Page 23 of Callen's Captive
“Lead on, Princess.”
“That’s not my name.” She wove through the parked cars, with him right behind her.
“I know,” he said as he took her hand.
“Then you shouldn’t call me it,” she said, without mentioning that he’d taken her hand. She also hadn’t pulled away from him.
“It’s a harmless nickname. Like Big Foot.”
“But you have big feet.”
“Ah, well, as they say, big feet, big. . .”
She wasn’t having any of his humor, and she definitely seemed uneasy at the moment, especially when they passed a group of women coming out of a church. The stares the women leveled at her could melt metal. Kate dropped his hand like it was a hot coal.
The anti-shifter bias in this town was not hiding in the shadows as it had been in years past. That was not entirely shocking, given how the WSSO had been ramping up their propaganda, infesting every facet of human society. These women didn’t know he was shifter, though. It was their racial bias that shocked him. He thought humans had moved past racial differences long ago when they redirected their hatred onto shifters.
Apparently, they had enough hatred to go around on several fronts, and Kate was no better than any of them. That realization was disheartening. He had thought her different from other humans he’d met.
Once they rounded the corner, and the church was out of sight, she turned, with tears streaking her face. “I shouldn’t have done that. I told you I’m no good at this.”
“We were only holding hands. It’s not a requirement for working together.” He couldn’t remove the dryness from his voice. Nor could he bring himself to comfort her. Her letting go of his hand had hurt. “If you’re embarrassed to be with me, then say so.”
“It’s not like that!” She had long since lost her composure or her sense of place. She stopped in the middle of the street, totally unaware of the cars honking at her to move. He yanked her to the sidewalk.
“Those women, they looked at me like—”
“Which bothers you more? That I’m black or shifter?”
Her eyes were shiny with tears as she opened her mouth, clearly shocked by his question. He exhaled long and hard as he smoothed a tear from her face. Damn, she was hard to resist, especially now, but if she couldn’t see past his skin or the fact that he was shifter and see the person beneath, then he would leave after he got her some place safe. Prejudices or not, he would honor his promise to her, but damn, he really liked her.
He should have listened to his instincts, not let himself think about how sweet she smelled and how good her hands had felt on his chest and abdomen earlier. Or admire how she’d outwitted Briggs and risked herself to save him. She was smart, funny, and brave, except on the one front that mattered most. Black, shifter. . . whatever her hang-ups were about him, they wereherhang-ups. He was proud of everything he was, including what he did for his pack. He’d been foolish to think she could be anything more than an ally.
“You think this is because you’re black?” She half-laughed, half cried and visibly shuddered as she glanced over her shoulder. “They looked at me the way Paula did every time I had a new boyfriend. I could practically hear Paula calling me a slut, a whore. I knew if she caught me holding hands, it would be an entire day in the closet.”
Hell, hell, hell.
Callen wrapped his arms around her and rested his head on hers. He almost wished it was a race or shifter issue between them instead of some fucked-up childhood. “No one will hurt you again, Kate. No more closets or abusers in your life, I promise you.”
One slender hand caressed the back of his neck then eased over his shirt, only to rest on his breastbone and push him back enough that he could see her face. Caution, way too much caution, filled her face. “I like you, Callen, but you confuse me.”
He raised a brow. He always thought he was a pretty straight-forward type of guy. “Maybe a kiss would help clear things up.”
She laughed as she shook her head. He kissed her forehead. She wasn’t ready for more.
“Thank you,” she said, wiping her face with the back of her hand.
“For what?”
“For being you.”
He traced her lips with one finger as he imagined what she’d taste like. Ruby red lips opened to his touch, and he couldn’t resist letting his finger take one last pass along her lower lip, feeling the silkiness there, imagining more than his finger dipping inside her warm depths.
Her tongue rolled over his finger unexpectedly and then her lips closed, as she sucked his finger in with such incredible heat and force, his cock pulsed with need. Her eyes closed as she poured out all her passion onto his one finger. When she finally released him, his blood was racing, and he knew there’d be nothing better than being inside her.
“Sorry. I shouldn’t have done that.”
“You need to stop apologizing, Princess. It takes away your confidence.”
