“That bullshit she filled your head with about humans is just that, bullshit. Have you ever even come close to killing someone unintentionally?” My tone is harsher than I want it to be, but I’m still pissed at him for Quinn’s sake. Griff looks down, his brow furrowed as his eyes glaze over.
“Eva killing Iris wasn’t an accident. She wanted you for herself, not because she was lost to bloodlust.” His head lifts slowly and his eyes are two pinpricks of light lasered on me.
“Fuck you! You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Griffin snaps.
“But I do, and you know it. Don’t try to lie to me the way you lie to yourself. You knew what Eva was for a long time. I know you hate yourself for allowing it to happen, but it wasn’t your fault.”
“Shut up!” Griff is right in front of me before I can blink, his fist curled around my shirt, pulling me closer to his face.
I don’t fight the hold, he’s my best friend. I would wade through a mountain of wolfsbane for him, and I know he would do anything for me in return. I also know my words make him face a truth he doesn’t want to acknowledge.
“Quinn isn’t Eva or Iris,” I breathe.
Griff releases me with a slight shove as he scrambles to get away from me. That’s how I know I’m speaking the truth.
“I don’t know what’s happening between the three of us, but don’t…” I stop when I hear the elevator door chime with its arrival. Most of the staff is still in classes or training. Quinn’s natural scent hits me like a wave, she smells like fresh peaches, but the sour smell of her unease soon follows.
Her steps falter when she sees me. “Hey,” she murmurs, her voice soft.
“Hey, I was just going to check out the door locks.” I turn to wave at her door, finding the hallway empty. Not surprisingly, Griffin has vanished.
“Oh, okay. Anything I can help with? All my appointments were canceled for the day apparently.”
“How about we check it out together? See what we can do about upping the security around here,” I offer.
Quinn ducks her head a little and nods. “That sounds good. Thanks, Evan.”
Griffin
The door snapsclosed with a barely audible snick. I’m a coward. I can’t face her, not yet. But I don’t move away from the door either. I’m a glutton for punishment. I can hear Evan talking with Quinn in the hall. Any of the aggravation he felt toward me has vanished with her arrival.
I admire him for that. I know by his reaction at the pack that he’s dealing with his own demons, but he doesn’t lash out the way I do. I drop my forehead to the door with a thud. I’m tempted to bang it a few more times, but I don’t because I don’t want to draw their attention.
Evan is good for her, will be good to her. I’m not even sure if I’m capable of not being an asshole. There are moments, moments when I’m with Quinn, where I feel almost normal. When the unnatural feeling of a smile curling my lips happens without thought or pretense. It’s been so long since I’ve even allowed myself to think I could be or have more than the way I’ve been surviving.
Evan’s right, I do blame myself for what happened to Iris. I’m not sure I ever fully dealt with what Eva did to her and what happened after. I wanted so badly to believe it was an accident. I believed what Eva told me because I wanted to believe it.
Blaming myself has always been the easy part. No matter if it was Eva who drained Iris or not, it was my fault for having her there, for allowing a human into my life.
I close my eyes and think back. It’s hard to even remember Iris’s face. Over the years the details have faded, leaving me with nothing but the memory of what I thought we had.
I do remember the day I realized she’d changed from the scrawny girl I played with as a child into a beautiful young woman. I was young myself, not yet a blooded vampire. Everything about Iris was different and appealing to me back then. Her long, dark hair was wild, as was the trust in her dark eyes. Her gaze spoke of an innocence I couldn’t find in my life.
Iris didn’t look at me the same way others of my species did, her gaze was for me, not who I was and what I could do for her. She knew my family was powerful, but because she was human, she didn’t understand what that meant in my world.
Her mother and father worked for my family. Back then it was just as hard to trust humans, but there was always a chosen few who knew about us, helped us obtain blood. There weren’t the storage options available back then like there is now. Hell, a vampire could go an eternity now without ever drinking from the vein if they so choose. It doesn’t happen though, drinking and fucking go hand and hand for most of us, but it could. I would know.
I can’t even remember the last time I drank from the vein. Eva’s amber eyes are all that comes to mind with that particular thought. Her gazing down at me, lips parted as she gave freely from her vein to help me through the blooding.
It’s not an easy time for a vampire, but we know when the transition is close and make arrangements to have another powerful vampire there to ease the new thirst. It can be dangerous, deadly, even if precautions are taken.
Thankfully, we now have ways to help with the blooding that allows me to just donate blood much the same way a human or shifter would to assist easing the newly transitioning.
My family called on Eva as my time drew near. Her family, like mine, was powerful. I think they hoped Eva’s beauty and the blood bond would make me forget about Iris, but they were wrong. I still wanted my human lover, and that was what drove Eva to kill her. Quinn’s soft voice pulls me from the thoughts of my past. “The knob is still broken.”
“That’s an easy fix, but we don’t want you coming home to any more surprises, so we need to find something better, something you can lock from the inside and outside.” Evan’s deep tone carries easily.
She could, should, stay here with me. Then she wouldn’t have to worry about it, but I fucked that up. I want to know why someone is trying to scare her, and what else they’re willing to do. Thoughts of Iris fill my head again. Could this somehow be my fault? I shake away the guilt, this isn’t the same. No one other than Evan even knows I’m interested in Quinn. But that’s not true, is it? Noah knows because I was foolish. These issues started before I staked my claim on Quinn though.
