“There are not many,” she told me with confidence. “Although…” Her hands stilled. “I did not know that some ran as deep as they did.”
So, she hadn’t known about Hollis and his family. I wondered if she knew about Lyra.
“You watch a lot,” I told her, handing her a wooden peg.
Adair frowned. “Watch? I don’t think I do, but I see more than some.”
“Do you share what you see?” I asked her curiously.
She shook her head. “It’s not for me to open the eyes of others, Alpha.” Her clothes were hung, and she stooped to pick up her basket. “Tea?”
“Sure.” I followed her inside, and the scent hit me immediately. “Tell me he was here to ask questions and nothing else.” I was not praying to Luna that it would be anything else. Adair’s smile told me everything I needed to know, and I held back the groan. “I see.”
“He is enigmatic,” Adair said dreamily, and I questioned everything I had ever thought about her beingwise.
“Diesel isnotenigmatic,” I corrected her with resignation. “He is really verybasic.”
Adair’s smile told me she thought otherwise.
“You know there were others?” I asked her, cautiously. She was still young, so maybe she thought there was a romance to be had, and I needed to dissuade her of that very quickly.
She started making tea, glancing at me once. “Are you concerned your enforcer is going to break my heart, Alpha?”
I let out a huff of laughter. “He has a tendency to break things,” I admitted.
She poured water into the clear teapot and added two spoonful’s of tea leaves into the tea basket. Placing it on the table, she turned back and picked up two cups. Adair satopposite me, her elbow on the table, and she dropped her head into the crook of her palm and studied me for a long moment.
“You aren’t worried he’ll break me,” she said after a moment. “You’re worried there are more women in this pack who Diesel’s had sex with. You know of…two?” She guessed, and I nodded. “I make three, and you’re thinking how many more.”
“He can be…generouswith his time.” I sucked my teeth as I looked out the window.
Adair’s delighted laugh made me look back at her. “He is definitely generous,” she told me with a wink. She poured the tea. “Now tell me what’s on your mind.” She blew across the top of her cup. “And I don’t mean about your man in my bed.”
“You’ve heard the rumors?” I asked, picking up my tea and taking a tentative sip. Lavender was the first scent, then something more floral, rose? I took another sip. Licorice? No, aniseed and simple black tea. “This is an interesting blend,” I told her.
Adair smiled. “It’s a blend of my own. I’m pleased you like it.”
I didn’t correct her.
“I heard Solana is leaving soon, taking her children with her. I heard Hollis is in a bad way in a newly created cell and that he can’t shift to heal.”
“You hear a lot,” I murmured.
“People forget that when you lower your voice to whisper, more ears than you want pick up to hear what’s being said behind hands.”
“Is that why you always speak evenly?”
She smiled again. “Maybe. Or maybe I have nothing to hide, Alpha.”
“From me? Or anyone?”
Adair slowly lost her smile as she watched me. “You think I knew?” she murmured, and this time I heard her surprise. “I didn’t. I knew there was something amiss in Solana’s marriage,but her husband was fond of homemade moonshine; I would not have said he was capable of being a traitor to his pack.”
“Because he was a good man or because he was a drunk?”
“A drunk,” she answered honestly. “Alpha Malric tried to clean him up,” she continued. “Even Lewis spent time with him, but Hollis always fell back into the bottle.” Adair sniffed, taking a drink of her tea. “Well, he brewed his own; it was more jugs than bottles.”
“Sherry?” I asked.
