Out of the Blue

by Kathryn Nolan

Quentin’s beat-up Jeep careened to a stop in my driveway. We ducked out onto the porch as he was rolling his window down with that mischievous smile.

  “I thought y’all were kidnapped or dead,” he called up. “But since you’re not, get in. I got good news.”

  Still out of breath, we jogged down the steps and into the car.

  “We’re neither,” I said, pulling down my seatbelt. “We were actually taking a nap. Well, we were…”

  “I just knocked out the two guys who’ve been following us around,” Cope blurted. “They’re in the kitchen, and Falco is tying them up.”

  “And we both survived a massive wipeout at The Wedge earlier today,” I said.

  “Both of you?”

  Cope’s grin was sly. “It’s a long story—we’ll tell you all about it. You’ve got that look on your face when you’re about to break a story wide open.”

  “I’ve got three factory inspectors willing to speak on the record about being bribed to lie for years. Plus one very brave employee.” He held up a slip of paper between his fingers. “And this right here is the address where Catalina Flores has been hiding.”

  “Holy shit.” I grabbed it from him as he drove out of my driveway. “Where are we going?”

  “She finally responded to one of my messages on social media, once I was able to convince her of my intentions and connection to you, Serena,” Quentin said, casually breaking the speed limit. “And she’s staying at her sister’s house about ten minutes from here.”

  He glanced in the rearview mirror at Cope sitting in the back. “Do either of you wanna tell me about the two men who just attacked you in your home?”

  Cope scrubbed a hand down his face. His knuckles were already bruising. “I’m pretty sure they were the two guys who’ve been following us. I don’t think they’re anything more than local muscle getting hired out to do shady or violent things. They had a knife but no guns, thank god. Makes me think they’ve done this before and had an easy time getting whatever they needed based on intimidation.”

  “They were there for the files, right?” Quentin asked.

  Cope’s jaw tightened. “The drive was all they wanted, and neither Lattimore brother was at the event today, which makes me think they’re holed up somewhere trying to figure out how to plug this information leak. You’ve got everything you need for the story, now?”

  “Catalina’s the key missing piece,” Quentin said, turning right into a small residential neighborhood. “All three inspectors confirmed bribe payments for the past five years—bribes to look the other way and pretend they were upholding the high standards Aerial is famous for. The employee willing to speak out told me the whole thing’s a fucking mess, but Aerial uses a system of intimidation and bribes to keep them quiet too.”

  My stomach churned with nausea as Quentin slowed the car down, creeping to a stop in front of a ranch-style house with bright blue shutters. “She knows we’re coming, but she’s definitely scared.”

  We exited the car. Quentin at least appeared professional, with his leather bag and button-up shirt. But I was just now realizing that Cope and I wore the same clothing we’d fallen asleep in, and one look at my hair told me it was a snarled mess.

  The neighborhood was quiet, nothing louder than bird song. The curtains in the house were closed, and the grass was a little high. At the front door, I looked to Cope for one last shot of bravery and then raised my hand to knock.

  It opened wide before I could do it. The same woman who bumped into me outside of Aerial five days ago stood in the doorway with relief on her face.

  “Thank god it’s you,” she said.

  38

  Serena

  Catalina served us glasses of ruby-red hibiscus tea that I sipped gratefully. Next to me on the couch, Cope was a solid, comforting presence. He didn’t let go of my hand once, only pausing to stroke his thumb across my pulse point every few minutes.

  Quentin sat in a chair, and Catalina pulled one up next to him with a shaky exhale. There were dark thumbprints beneath her eyes and lines around her mouth.

  “We’re so glad to see you’re safe,” I said. “We were worried Aerial had gotten to you. Did you plan to stay at your sister’s house?”

  She nodded her head. “My parents still live in Oaxaca, so my younger sister stays there with them in the summer for a few weeks, visiting family. With her gone, this was the best place for me to stay out of sight for a few days.” She wrung her hands together. “I’m so sorry I made you worry about me. I couldn’t reach out until now. Once things were a go on our end, we were all scrambling to hide our tracks. I didn’t want to lead them to your location if they were tracking me online.”

  Quentin’s forehead creased. “Who’s we?”

  Gripping the glass between her hands, she leaned over with a resolute look. “There’s a core group of six of us at Aerial—three lawyers, including me, two people who work in operations and human resources, and one of the product engineers. We all started at the company within a year of each other, so we happened to grow close. It was at a dinner party I hosted here one night when I mentioned I was noticing things in their arbitration files that didn’t match up with what the company was supposedly promoting to the public.”

  “The factory conditions, you mean?” Quentin asked.

  “Yes, and the violation of environmental regulations, the injuries, the illness,” Catalina continued. “All of us had signed non-disclosure agreements that guaranteed our silence and confidentiality. But between the six of us, we could more safely share what we were starting to find. Connections with sketchy lawyers and politicians. Hidden budget items and money trails. Complaints from employees not addressed or destroyed.”

  She regarded me and Cope. “They keep their staff and departments in strict silos, everyone holding a piece of the puzzle but never seeing the finished product.”

  Quentin leaned back in his chair, hands on his head. “That’s the first rule of the game if you’re wanting to keep your employees in the dark. That and generate obsessive brand loyalty.”

  She was nodding faster now. “Yes. Yes. That was the other thing. You’ve met the Lattimores and the other directors. They’re nice and unassuming and claim to love the environment as much as our consumers do. It doesn’t line up with what they’re doing behind the scenes, and that, more than anything else, had us doubting ourselves for a long time before we decided to come up with a plan to get the information out. We hoped the leak wouldn’t get tied back to us. We now know they’ve been searching our work computers. And I didn’t realize they’d put those cameras up on the perimeter of the building the day I passed the information to Serena. We were careful but not careful enough, I guess.”

  “Well, it’s not your job to be careful. It’s their job not to hurt people and lie about it,” Quentin said firmly. “There’s no instruction manual here, and you and your colleagues are doing something very brave and courageous. You made the choices you had to make to stay safe.”

  She gave him a smile of gratitude. “Thank you for that. I think all six of us have been replaying everything in our minds and only coming up with the mistakes that we made.”

  “I’ve been an investigative reporter for a lot of years, and you’re not the first whistleblower who’s come to my paper wanting us to print their story. It’s near impossible to get out unscathed. You’re going toe-to-toe with the ones in power. There’s a reason why they have it, and there’s usually a compelling reason they want to keep it.”

  “Like maintaining a pristine reputation right as you’re being celebrated as the first sustainable company to sponsor the Olympics,” Cope said.

  She sipped her tea and nodded. “Everyone at the office was excited about the news but tense the past few weeks,” she admitted. “Plus, Serena starting as our new ambassador meant there was a lot of pressure to get things right. No mistakes.”

  My conflicting emotions every time I was in those offices made a lot more sense now—feeling both welcomed a
nd uneasy, listened to and ignored. The force of their long-standing values always pushed back, whispered that what I was seeing couldn’t possibly be true.

  “Were they always like this?” I asked. “Was the whole story a lie from the beginning?”

  She bit her bottom lip. “Not that I can tell. The six of us have tried to pinpoint when Aerial abandoned their sustainable practices, and the closest we can get is five to ten years ago.”

  Quentin glanced at us. “Lines up with some of the sources I’m talking to.”

  “I think they were honest back then,” Catalina said. “And doing the right thing. They were pioneers for a long time. But it is more expensive for a company to pay people fair wages, protect them from harm, and ensure they’re having the smallest impact on the planet as possible.” She shrugged, looking sad. “I don’t know—maybe they saw that they could inflate their profit margin by keeping the lie but using the same awful practices widely used by other companies.”

  Her fingers curled into tight fists. “It’s infuriating. The more we uncovered and the more positive, happy press they received, the angrier we all felt. Especially since I don’t believe everyone who works there is in on it. A lot of people work there because they stand by those values and want to see it reflected in a company that could lead the way for others.”

  I leaned forward slightly but kept my hand in Cope’s. “You were all angry?”

  “There are no words to express how angry,” she said. “Going to work, putting a fake smile on my face, feeling like I was complicit in their actions. I was lucky the six of us had each other. We inspired each other to be brave and actually do something about it.”

  Cope squeezed my hand lightly. I was in awe of Catalina’s courage and the incredible risk these employees had taken. And I thought surfing big waves was dangerous. This was on another level entirely. And her anger hadn’t limited her ability to take action.

  It had guided her towards it.

  “It means a lot that you entrusted me with this information,” I said. “Although I still don’t know why. But I really hope I did what you needed me to do.”

  Her dark eyes brightened. “Serena, we chose you on purpose. We knew you’d be at that meeting, and we organized me bumping into you. The rest was a big risk. I knew you might not plug in a random flash drive dropped in your purse by a stranger. But it was our first usable idea to bypass our NDAs. And plain good luck that you’re friends with a reporter.”

  “Because I was their new ambassador?” I asked.

  “Because of who you are,” she said simply.

  My cheeks warmed at the sincerity in her tone. Cope squeezed my hand again.

  “You have a platform, and you use it,” she continued. “You’ve never smiled politely and gotten on your board while ignoring the problems that affect your sport. You don’t stay in your lane, and the community is better for it.” She caught my gaze and held it. “I know the detractors are usually louder, but a lot of people admire you. And not just for the fact that you’re an incredible athlete. But for living your values.”

  I thought about Dora, gazing down at me and saying there’s always another way. And the many, many times I railed against flaws in an industry that still benefited me because of the way that I looked.

  It had always been infuriating to witness the way other surfers, the media, and plenty of fans echoed the manipulations of my parents. They also believed girls and women should be pretty, polite, and agreeable. As if I only existed to entertain them. As if upholding the lie of that existence was more important than standing up for what was right.

  But standing up wasn’t exactly the same as taking action.

  “Thank you for saying that,” I said. My throat was tight with emotion. “That honestly means more to me than I can say. Until Aerial, I was stuck in that anger phase you were talking about earlier. It’s past time that I do even more.”

  I smiled in response to the excitement on her face. “Wait, what are you planning Serena?”

  “I don’t know yet,” I said, feeling suddenly shy. Although the thoughts filling my head were so numerous, they could no longer be easily slotted away. “But I’ve got some ideas. And a lot of really, really awesome people in my life who have their own ideas too on how to increase equality to our sport.”

  “It’s definitely needed,” she said. “I mean, look at Aerial. They’re a perfect example of how deep the problem can be and how power and money can still hide it.”

  Money. Those ideas in my head gave a standing ovation at Catalina’s words.

  “You’re absolutely right,” I said. My phone started ringing, startling all four of us. When I saw who was calling, my heart stopped. “It’s Marty Lattimore.” I showed them the screen.

  Quentin held his hand out, and I tossed the phone to him. He ignored the call then shut my phone off. “I’m guessing someone told them that you beat up a couple of his guys in your kitchen.”

  Catalina’s eyes widened. “You what?”

  “Cope handled it,” I said, looking sideways at the handsome bodyguard next to me, gripping my hand like he was never letting go.

  “I think I impressed them with my fighting skills and witty rejoinders,” he said.

  “You told them you were going to turn their lives into a shrieking hell.”

  His mouth twitched at the end. “Some people would think that was funny.”

  Catalina pressed her hands to her cheeks. “If I had known they were going to come after you like that…”

  I touched her knee. “There’s no way you could have known, and we’re all okay. I think it’s the next part that’s going to bring its own challenges though.”

  Turning to Catalina, Quentin said softly, “This is where you and your coworkers come in. My editor is ready to run this story forty-eight hours from now, as long as my sources check out. But she’s ready to make it a major headline, above the fold. So we need to talk about what you’re comfortable with. And I’ve got plenty of connections because of prior stories, so whatever protection you or your coworkers need, I’m happy to provide it.”

  “I feel safer with six of us stepping forward, and the sources you found,” Catalina said. “But talking to other lawyers is probably smart.”

  Quentin smiled. “I’ll make it happen.” Then he took out his notepad and tape recorder. “Are you ready to blow this story wide open?”

  Her eyes darted to mine, and I gave her a reassuring nod.

  “I’m ready,” she said.

  39

  Cope

  Before reality and its obstacles could set in, there was one last thing I needed to do.

  Serena and I were in the back seat of a taxi on the way to La Jolla Cove, holding a thick blanket I’d stolen from Quent’s Jeep. She was curled against my side, and I was stroking my fingers through her hair, listening to the sounds of her breathing and the steady rumble of the tires on the freeway.

  I’d called Falco, who handled Aerial’s men, made the requisite reports with the police, and was staking out the house until we returned. I was already dreading the conversation we needed to have about the many secrets I’d been keeping from him.

  The conversation awaiting me with Marilyn was going to be even harder.

  When we’d finally left Catalina’s house, she and Quentin had started the process of unraveling Aerial’s many lies, and calls were already being made to her coworkers. She seemed comfortable and at ease with him, and he was taking the time to be careful with her story.

  She’d also taken great pity on me and Serena by ordering us takeout from the pizza place down the street—and didn’t poke fun when we each ate one large pizza. Between the massive wipeout and fighting off two Hulk-sized attackers, we were ravenous.

  She and Serena had shared a long and emotional hug before we left—there was so much left to uncover and do, and they both had their own tough decisions to make, but seeing the connection already forming between them was moving enough.

  The cabdriver dr
opped us off at our location, and as I paid him, Serena stood on the low wall, hair blowing in the breeze, silhouetted in the moonlight. This was the location of our second date, where I’d once contemplated the foolish notion that I could walk away from this wild, passionate goddess instead of falling helplessly in love with her.

  The waves were inky black and reflected the stars above. The full moon hung low and luminescent in the sky, turning the sand below us silver.

  I walked her to the farthest end of the wall, which dipped down below the rocks, jutting out into the cove. It protected us from the sea breeze and any onlookers, although it was empty of people this time of night. I smoothed down the thick blanket and we sat facing each other, just like we had on that sunny day, all of twenty-two years old.

  The ocean waves pounded an ancient rhythm in the background.

  “Do you remember what happened here, sunshine?” I asked.

  A brilliant smile slid up her face. “Our first kiss.”

  I gave in to the pressing urge I’d had since the jet skis dragged us onto the beach. I gripped her cheeks and crashed our lips together. She reacted immediately, sighing against me, fingers clutching at my shirt.

  She opened for me, deepened the kiss. I smoothed my hand across her hair, and we stayed like that for a moment, finally able to touch and comfort each other after one of the hardest days of our lives. Finally feeling grounded, I sat back but didn’t put much distance between our bodies. Our knees touched, and I kept my hand interlaced with hers. Even now, after a day of non-stop fear, my fingers shook as I reached for my wallet.

  I opened it and slid out a thin gold band. I placed it on the blanket, directly between us.

  “I’ve been carrying this around with me for 1,510 days,” I said. “Wearing it hurt too much. Getting rid of it was never, ever an option. And falling out of love with you wasn’t an option either.”

  Serena stared at me as she fished her wallet from her bag. Opened it and removed the matching gold band we’d had made.