Logan stares at her, waiting.

“There’s more than just a picture,” she says. “I actually took a whole video. It’s up on our website right now. It’s gotten a lot of hits. It’s gone viral, actually.”

Logan squints at her. “What does that mean?”

“It means news channels all over the country are showing it.”

“Goddamn it!” Logan says, bolting to his feet, his anger back in full force, like a smoldering campfire reignited by a sudden gust of wind.

“It’s a great video,” Hannah says. “Very moving. Very inspiring.”

Logan begins to stomp off and then turns back. “Do me a favor, Hannah. Just leave me the fuck alone.”

“There’s something else,” she says, but he’s already halfway across the parking lot.

She isn’t able to tell him that someone claiming to be an old friend stopped by the paper that morning asking about him.

CHAPTER 8

I HARDLY SLEEP, and when I get up, it’s still dark outside. I sit on my deck and look out over the lake, waiting for the sun to rise. I can’t decide whether I should skip town or stick around.

If that video is being played on national news programs, there’s a chance Marco will see it and come looking for me. The safe play would be to leave Lake Tahoe and never look back. But I’m probably just being paranoid again. How many dozens of videos like that go viral each week, earning a thirty second spot on some national broadcast before they’re forgotten again? The odds of Marco seeing it are slim at best.

As the sun rises and the sky turns from black to blue, I think about the life I’ve made here. I have no close friends, no girlfriend—yet. But it’s a new life, very different from the one before. Living in Los Angeles, plotting jobs with Marco. There was always the fear of getting caught. Or being betrayed.

I feel like a new person now. I left that life only two years ago, and Lake Tahoe is only about four hundred fifty miles from LA. But that world seems like it was a lifetime ago. Those memories seem like something that happened to another person, on another planet entirely.

If I run, I’ll feel like I never left that life at all, like I’ve been playing pretend the last two years. But if I stay, keep putting down roots, maybe this life will continue to feel more and more like my life.

Yesterday’s clouds have broken up. Sunlight reflects like golden scales off the water. It looks like it’s going to be a nice day to go hiking. I go back inside and begin to get my gear together. One thing is for sure: regardless of whether I decide to stay or go, I need to hike up to Lake Aloha.