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“Nothing,” he said. “I kinda thought she might be different.”

“Nope. A big liar, like the rest of them.”

“It’s just…”

Sadie crossed her arms. “Don’t tell me you want to defend her.”

“No,” Amit said. “I knew she was hiding something. It just seemed like she had a good reason.”

“Seriously?”

“It’s a government job, isn’t it? Some top-secret thing?”

Wooo, how to answer that? “Top-secret, yes.”

“Something she couldn’t tell you due to security or clearance?”

“Well, maybe safety, but that?—”

“I could be way off base.” Amit ripped at the plastic covering one of the stacks of cups. “She does give off a military vibe. Watchful and wary. Doesn’t trust a lot of people.”

She trusted me.

“She made an effort to talk to me,” he added. “I could tell she was trying to win me over.”

“You like her because she was nice to you?”

Amit hesitated, then gave her a look bordering on sad. “You seemed happy together. Like you got each other. I’ve never seen someone dig on you as much as you dug on them.”

Sadie sighed again, heart pulsing grief with every beat.

“Her friends were nice.”

“You talked about gaming for a solid half hour with them,” Sadie pointed out.

“Yeah, so I can confirm they were nice. And you hung out with them. Joan let you meet her?—”

“No,” she stated. “She lied to me. End of story.”

“Okay. You’re right. Lying is bad.”

His subtext hung thick in the air.Unless she had a good reason.

Sadie slumped against the counter and dug her chipped red nails into the other plastic sleeve of cups. Objectively, she understood why Joan hadn’t told her she was Spark. And even why she’d let Sadie keep thinking she was Catch. But it still hurt. Even if Joan had simply told her she wasn’t Catch, that would’ve been okay. It wasn’t like Sadie expected a Super to reveal their identity. But leading her on was just unfair.

Her intuition had been trying to tell her to question Joan. For once, that nagging voice had been spot on.

Joan tried to tell you.

A hot flush climbed up the back of her neck. Joanhadbeen trying to tell her something over the past few days. And Sadie being Sadie, she’d plowed right over her.

The plowing always got her in trouble.

Settling the stack of cups next to the espresso machine, she said, “So you really think Joan’s lie was justifiable?”

“I’m not saying that,” Amit said. “I’m just sorry it didn’t work out. You were cute together.”

“You never say anything is cute.”