Oh god, this is exhausting. It's exhausting to realize how wrongly Neal is reading her, how wrongly Neal has maybe been always reading her, and she doesn't even know how to begin to unpack and untangle this, not when any misstep could send him flying back into a fury. It's like death by a thousand cuts, she thinks: anger followed by sympathy based on false pretenses followed, presumably, by disgust when the unstable sands underneath his conclusions shift away.

Just the anger would have been better. Anger and a quick, decisive cut-off was better than a slow deterioration will be. But she'll try to explain, because what the hell else can she do.

"You're wrong about... basically all of that," she says tiredly, with no real expectation that she's going to be believed, at least not yet. "Malcolm didn't hurt me. I know Malcolm thinks I hate him, and maybe he even told you that I was making my decisions about Will because I have an unresolved grudge against him and want to hurt him, but I don't. How I feel about Malcolm is complex, but it isn't confusing, and isn't the basis for my wardening of Will. How I feel about you is confusing."

Completely wrecked over Neal Caffrey, and she's not even a little bit aware of it says her sign. Shaw sees the lights blink on out of the corner of her eye, but she ignores them.

"I don't want to hurt you, and I know how easily it is to do that when Malcolm comes up. I should have redirected when we talked about this before."