Page 322 of Shadowblood Souls
I don’t answer, tearing my gaze from him to take in the rest of the room.
It’s a hotchpotch of furnishings: a sofa against one wall, a utilitarian table along another, and a couple of round, ringedtargets hanging at the far end. Like whoever set it up couldn’t decide whether it was for lounging in or training.
The table holds a row of gleaming knives. My fingers twitch at my side.
Griffin is watching me. “You always liked practicing with throwing knives. And I thought you might feel more comfortable if you had weapons available while we talk.”
My attention jerks back to him. “Are you planning on saying something that’ll make me want to stab you?”
He lifts his shoulders in a gentle shrug. “I hope not. But I know the last week here has been a lot more stressful for you than any of us would have wanted. You have every reason not to feel totally safe.”
I walk over to the table and skim my fingers along the edge while I eye the blades on offer. “What did you want to talk to me about?”
“Clancy knows he fucked up. I’ve told him how badly he did. He’d like to find a workable solution, but he thought you might prefer to talk things through with me first. Since you know me better.”
I don’t know the guy talking in that unnervingly even voice at all.
But Iwouldrather talk to Griffin than that asshole Clancy. If only because there are questions that’ve been gnawing at me that no one except Griffin can answer.
I select one of the knives—a particularly slim one that looks sharp enough to slice through flesh like butter. “Are you just his puppet, then? You speak for him and not yourself?”
Griffin shakes his head. “I make my own decisions. But I still think what he’s trying to do here could be for the best for all of us. It’s a work in progress.”
A work in progress that traumatized Zian more than he already had been, that forced me and Jacob to murder one gang on behalf of another that might be even worse…
My jaw tightens. I curl my fingers around the hilt of the knife and turn toward Griffin.
“Then you’re on his side. And I’ve got a lot of reasons to be pissed off with him. Aren’t you afraid I’ll stab you no matter what you say?”
I could kill him for real. He knows I could. One slash deep enough through his throat, and he’d be too far gone before the guardians could rush Dominic in here.
With my supernatural speed, I could land the blow before Griffin even has time to try to deflect me.
But he simply gazes calmly back at me, without the slightest sign of being disturbed by my suggestion.
“You’re not that angry,” he says. “You don’t want to hurt me.”
I grit my teeth. I might not be feeling particularly murderous, but the fact that he can read my emotions irritates the hell out of me.
Especially when he doesn’t appear to be remotely affected by them.
What the hell would it take to jolt a little emotion of outhim?
I adjust the knife in my hand, willing myself into a state of calm focus that won’t betray my intentions. Then I lunge at Griffin.
I slam him back into the stone wall he was standing by, hard enough to bruise but not to break any bones, and whip the knife up to brace it at the base of his throat.
Griffin’s expression twitches with the impact, but it settles back into its usual placid state a second later. I can’t say the reaction was anything more than physical.
He gazes down at me with those uncomfortably blank sky-blue eyes.
If anything, he lookscurious. Not rattled, not annoyed.
“Maybe I don’t need to be angry to think we’d be better off if you really were dead,” I snap, but I know even as the words come out that they aren’t going to land right. Because just saying them sends a twist of guilt and horror through my gut that no doubt he can pick up on.
He is right that I don’t want to hurt him, no matter what he’s become.
Griffin cocks his head, not seeming to care that the blade nicks his skin with the movement before I tug it back a fraction. “You’re upset with me, but not like that. What are you doing this for?”
