“We were. We’d just finished playing hide-and-seek in the house, and of course, she had won. She always won. My legs were too long to fit anywhere. She was gloating in that sweet way she had—nah, nah, nah, I’m the crown champion again—so I snatched her up to tickle her. Mom demanded we pose.”

He squeezed my shoulder. “I have one of my mom and me, taken a few weeks before she died. It’s more valuable to me than my heart and lungs.”

I liked when he shared something from his past. He didn’t do it often. I turned, met his gaze.

He hooked a strand of hair behind my ear. I could feel myself getting lost in the moment, in him, so when his phone beeped a few seconds later, I jumped. I also sighed with relief.

“Go ahead,” I said. “Check it.”

He hesitated a moment before scrolling through the message, his features darkening as he read. “Justin says the spy is someone who was at the park tonight. Information about the fight has already hit Anima.”

“So...that rules out Collins and Cruz. And Frosty and Bronx were too busy rescuing Kat and Reeve to hand out any details.”

“Not necessarily, but I know them better than I know myself, and they’d never help the enemy. I’ve never suspected them.”

Had he ever suspected me? “You can rule out Lucas and Trina, too. I watched the spy watch them, remember? So that leaves...Veronica.”

“You saw a male in the forest.”

“Yes, and she could be working with him.”

“Maybe.” His gaze locked with mine and searched. “There’s also Gavin.”

My hand fluttered to my throat, rubbed. Gavin... He had to be innocent. And yet he wanted to stay the night here, no matter how uncomfortable he’d be on the couch. Maybe not because he hated the motel, after all, but to keep tabs on me and my dark metamorphosis.

“Anyway, they weren’t the only ones there,” Cole reminded me.

“Me?” I squeaked.

He rolled his eyes. “I never suspected you. I mean Kat. Reeve.”

“Girl. Girl.”

“Like you said, a girl could be working with a boy.”

“Besides,” I continued, “there’s no way Kat would betray us, and Reeve doesn’t know anything.”

“Kat has no filter. She—”

“Isn’t responsible,” I insisted.

“What about Ethan?”

“Bronx has already looked into him. Found nothing suspicious.”

After a short pause, he nodded. “That leaves us with...yeah, Gavin and Veronica. But I’ve already checked, and they came out clean. As you know, that’s the reason I spent so much time with her. I was going through her stuff, checking everything she said. Nothing dubious came up. More than that, the problems started before the pair got here.”

“Maybe you didn’t dig deep enough. Maybe one or both were working for Anima before they got here and asked to be assigned to your team. Talk to Mr. Ankh and your dad. They’ll have ideas about what to—”

“No way. My reasons for staying quiet are still the same. I won’t blacken someone’s name without at least a little proof.”

“Yeah, but once the truth comes to light, whoever you’ve accused will be vindicated. Or not.”

He shook his head, saying, “The problem is, my closest friends will know I didn’t trust them. Maybe they’ll forgive me, maybe not, but from that moment on, no matter what I do, what I say, they’ll always wonder at my motives. That stuff doesn’t leave a person.”

Had he ever been accused of something he hadn’t done?

I must have asked the question aloud because he said, “When Justin started working with Anima, he hung around my team for information, just like the newest spy. I knew something was going on and stupidly blamed Boots and Ducky, members of the team you never got to meet.” As he spoke, he rubbed the tattoos of their names. “They were so mad at me, so hurt, they went hunting that night, I guess to prove their loyalty, and they found a nest of zombies. That’s the night they were killed. I can’t go through something like that again.”

“Cole—” I said, but he stopped me with another shake of his head.

“I’ll do more digging with Gavin and Veronica. And now let’s close this subject and revisit at another date. You said you had something to show me. Was it a kiss?” He backed me into the door, putting his body in front of me, and the hardwood in back of me, effectively caging me. And oh, good glory, had I just used the word hardwood? “Lately I haven’t been able to think about anything else.”

“Cole. No.”

“Just one more,” he said raggedly. “Then we’ll stop. Then maybe the madness will finally end and we’ll be able to be friends. I know you said we couldn’t be, but I don’t like the thought of being without you. I need you in my life, at least in some way.”

“Friends don’t kiss.” Besides, I’d already had my one more. Whimper. “Nana would hear us, we aren’t always quiet. She’ll come to the door, knock. I’ll be hugely embarrassed.”

“Okay.” He anchored his palms at my temples. “Okay.”

I had to stop breathing. He smelled too good, the scent of him invading my senses, making me dizzy with need and want and breaking through whatever new walls I’d managed to build against him. “You’re not acting like it’s okay.”

“When is the madness going to end?” he asked. “I must be obsessed with you, Ali. Addicted. Whatever I feel is definitely unhealthy. Without you, I’m having trouble eating and sleeping. I think about you all the time, wonder what you’re doing, and who you’re doing it with. Do you know how many times I’ve been tempted to hunt you down and just carry you away?”

“Cole—”

He wasn’t done. “You’re smart, fierce, brave. You have a habit of staring off into space, your mind lost to your memories. When you love, you love with your whole heart. And your compassion... When Holly Dumfries went on a date with Chad Stevens, Kerry Goldberg—Chad’s ex—dumped a bottle of water on Holly the next day at school. You helped Holly clean up, even switched shirts with her. Yeah. I checked into the shirt thing. Then, when everyone made fun of Aubrey Wilson for getting pregnant, you offered to throw her a baby shower.”

My eyes were so wide they had to look like saucers. I’d had no idea he’d known about Holly and Aubrey, and the fact that he did, that he’d kept tabs on me... My knees were threatening to buckle.

“What am I going to do with you?” he asked softly. He pressed his forehead into mine. “I’ve thought about sending Gavin back to Georgia, but then I feared something would happen to force you to follow him, and I wouldn’t be able to see you.”

“Cole—”

“You were right to call me a coward before. I’m afraid of the future, Ali. I can’t stand the thought of you with him, so how am I going to survive the reality of it?”

I wanted to wrap my arms around him, which is exactly why I pushed him away. “You don’t trust me when I say I’m not interested in him in a romantic way, and that I’m not ever going to be interested in him. You trust the visions more than you trust me and my feelings, and I deserve better.”

There was torment in his eyes as he muttered, “You’re right.”

And like that, something seemed to break inside him.

He fell onto the bed, put his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands. He stayed like that for a long while, simply breathing.

“Are you okay?” I asked softly.

“Not yet, but I will be.” He looked up, and I saw determination swimming in his eyes.

Determination to what?

It kind of...scared me.

I turned my back on him. Trembling, I said, “By the way, some of your friends aren’t happy with you lately. You’ve been really mean, apparently.” There. A safer topic.

“You want me to be nicer to them?” he asked almost carefully.

“Yes.”

He pushed out a breath. “Then I’ll be nicer.”

That easily? “Thank you.” I drew him toward the vanity. I sat down, keeping my gaze downcast. “Now, what I wanted to show you. Take a look at my reflection.”