Of course, he didn’t really have anything on Kanesha, and he rapidly gave up harassing her in favor of me. So, maybe it wasn’t anything to do with skin color.

“You know, it’s very strange, Ms. Rudi. You don’t seem to exist.”

He’d cornered me outside the school gate. “And? Even today people can slip through the cracks.”

“Not good white girls.”

I smiled slightly. “I never said I was good.”

That got something akin to a barked laugh. “No, you didn’t, did you. Still, no discernable past. A string of stuff following you. And no memory. Or so you claim.”

I knew that allegation would come sooner or later. “Agent Morrow, I haven’t told you anything but the truth.”

“Then how come your home and school burned on the same day?”

“I thought we’d decided that was gang activity.” I kept my tone even. He wasn’t going to get to me.

“Maybe you had. But there’s no evidence, and frankly? I don’t trust you. Or your…girlfriend.”

I half-smiled again. “You don’t have to. We haven’t done anything wrong and you’ll realize that eventually. Don’t you have, you know, drug dealers to chase or something?”

I knew I was getting bold, but I was also getting annoyed. Highly annoyed at Mr. Tomorrow. I kept wanting to call him that, now. Once I’d thought of the pun, it wouldn’t get out of my head.

Tom Oliver Morrow. That would work. And then it would be even crueler, because his initials and first name… But I knew his first name was Dave or David or Daniel or…David. Yeah, definitely David.

“I don’t like a mystery I can’t solve.”

“You might be in the wrong profession, then.” Cops couldn’t solve every case. Which was sometimes a good thing. I felt a sense of some presence, and Morrow glanced around too, as if feeling eyes on him.

“Other professions, Ms. Rudi, tend to have fewer mysteries to attempt.”

“Ah, so the ones you can solve make up for it?” I actually offered him a slight smile. That was a hint of humanity under the mask.

Maybe I could tease a little more of it out, but there was definitely that sense of presence. I hoped I hadn’t attracted a fairy to him.

Too late to hope that. I remembered that fairy, too. The one that had got into a prank war with me, but I was pretty sure it now had Morrow in its sights.

Well. I had no sympathy for him whatsoever. None.