angel - rafe cameron (outerbanks)

19 - pandora's box

chapter 19
pandora's box

i know what you did.

the text on it was short. just one sentence.

the words hit her like a physical blow. her head swam.

rafe was behind her now, leaning in. he didn't need to ask what it said. he could see it. angie's body trembled.

she turned the paper over in her hands, as though somehow, it might hold a second side—another message, something to explain. but it didn't. there was nothing.

angie's heart raced, the room closing in around her. she was suffocating.

then, she noticed the other contents.

at the bottom of the box, there was a small, sleek black object—a burner phone. no brand, no markings, just cold and anonymous, like it had been pulled straight from a shadowy corner of the world. angie held it for a second, the weight of it feeling wrong in her palm.

maddie's fake id.

angie's stomach twisted as she stared at the laminated card. it was maddie's, that much was certain. she could see the photo—the wide-eyed girl who had disappeared into the unknown—and her name, georgia woodsen—a shadow of her true identity. angie felt a pang of guilt, deep and raw, but it was swallowed up by the growing nausea in her gut.

but the worst part wasn't the phone or the id card. it was the stack of printed text messages that had been carefully annotated and placed inside the box. some of the messages had been highlighted in yellow, marked with annotations in an unfamiliar handwriting.

did you ever really know what she was mixed up in? one note read, scrawled in red ink, the jagged lines made angie's heart race. she was in over her head.

these weren't the innocent, mundane messages one might send a friend. they were cryptic. businesslike. and chillingly familiar. angie's eyes scanned through them, her fingers trembling as she flicked from one conversation to the next. some of the messages were brief. others, more detailed. all of them had a cold, transactional tone—much like the texts she had seen between barry and his clients. the tone, the phrasing, the language—it was unmistakable. the messages weren't just casual chats. they were deals. drug deals.

she felt her stomach churn.

have it ready by tonight. you know the usual place.

meet at the usual spot. don't bring anyone.

you got the goods? i'm good for the rest. just need a few hours.

each message seemed to corroborate the terrible thought slowly creeping into her mind. maddie—sweet, kind maddie—had been involved in something far darker than angie had ever known.

had maddie really been dealing?

it seemed impossible. maddie, the girl who had always seemed so perfectly placed in this world, had been mixed up in something so insidious, something that seemed so far removed from the person she knew.

but there was no denying it. these texts were evidence. evidence that maddie was involved in something. something angie had never even thought to question. lets be real, she didn't need the money.

the next message sent a chill down her spine.

if you back out, you know what'll happen.