I had no answer for him. To me it was worse, but I doubted he would agree.
“Last time someone tried to take me into a clan, it didn’t work out too well.” I gave him a meaningful look. He should know; he’d been the one to try to establish the connection. That connection had nearly killed me and done some damage to him.
His lips twisted in thought. “I’ve been thinking about that. The connection should work if we did one of the older bonds.”
I’d pass on that. I didn’t want to risk my life on something that might work. Especially when I didn’t really want to be claimed.
“Did Liam really send you?” I asked.
His face went carefully blank.
“He didn’t, did he?”
“I’m sure he would have if he knew you were going to happen on one of the applicant’s.”
I wasn’t so sure about that. I’d been thinking.
Liam was the sort to orchestrate that whole scenario to help motivate me to get to work on locating the descendants. It was diabolical, but Liam struck me as someone who thought and strategized on several levels.
“You know where he is?” I asked.
“He’s probably in one of the back rooms working on plans for the selection.”
Did I really want to find him? Sir Grumpy Pants was probably going to give me a bunch of orders that I had no intention of following.
I looked Aiden over. He didn’t look like he was just going to let me walk away.
“Don’t suppose you could pretend you didn’t see me?”
He smirked. “Nope.”
I thought so.
“We’d better get started on tracking Sir Grumpsalot down then.”
Aiden gave me an appreciative smile. “Accurate, but I dare you to call him that to his face.”
Not in this lifetime. Maybe on the phone when we had a few land masses between the two of us, but not when he had a chance of making me pay for my snarkiness.
Chapter Six
Liam turned out to be easy to find. He was in the first place we looked, giving a briefing to three very dangerous looking men. Aiden and I waited just inside the door as he finished up.
The men looked me over as they filed past us. They were all tall and had the look of soldiers. Fanged soldiers capable of tearing your head off with their bare hands.
Their eyes filled with humor as they took me in, and they shared a look. It made me curious about what they’d heard.
“Aileen. Come.”
I couldn’t help looking like I’d just bitten into something sour.
“Woof, woof,” I muttered under my breath.
“I heard that,” he said, not looking at me.
Louder, I said, “You were supposed to.”
“She had a run in with Elinor,” Aiden interjected.
