Elliot had brought her home that night and had kept her company for a short while, but hadn’t spent the night. He’d put his arm around her on the couch, nuzzled her neck with his nose, and kissed her good-night, but he’d left at the end of the evening.

That night, for the first time in her new home, she was finally able to spread her things out in her new office and get to work.

She was in the middle of a turning point in her life. So many things were happening all at once. Not just the sale of H-Surf, which was an enormous undertaking all in itself, but the charity Conquer, she created, was growing faster than she could have ever imagined. She’d also picked up the new construction prototype to build, was trying to rework a trip to Dubai that wasn’t going to fit into her schedule anymore, and wanted to take a quick but needed trip to London to see her father, and bag out on a meeting Kelsey had set up for her in San Francisco to oversee a project she had no interest in. Kelsey was busy getting her condo and her office set up there so Julia swore she wasn’t going to bother her. The problem was that she couldn’t stop working on the prototype construction software.

After speaking with Stephanie Young, a creative former juvenile delinquent hacker turned programming guru, Julia’s mind was running wild with ideas for this software. She’d been working non-stop since Elliot had left her, even knowing that they were working in the house around her. She was so wrapped up in the build, jotting down notes and writing code, that she barely had time to look up. There were so many details she needed to iron out: how it would work and who would want to use it. Would it be by subscription or would the buyer want to make it universal to their site?

She’d emailed her finance guy to have him draw up a few different business models to present to any potential buyers when the time came, and to present to the Williams brothers as options for how they wanted to proceed. He’d emailed her back and she was blown away by the numbers he’d projected. If she could get Williams Construction that much money for the software, she would be pleased. They’d been very forthcoming with their ideas, from the contracting side of things to the consumer side. They’d talked about building codes and having options to search for the most environmentally friendly materials available. All day, she alternated between contacting her team of professionals about potentially selling the software and actually building the software. That was saying nothing about the organization of the sale of H-Surf which was looming over her shoulder, too overwhelming to even begin to comprehend.

She felt like she was on the brink of something so incredibly amazing.

“Eat, Shorty.”

She heard the voice like it was coming through fog. Somewhere out there, beyond where all her ideas were swirling, someone was calling her name. She switched computers, moving from the small one she’d been working on to a larger one that she had her email on. Easily enough, she sent pages of source code and algorithms to Stephanie to see what she thought and then moved back to the small computer. Her fingers flew over the keyboard as she typed code after code, knowing that this would make a difference to someone somewhere.

“Julia.”

She kept on. She didn’t need anything right now. She didn’t need anyone. She was safe where she was, working behind her desk doing what she knew how to do. She didn’t want to stop, because when she stopped working, life happened, and that’s where she knew she was adrift. Work she knew. Computers and programming she knew. People and relationships? She was an epic failure and she wasn’t ready to come out of hiding yet.

* * *

Elliot picked up his phone and dialed Kelsey’s cell.

“Elliot? Is everything okay?”

“She’s still there and won’t answer me. I put food down, she won’t touch it. I call her name, she won’t answer me.” Frustration had his jaw clenched as he waited for her answer.

Julia had been working when he’d gotten to work in the morning and he’d noticed that she was in the clothes she’d been in the night before. She hadn’t looked up when he’d said hello, but he’d assumed she didn’t hear him. That was, until she did the same thing to Tucker, Kelsey, and Cole. She’d worked relentlessly through the morning, hunched over her desk, big black headphones wrapped over her ears.

At lunch, he’d sat in a chair in front of her desk, waiting for her to look up. It had been a blow to his ego that she hadn’t noticed him at all, though Kelsey had assured him that it was just the way Julia worked. She threw herself into things, Kelsey said.

By six o’clock, she’d been working longer than he had with no food, no drink, and no bathroom break.

“Hang on,” she told him. “Let me email her.”

A minute later, Julia swung herself from one computer to the other again and then back.

“You should be all set. She’ll be fine, Elliot. She’s just working.” Kelsey was quiet for a few seconds. “If you hang around tonight, keep an eye on her. She tends to sleepwalk when she’s overtired.”

A second later Julia looked up at him. Her face was withdrawn and pale and she looked exhausted. She blinked at him, like an owl, for a few seconds.

“Hi,” she mouthed. She cleared her throat and tried again. “Hi.” This time it was more of a rasp.

Elliot pushed a bottle of water toward her and watched as she drank the whole thing.

“You okay?” he asked.

She nodded and rubbed her eyes. “Yeah, sorry,” she told him. “I got caught up doing some work,” she looked around. “What time is it?”

“Six,” Elliot told her.

“No wonder I’m starving.” She unfolded her legs from what looked like an uncomfortable cross-legged position, stood up, and stretched her arms overhead. Her sweater lifted, giving him an eyeful of her smooth, milky-white stomach. “Let’s get something to eat,” she said as she came around the desk and held her hand out to him, ignoring the food he’d put out for her.

Wary, Elliot put his hand in hers and followed her to the kitchen.

“Have anything for me in there?” he asked as she rooted around the refrigerator.

“How’s chicken parm?” she asked, pulling out a foil container.

“Sounds great.” He took the container from her and looked around her cupboards until he came up with her plates. “Where’d this come from?”

“Kelsey must have brought it.”

“She won’t mind if I eat it?” Elliot asking, his finger stopping in midair as he was about to press the button on the microwave.

“No,” Julia told him as she took out her things to make a salad. For the first time, he saw her take out a block of cheese.

“Want to check out the upstairs after we eat?” he asked while he waited by the microwave.

“Is it done?”

He laughed. “Not even close.”

She nodded, considering, as she added things into a huge salad bowl. “Then, no, I don’t want to see it. I’m having a hard time not having my bedroom, and I don’t like where my clothes got moved to.”

“Not liking the little bedroom in the back?” he asked as he took his plate out of the microwave and sat at the kitchen island.

“No,” she muttered. “I went in there last night and couldn’t stand it. I felt like my bed was touching every wall.”

“We decided we’d get all the demo done and then make the spare room the priority for now,” he continued when Julia looked up sharply. “We figure the closet and master bathroom will take the longest, so if we finish the spare room, at least the demo will be done up there, but you can be somewhere where there’s a little more space.”

He said nothing when she cut some of the cheese from the block, tossed it into the salad, and threw the rest away.

“Did you get any sleep last night?” Elliot asked as they ate companionably.

“I worked,” she told him with a shrug. “I got myself on a roll and couldn’t stop.”

“That was some roll,” he muttered.

“I know, I got so much done. You should see the projected numbers on this software, Elliot.” She looked up at him and the excited pride on her face was enough to stop any comments about her overworking herself.

“The software you’re selling?” he asked.

Her brow crinkled. “The contractor’s software. The one we’ve been talking about.”

“You’re doing that now?” he said surprised. “Why wouldn’t you wait until you’re done with the H-Surf sale?”

“I’ve got some really great leads on pitching the prototype. I hate to lose my momentum.” She shook her head and went back to her salad. “I know I should wait,” she agreed. “I just can’t help myself. I feel like, I don’t know how to explain it, like I have to do this right now. Like, I’m going to miss something if I wait.”

“Like, what if someone beats you to it?” he asked, trying to understand.

She nodded a little. “That. But, what if someone beats me to it and doesn’t do it right? What if all these ideas get stuck in my head forever?”

He got what she meant on the most basic level. Sure, having someone beat her to the idea or the money would suck, he understood competition.

“Well, your big deal is only a couple days away, right? London tomorrow, sale later in the week.” He tried to sound encouraging, even though they hadn’t talked much about it at all. “Are you nervous?”

“Yes,” she admitted flatly, not looking up at him.

“What are you nervous about?”

“You’re grilling me again,” she pointed out, her cheeks turning pink at the accusation.

“So, grill me back,” he invited with a shrug. “Ask away.”

“Tell me about your life before you were adopted.”

A fist grabbed his throat and squeezed and he narrowed his eyes at her. “No.”

She shrugged uncaring and took her plate to the sink.

“I don’t need to ask you any questions. I already know everything about you,” she said, her back stiff as she looked out the window into the backyard.

“What does that mean?”

“What’s your plan tonight?” she asked. “That’s a question I don’t know the answer to.”

“Are you changing the subject?” he growled, annoyed.

“Yes.”

“Did you get any sleep last night?” Elliot asked without answering.

“No.”

“Then how about our usual?”

“I need a bath,” she said.

He was quiet for a second, considering. “Me too.”

His voice was low and husky, and as annoying as her non-answers were, sparring with her got him hard. He’d gone from picturing her on the couch watching TV in her yoga pants to underneath him in just her tiny panties. Now he’d moved straight to her naked in the bath.

“I have a big bathtub,” she told him quietly, confirming that she was thinking the same thing he was.

He knew just how big her bathroom was. It was one of the rooms she wasn’t touching in her remodel because it was big and beautiful with an antique claw-foot tub.

“Is that an invitation?”

She finally turned around to face him, her fingers fidgeting at her side. “Yes.”

Elliot walked to her, put his hands on the sides of her face, and kissed her long and hard until her hands were gripping his. He finished with a kiss on her nose. “I’ll let you scrub my back.”

She went into the back bedroom while he veered off into the downstairs bathroom. Between the kitchen and the bedroom, it was big enough for a large antique claw-foot tub and a marble vanity. He turned the water on and rooted through some of Julia’s lotions and potions on the countertop. She had makeup and lotions and perfumes, brushes and sponges and tweezers and a million other gizmos, but not one drop of bubble bath. He rummaged under the sink and hit the jackpot. There were tons of bottles of bubble bath and lotions down there.

Elliot smiled when he found the orange-scented one that she must favor and poured some in the tub and watched the bubbles form. He stripped himself down to his skin and lowered himself down when it was about half full, facing the door so he’d see her when she came in. The smell and intense warmth of the water had him sighing and closing his eyes before he knew it.

“You’ll drown like that,” Julia said.

He opened one eye and then the other as he looked his fill while she leaned, unashamed, in the doorway. She was in nothing but a bra that pushed her breasts up and offered a really nice view of cleavage, with a matching set of panties, her tattoos colorful against the white of the wall. The bathwater was about the height of his chest now, telling him that he had clearly dozed off for a moment.

“You’re beautiful,” he told her. She’d put her hair up into a big messy bun on top of her head, her green eyes bright in the light bathroom. Her light skin and delicate pink bra set made her seem like the epitome of sweet innocence, which he knew wasn’t the case.

She was passionate and curious, wild when she let go. She was everything he’d ever found sexy in his life in a package he’d never expected.

“I didn’t get to see you get in the tub,” she said as she came into the bathroom. “I didn’t want to miss that part.”

“I’m sorry. If I’d known, I’d have waited.”

She grabbed a few towels from the linen closet, leaving him with an exceptional view of her backside. She was on the shorter side so her legs weren’t long by any means but they were toned and slim. Her stomach was flat, her breasts small, and her ass was high and tight, toned to perfection.

“You’re staring,” she pointed out as she reached around and unhooked her bra, letting her breasts fall free. She hung the bra carefully on a hook and then she shimmied out of her panties which she threw in a hamper at the bottom of the closet.

“I can’t help it.” He held out his hand to her to help her into the tub. “I want to lick every inch of you.” She gave him a look that he couldn’t quite decipher before he added, “Twice.”

She adjusted herself so that she was sitting across from him, staring. “I think I’d like that.”

“I think we both would.” Elliot pulled her feet so that they were resting on his chest and started rubbing them. “So, tell me about this I already know everything about you thing you said earlier. What’s that all about?”

“I might have done some research on the computer,” she hedged.

“Might have?” he prodded as he ran his thumb down the sole of her foot to which she jumped and then scowled. “Ticklish?” She tried to pull her foot away but he wouldn’t let her. “Keep talking, Shorty,” he prodded. “What kind of research?”

“I might have looked into few databases.” She shrugged while looking insanely guilty.

He stopped massaging her foot, startled. “Looked into a few databases? What the hell does that mean?”

She rubbed her foot, soapy and slick along his chest, the look in her eye something well beyond sultry. “Are you sure you really want to know?”

The look might have been guilt. He wasn’t sure and he croaked out a yes as her toe ran over his nipple and then down his stomach.

“I did my own version of a background check.”

“And what does that mean?” His hand squeezing her foot.

“I hacked your computer and phone when you were in the shower. Checked your email, your phone records, your iTunes account, your Facebook, your photo history, your browser history, your passport application and travel history, your adoption records. I even dug up your old driver’s test at the DMV.”

He stared at her, stunned, kind of angry. “What, you didn’t want to know how much money I make? Didn’t go digging into my financials?”

Julia looked honestly confused. “I looked at those too.”

“You could have just asked me.” He was upset and he knew she could tell. “That’s how people get to know each other, Julia.”

She sat up, removing her feet from his chest, and sat across from him cross-legged. “I have a hard time getting close to people and asking questions. It’s easier for me to know the answers without having to get personal enough to ask the questions.”

He stared hard at her for a few minutes, his face as hard as granite as he scowled at her. “First of all, don’t sit there with your tits bobbing in the water like that’s going to distract me. Second of all, I’d rather you ask instead of digging through my life.”

“If it makes you feel any better, I do it to everyone.”

“It doesn’t,” he argued, trying like hell not to get distracted by her breasts. They were wet, soapy, and ripe-looking, and she caught him looking but he acted as though there was nothing wrong with it. And, annoyingly, he was slightly mollified by the fact that she dug through everyone else’s lives. “You should learn how to ask questions, Julia. It’s a shitty thing to do to people.”

She nodded her head. “I know.”

He nodded his agreement and rested his head back on the tub while she stayed sitting up.

“What?” he asked, annoyance clipping his words short.

“I was surprised to find your police academy records,” she told him.

“It wasn’t a big deal,” he explained. “I joined after college for a few years, but being a cop wasn’t for me.”

“Your father was a cop,” she pointed out.

“So?” he asked.

“Did you do that for him? Isn’t that what sons do? Follow in their father’s footsteps?”

“Something like that,” he agreed while she stared at him, her chin resting on her knee. “This bath is not nearly as sexy as I’d envisioned,” he complained.

“You’ve been staring at my chest. That seemed sexy.” Julia looked down while she said it and ran her hands over the breasts in question, making his rock-hard cock jump against his stomach.

“That’s sexy,” he conceded. “Do it again.”

“This?” she questioned as she did what he asked, her nipple perking up at the attention. He nearly jumped out of the tub when her small hand found him underwater, hard and ready. “You’re hard,” she pointed out in a quiet voice.

“I know,” he agreed as he thrust into her a little. “I’m always hard around you.”

She moved in an easy rhythm and he found himself relaxing under her touch. It was when her other hand rested on his hip and he opened his eyes to find her leaning over him slightly, her small breasts out of the water and covered in bubbles, that his body increased the pace all on its own. Her eyes were bright and her plump lower lip was caught between her teeth. She watched him intently, like he was an experiment she was working on, testing his limits, and he was fine with being her guinea pig. She could use him for any test she needed, use him for anything at all, as long as she didn’t stop what she was doing. His pleasure, after long days of torturous teases, rose quickly, leaving him on the brink of coming in minutes.

“I’m going to finish if you don’t stop,” he warned on a gasp when she stroked her thumb over his over-sensitized flesh.

“Do you want me to stop?” she asked, sounding on the edge a little herself.

“I want you to kiss me,” he told her.

She did. Desperately, she kissed him while her fingers dug into his hip and her other hand jerked him off. He reached for her too, one hand around the back of her neck and the other cupping her damp breast. It was only seconds after that that he exploded, days worth of pent-up longing finally being released by her hands. He felt satisfied, his body humming as her hands continued their now-languid exploration.

“That was amazing. I liked it,” she breathed.

He chuckled and leaned up to kiss her. “Me too.”

“But we should get out of the tub though because now there’s semen in the water,” she pointed out.

He laughed again, feeling lighthearted. “I’m right behind you, Shorty.”

Julia leaned down and kissed him thoroughly again before standing up and dripping her excess water in the tub. He was so tempted to turn her around, spread her out, and lick her until she screamed, but she was right about the semen in the water, and he wanted to spread her out on the bed again and take his sweet time.

He watched her luscious ass as she stepped out of the tub and bent to get her towel from the toilet seat. She reached around and handed him one, too, brazenly staring at his body. She dried off and walked naked down the hall and into the back bedroom. He threw his towel around his waist and followed her, only to find her slipping on a tiny pair of multicolored.

When she reached down and pulled a T-shirt out of a box, Elliot asked, “Are you sure you need to put that on?”

She turned around, T-shirt in hand. “I thought you liked my T-shirts.”

He took the few steps into the crowded bedroom, took the shirt out her hands, and threw it on the bed. “If we’re going to compare how much I like your T-shirts to how much I like your naked body, the T-shirts are going to lose every time.” He bent his knees and slipped his arms around her waist, lifting her up to his chest. She took the cue and wrapped her legs around his body.

He put one knee on the bed and with her still wrapped around him, climbed until her head rested on the pillow. Elliot propped himself up on one arm so that he could look down at her body underneath his. She was just so delicate; the contrast between them was astounding in that moment. The skin of her stomach an almost ethereal pale looked otherworldly compared to his hairy, scarred torso. Her breathing moved her breasts gently up and down, the quiver an invitation to suck one, puffy, ripe nipple into his mouth.

She responded like she always did, like she’d been electrocuted. Like she’d never felt anything so good. Her fingers threaded through his hair, pulling him closer.

* * *

It was too good. That’s all Julia could think. That something shouldn’t feel so tremendous and if that was how it was supposed to feel, then it was no wonder that people became nymphomaniacs. Was this the same rush they got? Did their blood soar in their veins? Did they throb and ache in anticipation of the moment they knew was coming?

Elliot lifted his head from her breast and gazed up at her. “I can hear you thinking,” he told her, nipping at her sensitive bud. “What’s going on in that head of yours?”

“I think I finally understand how people can become addicted to sex.” Her eyes rolled back as he explored the tender underside of her breast with openmouthed kisses.

“I’m guessing that means it feels good?”

“Oh God, yes,” she moaned as he kept exploring.

“Oh God, yes is good,” he agreed, inching her panties down with his fingers. When she lifted her hips, he pulled them off. “Good girl,” he murmured into the skin of her stomach.

Ridiculously, her legs were begging to part for him, but her mind didn’t want to cooperate. She didn’t want to be that easy. She wanted him to ask. She wanted him to tell her to do it and she knew him well enough to know that he would.

Elliot shifted, sitting on his heels before her bent knees. His eyes, smoky and hot were bright when he put his hands on her knees and began to part them. “Open for me, baby,” he instructed and just like that, her mind acquiesced and did as he bid.

She looked at him again but his attention was riveted to her body. His thick fingers slid down her slit and parted her, then rubbed around her throbbing clit. He watched the entire thing, his concentration unwavering. He did that for longer than she thought he would, not putting his fingers in her like she hoped he would or licking her like she hoped he would. He just watched avidly as he played with her slit and her lips, spreading them and then moving up to roll her sensitive nub between his finger and thumb.

She was so turned on by the attention he was paying her, like she was the only thing he could see and after what felt like a lifetime, he began licking his way down her thigh. He paid special attention to her entrance for a few minutes before moving up to her clit. When he did, he didn’t hesitate to take the nub into his mouth and thrash it with his tongue until she exploded, white hot and electric.

“Oh, my God,” she whispered to the ceiling, to which Elliot responded by slipping one of his fingers inside of her. “Oh, my God,” she repeated, pushing down against him, her inner walls clenched against him.

“You want me,” Elliot growled, his eyes absolutely savage.

“Oh, God, yes!” she whimpered as her body kept pressing against him, building her up for another orgasm.

“Good. Come for me, baby. One more time.” It came out like an order, which set her off again, the feel of herself tightening around him in rhythm with her heartbeat making her feel something she’d never felt before. Like she was shattered from the inside out and back again.

Elliot sat back on his heels before pulling his finger out of her body. She almost moaned when he sucked the finger into his mouth. Did people do that?

Her eyes widened before she flopped her head back onto the pillow.

Elliot crawled over her and rested his hard length on her naked body. “This is the part where I slide into you.” He thrust gently and kissed her neck. “But we’re not going to go there just yet.” He propped himself on both arms to look down at her. “I want to take my time with you. Explore every inch of you. Make you come apart as many ways as I can think of before we go there.”

“Okay,” she agreed, her voice coming out huskier than she’d ever heard it before. “You seem to know what you’re doing.”

He laughed then, like he was really enjoying himself, which pleased her immeasurably. “It must be that knowledge that comes with my advanced age.”

She looked down where he was impressively outgrowing his boxers, his skin hot on hers. “You’ve aged very well, Elliot.”

He kissed her then and she could feel his smile. Why that made her smile in return was a completely new feeling for her.

* * *

Julia woke to him shifting behind her, adjusting so that he was sitting against the headboard and she was lying between his legs with her head on his chest.

He took the clips out of her hair and spread it onto his chest, running his fingers through it absently while he read a book. She thought to ask him what he was reading but couldn’t find the words. They were lost somewhere in her exhaustion, floating untethered in her mind but unable to find escape. She felt at peace, for the first time comfortable in her own skin. She thought she might have even been smiling and on that thought, her eyes closed.

It was then that she had the strange dream where a llama had moved into her bedroom. Not the bedroom that she was in now, but her bedroom upstairs and it was trying to get into her new closet. She could see beyond the filthy animal into her pristine white closet, with its white shag carpet and white couch. She felt sheer panic rise inside her chest, squeezing her lungs and making her heart pound.

It would get everything dirty. It would ruin everything!

“I just need two pair of boots,” it told her, then spit on the floor.

“My boots won’t fit you. Your hooves are too small.”

“Just two pair. I’ll take the Fendi leather crocodile ankle booties.” It turned and headed for the closet. She didn’t know how she would do it, because she didn’t know anything about llamas, but she knew she had to stop it.

* * *

Elliot had woken up at eight, which was sleeping in as far as he was concerned. He’d spoken to his cousin Logan who was getting married in a few months and then his father. His dad had told him that he was heading to the grocery store and seeing as Julia wasn’t awake yet, Elliot invited his dad over for some coffee. He greeted him at the door and then brought him into the kitchen.

“The place looks great,” his dad, Jim told him. “You boys do the best work. I’m so proud of you.”

It meant a lot to hear his dad say that. Like Julia had suggested, he’d initially studied to be a cop, hoping to follow in his father’s footsteps, but it hadn’t worked out for him. There were far too many asses to kiss to get ahead and he’d never had the stomach for it. His dad had never expressed an ounce of disappointment.

“Thanks, Dad,” Elliot said with a smile. “We had a good teacher.”

“Who? That Mr. O’Lausen at the high school?”

“He was pretty good, but I remember building a tree house when I was about fourteen that beat anything he could have taught me.”

His dad, a slight man with graying hair and a genial smile, nodded in agreement.

“It was one hell of a tree house.”

They’d run through their regular repertoire of conversation topics: football, building, and his brothers, when they both heard a thump from the back bedroom. He assumed it was Julia getting up, but when his father’s eyes bulged and he nearly choked on his coffee, he wasn’t so sure.

Elliot turned to see her stumbling down the hall toward the stairs, her T-shirt askew and her panties in full view.

“Julia?” He hurried over to her.

“You can’t have my boots,” she said hurriedly. “Llamas don’t have feet.”

Not expecting that, he laughed, and heard his father chuckle behind him.

“Okay. No one is taking your boots.”

“You’re not allowed to go in the closet. You have too much fur.”

It was funny and he laughed until he saw that her eyes were swimming with tears as he held her against his chest and her lip was quivered dangerously. He scooped her up against his chest and brought her back in the bedroom, suddenly remembering Kelsey’s warning about Julia’s sleepwalking. He sat on the edge of the bed with her cradled in his arms for a few long minutes.

“Please don’t take my boots,” she whispered as a tear trickled down the side of her face, her eyes squeezed shut. “Please don’t take them from me.”

Elliot rocked her gently and spoke softly to her. “No one’s taking anything from you, Julia. You’re fine.”

He looked up, startled, when he heard a gentle knock on the door. It was his dad, wearing a soft, concerned expression.

“Can I get you anything?” his father asked, his voice no more than a whisper.

“I think she’s okay. I’ll put her back in bed and be out in a minute,” he told him.

When Julia settled back into sleep, he laid her in bed and watched her for a few minutes. She was a complex woman. From moment to moment her needs contorted in front of his eyes. She needed her space—privacy to contemplate the world around her without being overwhelmed—but she also needed to be held. Some moments, like this one, she would settle with barely more than a comforting touch from him, contrasted with moments when she couldn’t stand to have someone’s hands on her. She was bold and strong, a well-respected businesswoman who was known for being sharp and to the point, but she also struggled to understand people and what they needed from her.

None of those things scared him. He was strong enough to stand for her when she needed help and strong enough to step back when she didn’t. It was how he felt about the Williams’s, the family that had adopted him as a scared kid and taken them in as their own. He’d learned how to be man enough to hold someone up and be their backbone if they needed it, but also how to stand behind them and be their cheering section when they stood on their own. He felt like Julia was family, like he understood her and saw through her in a way he didn’t with other people.

He looked down at her, slumbering soundly as if she hadn’t just shaken him to his core. As if he hadn’t, right there, sitting in the spare bedroom she hated, realized he might be half in love with her.