The Rejected True Heiress (Liora and Callum) novel Chapter 402

Callum glanced at me in the dim light. “Can I ask you something?”

“Mm?”

He propped himself up on his elbow. “Earlier, you mentioned ‘home’; but I don’t actually know where you came from, or anything about your past.”

My heart stopped. I glanced at Callum and saw the steadiness in his gaze. It made the guilt bubble to the surface, and I quickly sat up, grabbing my diet soda to take a sip. Anything to buy myself a moment so I could figure out how to answer him without sounding cagey. And without making the reveal, when it did finally come, even more painful.

“I, um…” I looked at my lap. “What do you want to know? Specifically?”

Callum shrugged. “Anything, really. I barely know you, Liora Belrose.”

I flushed. “You know pretty much all there is to know.”

“Oh, come on. There must be something you’re hiding.”

My mouth opened. For a moment, I almost told him. Just because I wanted to and I hated that I wasn’t supposed to. But then I thought about my father’s voice through the mindlink, flat and final, completely unlike his usual self, and I knew there must be a good reason for me to obey.

I exhaled slowly. “There are things I want to tell you,” I said. “About where I come from, and my family, and all of it. I do want to tell you.”

Callum waited.

“But I can’t yet,” I said, looking at him. “Not right now. I know that’s a frustrating answer. I’m sorry.”

He was quiet for a moment. A small crease appeared between his brows, and his jaw shifted slightly.

“Is it something bad?” he asked.

My face turned aflame as his implication settled over me. His face was dark with desire, the usual steeliness in his eyes replaced by something softer, headier.

I felt it in myself, too.

It was dangerous. And soon.

But… dammit, if I hadn’t wanted this for a long time. Too long. Far too long to say no now, not when something in me was bristling with excitement at the thought of finishing what had been started ages ago in the training center.

I think I said something, although it sounded far away and muffled beneath the pounding of my heart. All I knew was that suddenly Callum moved, and then I was on my back and he was above me, one arm braced beside my head.

And the candlelight carved shadows across his face, and his eyes were fixed on me, only me, and every coherent thought I had left suddenly dissolved into a fine mist of want and need and everything in between.

A soft sound escaped me. I grabbed the front of his hoodie with both hands and pulled him back down, and his mouth found mine, and somewhere in the middle of it all we collapsed together in a heap on the blanket, and the last candle on the windowsill flickered in the draft from under the door.