“I want my own alpha.” He choked a little on the wordalpha, snapping off that telltale-s. “I want to choose.” Glancing down, he added in a small voice, “You were going to sell me.”
“Is that what this nonsensical defiance is about? Arden. I wasn’t going to sell you. Who told you that? Jack?” Lassit drummed his fingers on the arm of the chair. “I invited suitors for you, yes. You’ve been too isolated. Father kept you away from town and from society. I offered to take you to Sevennis myself, many times. To show you how it’s all done, let you get a bit of life experience. He always refused.”
“Oh,” Arden said. “I don’t think I’d have liked that. Thank you for thinking of me, though.”
“Those people at dinner were options.”
“It wasn’t an auction?”
“An auction?” Lassit pulled an incredulous face. “Wherever do you get your ideas? I invited alphas for you to meet. If you’d liked any, I’d have let you get to know them. I was never going to let you go for good, Arden.”
Arden believed that last part, at least.
“I’d have brought you home, and you’d never have needed to leave, ever again.”
“You’d have brought me home?”
“Yes.”
Arden sighed. “Then you’d have made me go. You’d have given me away.”
“It was necessary,” Lassit snapped.
“Because you needed the money.”
“Yes. If you insist on hearing it, then I’ll say it. Yes. Father left his affairs in an absolute shambles. You are part of the estate, and an asset I had to use to get things back to a stable footing.”
Arden caught a flash of movement from the doorway. It was Grillon, about to come in with the tray. He shook his head slightly. Grillon paused before backing out into the hall. “You have that money now,” Arden said.
As well as telling the indignant Arden that he’d been unknowingly engaged for years, and the sole lot in a disgraceful auction, Jack had told him that he’d thrown an enormous amount of money into the marriage contract.
It was quite the conversation.
“I’m not an asset anymore. You’ve been paid like you wanted. Besides, you have no need for an omega brother. No use for one.”
“I know what I need.”
“You have what you want!”
Lassit continued to stare at Arden with that heavy, brooding look in his eyes that Arden had always found so unsettling. “Do I?” he murmured.
“Yes. You have money. I won’t be a financial burden, and I’ll never be at Dalbryn to annoy you again. It’s all worked out wonderfully.”
Lassit closed his eyes briefly. The emotion that crossed his face was there and gone too quickly for Arden to interpret—not that he was ever any good at interpreting people in general, and Lassit in particular.
“Your Grace?” Stanton appeared in the doorway. “Your carriage is standing ready.”
“Thank you, Stanton.”
Stanton bowed and withdrew.
“Going somewhere?” Lassit asked.
“Yes.” Arden beamed at him. “I’m going home. Oh,” he added when Lassit tensed. “To J-Jack. To Avendene.”
“You’re going back to him? I assumed you were here because Jack had scraped you off.”
Now it was Arden’s turn to tense. “Scraped me off?” he said in affront.
