Page 34 of All In

“Juniper.” My voice comes out rougher than I mean it to. “Before we—I need to tell you something. It’s not so much a secret. Just something about me that other people don’t really know.”

Her nails scrape up my bare back and I moan at the sensation. “God, that feels good. But you’re distracting me.”

She gives me a sexy little smile and puts her hands in her lap. “I’ll behave.” She goes carefully attentive. And I’m struck again by how there’s no artifice about her. She is completely and wholly herself without explanation or apology.

“Okay,” she says quietly. “I’m listening.”

I look down at where my hands are resting on her hips.

“I haven’t been with anyone,” I say, “in a really long time. Remember the girl I told you about earlier?”

“Rachel?”

He nods. “She’s the only partner I’ve ever had. After everything happened with her, I just—stopped. Not on purpose, exactly, not as some grand vow. It just turned into the safest place to stand, and I stood there for over a decade, and it stopped feeling like a wound and started feeling like who I was.”

Juniper’s face has gone very soft, very still, no trace of shock in it, just a kind of careful tenderness that undoes me a little.

“We only had sex a couple of times. Fumbling, teenage sex.”

“Leo. I’m honored you told me. And that’s a really long time to carry that by yourself. ”

“It didn’t feel like carrying, most days. It felt like managing.” I exhale, some of the tightness in my chest easing now that it’s actually said, out loud, real. “But I want you to know, before anything else happens tonight, that this isn’t casual for me. I’m not capable of casual. I haven’t had the practice. This isn’t a con-weekend thing for me. I need you to know that going in, because once we do this, I won’t be able to pretend otherwise.”

She reaches up, cups my jaw with one hand, her thumb brushing slow along my cheekbone.

“Good,” she says simply. “Because I’m not capable of casual about you either, and I suck at lying. I don’t think I’ve been doing a very good job of hiding my feelings since we met, but after sharing a night together, there will be no hiding.”

“I might want to talk about those feelings,” I say.

“I don’t know if I’m ready to name them, but I can tell you they’re bigger than they have any right to be considering we’ve known each other less than seventy-two hours.”

“You’re sure?”

“Leo.” She leans back just a little and pulls her t-shirt off.

Her full breasts are encased in a pretty pink lace bra and I think I forget how to swallow. “Fuck,” I murmur.

“Am I sure?” She shifts a little. “Do you see this tattoo?”

I glance down and the ink rides her ribcage area. It’s a silhouette of all of the Scooby Doo characters running in a single-file line.

I laugh. “That’s the best tat I’ve ever seen.”

“Well, I was very certain I would love it and I got it when I turned eighteen. And I still love it. Once I make a decision, I lock in. So I know what certainty feels like. This is that.” Then she rolls her eyes. “That was a lame example. But you know what I mean.”

I kiss her, slow, deliberate. I’ve got nothing left to reveal.

She pulls back just enough to look at me, her hands sliding up my torso, palms flat and warm against my stomach. “For what it’s worth,” she says, “I’m planning on making this very much worth the wait.”

“No pressure.”

“All the pressure. I take my responsibilities seriously.”

I laugh again, and she grins up at me, delighted with herself. Then we’re kissing again. Tongues, teeth and lips and it’s so sensual and erotic that it will be an actual miracle if I don’t come before we get to the main event.

I take my time with her. I want to memorize every part of this—the way she gasps when I find the spot just beneath her ear. The way her fingers curl into my shoulders when I finally cup her breast, over her bra. The weight of her against my palm is perfection. The hardness of her nipple begging for more attention is exquisite.

I press my mouth to her collarbone, licking against her skin. “I’ve wanted to touch you, explore your beautiful curves since the first moment you kissed me.”