"A tool?" he repeated softly, the dangerous silk in his voice making the fine hairs on my arms stand up. "You think I claimed you merely to siphon your magic? You think my obsession is born of utility?"
He spun me around, his sheer strength lifting my feet entirely off the ground. He tossed me forward, not onto the hard stone, but onto the thick, sprawling pile of bearskin pelts he had arranged in the deepest, warmest recess of the cavern. I landed with a soft thud, my naked limbs tangled in the dark fur. Before I could scramble backward, his hands wrapped around my ankles. He dragged me effortlessly back toward him, pulling my hips to the very edge of the pelts.
"I am going to strip that pathetic, trauma-soaked illusion of yours down to the bone," Callum vowed, his massive frame looming
