The Rejected True Heiress (Liora and Callum) novel Chapter 429

We both looked down at the dirty dress I was still wearing. I’d done my best to clean it up in the motel bathroom, but it was definitely going to take a lot more than that to make myself look presentable again.

“Shower?” Callum asked.

I nodded, took his hand, and pulled him into the en suite bathroom.

A little while later, we emerged from the steam, both blissfully clean and smiling. Callum sat on the bed while I rifled through the closet for something presentable to wear for meeting my father. The butler knocked on the door and left a clean suit for Callum at my request.

While Callum dressed, I pulled out a simple yet elegant house gown. It had long, trailing sleeves and a skirt that fanned out slightly behind me. I put it on, too tired to bother with much underneath, then pinned my hair back into a simple bun with a few face-framing pieces.

When I was finished, I turned. Callum looked handsome and relaxed in the suit. His eyes wandered unabashedly.

“It really does suit you,” he said, pinching a bit of the fabric of my gown between his fingers.

I took his hand. “Come on. Let’s get some fresh air.”

We went back through the palace and out into the gardens through the south door. The air smelled like late spring, warm and floral, with the roses just starting to bud along the stone walls. We walked the main path, then the smaller winding one that cut through the older part of the garden where the hedges grew taller and the stone columns stood at intervals draped in climbing ivy.

Callum glanced at me sideways as we walked. “You look beautiful,” he said.

It was the same thing he’d said in front of the motel that morning before we got in the car, and on the drive over, and I had a feeling he was going to keep saying it and I was never going to get used to it.

Before I could answer, he caught my hand and pulled me gently off the main path, between two of the tall stone columns, where the ivy was thick enough overhead to cast the whole narrow space in shade.

He turned me toward him and kissed me. I let him, and then let it go on a bit longer than I planned to, my hands finding the front of his shirt.

When we came up for air, he glanced past me down the path in both directions. The garden was empty. The windows of the palace along this wing were all dark, no staff visible.

He looked back at me with a particular look.

VERIFYCAPTCHA_LABELVerify