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She pushed the closet away from the door. Altair sat at the dining room table. The smile he gave her stopped her in her tracks.
“Good morning,” he said, looking at her like all of his dreams were coming true and she was the reason.
She tried to tone down her surprise and smiled back as charmingly as possible, though it wasn’t hard. Her lips were responding of their own accord.
“Good morning,” she said, walking over to the table. “Did you sleep well?”
He nodded. “I’ve never been so…relaxed.”
Her cheeks flushed.
Altair reached out to grab her arm and pulled her to sit on his lap. She wrapped her arms around his neck, surprised to find the bulge of the necklace missing, maybe he hadn’t put it back on yet.
“Last night was fun,” he said, gently rubbing her arm. “When can we do that again?”
She laughed. “You don’t look stressed enough to need another massage.”
His expression became guarded. “I might need it again tonight. Though I doubt you’ll be in the right mood after the execution.”
“Do I need to be there?” she asked. She wanted to be there, but she needed to play the part.
“Yes,” he said. “I need you to show your support.”
She lifted her hand to trace the worry lines on his face with her finger. “You don’t look like you want to do this.”
He looked away from her, the pain and hesitation visible on his face. “I’ve never been responsible for someone’s death before.”
She swallowed. “You don’t have to be now. You have the power to stop this.”
He shook his head. “Gary would call me a traitor, like my father. Then he’ll execute him anyway.”
The hand on her arm had stopped moving and was gripping her instead. He didn’t seem to notice what he was doing.
“What if he’s innocent?” she asked. “This isn’t something you can reverse. Once Brent is executed, he’s dead. That’s it. You will forever know that you killed him. That you are a murderer. Because no matter what your feelings are about capital punishment, you know that Gary has no actual evidence against Brent. That makes this execution illegal. That’s murder. If that’s not something you can live with then don’t do it.”
“What if he’s guilty?” he asked, his gaze a million kilometers away. “What if I let a rebel free that ends up causing a revolution?”
That wouldn’t be such a bad thing, she thought, but she said, “Even if he is a rebel, his crime was a failed attempt to steal some marble. Is that a crime worth hanging him for?”
She wanted him to say no, because if he believed death was a fitting punishment for theft, then he would believe that she should die. And that bothered her.
“But he could do something worse next time.”
“Please tell me your government doesn’t punish people before they even commit a crime.”
She didn’t know why she wanted—shards—neededhim to be the good guy, to break free from his family’s influence and do the right thing and save Brent. But she did. Even though she knew that Brent was in no actual danger. Well, she couldn’t know that a hundred percent. There was always the danger that their sabotage would be discovered, or Brent would be searched and the pill found. But even if everything went according to plan, she wanted Altair to be… more. More than a broken puppet for a corrupt government.
“You think I should stop the execution?”
“I think that’s what you really want, and I don’t want you to spend the rest of your life regretting a death that you could have prevented.”
“Would you think less of me if I went through with it anyway?”
“Yes,” she said, without hesitating.
She worried that she was giving too much away, showing her allegiance to the rebels, but she worried abouthimmore. She saw the pressure his family put on him as a manipulative force trying to change him for the worse. And she felt a strong desire to protect the man she saw, the man she hoped was somewhere inside, the man he hid behind the coldness and the fear, the real Altair.
Altair was pensive as he finished his breakfast. She waited for him to get in the shower and searched his room. She found the fake key stored in the drawer of the nightstand by his bed and replaced it with the real one.
