The Brightest Night (Origin #3) - Jennifer L. Armentrout Page 0,73

as a knot of emotion swelled in my throat, I realized there was nothing I could say. There were no words for situations like these. I sank into the couch, my gaze dropping to my hands. “Is that what happened to Luc’s parents?” I asked, thinking that perhaps Grayson knew. Luc had told me that he was pretty sure his parents were both dead, but that was before I knew I was Nadia, and at that point, he was only telling me half-truths.

“Possible,” Grayson answered after several long heartbeats. “Either that or after the Daedalus got what they wanted, his parents were no longer of value.”

“That’s horrible,” I whispered the obvious.

“His parents may not have even known each other. They could’ve been nothing like Kat and Daemon,” he stated in such a matter-of-fact way my entire body jolted. “He could’ve been the product of a forced mutation and conception. Most Origins were.”

“That doesn’t make it any less horrible.”

“No.” He still stared at that door. “It makes it even more horrible.”

Yes. Yes, it did.

Over the next couple of minutes, I thought about how Luc had threatened both Daemon and Dawson more than once. “They were empty threats.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Luc threatening Daemon and Dawson,” I explained. “He said once he didn’t want to leave Beth a widow, but he knows how it works—”

“How empty his threats are depend on how angry Luc was when he made said threat, but if I were you, I wouldn’t assume any of his threats are empty.”

“He wouldn’t take out—”

“Luc is capable of anything,” Grayson interrupted as my gaze lifted to his. “Perhaps that’s something else you’ve forgotten.”

I didn’t care what Grayson insinuated; Luc was not capable of killing Daemon, knowing it would’ve ended both Kat and the baby’s life. Same for Dawson and Bethany.

Silence descended between us as we were both succumbed to our own thoughts. My earlier mantra—Kat and the baby will be okay—no longer was repeated with confidence. Humans died every second, and just because Luxen and all those who carried their DNA fought death and often won, that didn’t make them immortal. As Grayson had said, sometimes it was simply not enough.

And Luc’s parents? God, I didn’t even want to think about it. Had they loved each other? Had they even known each other’s names? Luc had to think about that, and if I was feeling it as hard as I was, I couldn’t even imagine—

“I miss Kent.” Grayson said those three words so quietly I wasn’t even sure I actually heard them. “He would’ve said something so stupid right now. Something incredibly off the wall. It wouldn’t even make sense, but…”

Sort of stunned by his soft admission, I watched his impressively stoic face, absent from the usual smirk or curl of distaste, crack just a little. It was a small fissure, barely noticeable, but I saw it. The break was in his eyes, in the brief moment when he closed them and his skin tightened. There. There was the touch of humanity I’d only witnessed twice before, when Kent had died and, bizarrely, when he’d discovered I was really Nadia.

If Grayson were James or Zoe or a rabid kangaroo, I would’ve gotten up and hugged him. But he was Grayson, and if I did that, I had a feeling he wouldn’t appreciate it, and I’d regret it.

That didn’t mean I couldn’t sympathize from a safe distance.

“He would’ve made you laugh. He would’ve made me laugh,” I finished, throat thick. “I know I didn’t know him long, but I miss him, too.”

Jaw working, Grayson gave a curt nod. “Kent was the first human I met.”

“You’ve known him since you were a child?”

Luc had explained some of the Luxen who’d been here before the invasion lived in communities, kind of like neighborhoods, and rarely, if ever, associated with the outside, human world. The general public probably thought those “strange” communities were just run-of-the-mill cults or something.

We had an amazing ability to find logical answers for the illogical.

Wait.

I couldn’t quite include myself in that whole we part of mankind now.

Grayson’s gaze coasted back to mine, stare eerily intense. “I met Kent when I was sixteen.”

Mentally repeating what he’d said, I put two and two together, adding in that look he was giving me, and ending up with holy evil Luxen, Grayson was one of the invading—

Ghost fingers danced over the nape of my neck, the sensation startling me enough that I reached back and smacked my hand down on my skin. Nothing but