The Brightest Night (Origin #3) - Jennifer L. Armentrout Page 0,183

as the door at the end of the room opened into a space lit the same. I wasn’t thinking of anything, because there was a cell. There were several of them, and all of them glimmered in the low light like they’d been doused with glitter.

“Onyx,” Luc explained. “The bars are coated with onyx and diamonds to prevent Luxen from escaping.”

“How did they make them?”

“I believe the bars already existed. They were moved here by humans,” he said, and I couldn’t help but think of who those bars had held at one time. But I needed to be focused on who the bars held now.

Blake was in the center cell, alone. He was sitting on a bed, one leg curled up, the other stretched out and resting on the floor. I looked around, seeing that the other cells were empty.

Chris is being held in the other room, Luc’s voice filtered through my thoughts. They didn’t want them together.

That made sense.

Blake lifted his head as we approached. A half-eaten sandwich sat on a plate beside the bed, next to a bottle of water. He didn’t smile or show any emotion. “I’ve been waiting for you two.”

37

“Sorry to keep you waiting.” Luc stopped about a foot from the bars. He didn’t sound sorry at all.

Blake sensed that, because he smirked. “I see you haven’t changed at all.”

“I think if you have five seconds outside the cell, you’ll find that even more people haven’t changed,” Luc replied.

The smirk faded. “I guess Daemon knows I’m here.”

“He does.”

He focused on the ceiling. That, too, shimmered with chips of onyx. “And Kat?”

“If I were you, I wouldn’t even think her name, let alone say it.”

“Yeah.” He exhaled heavily. “They want me dead.”

“Of course they do,” Luc answered.

“But that’s not why you’re here.” He lowered his gaze.

“Nope,” Luc said as I stepped forward. “The story is that you’re alive because Chris healed you.”

“I did die. More than once. Kat kicked my ass, and I’ve got the scars to prove it.” He gestured to his face. “They don’t stop there. My whole body is covered in them.”

“Am I supposed to feel sorry for you? If so, spoiler alert, I don’t.”

“I don’t expect you to feel sorry,” he answered. “Chris healed me. Brought me back, and then I was moved to another location, and if you want to know why they let her think I was dead, I have no idea.”

“How did Chris heal you if you died?” I asked. “Wouldn’t that have meant he would’ve died?”

Blake’s gaze slid to me. “Good catch, but Luxen don’t always die immediately when the hybrid they mutated dies. Some linger for a couple of minutes. Luckily—or unluckily—Chris lingered, but it’s not like he didn’t have help. The Daedalus kept restarting my heart and pumping more blood into me.”

I glanced at Luc.

“He’s telling the truth,” Luc said.

“Why would they keep you alive?” I asked. “From what I can remember about the Daedalus, they don’t tolerate failure, and if Kat beat you, you failed.”

“They thought I was still useful,” he said.

“And were you?” Luc asked.

“It took weeks for me to fully heal, and I spent most of the war being held, along with Chris, at Raven Rock.”

“Raven Rock?” I frowned.

“A military base in Pennsylvania outfitted with all the things necessary to survive a nuclear war,” Luc explained. “I razed that base to the ground.” He said it as if he were talking about mowing the grass.

“That’s what I heard, but we were moved out by then.”

Luc’s shoulders suddenly tensed. “You were moved to Fort Detrick.”

My lips parted on a shaky inhale, and I knew. I didn’t even have to ask, but I did. “That’s where you saw me.”

“I saw you before,” Blake reminded me. “At the club. You were dancing.”

“I should’ve killed you then,” Luc snarled, and the vicious truthfulness in his words sent a shiver down my spine.

“You should’ve, but you needed me.” Blake folded his arms over his chest. “I saw you again at the fort.”

My heart started thumping. “I was trained at Fort Detrick? The whole time?”

Blake nodded. “In the part that’s far underground, beyond their level-four biohazard. You didn’t know about that place, did you, Luc?”

Luc didn’t have to answer. He hadn’t known that I had been there.

“What can you tell me about what I did there?” I asked.

“You did what they wanted you to do.” He shifted, straightening out his bent leg. “Eventually.”

“Cut the dramatics out, Blake. You know I have very little patience,” warned Luc. “That also hasn’t