“We were friends?” And I know I’ve just screwed up my face like I ate something disgusting.

He leans in through the back door, his eyes dangerous. “Oh yes. Because I got involved in your life, remember?” he hisses. “Yeah, I was that hunter—intent on bringing the big haul back. And you had it. Enough to fill in a slew of blanks. To set me up for life when I turned it all in. And you had no idea how close you were to dying. The daughter of Amerie Szabo. You were the mother lode.”

Gone, the man who called me Bronco and tried to sell me nonalcoholic cider at the grocery. His expression is feral.

“Until the day I realized I couldn’t do this. I didn’t want you dead. More than that, I wanted to keep you alive. So the joke’s on me. The ambitious one who got too close instead of just getting it over with and taking whatever you had in that mind of yours. Now that’s gone and you don’t know who you are anymore. Well, neither do I! So here we are. The Historian will know soon—if he doesn’t by now—that you’re alive and I’m a traitor. So who knows. Maybe Rolan was shooting at me after all.”

“For all I know, I erased my memory to keep it from you.”

“I’m not the enemy here. Not anymore. Not for a long time.”

“How am I supposed to believe that?”

Luka straightens and practically shouts: “Because it’s true! You might not know me anymore, but I still know you, Audra!”

“I’m so sick of hearing people say that!”

“Yeah, but I’m the one not lying to you. Did it occur to you that if I wanted to kill you I would have done it before you erased your memory? You trusted me. You still do. Listen to your intuition,” he says, and for a moment it seems like he’s actually pleading with me.

I shrug. “Sorry. I got nothing. I wish there was some way to prove it.” And a part of me really does mean it.

He drops his head and walks away, hands on his hips. A minute later, he turns back. “I can prove it. I know things about you you don’t share with others.”

I wait expectantly.

“You hate math and don’t know how to cook.”

I roll my eyes. “You just described three-fourths of the population.”

“The first guy you had a crush on was some kid in seventh grade.”

“Every girl has a crush on some kid in seventh grade.”