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ANGELINE

After the Game

She stood on the edge of the dock and looked down into the cold, gray water. Above her the sky was cerulean, towering cumulus clouds piled high. She loved this moment, before the plunge. The water, she knew, would be freezing. When she dove into its depths, a shock would move through her. She’d emerge to draw breath more awake, more alive than she had been before. Still, she waited, counting her breaths, feeling alive in her body.

“Are you going in?”

Maverick sat on the Adirondack chair behind her. She didn’t turn to look at him.

Instead, she looked out at the island closest to theirs. Had she seen movement on its shore? It was far, a good ten minutes by boat. There was a house, bigger than theirs, all windows that glowed golden in the early morning. It belonged to some tech billionaire, according to the gas-station attendant at the marina. Hadn’t been there in years. Anyway, it was too far for anyone there to see her, naked on the dock.

She’d grown used to it quickly. Living without eyes on her, without voices, without chatter.

It had taken Maverick longer.

She turned back to him, and his eyes were closed. His body was toned and tan, wearing a sweatshirt and the navy blue swim trunks they’d picked up at the general store in the nontown on the mainland. He might join her in the water. Or maybe not.

She took a long, deep breath, put her hands over head, and dove into the gray, the cold. There was always that moment going down, breath held, when she wondered if she’d break the surface again.

When they’d first arrived, part of her had wished that she could just keep swimming deeper and deeper until the world was just a memory, a trick of light.

As soon as the storm had cleared on Falc?o Island, they’d bribed the air traffic controller to let them leave. As the plane taxied down the runway, she half expected to see Petra and her men chasing them in their ATVs. But no, nothing. Just a smooth liftoff.

The dirty secret about private airports like the one they landed in outside Toronto was that no one asked questions. There was a kind of person that came and went at places like this, passage greased with hundred-dollar bills. There was no stop at customs. No passport control. When they landed, there was a car waiting for them—a beat-up old Land Rover, sky-blue and with a definite cool factor despite its age, the rust around the wheel wells, the tilted bumper.

Maverick handed the pilot an envelope stuffed with cash. They exchanged nods. And Angeline didn’t ask what had transpired between.

Maverick threw the two duffel bags in the back. And other than what they were wearing, that’s all they had with them.

“Were you planning this?” she asked.

He laughed a little. “Not this exactly, no. But I did promise you a retreat, right? Just the two of us?”

“I didn’t think you meant it.”

“I meant it.”

They drove past the city in silence. And then they were on winding roads through thick forest, night falling. And they drove and drove, Angeline drifting, dreaming about the masked person on the trail, the falling building, Alex’s body broken, falling. She dreamed of him washing up on some beach, body turned to flotsam, everything he was to them gone. She woke up crying.

Maverick put a hand on her leg. “We’re here.”

A marina. It was late, past eleven, so the shop was closed. The harbormaster showed them to a boat at the end of the dock. Another envelope of cash changed hands.

The water was dark, but Maverick seemed to know what he was doing, where he was going. And she trusted him when it came to things like this. He could drive the thing, whatever vehicle it was. Get them where they were going. When she needed him, he came in for the rescue, guns blazing.

In the huge lake, there were islands. Windows from homes glowed like embers in the night. It was quiet, so quiet—just the boat engine and the water and the vast silent night. The sky was alive with starlight, and the water glimmered and danced all around them.

There was nothing.

They’d both ditched their phones in Falc?o Island.

She’d texted her mother: I’m okay. I love you. Whatever you hear about us, it’s not true. Not the whole truth.

Then Maverick had taken it and dumped it with his in a garbage pail. Neither one of them had a device of any kind now.

The world and whatever consequences awaited them receded for a time. A deep calm came over her.

Finally, after about twenty minutes on the water, they came to a dark island, and Maverick pulled their boat up to its wooden dock and tied them off.

“What is this place?” she asked. With the engine quiet, there was no sound except the water slapping against the hull.

“You know, up here in the middle of nowhere, islands are pretty cheap.”

“You bought an island.”

“Yeah,” he said. “It’s an engagement gift. Don’t get too excited. It’s nothing much. The house needs a lot of work.”

Then he was down on one knee, and from his pocket he produced a small velvet box. Inside was the biggest diamond she’d ever seen.

“If not now, then when, Angeline?” he asked. “Will you marry me?”

She said yes , and he slid the ring on her finger. It was a perfect glittering pink star. She didn’t imagine that they’d ever get married, not really. Because they were both probably going to prison at some point. So—why not?

He carried her over the threshold of a modest wood house that smelled a bit musty but was comfortably furnished with big couches and chairs and a decent kitchen—a pantry and refrigerator stocked with food. There were instructions about the water, and flushing the toilet, and the generator that would need to be kept gassed up. Too many trips into the marina could be a problem, she thought.

“It’s pretty rustic,” he said from the loft landing.

“It’s perfect.”

The master bedroom had a huge king bed, neatly made with enough pillows. There were clean towels in the bathroom, soap and shampoo.

“They’ll find us eventually,” she said.

“Or we’ll go back and try to put things right,” he said. “But not tonight.”

They made love and slept deeply.

In the morning the sunrise washed in the big bay window and the lake and the trees and the other islands. It was the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen.

She made coffee. When Maverick woke up and joined her in the kitchen, she said, “Maverick, tell me everything.”

He released a big sigh, took a swallow of the coffee she’d poured him.

He told her about the night in Iceland with Chloe. About the pictures she took. How she started blackmailing him. How he started taking money from the business accounts to pay her. Small amounts at first, then more and more.

Finally, they’d struck a deal. She would come to the Haunted Hide and Seek Challenge, and he’d make sure she won. And that would be the end of it. She promised.

Then she disappeared.

After that he started getting threats online, via email. He felt like someone was following him, trying to kill him. He was scared all the time. He bought and learned to use a gun. He didn’t feel like he could tell anyone because he’d stolen so much money from Extreme. He was afraid the scrutiny might draw attention to all the other things he’d done wrong.

He kept stealing money, planning an escape. He bought this island with cash under an old company name. It wasn’t perfect. If they were looking, and they probably were, they’d eventually find him.

Then came the BoxOfficePlus offer, which he and Alex knew was a lifeline, a way out. But who was he without Extreme? What would Extreme become if they had to answer to a corporate overlord? He fought the deal, found reasons to turn down every offer. He held the majority shares. No one could take Extreme; he’d have to give it.

Alex, still hopeful, was getting the books ready for review. That’s when he realized that money was missing—a lot of it.

“How much is in the bags?” she asked.

The black duffels were sitting in the bedroom.

“There’s a little under a million dollars.”

She walked over to the window, looked out into the vista. Like this, they could live on that money forever. She steeled herself to ask the question she most needed answered.

“Did you kill Alex?”

She had to know. If the answer was yes , then Maverick was one thing. If it was no , he was another. Maybe she could love him either way, but she wouldn’t know unless he told her the truth.

“No,” he said, walking over to her. He spun her around and took both of her hands. Her ring cast glittery rainbows on the wall. “Look at me. I swear to you, I did not kill Alex.”

Did she believe him? Or did she just want to believe him so badly?

“Then, who?”

“I don’t know. But the truth is that if Alex and I were out of the picture, all our shares and the money would go to Hector and Gustavo. Hector was with Chloe. He was the last person to leave the hotel that day. So maybe that was the plan. Ruin me, kill Alex when they realized he was going to cover for me, and take Extreme to BoxOfficePlus. They’d all be rich—even Hector with his small share. Like megarich.”

“It makes a twisted kind of sense,” she admitted. The logic was off, the risks were too high. But if you were stupid, you might think it could work. Hector and Chloe wanted to be the new Maverick and Angeline of Extreme.

“Except in the process, they destroyed Extreme,” he said. “Now it will be one of those stories—a great thing that was ruined by scandal, murder, fraud. BoxOfficePlus, with their whole woke, squeaky-clean image, won’t touch Extreme now. Without the deal, the company is bankrupt. Hector, the only one standing, gets nothing.”

His eyes filled then; he turned away so that she wouldn’t see. But she pulled him back and wrapped her arms around him.

“They’re gone,” he whispered. “Everyone’s gone.”

He meant the guys, but also his audience, all the people that fed him back the version of himself he’d needed to survive. Who was he without that? Without Extreme? Angeline supposed they were about to find out.

“It was Hector. Hector killed Alex,” she said.

He looked up at her.

“Think about it,” she said. “You’re right. He was the only one there after we went to the site.”

Maverick considered it.

“Maybe there was a fight,” she said. “Maybe it was an accident.”

She remembered how Hector had cried in the trailer. Had it been an act? Or had it been true grief, remorse, or even shock that Alex was dead? She knew Hector—or thought she did. She couldn’t see him murdering anyone in cold blood, even for money.

It was hard to recast him. Hector, the mom of Extreme, to Hector, killer, destroyer, betrayer. But everyone had their secret selves.

* * *

Now she swam deep, the water murky. Sometimes when she was down here, she saw things. Figures in the dark. Just a play of shadows and light, she guessed. But sometimes she was startled by their size, their closeness. Today, there was nothing, just that swirling gray.

She emerged finally, drawing a big breath of clean air.

Maverick was standing on the end of the dock. How long had she been down?

But he wasn’t looking for her. He was looking out into the distance.

A boat approached, still far off in the distance. But close enough to see the flashing red light and the word Police emblazoned on its side.

Angeline emerged from the water, climbing up the slim lad der, and walked naked up the dock to go get dressed. She knew they couldn’t run forever, that eventually they’d have to return and face everything broken they’d left behind, try to piece it back together. Pay the bill that had come due.

As the boat drew closer, she heard the wail of its siren.

Ready or not , it seemed to say, here we come.

* * * * *