Page 86 of Fall into Place

That had happened to Tess once before. She would never let it happen again.

Callum couldn’t understand why Tess had run out of the great room like that. Had he done something wrong? Should he ask her? Or would that be read as needy—or worse, aggressive—and was it better to give her space?

“Fucking hell,” he swore under his breath as he stormed down the hall back to his rooms.

He’d never felt so unlike himself—first the injury, now the girl? He’d never cared about a human’s opinion before; he didn’t see why he should start now. And so what if the best part of being injured was the night she spent in his bed—smelling her hair, the tantalizing feeling of her body only inches from his, the soothing comfort of her warmth, her steady breath, her living pulse? He was attracted to her, fine. And grateful to her for saving his life—sensible enough. But the only woman he’d ever really cared about was his sister, and he barely knew Tess. Let her be angry. It made absolutely no difference to him.

Except when he opened his door and saw her standing inside, he sped toward her faster than he imagined possible given how badly his leg had been injured only a few hours before.

“Tess!” he exclaimed. “Are you all right? What’s happened?”

He’d never seen her like this before—her expression was ragged and wild, like she’d gone feral in the twenty minutes since she’d left the great room.

“What’s a blood thrall?” she demanded.

“What? Why do you want to know about—”

“Just tell me,” she spat. “Right now.”

“Erm.” He mussed his hair anxiously. “So you know what a glamour is, yeah? Vampire looks in your eyes, you do whatever they say, only lasts as long as they maintain eye contact?”

“I’m familiar,” Tess bristled.

“Right. Glamours are dead useful for little things like booking in hotel rooms or bank transfers, but if you really want to control someone…”

He trailed off.

“Go on.” Tears were streaming down Tess’s face. “Say it.”

“You feed them your blood. And then the glamour can last for days, or if you keep feeding them and keep glamouring them…”

“It can go on forever.” Tess slammed her copy of Blood Feud down on Callum’s desk. “That’s what Konstantin used to do, right? It’s how he amassed so much power? You said you weren’t like him, you fucking liar.”

Hot shame roiled through Callum’s body—oh god, it wasn’t possible—there was no way she could honestly think—

“Tess, I would never do that to you.” He moved to comfort her, but she shrank back from him in horror. He felt desperate with worry—how could he have fucked up this badly, just when she’d finally started to trust him? “Please, you have to believe me—”

“Why should I?” She folded her arms tighter. “You told me to drink your blood, but you didn’t tell me what it would do—why would you do that unless you wanted to make me some kind of hostage? To control my mind, my body, to have complete power over me? Why, Callum?! Why would you do that to me?”

She was shaking now, tears spilling down her cheeks. He rushed over to her, reached to hold her, but she shoved him away.

“Don’t you touch me!” she shrieked. “I never said you could touch me!”

“Please,” he begged, “I swear to you, I never meant to use my blood that way.”

“Then how were you going to use it?” she demanded. “Why did you want me to drink your blood?”

“Because the idea of Felix hurting you was fucking unbearable!” he swore. “Tess, I would never hurt you. To make you do anything you didn’t want to do—that’s the last thing I could do. Your strong will, your stubborn determination, this fierceness about you—how could I ever change the thing that made me want you in the first place?”

Tess sank down in his favorite leather armchair, looking dazed. “That made you…I don’t understand.”

“I don’t either.” Callum fell to his knees before her. “None of it makes sense. I’ve been trapped on this island eleven years. After Octavia left…I didn’t know how I’d go on. If I even could. And then to meet you…”

Tess buried her head in her hands. “You’re saying…what are you saying?”

Callum sighed. It was time to stop lying—to Tess, and to himself.

“I’m saying I haven’t stopped thinking about you since the first time we went into that forest. I’m saying I would lay down my own life to protect yours if it came to that. I’m saying I could never hurt you, because any wound to you is a wound to me, sweet girl.”