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He pulled out of me and snuck off to the bathroom to get cleaned off. When he returned, he brought me a towel and a cold glass of water. Cal was always a gentleman like that. He slid onto the mattress next to me. Curling up around me, Callum drew me to his chest. Leaning up against him was almost as warm as a thick blanket.
He kissed my temple. “Partners, luv. I like the sound of that.”
“Me too.”
His arms tightened around me. “Still, if that rat bastard ever touches you again, I’ll end him.”
“I know, but tonight…I couldn’t let you do something you’d regret. Nothing messy, nothing horrible to blow back on you.”
He nodded and nuzzled his nose in my hair. “Thank you.”
“No, thank you for saving me.”
“I’d tear through heaven and earth for you. Don’t ever doubt that.”
My voice was almost steady as I replied, and I was proud of me for that. It was just impossible, deep down, to know what was true. That went double for a relationship so new and untested, for the first I’d ever had.
“I don’t,” I lied. “I know you care, that you’ll protect me with everything you’ve got.”
“Good,” he said, hugging me tight, my guardian against the night. “Because there’s nothing on earth that’s truer than that. Nothing.”
“Of course.”
But as I fell into a deep sleep, I just wished I could feel the truth of his words down to my bones. I wasn’t sure I’d ever get to the point where I believed them.
Chapter Thirteen
Three Months Later
Iris
“Was it awful?” I bit my lower lip and waited for Callum to laugh at the poem I’d finished reciting for him.
It made me more nervous to talk about my new writing than it did to try and shift under the covers to hide the extra ten pounds I’d gained while dating him. I was blaming the wonderful dinners we’d been eating. Going out on the town a few times a week was exciting and fun, but it wasn’t helping my already rounded hips any. Over the last few months, he’d been encouraging me to embrace my mostly forgotten inner poet. I had a reading at a small coffee shop soon—no biggie in theory, as I literally expected about five people from campus to show—but it was still scary. Maybe I was a hack. Maybe I’d fail.
Callum looked at me, his intense eyes boring into mine. Then he kissed my lips. “It wasn’t bad at all. Actually, it was pretty bloody excellent.”
I snorted and blew a long strand of hair from out of my eyes. “You say that because I have sex with you.”
He grinned and pinched my hip. “You have a lot of sex with me, but I’d still be honest if they were wretched. That one was really good; I loved the simil
e you used to bring in the moonlight.”
“Thanks.”
My shoulders relaxed as I leaned back against the headboard. I’d had more tension in my body than I’d realized, and the only thing that could have alleviated it was hearing those words from him. I needed confidence for my upcoming small show, and he gave me my strength. Over the last almost four months, he’d been my rock.
Callum slid the notebook from out of my hands and offered me a wide-eyed smirk. “You know,” he said, his voice hitting a low rumble that made my belly flip-flop. “I think your poem might be the perfect aphrodisiac.”
“I think you have a one-track mind, and that you’re not always thinking with your big brain.”
He crawled across the bed and hovered over me, lowering his hips just enough to grind his hardness against my hip. “It’s not that little, vixen.”
“Oh, I agree and—”
I closed my mouth fast as a bit of backwash threatened to work its way up my throat. Suddenly the flip-flopping in my stomach didn’t feel like it had anything to do with sexual attraction. Shaking my head, I slid away from him and rushed for the bathroom. I fell to my knees by the toilet and vomited into it. Damn. I almost didn’t make it. The spewing continued until I felt like my body was twisting itself inside out. It had come on so suddenly at only eight a.m., and I just hadn’t been expecting it.
I hadn’t felt bad last night, and I’d had some soup I’d made for myself before coming over to Callum’s penthouse after class. That didn’t make sense. Nothing else could have really upset it either.
