It looks peaceful in the early morning, mist tucked into the low places of the grounds, light softening the sharp angles of stone, the wind moving through the trees like it’s only passing through.If you didn’t live here, you’d think it was all old-world romance and quiet history.
Callum knows better.
History isn’t quiet.It just learns to whisper.
And this morning, the whisper has a mouth and a name and the taste of citrus soap and heat, and it’s the reason he’s been awake since before dawn.
Isla MacLaren kissed him like she didn’t care what she shattered.
Callum has replayed that mouth sucking kiss a hundred times and hated himself a hundred times for the same reason, because the moment she surged into him, his restraint broke clean in half.He didn’t stop her.He didn’t step back and let her recover control.He kissed her back like he’d been waiting for permission.
It wasn’t romance.
It was anger.It was grief.It was a woman finally snapping under a lifetime of being managed and tugged and steered.
All of that can be true and still not change the fact that his body remembers the pressure of her mouth, the sharp hitch of her breath, the way her hands fisted in his shirt like she needed something solid to hold onto or she’d come apart completely.
He scrubs a hand over his jaw and forces himself to breathe.
It’s daylight now.It’s morning.He is not sixteen, not trapped in a boys’ school where every choice was punishment.He is not fourteen, waiting for another adult to decide what he’s allowed to want.
He is a man in a castle he has fought to keep standing.
He can make a decision.
So he does.
When he hears footsteps, fast, clipped, purposeful, he keeps his hands in his pockets.A deliberate act of self-control.A reminder that desire doesn’t get to decide what happens next.
Isla enters without looking at him, a folder tucked under her arm, hair pulled back tight.She’s dressed for work, clean lines, minimal fuss, a kind of composure that reads like armor.Shadows sit beneath her eyes, faint but unmistakable.
She didn’t sleep either.
“Morning,” Callum says.
“It is,” she answers, as if the words cost her nothing.
No mention of last night.No awkwardness.No apology.
He almost prefers it to the alternative, almost.
She crosses to the long table and spreads the papers they found yesterday in Keir’s office: flight searches, torn calendar pages with dates crossed out again and again, a half-completed list of requirements in Keir’s handwriting that reads like a man talking himself into a life he kept postponing.
One piece of paper they found yesterday gave her hope.One simple clue that was both gratifying and infuriating.A letter from his solicitor that simply said, Alisa said now was not a good time.It appeared that Keir had tried to visit Isla, and Alisa told him not now.
“We need to organize this,” Isla says.“Chronologically.Without interpretation.”
Callum leans against the back of a chair.“That’ll be difficult.”
Her gaze flicks up, sharp.“Then don’t make it harder.”
He gives a shallow nod and pulls out a chair, sitting opposite her, close enough that the table feels smaller than it should.
He becomes aware of her in the way he becomes aware of a storm building, pressure, electricity, the certainty that something is going to break if the air gets heavy enough.
They start sorting.
At first, it’s pure mechanics: dates, cities, torn edges fitted back together like a puzzle.Isla’s hands move with precise efficiency, fingers quick and decisive.She’s good at this kind of work.Not because she likes it, but because she’s been trained to treat chaos as an enemy.
