It’s Verona Comics, the shop and publishing line that Vera owns. It’s not unusual for artists—especially ones as big as Vera—to have a table in Artist Alley with everybody else and another one for their shop or publisher itself. This one appears to be carrying their old comics and toys and promoting their line.

Peak hands some change back to the woman running it, who looks so familiar. It takes me a minute to place her, and I wouldn’t if I wasn’t obsessed with Vera, but the woman Peak’s talking to is Lillian Jones. The same Lillian Jones who supplied Vera Flores with her new and improved hyphenated last name a few years ago. She gives Peak a kiss on the cheek and Peak smiles, dropping into a chair in the corner. When I glance from Lillian to Peak, I realize that they definitely have the exact same eyes and nose.

No. I cannot be texting Vera’s stepdaughter. I cannot be flirting with her. There has to be some other explanation. Maybe she’s just an intern after all. An intern that Lillian . . . kisses on the cheek?

“You looking for something in particular?” I jump at the voice. It’s Peak’s friend with the awesome Shuri cosplay. She’s in leggings and a T-shirt now, though, and looks to be around my age. Does everyone work here?

I shake my head and mumble, “Just looking,” and she goes off to help the next customer. I pretend to be checking out a rack of comics but pull out my phone and google Vera instead. There are tons of pictures of her and Lillian, but I have to scroll forever to find one of their whole family. Maybe Peak’s an outcast like me, which shouldn’t make me feel reassured, but it does.

But then I find it, an old wedding picture that Vera posted on the Verona blog a few years ago. And there’s Peak, smiling, walking them both down the aisle. The logical explanation is that Peak is . . . Vera’s stepdaughter. Shit.

And I happen to know that Vera’s shop isn’t all that far from my dad’s house. Which means Peak might not be that far from my dad’s house. Which means . . . absolutely nothing. Because I’m flying back to the other side of the country tonight.

fuckfuckfuckfuckfuck

I’m still squinting at the wedding picture so hard, it’s blurry from my eyelashes, when a text message scrolls down across my screen.

I don’t recognize the number, but the response is unmistakable: Hey! How goes it in the Batcave?