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"It's the middle of the night," I managed.
"So you've said." Theo chuckled, low and deep. "How is it over there? Everything you gloated it would be?"
I sat up straight. "I did not gloat," I snapped.
The chuckle turned into a laugh. "There she is," Theo said. "I wondered when you'd show up."
I couldn't bring myself to laugh with him. There was too much at stake. "Theo, I don't—I mean, I can't—"
There was a long silence. When Theo spoke again, his tone was gentle, almost sad. "Listen," he said. "I'd be lying if I told you I didn't, you know, have fun that night."
"Theo," I said again, pleadingly.
"Okay, okay." Theo sighed. "Look. We don't have to talk about it ever again, okay? And no repeat performances. I promise."
I remembered the feeling of his palm on my skin, the scrape of his teeth over my throat. I clenched my jaw. "Good," I said tightly.
"Friends?" His tone was teasing, but I could hear a thin current of anxiety just below the surface.
I breathed out. "Friends.”
"Yeah." He cleared his throat. "Well. Okay. So. Is it, uh, sunny there?"
I glanced toward the window, at the thin lace-edged curtains lit with gold. "Yes.”
"Wear sunscreen. And your seat belt," he said, his voice deepening in a perfect mimic of my father's. "Don't drive so fast."
I smiled despite myself. "Theo. Of all the conversations to imitate my dad."
"Yeah, well," he said, and I suddenly realized that my eyes were closed, that I was picturing his smile, the deep dimple in his right cheek, the way he raked his hand through his hair when he laughed. I stood up abruptly, knocking the empty spurgo bag onto the floor and scattering sugar everywhere.
"I, um, have to go," I said. "Work. Dig."
"Shovel. Bucket," Theo added. "Yeah. I'm gonna hit the hay. I'll tell your dad you said hi."
"Thanks.”
"And unicorn?"
Something in his tone made my stomach pull tight, made my toes curl inside my boots. "Yeah?"
He huffed softly, a half-laugh that was almost too quiet to hear. "I miss you," he said, and then the line went dead.
It was a good thing there was only really one road through the town, because I was in a daze as I drove toward the dig site. Stupid Theo. Stupid Theo with his stupid dimples and his stupid…his stupid words.
I pulled the borrowed blue car into the gravel lot a little too fast and stalked toward the tent where Vanessa was hunched over her laptop.
"Get enough sleep last night?" Vanessa said as I approached, her eyebrows raised.
I frowned. "Yeah. Why?"
She pointed at my chest, and I looked down to see the tag of my shirt just below my chin. It was inside out and backwards.
I groaned. "I wasn't here that late." I pulled my arms inside the sleeves and wriggled the shirt into the correct orientation, at least. I was halfway into the chair next to her when I remembered.
The box. The book.
I straightened up again, knocking the chair over in my haste.
