CHAPTER 49
I knew I’d found the one, not when I was willing to die for her. But when, for her, I was willing to die to myself.
—EDMUND PREW
Whatever shock or anger Edmund might’ve carried these past few days, none of it shows now.
The only thing I see in him is sadness, like the shadow cast when a cloud drifts in front of the sun.
It doesn’t fit the suit he’s wearing, a bright, eggshell-blue three-piece that makes him look like spring in mourning.
When I reach him at the tram stop, the rain begins.
It’s only a few shy drops at first, but the sky above us appears swollen, ready to split wide open.
Edmund remains silent as the tram arrives, though his gaze drifts over my goosebump-pebbled arms, as if noticing I’m cold.
He lifts his hand to signal for me to board first.
I glance up at the overhead display, which shows the route to the Moonshine Mile.
Of course. It’s Thursday, the day we usually breakfast at the Tangerine Tree.
But I won’t see that place today. It’ll all be over long before then, and I’ll step off this tram alone, heading back to the low-citizen zones where I belong.
I can’t bear it.
As Edmund guides me through the Blue section of the tram, the silence between us feels like it could crush me.
My throat works around all the words I want to force out, yet each one feels too little and too late.
We pass several booths, private and luxurious, until he chooses an empty one near the end.
We step inside and sit facing each other, our knees nearly touching.
As Edmund closes the door, he avoids my gaze as if my face were an open wound he can’t bear to look at.
I swallow hard and slip my hand into my pocket, wrapping my fingers around the wire daffodil he gave me, willing it to steady me.
But when he finally looks at me, the sadness in his eyes wilts my hope, and my composure breaks.
I don’t have the right words. There aren’t any.
All I can do is say the ones that claw their way out first.
“I’m so sorry, Edmund. I didn’t mean to lie. I swear, I never meant to hide what I did. I didn’t know Charles was your cousin until a few weeks ago. My dad told me. And by then… by then I was already—We were already—” The words break apart on a gasp.
“We already cared about each other too much. And at that point, I didn’t know how to put it in your hands and hope you wouldn’t hate me.
I tried—on the yacht, before Irene came.
And after that, when you asked me to go flying with you.
I was going to tell you then, I promise.
I never wanted it to come out like this.
Not in that room. Not in front of everyone. ”
I pause and draw in a ragged breath that scrapes my throat raw. My hands shake so violently that I clamp them between my knees, trying to still them. “And I know it cost you everything. All those Blues telling you to get rid of me—”
“Yes,” Edmund says softly.
The word silences me.
“Yes,” he repeats. “But the cost never mattered to me. Like you said, we care about each other. And that’s what people who care about each other do.”
I frown, unsettled by how calm his tone is. It doesn’t match the tension in his body or the unsteady look in his eyes, quiet yet desperate, like a man slowly bleeding out. I lean forward and reach for him instinctively, but just before my hand touches his, he pulls away.
“Given the nature of our… situation,” he says, loosening his tie, “I’ll give you a choice. I won’t cut you out of my entourage. I won’t hold it against you. I’ll even forgive you—if you prove yourself the way I proved myself to you, by paying a cost. For me.”
I nod before I can stop myself, even though every ounce of my survival instinct screams at me to run. Something about this is wrong. It feels like he’s moving pieces on a board I can’t see or touch, yet they’ll decide my future all the same.
“Prove it how?”
Edmund’s throat tightens, and he drags his hand across his mouth as if to hide it. Then he reaches into his suit jacket pocket, pulls something free, and presses it into my palm.
I look down and see a small glass vial holding a single black pill.
Bliss.
As I stare at the pill, black as a dead star in the vial, the deal that Edmund is lying at my feet dawns on me in brutal flashes, like a shockwave of glass shattering behind my eyes.
I see it all: take Bliss, one tiny pill.
It’ll cost me a hundred civil credits, pennies he’d probably slip back into my account himself.
But the real price isn’t in the civil credits.
It’s in the destruction that would follow.
My tongue grows heavy as I realize why Edmund wanted to meet in public.
Here, under the eyes of students, Coppers, and surveillance cameras, there’s no way to hide the drug’s effects.
People would see. They’d whisper. They’d take pictures and run to sell them.
The story would spread like oil on water until even Benjamin Bogart is laughing it up live on air: Bruce Waldsten’s daughter, high on the very drug her father banned.
Worse, the story would break just as Dad is about to announce his run for Governor of the Rainbow District.
Edmund understands this. He knows exactly what a scandal like this would do to me, to Dad, to our family. I see it in how he watches me now, as if he’s handling something fragile, fully aware he’s about to drop it.
But why? Why?
I shove the vial back into his hand, trembling so hard I can barely choke out the words. “No, Edmund. Don’t ask me to do this. Please.”
“I won’t force you to take it, Loredana. As I said, it’s your choice.”
“It’s not a choice. And you know it’s not.” My voice echoes in the hollow cabin, humiliated and helpless. “I’m sorry, Edmund. I’m so sorry for what I did. I’d do anything to take it back. I know you loved Charles—”
“Loved him?” The sadness in Edmund’s eyes clouds with a sharp, poisonous disdain. “No, Loredana. I didn’t love Charles. I hated him, even more than Miss Hussey did.”
Irene? What? My mind staggers, struggling to make sense of the connection, until I remember that Irene had another fiancé before Edmund. A fiancé who died.
“Was… Charles engaged to Irene?”
Edmund doesn’t answer, but he doesn’t need to. I see it in the rapid rise and fall of his chest, as if his heart is beating itself bloody against his ribs. It wasn’t fate that tied Edmund to Irene. It wasn’t an accident. It was me.
The truth rips through me, and I slump back into the seat, curling in on myself like paper burning too fast to save. I reach for words, but there are none for this, no apology big enough to cover it. I understand now that Edmund’s misery is mine to own. When I killed Charles, I killed him, too.
“Edmund—”
The word falters, breaking off as dizziness engulfs me. My injured leg buckles beneath me as I lurch forward, nearly sliding off the seat, until Edmund stands and catches me. He steadies me against the armrest, then starts to let go, but I clutch his suit jacket with trembling fists.
“I didn’t know,” I rasp, the tears scalding my eyes. “Edmund, I didn’t know.”
I rise beside him, clinging tighter, and bury my face in his chest with a desperation that burns through every shred of my pride.
My sobs come out harsher, rougher, shaking against him.
Edmund’s body stays rigid, refusing me, until I tilt my face up and meet his eyes through the blur of tears.
His jaw constricts as he watches them spill down my cheeks, his expression fractured by the same devastation I saw in the elevator when he told me he loved me and I refused to say the same.
His hands hang frozen at his sides, though his fingers tremble, as if he’s trapped between pulling me closer and tearing himself away.
“Edmund.” My hand hovers before I finally brush it along his cheekbone.
He leans into my palm instinctively, then pulls away.
“Please,” I whisper, softer now. My fingers drift to his mouth, and he stiffens, his breath catching low.
I can feel his pulse pounding in his chest, his skin growing hotter, and the tremor in his arms, as if every part of him is straining at the brink of surrender.
“Please, Edmund,” I breathe, clutching his lapels as hope sparks inside me. “Forgive me, and I’ll never hurt you again.”
His head dips a fraction, his mouth so close that the heat of it grazes my skin. I rise onto my toes, reaching for him as my hope grows stronger. And then, just before our lips touch, he pushes something into my hand.
I stumble back, stunned as I recognize the object’s shape.
My eyes drop to my hand, where the vial of Bliss gleams like a loaded gun, and my chest caves.
He’s really still doing this? After telling me he loves me, after everything we’ve been through, this is what he chooses? This is his forgiveness?
No. Something’s wrong. This isn’t the Edmund I know.
I reach blindly for the seat, ready to collapse, when the tram jerks to a sudden stop. I stumble back and collide with the cushions, bracing myself on the armrest as the conductor’s voice crackles overhead.
“Attention, passengers. Due to a technical fault, this line will terminate at the next stop. Please disembark and wait for the next available tram. We apologize for the inconvenience and thank you for your cooperation. May you always be virtuous.”
I don’t look at Edmund again. When the tram rocks into the station, I hurry outside and step straight into a mud puddle that drenches my shoes.
The drizzle has thickened to a heavy downpour, soaking me within seconds.
The rain is so fierce and side-slashing I can barely see a few feet ahead, as if the sky itself is tearing open for me.
The Genetic Engineering Facility looms ahead, its iron gates dark through the sheets of rain. Beyond them, the neon signs of the Moonshine Mile flicker down the street.