I kept staring at that lovely pale face. The one I thought I knew.
“All of you were in on it. This whole time, you all knew Crito wasn’t the real threat.”
“Yes.”
“What did Laney actually want with him that night?”
“A meeting. I was merely checking in with him till you twits showed up. I bound him to make it look like a mission, like I’d come to scare him straight. But then you wanted to take his gag off, so I had to bloody shoot him.”
“Laney was working with Adam.”
“Yes, but now you can see the big picture.” Tam shook her head. “Adam went to Ingrid with a plea bargain for Crito. Crito thought she was involved with Black Iris’s missions against him. He was wrong, but it tipped Ingrid off. She learned about us. She learned you were one of us. And she tried to turn you against us. But we’re smarter, stronger, bigger. We let her watch us while we watched her. She was right about me following her—I’ve been surveilling her since summer.”
“What did you see?”
“Everything. She met with Adam. She ‘befriended’ Norah, used her as a pawn. She manipulated you in so many subtle ways. I wanted to tell you—wanted to throw the whole thing, expose her, but Laney told me to wait. Armin had suspicions that someone was tampering with your medication. We needed to be absolutely sure before we unmasked her.” Tamsin stared at Ingrid with a look of puzzled revulsion. “What I don’t understand is why. Why did she tamper with your medicine?”
My knees burned on the freezing cement floor. “Because she wants me to go back.”
“Back to what?”
“Sofiya.”
Ingrid leaned forward, her face unsettling in its implacable calm. Those intense eyes, that softly fervent voice. “His life is ruined, not yours. You don’t have to be him anymore.”
It wasn’t just my reputation. It was my fucking body.
Tampering with my meds. My bloodwork always coming back weird, the T levels too low. How good it felt when I “overdosed.” How right.
She’d been trying to undo my transition.
“You are the sickest person I’ve ever known,” I said.
Ingrid rolled her eyes. “So are you, Sofie. You used to be so pretty. And now look at you.”
A spasm racked my body. I reined back the arm that wanted to hit her.
Do not. Do not fucking do it.
Don’t prove her right.
“Show some fucking appreciation,” she said. “I freed you from this. Your ‘masculinity,’ your delusions of gender. You’re not trapped anymore.”
“I was never fucking trapped, you lunatic. I’m not delusional. This is who I am.”
“You were suffering.” Her teeth met in a rictus between words. “You were miserable. I watched you writhe in agony every day. It was mercy to stop it.”
“I was suffering because of you.” I lunged, shook her till her head jerked, hair flying. “You were never fucking happy for me. You dragged your heels the whole way. You hated what I was doing but you wouldn’t let me go.” My jaw was about to drive straight through my skull. “You’re the reason I dated Adam. So I could break free of your fucking Svengali hold on me. You’re the reason all of this happened. You toxic fucking bitch, this is all on you.”
Tamsin crouched beside us. Put a hand on me, an anchor to reality.
I let Ingrid go. Her hair was wild, a lash of blood snaking from her lip.
“You’re in denial,” Inge said. “I’ve seen your videos. I’ve seen how much you regret this.”
“I don’t regret it. It’s just hard.”
“You bailed on being a girl because being a girl is hard.”
“I bailed because I’m not a fucking girl.” I clawed the back of my head. “Want to talk about how hard being a girl is? Were you the one who was fucking raped?”
Saying it aloud tore something loose from me, left a raw place.
“You think it was easy for me, Sofie? Being the dyke, the fag?”
“It doesn’t justify this.”
“But you never gave a shit how hard it was. It was all about you and your fucking gender identity. My identity is always visible. I can’t hide being a lesbian. But you pass now. If you didn’t tell people you weren’t born a boy, they’d never know. You could live without taking anyone’s shit, if you wanted.”
She was right. But it didn’t make me wrong.
“You could have said this before taking matters into your own hands, Inge. Told me you were struggling with your identity, too.”
“I’m telling you now.”
“It’s too fucking late.”
“Sofie,” she whispered. Her eyes were glassy, limpid. “I know you’re still in there. And I still love you.”
Something snapped. That last thread between us, finally breaking.
I reeled away from her, staring up into the light. Looking for something to burn away this feeling.
Tamsin stood, touching my shoulder. “We’ll take care of this now.”
“Just let her go.”
“She’s tried to ruin your life. She’s no better than Adam.”