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ANGELINE

Angeline’s knee always ached when a storm was coming. She trudged behind Tavo, who moved with the speed and lightness of a true athlete, seeming to leap along without the drag of gravity, ignoring her. She pushed the pain away. She’d thought that aching old injuries were just a myth until she’d started wrecking her body at those Tough Be-atch competitions. Now, her rotator cuff swelled when she was overtired. And when rain was coming—and it was coming—her right knee was a siren, high-pitched and relentless.

She dug deep, tried to keep up with Tavo.

She’d started training for the competitions after a guy tried to overpower her in a basement bathroom of a nightclub. Not tried. He had overpowered her, quickly, easily, as she’d emerged from the stall having broken one of her mother’s cardinal rules: never go to the bathroom alone at a nightclub. Especially in New York City where the bathrooms were almost all in the basement, where the music upstairs was so loud that no one would ever hear you screaming.

He had been big, she remembered that much. His narrow brown eyes were blank, glassy, unfeeling. High, drunk. His mouth tasted like tequila as he pressed it against hers, pinning her to the cold tile wall with his body. She struggled, but her arms and legs were as useless as butterfly wings against his superior strength, his weight. She still dreamed about it sometimes, that feeling of utter powerlessness, the brutality of a man taking what he wanted, of being dehumanized by another person’s desire.

If a group of girls hadn’t busted in, laughing, yelling, oblivious, and startled him, he’d have raped her, maybe worse. He ran when they entered, thrusting past them, knocking one of them down. By the time they’d found the security guard, he was long gone. Between the four of them, they couldn’t even identify him. Big, brown hair—well, maybe dark blond. Was it a black shirt? No, navy. A tattoo on his hand they’d all agreed, but of what? Angeline could still smell his cheap cologne on her skin.

She remembered the look on the security guard’s face, not apathetic, not unkind. Just like Yeah—well, sorry, girls. Nothing I can do.

After that, Angeline had started training. Ran, lifted, hired a coach to take her from weakling to tough bitch. She learned how to defend herself. Never again. She’d never let a man surprise and overpower her again. Ha. Not physically anyway.

“Tavo,” she said now, growing breathless. “Please.”

He stopped, looked down at the ground. Angeline came up to see what he saw. One of the cameras smashed to pieces on the ground, glittering in the scant light.

The silence and growing darkness all around them took on a kind of menace. Angeline moved closer to Tavo, glancing behind them to make sure they were alone.

Was there someone else out here with them, hiding? The same person who’d killed Alex? Someone who wanted to hurt them all?

Were the broken cameras a trap, to lure them out looking? She realized that they were all separated now. She and Tavo were out in the forest; Hector and Maverick were back at the trailer. Let’s not split up like this , Maverick had said. She’d ignored him.

Her breathing was labored; she couldn’t catch it. Fear, effort, a heavy fatigue.

Finally, she leaned against the rough, thick trunk of a towering tree. She was so tired. She couldn’t stop thinking about Alex, his body in the closet, going over the edge. Oh, God. Oh, God, what had they done?

The trees, black and green, their movement in the wind making a kind of whisper, looked down on her. She was so small, so temporary. Her deeds, the things she held as important, her desires meant nothing in this ancient forest. The trees had seen it all, held a primal knowledge in their trunks, their roots, the mycelial network between them. Humans thought they ruled, but far from it. Angeline sagged heavily against her tree, relying on its strength to keep her up. Away from Maverick, away from the challenge, she saw what a sickness there was surrounding the company. They all had it. It was like a virus they passed back and forth.

Why hadn’t they called the police?

Why hadn’t they come clean when the police came to them?

Now there was no way out.

Tavo turned to look at her for the first time since before Maverick had showed up at the hotel. She thought he might take her in her arms, comfort her. But no. There was a new coldness to him, a distance. He’d seen something in her that neither one of them had known was there.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m sorry. You were right. We should have called the police.”

He was slightly breathless, too, put his hands to his hips and stared past her.

“But we didn’t,” he said. “And now we’re all fucked. You see that, right?”

She was about to reach for him when a rustling in the trees had them both spinning toward the sound.

She looked around, peering into the growing darkness, the shadows. Why wasn’t she more afraid? Was it because on some level she believed that Maverick had killed Alex? Or was it because she’d confronted a terrible darkness within herself as they dumped their friend’s body off a cliff in a futile attempt to save their game?

Maybe she was the worst person out here.

Nothing, no one, emerged from the overgrowth. There was silence again, just the sound of light rain on leaves.

Tavo moved off the path and into the thick forest. She didn’t follow. When he came back, he held the broken bits of another camera.

“Mav was right,” she said. “There’s someone else out here. Fucking with us. They killed Alex.”

Tavo was looking at her oddly, a tight smile spreading.

“Angeline,” he said, “you’re never going to see him for what he is. Are you?”

“We can’t do this now.” They’d argued about Maverick before. The truth was that she did see him for exactly who he was. Every layer, every flaw. And in spite of it all, she’d never loved anyone more.

“We can’t not do this now,” said Gustavo. “Time’s up.”

He grabbed her arm, hard. She struggled to get away from him, panic rising.

“What are you doing?” she asked. But he didn’t answer, grabbed her other arm. Beneath the panic, there was rage. The rage of all women everywhere, tired of being bullied, overpowered, crushed beneath the will of men.

“Get your fucking hands off me.”

She kicked him in the shin as hard as she could, freed herself from his grasp with an inward twist of her arms like her trainer had showed her. She was about to break into a run back to the site when a shadow slipped from the darkness ahead and blocked her path.

Angeline stopped short, heart thudding, throat dry. “Who’s there? Who are you?”

The rain came down harder then.

She put up her fists, ready to fight. Instead, she caught a hard, stunning blow on the side of the face, sending her to the ground.

Tavo stood over her. Her head spun. Warm blood sluiced down her cheek. The world wobbled, white stars dancing. The pain, the brutality of his betrayal.

“I’m sorry, Angeline,” said Tavo. But his voice was cold: he wasn’t sorry. The other person came to stand beside him.

No. It wasn’t—possible.

“Oh, God,” she said. “You.”

Then black.