While he still considered Nathan one of his best friends, and always would, times had changed. Nathan had a family now while he and Asher were still single and didn’t have the concerns or time commitments that came with mated life.
Elena didn’t know either of them, so it was a perfectly reasonable assumption. Still, it took him longer than it should have to answer, simply because he couldn’t wrap his head around anyone accusing Asher of such an underhanded thing.
“Asher would never do that,” Logan said.
“And I’m supposed to take your word for it?” Elena sniffed.
“No, of course not, but he wouldneverdo that.”
Elena crossed her arms over her chest again as she studied the vamp. He was handsome with his narrow jawline, straight nose, and full lips. His light brown hair curled against the edge of his shoulders, and his pine green eyes were intent as they remained focused on her.
She disliked herself for noticing that, but it was impossible not to.
“I was with Asher when your father was killed,” he continued.
“In the room with him and my father?”
“Of course not.”
Logan buried his irritation. He didn’t blame her for her distrust. Before Kadence met Ronan, if anyone told him that he would one day sit in a room with a vampire and believe anything they said, he would have told them the world had a better chance of exploding tomorrow.
Now, he was a vampire, so was Nathan, and he considered many others to be his close friends. He’d fought beside them and would die for them… as he would for any hunter.
No, he didn’t blame her for her distrust. However, for some reason he couldn’t explain, he wanted her to trust him. He had no idea why it was so important to him, especially when they would soon part ways, but he was determined to have her trust him by the time this was all over.
When her hand fell onto her lap, he almost rested his over the top of it to comfort her. She wouldn’t welcome his touch and would probably punch him in the face.
Deciding he wasn’t in the mood for a punch, he gave her his most disarming smile. It had melted a few irritated women before; it did nothing for her.
“If you listen to your instincts, you’ll know what I’m telling you is the truth,” he said. “Asher and I had nothing to do with your father’s death.”
Elena ignored the annoying little voice trying to tell her that he was speaking the truth. She’d always trusted her instincts; they’d kept her alive during some pretty scary times, but years of ingrained distrust toward vampires told her not to believe a word he said.
Maybe if his hunter friend was awake, she could talk to him and sort through this whole mess. But could she trust a hunter who was friends with a vamp?
“Why did you take me?” she demanded. “Why didn’t you leave me behind for the hunters?”
“You’d have preferred if I left you behind for the hunter who shot you?”
Elena winced at the reminder that one of her own shot her. “Once the others learned what Mateo had done….”
Her voice trailed off. But would the others have believed Mateo had anything to do with her father’s death? Mateo was one of them; he was a stalwart presence in the compound and had been ever since she was a child.
He came from a long line of respected and powerful hunters. Very few, if any, would have considered it possible for Mateo to have a hand in her father’s death.
And that was if the vampire, and her instincts, were telling the truth. Vamps weren’t exactly trustworthy, and her senses were a little frayed right now. Someone killed her father, and she’d been shot and lost a lot of blood. She wasn’t sure she was in the right frame of mind to judge anything right now.
“How is my leg?” she asked to change the subject.
Logan rose from the bed and gestured at the blanket. When she nodded, he carefully lifted it away from her leg. While she slept, he’d removed her shoes and used the scissors he’d taken from the motel clerk to cut the pant leg of her jeans away.
He’d cleaned the wound but hadn’t bandaged or put a tourniquet on it again. His blood stopped her bleeding far better than any bandage could.
Elena frowned at the puckered, red welts on her upper thigh and the missing part of her jeans. She was a fast healer, but that was abullet hole. And now it was nothing but swollen, angry flesh. She didn’t even see a hole anymore.
“That looks good,” she muttered.
“It does.”
