Am I?
I continue to watch the speech but can’t believe this is real. I haven’t known I’m the dictator long enough for it to settle in.
A man moves in view of the cameras to stand beside the older me. He slips an arm around the waist of the older me without thought or worry.
My heart stops for a second. His blood is still on my clothes, but he is alive and well and much older.
Dmitri’s still alive.
And he’s my husband. Well, the husband of my future self.
But…the note Vera gave me?
“We opened some kind of loop in time. Vera said that time travel could get complicated like this. Your dictator self must have already changed the past we came from. She must have saved Orion. Meaning if we go back, we’re
Alexa Mackintosh
the only ones that will remember the past. She’s changed what we know and started a new future.”
“I’m more worried about who the new rebel leader might be. From what little I know, there never was a new leader. They had the same leader for years. When Angel- ica wakes, we can ask her. She will know more about that part of the revolution. Also, shouldn’t we forget what hap- pened if things change and never happened? I killed Orion, but he’s alive. The older me stopped his death. How can I remember killing him if it never happened?”
Ivan shrugs. “Time travel is a complicated thing, and no one understands it fully.”
“This future will be different from what we know too. I’m sure my future self already changed things that we know about in this time too.”
“Our job would be a lot easier if you were foolish. Your future self wouldn’t be as conniving or smart enough to use time travel,” Ivan says.
I glare at him, not in the mood for a joke. I think it is the first joke I’ve ever heard him say.
We have a dictator to topple, and I have to finish my business with Dmitri again. Dmitri will pay dearly for what he did, and my revenge will be bittersweet. I will find a way to defeat myself and never become the enemy no matter what must be done. Our planet’s future rests in my hands, and with it, the future of Earth.
City of Deception
If I can’t find a way to convince people on our planet that those on Earth aren’t all like the Mersiovskys, Earth will fall with us.
“We need to find this new rebel leader. They should help us. We need to get Angelica somewhere safe until she wakes. Can you carry her?” I ask.
He picks her up. “I can carry her for a while. She’s not extremely heavy.”
I’m sure Angelica would love hearing his compliment: ‘she’s not extremely heavy.’
I want to know who this mysterious leader is to see what kind of new future we have unleashed.
Our future depends on my choices, and I will be the one to choose. No one will create my future for me again.
THE END OF BOOK 1
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Coming Fall 2017 and Summer 2018:
Several Novellas related to the White City Series will release Fall 2017, the first of which will focus on Ve- ronica and Ivan, long before Natalia came to the pal- ace.
Reign of Deception, the sequel to City of Deception is currently slated to release late Summer 2018, but the date may be subject to change.
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Acknowledgements:
I want to thank God for giving me the gift of writing.
Without my faith, my life would be nothing.
I also want to thank all of you: my wonderful readers. Without you, I wouldn’t be able to write. Knowing some- one enjoys my stories makes them worth writing. Even if I only change the life of one reader, I’m doing my job cor- rectly and making a difference. I’m not the best writer, not by a long shot, but I get better with each book (I hope!) and thank you for sticking with me.
To the many friends who loaned me their homes for weekend writing retreats: thank you, thank you, thank you! You gave me a chance to find a quiet place to type this novel.
To the reviewers, bloggers, West Coast Design, edi- tors, and many others who helped bring this book to- gether: without your invaluable help and knowledge, I wouldn’t have been able to do this. Since my second book, I read many blog posts about publishing and writing, and the information I found in them aided me in making this novel the best self-published novel I could make on my small budget. So, thank you for sharing your experience with me. I’ve much left to learn, but with each book I’m improving because of you.
Alexa Mackintosh
I also want to thank my family for tolerating my writ- ing habits. I know I ask strange questions about revolu- tions, mythical creatures, and unicorns, and I’m sorry. More than once I’ve called you in the middle of a work day to ask, “What name should X prince have?” or “Should my main character do XYZ?”
Thank you, lovely people, for dealing with my quirky, anxious, coffee-driven personality and enjoying the crazy worlds I design. I hope my stories make you smile, cry, laugh, and journey to worlds you can escape in and leave reality behind. This book isn’t perfect, I know you’ll find at least one mistake, but it’s the best I can make it at this point in my life.
About the Author
Alexa Mackintosh is a book dragon at heart. She is the author of Black Forest, self-published at age fifteen, fol- lowed by its sequel Hollow Dreams. City of Deception is her third novel, self-published at nineteen.
When she’s not starstruck over a fictitious guy she found in the pages of her favorite novels, she is destroying worlds or trying to live in reality. She also owns 1/56th of a star. She currently lives in the Shenandoah Valley, Vir- ginia.
To learn more about Alexa, visit www.alexamackintosh.com or follow her on social media.
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