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his apartment building. Violet scooped up the overflowing grocery bags and re-set her shoulders, determined to exchange enough mono-syllabic pleasantries with Noah to make sure he was getting by and then retreat to his kitchen. But then he opened the door, and all bets were definitely off.
    “Oh my God, you look awful.” The words sprang out of her mouth without permission, and Violet clapped a hand over her lips in a textbook illustration of too little, too late . But the half-moon shadows cutting deep under Noah’s eyes, coupled with the pale cast of his skin and seriously bed-rumpled dark hair all but screamed of someone in pain.
    “Thanks. You look great,” he said, and she winced at her rudeness.
    “I’m sorry. But…” Violet clamped her teeth over her bottom lip, willing herself to shut up. She might not be crazy about the guy, but he kind of had good reason to look rough.
    “Don’t worry about it.” Noah waved her off with his free hand, stepping back to usher her inside the tiny foyer. “It was a hard night, that’s all.”
    Something odd gave up a hard twist in her chest, and all she could manage in response was a very lame, “Oh.”
    Noah started to move down the hallway without further elaboration, but this time, instead of taking his cue and simply parting ways with him at the turnoff to the kitchen, Violet stopped to peek into the living room. As she’d come to expect, a cinematic fistfight was in full swing on the flat screen TV mounted on the wall. But the newspapers and scrawled notes covering every available surface on the coffee table, as well as a good chunk of the couch, had her pulling up in surprise.
    “Wow, you’ve been reading a lot.” She clunked the grocery bags to the floorboards, stopping to give the room a healthier scan, and Noah’s face pinched into a frown.
    “I’m catching up on current events.” He angled his body toward the kitchen, but something about his expression made her balk.
    “Are you reading about the other day? When you were…” Violet trailed off, the taste of the terrifying unspoken words metallic and sharp in her mouth.
    “There’s nothing to read. No suspects, no details. None that are being printed, anyway.” His voice was even, almost methodical, but the scenario told her things his expression wouldn’t, and even though his eyes flicked to the kitchen in an obvious gesture, she didn’t budge.
    “Have you remembered anything else?”
    Noah’s gaze went from cold to glacial, and he straightened against the navy blue sling hugging his arm tight to his frame. “No.”
    Violet’s fingers twitched with intention, even though the thought running rampant in her head was borderline crazy. She should just reclaim the grocery bags from their spot on the floor, head into the kitchen, and do her job. Pushing Noah like this was a bad idea for several reasons, not the least of which was that whatever he did end up remembering was likely to scare the hell out of her since Jason had been at the scene when someone put a bullet in Noah’s arm. But the look on his face was so devoid of feeling, so devoid of anything, that it occurred to Violet all at once that it must be manufactured.
    And this was her chance to let the food take care of him. Even if it was just for an hour.
    “Since you’re all caught up on the news, why don’t you come help me in the kitchen?” Without waiting for an answer, she hefted the bags from the floor and headed into the kitchen, hoping he’d either be too shocked or too stubborn not to follow her.
    Three…four…five…
    “You want me to help you cook?”
    Violet pressed her smile firmly between her lips, ducking her chin to try and further hide the evidence while she plopped the grocery bags next to the sink. “Sure. Unless you have something more pressing to do.”
    He shot her a look akin to a nonverbal hardy har har , pressing his back against the counter by the doorway in what looked like a well-practiced lean. “In