Free The Killables by Gemma Malley Page B

burying his head in his knees. Evie tentatively reached over.
    ‘He didn’t mean to be evil,’ she said. ‘I’m sure he didn’t. But the System . . .’
    ‘The System’s always right. Of course it is.’ There was a note of something dangerous in Raffy’s voice. Evie’s eyes widened as she looked at him. Could the System hear him?
    ‘The System
is
right,’ she said, looking around fearfully. ‘It knows us all, and it can see deep into our hearts, and—’
    ‘And my father went straight from an A to a K? The System can’t have been on the ball, can it?’ Raffy stood up. ‘Don’t you see, Evie? I thought you’d see. I thought you understood. It’s all rubbish. It has to be. I’m not evil. You’re not evil. The feelings I have for you aren’t evil. The feelings you have for me. Or had, I should say.’
    He stared at her again; Evie felt herself getting warm.
    ‘Have,’ she whispered. ‘Have.’
    A smile crossed Raffy’s face. He sat down on the bed again, grabbed her hands, pulled her towards him.
    ‘The other day,’ he said, his voice so quiet she could barely hear him, ‘when I found the glitch. It wasn’t a glitch. It was a communication device. There were messages there to people outside the City. People who must have a System too. The Brother says there’s no one outside except Evils and savages. But I saw the messages. I saw the device. Don’t you see? If they’re lying about that, they’re lying about other things, too.’
    Evie’s eyes were like saucers now as her heart began to thud anxiously in her chest. She shook her head.
    ‘No,’ she whispered. ‘No, Raffy. That’s impossible.’
    He rolled his eyes. ‘Yeah, that’s what Lucas said. Said I imagined it, that I was hallucinating. But I know what I saw.’
    ‘But . . . but . . .’ Evie stammered, her mind racing, compounding her confusion, making her feel like she’d lost her balance.
    ‘But nothing,’ Raffy said. He squeezed her hands and his eyes suddenly lit up. ‘If another place exists, then let’s go to it. Together.’
    ‘Go to it? You mean leave the City?’ Evie recoiled.
    ‘I mean, find somewhere better. With no rules. Where we can just live.’
    ‘You mean like the Evils live?’ Evie said, shaking her head violently. ‘No, Raffy. No. We’re not going anywhere. You’re going to go home and not come here again and I’m going to marry Lucas.’
    ‘No!’ Raffy cried angrily. ‘Evie, listen to me. We always talked about this, about finding faraway places where we could live happily. We always talked about escaping. Well now we can. Now we have to.’
    Evie pulled her hands away. ‘That was make-believe, Raffy,’ she said angrily. ‘That was children’s talk. We’re grown up now. You have to stop living in a fantasy land. You live here, in the City. You are lucky to be here; we both are. You have to stop, Raffy. You have to . . .’ She dried her eyes, stood up on the bed and opened the window again. ‘You have to go, Raffy,’ she said. ‘Now. Please.’
    ‘You really want me to?’
    Evie nodded; she could barely bring herself to look at him, to see the confusion and pain in his eyes which she knew would weaken her resolve.
    ‘Fine. I’ll go,’ he muttered, his voice angry. ‘But I’m telling you, this place exists. It’s not a fantasy. It’s real. Just like this is real.’ He grabbed her, pulled her towards him and kissed her, and she tried to pull away but she couldn’t. She wouldn’t. Instead she held on to him, his shoulders, his hair, pressing him into her, breathing in the scent of his skin so that she might never forget it.
    ‘Bye, Evie,’ Raffy said, his voice hoarse and quiet. ‘Look after yourself.’
    And then he let go of her, and she had never felt quite so alone, quite so cold, quite so adrift. But she steeled herself; took a deep breath. She was doing the right thing. For once, finally, she was doing the right thing. Raffy moved towards the window; Evie