Page 30 of The Next Lie

“I have never claimed that it was the right thing to do, Delia. Just…necessary.”

She moves farther into the room, though she keeps distance between us. Delia has learned lessons Reva has yet to learn. I’ll have to make sure she learns them, and fast, now that she’s here. Never stand too close to a man you’re not prepared to kill. Never put your back to the only door. Never let tears make your throat soft.

“Does she know?” Delia asks.

“Know what?”

“That you knew. That Cal knew. That everyone she trusted built a grave around her and called it protection.”

“Not all of it. But she’s going to soon.”

Delia closes her eyes.

The tear that slips out seems to offend her. She wipes it away hard enough to redden the skin beneath her eye.

“She looked at me like I was supposed to run into her arms.”

There’s bitterness there.

Guilt too, buried under it but breathing.

“She thought you were dead, Dee.”

“So did I. Her, I mean. I just…don’t understand why.” Delia looks at me with a mixture of defiance and brokenness.

I run a hand across the back of my neck. The truth has been rationed to all of us in different portions. It should not surprise me that she was starved too. I didn’t have much contact with Delia beyond seeing her around Mother Superior’s compound.

“What did they tell you about her?” I ask.

Her jaw tightens.

“Delia. I can’t tell you the truth if I don’t know what lies you’ve been told.”

She looks toward the closed door. “I was told that bad guys had killed my sister…Daddy…they shot Mommy. That Reva had died. I asked about my best friend and my cat and they were confused, so I stopped asking. I think they thought I was confused…making things up. They said you searched and everyone was accounted for. That there was nothing to recover. That…that grief was a privilege we could not afford.”

Mother Superior’s phrasing, if not her exact words. My stomach churns with a familiar, useless fury.

“It made sense.”

“I was seven.”

The room goes quiet.

I look at her then. Really look.

Not at the weapon she became. Not at the woman who knows how to walk through Noir Night with a straight back and a cold mouth. At the child she was when we carried her out. At the girl who had blood on her dress and asked for her sister until her voice broke.

Seven. Reva’s twin—fraternal, but still so similar.

Old enough to understand the shape of death.

Young enough to believe adults when they tell you where to put it.

“I didn’t know what they had told you,” I say.

Her laugh is empty. “Well. Add it to the list of things you didn’t know while knowing everything.”

Fair.