Page 19 of Callum

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“Do you think that’s the whole truth?”

“I’m not sure.”

—

Jericho rattles the chain of my ankle cuff, his maniacal laughter bouncing off the walls of my room. It looks so much like the bedroom I grew up in, but it isn’t. This is no home to me, but that wasn’t either. I know that now. I’ve always been in prison; Jericho’s just my newest captor. The only difference is that he paid good money to have me.

I don’t scream. I don’t beg or cry. I don’t make any noise at all, not even when he pulls me toward him, my legs giving out as his rough hands rip at my clothes.

I just want it to be over. I just want it all to be over.

—

“Well, in that case, ‘this’ is MacAlister Business.”

“And?”

—

Dodge slides his pudgy fingers against the skin of my thigh, his promises from earlier no longer the empty threats I’d hoped they’d be. He hadn’t partied as hard tonight, claiming he wanted to be “fully present” for what he had in store.

The idea of letting him touch me makes me physically ill, but I push the nausea down as I spread my legs in the back of his limo. The ancient leather cracks loudly in the silence pressing around me. This is the only way to get out of the GiGi’s, and I will do it. I will do anything.

—

“You don’t.”

“We fucking do, and it’s time you grow the fuck up and join us again.”

—

Kyler presses my own knife into my shin, the tip dragging against bone as Ginetta and Harlowe scream at each other in the distance. “Just fucking stop, Ginetta! We have to call Grim. He’s going to come for her!”

—

“I can’t work for him, Lachlan.”

Just fucking stop, Ginetta!

“You need to talk to Grant.”

We have to call Grim.

“Why?”

He’s going to come for her!

“Because it’s time.”

He’s coming for me.

—

A cold sweat coats my body as I jolt awake. It takes a moment to remember where I am, the house looking completely different in the light of day.

Callum.

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