393
Another Infernian might have taken offense at the flippant remark about loyalty, but Vesper could understand the sentiment. She had scoffed at most of the packs in Nova Scotia, especially at those who joined them on a whim. The entire autumn she’d survived as a loner, feeling above all of the wolves she ran into, but when her life was suddenly at stake, she found herself in the care of the clan healer. She still firmly believed that she could skip away from it all and survive on her own at any time—but she didn’t want to.
“I like Inferni,” the coywolf stated simply, knowing that Ria probably wouldn’t care for her to add more than that.
The deadpan remark wiped away nonchalance, and something flashed in her pale blue eyes. She searched momentarily for hate and found none—only the carelessness Alegria had always carried herself with. Then again, even the others could not find hate when they found their tyrant dead on the ground—but the difference was that they feared, and turned away. She didn’t remember if Ria did either, but she wasn’t flinching now, wasn’t regarding Ves like a murderer and monster.
“I shouldn’t have killed your brother,” Vesper said, trying to keep her voice strong. “He was just a stupid kid. I should’ve let him go and driven him off.” Her ear snapped down, and she called up some of her old fire to keep from sounding like a whimpering ball of remorse and weakness. “All of us were stupid kids. I shouldn’t have killed him, but I did, and I did most of you brats a goddamn favor.”
Justification—but a life was a life, and she understood Oliver more than she’d understood the two wolves she’d had a direct hand in killing these past couple of months. She wondered what everyone else would think, to hear her speak like this.
Her smirk returned when the girl stated that she hadn’t changed, and she nodded lightly. Others as sweetly acidic as her feigned ignorance, but Alegria made no apologies, and that was what kept her more interesting than most “nasty bitches” that ran around the earth manipulating and mocking.
She lifted her head as the other concluded. “I am,” she answered, and her blue gaze grew challenging. “So what are you going to do about it?”
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