Page 196 of Shadowblood Souls: The Complete Series

Twenty-Three

Jacob

I flop onto one of the stuffy armchairs, but I can’t sit there for more than a few seconds before I’m shoving myself off it again. Agitation winds through my limbs.

I glance over at Dominic and Griffin where they’re poised at the room’s card table, attempting a game of checkers I don’t think either of them is all that focused on. “Shouldn’t they be finished talking already?”

Dominic’s mouth tightens with a hint of a grimace. “We don’t know what Balthazar wanted to talk to them about.”

Riva, Andreas, and Zian got back from their overnight mission a couple of hours ago. I heard the whir of the drawbridge lowering to admit the car.

But Toni ushered them into the drawing room immediately and shooed us off when we came asking if the job had gone okay. They still haven’t emerged.

My gaze fixes on my brother. “How are they feeling? Has anything changed?”

I asked Griffin a similar question when they first returned. He told me then that both Riva and Zian were upset, with some agitation and a little fear, but not hurt. Not in an immediate panic.

Has this long discussion with Balthazar made them feel better or worse?

Griffin leans back in his chair, fully abandoning the game. His eyes take on a distant cast.

He can pick out their separate impressions because he knows them so well. That’s how he once helped the guardians track us all across the continent and beyond.

He will always know Riva from the inside out, in ways I never can. He hasn’t solidified the connection in our blood with her like I have, with the mark that hums on my breastbone with a faint but clear sense of her presence in the house, but he has a much more direct line to her heart.

It shouldn’t bother me anymore. It shouldn’t bother me that Balthazar sent her off with Drey and Zee when having my powers in the mix should always mean she’s better protected.

So I’ll just pretend that it doesn’t. That’s gotten me pretty far already.

“Their agitation has become less intense, but it’s still there,” Griffin says after a moment. “The general uneasiness has spread to Andreas too. He and Zian are frustrated now—Riva’s closer to outright angry.”

Dominic is taking all this in as I do. His grimace lingers. “Whatever Balthazar is telling them, it’s not helping.”

I can’t restrain a snort. “When does it ever?”

But making that snarky comment doesn’t help anyone either.

I stalk around the room that’s part living room with its hearth and upholstered chairs, part games room with the table and the collection of basic board games in a nearby cabinet.

“If he’s not helping, maybe he should let them go so they can tell us what’s going on. ”

Of course, that would serve our purposes rather than the asshole’s. He only cares about what he wants.

If I knew exactly which of the rooms on the far side of the villa he’s lurking in—if I could barge right in there and wrench his neck around with my powers for that satisfying snap of his spine?—

My hands clench, and one of the cabinet doors flings open hard enough to smack into a neighboring side table.

With a waft of shame, I inhale slowly. Then I nudge the door back shut with the same power that yanked it open accidentally.

Griffin and Dominic don’t comment on my lapse, but it’s not as if they won’t have noticed. They’re just being polite about it.

I open my mouth, wanting to say something that’ll make me sound like I do have some self-control, but just then Toni appears in the doorway.

She takes us in with a flick of her cool gaze and jerks her head toward the hall. “Mr. Balthazar wants to see the three of you now.”

My pulse speeds up with a searing mix of relief and annoyance. We’re going to find out something, finally—but naturally the bastard made us wait a good long time before he could be bothered.

Toni escorts us down the hall to the drawing room. She steps back while we walk inside and closes the door behind us. I don’t know whether she stays outside to guard the doorway or goes off on some other business.

Apparently whatever business is going on in here, it doesn’t concern her.

In the past few days, the drawing room has become a lot less ominous. Not having the nearly dead specter of one of our friends lying there attached to unfamiliar hospital equipment will do that.

But today, it feels almost as unsettling as it used to. Even I can pick up on the tension lacing the air.

Riva glances over her shoulder at us from where she’s standing between Andreas and Zian in a semi-circle facing Balthazar’s screen. Her shoulders are raised, and the tendons show around her tightened jaw.

Zian is sporting an uneasy frown. Andreas holds on to some semblance of his usual easygoing posture, but his dark gray eyes have turned stormy.

It’s not just them in the room. To my surprise, Matteo has joined the discussion.

The scrawny, pinched-faced man who loves to poke and goad us stands off to the side between my friends and the screen, studying us new arrivals with an avid air I don’t like at all.

From the video transmission, Balthazar acknowledges our entrance with a smooth nod. He doesn’t look remotely out of sorts. He doesn’t look happy either, though.

The worst thing about the prick is that I can rarely tell how to read him. Even when he does let some emotion slip, it always seems a little off kilter with the situation.

I stride over to join my fellow shadowbloods, my muscles braced. “What’s going on?”

Balthazar draws in a breath as if to answer, but Riva beats him to it, her voice taut. “Our expanded powers—it’s getting harder for us to contain them. I hurt someone by accident while we were out there, and Zian damaged the office we were in.”

Her gaze shoots back to the man on the screen. “Apparently he knew that was likely to happen all along and doesn’t care.”

“Didn’t bother to warn us either,” Zian adds in a wary mutter.

My own anger flares inside me. I know how badly Riva takes it when her powers get away from her. I’m not sure there’s anything she hates more than the idea of hurting someone who didn’t deserve it.

And this jackass has forced her back into the chains of guilt and self-doubt she worked so hard to throw aside.

I’d like to smash the fucking TV screen and his stupid face with it. But I know that’s not going to accomplish anything useful.

Elsewhere in the room, a chair leg cracks.

“Now I’m ensuring that all of you know,” Balthazar says in a tone so calm it makes me want to smash a whole lot of other parts of him too. “It’s an understandable trade-off for the growth of your powers, but I’m sure you’ll adjust in time.”

Dominic folds his arms over his chest. “Are you going to help us with that adjustment or just expect us to figure out how to adapt to the changes you’ve forced on us on our own?”

Balthazar’s bland response is barely an answer. “I can see you’re all motivated to harness your powers. I doubt it’ll be much trouble.”

I glower at him. “Fucking bullshit.”

Our captor considers me for a moment, his lips curving just slightly. Is he amused that we’re upset?

Then he turns his attention to Riva. “If you’re particularly worried, maybe you should spend more time with Griffin. From what I’ve seen, he has a steadying effect on all of you.”

His gaze flicks back to me. “And it might be best if Jacob keeps his distance from the rest of you while he gets his own issues with control sorted out, since he was dealing with those before Matteo even got started with him.”

My jaw starts to clench. “If you don’t like my temper acting up on your furniture, maybe you should stop pissing us off.”

Matteo tilts his head at a contemplative angle. “You have struggled the most out of all the shadowbloods I’ve worked with.”

Balthazar hums in agreement. “Your companions need to think of what’s best for themselves, not just what will pacify you. Why would they want to be around someone unsafe, who doesn’t even care enough to keep his destructive emotions reined in?”

My skin burns with a heat that’s both fury and shame. I suck in a harsh breath, and Riva shakes her head.

She narrows her eyes at the screen. “Jacob’s only ever struggled because of all the shit the organization you helped form put him through. We’re not afraid of him.”

But has she already eased a little closer to Griffin? How much does she believe her defense of me, deep down under the loyalty that comes instinctively to her?

Is it possible some of the forgiveness she’s offered really has been an attempt to placate my temper for her own protection? It’s not as if I didn’t hurt her—and badly—not that long ago.

Balthazar speaks as if he’s pulled the conflicted thoughts right out of my skull. “Look at how well you’ve convinced her that you need coddling. Are you really surprised that she’s gravitated toward your brother now that he’s back with your group?”

Griffin stiffens, but whatever he says, it’s lost in the roar of rage that floods my head. I close my eyes, grappling with the caustic rush of anger turned more venomous by the fear that he might be right.

I can think of times all the others seemed to treat me with kids’ gloves. What if they’ve just been waiting for an excuse to shove me away, to get rid of the problems I make for them?

Have they been fucking lying to me all this time, feigning friendship as well as forgiveness?

The darkness behind my eyelids brings me back to the endless nights in my cell while the guilt over Griffin’s death—the death that never actually happened—gnawed through my insides. Swallowing a growl of despair, I glare at the screen again.

And catch the glitter of triumph in Balthazar’s eyes an instant before the smug prick wills it away.

Understanding hits me in a chilling deluge that douses all my fury.

He wants this. He wants to get me worked up, have me questioning my friends, provoke me into doing something that might encourage them not to trust me in turn.

He almost succeeded.