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“Well, you bailed on your career to take the girl to some fancy party this weekend, so forgive me for being a little curious.” Gonzo lifted his dark sunglasses onto his head and leaned toward me. “Wait, is that a smile? I haven’t seen you smile in weeks, months maybe.”

I shrugged. “I’m still trying to make sense of it all. You and that bastard Fiero really got into my head, man. All that talk about me having feelings for Indy for years and never acknowledging it. You were right.”

Then I started spilling my guts. Told him about the almost kiss, how over the years I’d never stopped thinking about her, and how being with her was like having found a lost appendage.

“Word of advice, man. I know what you mean about the lost appendage and all, but don’t say that to her. That shit will not fly. No girl wants to be her man’s appendage.” He slapped me on the back. “This is good news then. Your fake engagement might become the real thing.”

“Not so fast. First, I have to get through the next week.”

October 21. It was looming on the calendar. My anxiety was ratcheting up, because I knew the risk of having her near me right now. But my plan was not to let her out of my sight that day. I was prepared to throw myself bodily in front of anything that came her way.

Gonzo didn’t know anything about my curse though, so he had no idea what I was talking about. “Yeah, this next week is gonna be real important for you. I don’t think Anderson’s going to give you another chance.”

My phone buzzed and I pulled it out thinking it was a message from Indy wishing me good luck, but it was from Callie. She’d been busy with her new restaurant, and we hadn’t spoken since I chewed her out about not telling me she’d run into Indy. I opened the message to find one word—Eureka!—and an image of her and Nikos holding a broken bowl. I squinted at it, enlarging the photo, and saw it looked almost exactly like Indy’s “fake” cup. What the?

I excused myself and stepped outside to call Callie. She picked up immediately. “Hey, you. Is Diana out of her mind excited?”

“About what? Why did you send me that photo?”

“We discovered it this morning!” she explained. “Actually, the dog found it. He’d been digging a hole for the past few days, obsessively in this one spot. It’s identical to Nikos’s cup. Same inscription and everything.”

“So it’s another fake?”

“Fake? No, it’s probably from the same time period as the cup. They’ve been digging in the wrong place. Nikos called Reginald Harris first thing this morning, and he’s on his way here. Is Diana coming with him?”

“I haven’t seen her this morning.” I was so confused. Hadn’t Diana said that Harris had thought her discovery was a hoax? Why would he be digging in Lyra?

“Callie, I’m not sure that Diana is aware of any dig in Lyra. As far as she knew they weren’t going to investigate any further.”

“What do you mean? This has been in the works for a couple months. Nikos was surprised they’d taken Diana off the project, but Reginald Harris had assured him that she was working on something else. This is the first thing we’ve found.”

“When does Harris get there?”

“Later this afternoon, with a film crew.”

My mind was spinning. I had to talk to Indy and fast. Goddamn that man. “Cal, don’t let Harris go anywhere near that bowl!”

I hung up the phone and immediately called Indy but got her voicemail. “Fuck!”

I checked my watch. I might be able to make it to her place and back in time for my meeting with Anderson. “Gonzo, I gotta run. I’ll be back!”

“What the hell, man?” Gonzo shouted after me as I ran to the car.

Forty-five minutes later Francine screeched to a halt in front of Indy’s apartment. I barely even turned off the ignition before racing to the front door and buzzing. Indy opened the door, dressed in sweats and her hair wrapped in a towel, zit cream on her chin. “What are you doing here? Did you already talk to your CO?”

The worry in her eyes made it impossible to tell her the truth—that I’d blown Anderson off again for her. “It went fine. Listen, I got a message from Callie this morning. Look!”

I held my phone out for her. She stared at it confused, but then she saw it. “I don’t understand . . .”

“Callie said Harris has an excavation site set up on the island. Apparently this was an ongoing project,” I explained as she sank down onto the sofa, still staring at the photo.

“A dig? No, it must be for Incredible Hoaxes.” She looked at me with desperation in her eyes like she didn’t want to believe the alternative explanation.

“That’s not the impression I got from Callie. She and Nikos were excited that they’d found something.”

Indy pinched her fingers over the screen and held it closer to her face. She seemed to have gone far away, in a daze staring at the wall. “Talk to me, Indy. What should we do?”

Speechless, she continued to stare unblinking at the wall while I called Callie and put her on speaker.