Page 136 of Shadowblood Souls: The Complete Series

“But if there isn’t any option that’s good in every way, you have to go with the closest one.”

I take another knife but simply toss it from one hand to the other, eyeing Griffin. “And what about how he treated me and Zian? How is that anything close to good?”

Griffin’s voice firms. “That wasn’t okay. At all. I didn’t realize he was going to try something like that. But he knows it was an awful mistake. He hasn’t pushed you two together again, has he?”

It’s true that I’ve only seen Zian twice in the past four days, and those were during regular training sessions, no one forcing us to even work together.

“It was still sick that he tried to force us at all,” I have to say.

Griffin’s gaze drifts away from me, somehow going even more distant than before. “I think… the guardians aren’t used to seeing us as people instead of test subjects. Even the ones who are trying to do the right thing. That might take time.”

I swallow a growl of frustration. I’m obviously not going to get Griffin to reject Clancy’s approach right now.

If we get a chance to make a break for it, using the emergency system Andreas told me about in a secretive murmur during dinner two evenings ago, would we even be able to take Griffin with us? Would he be willing to go or try to stop us?

But if we leave him behind… he’ll point the guardians right to us like he did before, won’t he?

I change subjects to get at the most vital information he could still give me. I’m not sure if he’d answer if I ask directly, but that doesn’t mean I can’t prod my way there.

“We’re talking about the people who made you bleed all over the country tracing our movements too. I’m surprised they didn’t drain you dry over all those days you must have been following us.”

Griffin offers a faint smile as if he thinks he’s reassuring me. “It wasn’t like that. My powers have evolved and grown too.”

I raise an eyebrow at him. “Our emotions led you to us?”

“In a way. We’ve determined that if I focus on someone I know reasonably well, I can pinpoint their location on a visual display like a map. I just… feel where they’re feeling things, you could see it as.”

He can pinpoint us on a fucking map? A chill races over my skin.

We’d never get far enough away from the guardians while Griffin’s willing to serve as a tracking device. Even crossing the ocean only worked because he was momentarily refusing.

But I have no idea how to get through to him.

No, maybe that’s not totally true. I know the one thing that’s provoked anything close to a real reaction in him the entire time we’ve been in the room together.

Setting down the knife, I turn to fully face him. I reach out and take one of his hands in my smaller ones.

The simple skin-to-skin contact sets my nerves alight. They spark brighter when I stroke my fingertips over his knuckles, the shadows inside me flaring with the impulse to step closer.

And a hint of the same longing wavers in Griffin’s suddenly uncertain gaze.

“You know me that well,” I say softly, holding on to him.

“You’ve always known me the best out of anyone.

Can’t you see that I’m not some kind of monster who needs to be locked in a cage?

We were figuring it out—we were getting a grip on our powers.

None of us would have hurt anyone if we’d been left alone to live our lives. ”

His mouth tightens. “I don’t know that for sure. And if you lose control again—if Jacob goes on a rampage— I can’t just let that happen.”

I squeeze his hand, and his fingers wrap around mine in return. A pang resonates through my chest. “It wouldn’t be your fault. Nothing we did was your fault.”

Griffin laughs, a strangely rough sound after the eerie calm I’ve gotten so used to. His voice drops until it’s barely a whisper. “You have no idea how much is my fault.”

What is he talking about?

Anguish shines in his eyes, there and then gone so quickly I can’t tell whether I only imagined it. I let myself step closer, lifting one hand, meaning to touch his face?—

But Griffin pulls back, dragging his hand from my grasp.

Whatever tenuous connection I forged vanishes. He blinks, his expression evening out.

Before I can try again, the door behind him opens. A guardian pokes her head into the room.

“Griffin, Riva—since your talk is going well, Clancy wants me to move you on to dinner.”

Your talk is going well . The words roll over me, and something clicks in my head.

Horrified certainty spikes through my veins. I jerk my gaze back to Griffin. “For fuck’s sake. You know what this is, don’t you?”

Griffin knits his brow. “What what is?”

I can’t read his mind even as much as he can read mine, but I think he genuinely didn’t realize.

I step farther away from him and cross my arms over my chest defensively.

“You said Clancy learned from his mistakes? He’s only gotten sneakier about them.

This is a fucking date . He wanted us to get friendly again—why now, after he couldn’t force me to hook up with Zian?

Why would he care other than because you’re the only other guy from our original six I haven’t already been with? ”

Griffin stares at me. Before he can respond, whether he’d deny it or argue in Clancy’s defense, I decide I can’t stand to hear any more from him.

I march over to the guardian at the door. “I’d like dinner, but I’m not having it with Griffin. Let me go to the cafeteria. Now. And tell Clancy he can fuck off to the goddamn moon, if he isn’t already listening to hear me say it himself.”