“Good god, Sophie.”
“What? I needed to get my fix! I was feeling it. Oh, and I brought you a teensy gift.” Sophie pulled out a vial of blood from her cleavage and winked at Henry. “Sorry, it’s a bit chilled now, but not too bad. Drink up. This will help you perk up some. Lord knows all that bloody alcohol isn’t doing anything for you.”
Henry reached for the vial of blood. “Thanks. It’s not too cold. Refrigerated is the worst.” He popped open the vial and tipped it back like he was doing a shot of tequila. Then he recapped the vial and handed it back to her as he shuddered.
His eyes rolled in the back of his head. He relaxed a little. Between the alcohol and the donation, he was drifting off into la-la land. He wished he and Elaina were on good terms. He really wanted to lay down with her. Not for sex. He just wanted to hold her like he used to.
“You really need to be more careful.” Henry’s words were breathy. “We need to get out of here. There aren’t enough clean donors around here. We’re going to need more blood. Plus, we need to find Gunther so we can take him out.” His words ended in a growl.
“I know.”
“The trouble is going to be convincing the others.”
***
Once I realized they pulled their Houdini act again, I went looking for Henry and Sophie. I listened at the door and heard Henry say something about convincing the others. I whipped opened the door of the bathroom. Why everyone decided to have their private conversations in the bathroom was beyond me.
“Convince us of what?” Henry and Sophie looked at each other. I was pretty sure I startled them again. Obviously, they were up to something. Henry took a slow deep breath.
“To travel.” Sophie said. “We believe we should travel.”
She grinned. It made me want to throat punch her again. I was getting sick of that feeling.
In all honesty, I didn’t know what would be best for us as a group, but I wasn’t convinced that traveling would be the most excellent idea.
“Why? I think we would find this amount of devastation anywhere we would go.” I folded my arms in front of my chest, showing my protest. I put on my best “fuck you” smile.
“Not necessarily. Gunther may have secured a larger area than us. He probably has better help.”
“Really?” I was pissed. I thought I was doing a good job, considering I was the one who originally shot Jacob so he would let “Her Mental Highness” go. I thought, for the most part, we were all doing a fine job since we had nothing to compare it to.
“That’s not what she meant,” Henry snipped.
I glared at him. “Then what exactly did she mean, Henry? Why is getting to Gunther so important?” I was confused.
“He has the most experience…and some tools that are quite valuable,” Sophie purred. She was such a two-dollar-tramp at times.
I rolled my eyes and looked over at Henry. “Henry, I thought you were the be-all, end-all of this entire situation.”
“Henry is amazing, as you know.” And there it was again. I wish she would stop referring to my man in a sexual manner, or I was going to snap. She was doing it on purpose, and I was quite sick of it. “And he understands a lot of what’s going on, but Gunther just has that bit extra that Henry doesn’t.”
Could the conversation be any more implying? She really seemed to prefer Gunther’s tools and abilities over Henry’s, which was nothing I would be complaining about. He had kept me quite happy. I wondered how many of the recruits and trainers she willingly did the “horizontal tango” with.
“I just don’t get it.” I was really confused.
In all honesty, I wasn’t trying to be a hard ass at that moment but, from the beginning, I got the impression that Henry was the best of the best. I wanted to believe that. He had shown signs of weakness, but he was human. We would all crack, training or no training, under the pressure he had put on himself. I felt myself folding to the pressure to travel. I was chewing the inside of my cheek.
“Well, can Claire, Nick, and I discuss this in private?”
“If it makes you feel better.” I was getting sick of Sophie’s attitude.
“Yeah, it would, actually.” She seemed to forget I owned the attitude around there. She needed to pay me royalties if she wanted to borrow it, even for a moment.
“Any decision made should go through Henry.” She quirked a brow and rested her dagger-clawed hands on her hips. “After all, he is our leader.”
“Yeah, well, I think the three of us should discuss this alone for a minute to see if we’re all on the same page.”