Allegiance of Honor (Psy-Changeling #15) - Nalini Singh Page 0,36
SnowDancer had been psychically and mentally broken when rescued. Yet instead of drowning in the darkness that had threatened to suck her under, Brenna had said “fuck you” to the monster who’d hurt her, and she’d chosen to live. She’d not only wrenched back control of her own life, she’d taken on an Arrow and claimed him as her mate.
Lucas had a great deal of respect for Riley’s younger sister.
“None of us will give up on Leila,” he promised. “Unless and until we have a body, we act as if she’s alive.” A woman who’d fought so hard even when alone, far from the sea that was her home, deserved nothing less. “It would help if Miane would allow wider dissemination of the information, but she’s caught between a rock and a hard place.”
Sascha’s eyebrows drew together, even as she continued to run her fingers through his hair. “There’s no way to weed out the Consortium spies in Trinity, is there?”
Nipping at her lower lip just because he could, Lucas said, “Can empaths sense deception?”
“Possibly.” Sascha nipped back, making him grin. “But even if the Empathic Collective suddenly abandoned its code of ethics and started scanning everyone, the most dangerous spies will have dense shields. An E might pick up surface emotions, but everything else will be locked down.”
Running his hand down her side, Lucas pushed up her lightweight top to touch skin, purring deep in his chest at the contact. At the lush feel of her warmth against his rougher skin. Shivering, Sascha wrapped her legs around him. “Why did you ask anyway?” she murmured, her breath kissing his. “You know no empath would ever be so dishonorable. Scans are only allowed with permission—like in business negotiations where both sides have an E at the table.”
Eyes going panther as his feline nature rose to the surface of his mind, Lucas took his time kissing his mate, licking his tongue over hers as he lazily explored her body. “Because,” he murmured against her lips several minutes later, “your own research has shown that not all Es are good.” The vast majority, yes, but like any being on the planet, even an E had loyalties. “What if the Consortium has an E in its ranks? What if that E truly believes that racial peace and the resulting comingling is bad for the Psy race?”
Sascha blinked, then pushed at his chest until he rolled over onto his back on the bed. Kneeling beside him, her knees brushing his side as he slid his hand under the back of her top to find skin again, she stared down at him. “You’re right,” she whispered. “‘Good’ and ‘bad’ are relative terms. An E, who, for whatever reason, is virulently anti-human or anti-changeling or simply pro the purity of the Psy, could justify all kinds of things.”
She rubbed both hands over her face. “I don’t know what the impact would be on the E—if the harm they did would rebound back on them, or if they’d be protected by their own belief.” Lines formed on her forehead. “We still don’t know enough about the E designation, not after the Council spent a hundred years erasing all evidence of our existence.”
“Alice’s memories still scattershot?” he asked, referring to the brilliant researcher who’d spent a century in forced cryonic suspension, and who now lived among the SnowDancers.
Sascha nodded, her frustration a palpable thing. “She has so much critical knowledge, but it’s locked deep inside her.” Compassion thickened her voice. “I’m guessing it’s a combination of lingering shock and the organic damage done by the amount of time she spent suspended that’s behind the gaps in her memory.”
“She’s tough to have come as far as she has.” Lucas couldn’t imagine going to sleep one day only to wake in a distant future where Sascha was dead, Naya was dead, his closest friends were all dead. “I think I’d go mad.”
“She’s stronger than she knows.” Sascha’s eyes were dark with poignant emotion. “But her heart’s broken, shattered into splinters.” Shaking her head, she touched her fingers to the hunter marks on his face. “It hurts me to even imagine the depth of her loss.”
Taking her hand with his free one, he pressed a kiss to it. He didn’t have to say what they both knew: If one of them died while Naya was young, the other one would fight and survive no matter their own shattered heart. “What if an E decided to hide his or her ability?” he