Alec turned a purplish shade that didn’t look healthy. Even his scalp was red beneath his fair hair. Colin went so pale that his freckles stood out like copper coins on his face. Neither of them spoke. “There was no raid, was there?” I said, breaking Alec’s hold on me and backing away. The realization made me ill. “The police weren’t searching the neighborhood. All that gathering evidence and escaping was merely a bit of theater to make the new recruits—what did you call us, ‘sparks’?—feel like we shared your danger, to convince us of how horribly persecuted your movement was so we’d sympathize and be useful to you.”

Alec regained his composure enough to ask, “Do you disagree with the cause, Verity?”

“No, I don’t, because it’s a good and just one. There was no need to trick me.” That fateful day in the park flashed before my mind’s eye, and I saw the roadster rush past after Alec swept me off my feet. The driver’s hat had been pulled low, but I remembered red hair. “That was you that day in the park, wasn’t it?” I asked Colin. “That reckless ‘magister’ who nearly ran me down so that you”—I whirled on Alec, my finger pointed in accusation—“could rush to my rescue. What did you do, steal the roadster from some unsuspecting magpie?”

“Borrowed,” Colin insisted. “He was having lunch and never knew it was gone.” He went a little misty-eyed. “Drove like a dream, too.”

“You were a potentially valuable resource. We had to secure you,” Alec said stiffly, ignoring Colin. “We weren’t likely to find another person placed that high in the magpie world who might sympathize with us. After Nat told us where you were employed, we had to get you on our side, right away.”

“So all of it was a lie?” My eyes stung, but I refused to cry.

“Not all. It may have started that way, but it came to be true.” Alec looked genuinely distressed as he reached out to me.

I wasn’t ready to forgive him. He’d kissed me. I’d kissed him. I’d thought it meant something, but I’d been such a fool. “What part was true, and what wasn’t?”

Alec opened and closed his mouth, but no words came out. “We liked you from the start,” Colin said. “What I said on the bus that day was true, that you’re the kind of person we’re doing all this for. Even if you hadn’t wanted to get involved with us, Lizzie would have been your friend. She thinks you’ve got a good heart.”

That was nice to hear, but it wasn’t what I’d asked. I repeated to Alec, “What part was true? How many girls have you wooed into your cause?”

“You’re the only one,” he said, so softly I could barely hear him.