The Brightest Night (Origin 3)

“But that’s not what happened.”

“No,” I whispered. “She stopped fighting me, Luc. Closed her eyes and stopped, and I was disgusted by the fact she had failed, and if I had control, that was me. That wasn’t the Source, not completely.”

“It’s not entirely unheard of for the Source to make hybrids more aggressive. The key is to recognize when it is having that kind of effect on you. It’s not something you can’t change.” His finger touched my upper arm. “I have a question for you.”

“Okay.”

“If you were cornered by a Trojan who you believed could beat you, what would you do if it backed off once you stopped fighting?”

“I would—” I stopped myself before I answered in the way I would’ve a year ago. “Honest?”

He drew his finger down to my elbow. “Honest.”

“I would attack,” I admitted, feeling cruddy. “I mean, that’s what would make sense.”

“It would.” He dragged his finger back up my arm, making little circles. “Showing mercy can be a weakness that can be exploited.”

“You think that’s what Sarah would’ve done?”

“Possibly.”

I wanted so badly to latch onto that, so I could tell myself I’d done the right thing.

You did the only thing you were trained to do.

“That doesn’t make it okay.”

“Doesn’t make it wrong, either.” Luc curled his hand around my bent elbow. “Having Sarah here to question would’ve been great, but it would’ve been a hell of a risk. We have no idea what she would’ve done or if we could’ve even contained her. You did what I would’ve done, and I know that’s not saying much. I am a bit more trigger-happy than you will ever be, but she was here to see if she could turn you into something like her. What if you let that heart of yours, that beautiful but soft heart, make that call and she hurt you? Hurt someone else? You would never forgive yourself for that.”

He was making all kinds of sense, but what if Sarah wouldn’t have attacked? She’d known she’d been defeated, that she had failed and it was over. She was ready to die—

“Do you think the Daedalus would’ve trained any of you to lie down and die? You don’t remember your time there, but I do. So do Zoe and Kat. Dawson and Daemon and Beth. Ask Archer.” His thumb smoothed over the skin above my elbow. “She may have only spent a short time there, but you can be damn sure that fighting to the death was drilled into her. Not a part of me believes for one second she wasn’t playing possum. To the Daedalus, failure—”

“—is the option for those who court death,” I finished.

His jaw flexed. “You had another memory? You didn’t tell me that.”

“It was just a brief one. It wasn’t important.”

“Anything you remember is important.” He tugged on my arm and wiggled a few inches closer.

I told him what I remembered. “That was all. Nothing big.”

“You saw someone dead, bleeding out on the floor, and that’s not a big deal? Jesus.” He scooted the rest of the distance, folding his arm around my shoulder. I snuggled in under his chin. His hand curled around my hair. “I’m right about Sarah.”

“You’re saying that because you think you’re right about everything.”

“I am.”

My laugh was muffled against his chest.

“And I’m definitely right about this.”

“Okay.” I let it go. For now. “I can’t believe I destroyed a house.”

“It’s fine.”

“Fine?” I drew back enough that I could see his face. “How is blowing up a house fine?”

“It was unlivable and basically being scrapped for parts.” He paused. “What you did was really badass.”

A small smile tugged at my lips. “It was.”

Dipping his chin, he brushed his lips along my forehead. “There’s something else we need to talk about.”

“What Sarah was doing with them in the first place?”

“Yeah, that, too, but something else.”

“Oh, goodie.”

His arm tightened. “When the Source took over, you went quiet. I couldn’t pick up any of your thoughts. Not until the whole house thing. Then I could hear your thoughts again.”

I tossed an arm over his waist. “What do you think it means that you couldn’t hear me at first?”

“I don’t know,” he said as I rubbed my nose against his chest, and he sucked in a breath. “Why is your nose so cold?”

I giggled. “Sorry.”

“No, you’re not.”

That was true. I thought about what he said. “Maybe Viv is completely right, and I was rebooting, and when I got close to coming online”—man, that sounded weirder than I’d ever thought possible—“you could hear me again. Doesn’t explain why you couldn’t hear me in the beginning.”

“Could be because that was when you started to reboot, and I couldn’t—”

“Oh my God!” I jerked, wincing as it pulled at my back.

Concern flashed across his face. “Are you okay?”

“Yes. Fine. I just remembered something I figured out before everything went down,” I exclaimed. “It’s Nadia!”