The Brightest Night (Origin #3) - Jennifer L. Armentrout Page 0,83

I knew he needed to hear even if I didn’t fully understand it. “I’m still here.”

He didn’t move or speak.

Neither did I.

And then he did move. He jerked halfway up, and then his face was right in front of mine. I thought he might kiss me, but his mouth halted mere inches from mine. His hand trembled against my cheek, and several long moments passed before he said, “Peaches, I’ve been waiting for you.”

Such simple words but so incredibly powerful. “I’ve…” I cleared my scratchy throat. “I’ve just been sleeping.”

“Just been sleeping?” He let out a shaky laugh full of relief. “You’ve been just asleep for nearly four days.”

I opened my mouth and then closed it. “Four days?”

“Yeah.” His wide eyes searched mine. “Evie, you’ve been gone for four days.”

I stared at him, unsure how to process that news. Only one thing came to mind. I hadn’t brushed my teeth in four days? “Thank God you didn’t just kiss me,” I blurted out.

His brows climbed.

Wait. That meant I also hadn’t showered in four days, and I did not have the kind of hair that looked or felt like anything other than a grease slick after that many days. His hands had been all up in that. “I must look like a mess. Smell like one, too.”

Luc stared at me, and I had never seen him like that, as if he didn’t know what to say.

“What?” I rasped.

“You’ve been unconscious for four days and you’re worried about me kissing you?” He sounded utterly dumbfounded.

“But that means I haven’t brushed my teeth or bathed in four days,” I pointed out.

“God.” He laughed again, and this time it was even realer and more relieved. “Evie. I don’t know if I should yell at you or hug you.”

“Hug me?” I suggested.

Luc leaned in, slipping his hand from my cheek to my back, and that hand still shook as he tightened his arm around me and pressed his forehead against mine. He was rattled, and that was big. “I don’t care how you look or if you’ve brushed your teeth or showered. You’re still the most beautiful being I’ve ever seen. I would kiss you right now, but as much as I want to prove that to you, I need to get the doc in here to see you.”

“You always say the right things,” I murmured, uncurling my fingers and pressing them against his chest.

He shook his head as he stared down at me. “No, I don’t. There’s a lot wrong in a lot of things I say.”

I started to argue, but Luc pressed a quick kiss to my forehead. “I’m going to get the doctor.”

“I feel okay,” I told him, and that was the truth. “Just a little tired.”

Luc blinked once and then twice. “Just in case you didn’t hear me the first or second time, you’ve been unconscious for four days, Evie. I’m getting the doctor.”

Realizing Luc wasn’t going to be swayed, I quieted, and then I thought of Nate. My stomach dropped. That food wouldn’t have lasted four days. “Has Nate come by?”

Luc’s brow puckered. “The kid? I don’t think so, but I imagined if he did and saw me or anyone else here, he probably headed in the other direction.”

That would make sense. I sighed, hoping if that was the case, he’d come back.

Luc rose from the bed, and I’d never seen him so wrinkly. He’d changed since the last time I’d seen him, having switched out jeans for a pair of black cotton jogger pants and a plain shirt, but it was clear he’d spent the last four days in those clothes.

I looked down at myself, brows raising when I saw that I was in a shirt—a black shirt. Unease blossomed in the pit of my stomach as I lifted a tingling arm and pushed the thin, yellow blanket down with fingers that alternated between numb and prickly.

The shirt featured a UFO sucking up a T. rex.

My heart skipped a beat. “This is your shirt?”

“One of the ones I had here. Zoe changed you,” he explained, reaching for a bottle of water on the nightstand. “She thought you’d be more comfortable, and it didn’t feel right for me to do it.”

My gaze lifted to his. How was I wearing the same shirt in a dream before I’d even seen it? Had I at some point woken long enough to have seen it and didn’t remember? That was possible, I supposed. But it was still bizarre.

“Thirsty?” Luc asked, and boy, was