Page 24 of Brighter Than Gold

“Hey, we’re all right,” Callan said taking me by the hand and seating me on the edge of the bed. “We’re fine. We finally have a solid wall between us and those animals.” He knelt and held my hands in his.

I let out a few more shuddered breaths before I felt the panic ebb from my veins. I’d never been locked up before.

“There, that’s better.” Callan smiled up at me. It wasn’t genuine but I appreciated the sentiment.

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry, Reyah. Is there anything I can do?”

I shook my head. “I think I just need to sit quietly for a moment.”

Callan nodded and stood. He began to walk about the room, methodically checking the window latches and the door frame. Trying to see if there was some weakness he could utilize. “Fuck…” he uttered under his breath after several minutes.

“Nothing?” I asked, defeated but not surprised.

“Everything has been reinforced with steel. An ox couldn’t get out.”

“The whole place is swarming with people. We wouldn’t get far anyway.”

Callan turned back to me with a concerned look. “I’m going to get you to safety, Reyah. If it kills me, I am going to keep you safe.”

I felt the man’s solemnity. “I know.”

He turned to the small dresser in the room. There were clean clothes and towels in the drawers.

“Reyah—” he started awkwardly. “I’d love nothing more than to clean up and change…”

“Gods, of course,” I said flustered, understanding his request. I kicked off my borrowed shoes and pulled myself to the opposite side of the bed, facing away from him. I lay down on one of the plush pillows to give him a modicum of privacy.

“I’m sorry about this,” he said, as I heard the basin splash with clean water.

“No, don’t be ridiculous.”

I stared at the grooves of the wooden wall in front of me as I heard him unlacing and unbuckling. I heard the unmistakable sound of clothing being tossed onto the floor, and the water churn. I listened as the wet cloth slapped against skin and knew that if I just turned my head…

Unbelievable harlot!I chastised myself. I rubbed my face in my hands for allowing such a thought to cross my mind.

I tried to focus on anything other than the sound of the cloth being dunked and then wrung out. Anything other than the sound of that cloth running across his muscular body as he rid himself of all of the foulness that had clung to him, like a snake shedding its skin and becoming new.

Fuck. What the hell was wrong with me? I’d been married for all of five days and besides, I hated Callan. Absolutely, categorically, despised him.

Thankfully a drawer opened, and I heard the flaps of what could only be the towel he was using to dry himself. That too was tossed on the floor before the drawer was open again.

“Thank you,” Callan said after a moment.

I sat up slowly. “Are you…”

“Clean and clothed. I’m sure I smelled worse than a dead pig on a hot summer day.”

I cracked a smile but when I turned to him, I wasn’t altogether certain he was joking. The tunic he wore was snug across his broad chest. He pulled out the cord that laced the front closed at the top. It was looser now, but only slightly.

“Are you still hungry?” he asked, motioning to the food laid out on a small table. I shook my head.

The general sauntered over to the single chair in the room and slumped gracelessly into it, defeated. His shoulders slouched and his head tipped back against the wall. I chewed the inside of my lip.

“Penny for your thoughts?” I asked quietly.

Callan loosed a heavy sigh before he answered. “I’m thinking about what a colossal fuck up all of this is. Arguably the most important orders of my career, of my whole fucking life and I have absolutely and utterly failed.” He turned to face me with a drained look. “I told Burke there were a hundred men better suited to the job of safeguarding your transfer to the homestead, but he insisted. I told him we needed more men, and he refused. ‘It’s only a four day ride,’ he said. And now here we are.”

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