Defy Me (Shatter Me #5)(47)

“Three broken ribs,” Max says, and nods. “And still, you managed to sever Paris’s carotid artery. Nicely done.”

I meet his eyes. Max thinks this is funny.

And then I understand.

“He’s still alive, isn’t he?” I say.

Max smiles wider. “Quite alive, yes. Despite your best efforts to murder him.”

“That seems impossible.”

“You sound irritated,” Max says.

“I am irritated. That he survived is an insult to my skill set.”

Max fights back another laugh. “I don’t remember you being so funny.”

“I’m not trying to be funny.”

But Max can’t wipe the smile off his face.

“So you’re not going to tell me how he survived?” I say. “You’re just going to bait me?”

“I’m waiting for my wife,” he says.

“I understand. Does she help you sound out the big words?”

Max’s eyebrows jump up his forehead. “Watch yourself, Aaron.”

“Apologies. Please step out of my way.”

“As I said, I’m waiting for my wife. She has something she wants to say to you.”

I study him, looking closely at his face in a way I can’t remember ever having done. He has dark brown hair, light brown skin, and bright blue-green eyes. He’s aged well. On a different day, I might’ve even described his face as warm, friendly. But knowing now that he’s Ella’s father—I almost can’t believe I didn’t notice sooner. She has his eyes.

I hear a second set of footsteps drawing nearer to the door. I expect to see Evie, Supreme Sommers, and instead— “Max, how long do you think it’ll take bef—”

My father. His voice.

I can hardly believe it.

He stops, just inside the doorway, when he sees my face. He’s holding a bloodied towel to his throat. “You idiot,” he says to me.

I don’t have a chance to respond.

A sharp alarm sounds, and Max goes suddenly rigid. He glances at a monitor on the wall before looking back at my father.

“Go,” Anderson says. “I can handle him.”

Max glances at me just once before he disappears.

“So,” I say, nodding at my father’s face, his healing wound. “Are you going to explain?”

He merely stares at me.

I watch, quietly, as he uses his free hand to pull a handkerchief from his pocket. He wipes the remaining blood from his lips, refolds the handkerchief, and tucks it back inside his pocket.

Something between us has changed.

I can feel it. Can feel the shift in his attitude toward me. It takes a minute to piece together the various emotional cues long enough to understand, but when it finally hits me, it hits me hard.

Respect.

For the first time in my life, my father is staring at me with something like respect. I tried to kill him, and instead of being angry with me, he seems pleased. Maybe even impressed.

“You did good work back there,” he says quietly. “It was a strong throw. Solid.”

It feels strange to accept his compliment, so I don’t.

My father sighs.

“Part of the reason I wanted custody of those healer twins,” he says finally, “was because I wanted Evie to study them. I wanted her to replicate their DNA and braid it into my own. Healing powers, I realized, were extremely useful.”

A sharp chill goes up my spine.

“But I didn’t have them under my control for as long as I wanted,” he says. “I was only able to extract a few blood samples. Evie did the best she could with the time we had.”

I blink. Try to control the expression on my face. “So you have healing powers now?”

“We’re still working on it,” he says, his jaw tight. “It’s not yet perfect. But it was enough that I was able to survive the wounds to the head just long enough to be shipped to safety.” He smiles a bitter smile. “My feet, on the other hand, didn’t make it.”

“How unfortunate,” I lie.

I test the weight of the syringe in my hand. I wonder how much damage it could do. It’s not substantial enough to do much more than stun, but a carefully angled attack could result in temporary nerve pain that would buy me a sizable amount of time. But then, so might a single, precise stab in the eye.

“Operation Synthesis,” my father says sharply.

I look up. Surprised.

“You’re ready, Aaron.” His gaze is steady. “You’re ready for a real challenge. You’ve got the necessary fire. The drive. I’m seeing it in your eyes for the first time.”

I’m too afraid to speak.

Finally, after all these years, my father is giving me praise. He’s telling me I’m capable. As a child, it was everything I’d ever wanted.

But I’m not a child anymore.

“You’ve seen Emmaline,” my father says. “But you haven’t seen her recently. You don’t know what state she’s in.”

I wait.

“She’s dying,” he says. “Her body isn’t strong enough to survive her mind or her environment, and despite Max and Evie’s every effort, they don’t know if there’s anything else they can do to help her. They’ve been working for years to prolong her life as much as possible, but they’ve reached the end of the line. There’s nothing left to do. She’s deteriorating at a rate they can no longer control.”