He sighed and shook his head. “I’ll take you.”

“So you can spy on me, make sure I’m taking proper care of Lily?” I demanded. “No thanks.”

“I’m trying to make sure we all stay safe, okay?”

“Fine,” I said immediately. “Then you’ll take me to Malachi’s with you, if it’s about keeping allof us safe.” He’d walked right into that one. Not that I wanted to go—can you say giant waste of time?—but, by God, I was going to hold him to those stupid standards he thought were so fair. He couldn’t argue, after today, that hewould be safer without me.

He grimaced but said nothing.

That’s what I thought.“Good. Pick me up here tomorrow at noon, and we’re going to Misty’s first.” I levered myself out of the car, using the door as support.

“What are you going to tell the Turners?” He was, unfortunately, correct to ask. Mrs. Turner was the very definition of overprotective. I’d had to wait until she took Tyler out shopping this afternoon to be able to sneak out and meet Will.

“That I’ve made some new friends with motorcycles and we’re going to have an orgy in the park,” I said. It wasn’t any of his business how I managed “my” family.

He threw me a dark look.

“Don’t worry about it. I’ll handle it. Unlike somepeople, I actually have a spine when it comes to dealing with parents.”

He glared at me, spots of red rising in his cheeks. And okay, maybe implying he was a mama’s boy was a bit of a low blow, but it was true. I limped out of the way and started to shut the door.

“Hey,” he called.

I leaned down to see him, expecting retaliation for my slam on how he handled—or didn’t—his mom. “Yeah?” I asked warily.

“I know who you are, no matter what you look like,” he said quietly, surprising me.

Maybe.I nodded at him and slammed the door before the tears filling my eyes escaped. But I was beginning to think the real problem might be that who I was was just not good enough. Apparently, it had been one thing when I was the pretty face and the good body, but now, when there was nothing left of me but me, well, that was a different story. And there was no fix—easy or seemingly impossible—for that.

I watched to make sure Alona crossed the street safely, and then I pulled away from the cemetery and headed home, her words still rattling around in my head.

She was wrong. Yes, okay, it was a little weird to watch her as Lily. And yeah, sometimes it bothered me to see her do or say things that I knew were not like Lily.

But it wasn’t because I thought Alona wasn’t good enough to be Lily, temporary condition or not. It was just, for lack of a better word, jarring. Like hearing a cat bark.

I was doing the best that I could, too. The friend I thought I’d never talk to again was now inhabited by the spirit of the girl I’d never dreamed I’d ever talk to at all. It was complicated and confusing, to say the least.

And every time Alona tore Lily down, I felt it. I had an obligation to look out for Lily since she couldn’t look out for herself anymore. Yeah, Lily was in the light and probably could give a rat’s ass what anyone said about her. But you try remembering that when she’s sitting right next to you…or seems to be, anyway. It felt disloyal—like dishonoring her memory— notto defend her.

I wasn’t asking Alona to be happy about it or—God help me—to appreciate it, but just not to act like getting stuck inside Lily’s body was the worst thing that had ever happened to her, up to and including getting run over by a freaking bus.

Especially because I was beginning to get a little worried. It was going to be one thing to pull Alona out of there. But add to that the necessity of pulling her out without destroying her spirit and killing Lily…and things weren’t looking so good. Even the Order, with all their tech and research, hadn’t been able to work around that. They were just willing to let Lily die in order to capture Alona.

Then, even if we managed to find a way to work around all of that, there was the question of what to do with Lily. Her parents…they couldn’t go through losing their daughter again. Even though “Lily” had never woken from her coma, they didn’t know that. To them, she was back and on her way to recovery. It would destroy them to see her land in the hospital again. Even Alona knew that.

We hadn’t discussed it, but there was a distinct possibility Alona might be stuck for a while. Possibly a lot longer than either of us had hoped or imagined. Which she would hate with the fire of the sun, and which wouldn’t be so great for me, either, for a variety of reasons. My life was complicated enough as it was already.

Pulling up to my house, I saw Sam’s pickup in the driveway. Right next to my mom’s Corolla. My mom and her boyfriend/boss were here…alone. Uh-oh.

But they were old, and it was the middle of the afternoon. Surely they weren’t…

I grimaced and parked behind my mom’s car. I’d make a lot of noise on the approach so I wouldn’t catch them by surprise. I’m not an idiot; I knew what went on, but that didn’t mean I wanted to witness something that would be burned into my brain, forever flaring up at the least convenient moments.

But as soon as I reached the back door, I realized I didn’t have to worry. Through the window in the door, I could see my mom at the kitchen table, alone. Thank God. Except her shoulders were slumped and she seemed smaller than ever, hunched in her chair.

I opened the back door cautiously. “Mom?”

“Hi, sweetie,” she said, without turning around, but I could tell she’d been crying by the sound of her voice.

“What’s wrong?” I came in and closed the door behind me. “Where’s Sam?”

“Oh.” She waved a hand. “He’s in the basement, checking the air conditioner.” She frowned at me with red-rimmed eyes as I took the seat across from her. “The hallway back by your bedroom is freezing again.”

Great. Only one thing that could mean. But I couldn’t deal with that yet. “What happened?”

She smiled and picked up her mug of tea. “It’s nothing. I’m fine.”

“Mom, you’re not fine. Crying alone in the kitchen is not—”

“Shhhh.” She frowned. “Not so loud.”

Okaaay. So Sam didn’t know she was crying, which meant…what? “Can you please just tell me what happened?”

She smiled again, and this time I clearly saw sadness there as well. “Sam…” she began slowly.

“Did he break up with you?” Damn it, Sam. I liked him, thought he was good for my mom, who needed someone to make her laugh. “If this is because of what happened at the diner…” I’d had to quit the diner a couple of weeks ago, after a ghost just would not get the message that I was off duty as a ghost-talker when I was working as a busboy. Said ghost had decided to express his displeasure by sweeping a table clear of dishes…while the people were still eating, unfortunately.

Sam had been pretty cool about it, and no one had blamed me. The customers had been stunned at first and then eventually blamed it on the table legs being uneven. Yes, most people will find a way to explain the inexplicable so as not to acknowledge the existence of the supernatural. But clearly I couldn’t continue to work there without risking exposure…or someone’s injury by flying dinnerware.

“Will you let me finish?” my mom asked in exasperation.

“Okay, okay.” I held up my hands in surrender.

“He wants me to move in with him,” she said carefully, her attention focused on the mug in her hands.

“Oh. Uh…” I’d not been expecting that, and, as with other moments in my life where my next words would be essential…my mind was blank. “Shouldn’t you, uh, at least be engaged first so that he…”

She looked up at me, amused. “So he’s not taking advantage?”