“After all this, you have a conscience?”
“Do you think I enjoy this?” he snaps. “You made me do this.”
That’s what bad men have been saying to their victims for a long time. Has it ever been true? No, because he’s the ultimate liar. I lift my hands up, palms open, my gaze fixed on him. I’ve done too much to make his life easier. I won’t turn away and let him shoot me in the back.
He lifts the gun and points it at the center of my chest.
Standing in front of the hole, I realize I’ll probably fall back into it. He won’t even have to touch me. Small mercy. I don’t want him to touch me, even when I’m dead. Only the earth will touch me then. Dirt, like the kind that was under Niko’s nails. The kind that coated his hands.
In this moment I am afraid, but I’m also brave. I’m about to die, but I’m more powerful than I’ve ever been. Because no matter how insane the world is, telling the truth is worth something. Even telling the truth to yourself. And I can finally be honest. Without the pink phone and the panda alarm clock.
This dirt hole is the most honest thing in my entire life.
A blast rips through the air, sharp and sudden.
I suck in a breath, waiting for the pain. Will the bullet kill me right away? Will it take time to die? Will I have to watch my father pile dirt on my dying body?
And incongruously, the thought comes: Where is Niko now?
As if I’ve conjured him from my mind alone, I hear his shout. “Emily!”
My father stares at me in shock, in anger. In relief? And then he falls to the ground in front of me, a blooming red flower on his back. I look up and see Sergio De Fiore striding toward me. It feels like a strange fever dream, seeing these terrible men. Maybe I’m already six feet under. Maybe there’s dirt in my nose, these images the result of an oxygen-deprived mind.
Except then Niko is there. He’s running his hands along my arms, as if making sure I’m still in one piece. And then standing in front of me, using his body like a shield.
“Don’t touch her,” he says to the Sergio De Fiore fever dream.
“Even though she conspired to steal the diamonds with you?” he asks, his voice dry. “I should shoot all three of you and leave the cops to puzzle over what happened.”
“That wasn’t our deal,” Niko says, sounding fierce.
And afraid. He’s afraid, I realize, and that’s how I know this isn’t a dream.
“Sustainability,” I say, stepping out from behind Niko. If we end up in a bloodbath on this pretty green grass then we’ll do it side by side. He came back for me.
Sergio lifts a sardonic brow at me. “You wish to speak to me about earth sciences?”
“Yes, sir. They’ve had a catastrophic impact on the environment.”
“What has?”
“Blood diamonds,” I say softly, nodding toward the small black case at his side. I can guess what’s inside. I can guess what Niko must have traded for my life. “Soil erosion. Deforestation. Thousands of abandoned mines that have left a surface uninhabitable by wildlife or humans.”
Sergio gives me a small nod, as if conceding a point. “But the diamonds have already been mined. The destruction has already been made. What good would it do to ignore the diamonds now?”
“Not ignore them, but make changes for the future. We can impose limits on diamond mining. We can invest in land restoration projects. We can do better in the future.”
“Can we?”
“Niko is a farmer. That’s all he wants to do.”
“And you wish to be a farmer’s wife?”
“I’ll start by being a farmer’s girlfriend, I think. That’s the natural progression of things. And I’m very interested in things that are natural right now, after a lifetime spent inside.”
Sergio seems to examine this, taking his time as if my dad’s body isn’t cooling between us. Finally he says, “There aren’t many farms near Tanglewood.”
“Not in the city,” Niko says carefully.
“Far away,” Sergio says, his expression hard.
“Very far away,” I agree, taking Niko by the hand. His fingers squeeze mine. Because we can find that patch of dirt together. It’s a small dream, especially by the glittering standards my mother has. But a huge dream for two people who’ve longed for this. It’s everything.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Emily Coulter lives up to her terrible reputation. More than a liar, she’s also a thief and a murderer. She kills her father one terrible night and buries him in the backyard, before disappearing for good.
It’s a fitting end for a terrible life.
It’s someone else who appears in a small town about two hundred miles west of Tanglewood. Someone named Emma, but her boyfriend calls her Em. Like being born again, into a life I choose.
