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ADELE

“Are you comfortable, Adele?”

She wasn’t comfortable, hadn’t been since Falc?o Island.

Her body ached. Her back, an injured neck, leg, and elbow were all healing slowly. She struggled with flashbacks, was in therapy for trauma. She hadn’t slept through the night without vivid, terrifying dreams in months.

But she was alive, thanks to Blake. Both her kids were okay. Miller, for all his crimes and betrayals, had come back when they’d needed him. And he was now in custody. And after it all, the healing had begun. That was enough.

So it was truthful when she answered, “Yes, I’m okay.”

“Thank you for being here,” said podcaster Harley Granger.

He was younger than she thought he’d be, slim and unassuming in a long-sleeved black Vans T-shirt, a beanie over dirty-blond hair, jeans. They sat in a quiet, dim recording studio. It was nicely appointed with ergonomic chairs and a big walnut table between them. The professional mics hung from the ceil ing, monitors and a soundboard blinked on a table lining the far wall. There was a pleasant quietude to the place as if nothing outside existed and nothing mattered as much as the conversation that was about to begin.

Through the glass window, Harley’s producer, Roger, tapped on a keyboard. Finally, he gave Harley a thumbs-up, and a light box glowed red, reading Recording .

“Folks, today I’m sitting down with Adele Crane, who was at the heart of the Extreme Hide and Seek scandal and what I like to think of as the final chapter in the Chloe Miranda story.”

She’d heard a lot about Harley Granger, that he was unethical, tricked people into saying things they didn’t mean, not honoring the victims in his reporting. But there was something easy and warm about him, the inquiring gaze of his heavily lidded eyes. She felt like she could tell him anything and whatever it was it wouldn’t surprise him. She planned to tell him everything she knew.

“Adele, is it fair to say that you went to Falc?o Island expecting one thing and found something else altogether?”

Adele had to think about that for a second. What had she expected when she signed up for Extreme Hide and Seek? A game. A challenge. What had she wanted? Money, first of all. No point in lying about that. But also, she wanted to prove something—to her kids, to herself, to the world. That she was more than just a survivor. That she was a winner. That Miller hadn’t won, that he hadn’t deceived her for years, then left her broken and struggling to care for her kids.

“That’s fair, yes,” she said. “I went there expecting a challenge, to play a game I thought I had a chance at winning. Instead, I walked into a storm—literally and figuratively.”

“Malinka Nicqui calls you a hero. She says you saved her life.”

Adele had to laugh at that. “I’m no hero. And I had help saving Malinka. Cody Bryce, who most people know as Wild Cody, saved us both, literally pulling us back from the edge. He sacrificed his own win and his life when we needed him.”

She held back tears, took a deep breath, remembering those terrifying moments when she thought the world was going to end.

“He helped me save Malinka. He stayed with us until the end, when Hugo Silva found us and showed us the way out through the tunnels as Enchantments collapsed. So if we’re looking for heroes, I’d choose Hugo and Cody.”

Harley tapped his pen on the notes in front of him. “We’re always looking for our heroes, aren’t we?”

“I think it helps to believe there are people around without flaws, someone to come in for the rescue when things go FUBAR , as Maverick Dillan likes to say. But I don’t think there’s a person alive without flaws, someone who doesn’t make mistakes.”

He turned an intense gaze on her. Harley Granger, she knew, had faced down his own scandals. “What mistakes have you made, Adele?”

She smiled. “Too many to count. Leaving my kids behind to chase after a cash prize, for one. Before that, not seeing my husband for what he was. For relying on him for the life I thought of as my own but couldn’t sustain without him.”

He folded his hands together on the table between them.

“Your husband, Miller Crane, the biotech engineer accused of embezzling funds, stealing ideas from junior scientists. As the authorities descended, he fled and remained missing until he was recently captured.”

“That’s right,” she said. “But he returned to face his crimes and make amends to his kids. He turned himself in to authorities.”

That was partially true, without being the whole truth.

“There are people who say you knew where Miller was all along,” said Harley. “That you helped him get away and stay hidden.”

She bristled at that, shifted in her seat. “That’s not true. Anyway, this podcast isn’t about Miller Crane, is it?”

“No,” he said, flashing her an apologetic grin. “Maybe next season?”

“I hope not,” she said. “The truth is all out there now. Miller is in jail. He’s confessed and is awaiting sentencing. He’s working on making amends.”

“And what about you? How will he make amends to you?”

“All I want is for my kids to heal, to find a way to forgive their father if they can, to love him in spite of his flaws. He is a man who did bad things, but he loves his children. That’s…something. And that’s all I can say about this.”

He gave her an assenting nod.

“So let’s start at the beginning,” he said. “Tell me when you first decided to apply for the hide and seek challenge.”

Adele started at the beginning and ended at the collapse of Enchantments. By the time they’d finished talking, more than two hours had passed. It was healing to tell the story, to relive that day and night, to take it all apart, question it, analyze it.

When she was done, she felt better than she had in months.

How are you doing with it? Cody had texted her last night.

Moving through it , she’d answered. You?

One day at a time.

Exactly.

Can I see you again?

I’d like that.

“Lives were lost on Falc?o Island,” said Harley. “Alex Tang’s body was found washed up on Falc?o Island’s north shore. Gustavo Bello did not make it out of the building before Enchant ments fell; he is presumed dead. According to island officials, the site remains unstable and recovery efforts have faltered. His body has not been recovered.”

How close she had been to meeting the same fate, leaving her kids forever. That sudden wash of sadness, the tingle of dread, the hallmarks of trauma’s aftermath made themselves known, and Adele felt heat come up her throat. She breathed through it.

“It’s a tragedy,” she managed. He gave her a moment to collect herself.

“Let’s talk about Chloe Miranda and Hector Cruz. They claim that they were on a year-long mission to reveal all the fraud and corruption at Extreme. Chloe, with Hector’s help, staged her disappearance to draw scrutiny to the organization and expose all their wrongdoing.”

“Hmm,” said Adele.

She’d watched Chloe make the interview circuit, explaining herself, trying to paint herself as a hero and a crusader for good. Apparently, she spent the year on Falc?o Island, squatting at Enchantments. Men like Maverick Dillan can’t keep getting away with hurting people and stealing. Good women, strong women have to expose them.

Adele hadn’t heard her talk about the pain she must have caused her family, or how they might heal now that she’d returned home. Maybe Chloe thought it was worth it. Or maybe she didn’t think about it at all. Adele couldn’t help but compare her to Miller, someone else who’d put his own interests before the people who loved him.

“Chloe faces charges now for blackmail, falsifying a crime, among other things,” said Harley. “Neither Chloe nor Hector will speak to me for this podcast. Attorneys I know think she could serve prison time.”

Violet told Adele that Chloe’s following had more than tripled, that online she was hailed as a hero and a female crusader against men who use and ghost women, who lie, steal, and cheat. “She’s like a feminist icon, now,” said Violet, quite sincerely. Adele wasn’t sure how she felt about that. Any of it. But feminist wasn’t a word she’d use to describe Chloe Miranda.

“Meanwhile, Malinka Nicqui has used the scandal to come clean about her own business failings,” said Harley, looking down at notes in front of him. “She has admitted that she would not have been able to climb all Seven Summits without the help of her father, who died several years ago. She said it was you who helped her see that a lot of what she did as a kid was to please her dad. He wanted her to climb. So climb she did.”

Adele thought about Malinka a moment, what she wanted to say. She and Adele were in regular contact. A few weeks ago, Malinka had sent a box of clothes to Violet who practically lost her mind with joy.

“Maybe a lot of us, women especially, go through life pleasing people. First we try to be what our parents want us to be,” said Adele, thinking of the place she was in when she met Miller. Unformed in a lot of ways, ripe for the taking. “Then maybe our boyfriends or husbands. Then everyone —social media, our kids, the neighbors. It’s not even conscious all the time. It often takes a moment of reckoning before we ask ourselves, Who am I? What am I doing here? What do I want? ”

She paused a second, took a breath. She noticed how Harley gave her the space to finish her thoughts. How much of this interview would wind up on the cutting-room floor? Probably a lot.

“I think that’s what happened for Malinka,” she went on. “She is a young woman who has accomplished a lot—for her father, for her fans. I think what happened at Enchantments helped her to see herself in a new way. Helped her look at her past from a different perspective and forge a truer path forward.”

She nodded to indicate that she was done.

“Malinka and Chloe continue to support each other online, and have a message of facing the truth, mental health, honesty, and self-love,” said Harley. “Between the two of them, they have more than three million followers, and they are launching their podcast Grrl Power: Yes I Can in January. The outpouring of financial support for Malinka has allowed her to save her company and the foundation which continues its work of empowering women.”

“That sounded like spon con,” said Adele. Harley just smiled. That, she figured, he’d edit out. She remembered that last moment in Enchantments when Malinka went back for Chloe. Petra Arruda’s men then helped them both to escape before the collapse. “I wish them both well. I hope they both face down their demons while they’re young.”

If Malinka was her daughter, she’d have had advised her to stay away from a woman who’d lied and hurt countless people with her so-called crusade to expose Maverick, who then bailed on everyone when Enchantments started to fall, including Hector Cruz and Gustavo Bello, her supposed partners in trying to bring down Extreme. But Malinka was a grown woman, and like everyone, she’d have to make her own mistakes.

Harley kept his eyes down a moment, then said, “And finally, let’s spend a little time talking about Maverick Dillan and Angeline Alba.”

“So much to say about those two,” she mused.

“Indeed. Maverick Dillan, founder and CEO of Extreme, and Angeline Alba, COO, escaped Enchantments that night. They somehow managed to get to the airport, though roads were washed out. Dillan’s jet was the first to leave Falc?o Island once the storm had cleared with just the two of them and the crew on board. What do you think about that?”

What did she think about that?

“It’s easy to think that they got away with something,” she said. “Supposedly there was money, right? Cash in the back of one of the Range Rovers?”

“That’s the rumor. The jet, corporately owned by Extreme, landed at a private airport outside Toronto. And now Dillan and Alba are off the grid. Gone. No one has heard from them since. Maverick Dillan is wanted for questioning in the murder of Alex Tang. Angeline was caught on film along with Dillan and Gustavo Bello disposing of Tang’s body and is also wanted by police. Thoughts?”

“There’s something I know for sure,” she said after drawing and releasing a breath. “We don’t get away with things. We can run and we can hide. We might escape justice or the law, for a time. Like Miller did. But he said that he was never free, knowing what he’d done, that he was on the run, how badly he’d hurt his family. That his life was a kind of hell of looking over his shoulder, separated from everything he ever loved.”

“We can’t escape the truth of ourselves?”

“Something like that.”

“Online rumors abound,” said Harley. “There have been Mav-and-Angeline sightings all over the world. One or two of the photos are convincing.”

Blake filled her in daily on the latest. It was his mini-obsession.

“Sounds like you have the subject of your next podcast. The Rise and Fall of Maverick Dillan and Extreme .”

“And fall it did. Hector Cruz, the last shareholder still accountable, filed bankruptcy for the company. A pending multimillion-dollar deal with BoxOfficePlus imploded. Extreme is being sued by sponsors who paid for advertising they never received. A group called Moms Against Mav, who demand compensation for their injured children, has filed another suit. No fewer than ten charities say that money raised for them was never received from Extreme. The company that made it seem like their Extreme Games was simply a fun way to do good in the world. But that’s not the whole truth. What would you say to Maverick if you had the chance?”

Adele didn’t have any anger toward Maverick or Extreme. Since her trials on Falc?o Island, her followers had more than doubled. She hadn’t won the prize money, but her income from her WeWatch page had tripled. She had a raft of new sponsors—from apparel to camping and climbing gear to organic, vegan protein bars. Her interview with Malinka and Chloe would be the premier episode of their new podcast. Adele Crane: Mom, Tough Be-atch, and Survivor.

Adele had gone to Falc?o Island for something she didn’t get. But she walked away with other things she never expected.

She would keep her job at the school because the work meant something to her. In her heart, what she’d wanted as a younger person, before she met Miller, was to help people, as cliché as it sounded. With her job as a school counselor, her blog, and her WeWatch channel, she felt like she was doing that. Finally.

“I’d tell him to come back,” she said. “To face the truth. To make amends. It can be terrifying to face the consequences of our actions and choices. But it’s no easier to spend your life running.”

Harley looked down at his notes.

“The most recent headline is that Hector Cruz has been arrested for the murder of Alex Tang,” said Harley. “Apparently there’s security footage that shows them in an altercation, ending in a fatal fall.”

Adele nodded; she’d heard the news last night. That, at least, was one question answered. They dove into other open items like: Who had been hiding in the hotel leaving items that reminded her of Miller? Who had put that flask in Cody’s tent? The consensus was that it was just one of the Extreme team, doing what they did best: keeping things unstable. It tracked with claims from other challenges. But Adele thought that maybe it was Chloe, though she’d denied it. Adele had become adept at understanding that some questions didn’t have answers. And you just had to live with it.

“There is one other thing I wanted to get your opinion on, Adele.”

“What’s that?”

“There are some people that say the whole thing was a plan cooked up by Maverick, Malinka, and Chloe, something to get more views. All of the drama with Petra Arruda, the radical shaman as she calls herself on Photogram, and her private security team, the abduction of Angeline—that it was all theater. And then things just got out of hand when the hotel collapsed.”

Adele shook her head. The storm, the building collapse. She remembered the fear, the anguish. She remembered, too, how those men who seemed so menacing were responsible for rescuing everyone who survived, leading the way out of Enchantments.

“I don’t believe that,” she said, shaking her head. “It was real.”

“You’re sure.”

“Positive.”

Harley gave her a look she couldn’t read.

“What’s true is that people were hurt and died on Falc?o Island,” she went on. “Maybe we all went there for different reasons. We all believed that we were playing a game of one kind or another. But the game turned deadly real. I just feel lucky to be alive.”

Did he think she was naive? What did he believe? She didn’t bother to ask. She wasn’t sure he’d tell her the truth.

* * *

Back at the house, the kids were home, Violet making dinner, her famous one-pot baked ziti. Blake was on the couch playing Red World . Adele didn’t give him a hard time about the game anymore, or about the people he met while playing. If it wasn’t for Hugo Silva and Blake’s ability to reach him via the game, she might not be here right now. Although, Violet was always quick to point out that Adele might not have gone to Falc?o Island at all if it wasn’t for Blake’s “stupid virtual friend.”

Blake and Violet both had a million questions, about Harley Granger, about the interview. She told them everything while they set the table together, then gathered to eat. They’d spent some time in therapy together in the months since she returned from Falc?o Island—where Blake confessed to communicating with his dad on Red World , and Violet felt crushed that Miller hadn’t also reached out to her. And Adele told them about the money Miller had left, and the house she had a feeling he’d return to someday.

She’d also admitted that after she took the money from the safe, that she reported the house to the FBI. Even though she’d said otherwise, she’d always suspected Miller would one day return there and try to contact them. The FBI was monitoring the house, so even if Agent Coben hadn’t been trailing Violet, they would have found him when he came home. Miller claimed that he knew that. He’d returned to help Adele and reconnect with his kids before the FBI came for him.

Blake, Adele, and Violet made a promise to each other: no more secrets between them, ever. Just the truth, however uncomfortable, however unpleasant.

Blake intended to maintain a relationship with his father, even though he’d likely be in prison for a long time. Violet had so far chosen not to speak to him again since he’d been taken into custody while the kids watched. Adele hadn’t decided whether or not she wanted to confront Miller. She was working through it with Dr. S. Sometimes closure is a thing we find within , he’d said. It’s not necessarily given by another person. It can be something we give ourselves . She was all about moving forward now. She didn’t want to go back to the person she was— before .

As they were cleaning up after dinner, she had one more thing to tell her kids.

“Hey, so,” she said. “Wild Cody?”

“Yeah,” said Blake, mildly interested. Enough to look up from Red World . He’d finished clearing the table and returned to the couch. “What about him?”

Violet was wiping the counter, and Adele started the dishwasher.

“In about five minutes,” said Adele, “he’s going to ring that doorbell.”

Violet and Blake both stared at her, confused.

“He’s, uh…” She felt herself blushing, unable to go on.

“Oh. My. God,” said Violet, drying her hands on a dish towel. Outside the sun was setting, washing the kitchen in its final golden glow.

“He’s a friend now,” said Adele, clearing her throat.

“A friend ,” said Violet flatly, frowning.

“What?” said Blake. He closed the lid on his laptop. “Are you dating Wild Cody?”

Was she? Not really. Maybe? She wasn’t sure of anything yet. She hadn’t been with anyone but Miller in almost twenty years. What did the kids say these days? Adele and Cody were talking .

“He just wants to be called Cody now,” she said instead of answering.

Blake’s jaw dropped open. “That’s…nuts. I don’t know how to feel about that. I mean—you mean—he’s coming here? Like now. Like…he’s your boyfriend?”

“He’s just a friend right now. I’ll let you know if that changes.”

“Wait,” said Violet. “Have you… kissed him? Ew, gross! He’s so old.”

“He’s not that old!”

“Does that mean you have ?”

“That’s private. Not a secret. Private.”

“That means you did!”

The doorbell rang, and they all stared at each other. Then Violet started shrieking and ran up the stairs. Blake gave Adele a look, amused, curious, but then he followed his sister. She didn’t call them back. She knew curiosity would get the better of them.

This was going to take time.

She walked toward the door, toward her future. And for the first time in a while, she smiled.