Chapter 175

I freeze as I look to the door. Caleb stands there, glowering at me. Bethany looks nervously between us.

“Uh, please excuse me,” she says and quickly makes her way to the door. She slides around Caleb, whose gaze is fixed solely on me, and escapes.

With Caleb looking right at me, though, I have no possible way out of this scenario.

“Were you planning on going somewhere?” Caleb asks, his face grim, his mouth in a hard, thin line.

“No,” I says. “It’s nothing like that. We were just talking.”

Caleb stalks into the room, his gaze ever on me. I feel like the prey to a great predator moving in close, ready for the kill. With how things are, maybe I’m not too far off the mark.

“It didn’t sound like just talking,” he says. “In fact, it sounded as if you intended to put yourself in danger yet again.” He comes closer, right up in front of me, only a foot or so away and closing by the minute. “But you wouldn’t do that, would you, Harper. Endanger yourself. After knowing how much it upsets me.”

I swallow hard as the anger in his eyes takes on heat. His gaze trails down my body and I feel naked in front of him.

When he looks at me like this, like he wants to eat me, I start to shiver, my body reacting at once.

I can’t help my response to him. It feels embedded within me, all the way down to my bones. Caleb is a very generous lover, a fact I’ve learned over time, and every time we are together, I feel like I am the center of the entire universe.

It’s addicting and exhilarating.

And not a feeling I want him to share with Annabelle.

The dark thoughts push into my mind uninvited. I glance down and away, trying to escape them.

Caleb cups my face with both hands, his thumbs tracing over my cheekbones. He tilts my face up so that I’m forced to look at him. Then he stares down straight into my eyes like he can see me all the way to my bones.

“Do not try to escape from me,” he commands, and I’m not sure if he means physically or mentally. “Stay here, in this moment, with me.”

“Caleb,” is all I can say, a shaky breath, before his mouth crashes down over mine and he swallows away whatever other words I might have thought about or uttered. I’m entirely senseless other than to feel his touch and his mouth and his hands as he eases my clothes down away from my body.

We’ve laid next to each other every night on our trip away from the palace, but with the danger and the worries, we didn’t truly have time to enjoy one another.

Now, it seems, Caleb wants to make up for lost time.

When I’m entirely disrobed, he makes quick work of his own clothes. Then, hitching me up against him, with his hands under my thighs, he carries me to my bed and lowers me down.

His mouth leaves mine only to explore my body with his tongue, mapping pathways that he’s already trekked. He knows the entirety of my person by now, but it never seems enough. He’s never satisfied.

For that, I am exceedingly grateful.

I hope he never tires of his exploration.

When he’s satisfied, and I’ve come at least twice, he returns to kiss me full on the mouth. It’s passionate and fierce.

He kisses like he rules, ruthless and demanding.

I hold onto his shoulders as he pushes my thighs apart and slides himself between them. Then I lose all thoughts for a while.

When we are finally done and sated, we hold each other in the dark. Night has crept in and the many strenuous activities of the day – not just sex, but also the meetings and the travel – are starting to take their toll.

Caleb, unusually, is already asleep beside me. He holds me tenderly in his sleep in a way that makes me feel like a precious treasure and not just his consort.

What did his advisors call me? A whore?

I don’t care about their opinions really, but I do feel a touch of regret. In another life, maybe I could have been the one Caleb wanted to marry. Maybe, if I was never disgraced, Caleb would have swept me right off my feet, carried me to his palace, and made me his wife.

It seems unlikely. Without my disgrace, Caleb probably wouldn’t know who I am at all.

Still, it’s a sweet little dream to think about. Laying here, looking at Caleb, with his eyes closed, his eyelashes fanned out over the tops of his cheeks, he seems so restful, so peaceful.

I wish things could always be like this.

Soon, he’ll be sharing his nights with Annabelle. Will he rest as sweetly by her side? Will he make love to her the same way he does with me?

“I can feel your eyes on me,” Caleb says, and I startle. He peeks his eyes open and looks at me.

“I thought you were asleep,” I say, embarrassed.

“I was,” Caleb says. “But now I want to know what you are thinking about.”

“I wasn’t thinking about anything,” I say, glancing away.

“You are lying,” he replies, frowning. “And you know how I feel about that. I want the truth, Harper.”

I swallow hard, desperately trying to think of a way to avoid this conversation – and fast. But every solution I can think of seems contrived. Caleb will never go for an easy change of subject.

Now that he smells blood in the water, he will track down the source, as determined and single-focused as a shark.

He won’t stop probing me until I give him an answer that will satisfy him. Unfortunately, in that case, this means I must tell him the truth, even though I’d rather not.

“Harper,” he says, an edge in his tone. His patience is running thin.

I don’t want to argue with him tonight. Instead, I say, “After the wedding… Will you stop spending your nights with me?”

His face clouds over, a thunderstorm of dark emotions: anger, annoyance, frustration. Finally, after a while, his features harden and his expression goes blank once more.

“Do you want me to lie to you?” he asks.

Those words are answer enough, and it hurts.

Coiling into myself, I roll away from him.

“I haven’t said anything yet,” he insists. He pushes himself up onto one arm and leans over me, watchful.

I refuse to meet his gaze. “I already know what you are going to say.”

“I could lie.”

“Don’t.”

He rubs a hand down his face. “Harper. You’ve known from the start that I’m a king. I will never be faithful to any one woman who is not my mate, and my mate does not exist. When I am married to Annabelle, there will be certain expectations on me that I will be forced to meet. For instance, an heir…”

Each word is a slice to my heart. “Please, stop.”

“Harper.”

“Leave,” I say, tears in my eyes. “Please, Caleb. Just leave me alone.”