“You know, before I ended up in the hospital, I finally went to the police station to look at the case file from my mom’s accident,” I say.

“Really?” Jasper asks. “I thought they kept saying no.”

“They changed their mind. I wish they hadn’t. It wasn’t at all what I thought it was going to be.”

“What do you mean?” Jasper asks.

“There was—they found a vodka bottle. Like my mom had been drinking in the car before the accident,” I begin. And suddenly I am flooded with the horrible sense that I am missing the point. Like I felt on that bridge with those officers inching closer as I looked for Jasper. “And, I guess, I—”

My voice cuts out. I am grateful that Jasper doesn’t say any of the annoying, empty things he might. Instead, he leans his body closer to mine and wraps an arm around my shoulders. And before I know it, I am curling myself against him.

“It makes me feel like I never knew her.”

“You can be wrong about some things,” he says, holding me tighter, “without being wrong about everything.”

And for a second I almost believe him. Or I want to. And that is something.

There’s a sharp whistle then from the far end of the alley. When we look, Leo waves us down, then disappears around the corner.

I AM WALKING fast by the time we get to the edge of the building, not quite a jog but close. When I finally turn the corner, the alley is almost pitch-black and narrower than I expect, filled with trash cans and Dumpsters. I see Leo, someone else, too. But they are tucked back in the shadows. Kelsey’s sister, I am hoping.

“Explain where you got the book,” Leo says. “The whole story, now. Or we’re gone.”

Finally, the person he’s with steps forward from the wall and into the pale light. Even in the mostly dark, I recognize her right away: Riel. Level99, Riel. My heart drops. What the hell.

“What are you doing here?” I ask, feeling betrayed yet again.

“I ask the questions,” Riel snaps back. “You’re the one who has my book.”

“Your book?”

“Yeah, my book. Where the hell did you get it?”

“From Kelsey,” I say, though already I have a very bad feeling that I am wrong. About so much. And then, far too slow, finally it comes to me. “Riel is short for Gabrielle?”

“Very good,” Riel says flatly, then punctuates it with a slow clap. “Leo already told you that Kelsey is dead. So where did you get the book? Tell the truth, too, or I will ruin you in ways you cannot even imagine.”