He scowls and pivots to leave, and I realize that I don’t want him to go. Mostly because I’ve been alone all night, and I guess even his company is better than none. “How did you meet, then?”

“Who?”

“Jessica.”

He hesitates, but then he turns around and sits at the edge of the pool. “Honestly? She’s my godsister. Our mothers met way back in college.” As he says this, he rolls up his trousers to just below his knees, takes off his shoes, and sticks his feet into the water. “I’ve known her my entire life. We’ve done everything together.”

“Wait, so you’re like twenty-something? Really?”

He blanches. “Do I look that old? I’ll be eighteen in December. I just finished high school. I’m taking a gap year, and Jess needed an assistant, so here I am.”

“But you wore a suit today!” I reply, flabbergasted. “And you’re always on this high horse of ‘oh look at me I’m so superior to you.’”

“I do not sound like that.”

“Oh you so do. You called me a rapscallion.”

“I will never live that down,” he mumbles, more to himself than to me, and rubs his hand over his face.

“So.” I slowly migrate toward his side of the pool, doing the numbers in my head from what I know about Jess and now what I know about Ethan. “You two are like five years apart? Jess is twenty-three, isn’t she?”

“Actually…no.”

“Older?”

“She’s nineteen.”

“Nineteen,” I echo. “But the internet says she’s definitely older.”

“The internet’s wrong, surprisingly. She lied when she was fourteen to get the part in Huntress Rising. She told the director she was almost eighteen. After that she just never corrected anyone.” He shrugs. “She’ll do just about anything to make sure she succeeds. She needs to. It’s like there’s this dial in her head that’s constantly turned up to eleven. She’s intense. She’s always thinking one step ahead—or three.”

He talks about her in such a tender tone, like he really does admire her. He might say he doesn’t love her, but maybe he just doesn’t realize it yet.

“Sounds like she means a lot to you,” I say.

“She does—she’s like a sister to me.”

“Well, she’s doing better than me. I’m no one,” I reply. “I mean—Jess is smart, and she’s gorgeous, and she’s talented. She made a fantastic Amara. She’s amazing, and I…I guess I can do cool voices?”

Ethan studies me with those dark, dark eyes, and I feel myself shifting uncomfortably. “Imogen,” he starts—and the way he says my name, like it’s somewhere between a lullaby and an exasperated sigh, makes my stomach flip all the same. “Why did you want to trade places with Jess?”