”
“Eph ou fahe or ahn ohp ma mouh, I deh ou.”
I wrinkle my nose at her. “What the hell did you say?”
Batting my hand away, she lifts her chin in staunch defiance. “I said if you take your hand off my mouth, I’ll tell you.”
“Tell me what?”
A confused look crosses her face. “Wait, what?”
“What you were going to say?”
“Nothing. You were saying something.”
Growling, I fist my hair and let out a groan. “I swear, woman, you drive me crazy. You said if I took my hand off your mouth, you’d tell me.”
The devilish smile plastered across her face has me ready to fuck her senseless again.
Instead, I blow out a chestful of air and gently slide her off my lap as I grab my pants off the floor. She watches, not saying a word as I pull them over my hips and secure the zipper.
Clasping my hands behind my neck, I look down at her.
Those blue eyes tear into me. They’re the same eyes that knocked me off my feet in a New York nightclub almost eight months ago. The same eyes I couldn’t forget. The eyes I’d gazed into in a hotel room after claiming her for the first time, knowing things would never be the same.
I’d never be the same.
“Julian, what are you staring at?”
“You, princess. I’m staring at the reason I do what I do. I don’t know if you realize how important you are to me—both personally