“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?”