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

hurt Luc. Badly. In fact, I already had. If he hadn’t gotten through to me, reached through to me, when I went all psycho Trojan, taking out the Sons of Liberty, a group that had been activated to take out the Trojans before it was too late, I would’ve killed Daemon.

I would’ve killed Luc, who I loved with every fiber of my being.

But in those woods, he was not the boy I loved before and the man I loved now. In those moments, Luc had become nothing more than a challenge to me—a threat this alien part of me saw and had been trained to take out. I …

I had peeled his flesh from his bones with just a thought.

Sickened, I squeezed my eyes shut, but that did nothing to stop the images of Luc going down on his knees as his skin tore, as he begged me to remember who he was.

I had believed in my heart of hearts that if I became what I had in those woods outside the safe house, Luc would be able to stop me. He’d find a way to get to me before I hurt anyone. But we’d been missing an important piece of information.

That I was coded to answer to Jason Dasher.

I had an idea of what that meant thanks to April’s reaction to me after she’d used the Cassio Wave, a device that had awoken whatever training I’d had. She’d expected me to go with her without question, to return to him, a man nameless at the time but I now knew to be Jason Dasher.

My heart pounded against my ribs as panic seeded like a noxious weed. What if he or another Trojan used the Cassio Wave again? Or what if what happened in those woods occurred again?

What if Luc couldn’t reach me the next time?

Then I’d turn into a mindless minion, and not even one of the cute yellow ones.

A laugh bubbled up, but it got stuck in my throat, where I felt like I was being choked, and it was probably a good thing, because it was the scary kind of laughter that ended in tears or blood.

Jason Dasher could take it all away from me again. Memories. Sense of self. Free will. Autonomy. My friends. Luc.

The mere idea of losing myself all over again burst open a door deep inside me, and out came a mess of emotions. A cyclone of fear and anger rose up, drenching every fiber of my being.

I would destroy myself before I allowed everything to be taken from me again.

“Never.”

My gaze jerked to Luc. Energy spit into the air, hissing and crackling as Luc picked up on my thoughts, something that annoyed the living crap out of me even though he couldn’t always control it. According to him, my thoughts were often … loud.

“Never will you have to make that choice,” he vowed, the surge of power emanating from him pulsing brightly and then easing off until there was no glow around him. The air in the room lightened, becoming easier to breathe. “He will never have control of you. No one will.”

But I hadn’t had control of myself in those woods, not when I’d attacked him and Daemon. That hadn’t even been me—

“It doesn’t matter.” Luc was suddenly directly in front of me, his warm palms cupping my cheeks. Skin against skin. Like always, the contact sent a muted charge of electricity dancing over my skin and coursing through my veins. The brightness of his pupils receded until they were normal. Well, normal by Luc’s standards. The fuzzy black lines around his irises and pupils were now visible. “That was you in the woods. Just another part of you that I haven’t quite made friends with yet, but I will.”

“I don’t know about that.” That power that was in me, the Source that had been twisted by all the serums and the alien DNA, wouldn’t make friends with anything other than maybe a honey badger.

“Honey badgers are extremely intelligent creatures, did you know?”

“Luc.”

He gave me a lopsided grin. “To be honest, I think the honey badger part of you thought I was the bee’s knees.”

A strangled laugh broke free. “Bee’s knees?”

“Yeah. Isn’t that what all the cool kids are saying?”

“Maybe in the nineteen-twenties.”

“I could swear I heard someone say it recently.” He lowered his head, stopping when the bridge of his nose brushed mine. “I’m not worried, Peaches.”

Peaches.

In the beginning, I thought that was such a weird nickname, but now? Hearing