“Not happy, no. But yes, I was going to give up those other names. Because I was—I am—a terrible person. I didn’t think I had a choice. But then …” Archer’s eyes slid down once more, seeming to look through Ridley. “I was standing inside my own home, waiting for Dad to return from work, and it just … it didn’t feel like home anymore. And it suddenly hit me that every experience I’d had out there in the wastelands with people I was supposed to hate was genuine, real, full of hope. And I just couldn’t do it. I couldn’t betray them like that. It was a terrifying decision, Rid, but it was such a relief.” He ran a hand through his hair, almost smiling for a brief moment. “But I was still too afraid to go against my father. Too afraid to confront him. I decided to pretend I’d never been there.
“I had just made the decision when two men arrived at the apartment, responding to some security alarm I must have unknowingly set off. I suppose I could have let them see it was me. Told them nothing was wrong. Told them to leave. But … everything was still so confused inside my head. I had no plan. So that’s when I hid the flash drive—just in case they caught me—and ran.”
“And that’s when my father helped hide you,” Ridley said.
“Yes. I lied, just as I did to you, about how I’d accidentally found an elemental community. But everything else was the truth. After I left, when I eventually made contact with my father, it seemed he thought it was an elemental who’d broken into our home. So I went with that. Told him one of them had followed me, that I was risking blowing my cover, that I’d ended up losing the flash drive along the way. He told me to return to the elementals and continue gathering more information.
“As the months went by, I had limited contact with him, and I made excuses about why I couldn’t return or why I couldn’t access certain information and send it to him. But eventually he became impatient and insisted I return home. I had to concoct a story about how my true intentions had been discovered just before I left, and how I’d had to fight my way out with magic and hadn’t been able to steal any information. I told him they had never fully regained their trust in me after I was unable to deliver the flash drive to the intended recipient in Lumina City.”
“And of course he believed you,” Ridley said quietly, bitterly, “because everyone believes the lies Archer Davenport tells.”
“Ridley—”
“We stood in my living room and I asked you point-blank if you were part of the Shadow Society. Remember that, Archer? Do you remember how you denied it? Do you remember using the words ‘absolute truth’?”
“It was the truth,” he insisted. “It just wasn’t the whole story.”
“Right. And why exactly did you decide to keep the whole story to yourself when you could very easily have it explained it all right then and there?”
“I just … I was ashamed, okay? You trusted me. Your father trusted me. So because of my stupid pride, I didn’t want to admit that I used to be one of them. And I was leaving it all behind anyway. I had planned to leave the city and my family and the society forever. They would never be part of my life again, and there would never be a reason for me to tell you what had happened in the past. Especially since you and I weren’t that close yet. I mean, I … I knew I cared about you. More than I had expected to. But I didn’t know it would turn into anything. I didn’t know how close we would become. And I certainly didn’t know someone would discover the location of multiple elemental groups and tell the Shadow Society. I didn’t know I would be captured and dragged back to Lumina City.”
“Where you’re still lying your way through everything.”
“Yes. I don’t know where Jude Madson got his information from or how much more he knows, but I can’t exactly find out anything about future Shadow Society plans if they know he’s right about me betraying them all. I swear, Ridley. They’re the ones I’m lying to, not you. Please, please believe me. Even if—if you never … forgive me for everything I’ve kept from you … at least believe me.”
Ridley shook her head and looked away. She wasn’t saying no. She wasn’t sure what she was saying except that everything hurt and whether she believed him or not, whether she forgave him or not, that didn’t change. In a small voice, she said, “Disgusting and unnatural.”
After a moment of hesitation, Archer asked, “What?”
“In the meeting. That’s what you said about our magic. My magic. You want to get rid of us and our disgusting, unnatural magic.”
“Ridley—”
“It wasn’t that long ago that you told me you thought it was beautiful.”
“I do think that.” He moved toward her, and once again, she stepped out of his reach. “Rid, I was just telling them what they wanted to hear. Repeating their own words back to them.”
“And when you used the word ‘beautiful,’ were you just telling me what you thought I wanted to hear?”
“No. In fact, I figured you didn’t want to hear something like that—especially from me—but it was the truth and it slipped out.”
Ridley released a long sigh and shut her eyes. “You’re such a great actor, Archer Davenport.”
“This isn’t an act, Ridley, I promise. Nothing with you is an act.”
His anguished tone was so genuine, Ridley struggled not to believe it. Perhaps this was the truth. The fact that he wasn’t currently knocking her out with arxium and dragging her back home to the director of the Shadow Society was a good sign. She opened her eyes again, thinking vaguely about the fact that putting the gas mask back on for this confrontation would have been a good idea. It hadn’t even crossed her mind until now.
“I want to believe you,” she told him as she met his desperate gaze once more. “I really do.”
“Please, Rid—”
“And I think I actually do.” She pushed her hands through her damp hair. “Despite my better judgement, I think I do believe you.”
“Thank you, Ridley. Thank—”
“Which probably just makes me really stupid.”
Archer shook his head, holding her gaze. “Every moment we’ve spent together recently was genuine. Every time I told you how I feel about you, it was real. You must know that.”
Ridley wanted to look away, but she couldn’t. She wanted to cry, but she refused. “It doesn’t really matter. Even if everything you’ve told me is the truth—and even if I believe you—it doesn’t matter. Because I’m returning to the elementals and you’re not. This is the end for us.”
Archer turned his gaze down. He clenched his jaw, then nodded slowly. “I hope you at least understand why I put off telling you the truth for so long. I knew it would be the end for us, and even though it was wrong, I wanted to delay that for as long as possible.”
Ridley let out a frustrated sound. “You don’t know that, Archer. If you’d been truthful from the start, maybe it wouldn’t have gone this way.” She lifted the backpack, shoved her arms through the straps, and tugged it onto her shoulders. Turning her back to him, she let her magic rise from her skin as she prepared to become air. “But like I said,” she added, “it doesn’t matter now.”