In his dream, Jasper stood at the edge of a high cliff, a massive, jagged stone rising like a monolith above a dark ocean. Nothing but sea and rock and a sky peppered with stars as the sun set behind him. He cupped a small yellow bird between his palms; his mission was to see the bird soar into the dusky sky. Raising his hands, he hoisted the bird up and released her. It was only after she'd dropped below the cliff that he remembered her wings were clipped, and by then, it was too late. She would fall and she would crash into the ocean, her body carried in and out with the tide.

She fell, and Jasper watched her fall. Helpless. She cried out, a bird's squawk that sounded odd to his ear. She cried again and the sounds formed words, but the waves upon the shore and the roar of regret coursing through his mind made it hard for him to understand. It was a last message to him, perhaps. A scolding, a warning. Or a curse.

The screaming continued until the cliff and the falling bird and the ocean slipped away, replaced by a mahogany bedstand, light from the morning sun pressing into his room through a silk draped window. He rolled onto his back. Only a dream. He'd done nothing wrong, done nothing that couldn't be undone. He'd let no one slip through his fingers to fall and fall and fall.

And then the scream came again. A scream and words with it. "Wake up and help me find her."

His heart sped. Someone screaming. Someone needing to be found. He tugged on a pair of basketball shorts, hurrying out of the room, the urgency in Tam's voice outweighing his reluctancy to engage with her.

He opened his door to an empty hallway. Becca and Paul had already emerged from their room, Becca tying the cord of her bathrobe around her waist as she rushed in the direction of Tam's screams, Paul following a pace behind, camera in hand.

"Really dad?" Jasper said as he passed his father.

"You know the drill."

Jasper pushed ahead of his stepmother onto the balcony at the villa's western side. There, standing in its center was Tam, cheeks flush, eyes about to release a river of tears as soon as she blinked.

"It's Goldie." Her shoulders slumped forward. She studied the eye of Paul's camera as though she might find Goldie trapped behind its lens. "I've looked everywhere."

"Isn't she in her room?" Becca leaned over the edge of the balcony, scanning the dense foliage and the empty beach beyond it. "Maybe she's taking a bath."

"I checked. She asked me to wake her up early this morning for a jog, so I went to her room, but she wasn't there. Her bed—I don't think she slept in it."

Jasper followed his stepmother's gaze up and down the beach. "Are you serious?"

She rubbed at her cheeks as the tears she'd been holding back fell. "I searched downstairs, then outside. I came up here to see if I could spot her, but," She wavered and slumped against the railing. "It's like she just disappeared."

"That can't be!" Becca headed back into the villa. "People like Goldie don't disappear. Paul, let's search her room. Tam must have missed her."

"I'm sure that's the case, dear." Paul, still filming, followed his wife, probably eager to get shots of Goldie's empty accommodations.

As soon as they were gone, Jasper crossed his arms and stared at Tam. She shifted her weight and stared back.

"Why are you looking at me like that? Shouldn't you go search for her?"

"With my camera, right? Run down to the beach, make sure the mic picks up how hard I'm breathing. Is it because I'm run so fast hoping to discover her on the beach or is it because I'm so afraid she's gone?"

"What do you mean?"

"How long did the two of you plan this?"

She shook her head. "I didn't plan this."

"No?" He examined her. Her head was no longer shaking but a tremble seemed to have taken over the rest of her body. That body that he'd held as they marched away from yesterday's charade so they could start a new day with a more dramatic charade. "Just Goldie then. But she told you about it, at least."

Tam lifted her chin. She played timid when it suited her but there was a defiance behind the scenes. She wouldn't give up her secrets so easily.

"Yeah, that's what I thought. I told you this sort of shit would happen, Tamara."

"Don't call me that. I hate it."

"You've never told Goldie not to call you by that name."

"She's my boss. You're..." she turned around. "You aren't."

"So, where is she?"

"Don't tell her I told you anything."

"You haven't told me anything."

"I mean, she specifically said you weren't supposed to know."

"That's bullshit. This isn't the first time she's pulled this sort of fuckery. I always figure it out. She's well aware of that. Who's she with this time?"

"She refused to say. I told her I didn't want to do this. She didn't give me a choice."

"I'll spare you the lecture about us always having a choice." He paused, listening to Becca's increasingly hysterical voice as she instructed Paul to call the police or whatever sort of FBI they had in the Maldives. "Two options here. We tell Becca that this is one of Goldie's stunts before she has an aneurism."

"What about Paul."

"He already knows. It's obvious."

"Wouldn't he tell his wife then?"

"You're making an assumption that they're normal people in a normal marriage instead of an illuminati arranged marriage."

"Shut the fuck up."

"No, I'm semiserious. If the illuminati were real, Paul and Becca DeAngelis would be worshiping at the altar of Beelzebub in exchange for catapulting Goldie to fame and riches."

"God, you one percenters are weird."

"I'm not even a ten percenter. Although, you're right—

that is the goal. Their goal. All this—everything that's happening—is so they can make it to the top rung of the capitalism ladder. What's even weirder are people willing to lie their way into this madness."

"You don't understand."

"Probably not. But let's move on. We have a second option."

"What's that?"

"We make this the best EpiGold her fans have ever seen." Rushing to the edge of the balcony, he brought his hands up, cupping them around his mouth. "Goldie!"

He waited for Paul to re-emerge, then called again. "Goldie, where are you?"

"We'll find her, son. We will."

Unable to manufacture tears as easily as Tam, he went for a stoic expression. "We have to. We have to."

When Tam crumpled against him, he caught her and brought her close.

"Wow, you two. You would never guess how much you detest each other." Paul said, camera lowered. "No pun intended, but that was gold."

#

Becca was put out of her misery as soon as Paul had decided they'd gotten enough footage, but not before she'd informed their butler that her daughter had likely been swept out to sea and they needed to launch a multinational search for her. The butler dashed outside to call emergency services. "I'll let him know," Tam whispered and sped off.

It was one thing to give the EpiGold drama, and quite another to file a false police report.

"What was she thinking? Where did she go? Did she walk down to the beach alone last night? Have we found her footsteps?" Becca collapsed onto the chaise lounge in the villa's living room, the flowing sleeve of her robe draped across her face as she brought her arm to her forehead.

Jasper sat down in a chair next to her, elbows on his knees. He gave Paul's camera a death stare until Paul turned it off.

"Yep. That'll do it. I assume you know, Jasper?"

"Goldie's pretty damn predictable. Remember when she told us she'd taught herself to disappear using a magician's tutorial online but really she'd hooked up with that biker chick Becca disapproved of?"

Paul chuckled. "Becca still swears under her breath whenever she passes a Harley."

Becca lowered her arm. Mascara ran down the sides of her cheeks. "How can you both laugh right now. What is wrong with you?"

"Becca," Jasper patted her shoulder. "Goldie is fine. She didn't disappear in a puff of magical smoke or into the ocean. She orchestrated this so she could go off and do whatever she wants while we make pretty for the cameras."

Her face puckered, but she raised herself to a seated position. "How can you be so sure?"

"Common sense. Plus, Tam was in on it." He nodded to Tam as she reentered the room. "Right Tam?"

"Oh, you told her." Tam took a heaving breath. "Thank God."

Becca, always one for theatrics, stood and stomped away from them. "Cruelty doesn't suit any of you!"

Maybe not, but it had suited Becca many times over the years Jasper had been acquainted with her.

"Goldie isn't going to like that you all realize she faked this," Tam said. "She wanted the relief at her return to be genuine."

"Seems not even Goldie always gets what she wants." Jasper hopped up from his chair. "It's not like we aren't good at faking it. You did a good job of that this morning."

Paul raised an eyebrow.

"Not like that. I mean, you have acting chops. Guess that's not a total surprise."

Tam raised an eyebrow. "And why's that?"

"Liars act every time they open their mouths."

"Is that why you open your mouth so often lately?"

"Okay, enough of that. Save it for whenever Goldie decides it's time your fake romance goes south. For now, let's head to the beach, maybe get a few shots of you holding each other for comfort. When she does decide to show up back here, Tam, you'll pretend to make a phone call cancelling the need for police. We'll have a big happy reunion, let her put herself in the center of her loving, relieved family and spin whatever tale she wants about her absence. Then you two can go back to hate fucking each other and I can enjoy sometime away from all of you. You're exhausting." He motioned them both out the door. "Let's go."

Midday. Jasper had the chef make him a Maldivian fish soup with lime and chilis. He ate alone on the balcony, the cloying smell of a white flower he couldn't identify overpowering the spicy food in his bowl. Midafternoon, he found Tam sitting on the beach, the pleats of her yellow sundress weighted down with the sand she shoveled onto her feet. She didn't turn when he approached.

"What time did she say she'd be back?" he asked.

"'When the time's right,' is how she put it." Tam lowered her chin to her knees. "I assumed it'd be before now."

He sat nearby and they both stared out at the blue on blue horizon. "You sure you have no idea who she's with?"

"You think I'm lying about that too? That I know and refuse to tell you?"

A piece of driftwood rose with a wave, sloshed forward, then away, then rose and moved forward again. A bird with clipped wings carried on the tide. Some things can never be saved.

"No, I don't think you're lying. Not about that."

"What if she doesn't come back?" Tam lifted her feet from their sandy cage, then began to rebury them. "How long do we wait before we decide she's actually missing?"

He'd already thought about this. Even though Goldie was likely fucking with them on purpose, his mind still played out a worst-case scenario.

"Tonight. If she's not back before sunset, we call for help."

--------

Goldie's disappearance was all part of her plan, right? But... what if that plan went wrong? Find out in the next chapter!