It’s the cutest. Name. Ever.
My stomach lurches. Oh Lord, I’m going to be sick.
Stone continues, “There’s also another lambicorn outside. I saw it with the piggycorns.”
“Oh. That’s great.”
“Thanks.” His gaze flicks to the book. “So. Whatcha doing?”
I slam the book shut. “Just some research on amnesia.”
“Any luck so far?” he asks.
“Still working on it.”And no, this isn’t a spell book in case he asks.
“Okay,” he says sharply. His eyes darken like they usually do when he and I are in the same room. I knew this niceness wouldn’t last forever. It was too good to be true. “There’s just one thing.”
“What’s that?” I ask.
Stone’s eyes narrow to slitty wedges of death. “Exactlywhoare you?”
An even better question is, how much of the truth and how much of a lie do I tell him?
Chapter 13
Coco
“Sorry,” I say, dismissing him with a friendly wave. “In all the commotion, I forgot thatyouforgot.”
Stone swallows a bite of apple. “Yeah, nothing’s come back yet.”
He levels a steely gaze on me. Orisit steely? It feels steely. Like, soul-stripping, the kind of gaze that peels back layers and instantly spots the truth.
It makes me feel like he’ll say at any moment,You poisoned me and I lost my memory! You’re going to jail, where a woman named Bertha will make you her girlfriend and you’ll do anything for a cigarette.
Anything.
The first rule of lying is to keep the lie in the same hemisphere as the truth—not that I’m an expert. I don’t generally lie. However, this situation is an exception to the rule. To be clear,myrule aboutnotlying.
“You and I? We work together.”
“How?”
“On the project.”
“What project?”
“The resort.”
“Whatresort?”
I sigh. This is harder than it should be. “You are building a resort in Mystic Meadows.”
The lambicorn bleats and he puts it down. Stone takes a bite of the apple, leans against the doorframe, and watches me with a gaze that makes me want to disappear even more than I normally do. “Why am I doing that? Building a resort?”
Beside me, Cristina holds her breath. I’m not sure if it’s because she’s waiting to see whether, at any point, Stone will recover his memory, or I’m going to lie about every question he asks.
I clasp my hands tightly. “You’re building a resort because you see the potential to make a lot of money. Mystic Meadows, my town, recently had some cool things happen.”
