By some miracle of luck—something I don’t usually have in great supply—I make it out of the office without notice. The moment I step foot in the hall I’m ready to break into a sprint—yes, an actual sprint. But before I can take a single step I collide into another person.

“I’m so sorry,” a girl’s voice says. “I did not watch where I was going well enough.”

Finding myself face-to-face with the serving girl I had just been impersonating is a little bit of a surreal moment. Of course, face-to-face doesn’t quite apply because she doesn’t lift her eyes to look at me.

“No worries,” I insist.

I step aside so she can continue on her path. The moment the tail of her flowy white robe disappears through the door, I’m in a full-out race for the front door.

My luck holds, and I make it back through the back chambers, to the entrance hall, and out the front gates without being seen. The moment I’m clear of the protection, I autoport myself the heck out of there.

Step one: success!

“I got it,” I shout the moment I reappear in my room. “Troy, I—”

“Got what?” Phoebe asks.

Mother of Zeus. I knew I hadn’t sold the nothing-is-going-on act in the library. She knows me too well. And she knows Troy is a pushover.

I scowl at Troy, who shrugs and gives me an I-couldn’t-stop-her look, and then turn to face Phoebe. She isn’t cowed by my scowl.

“Want to tell me what’s going on?” she asks.

“Not really,” I say.

“Too bad.” She crosses to my desk, pulls out the chair, and drops into the seat. “Tell me anyway.”

5

“Nothing’s going on,” I insist.

“Right,” Phoebe says with a laugh. “You’re always hanging out in the library and autoporting into your room like the hounds of Hades are at your heels.”

Crap.

She doesn’t miss anything.

The only way to get out of this is to dig in deeper on the library cover story.

I flick a warning glance at Troy. Even he can’t miss the subtle go-along-with-this-or-suffer-dire-consequences look. He shrugs and backs up a step. Smart boy.

Taking a deep breath, I walk up to him, reach down, and take his hand.

“We’ve been trying to keep it a secret,” I explain.

I look up at Troy, trying to bat my lashes like a lovesick schoolgirl. His face turns bright red and his eyes grow so wide I can see white all the way around. Way to sell it.

If he throws up on me a cursed tongue will be the least of his worries.