famous enough for it to count.”
“I couldn’t care less what the world thinks about me,” he growled before brushing his mouth over mine. It didn’t matter that the kiss was quick, the impact on my senses was instantaneous. It felt as though every nerve ending in my body was begging for more. “Your opinion is the only one that matters.”
My fingers trembled as I reached up to touch my lips. “Why?”
“Don’t pretend you don’t know why, Anna.” He cupped my chin with his palm, stroking my cheek with his thumb. “Not when you’ve already admitted to feeling this thing, the same as me. We’re moving forward. Together. Not backward.”
It felt as though butterflies took flight in my belly upon hearing the steely determination in his tone. As much as I tried to convince myself that a relationship with him was impossible, I still wanted it with every fiber of my being. I gave him the barest nod of my head, and he continued, “I took my dad’s advice on investments when I started earning decent money, and I’ve amassed quite the nest egg over the years. I’m not as rich as some, but I’m willing to concede the fact that I have money. Not as much as Drew, but it doesn’t seem as though you hold his wealth against him from what I’ve seen this past month.”
My lips had curved up in a small smile when he mentioned his dad because it was unexpectedly adorable, but they pressed together in a tight line when he compared my reactions to him and Drew. Julian was correct, I didn’t have any issues with my boss’s wealth. Maybe it wasn’t entirely fair to Julian that I was holding him to a different standard, but Drew was only my boss while he was...more. It was time for me to stop lying to myself and admit that no matter how hard I’d tried to fight my attraction, I hadn’t succeeded. And if I wanted to move forward like Julian said, then I needed to open up to him about why I’ve been fighting this thing between us so hard.
“I don’t care how wealthy Drew is. He seems cool enough, but he’s Autumn’s problem. Not mine.”
Julian’s eyes filled with male satisfaction at my admission. “You can’t say the same thing about me, can you?”
I dropped my forehead against his chest and mumbled, “No, darn it. Even with as hard as I’ve tried, I can’t.”
His arms tightened around me, pulling me closer before he brushed a kiss against the top of my head. “Thank fuck you’re finally willing to admit it. That means you’re going to stop fighting what’s happening here and tell me why you’ve been avoiding me this whole time?”
I heaved a deep sigh and nodded, keeping my face buried in his broad chest as I answered, “My very first job was with a public relations firm with a lot of celebrity clients. Nobody expected me to handle any of them directly because it wasn’t in my job description. I was basically a glorified gopher, but then one of their biggest clients took...a shine to me, I guess you could say.”
Julian was close enough for me to feel his body tense as he growled, “I’m sure he did.”
“I didn’t see it at first. As far as the whole world knew—me included—the guy was happily married to his equally famous wife. My boss grumbled about it when he insisted that I be assigned to the team who handled him, but she didn’t hesitate to give in to his request because she was all about keeping the client happy. I didn’t start to second-guess my luck until she made an odd comment one day about how much easier her job would be since I signed a non-disclosure agreement when I started working there.”
“That fucking bitch,” he bit out, tilting my head back to look into my eyes. Whatever he saw there made him swear some more before he walked me over to the couch and settled me on his lap. “Let me guess, the celebrity client’s marriage wasn’t as happy as everyone thought because he was a cheating bastard.”
“Yes.” I thought about everything I had learned back then. “But also no since it was more of a case of them having an open marriage as long as they didn’t publicly embarrass each other. She had apparently had just as many lovers as him from what he told me when I turned him down flat. He thought I’d