Her eyes are impenetrable. “Figure out your own problems.”
“Except these aren’t the kind of moves Diamond usually makes.”
“I’m not here to discuss what we are and aren’t doing.”
He nods at her. “Of course not.”
“And what about you, Ari?” Sam turns the questions on him now. “How do you like your job for Reed?”
Careful,Ari reminds himself. Just as he’s trying to dig for information from her, so can she from him. “Well enough,” he replies.
“Word has it that Doherty has cut some sort of deal with Lumines, in exchange for campaign favors.”
“Is that why you’re here tonight, then? To get some answers?”
“I thought that’s what we were doing here, questioning each other.”
“Okay, then. What other questions do you have for me?”
She seems to gather herself then, and when she speaks again, she says, “Ari, why did you stop answering my messages?”
He hadn’t expected the pivot, and for a moment, he’s quiet. “Because I work for Lumines,” he answers.
“But you’ve always worked for them. You didn’t know back then that Iwas with Grand Central, and I didn’t know you were with Lumines. What changed?”
He looks out at the black ocean. A part of him tenses, waits for her to take the chance to shoot him. But nothing happens, and when he turns back to her, she’s still waiting for his reply.
“I thought you were going on to college,” he answers. “A new life. How could I fit into that without putting you in danger?”
“You didn’t even give it a chance. You were my only friend, Ari, and you just disappeared.”
Now he sees the girl he used to know, the wide, hurt eyes, and his heart twists, his mission for Reed falling away.
“I couldn’t bear to keep you,” he says quietly.
She studies his face. “Because you were afraid I’d find out that you were an alchemist?”
He gives her a somber look. “Because I wanted to protect you. I thought you were too good for that.”
Too good for me.And he realizes that he still believes it, even now, even as she looks away from him. God, she’s so, so, so beautiful, and in this illuminated moment he can hardly stand to look at her. Old wounds are reopened, emotions once put to bed are unearthed. Everything in him aches for her. She is all he wants.
“Well,” she says, “I guess I’m not.”
“What reason did you have for joining Grand Central, then?”
“Because,” she says, “we needed the money.”
We.Ari realizes she means her mother, and in a flash, he recalls the terrible thing that had happened to her in their youth. His heart twists. She had kept her struggles secret, but perhaps he had failed her by not trying harder to help. Perhaps they had both failed.
“Then we would have lost each other, anyway,” he murmurs.
They stay silent for another beat.
“What are you going to tell Lumines?” she asks him. “When you give them the rundown of our little meeting?”
“You know I won’t,” he says.
“Then what’s the point of this?” Sam snaps.
