Pawn (The Blackcoat Rebellion #1)(55)
Author: Aimee Carter

I nodded, and he patted me on the shoulder. A cameraman called for him to get out of the way, and he moved to the side, still within my range of vision. He gave me a small smile, but I couldn’t return it.

Bright light flooded the room, and I flinched. The same cameraman counted down, and I threaded my fingers together and struggled to keep from fidgeting. Beside me, Augusta sat up straighter and lifted her chin, and as the countdown reached one, she took a breath.

And then we were live to the entire nation, and there was no going back.

Chapter 17

The plea lasted less than two minutes. Augusta didn’t say a word about Lila’s supposed death, nor the fact that I’d been masquerading as her for weeks. I awkwardly said my only line when the cameraman pointed at me, and that was that. No member of the public had enough pieces of the puzzle to figure out why I had to be there, but it wouldn’t save me. They knew now that there was someone out there who looked exactly like Lila, and she would be scrutinized for months until they were sure it was her.

Once it was over, Lila and I returned to her suite to wait for Celia to respond, and Knox trailed after us.

“This better work,” said Lila.

“It will,” said Knox, and he set his hand on my back.

“You did a good job.”

I started to reply, but Lila beat me to it. “It wasn’t exactly hard.”

He squeezed my shoulder, and I said nothing. Whether or not half the country was convinced Lila was some kind of divine savior, she was still a Hart.

Once we entered the suite, the guards shut the door behind us, and Lila stretched and cracked her back. “I claim the big bed,” she said, heading toward her bedroom. She tugged on the knob, but it didn’t budge. “Please tell me someone has the key.”

Right. I’d locked it to make the guards think I was asleep while Knox and I had sneaked out. I slipped past her, and using the necklace Greyson had given me, I unlocked it for her. As soon as it opened, she waltzed inside and closed the door behind her, and I heard the click of the lock once more.

“Is she always like this?” I said when I returned to the living room.

“This is one of her good days,” said Knox. “Try to get some sleep while you can.”

I curled up on the couch instead of heading into her second bedroom, but after a few fitful attempts to nap, I gave up. Knox sat nearby, staring into the crackling fire.

Occasionally he stood and tended to it with one of the pokers, but we spent several hours in silence.

Whatever happened, there was nothing I could do to stop it now. I’d agreed to this, and I had no choice but to see it through. I clung to the hope that everything would go according to plan and in the end, they would still need me, but I knew hope alone wouldn’t do it. Augusta had to see that I was more easily controlled than Lila. She had to recognize that this short life was better than the long one that waited for me on the streets as a fugitive III, and because of that, I would stay. But Lila wouldn’t, not for long. Not when she still had a choice.

However, Augusta had also lost all of her family in one fell swoop, and I was sure that when she was given the choice between a real Hart and a fake, I would lose every time.

“Can you make sure Lila gets this when it’s over?” I said to Knox, touching my necklace. It was rightfully Lila’s, but I couldn’t bring myself to give it up. Not yet.

“Greyson gave it to me thinking I was her, and—she should have it.”

“Of course,” he said. It was well past midnight, and the flames were dying. I glanced up at the air vent in the corner of the room. It would be easy to escape now, but without knowing where Benjy was or that Greyson was all right, I couldn’t bring myself to leave.

“Knox?” I said softly. “I’m scared.”

His jaw tensed, and his Adam’s apple bobbed. “Yeah, me, too.”

“What if Celia isn’t willing to make the trade? What if she decides Lila isn’t worth it?”

“She will,” he said. “She loves Lila more than her own life. She made mistakes, manipulating Lila into being the face of her rebellion—”

“Lila really didn’t believe in what she was saying?” I said. “Even after seeing what Elsewhere was really like?”

“She did,” he said slowly. “But when you live the life of a Hart, it’s hard to see past your own privilege. After what happened to her father, Lila wanted to help her mother, and Celia is persuasive. It wasn’t worth dying for, though. The idea is to stop the murders, not to get more people killed.”

“And you helped her fake her death?”

He rubbed his face wearily. “I should have told Celia.

I know that now, but Lila was so damn scared, and Celia would have gone after her if I’d told her the truth.”

“It’s not your fault,” I said. “Lila shouldn’t have run away in the first place.”

“What should I have done instead?” said a voice behind me. Dressed in pajamas, Lila moved into the space between us, blocking Knox from my view. “Tell me, Kitty, since you seem to have it all figured out—what else was I supposed to do?”

I sat up. “You should have stayed. If you didn’t want to talk to all those people, then you should have told your mother no. Then no one would have wanted you dead, and you wouldn’t have had to run away.”

“And you wouldn’t have my face,” she said. “And Greyson wouldn’t be kidnapped.”

“Exactly.”

She took a step closer to me, and behind her, Knox stood, but he made no move to pull her away. “I love my people,” she said in a trembling voice. “Maybe I didn’t want to risk my life, but I wanted to help them. I just thought there were better ways to do it.”

“How can you help them now?” I said. “What good are you holed up in a bunker?”

Her jaw tightened, and anyone in their right mind would’ve backed off with that wild look in her eyes, but I didn’t care anymore. I was as good as dead anyway, and when that happened, I couldn’t think of anything worse than Lila running away again and abandoning all of the people who counted on her.

“You’re no better than my mother,” she said, her eyes watering. “Not everyone’s prepared to die for the greater good, all right? We can’t all be heroes. I do my part down there, and no one has to know. I had no idea they were going to have someone Masked, and I’m sorry they put you through that, but that isn’t my fault. I thought if everyone believed I was dead, it would have made me a martyr. I thought it would fuel the rebellion. They know I’m alive now, though—the entire world does, and they also know their leader abandoned them and kidnapped Greyson. Some of them love him as much as they love me, you know. Do you really think they’re going to be happy about this?”