Page 89 of Rite of Unity

I turned to face him.“How areyou getting out on Mondays?”He looked at me.“Every alarm in this city goes off the moment you open your front door.I’ve seen what happens to people who try.”

He held my gaze for a moment.Then reached for the tablet.

“Calden.”

“It's none of your business, Quick.”

For a moment, the weight of his dark gaze burned through me.

My pulse thrummed at my collarbone.

He touched my tablet, scrolling forward.

“Wait.”I grabbed his finger, lifting it, ignoring the warmth spreading up my arm at the contact.

The screen stopped on Ruth’s beaming face.

“As we enter week three of Joshua Silva’s Rite, Ruth maintains the lead.The nation waits and watches as she prepares to give her lineage recitation.”

A genuine smile tugged at the corners of my mouth.

Calden propped an arm under his head.“She’s doing well.”

I glanced sideways at him.“It’s early days.”

“Have faith in her.She’s stronger than you think.”

I faced him.“You stalking her, too?”

He barked a laugh, and my eyes went wide.

“Sorry,” he whispered.“I think of myself as a one–girl–at–a–time kind of stalker.”

The corner of my mouth began to curl up before I pressed my lips into a flat line.“So you admit it.”I sat up.“You've been stalking me.”

“Shhh.I’m watching.”He waved his hand at the screen, and I leaned back, settling into a comfortable silence as we watched Ruth’s recap.

I peeked at the strange man who had barged into my life and my room, admitted to being my stalker, but claimed he was only stalkingme.

Stop it, Maryn.

The screen changed.A message from our president.

Then, the recap of another Friday Rite ball.

The silence between us was too easy.I got lost in the announcers’ droning voices, and Calden slid closer, his warmth pressing against my defenses.

On screen, two guards flanked a woman as she was escorted from the ball.

“Who is she?”

“Nobody now,” Calden said.

“What happened?”

His eyes stayed on the screen.“She lost her ribbon.”

I watched until she disappeared from the frame, something cold settling in my stomach.