Page 78 of Before the Bond
Elias was already seated when I arrived, both hands around a coffee mug, looking like this had gone exactly how he wanted. The smugness was subtle. But it was there.
"You came," he said.
I pulled out the chair across from him and sat down. "Not to socialize, if that’s what you mean.”
"Of course not."
He wiggled into his diner seat and clasped his hands together on the table.
"What are you hoping I'll tell you?" he asked.
"I want to know what you meant," I said. "When you told me the Ashwoods weren't what I thought. You weren't talking about just being werewolves, right?”
I drew up from memory the things Caleb told me about the Voss pack. The two had ancient history, but there seemed to bemore to it than that. Something that happened more recently. What “recently” meant, I wasn’t sure just yet.
Elias spun his mug along its coaster, his pinky nudging the red handle lazily.
“Wolves protect what's theirs," he said. "Their territory, their honor… their dead."
"That's not an answer."
"It's the beginning of one." He looked up. "My father hated the Ashwoods long before I was old enough to understand what that meant. His brother died in a dispute with Caleb’s father.”
I could only look back.
“Kieran,” Elias said. “He was not much older than Jake Ashwood around that time, I believe.”
I couldn’t even fathom the idea of Caleb losing Jake.
“My father never got over it."
I shook my head. Even if the idea disturbed me, it wasn’t what I wanted. Not yet.
"That has nothing to do with Caleb," I said. "He wasn't responsible for his father's decisions."
Elias looked at me for a moment with something that might have been genuine feeling. "Why do you defend him so fast?”
“Why wouldn’t I?” I said. “Caleb’s always been looking out for me. The Ashwoods always have.”
Elias’s jaw tightened. He spun the mug harder this time. Coffee spilled on the surface.
“How dense do you have to be, Olivia?” he said. “Why can’t you just accept that Caleb isn’t as noble as he makes himself out to be?”
“Because I trust him,” I said firmly.
“If you trust him so much, then why are you here?" His scowl deepened.
My fingers curled around the underside of the seat.
“I don’t want to bother him.”
“Oh, that’s perfect.”
Elias shook his head. He leaned forward on the table and stared at me hard.
"Children don't inherit their parents' sins,” I said.
"No," Elias agreed. "But they inherit their consequences."
