He rakes his fingers nervously through his thick black hair. “Okay. If you’re in this, I’m in this—but at the first sign of trouble, we’re out. Swear?” He holds up his right pinky finger.

I hook mine through his. “Pinky swear.”

We kiss our thumbs and the deal is sealed.

Ethan marches over to the door. He gives it a knock and Imogen appears. She gives him one quick look before diverting her eyes to me. Oh that’s harsh.

She really does detest him.

Though the feeling looks pretty mutual.

“Oh thank God last night wasn’t a dream!” she blurts out in relief. “I was kinda afraid you wouldn’t come back. Not that I think I’m imagining things but my moms do say I have a pretty good imagination and some of my dreams recently have been super whack so—”

“You’re babbling,” Ethan interjects.

“Anyway,” she says tightly, “come in.”

I follow her inside. It’s clear that someone else shares the room with her—two other someones, by the looks of it—but just like last night, they’re not here.

She sees me staring at the two suitcases and says, “My brother and his boyfriend won’t be around much this weekend. They might come in to take a shower or something, but Bran’s a film nerd so he’ll be in movie showings all weekend or at panels, and my brother’s dedicated to him.”

“Ah.”

I glance around at her suitcase strewn across half of her bed. Again, just like last night. Clearly, she’s not a tidy person. But she seems to like space operas and fantasy shows, by the looks of the graphic T-shirt collection strewn on the ground. And she wears Converses.

I pick up the SPACE QUEEN beanie on the nightstand.

“It’s kinda weird, right?” she says. “How we got mistaken because of that beanie? It’s funny, I got that beanie from my—”

“Artists’ Alley,” I interrupt. “Ethan got mine there, too.”

“Oh.” As if Ethan even stepping into that area of the con seemed unbelievable to her. “Well, I was thinking we could just keep using it. Since it worked the first time?”

“Someone’s bound to catch on,” I reply dismissively, “which is why we brought a wig.” And as if on cue, my assistant produces a plastic bag out of his satchel. “It’s brown, almost the same color as my natural hair, a good enough dupe if you don’t look too closely. I had my housekeeper overnight it from LA.”

Imogen blinks at the wig Ethan’s holding. “You just have a wig lying about? That’s convenient.”

“I bought it to disguise the awful Amara-red I had to dye my hair,” I reply.

“And what about you?” Imogen says. “Will you cut your hair to look like me or something?”

“I’ll wear the beanie,” I say.

“Can you imitate my voice?”