Alex squeezed me tight. “Thank you,” she whispered against my chest, and then bounced back, putting distance between us. “I still want to throat punch you from time to time.”

I laughed hoarsely. “Yeah. Trust me. I still want to throat punch myself too. And Aiden. I’ve always wanted to throat punch him.”

She chuckled softly as she turned back to the furies. “How’s Josie?”

My attention sharpened at the change of subject. “Why do you think I would know how she is? And by the way, why were you in her room yesterday?”

Alex’s lips curled up. “Well, to answer your second question first, she and I are kind of related, so it made sense to go meet her. To answer your first question, your second question kind of gives that away.”

I narrowed my eyes.

She sighed. “And I talked to Luke a little bit ago. He said you two were together, but . . .”

I said nothing at first. It wasn’t like I was ashamed of my relationship with Josie or that it was weird to talk to Alex about Josie after my past with Alex. I mean, yeah, it was awkward, but we’d been inside each other’s heads more than once, so whatever. But Josie was . . . she was precious to me and that made me wary of what I said and who I said it to.

But this was Alex.

Rubbing at my chest again with my palm, I sighed. “Josie is good. She’s asleep right now.”

“Huh.” There was a pause. “In her bed or . . . ?”

I rolled my eyes. “Mine. Alex. Mine.”

“Huuuh,” she stressed that word this time. “So, I’m guessing you two are . . . ?”

“Together? Yes. We’re together. Look, I’m heading somewhere. I’ll be out on the wall, probably in the late morning or early afternoon.” Done with this conversation, I started toward the door, but she stopped me by calling out my name. “Yeah?”

Alex lifted her chin. “You okay, Seth?” she asked after a moment. “And I mean, are you really okay?”

Those statues of the furies stood between us, a symbol of how not okay things could get, because I knew Alex didn’t think their presence had anything to do with what was going on between the breeds. And maybe they didn’t. Maybe what I had done, what seemed to breathe inside me, with me, had brought them here. And maybe I was about to lie.

Either way, I nodded. “Now . . . I’m okay.”

Josie

Walking the first row of skyscraper-sized shelves, I trailed my fingers along the dusty spines. I really didn’t expect today’s library stalking to be different from any other day, but Seth was meeting with Marcus and Solos about the attack, and I needed to get out and move around since I really didn’t want to bum-rush whatever meeting Marcus was hosting.