“The only way to what? Destroy my entire life? Why didn’t you tell me you’d joined the Dissent?”
“You were trying so hard to honor Mom’s memory by working in that infirmary. How could I ruin that for you?”
“So instead, you just waited until you’d left me behind and pretended you weremurdered?” Gemma hissed. Her hands curled into fists. “I tried to kill myself because of you. I wastortured because of you. Reymond sent me to my death because of you.”
“Be angry at me all you want, Gemstone, but my reasons were to protect you.”
“Don’t you dare call me that,” Gemma snapped, the pain bubbling into fury. “You weren’t protecting me. You wanted me to be so angry at the Systems that I would kill for you. You said so yourself.”
“No, I said you were too soft.”
“That’s the same thing!”
“It isn’t.” Nadine’s voice was growing irritated. “I needed you to toughen up because getting you to fight with the Dissent was the only way to keep you alive.”
“That’s a load of shit.”
“Is it? You know the kind of radical Reymond was. He was ready to call an all-out war against the Systems. Who do you think would’ve suffered? You. The people in Perileos. By convincing him to use you as an inside man, he put off the attack. You never would’ve died in Zion. Colton was loyal to me.”
“Colton nearly killed me! Did he tell you that? He marched me across the desert and beat me within an inch of my life.”
“And I nearly hadhimkilled for doing it.”
“Oh, shut up. All of this is your fault. Rami knew you’d sent someone else. And it was during my search for him—for Colton—that I turned myself intothis. Now, I’m locked in a cell, on my way to Capital City, and I wouldn’t be in here if you hadn’t made me angry enough to try to assassinate Rami.”
“To survive in this place, you have to be angry. You have to be willing to burn things down. I knew you wouldn’t get there unless you had a reason.”
“So, what was your reason for murdering hundreds of people on Oranos after the uprising here in Zion, then, hmm?”
“The Dissent did not start the battle on Oranos.”
“Again with the shit.”
“I’m serious, Gemma. That wasn’t us. Reymond was supposed to die in Zion so that I could take over, and someone let that slip. So the Systems came after me on Oranos, and my men did what they had to make sure I survived. I barely did.”
“Okay, but how about the hundreds of people who mysteriously ‘disappeared’ from Perileos?”
“Nobody ‘disappeared.’ They joined our ranks and went into hiding. We have cells all over Perileos now. Look, I am sorry for what I did to you, but it was for a good reason.”
A good reason?Gemma screamed inside her head.
Her fists clenched as a ferocious heat overtook her body from head to toe. Her chest constricted. The tattooed veins on her arm grew a brighter shade of violet and began to pulse in time with her sprinting heartbeat. Anger surged through her like lightning on a wire—too fast, too bright to stop.
The overhead lights flickered. One exploded. Then another. Then the entire corridor went dark as glass and sparks rained like stars.
“It’s happening!” one of the guards shouted. “Gas her!”
A loud hiss sounded, and her cell filled with white smoke.
“Don’t fight it, Gemstone,” Nadine said. “Just breathe it in, and you’ll get less of a headache.”
Before Gemma could tell her to eat sand, everything went black.
The flat in Zion felt different now. Colder. Too quiet.
Christian stepped inside, letting the door slide shut behind him, and just stood there. The place still smelled faintly like her. A soft flowery scent, and something warm and sweet he could never name. Her blanket was still slung over the arm of their small sofa. Her slippers were tucked neatly by the wall.
But she was gone.
