Pawn. Aimee Carter

I’d seen earlier. My cheekbones were higher, my eyebrows thinner, my nose smaller, and my lips fuller—even the shape of my face had gone from a square to an oval. And somehow my forehead, which had always been a little too small, was now perfect.

      I gazed at the image for several seconds before it dawned on me. This wasn’t just a gorgeous face where mine was supposed to be.

      I stared into the camera, and Lila Hart stared back.

      IV

      Knox

      I couldn’t breathe. The room spun around me, and the edges of my vision faded until all I could see was Lila’s face where mine should have been. No matter how many times I blinked, it didn’t change back. I was her. She was me.

      Daxton had turned me into Lila Hart.

      “What did you do to me?” I cried.

      “You were Masked. A simple procedure,” said Daxton from across the room. “Nothing more than a few alterations.”

      “Masked?” I said, choking on the word. What had they done, removed Lila’s face and put it on mine? “I don’t even look like me anymore.”

      Celia turned the camera off, her brow furrowed with anger. “There’s nothing simple about it. Being Masked is rare and supposed to be done with the entire family’s permission.” She took a slow breath, like she was trying to keep calm. “It’s more than a few alterations. Typically we use it for a body double, but in your case, my dear mother and brother always intended on you taking over my daughter’s life, no matter how innocent Daxton pretends to be.”

      The pair of them exchanged venomous looks, and my mouth went dry. Taking over Lila’s life? “You mean I’m—you expect me to be—”

      “It means that your VII has a few strings attached,” said Daxton. “You can fight it and suffer the consequences, or you can accept it and all of the perks that come along with being one of us. It is, of course, your choice, but I’ve honestly no idea what in your past life is worth holding on to. You’d be a fool to refuse us.”

      A dead fool at that. I was nothing but collateral damage to Daxton. The only thing keeping me alive was my face. But Daxton was wrong; Benjy was the one thing in my life worth holding on to.

      Daxton smoothed the front of his unwrinkled shirt. “It won’t be so bad,” he added, his voice a mockery of comfort. “You’ll be waited on hand and foot, and you’ll never want for anything again in your life. You, my dear, will be the most powerful girl in the country. You’ll be one of us, and what more could you ask for?”

      I closed my eyes as my mind raced. If I refused, I was dead. But if I said yes—then what? I would be Lila Hart. For the rest of my life, I would have someone else’s face, answer to someone else’s name, live someone else’s life.

      But at least I would be alive. I breathed in slowly, forcing myself not to panic. I was still me, wasn’t I? I still felt like me. I still thought like me. They couldn’t take that away no matter what they did to my body. I might have looked like Lila Hart, but I was still Kitty Doe.

      Then why did it feel like Kitty Doe was lying alongside Tabs in a ditch somewhere?

      “Besides,” added Daxton, “it won’t last forever.”

      I opened my eyes, the only part of me that was still me. “What d’you mean, it won’t last forever?”

      “It would be silly of us to expect you to give up your whole life, now, wouldn’t it?”

      That was exactly what they wanted me to do, though. “Can you—undo it?” I said.

      “We can’t give you your old face, but if you pretend to be Lila for as long as we need you to be, we can give you a new one,” he said. “Do what we ask, and you can even keep your VII once it’s over.”

      I glanced at Celia for reassurance, and she refused to look at me.

      So Daxton was lying. I would be Lila for the rest of my life, and the only choice I had would be how long it lasted. I could call him on it, or I could pretend to be the fool he thought I was and play along. Only one option meant staying alive and in his good graces.

      “And you won’t kill me?” I said.

      “Do what we want, and there will be no need for anyone to die,” he said. “I promise.”

      It was the voice he used when he promised a better life for IIs and IIIs. When he promised new opportunities and chances for those who were stuck serving and cleaning up after the rich and powerful. It was the same voice he used every time he swore that if we worked hard and did our best, we would get the rank—the life we deserved.

      Even if I did this, they would kill me eventually, but I would have a few more months or years to figure out how to escape. I couldn’t change what they’d done to me, but I could use Lila’s privilege to find a way out of it. And a way back to Benjy.

      “Are you—are you all right with this?” I said to Celia.

      “Seems I have about as much choice as you do,” she said frostily. “But if you’re asking if I will help, yes. Enough people have died for my dear brother’s ambitions. No need to add to the body count.”

      Daxton set his hand over the place where his heart would have been if he’d had one. “I’m wounded, Celia, truly. If you have a problem with it, talk to Mother, not me. I’m merely following her instructions.”

      “Of course you are,” said Celia. She set the camera down on my bedside table and reached toward me. For a moment I thought she was going to touch my face—Lila’s face—but her hand stopped short, and she pulled away. “Once the medication has run its course, I will help you learn all you need to know. Knox must be told, as well,” she added, directing that at Daxton. “And your son, if you haven’t told him yet.”

      “I won’t be telling Greyson,” said Daxton shortly. “And neither will you.”

      “Of course not,” said Celia. “Wouldn’t want him knowing you killed his cousin so soon after the deaths of his mother and brother, would we?”

      A wave of dizziness hit me. I’d have to deal with Greyson, Daxton’s eighteen-year-old son, along with every other member of the Hart family. I’d grown up seeing their faces on television and hearing their voices on the news, and now I wouldn’t just be meeting them. I’d be one of them.

      Originally Jameson, Greyson’s older brother, had been set to inherit the country. But now, once Daxton died, Greyson’s name would replace his father’s as the only one on the ballot every four years. I didn’t know why Daxton didn’t want to tell him about me, and I didn’t care, but I couldn’t remember a Knox in the news articles Benjy read to me every morning.

      “Who’s Knox?”

      “Lennox Creed,” said Celia. “He prefers Knox.”

      The beeping next to my bed accelerated. Lennox Creed was famous not for his father, who was one of the Ministers of the Union, but for his antics inside the exclusive nightclubs and parties that no V could ever dream of getting into, let alone a III.

      And he was Lila’s fiancé.

      “Do I still have to—”

      “Yes,” said Daxton, cutting me off. “Like it or not, darling, from here on out, you’re Lila until I tell you otherwise. Hold up your end of the bargain, and I’ll hold up mine. Sound fair?”

      When the end resulted in my death no matter what I said—no, it didn’t. “Doesn’t seem like I have much of a choice,” I said, echoing Celia’s words. When Daxton continued to watch me expectantly, I swallowed. “Sounds fair.”

      Celia sniffed and stared down her nose at me. “If you’re going to do this, you might as well do it right. Is the tattoo there?”

      “The