Her heart cracks for just a moment.“Not tonight.I can’t take any more.Let’s save that for tomorrow.”
Isla closes her eyes.
“That might be the cruelest part,” she says.“I believe they both loved me.And they both hurt me anyway.”
Callum looks at her, something fierce and protective flickering across his expression.
“You deserved better than fear-based love,” he says.
The words strike her harder than anger ever could.
For a moment, Isla can’t breathe.She has spent her life excelling, achieving, mastering, controlling every space she entered, except the one where love lived.There, she learned to be careful.Restrained.Managed.
She stands abruptly, pacing again, energy coiling tightly inside her chest.
“I don’t know who I am without all of that,” she admits.“Without the schedule.Without the expectations.Without being the girl who never caused trouble.”
Callum watches her.“You’re the woman standing here now, and you’ve been causing your mother some trouble.”
She scoffs weakly.“That woman feels like she’s coming apart.”
“Sometimes that’s the only way to find out what’s real,” he replies.
Isla stops in front of him.“And what if I choose wrong?”she asks, voice trembling.
Callum meets her gaze steadily.“Then you choose again.”
The simplicity devastates her.
“All my life,” Isla says, “love has meant rules.Distance.Sacrifice disguised as responsibility.”
Callum’s voice is quiet but sure.“It doesn’t have to.”
She steps closer, heart pounding.
“What if I don’t know how to do it any other way?”
“Then let someone stay,” he says.“Not to fix it.Just to be there.”
Something inside her cracks open.
Isla lifts her hand, hesitates, then rests it against his chest.His heart beats steadily beneath her palm, real, present, unguarded.
“I don’t want to be alone tonight,” she says, and this time she doesn’t try to disguise the need.
Callum’s breath catches.“Tell me to stay.”
“Stay,” she whispers.“But not here.My bedroom.”
His hands slide to her waist, firm and grounding, and the kiss is slow, deliberate, nothing taken, everything offered.It’s a kiss that saysI’m herewithout demanding she be anything other than what she is right now: furious, grieving, and undone.
Isla clings to him, not because she’s weak, but because she’s finally letting herself want.Because for the first time in her life, her body has been awakened.While Callum may still be her enemy, she wants him like she’s never wanted a man before.
Tonight, she needs to feel his arms around her, holding her, reassuring her that everything will be all right.
When they part, their foreheads rest together, breath mingling.
“This doesn’t fix anything,” she whispers.
