CHARACTER
Stay Awakeby Megan Goldin

Ted Cole

Ted Cole

Quick Facts

  • Role: Central murder victim; his death is the novel’s inciting incident
  • Age/Background: 39-year-old British executive, newly in New York to run the commercial side of Cultura Magazine
  • First Appearance: Introduced as “Edward Cole,” the unidentified victim at the start; revealed through flashbacks and others’ memories
  • Key Relationships: Ex-fiancé of Liv Reese; engaged to Elisabeth in New York; murdered by Brett Graham; investigated by Detective Darcy Halliday and Detective Jack Lavelle

Who He Is

Edward “Ted” Cole is the book’s moral center in absentia—a gentle, principled protector whose love and responsibility for Liv define him. Through others’ memories, he emerges as a man torn between a future he’s building and a past he feels honor-bound to confront. Ted is not only the catalyst for the plot; he embodies the story’s warning that the past does not stay buried. His warm physical presence—tawny hair, smiling eyes, an easy handsomeness—underscores how starkly his violent end fractures the world around him.

Ted’s attempt to shield Liv after her amnesia is both tender and tragic. He secures a safe house under a false name, arranges expert medical care, and methodically pursues the clue of the dotted fleur-de-lis—actions that show a protector’s resolve and an investigator’s curiosity. In doing so, he becomes the novel’s quiet martyr: the one who dies so truth can surface, illustrating the theme of The Past's Influence on the Present.

Personality & Traits

Ted’s defining tension is between heart and principle. He sets boundaries when love turns self-destructive, yet returns when responsibility calls. His steadiness, warmth, and initiative make him the kind of person who moves furniture, not just feelings—and that’s what gets him killed.

  • Protective and responsible: He rents a safe house under a fake name, stocks it with food, and secures a top neurologist. He even warns a bartender that people might “take advantage of her because of her memory issues” (Chapter 55), showing vigilance that extends beyond private care.
  • Caring and compassionate: He repeatedly re-explains Liv’s forgotten trauma, accepting her cyclical grief. “I still care about you. I worry about you, Liv” (Chapter 51) reveals that his actions stem from enduring attachment, not saviorism.
  • Pragmatic and principled: He ends their engagement when her obsession with the past makes a shared future impossible—“You never gave us a chance” (Chapter 51)—proving he values emotional health and truth over fairy-tale persistence.
  • Inquisitive and proactive: He chases hard clues—the dotted fleur-de-lis sketch—as if facts could free them both. That same initiative draws the attention of a killer and becomes his fatal flaw.
  • Warm and disarming presence: Descriptions of his “tawny hair and crinkled eyes” (Chapter 46) and “dimples denting his handsome cheeks” (Chapter 47) mirror the trust he inspires and the tenderness he offers.

Character Journey

Though Ted is dead when the story opens, our understanding of him arcs from a name on a case file to a fully realized man whose final days resound with love, regret, and resolve. First, he is “Edward Cole,” a statistic. Then accounts from Elisabeth, colleagues, and detectives reveal a conscientious executive starting over—and a former fiancé who couldn’t walk away from the woman he loved. He tries to outrun history by crossing an ocean, yet his conscience pulls him back into Liv’s unraveling. The more he protects and investigates, the more the past tightens around him, until his near-breakthrough on the dotted fleur-de-lis invites lethal retaliation. Ted’s journey is thus posthumous: his choices echo forward, propelling Liv toward truth and binding the novel’s moral arc to his sacrifice.

Key Relationships

  • Liv Reese: Ted’s great love and enduring responsibility. Even after their painful breakup, his care for her is logistical as well as emotional—he becomes the person who remembers for the woman who cannot. Their bond is defined by repetition and resilience: every time her memory resets, Ted chooses her again, until his final choice costs him his life.

  • Elisabeth: In New York, Elisabeth represents Ted’s attempt at a clean slate. Yet his secrecy about helping Liv creates a fracture: he is faithful to his principles but not fully transparent about his past. The engagement highlights his split loyalties—between a future he’s promised and a past he feels obliged to mend.

  • Brett Graham: Ted never seeks Brett; he finds a pattern that threatens him. Their “relationship” is an asymmetrical hunt: Ted pursues truth, Brett pursues silence. By framing Liv for Ted’s murder, Brett weaponizes Ted’s compassion against the person he most wanted to protect.

  • Detective Darcy Halliday: Through Darcy’s investigation, Ted evolves from a victim profile into a person with motives and virtues. Her reconstruction of his choices foregrounds his integrity, forcing the case to look beyond the easiest suspect and toward the deeper pattern Ted died trying to expose.

  • Detective Jack Lavelle: For Lavelle, Ted’s death is a puzzle that resists simple answers. The more he traces Ted’s care for Liv and the fleur-de-lis lead, the more the case shifts from “who stabbed a man” to “who feared what he knew,” aligning the investigation with Ted’s final line of inquiry.

Defining Moments

Ted’s story is a series of steady choices that culminate in a single, catastrophic night. Each moment deepens his character while tightening the thriller’s noose.

  • Moving Liv to the safe house (Chapter 47): He arrives at Liv’s squalid basement, calmly explains the danger, and relocates her under an alias. Why it matters: It crystallizes his protector role and tragically places him in the very apartment where he will be killed.
  • Explaining the past to Liv (Chapter 51): He gently recounts Amy and Marco’s murders, her amnesia, and their breakup. Why it matters: The scene provides crucial exposition and shows the emotional labor of loving someone whose memory resets—Ted becomes both caregiver and historian.
  • The murder: Drugged and stabbed in the safe house, Ted is killed in a way designed to frame Liv. Why it matters: His death ignites the plot and converts his private investigation into a public reckoning.
  • The final investigation and voicemail (Chapter 56): After asking a friend about the dotted fleur-de-lis, he calls Liv: he thinks he has identified Amy and Marco’s killer and wants to involve the police. Why it matters: It proves Ted was inches from the truth—and that truth is precisely what got him silenced.

Essential Quotes

Liv, I can’t stress enough that you can’t go out and you can’t contact anyone. Do you understand? It’s for your own protection. Nobody knows you’re here. We have to keep it that way. (Chapter 51)

This is Ted at his most parental and precise: he anticipates risks, sets clear boundaries, and asks for trust without theatrics. The urgency is practical, not possessive, reinforcing that his control is in service of safety, not dominance.

I wanted to make a life with you, Liv. Get married. Have a family. You kept delaying it... Your obsession with the past. Constantly trying to piece together what happened... It consumed you. Ultimately it consumed our relationship. It destroyed us. (Chapter 51)

He names the cost of trauma—how an unanswered question can devour the present. The speech frames Ted as principled: he refuses to romanticize pain, even as he still loves the person inside it.

I think I know who killed Amy and Marco. It’s time to involve the police. (Chapter 56)

A mission statement and a death warrant. The line reveals Ted’s threshold: once he has evidence, he shifts from private care to public accountability—which is exactly the moment the killer moves to stop him.

...a smiling man with tawny hair and crinkled eyes. (Chapter 46)

This warm, almost candid portrait introduces the gentleness others feel around Ted. The softness of the image makes the violence of his fate feel even more jarring and unjust.

...rumpled tawny hair and dimples denting his handsome cheeks. (Chapter 47)

Seen by Liv during a memory lapse, the description carries dramatic irony: she notices his approachable charm without recognizing it as familiar. The detail underscores the heartbreak of their dynamic—he is known to her body before he is known to her mind.