Hell's Bell (Lizzie Grace 2)

I snorted again, but didn’t bother questioning her any further. Even if she had read him—and I doubted she had, given she generally believed everyone had a right to privacy unless or until they in some way provoked her—she obviously wasn’t about to tell me.

Aiden sat at the table in the corner of the room, one that had, over the last few weeks, become “our” table—the one we always used whenever he came to the café.

The sunlight streaming in through the nearby window had streaks of silver glimmering through his otherwise dark blond hair, and highlighted the somewhat sharp planes of his face. He was nursing a mug between his hands, and watched me approach with an intentness that had heat rising to my cheeks.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t stay behind last night.” I pulled out a chair and sat down next to him. “But I really wasn’t in a fit state to be questioned.”

“So I gathered.” His gaze briefly swept me, and his expression gave little away. “Are you feeling any better?”

I nodded. “Did Belle send you the recording we took?”

“Yes, as well as the photos. Thanks for that.”

Despite the earlier intentness, he was being overly polite, which worried me somewhat. “Do you know who he was?”

“Yeah—Aron Marin. His father is one of the pack’s alphas.” He hesitated. “Ciara said you believed his death was caused by an evil spirit—one that ate his soul. Are you absolutely positive about that?”

“As positive as we can be without actually confronting the thing.” I frowned. “Why?”

“Because Rocco was having problems within the pack, and very recently his family was threatened.”

My eyebrows rose. “I wouldn’t have thought the person behind such a threat would have lasted long within the pack.”

Aiden’s smile held little in the way of humor. “She didn’t—”

“She?” I cut in, surprised. “Do female wolves often go about threatening the hierarchy?”

He raised his eyebrows. “Isn’t it almost a rite of passage that young adults fight back against the restrictions of their parents? Didn’t you?”

My smile held an all too familiar edge of bitterness. “Not really.” I’d simply run away rather than keep uselessly flinging myself at walls that would never come down, and accusations that would never cease. My parents might have had three children, but my sister had been their golden child—and my brother came in a close second. As my parents had told me multiple times, either were worth a trillion of me. “But if it was only a teenager who’d threatened the alpha, why was the threat taken so seriously?”

“Because the woman in question was twenty-three, and the somewhat troubled daughter of a lower-rank pack member.”

I frowned. “I still don’t get why it was taken seriously enough to banish her.”

“Larissa has a string of minor and major assaults behind her, stretching back to when she was barely twelve.” He grimaced. “Her behavior of late has been escalating.”

“But still—”

“She’s a werewolf.” His voice was blunt. “And a strong one. She might never have beaten Rocco, but there’s no doubt in my mind that she’d hold her own against Aron.”

“Except he wasn’t physically attacked.”

“On first appearances, that appears to be the case. But until the autopsy is done and we get the tox results back, nothing is certain.”

Including my claim that evil had dined on his soul, I suspected. It would only be the lack of any other cause that would allow him and the other rangers to actually contemplate the impossible. “So why did she threaten the pack’s alphas?”

“Because Karla Marin refused permission for her to marry Garrett, their youngest son.”

I blinked. “Do alphas often go about doing things like that?”

“Yes.” He hesitated. “It’s often necessary, as many within his pack are blood-related.”

“But wouldn’t that be a problem for all three packs here? The reservation certainly isn’t the largest.”

“Again, yes, which is why we long ago started an exchange program—with packs both here in Australia and overseas—that allows those seeking mates to investigate options elsewhere.”

“So Larissa is related to Garrett?”