Page 64 of His to Keep

I shake my head, refusing to believe him being here. He was so cruel it has to be my mind playing tricks on me. He doesn’tcareabout me. He made that clear. “I hate you.”

“You don’t.”

“You touched Maisie.”

“I never went near her.”

I cover my face with my hands, shame throbbing through me. Breaking down, I sob into my hands, hiding my face from him.

“Please don’t cry,” he repeats the words his father said, and I shake my head.

“Get away from me.” I push him back, but he doesn’t let go. “Please get away from me.”

“I’m sorry,” he says, but I can’t listen to him. “I’m sorry for everything.”

“I just want to die. You shouldn’t have saved me. I mean nothing to you.”

“You meaneverythingto me.” Gasping, his arms come around my shaking body, and he hugs me. Immediately I try and pull away, knowing this isn’t meant to be happening and knowing he’s a lie.

“No…you’re not real.”

“I’m real, and I lied to you. The things I said were lies.” My heart aches as I smother my face into his chest and sob out loud. “I wanted to save you from him, and I failed you. It made me so angry.”

“You’re right to be disgusted with me.” I sniffle. “I didn’t even try to fight him.”

“How could you fight him? He’s a man, and you’re a girl. You’remygirl. I could never be disgusted with you.”

“I saw it.” I shiver against him, my fingertips turning blue with the cold. “In your eyes. I saw the disgust toward me.”

“We need to get you dry.”

“No.”

“Ava—”

“I saidno.”

Even though Callum betrayed me the most, once again, he’s ripping my pain away, and I hate myself for it. I don’t understand why he was doing this—not after what he said—but I can’t bring myself to ask why. Why would he risk coming to this room in the first place?

I’m so confused. Even when he grabs my chin and kisses me. For what should be so wrong feels entirely right being in his arms with him kissing me. A kiss that becomes passionate and intense, his tongue trailing along my lower lip before gently entering my mouth. He may not have been my first kiss, but he was my first everything else. My first love and heartbreak.

Once again, I find myself sinking into the devil’s pit as I surrender body and soul to a liar. With his arms wrapped around me, he lays me on the floor. The world could be watching, and I wouldn’t give a damn as I grip his wet shirt and kiss him harder.

His warm, soft hands travel up my bare thighs. A moan splinters my throat. I don’t know what’s possessing me, but I want him. I want him so badly it hurts in every way possible. Moments ago, I was on the verge of death, and now I’m wrapped in the arms of the person who sent me over the edge.

I asked who he was, but who am I?

Grabbing the wet fabric of my dress, he helps me remove it. My body shivers as he kisses my neck and touches my breasts. The sensation of his warm lips on my neck has my body on fire.

“I want you,” he rasps against my throat. “I’ve wanted you so badly all this time. You’re all I think about. All I want. You die, I die. Do you get that?”

Reaching for the hem of his shirt, I tug it upward over his head. His lips crash down onto mine, the heat of his body banishing the coldness away.

I touch him and enjoy his moans and shudders as I move my fingers down his pale, hard chest. I inhale sharply as his hand lightly brushes my stomach and then disappears beneath my panties. He touches between my legs, rubbing me in a way that turns my bones to liquid.

I shake with trepidation and suffocating need. Knowing what I’m doing is wrong makes it all the sweeter, and maybe this is the new Ava I’ve become. The Ava I need to be to survive this.

His fingers rub circles around my clit, and before I know it, his pants are down by both our doing, and he’s thrusting inside of me hard and fast. “Callum,” I moan.

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