Page 127 of Split or Swallow

“Is he always like that?” Leo asked.

“Like what?”

“A bit of a brute.”

“Caspen is not a brute.”

The words came out sharper than she’d intended. Leo raised an eyebrow at her tone.

“Have I offended you?”

“You insulted someone I care about.”

Too late, Tem realized it was utterly the wrong thing to say. The look of pure disgust on Leo’s face was exactly the one Rowe had given Caspen earlier.

“You care about him?”

Tem tried to recover, reaching for his arm.

“I just don’t think he’s a brute. He prepared me for you, after all. Don’t you think we owe him our gratitude?”

Leo jerked out of her grasp. His voice was flat when he spoke again:

“Preparing you for me is his duty. I owe him nothing. And neither do you.”

“Leo—” she started, but he shook his head, and she fell silent.

He stepped closer. His gray eyes were shards of ice.

“Is this why you won’t fuck me? Because of him?”

Tem’s mouth opened, then closed.

In the silence, he studied her.

She didn’t dare speak. Leo was smart; he would not be fooled by words. Tem had no choice but to let him come to his own conclusion. When the prince finally spoke, his voice was a quiet murmur of realization:

“He means something to you.”

Tears began to form. Tem was being pulled in a direction she had no control over—being forced to reveal something she had never intended to reveal. Everything was coming to a head right now, and there was nothing she could do to stop it.

There was no point in lying. Leo would see right through it if she did. So Tem whispered:

“Yes.”

True hurt and disbelief flashed across Leo’s face.

“How much?” Leo asked.

“How much what?”

He leaned in so she couldn’t look anywhere but at him.

“How much, exactly, does he mean to you?”

Tem couldn’t believe this was happening.

“He…” she started, but had no idea how to put it into words. How much did Caspen mean to her? A lot. But she couldn’t say that to Leo. Before she could come up with an answer, he was already asking a far worse question: