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“What did I want to supply?”
I snorted. “You don’t need me to tell you that. You were a player, and the girls lined up for a chance with the prince.”
“I can’t help my natural appeal.”
“Again with the modesty,” I said, but I felt some of the tension leaving my shoulders. “I talked with my mom about you.”
“You did?”
“We were discussing the AAM, the Pack, vampires. About trouble for all three, and the trouble you’d gotten in as a teenager.”
“Growing pains,” he said, and there was no regret in his smile.
“That’s one way to look at it. You got in trouble so often I kept a list.”
Connor looked down at me, brows raised. “Excuse me?”
My smile was wide. “In my journal. Only the times I knew about, of course. So if you told me or Lulu or my parents.” I slid him a glance. “Or if I actually watched you get hauled off by the CPD.”
“That only happened a couple of times.”
“Four that I’m aware of,” I said, correcting the record. “And it was a good thing your father was friends with the Ombudsman. I also kept a top ten list.”
“Worst crimes, or most impressive?”
“Both.”
“Why were you so obsessed with me, brat?”
I was torn between humor and insult. “I was not, and have never been, obsessed with you.”
“You had a list.”
“Because you kept getting in trouble. And those were only the times you got caught.”
His grin was wide again. “Those were halcyon days. Before screens and responsibility.”
“Before actual consequences, you mean?”
“Yes.”
“My favorite was probably when you replaced the bottled blood in the Cadogan cafeteria fridge with ketchup and hot sauce. Or when you marked all the cards in the Pack bar, then spent the evening emptying your uncles’ pockets.”
“Those were good nights,” he said with a very pleased smile. “My uncles were pissed. Or all except Christopher, who said they should have known better and checked the deck first. Said it was a good lesson for them. I was grounded for a week after the blood because someone snitched.”
“I do not admit to snitching”—I totally had snitched—“and even if I had, there was plenty of evidence. You’d been in Cadogan House that night asking about how blood tasted.”
“You snitched,” he said. “And I got in trouble. Thing was, it wasn’t me.”
“Right,” I said dryly. “Who else would it be?”
He looked down at me, and there was honesty in his eyes. “You tell me.”
Puzzled, I thought back. I remembered that night, because Lulu had stayed over, and we’d spent a good chunk of the time complaining about Connor and eating ice cream. Until we’d snuck him inside, and let him join us. So Connor and I weren’t the only ones there...
“Lulu,” I guessed. “She did it—and you took the blame.”
He shrugged, as if he might have shrugged off the gallantry. “Her parents were stricter than mine.”
