“We can’t leave until we get this sorted out,” she added.
She didn’t want to say it, but one of them had to.
Keith made a face. “I know. Even though right now I want to get you as far away from here as possible.”
“I know. Don’t get me wrong, that sounds pretty good. But I don’t want to burn our bridges here if we don’t have to.”
He nodded reluctantly. “I don’t want you to have to leave your family behind. But for the record, if they ever cut you off, it wouldn’t be because we had some scandalous life where we made our own choices. It’d be because this place is broken.”
No one had ever said that to her in so many words. She’d always known that being true to herself could mean breaking her family’s heart, but she hadn’t let herself think that thatwasn’t her fault.
She had always seen it as a question of what choiceshewould make: behave or rebel?
Now, with Keith next to her—with someone to actually share her anger—she could see that other people’s choices came into it too.
Her family could choose to keep talking to her and keep seeing her, no matter what the Silver Council said.
And the fact that the Council would essentially rescind her citizenship if she questioned their authority—well, that was a choice on their part, too. And it was a bad one.
It wasn’t like the universe was chugging along perfectly, and her choices, her willfulness, were throwing spanners into the works.Everyonehad a spanner. This machine they were all working on together had been broken for a very long time, longer than any of them had been alive.
“I needed to hear that,” she said, looking up into his eyes so he could know how much she meant it. “Thank you. You must have had to work all this stuff out on your own. Figuring out how to live with nobody to tell you if you were doing it right or not ... that’s not what we’re used to, is it?”
He laughed a little, and she could feel the rumble in his chest. “No, it’s not. But I did have my team. They couldn’t understand all this from the inside-out, the way you can, but they were always there for me.”
“They like you a lot.” She realized instantly that that was an understatement, so she corrected herself: “Theyloveyou.”
Keith turned slightly pink, but she was glad he didn’t tell her she was wrong.
He mumbled something under his breath that sounded a lot like,I love them too, and the pink in his cheeks deepened.
“I can’t believe how embarrassed you are by this,” Iris said with delight. “It’s like you’ve never said it about anybody before.”
The tiniest flicker passed over his face, and all her amusement suddenly dropped like a stone.
Hehadn’tsaid it about—or to—anyone before. When would he have had the chance?
His parents had left him with the Council, and the Council, even at its best and most genuinely supportive, didn’t believe in hugs and kisses. He’d gone through years and years of life with no one to love and with no one to love him.
No wonder he hadn’t figured out how to talk about his feelings about his team.
Her heart broke for him. She and Seraphina had always loved each other, and they’d always said so—they’d said it to each other just the other day!—and even though her relationship with her parents had been rocky at times, she’d always known they loved her too.
Keith swiped his thumb underneath one of her eyes, and Iris realized she’d started to cry.
“It’s okay,” he said. “But you’re right. I never got in a lot of practice on that one.”
“You should have.”
“Yeah. I think I needed to hear that just like you needed to hear that the whole thing is broken. And I think I could get some of that practice in now.”
He wiped away another smudge from a tear.
“I love you,” Keith said.
Light seemed to flow through Iris, like someone had opened up a window inside of her. He was sunshine and fresh air and everything she’d ever wanted.
She had no problem saying it. She couldn’t believe it hadn’t somehow slipped out already.
