Pawn (The Blackcoat Rebellion #1)(49)
Author: Aimee Carter

“It’s the biggest city in the country,” said Knox. We’d barely spoken for the rest of the flight, but once we stepped off the plane, I hadn’t been able to contain my excitement. Other than my brief stay at the Stronghold, I’d never been outside the District of Columbia before.

Was this what the rest of the country looked like?

“How many people live here?” I said, my eyes glued to the skyline.

“Now? Ten million. Before the population laws were put into effect, there were over twelve million people living here.”

“And they have the rank system, too?”

“The entire country uses it.”

“Oh. Right.” My cheeks grew warm. I tried to distract myself by figuring out how many floors there were in one of the buildings, but we drove by too quickly.

“You’re pretty when you blush,” he said, which only made my face grow hotter. “Lila rarely ever got embarrassed.” He shifted closer to me, and the leather squeaked underneath him. “I have to admit, I’m curious what you’re going to do about Benjy. Seems he’s quite in love with you.”

“What do you mean?” I said, fighting the urge to move away. There wasn’t anywhere to go anyway.

Knox’s lips twisted into an amused smirk. “I mean, how do you expect to still be his girlfriend when you’re sleeping in my bed?”

I dug my nails into the gauzy fabric of my dress. “Benjy knows what’s at stake,” I muttered, turning away from him to stare out the window again. “Unlike some people, he doesn’t get jealous.”

“Are you sure?”

Knox’s lips were so close to my ear that I felt his warm breath on my cheek, and his fingertips danced across the back of my neck, tracing the three ridges underneath my skin. From anyone else, it would’ve been a warning, but from Knox it felt like a promise.

I shivered. If it weren’t for the fact that I needed him to get back to D.C., I would’ve murdered him right then and there.

Seconds passed like hours, and by the time I found the words to tell him off, he was halfway back to his seat, looking bored and distant, not tempting and warm and— I really was going to kill him.

“Do you have your earpiece?” said Knox, and I nodded, forcing myself to focus on the passing buildings.

If he was going to play these kinds of games, I’d play them, too.

“I don’t need it, though.”

“Oh?” he said. “Do you have the entire thing memorized?”

“Yes,” I said flatly, silently daring him to challenge me.

“Which speech will we have the privilege of hearing this afternoon?”

“I already told you, Celia and I had a deal. She didn’t hold up her end, so I won’t hold up mine. I’m not your puppet.”

“Yes, I realize that,” said Knox, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw his jaw twitch. Good.

Ten minutes later, the car pulled to a stop in front of a huge stadium, and through the door I heard a strange murmur. I pressed my ear against the window, and my eyes widened.

Lila, Lila, Lila—

The audience was chanting her name.

“Take your earpiece out so you don’t get confused,” said Knox, not seeming the least bit fazed. “Wouldn’t want you to start rattling off both speeches, would we?”

My mouth went dry. “How many people are going to be there?”

As the chauffer opened the door for us, Knox slid out first and offered me his hand. I didn’t take it. “It’s an open event, so anyone who wanted to come and could afford to take a day off will be there. Mostly IVs and above, but I suspect there will be some IIs and IIIs in the audience, too. Many of them are Blackcoat supporters, but the majority will be everyday citizens who’ve come to see you, and every last one of them already loves you. Trust me, you have nothing to worry about.”

I wiped my sweaty palms on my dress. Easy for him to say.

Together we walked into the building, where we were met by a guide who bowed but said little else. As he led us through the maze of concrete hallways, the sound of Lila’s name grew louder, and the very walls seemed to shake. The audience began to stomp their feet, and by the time we reached the platform that would lift me up onto the stage, I could barely hear myself think.

“You can do this,” shouted Knox. He set his hands on my shoulders and looked me straight in the eye, dead serious now. Whatever he’d tried to do in the car, those thoughts were gone now. “Those people are here for you.

Remember who you are and what you’re here to do. If you want to give Augusta’s speech, I won’t stop you, but do me and all twenty thousand people out there a favor and remember what it was like when you were a III.

Then decide what you’re going to say.”

My heart nearly stopped. “Twenty thousand people?”

“If I’d told you ahead of time, you would never have left the car.”

Now I had no choice. I yanked my earpiece out.

“Here.” I closed his fist around it and stepped backward onto the platform. “This isn’t a game, and I’m not your damn pawn.”

“I know. Everything’s in your hands, Kitty. You’re in control. This is your chance to prove what kind of person you really are underneath that face.”

The platform began to rise, and Knox and I locked eyes until the lights onstage blinded me. The cheering turned into a wall of sound, and the bright lights wound up being a good thing—because even though I could hear them, I couldn’t see how large a crowd of twenty thousand people really was.

All of them had come to see Lila, not me. To hear her words, to cheer as she encouraged them to keep fighting. I wasn’t her, though. I was a nobody trapped in the body of a Hart, and if they knew the truth— I inhaled sharply. Lila would never have won me over because she hadn’t known what it was like to be a III.

She’d lived with her cushy mansions and private jets, and even though being a Hart couldn’t have been easy, especially after what Daxton had done to her father, she’d never known what it was like to want for basic human rights and necessities. The entire world laid itself out before her, ripe for the picking. These people didn’t know what that was like, and she had no idea what it was like to be them.

I did. And I knew what I was going to say.

Pushing my worries about Greyson from my mind, I took a breath, opened my mouth, and began.

The applause was deafening. The stage shook underneath me, and security guards fought to keep the audience from spilling onto it. Even if they did, I didn’t care.