Dead Pool

The humidity in the bar was thick enough to chew on. Maya sat across from him, watching the beads of condensation trace paths down her gin and tonic like tears she couldn't cry anymore.

"You're going to run it, aren't you?" David said. His gray hair was longer than she'd ever seen it, curling at his collar. He looked like someone who'd stopped caring about appearances.

Maya's iphone buzzed on the table between them. Her editor. Again. She ignored it.

"The investigation's solid, David. The audit trail alone—"

"We were friends, Maya." His voice cracked. "Fifteen years. Since we were kids playing baseball in that dirt lot behind my house. You were the only one who could ever hit my curveball."

"That's exactly why I have to publish. Because you trusted me to be the one who wouldn't look away."

The pool outside glowed with an unnatural blue light. Two children splashed in the shallow end while their parents drank at the umbrella tables, oblivious. Normal life continuing. Meanwhile, David had embezzled three million dollars from the youth center he'd founded. A baseball camp for at-risk kids. The irony tasted like bile.

"What about Katie?" David asked quietly. "She doesn't know. She thinks I'm at a conference."

Maya's phone buzzed again. A text from her this time: *Running late! Be there in 10. Can't wait to see you both!*

Katie, David's wife. Maya's friend. The woman who'd held her through her divorce last year.

Maya looked at David, really looked at him, and saw the same boy she'd played baseball with all those summers. The friend who'd driven three hours through a blizzard when her mother died. The man she'd helped pick his wife's engagement ring.

Then she saw the bank records. The forged signatures. The kids who'd lost their scholarships.

"Katie's meeting us here?" Maya asked.

David nodded, defeated. "I thought if you both heard—"

"She's going to find out, David. But not from me. Not tonight."

Maya slid her phone across the table, face down. She stood up, smoothed her dress, and walked toward the pool where the children were still laughing, still innocent, still believing the world was fairer than it actually was.